Looking Back

Perspective Affects Everything

Just because something does or doesn’t happen to you doesn’t necessarily mean that it doesn’t occur. The best example of this is the latest conversation that I had with my brother. For example, my whole life I felt like he, my sister and my mom had this strange close bond between each other and I was excluded because “I was like dad”. My mom is an artist and has been an art teacher and always tried to be an artist in her free time. My brother and sister seemed to fall into that easily and could draw, paint, etc, fairly easily and do it well. Dad was a musician and played the trumpet and piano and had a music scholarship for college at WKU. Due to Vietnam, and family issues, he ended up not drafted and working at the phone company as an outside lineman for his entire career. 33 years, ultimately. 33 years… 🤯

During that time, he married, had a daughter, divorced, remarried, and had 3 more kids, me being the middle kid of that second crew. He and I seemed to be like a spitting image of each other, in so many ways. We talked constantly, could have a conversation with a fencepost, I’m sure Josh Overmeyer could attest to that fact. The biggest thing was that I saw dad as my confidant, my friend, someone I could talk to and trust with my feelings. But it wasn’t always like that.

Dad playing air piano at his Christmas party

Hate Takes Energy. LOTS of Energy

There was a time I didn’t like him and there was a time I hated him. Like actively spent energy on hating him. And if you’ve ever really hated anyone, holy shit, it takes a LOT of energy. A LOT. After about 18 months, I realized that he wasn’t worth the energy it took to hating him. It took more energy to dislike him than if I just didn’t care. That’s a sobering thought. When someone doesn’t even seem to be worth enough energy to care about. 😳

But there I was. Enter my ex stepmom. She wanted all of us to come together and well, she succeeded. I eventually told dad that I could wipe the slate clean and move forward from here on but it wasn’t baseball, there weren’t 3 strikes, he got 1. Just 1. But I’d be willing to start there if he was. And he was more than excited to have a chance and off we went. From there, it was one of the stronger adult relationships I’ve ever had. We talked often, usually a couple times a week and if it went less than 2 hrs it was shocking, lol. We’re both talkers, so content was never an issue. But we’d be open and vulnerable and share life with each other and that was what I loved and enjoyed.

A much younger Mr. SSC and Dad hiking on Father’s Day.

Reconciliation Works

It’s scary and hard to trust someone with your feelings. Really scary. That’s why when people find that someone they usually marry them and spend their lives together. And I’m not saying I wanted to marry dad, rather that connection with anyone is special, regardless of how they came into your life. One of my greatest supporters in my life now is a friend I’ve had since 🤷🏻‍♂️ 2010 or so? But I can tell him my feelings, good and bad, how life is going (for real) and not ever think I’ll be judged, but rather supported, accepted and asked how they can help to make life better. That’s a friend, and what I had with dad for the last 8-10 yrs of our relationship.

Things are never the same for you as other people. As we’ve seen over the past year and longer, that just because things don’t happen to you doesn’t mean that they don’t happen to other people. I should’ve known this but even I was blinded to that fact. While I was able to make amends and ultimately have a good relationship with my dad, I didn’t consider that my siblings couldn’t so the same. To be fair, my relationship with my mom was toxic. Imagine loving someone and constantly feeling they keep you at arm’s length and don’t even acknowledge you’re in their top 10 of important things in life, and that’s my mom. My therapists both in LA and OK pointed this out, and this is why I was so comfortable with my ex wife, let’s call her Mabel, because emotionally, Mabel was the same emotional relationship I was comfortable with having grown up with my mom. No physical relationship, love is on their terms and there isn’t any way I felt loved, unless they “allowed it”. Super controlling in every way, but especially emotionally. When my OK therapist brought this up, I was like 🤯OMG… Yeah, that tracks.🤯

Nothing is Unique

What I’d didn’t expect was that my situation was unique. After talking with my brother this evening, I found out that I’m not unique, no one is unique, and life and poor parenting cam happen to anyone. Much like my mom was toxic to me, he never knew anyone beyond “the asshole” that was my dad. We talked and I was like, well growing up there was “the asshole” and then there was “Pat” the neutral version of dad. Not mean but not nice. My brother said he never knew anyone but the asshole. No “Pat”, no “dad” just the asshole. Always. There was never any connection as a friend or confidant or even parent. It blew my mind. How is it that this person I could share with and be so intimate with and be so supported by, be nothing more than an asshole to my sibling who was in the same situation?! I was lost.

Then I started thinking about my relationship with mom. She was a very talented artist with pottery, charcoal drawing, pastels, and watercolor and my brother and sister picked up on that immediately, it seemed. They were all talented in that respect and while I might be able to draw 2d better than most,it sucks compared to them. 😂 They had this incomparable bond and art seemed to be it. I always felt on the outside with those 3.

