About sixteen years ago, I met him for the first time. My trainwreck sibling brought home this adorable puppy he had no business adopting because he had not one thing in his life that wasn’t a mess. I was furious at my sibling – he didn’t even take care of himself, how could he drag
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May 13, 2016
Mood: winding down
- The refi was completed last week and I’m still basking in the feeling of completion. FIVE MONTHS of work, finalized!
- I impulse bought a lovely purse at a boutique shop. Not a thing I normally do, but once in a while you spot something that fits your needs perfectly. All week I’d been squishing everything into an old wristlet that JuggerBaby has been using as a chew toy / teething ring, and idly thinking that I ought to keep an eye out for something more functional.This thought usually leads to nowhere but while running an errand with a friend, I spotted just the ticket: larger but not too big (too big is relative – I love “too big” normally because I like the possibility of carrying EVERYTHING I need), wristlet and cross body options, soft sturdy material, a good variety of pockets with safe places for my keys, pens, cards and even sunglasses. So pleased with it, I don’t even harbor guilt for buying it on the spot instead of deliberating for 4 years as usual.
- I finally understand what my fair skinned friends experienced in the harsh Southern California summers of yore. Instead of turning my usual peasant brown after a couple hours outdoors without sunblock (an accident!) I’m now peeling and feeling like I’m shedding my skin. I’m too old for these new, gross, experiences!Maybe instead of complaining I should be grateful it only took 5 days to hit the peel stage?
- My soul thrills for Hamilton’s Tony nominations. Loved this article on Leslie Odom, Jr. and will hope with everything in me that he renews his contract and comes to play in San Francisco and we get to go see him.
- We took a few days just for family time and I’m physically best but my soul feels rested. I had forgotten what that felt like.
- Samantha Cristoforetti, I doff my cap to thee. She wore the first Star Trek uniform into space!
How was your week? When’s the last time you were sunburned?
May 11, 2016
It feels like we’ve been tossing in the tempest, caught up in a life twister, for weeks. Nay, months!
Normally I run at 70% efficiency, sickness took me down to 40%. I regained some health points just in time for a long travel weekend (write up to come when my head is back on my shoulders), and oh, by the by, finish ALL THESE THINGS NOW.
It’s tax time so I have to review our return before signing off on the ma-hoo-sive payments to state and federal.
SoFi finally got off their collective posteriors and sent our application through underwriting after requesting additional documents in a dozen back and forth emails. (Hint, professionals ask for everything they need at one time. Clearly and in complete sentences, not half sentences and in ones and twos.) ((Second hint: professionals get the name of their own company right and don’t call it Sofee.))
Naturally, right before we left town, I had to URGENTLY sign and initial 78 pages of initial agreements. Guys, I started this process at the beginning of January and it’s been radio silence for 14 weeks. Now it’s life or death urgent. Of course!
Then I have to pay for an appraisal: $575. That same day I get an email: schedule it IMMEDIATELY. Bear in mind, we’re on the road. Then SoFi comes back asking for MORE documents and nags me for them when they’re not uploaded in 48 hours. Man, look.
While that’s going on, our estate planning paperwork came back almost completed and needs to be reviewed so I can schedule a signing. I refused to drag myself to a lawyer’s office when I was sick, there’s something about law firms that make me feel like I have to look like I’ve got my shit together. So, note to self, find time for reading another stack of serious business.
Meanwhile, PiC has been laboring mightily searching for cars. The last of the three prospectives were so close to the right fit, enough so that we thought he’d have to buy the dang thing right before we flew to Washington, but they were all half a state away. It was nearly a relief that the prepurchase inspection revealed about $3500 of repairs, ignoring the non-critical ones, so we couldn’t agree on price.
He and I had agreed that if it fell through, though there is a cost to our time, the cost of paying for a vehicle that only sort of fit our specifications was both too much frustration and money. We’d rather wait and get the closest possible fit.
With all these things weighing on our minds, and traveling to a fly-away Con with LB for the first time, the watchword has been: frantic.
Friday morning, of course the energy checks I’d been writing were cashed and my body could not pay up. So, tucked back into bed after a wearing morning ended with a sleeping LB nearby, I sent him off for a run while I answered some household and money emails. Rent’s in. Baggage problems. Taxes. Etcetera.
