The Power of the "P"

I'm a planner. In fact, I'm so good at planning, so good at dreaming up enough details and nuances to make you weep with the vision of it, that I can plan myself right out of an action in almost no time at all. I've already planned myself into our home, the most beautiful home you've ever seen ... as long as it stays in my head.

Yep, several bestselling novels, three screenplays, four or five songs, an entire clothing line, two syndicated cartoons, blueprints for both saline-water separators and time machines, and the solutions to at least two of the Millenium Problems, all float around in my mind, all the time - and all thought out to the nth degree and therefore (to my silly little psyche) already reality.

That, in a nutshell ... uh, in essence ... is the problem.

It wasn't always like this. Once upon a time, I actually wrote for the fun of it - my first drafts were so drafty I had to quadruple the page count to get even close to where I should be. Once upon a time, I even painted what I wanted, when I wanted, and no thought to more than "wouldn't that be lovely." Once upon a time, I could look at a math problem and just know I could do it ... and then did. No chewing it for so long the flavor's gone. No urges to haul out the mental microscope to see all the inclusions. Nope. Brief outline, a vague sense of a direction, a foggy glimpse of the end product then ... begin!

It was a blast. It was a real quest. And I want it back. I need it back.

But how? How do I make that particular p-word (plan) a swear word? Could I just eliminate it from my vocabulary? Replace it? Maybe if I put up Post-It notes in the bathroom, cover my world with "believe" and "trust" and ... wait, am I doing it again? Isn't that a plan?

Stop! No more plans! Plans aren't fun, they're constricting and boring! I have to make life my coloring book again! Sketches without a finished product! Take a line for a walk and see where it leads me! A sense of destination but not a map - especially one that only covers the interstates!

Adventure, dammit! Life should have rhythm, yes, but it shouldn't be so stressful, so dull. I want some surprises in my life again!

Why not look for other p-words ... hm, how about passion, purpose, progress ... so much better ... parachute, paradigm, paradise ... possibility, playful, prospector ... and, of course, prank ...

Oh, that opens a whole new realm of possibilities, doesn't it?

Day Off or Off Day?

I really did ask for help during the writing of that last post - my daughter was going to come over today and spend time with me before and after her yearly well-woman exam. I asked if she'd help me with a couple of projects, and she said "yes." Then her doctor called in sick last night, so Head Trip went to work today ... and I have nothing on my calendar.

This isn't happening very often lately. My workdays don't begin until 2 or so (I get students after school, remember) but since the first of January my mornings have been full of trying to catch up on sleep (late classes 5 days a week) and on household errands. My hours since mid-December have been double, even triple, what they have been in years past, too. And though Fridays are technically my days off, I've been travelling with the Big Lug and dealing with paperwork, or reading about new ways to make, save, and find money and treasures instead (even expanding my writing horizons, too - can we say "NY Times Bestseller?"). By last night, when Head Trip called to cancel, I'd already burst into tears twice (when I couldn't find the checkbook and when I thought about today's then-full schedule), lost my cool once (over a possibly stolen trash can, of all things), and went a little binge-y on some Popeye's. Let's just say I was ... relieved. But a day off? Me?

Then I woke with Brain Fog. Menopause, stress, or depression, I have no idea, but I respect the Brain Fog - so much so that today, for the last ... seven hours (!) the most work I've done (besides this post) is to clip all the coupons from my accumulated stack of circulars. I've also eaten three times (small meals make Bunny smaller) and watched four or five of the shows I'd recorded and saved for the network hiatuses, but haven't had a chance - no, haven't allowed myself the time - to watch yet.

Now, though I could keep writing, I'm going to keep watching, or maybe reading something that won't expand my mind ... or maybe I'll just stare out the window, do anything that doesn't feel like work. If it feels like work, if I don't relax the lobes thoroughly, I won't be able to have a good day, a happy and productive and non-stress, day for a very long time.

Been there, more than once, and don't want to be there again. So I will continue to do that which I don't do easily. I will rest.

And remember to breathe.

Baby Steps

It's happening again - the month is moving faster than the speed of intention. How am I going to get things done around here when my life is in fast-forward?

Hours long and tedious at work, writing twice a week here (even more outside this box), and family stresses ... well, easing, I think, so that's good: one more week for one, a lifetime of success (if bad habits are broken indeed) for another, and (finally, I hope) my acceptance that I cannot change the other no matter how badly I want to. I have sketched out some designs (bedroom closet and kitchen everything), shopped for tools and appliances (to price compare), measured spaces (for hunting), and dreamed (a lot), but I don't feel as if I've really done anything toward this new goal.

Impatient much? Me?

I'm not good at small steps - nothing I do is ever small. Two years ago, I weighed over 230 pounds, and ballooned up to 248 before I finally went to Weight Watchers that April. This morning I weighed 169. And this after I gained 10 pounds in 10 days during the holiday season and then dropped back down (even a bit below where I'd been). It took every ounce of control I possess. It took focus and determination. It took emptying the house of Cheeze-Its and Haagen Daz. It took only eight days. Why does this seem so much harder?