I just never realized that it went both ways. Because I felt ostracized with my siblings and mom, and more so because “you’re just like dad” and noone liked dad, well, it made sense that if dad asked me to hang out, it beat the shit out of being around that environment. Seriously, it felt like a “you’re with us or against us and we’ve already decided you’re against us” sort of thing. So when dad would go out to have coffee with his HAM radio buddies on the weekend hell yeah I’d go. I learned to talk to all kinds of people. I asked questions and learned all about how to solder, make radios, electrical engineering (very minor for sure) but if I asked questions (which I did A LOT) they were more than happy to answer. And I got to spend time with dad. And we’d go hiking together or spend time together in other ways but mostly it revolved around HAM radio.

Again, even with this seemingly solid foundation, remember this is still a person with undiagnosed bipolar disorder that was self medicating with “not alcohol” at that time so he was still an asshole to deal with. Or rather he was dad, and was “moody” “disruptive” “explosive” or more. Her could also be loving, kind, and hugged me more than any person I’ve met to date but he wasn’t without his faults.

Jealousy Sucks: In Every Way

While I had this seemingly “great” relationship with dad, my siblings saw it as we were tight and they just got treated like an afterthought because he was “the asshole”. And it sucks, because I’m like, sure me and dad didn’t get close until college but when we did, damn, he was my closest friend in the world. Literally, my best friend. We supported each other as best we could and we got each other and didn’t judge each other or anything.

But I get it. They felt that same strong relationship with mom but for me… Mom was toxic. I felt and she confirmed through action that I was the last thing on mom’s to do list each day. She’d get off work at 5pm and I’d get picked up between 7-9pm before she’d head out of town to the house. Literally, I was THE LAST thing on her list of stuff to do. As I progressed thru life, that never changed but became more amplified. At one point she was moving from New Orleans to Nashvegas and I went down to Slidell to help load stuff. She started crying at some point and I asked why and she replied that she was going to miss “her kids” so much and being so far away was going to be hard. I was kind of stunned because “her kids” she’d known for less than an academic year at that point, meanwhile her literal son and only grandson had lived within 30 min from her for the last 18 months and she’d never come up to visit once. Literally, visits were when I tried to get them to happen and seek validation for, idk but that’s what I wanted back then. Acceptance, confirmation I was doing great, and love. Just love. And nothing. I got nothing. When she said that statement, it validated all my feelings and all that I’d felt over the last few decades of not even being enough. To not be enough, I’d have to be noticed. You can’t be less than, when you’re not even noticed. While I’d like to say that was the end of my relationship with my mom it wasn’t. It went on for another 4 yrs until I was in Texas. Until finally, I was able to say that I deserved better than that.

I just never realized my brother could’ve been feeling the same with my dad. I know he called him Pat (his name’ish) since the divorce, I just figured it was a male dominance, “you’re not my dad” sort of thing. I never knew it was that it was the least aggressive way to address him by also letting him know that “yeah, you’re done here”.

Summary

So, yeah. That’s my story of growing up with my parents and siblings. Rather, that’s one aspect of that whole godawfulness that was my childhood. 😆 I loved my dad, and I’m glad I got to know him and we became such friends and companions and confidants later in life. I’m sad for my brother that he never had that or got to see that side of dad. He was awesome. For me. He was supportive. For me. He was my best friend. For me. I still miss him. A lot.

I hope that my mom is as good as a support that I got from dad to my brother as my dad was for me. My brother and mom are super close. Always have been, and will be until they die. And I’m sad I don’t have that relationship, but I’m ok with it too. I cut my mom out of my life , idk, 5 yrs ago now? It’s been one of the better things for my mental health but it still sucks not having a relationship with a parent. Even when you know it’s toxic to you, it still sucks. Amd knowing how strong my dad’s relationship with me was and how much positivity it added to my life, I hope he’s getting the same from mom.

It’s just amazing to me, how disparate our perspectives are and yet we grew up in the same space, with the same people, and we actually felt supported and disliked/not even acknowledged by the other parent. Just… Wow…

I don’t know what the point of all of this story is other than, be empathetic. When hearing others stories, know there aren’t just 2 sides, there are at least 6 sides whether you recognize the other 4 sides at the time or not. Everything is more complicated than we make it seem to be, whether you acknowledge that it IS or isn’t more complicated. Your validation of a situation doesn’t make it any more or less real. That situation exists whether you decide to validate it or not.

In the end, be nice. Be caring and be open to other views than your own. Just because you also existed in the same time and space as someone else DOES NOT mean you experienced the same thing.

Have you ever experienced this? Do you have a sibling, ex, anything that sees things a totally different way but you both “lived thru the same experience”? Any thoughts on how it was different for them? I’d love to hear about it.

