December 28, 2015
I feel prolonged guilt over the most nonsensical things. I was participating in a volunteer project years ago when the depression set in. I felt so bad about not completing my part of it, even though it was totally voluntary and it didn’t significantly affect anything that I stopped, that just a month ago I had one of those dreams where the person I “let down” (during only one of the worst times of my life) asked me about why I stopped.
Meanwhile, it’s been nearly 15 years since I’ve spoken to my maternal grandparents and some aunts & uncles. Not an ounce of regret. Didn’t invite them to my wedding and ignored them at Mom’s funeral because they’d been utter dipwads from forever before, and then harassed me every single day after she died because they wanted to pay for her funeral so they could pretend they loved her.
I read blog comments from years ago and get verklempt that I don’t know what happened to them (M is for Money, 444 express, The Quest – if you’re still reading, I can’t find your new URL?)
How can I be of service to you? When I’m in a really bad mood, or crappy stuff has been going on, my only refuge is sending a nice card or gift to someone else having a hard time.
Babies are weird! So weird that sometimes I refer to them as “just like a human!”
A majority of minorities. I know nearly as many lefties as righties and more people who hail from US territories than I know people from any state but CA. Offline that is. Online, where would you say you’re from? Originally or now. And: lefty, righty, or ambi?
When stressed, clean the house or balance the books. Going over spending and savings spreadsheets calms me down better than anything else.
I’m more likely to give money to charities, say, for refugees, than give birthday gifts to people I know but are well off. My $20 to a charity is likely to matter more than any $20 gift I could give someone who makes perfectly good money.
October 12, 2015
LB and I have been playing with Legos lately. (Truth? PiC and I have been playing with Legos a lot while LB gnaws on them, contemplatively.)
I connect a few, ze takes them for a taste test, pulls them apart, ponders the meaning of color.
While ze debates the delectability of yellow squares versus blue rectangles, I find myself aimlessly connecting more Legos. Invariably, I connect several larger rectangles using a variety of smaller pieces to make a platform and then build walls up.
I’ve never watched other people play with Legos but dollars to donuts they don’t always build a flat foundation first and a standard four walls before unleashing creativity. There’s simply no other way, though, not if I’m letting my subconscious lead the way. Nature or nurture questions aside, this is how I’m built to build. A firm foundation and then slowly build walls and a roof for protection.
Now that we’ve reached a particular level of stability, where I’m not viscerally worried that a missed paycheck or three would set us scrambling, my subconscious is now casting about for the next thing that comes after the walls.
What’s next?
What steps do I take to start building the next, perhaps final, stage of our life? Where do I go from here?
This could be the start of the renaissance of my life. I spent 15 years climbing out of and barricading ourselves against poverty. When I take a good look around, I realize that we can afford to take some risks now. Typically the time to take risks was a decade ago, in my 20s, but I couldn’t. Now, with a brand new child and aging parents on both sides, it would seem that now isn’t the time to take risks either. But! We have good savings, a variety of investments, and for now, we’re in relatively decent health. (Well. PiC is. We have good health insurance anyway.)
I don’t want to forever take and make the safe paved roads. I want that luxury of knowing when my next payday is, sure, but that desire is cohabiting with the need to grow and challenge myself.
I, no, WE can afford risk now. Some risks. I can’t afford to ignore the spark that pushes me to try. Dendrites die when you don’t use them. Motivation gutters when ignored too long, like a fire deprived of oxygen. I’ve long considered myself an intrinsically powered person, driven by circumstances. This period is, perhaps for the first time in my life, an opportunity to try for something purely because I want to and because I want it. Whatever it is. This is a real luxury that many of us enjoy in America / in a first world nation, should we be lucky enough to be born with a few resources and have both the awareness and ability to choose to partake of it.
September 23, 2015
Optimistically I hatched an almost plan to celebrate the whole month, like some of my friends who love life do. Just an “almost plan”, because that thought was as far as I got. In part to make up for my lack of enthusiasm in previous years, and in part to add to my new habit of doing small good money things each day.
It’s been half a decade since I felt comfortable with my birthday and it was nothing to do with age. For a few years, in my 20s, it was actually even fun. I shared the week with a dearly departed uncle. Then one year, he fell ill. It seemed like a small thing, until it wasn’t. I hoped, and hoped, and hoped that we’d have a miracle. But we didn’t. Then our birthweek became the week of losing him. And it’s just never felt right since.
Even when I’m not fully cognizant of the reason, a malaise sets in around 2-3 weeks before the actual day and I spend that whole time trying to convince PiC to cancel everything, when “everything” is hardly any more taxing than having dinner because I can’t think of my birthday with joy without being reminded of our joke that I was “4 days older than Uncle”, and it feels like my breath is sucked away as I remember he’s gone and it’s not fair.
