Crisynomics

Anyone that knows me knows I am CONSTANTLY at my journal...Hopes (please God another 10 lbs)...Dreams (Chickens, goats, and gardens OH MY!) Quotes (Winston Churchill 'when you are going through hell...keep going...)

Ive been in and out of journals since highschool - Get it out of the head.  Organize thoughts. Plan your life etc...It's been therapy, a friend that will listen and not talk back, a creative outlet, and all out bitch session @ 2AM, an ink clarification, a happiness, a hope, a smile. 

Rarely do I look back, often I just keep going lapping up the paper.  My mother used to say when she would come over 'There's something to write with and write on in every room in this house...even the bathrooms!"  My love affair with words can be directly attributed to the many wonderful teachers I've known - both in and out of the classroom.  There is always something to learn, something to strive for, something to laugh about.  I wrote the following when I was in a strange spot - a grown-up trying to figure things out that I had never learned.  I just opened my brain grabbed a pen and let it go...

Dear Journal - Today I am bummed out...feeling weary at how far I have to go to believe I am financially ok, so I've decided to write this 'list' of things I have learned and things I am grateful for to get me out of this mood.  Forgive me if it rambles...in the end this race is only with myself...

This last month has been an amazing journey for me.  I must always remind myself to stop looking at where I 'think' I should be and instead look at how far I have come over the last 4 years.  

Subconsciously my thought patterns are looking at this over and over and even when I am in a lucid sleep my thoughts play (when I do sleep that is).  I can only hope that this replaying is like the last paragraph of a really good chapter that you re-read a few times because it gives validity to all you’ve read before and perhaps missed.  The story.  My story.

I went from not having a damn quarter on food shopping days for those frigen hi-jacked force-you-to pay carts at Shoprite.  I had to grab the free carnie cart with the huge baby seat that I could’ve fit my grandfather in.  I’m short so those shopping days would consist of me usually hitting someone, or a display, and hopping randomly to see where I was headed.  Today I have quarters!  I have quarters for coffee, quarters for parking meters, quarters for school lunches.  I will never forget the day I plopped my real estate ‘throwback to my rich days’ Coach purse in that cumbersome baby seat…right in a small pile of baby diarrhea left by another happy customer.  If that wasn’t a metaphor for my situation I don’t know what was.  It’s simple but when you’ve been without and you open your change ($)drawer in your car and it is now filled with 'change' on every level it boosts confidence on the micro level.  Try it.

‘It is difficult to fully enjoy today when you are paying off yesterday’ – Ben Franklin on Debt in the Poor Richards Almanac (Keep it Simple)

I went from late night panic attacks because my Credit cards (Chase being the worst) were at 30% interest and the payments with a missed payment fee would show up $1800 FOR THE MONTH.  I couldn’t even begin to explain the white knuckle gastro nightmare when that little beauty showed up like clockwork.  After tearfully calling the company ‘please help me please help’ – to no avail, something strange happened…I decided the mortgage was more important and didn’t pay that Chase bill for 3 months.  When they would call (and boy did they) I would kindly tell them to choke on it and call me when they were ready to work with me.  Would I ever recommend that to anyone? NO WAY. But for me a psychotic calm showed up.  Finally after three months I suppose someone there looked over the blatant ridiculousness of this bill and realized a normal human would never be able to make a monthly payment of $7000 so they called…and I told them to choke and gag on their own effluence…  They called back.  We were both ready to talk.  I wanted to do the right thing.  They realized a little $ at a time was better than none at all.  So we went from $1800 a month to $7000 a month to a very tight but doable $501 a month.  I’ve made it every month since – sometimes by the skin of my ass.  Every month and now I’m looking at the light which is the end of the tunnel – This account is closed but this debt will be paid.  Never again Never Never Again.  Bankruptcy wasn’t for me at the time.  It was Put Up or Shut Up and somewhere deep down I knew it was time to learn that lesson – pay the piper.  It is 4 years later and I have lived and continued to live on a cash based diet – Yes it can be done – talk to me.

-I paid off other odds and ends  Macy’s (hi! my kids didn’t fit into those clothes 2 months later but boy that bill showed up for a long time)

-Other Master Card (Master because you are the slave!) Vacations went on these – the worst souvenir ever!)

-Medical Bills – These deserved to be paid and I sent a note with every single one.  EXCEPT the emergency vet visit.  They would only take full payment not the 2/3’s I had the night of the emergency – they went to the very bottom of the list Entitled “Choke on it – now you’ve pissed me off and you will wait til I get to it”

In a perfect world my hair is done and I’m writing checks with manicured nails from an account overflowing with money and a teacup Chihuahua rests in my overpriced leather bag…

In reality I think I washed my hair, I’m out of checks – I have no idea what a stamp even costs – I’m praying there’s an 800 # so I can do a direct payment over the phone (and gladly pay the $15 service fee for that)  Forget the manicure I’m hoping that’s not a wart on the sole of my foot and I have a ½ Chihuahua ½ Jack Russell that is rolling in the kitchen garbage like some frigen oversized Brooklyn RAT after which she will find someones underwear to rip into.