 

Adventures in Shopping: How I Got My First “Good” Banjo

When my Dad “left” the phone company, he was offered a buyout and a boost of his pension and benefits to make it seem as if he had worked a full 35 years. To the best of my recollection, he was at 33 years +/- but he’d been dealing with increasingly expensive and work disrupting carpal tunnel issues due to, well, 33 years of twisting and splicing wires. He was an outside lineman for his whole career. This story isn’t about that, but about how he and I found my first “good” banjo.

Young Jay and a CRAPPY banjo…

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m great at spending money, and it’s a trait I get honestly. I learned from the best, lol. See, when he got his payout, it was lump sum 2 years salary-ish, and benefits as if he’d worked 35 years. 35 years… It sounds like hell to me, and listening to him talk about it, it wasn’t fun for him at all. When I was thinking about applying to a similar position in Denver due to the starting pay being ~$60k/yr and also because I was so DONE with being a broke college student… OMG, if he could’ve reached thru the phone and slapped me he would have. He convinced me to stay the course and NOT follow his route, and thank goodness I did and that he was so adamant about getting education over “easy money”.

When he got his payout, it was like he’d won the lottery. He had a pension, and now a fat stack of bills to throw around and holy hell, did he throw it around. For me, I ended up with a grand, $1,000 USD, with the only stipulation from him that I do NOT spend it towards bills or any “useful/needed” purpose. It was designated to have fun with and get something I wouldn’t be able to afford but wanted to buy. My first thought, New banjo!! For those unaware, banjos are expensive! A thousand bucks would get me into the “starter realm” for good banjos. I started shopping around and test playing any that I could find to figure out what I wanted or didn’t want, that was in that price range.

Deering It Is

I quickly came to realize that I liked the Deering sound, and I’d just saved up and bought my first good banjo, a Deering Goodtime with resonator and I still have that banjo. It’s great, lightweight, and packs a ton of sound for its size/weight. I visited the Ome factory in Boulder, if you’ve never been, it’s very cool. You can see where and how they make the pots, necks, inlay, apply the finish, all of it. It was awesome, but out of my price range. Then I decided it would be time to take a trip home because where else could I find a better selection of banjos than Nashville? It was only 45 minutes south of Bowling Green, so why not have a visit AND shop for a new banjo?

My Good Time banjo. Still love playing that one.

To Nashvegas!!

I flew in and we hung out for a bit, but I get very focused when I go somewhere with a purpose, so we headed to Nashville the next day after I arrived there. This was most likely the summer of 2000, specific dates I can’t recall, but it tracks with other memories from then. For everyone under the age of 40, this means pay phones were still common, cell, not as common, gps and maps on cell, not common or maybe even around. These were the days of printing out mapquest style directions and taking the printouts with you, because, that beat the crap out of a “dumb” paper map, lol. If you made changes to your travel itinerary on the fly, good luck and may the winds be at your back.

We hit up the big name stores like Gruhn Guitars and some others I’d known from my limited internet search. We had a plan and knew of some places to check out and went to make a day of it. If there was one thing Dad loved more than spending money was shopping. Not buying, necessarily, just plain old shopping was his jam. I also still love shopping, browsing, etc… We spent most of the morning hitting those places, but quickly learned that, yes, $1000 USD is limiting in what banjos you can afford. Most were in the $2k and up range, and the ones I found in my price range, I didn’t want to spend the money on, because I liked my Deering Good Time better.

Along Came A Stranger

We met up with my sister and in a glorious stroke of serendipity, she suggested a Guitar Center nearby, and away we went! It was fun, we were adventuring and making memories, regardless of if I found a banjo. Guitar Center had some better offerings in my price range, but again, nothing grabbed me and said, “I’m yours, we found each other!” It’s very similar to wand selection, for any Harry Potter fans. While I was playing around on a banjo, some guy was tearing it up, flat picking a guitar and of course, we struck up a conversation.

Him: “What brings y’all out today?”

Me: “I’m looking for a banjo, but I’m striking out so far…”

Him: “A banjo?! Have y’all been out to Curtis’s yet?! He’s got lots of banjos! You should check ol’ Curtis out!”  Side note – yes, everything was loud exclamations and very much “y’all-centric” lol

Me: “Ummm, no. Who the hell is Curtis? And where is his store?” Side note – this guy is a bluegrass legend and I had no clue

Him: “It’s no store, but he’s got a massive collection of instruments in his basement. Curtis McPeake. Check him out!”

Me: “Awesome, thanks, do you have his address?”

Him: “Nope, but he’s off “random road and parkway/interstate junction I forgot by now”, take a right at the exit, you’ll see a waffle house, head down the road beside Waffle House and he’s back there somewhere. Shouldn’t be too hard to find him though. Good luck!”

Me: ”Thanks!”