We weren’t close close, not talk on the phone every other day and finish each other’s sentence close. But we were kindred spirits. I admired and respected the hell out of him and he recognized me as one of his sort, seeking my back-up in faux-arguments and treating me with an easy warm fondness unique to him. Above all, he was a good man who’d made good for his family and I wanted nothing more than to match his example.
That’s my whole trouble with anniversaries and special dates. The big ones tend to remind me of those I’ve lost, more than anything, and I haven’t been great at turning that around.
But each year I try again. We’re only given so much time and I’m trying not to waste what we have by forgetting to live while mourning, grieving rather than remembering.
There’s a lot more I want to do and each birthday is a reminder to get off my duff and do it.
I don’t usually ask for anything for my birthday but this year I will: would you share a fond memory or a fun thing you’re doing?
June 3, 2015
A fellow PF blogger, Jessica of Mo’ Money Mo’ Houses, is launching her new podcast today and I was happy to give a shout about it. I read Jessica’s blog back when she first started out a few years ago and have popped in from time to time, when I can since my reading time has been severely curtailed, and it’s great to see that she’s launching a fun new project.
Jessica’s guests will be sharing their experiences in debt reduction, getting spending under control, and entrepreneurial ventures including side jobs and quitting their 9 to 5 to become their own bosses.
You can find all the podcast episodes at momoneymohouses.com/podcast and tell her what you think by leaving a review at her iTunes page.
And as a little thank you for checking out the podcast and giving it some love: a Giveaway!
You could win:
One $100 Amazon gift card
One $50 Amazon gift card
One “Mo’ Money Mo’ Houses” bag from Bow & Drape (valued at $75 and totally unique!). Here’s a photo of what it looks like.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
December 23, 2014
As a kid, unprincessy things were my forte. I slew invading insects and marauding spiders, climbed walls, played in the dirt and the trees and insisted on pants with pockets, darn tootin. If I was wearing frills or pink, or Lord help us all, BOTH, you’d know from the look on my face that I was only tolerating it because I was told to.
So M.R. Nelson’s latest, Petunia, The Girl Who Was NOT a Princess, put a smile on my face before I even got into the story. It sent me back to a time and a place when things were so much simpler and gender issues were dismissed with a scowl and a determination to do whatever I wanted even if Dad said that “it’s not suitable for girls”. No one else had the nerve to say that.
But I digress.
Fully expecting to find the kind of story I could relate to (though I suppose I’m long past those days of defiance) and I wasn’t disappointed. This is a story of a kid who unabashedly enjoys playing her way, whether or not she’s quite in line with her compatriots.
It’s a cute romp that touches on being your own person, which is wonderful, and also gently suggests that keeping an open mind can be a great thing.
I’m reviewing this just in time for a last minute Christmas book gift, if you’re needing something light and fun – it’s an e-book available at Amazon!
August 21, 2014
Funny about Money, that is. I swear VH does more in a day than I do in some weeks but every so often, I find myself channeling her.
This was my version, recently….
1. Wake late for the second time. Having gone to sleep around 2-3 am after working too late, fail to appreciate Seamus’s charming morning check-in around 6:30 or 7 wherein he confirms I’m here and alive. I notice this is a thing that’s never concerned Doggle. PiC thankfully does their morning routine and I get a lick more sleep.
2. Rouse to give dogs their morning meds.
3. Swipe myself into some semblence of order and hygiene. Set down to work.
4. Check all the emails, clear out the FYI stuff that I cannot unsubscribe from but rarely read. Can’t filter because some subject lines are too similar.
5. Start a load of laundry.
6. Answer newbie questions.
7. Load the dishwasher. Ponder as my technique, not having grown up running a dishwasher, is still evolving. Recently had a long conversation with Anne of Unique Gifter about her technique and fabulous dishwasher. We haven’t had a successful, totally clean load for a few rounds now and I’m questioning everything: is the detergent crapped out? Is it my loading? Is it the washer? (I still think it’s me..)
8. Review the pile of stuff I have to check and approve.
9. Remember I haven’t eaten breakfast. It’s noon. Throw together something like a quesadilla; wave at Doggle who, whenever he’s saved part of his breakfast, will eat with me.
10. Cram food in my mouth as I clear more emails.
11. Start second load of wash.
12. Frantically run to a doctor’s appointment, find out it’ll take no less than an hour. Goody.
13. Get home and dive back into work, juggling Swagbucks on the side.
14. Remember that I haven’t finished booking parts of our upcoming trip and take a break to get that done.
15. Synapses connect and realize that the first load of wash was super heavy because it was still too wet, not because I was weak with hunger. Drag it back out and toss it in for an extra spin. Thankful we have an extra spin option and that I didn’t start the dryer while I let that puzzle simmer.