He sat down next to me, unreadable expression on his face.
I nudged. Go work out.
He sat.
Sighed.
Said, I hope you know you can ask me to take on some things. Even if it take me longer.
Confused.
He said, you make a lot of this (our lifestyle) possible.
It’s true, what he says. I do massive amounts of work managing our income, savings, spending decisions so we can have what we need and some of what we want. Planning for a possibly long future, planning for our family in case of the worst possible circumstances. None of it’s exactly FUN, in the sense of confetti bombs and popping balloons, but it’s a comfort to know that working my butt off isn’t squandered on someone who just wants what he wants and devil take the hindmost.
I guess what I’m saying is that a metric ton of weight on your shoulders doesn’t feel quite so heavy when you have a partner doing his share and reminding you that you’re not alone in your share either. And it makes an enormous difference that he wouldn’t for a split-second consider undermining the work I do for our family because he wants something that’s greater than our budget can currently bear, in the same way he wouldn’t take it for granted that he’s financially set because I manage our books.
It’s nice to have a quiet hour in the eye of the storm before it takes us up again.
:: Do you feel like your contributions are appreciated? Are your affairs are in order or on track to be in order?
May 9, 2016
Every so often, I think about the fairness of our relationship.
It’s in the context of my chronic health crap and how I hate that PiC has to pick up my slack. It’s also in the context of considering whether the overall load is properly balanced.
Socially, the weight is typically heavier on the women’s side for what we call “emotional labor”. That’d be the scutwork of making life smooth, but it doesn’t have to be that way.
As head of my nuclear family’s household, the division of labor was the breadwinner (me) did all the money stuff, and the non-breadwinners (not me) did all the housework. This wasn’t a mutual agreement, it’s what the non-breadwinners were comfortable with. But the part I wasn’t comfortable with was picking up after everybody when they made mistakes and couldn’t figure their way out.
In our own small family, it’s different. Our roles and contributions change depending on the day and the need. The often unnoticed work of keeping things clean, making adjustments to schedules to accommodate other needs, making the schedules themselves, and all that, belongs to both of us because we make it known. We make it noticed.
As the family financier, much of my contributions are nearly invisible in our day to day lives, but that doesn’t mean it’s without value. It’s of tremendous value and we’ll both benefit from it in years to come. This valuation doesn’t just magically happen. PiC doesn’t just read my mind and go “Ah! You’ve scored a coup for us in ten years with that move!” That would be weird. But I tell him. I say out loud (this is the key part, saying it OUT LOUD) that I’ve been working on our estate plan, or the questions with the lawyer, or the mortgage refinance. He gets mini updates and that helps him understand that I’m not just staring at hilarious Hulk gifs online all day. I could.
It’s easy to declare that I am not automatically the family secretary, maid, or nurse but these chores and labors are not static assignments, and so it’s important to pay attention to the shifts lest either partner find themselves burdened with the lion’s share of the work permanently. Believe you me, that breeds a world of resentment, snarling, and imagined payback. That’s not one of our best looks.
Scheduling
We share a calendar that we’re both responsible for adding things to. That’s not in the “if the world were perfect he would add them” kind of way. If PiC tells me something is happening on such and such a date, then I can reasonably expect that 75% of the time he’ll also have added it to the calendar. He can reasonably expect the same success rate from me.
I avoid being our social secretary by not being social and we observe a loose “to each their own” rule. If they’re his friends, he takes care of “just because” or birthday gifts. My friends, my responsibility. Same with family. He doesn’t worry about how we’ll do Father’s Day and I don’t worry about how we’ll do Mother’s Day. If I say we’re doing a thing, then he’s guided by my preference. If he wants to do a thing, then I work with that. His siblings are not my job, like my sibling is not his. This isn’t to say that we see each others’ families as chores, we simply don’t make them the other person’s emotional work. I don’t take it upon myself to worry over this person’s birthday, or that person’s anniversaries because most birthdays and anniversaries are not a thing I care deeply about. He cares, so he pays attention. He’ll remind me to send a text to whomever is having a birthday, whether it’s my side or his, because he gets alerts and I don’t.
In over ten years of our relationship, he has planned for every single special occasion celebration. Every single one. Even if it’s not something that I personally find important to do, I do cherish his effort and his love in doing so.