Today I have a poster board I keep hidden from the world and cross off and check balances on everything when I come up for air (once every 2 months).  I am happy to say there are more things crossed off than there are left to pay.  I look it over to stay aware then return to the salt mines and just keep shoveling.

I must’ve read every single financial book I could get my hands on…Suze Orman, Dave Ramsey, The Automatic Millionaire, The Richest Man in Babylon, Til Debt Do us Part and the list goes on and on.  From each one I’ve learned something staggering to my brain.  Something I didn’t learn in school, missed out on in childhood because I had a vagina, didn’t think about because I married young to a control freak.  I can recite Frost verbatim Coleridge for Breakfast and help you decipher Elizabethan English…Money was never my thing.  It was the only language my ex spoke but I am happily divorced and know I can learn this – I’m learning it every day.

I’ve made a conscious decision to live with less

 and it turned out to be so much more. 

Now I begin saving for trips and activities months in advance and have a limit to what can be spent.  You can live without the almighty plastic.  Some months the timing just sucks.  And when I say ‘it would be so easy if I only had a credit card as an emergency’ I know it is precisely the opposite. 

 I’ve taught my children that they deserve everything in life but everything cannot always be afforded – and that has not a damn thing to do with self-worth.  Security in knowing you can pay your bills and sleep at night is the most secure feeling ever.  Security in knowing you are building savings every week no matter how small makes you feel in control and smart ;)  Security is knowing that you don’t have to be afraid of tomorrow because you walked this walk and deep down you know God gave you the brains to figure it out and make it all work.  Sometimes you don’t like the answers your find.  Sometimes you cry in the rain then fall in the mud – that’s called redemption in my book.  And sometimes you just fall right on your ass – don’t worry it’s padded.

I’ve learned my grandparents were right…pretty much about everything.  I’ve learned to listen when people that have been around longer than I have give me advice, especially when it comes to the government or finances. Eerily they are usually right in the end... I will be old one day too – and I’m gonna talk til my tongue falls out…And when I can't talk I will write...about anything....about everything....but mostly Hope.     

People need to know there is hope ALWAYS HOPE.

In a Nutshell: 

*I learned to snowball my debt - accelerating payoffs

*I've learned that when you've dug yourself into a hole of any sorts and you want to get out step one is stop digging.

*I've learned that if you need $100,000. you can't get there til you save $10 first

*I've learned to automate my savings every week and a nominal amount goes into automatic savings every Monday and dad was right it adds up.  This totally took an edge off...I now have a little cushion, funny thing is I don't ever want to touch it...not even for an emergency (Christmas used to be an emergency for me!)

*I've learned to say no to the kids a little bit more, realizing financial security is a roof over their heads and taking care of their needs...not xbox...not eating out

*I've learned to look for bargains, I'm no extreme couponer (I prefer a much more elaborate mental illness thank you)  but I do arrange my weekly meals around what's on sale.

*I've learned good shoes are worth the money - they usually last and in turn so does your back.

*I've learned I can cook a better dinner than anything I've ever been served in a restaurant and a cold beer really is better after you've mowed a lawn.

*A firepit is a cheap meditation class

*I've learned to be creative in planning activities with the boys - I rented a cabin for 3 days for $90 because I wouldn't do Disney on credit for $5000.  And the boys learned so much more.

*I've learned to go to Tractor Supply in spring when they get their shipment of baby chickens, ducks, and hens, You've never seen teenage boys so tender... it'll break your heart in a very good way

*I've learned a packed PB&J will sustain you when you can't order out at work

*I've learned to wash my own car every week and I silently thank the Toyota Gods for making a gas efficient reliable vehicle.  (I used to drive a Mercedes then a Jeep - I could've flown around in a frigen helicopter for what they cost in gas and repairs)

*I've learned that nothing beats a glass of wine and Zen music after scrubbing floors.

*I've learned to follow up the cleaning with a steamy Epsom bath and an Amazon purchased book for $2

*I've learned what vinegar cleans...everything

*I've learned that it's the time we spend, not the money, that family will remember

*I've learned that sometimes there is great freedom in parameters

*I've learned that If I can do this...Single mother...stressed but happy...tired but hopeful...willing to go at it

SO CAN YOU!

But above all:

I've learned to appreciate the little things in life

because I've been alive long enough to know

That the little things in life

Are really

The big things :)

Good Energy to you and a journal you may keep!