16. Seamus still needs a sitter for a while and we’ve struck out with half a dozen possibilities and another half a dozen options never answered. Not impressed with DogVacay at this point but neither am I thrilled about (or even mildly happy with) kennel options.
17. Start to stress out big time. Have a vent on Twitter to a couple friends for ten minutes to blow off steam, then buckle back down.
18. Read all the fine print of booking train tickets. Way too much silliness to do with times and delivery options. Everyone should let us print at home or view the email on phone screen as standard options that don’t cost extra!!
19. Post-booking, comb through TripIt itinerary to delete the last bits of my last mistake: booked a hotel near a train station but wrong train station. And then wrong date. Luckily hotel reservations are the easiest thing to cancel or rebook as long as you remember to actually do it.
20. Start to breathe, stop again as I dive back answering newbie emails and my own projects.
21. Resurface briefly to throw dinner ingredients in the oven. Thank whatever that while I joke that PiC has to eat what I make, he’s actually quite happy to. He supplements my baked chicken breasts topped with sliced onions, tomatoes and lemon with a garlic onion green bean concoction. Was that with butter? I can’t tell. It was great but a touch salty, mine was good but a touch dry. I could really go for a steak right now. Baked potato on the side. Cooked by someone not me.
22. Back to work.
23. Oh but stop and translate a menu. As a favor to PiC whose hands were already full with related organizing, I took over arranging a dinner for a horde of people. But the menu required translation first and in doing so, I culled most of it, making an executive decision we’d have a set menu with few choices and those would be whatever I could translate. Kick the whole multi-course list to PiC for approval and mentally plan to make up a survey to collect orders tomorrow.
24. Back to work and Swagbucks. This is all meant to fund some ongoing expenses we have and alleviate the pinch on our cash flow. Since I’m in front of the computer anyway, most days I can eke out some points without too much distraction. Other days I let it distract me from buckling down which isn’t good.
25. Drag all the dry laundry out and shake it out on the guest bed. PiC will be a good soul and actually make up the bed later.
26. Fold and store the dog towels, hang the guest towels. Things are coming together.
27. More work. Fight with Amazon for an hour for being stupid and stealing my gift card money weeks before shipping my subscribe and save items. What’s up with that?? Hugely annoyed.
28. Write up some more guidelines for people who’ll need them. Realize I could work straight through the next morning but then I’d be all discombobulated for Seamus’s vet appointment.
I keep thinking that if I power through just one or two more days, it’ll all come together but that’s starting to sound like a load of hooey. Serves me right bringing home Seamus! Among other things…
June 6, 2014
“You don’t have to eat in the dark,” calls out PiC, sounding vaguely concerned that I’d finally lost my frugal mind and refused to use electricity for just one person. He doesn’t have to say it, I know he’s thinking it.
It’a not untrue that I was choosing not to turn on the light because it was just me and my croissant at the table, but that wasn’t the whole of it. I could see well enough in the near dark, but sometimes it’s just kind of nice to sit in the quiet night, with a snack, maybe poking through a blog. You’d think I get enough alone time, working mostly away from people everyday and seeing only PiC most days of the week. It’s a darn good thing I married a man whose company I actually enjoy in spades!It’s been a lot of long weeks, slogging through work day after work night after work day, in the midst of a fairly intense episode of fatigue, pain and more fatigue. But it’s also been a lot of exciting stuff going on too, taking up all my energy and brain space. I can see light at the end of the tunnel and even if I need more recovery time than ever to struggle up to the surface, it’s still pretty cool that I’ve pulled this off. I can share some of it in a month or two, probably, once the loose ends are tied up.
In the meantime, introspection in the dark is just what the doctor would order, I think, if I actually found a good therapist who’d recommend that which was soothing to my soul.
I feel like Mal at the end of the first episode of Firefly: my best effort today was only 2/3 good enough, I worked til 1 am the day before so was dragging from sleep deprivation, PiC had to pick up my slack from this week and run to the vet for Doggle’s ridiculously expensive medication and do the grocery run for me, arriving home exhausted, late and grumpy. I’d managed to make a soup but it wasn’t enough to serve as a meal for a normal human that expends energy so even my “sorry I couldn’t run the errands but have a nice dinner” gesture was… Well, inadequate. In an attempt to thank me for trying to make the day end nicely, he knocked a glass over and spilled water all over my pants, in a move that is so typically ME (confession: I forgot how to work a glass two days ago and spilled water all down my front); it was just so absurd we had to laugh.
But at the end of the day, we’re still flying.
Little as that may seem, it’s enough.
(By the by, I did figure out the old family recipe and made it twice without disaster, so I’m calling that a win.)