Nursemaiding & Parenting
He does 99% of daycare duty which means he has to come home when LB is sick. We take turns with being point parent. If his deadlines are pressing, he goes back to work. If mine are, he takes hir while I work.
He takes every morning shift, matter how painfully early, no matter how tired he is. I don’t sleep well so middle of the night wake ups are mine. He still insists on coming to check on hir with me if it takes more than a few minutes. Then Seamus comes to check on everyone! Baths and bedtime used to be his job when I was home alone all day with hir. Now we switch off so he can hit the gym some nights.
If we were to keep tabs, it’s really close to 50%.
Cleaning House
He likes a house to be clean. I like a house to be tidy. Therefore, I pick up those loose things that inevitably clutter and sweep up with my adorable new broom and dustpan. He wipes down the stove, scrubs the toilets, beats the rugs. We split things like vacuuming and dishes.
Highlight: PiC’s always cleaned the toilets in all the years we’ve lived together. This isn’t my favorite thing about him but it’s on the list.
Money, money, money!
I happily (ferociously possessively) take care of our bills, investing, real estate, savings, and taxes. He does a few bills and Craigslist sales and gets periodic update on the Financial State of the Union. I also do most of the household needs ordering from my Amazon account because I work the rewards systems for gift cards.
We each bring home a good income. I still feel pressure to keep making more because it’s my family that’s costing us a significant amount of money every year. He doesn’t look at it that way but I do. So, even though we have nearly equal incomes, I’m always 40% more concerned about stretching every dollar and saving every ten. He’s gotten pretty good at saving too.
Guest Haus
We host together. If we have friends or family staying over, we menu plan together. He’ll do the grocery shopping, and I’ll do the cooking. He’ll clean the guest room while I launder the bedding.
Everybody’s gotta eat
I am Chef, I do most of the “big” cooking: whole meals, more complicated entrees from scratch, new recipes. He is Sous Chef and reigns over all the reheating of leftovers and filling in the blanks with a vegetable or making sandwiches and soup.
He makes the grocery lists and we shop together unless I’m down for the count. It’s our family thing.
Maybe the funny thing about this is Dad doesn’t know (see above, about old household) so he cracks jokes about how we must starve if we rely on my cooking and PiC gets really confused.
On the road again
Travel planning is my domain because my heart would bleed to find that we overpaid or failed to maximize points or miles. He does some of the research and weighs in on details.
Four-leggers
All pet health stuff is my area of expertise so I take point on decision making and manage all the medication ordering. PiC takes Seamus to the vet as often as I do, and we split walking duties.
:: How do you create balance in your lives and recalibrate? When do you need to recalibrate?
*Part of Financially Savvy Saturdays on brokeGIRLrich, andDisease Called Debt
May 6, 2016
Mood: Resolved
- Healing is hard. I battled my way through a pain spike for days, losing miserably because sometimes you can only win by not fighting, and this is a concept I totally stink at. How do people just veg and do nothing? I made myself lie down and give in to the urge to pass out at least once a day when JuggerLB was napping. It was bizarre but effective, the pain spikes were less severe and a little bit lower for each spike, the jagged aches were a little less intense for every 8-10 hours of sleep. Bless PiC for taking the brunt of the Unstoppable JuggerLB’s onslaught so that I could get that precious sleep.
- Friends depicted LB as the Unstoppable JuggerBaby and it’s so apt I haven’t been able to stop calling hir that ever since.
- I scored 48 on the Do you live in a bubble? quiz. What do you score?
- On a quest to annoy me to pieces, my craptacular phone’s trick this week is to keep turning off Mobile Data. STOP THAT.
- This may come to you as a surprise but we didn’t win a million dollars. Or even a $5 gift card.
- Last minute bonus: OUR REFINANCE IS COMPLETE. Wahoooooo!
Happy Friday, y’all! How was your week? What’s on for your weekend?
May 4, 2016
What’s in a name?
My friend hung up the phone and turned to me, “Never change your name if you get married. It’s such a pain to change back when something goes horribly wrong and you have to divorce him.”
I just nodded.
She’d finalized a painful divorce. While enrolled in a 4-year professional program, supporting his worthless butt, she came home to find her husband had been cheating on her the whole time. He didn’t even have the grace to be ashamed of his betrayal.