Maybe the trouble is that baby steps are just too small for my size 9 1/2 feet. I remember when my daughter was born - every time I picked her up to nurse I was terrified that I'd break her (or smother her - everything is oversized on me). Losing weight, for me, occurs mostly in a series of stalls and plummets. No "one healthy pound per week," as per The Book, oh, no - my weight chart looks like a 747 flying through a thunderstorm feels: uuuuup and dooooowwwwwn and uuuuuup and doooooooooowwwwwwwwwnnnnnnn ...

Would it be a bad thing if I do the same thing here? Simply take a week and give it my all until a room is finished? Then another and another and ... Okay, so I'd end up in physical therapy for six weeks after each binge, but who cares? I can use the vacation, right?

Argh, wrong, wrong, wrong! For once in my life, I must do this the logical way, the reasonable way, the smart way - I can't afford to lose work or exercise time or anything else a hospital stay will give me. Bit by bit, inch by inch, room by room, I will paint shabby walls, and I will install slidey things under the stove for the pans, and I will hang drapery rods (with drapes on them this time), and I will router-out new molding for the living room and door frames for the cabinet-reface. My feet are just the right size for a single step - I need to learn to take those steps, at my own pace, that's all.

Oh, yeah, and to ask for help when I need it.

I can do that.

And I just did.

Found Money

A home, a year from now, for free ...

Yep, it's going to be a year-long episode of I Love Bunny (can you say "vitametavegimen"?) or maybe one of the stranger episodes of ER, but yeah, that's still the plan. How? I've now had a week to answer that question, and while I still don't know all the details, I figured out one thing for sure - in order to idiot-proof this particular adventure (so I don't "change" things along the way) I really, really, really need ground rules.

So, first, I will work hard on this project. This might sound stupid to say aloud, but don't forget my default position is "couch-potato." I will work hard. Anything that makes a house a home, from structural fixes to kitchen cabinets to decorating to lighting, is involved here. And I don't simply vow give it my best as a laborer, either - I will go out of my way to recycle, reuse, and reduce. I will find no-cost items by checking our disposal company's routes (for curbside shopping in other, more target-rich, neighborhoods), by finding out and exploiting the landfill's policies for construction waste (cabinets and stone, especially), as well as make friends with some local contractors (for same, only cleaner, possibly even delivered). In fact, although I will be the most opportunistic Bunny you've ever seen, I'm not going to fly by the seat of my pants. I'm already in the process of drawing up a master plan (so I'll never have an easy excuse for downtime), and a list of current assets (not extensive, but expensive if bought new). I've also started pulling pictures from magazines to use as templates (more than one per room, in case my scavenger skills are better - or worse- than I think they'll be).

Second, what I cannot find or inherit (or win - I haven't given up on HGTV and DIY Network sweepstakes and shows!), I will pay for using a simple transfer of energy. In some cases this means using my "rewards" and rebates for things I already buy. But it could also mean bartering my expertise as a writer or tutor or babysitter, or even trading one item for another (muffins or a first edition for cabinet knobs - and yes, the muffins count because as long as it's low-or-no-cost and labor-intensive, it's a barter, baby). To extend the scope a bit, I'm also counting any money gained in a yard sale or on eBay in this category. As long as I'm selling things I already own it's just trading (using the intermediary of cash) for things I really need (like a basement waterproofer who takes PayPal).

Third, I have one big job pre-concept, and already in the pipeline - our electrical wiring is original to the house, a bit of a hazard. The Big Lug and I agreed to get a new, higher-amp panel put in as soon as the holidays were over. We also want to get a GFI in each bathroom, hardware that will support ceiling fans in all the bedrooms, and new outlets to support a modern stovetop (and our 21st-century multitude of electronic devices) installed all over the house, but because the panel is the only necessary part of the project, we will do only that. The rest will come later, as needed or horse-traded.

Speaking of which - fourth, if something is about safety or is an emergency (i.e. when the water heater blew last year), that doesn't count in the free-zone, either. I refuse to start finagling and finessing work or supplies while the water level is rising or the power is out. And while I'm at it ... okay, bit of a stretch, here ... but paying for necessary furniture, training, and tools, the stuff I need so I can even do the work, won't count, either - but I swear no credit will be involved, and I will always try to borrow, or inherit, or buy or heavily discounted or with gift cards (that I'm already asking for at birthday time and other holidays). And I will never buy ahead for projects I might do, or buy a new sofa if I have one already. In other words, I promise to purchase only things I'll be using a lot (like a table saw or pneumatic nailer), or that I absolutely need (like a sideboard or a replacement for a dead appliance), and anything I'll rarely, if ever, use again (like floor sanders and rototillers) I will rent. However, I'm warning you - if I see another Stickley bookcase for $200, I'm grabbing it first, needs or not.

Lastly, I considered giving myself a monthly budget for paint and lumber, but I think I'm already bending the concept as far as I can with my previous dodges. However, since I still have about $200 (in ones) that I got for change for the yard sale last June (seriously), I consider that my seed money and I will spend it here (probably for actual seeds, too).