In that position, I surely wouldn’t want to carry the taint of his name.
When it came time for us to consider the question, I knew that particular issue wouldn’t ever be a problem with PiC. I know you always think you know, but he’s an incredibly stand-up person, husband, father. It’s simply not in him to cheat. Leaving that aside, there are always reasons, and good reasons, for people to dissolve their marriages that aren’t rooted in betrayal.
And likewise, there are good reasons for choosing not to take your spouse’s name when you’re getting married, many of which ring true for me.
“The HisLastName Family” would be easier for people to remember, and most people assume that’s the case, but it wasn’t comfortable or the right fit for me.
First and foremost, I simply wasn’t feeling the love. My first name + his last name didn’t bring the sparrows out of the trees, twittering and singing. I was never that girl who scrawled her name, testing it out with the future prospective husband’s, and that wasn’t just because I didn’t feel that for anyone in those days but also because love didn’t mean a name change to me. Love is many things but it’s not a different name.
I asked PiC if he had an opinion, out of respect for his thoughts but they were the same as mine: it’s my name, it’s my choice. I left it open-ended, assuming that I might choose to change it at a later date but years later, it still feels like the right choice.
This was the name I was born with.
I got married, I wasn’t reborn. I don’t feel reborn in any way. Your mileage may vary, of course this is just about me, and speaking about me? I feel older, I feel like we’re a team, like we have evolved, and grown together. But this marriage didn’t just spring fully formed from Athena’s forehead. We haven’t experienced a rebirth as humans. We knowingly chose to enter into a legal and cultural covenant to fight this life’s fights side by side.
My husband doesn’t need to bestow upon me a new name because we’ve entered into this union any more than I need to bestow a new name on him.
But, (new) faaaaamily??
I know that some people feel that they need to share the same names as a family to be a family. That’s valid, for them.
For me, changing my name would no more make me part of a new family than not changing it would exclude me. Changing my name would unmoor me from who I know I myself as but it would not be in exchange for making me a part of a new family. Those were, and are, completely separate issues: my identity is one, my sense of belonging is another.
I’ll admit the issue gave me pause when we discussed having children. We were aware that there is a way things are usually done, and that people are likely to be confused if our offspring don’t share a name with both of us. But I have faith, people! I have faith that it’s possible for people to wrap their heads around the idea that I have my name, and PiC has his name, and those names don’t make or unmake our relationship to our child.
More seriously, there’s a nice solution that friends have had to the kids and naming question: they take both names. I don’t care at all for the idea that my last name and the last name of any children wouldn’t match and therefore we don’t “appear” to be family – I did so much work so darn it, my kid is going to have my name too. Giving our kid both our names in some way works for me.
But your name is just your dad’s name so Patriarchy still wins!
Sure, it was my dad’s name. But my first name was from my mom. It’s not like I was born with a first name attached and whichever parent appended their name determined whether patriarchy or matriarchy wins. They both gave me a first, middle, last, and non-English name. What I did after that made it mine.
I won awards in my name.
I made mistakes in my name.
I learned life and academic lessons, failed, and tried again, in my name.
I graduated from school in my name.
I established my career and a professional reputation in my name.
(I’ll take credit for my part in keeping our marriage healthy, in my name, but I don’t think the act of getting married is in itself an accomplishment.)
What’s good for the goose is good for the gander
I’m a strong believer in fairness and equality. They don’t always mean the same thing but in this case they do: when getting married these days, there’s no good reason to my mind that only the woman has to consider whether or not to change her name. Aren’t you both getting married? Aren’t you both equally entitled to like your name enough for it to be the family name?
My favorite solution yet was the couple who hyphenated but took each other’s names as the first last name. So she was Mrs. His-Hers and he was Mr. Hers-His. That truly felt like something I might have, were I inclined to hyphenation, felt comfortable doing together. That felt like a family thing to me.
Since PiC likes his name as much as I like mine, neither of us chose to change our names and that felt perfectly fine.
Bonus: I didn’t know this at the time, having never called most of my family members by their last names, but it’s rare for any women in my family to change their names on marrying. It’s apparently the cultural norm not to and it’s one cultural tradition I’m ok with carrying on.
:: What’s the norm in your culture? Would you have / did you consider changing your name or not (whether you’re male or female)? I can barely remember my first name on bad days, would you be concerned you wouldn’t know what name to respond to if you did change it?
May 2, 2016
ON MONEY
I use Swagbucks. Here’s a handy tutorial if you’d like to join and earn.
- GoBankingRates says CA is the worst place to be for saving money. *looks at consistent 25% savings rate* In your face, California! Or GoBankingRates.
- Last month’s insurance bills and this month’s travel piled up for a truly horrific/impressive $4500 credit card bill. I’d done my best to mitigate using points and miles, but on top of that horrendous tax bill, OUCH. It’s all expected spending that rises and dips through the year but Mint is totally judging me and my spending right now.
- As one of the steps in the dang refinancing, we had an appraiser come through here and I updated our appraised home value in my personal spreadsheet. It was off by more than $100K, if that’s any hint about how conservative I’ve been playing this. Call me paranoid but I hate the idea of assessing the value of our home as a part of our net worth, and relying on that number as we progress toward retirement numbers, because I remember the bottom dropping out of the real estate market. It’s not super likely that it’ll hit the SF Bay Area that hard but we’re due for a big earthquake…that would do it! But we did, if I’m going to stop being so paranoid, hit Major Milestone 1! ::confetti::
- I dabbled in Amazon’s Mechanical Turk this month just to see what it was like. 30 minutes of tinkering yielded a fee of $0.56. *laughs* It’s not going to make up the difference above but you know what I’m about: Every little bit makes a difference.
- I was saving up for a side table from West Elm that PiC liked and had cashed out a $50 GC from my Citi Thank You points towards the purchase oh, 16 months ago. I earn Thank You points veerrryyyy slowly. But it wasn’t a high priority. Then he found a far cuter cubbything from Sprouts for half the price and $70 is a no brainer over $140 so now I have a West Elm GC that mocks me.
- Comcast’s internet-only pricing is outrageous. After a promotional rate expired, it shot up to $70/month so I had to talk to them. Unfortunately I had to add cable back to our package to have the price only go up $10/month instead of $30. *grump* What a pain.
- The numbers: Our net worth increased 16% almost entirely because of #3. We had a total year-to-date increase of 51%. We still have a long way to go but this is good.
(more…)
April 29, 2016
With a firm nod at Jana’s rechristening of her Friday posts to the Friday Six-Pack, a few thoughts to close the week.
- My soul is chafing against all the things I need to get done, all that things that must get done but take time. It’s rebelling against the ever growing list of things to do, and it wants to shed all responsibility and run wild down the street in the rain. I don’t blame it. I can’t do it, but I don’t blame it. We all need to cut loose on occasion. Even if, in this case, it can only be in my imagination because no one is spending on frivolity for a few months.
- No one needs to make and hand sew name tags into their toddler’s clothing on the off chance that a second shirt will go missing at daycare. No one has TIME for that. (But I want to.) Because labels are cute and I have a serious problem with loving labels. 98% of LB’s clothes are hand me downs and will be handed down to the next baby. Name tags only have temporary purpose, and will be useless after ze outgrows this pile of clothes. (But I want to!)
- All of my Amazon money, now and $300 into the future for perpetuity, is dedicated to household supplies so, no, I still can’t buy those 10 books I really want. (But I want to.)
- I can, and must, wait for a sale before buying that replacement professional lightweight handbag. It’s nonsensical to pay full price just to have it now when it will go on sale again eventually. (My last one, much beloved though it is, is flaking and looks like it’s got bag leprosy. Not professional at all.)
- I took a couple days off this month and it was so nice not to think about work at all, I think my brain forgot to come back.
- The Refinance That Took a Lifetime: still in progress. Naturally. But I will not be defeated!!
- LB’s teething and fever cycles this week destroyed me. My entire body feels like it’s a sea of molten lava.
- There are already 50 work emails waiting for me before 9 am and that’s just not right on a Friday.
In good news
We have houseguests this weekend so the timing of this flare-up stinks but I hope with a lot of breaks through the day, and a good night of sleep (cross your fingers for me!), tomorrow will be recovery mode and not sinking ship mode.
:: What’s your good health regimen? How do you beat back feeling like crap right before the weekend? Have you got any fun plans for this weekend?