Now, after all that thinking, and all that see-how-far-the-old-girl-can-contort-around-her-original-statement, here's the payback - I will not sacrifice quality for frugality. Oh, I could redo the entire house in the old "shabby chic" or the newer "retro chic," both of which are very informal, kind of cool, and (many times) extraordinarily inexpensive. But I won't settle, and no Modern (Mid-Century or otherwise) is me. I love things a bit more traditional, a bit more formal - Shaker or Mission or Art Nouveau. I will not accept anything less than what I love (or at least love at the time), because I know that even with this absurd budget, even with my half-century-old body, even with no taste of my own and a bad case of the lazies (and the prideful), I know I can get pretty darned close to my idea of perfect, somehow - and I'm going to work until I "canst work no more" to prove it (to myself mostly).

Funny thing is, I think Mama Angel didn't just nudge me in this direction, I think she's given me her blessing, too. This morning, I was going through all my accounts (starting the asset vs. obligation tally) and found an unexpected automatic debit from the life insurance company - you know, the one with all the (supposedly) liquidated policies, the ones we cashed in before the holidays? Well, it turns out I had another policy sitting there, one that didn't show up on the list (linked to the Big Lug's accounts), one I didn't even remember addending to the main policy. So I called, got the surrender ball rolling, and I now have about $2K coming my way in ten days or so. And since it's found money (shut up), and almost exactly what that new electrical panel will cost (no, really, shut up), I'm going to put the budgeted stash toward his retirement buyback or my IRA instead (aren't you glad you didn't comment?), getting us that much closer to the prize, today.

We'll all see what happens next, but as far as I'm concerned, life is pretty amazing.

Making Good

Y'know how sometimes you say something, or write something, and you don't know where it came from or where you're really going with it but it sounds so right you just had to say it? Okay, yeah, that was my last post. When I wrote it, I didn't know what it actually meant - all I could think of at the moment I typed it was the fact that I had a houseful of family on their way over for "second Christmas" (for the ones who weren't here for the first) and I wanted, I needed, a theme for the year. That's what came through, and it sounded fantastic in my head, y'know? But ... how?

Then, like a yeasty bread dough, it grew. While the Big Lug and I celebrated our 29th wedding anniversary, while I cleaned and taught a long weekend - when I wasn't even looking - it grew. I punched it down when I could, muttering "that can't be right," but it kept coming. My last posts, about the Deadlies and regret, began to swirl inside it like cinnamon and brown sugar. I shoved again (no, no, no, not that) but it just kept growing, laughing at my resistance with little bursts of fragrant promise. Frightening. Absurd. Seductive. Impossible.

It was like getting locked inside a horror-movie Cinnabon store - I fought and I tried to shape it or resist, but I couldn't help it. I caved.

2009. The year that Bunny and the Big Lug get a Home. For free.

If you just rolled your eyes at the seeming anticlimax or frowned in puzzlement at the duh quality of my big announcement, then you haven't been paying attention: Fifty-year-old house. Original cabinetry and scratchy laminate countertop. Original bathroom plumbing and fixtures (mostly - pink in one, mint green in another, baby blue in the half). Original wiring (by original owner). Leaky basement. Small, boxy rooms. Toilet bowl of a market.

All-thumbs, terrified-of-failure Bunny. Would-rather-eat-nails-than-show-the-world-her-incompentence Bunny. Do-as-I-say-not-as-I-(don't)-do Bunny.

Yeah, it was that last one that proved I have to do it this way, that I must take this particular leap forward, and now. In part because there's not a lot of travelling (for treasure hunting) in my future, but mostly because ... well, we hear that our house is our biggest investment, and we know that it should be a place that we love to live in, but, truthfully, my own words in recent weeks told me that the Big Lug and I have not done well on either front. Of course there were reasons (aren't there always?) - at first we didn't have to money to fix it up (we said). Then we didn't have the time (uh-huh). And now ... now the outdated everything is kind of ... well, just a view we've allowed ourselves to get used to because we are too cheap and too lazy to do anything about it.

"See Ms. (future homebuyer), I'm sure you'll get used to it, too. Oh, we understand we're getting peanuts compared to the cozy, warm, HGTV-ready houses in our area. Why should we care? We're only retiring ..."

Oh, I'll still work hard to win, steal, earn, inherit, and find (especially find) my treasures, if only because it's now a habit I wouldn't break even if I could. But in the (truly) absurd flash of inspiration that day I realized that, like so many other things I simply accepted before this quest, the familiar, easy view I'd allowed myself of our biggest single asset has been like a grain of sand beneath my skin for a very long time, itching and annoying me.

Last year, I cleared our house significantly, cleaned it (keeping it - for me - pretty uncluttered and dirt-free), and began to fill it with things I Love instead of only things I Could (and in the process discovered they can actually be both). This year the entire place will become more than just four walls and a roof because we deserve better than this. And if I have to curbside shop, and barter, and watch craigslist like a hawk because the only thing I can afford to risk right now is my comfort zone and my fingernails, my overblown self-image and my know-it-all status - my sloth and my pride - well, then, that's the price I'll pay ... somehow ... and I'll pay it with a cinnamon Bun-y grin.

In the kitchen.

With a circular saw.

Oh, God, this is going to be such a train wreck ...