I put down my banjo, and away we went to that random interstate exit.

Sleuthing in 2000

Well, we got off the exit, and sure as shit, there’s a Waffle House and a sideroad right beside it. Before we got any further, we stopped at Waffle House and I looked in the phonebook at the payphone, yes, it was still there thank goodness, and I looked for any McPeake nearby. Although, how would I know if they’re nearby without any other map, lol. I found a C.M. McPeake and I tried calling but to no avail. I noted the street name, got back in the truck, and we headed down the side road as per mystery guys directions. A few miles down the road we pass a street sign that was the same name as the phonebook! Glorious! We hit the brakes, backed up and went down it. I had the number memorized, so at this point, we were just looking for a house. We drove along and found the address and it was an unassuming ranch house with a walkout basement sitting on about 2 acres of well manicured grass, a handful of mature trees, and a ¼ mile long winding driveway. There was an older lady mowing the grass on a riding mower and she waved as we stopped at the end of the driveway gawking like we weren’t sure if we should be there or not. When I looked up the driveway I saw 2 full sized vans and a truck and they all had license plates from “not Tennessee” and I said, “Well, looks like we found Curtis…” lol

We pulled up the drive, and I shit you not, as we get out, someone opens the door to the walkout basement and asks, “Y’all looking for Curtis?” Man, I miss some things about the South, lol. We replied, “yes sir” and he invited us in. As I got closer to the door I could hear live bluegrass, and inside there was a 3 piece jam going on. I walked through the door and I’m looking straight down the entire length of the walkout basement. To my amazement, I see instruments fully covering the walls, top to bottom with some racks built in the middle to hold additional instruments. Imagine angels singing and this is how I felt, lol. Mandolins, guitars, resonator guitars, standup basses, and then… the banjos!

At the end of all of this basement, is a 1950’s style army green metal desk with who I can only assume is “Ol’ Curtis” sitting behind it and he says, “Come in, come in, what can I do for you?” We tell him we’re looking for a banjo and he motions to the wall of banjos, about 20’ long with 3 rows of instruments one on the floor, the next right above that, and then a final row hanging just below the ceiling. It was the biggest selection of banjos I’d seen that day! He asks about price range and style and when I say, well, I only have a grand ($1k), he replies with, “Well, I don’t have many cheap banjos for sale, but they’d be on that bottom row.” My heart sank, because like Gruhn Guitars, most of his banjos were vintage and professional quality but there were a few under $2k. I started playing a couple of them, I really sucked back then, but again, nothing grabbed me.

Lucy Arrives

Then I opened a closed case and found her. A Deering Maple Blossom and it was beautiful! She had a gorgeous finish and curly maple that looks 3D in the sunlight. I picked around on it and the volume and tone was incredible. Very bass forward and it had an amazing driving sound to it, even with my poor playing. I dishearteningly looked at the price tag, and it was only $1400 USD. Oooohhh… This was close to my range, and I’d had an extra $300 in my savings, by extra, I mean, that was all I had in there. Oh the “good old days”, lol. I asked Dad if he would be able to spot me $100 to cover it, because this was THE ONE.

Me playing Lucy back at the house

Then we found out Ol’ Curtis didn’t take credit cards, just cash or check. Fortunately, Dad had his checkbook and was able to cover it, and I even got a free strap, lol. Less than 45 minutes after getting there, we had procured a banjo, met a bluegrass legend, heard some live bluegrass, and were walking out the door grinning like we’d just won the lottery.

 

After we got back in the truck Dad told me, “Look, don’t worry about sending me that money. Just enjoy it and think about me whenever you play it, and don’t sell it. I’ll buy it from you if you need money that badly.” And like that, I ended up with Lucy. Her full name is Loose Lucy, because until I did some tweaking and “jiggering” over the years, her pot screws would loosen randomly, and there were all sorts of things that were “almost but not” quite with her, lol. Also, it’s one of my fav Grateful Dead songs, so it fit well in a lot of ways.

Since then, I’ve changed out multiple heads, tailpieces, bridges, and more to try to get different sounds out of her, and after getting a Stelling Red Fox I kept a black head on it for more sustain and a mellower tone.

My Red Fox

Memories Made

I still think about that trip and our adventure whenever I play it. I don’t plan on selling it, but rather keeping it until I die, or if one of the kids gets interested, then give it to one of them. It’s a great memory I have with my Dad and it makes me smile when I tell that story, well now I’m teary about it, but still, it’s a great memory for me. I still play Lucy, my Maple Blossom, just not as often as my Stelling, and next time I get a wild hair, I’ll swap the head back for a traditional one and get that punchy bass sound back, because man, does she throw out the notes! Regardless, of how she’s put together, the memory of that adventure remains.

It’s odd with the pipe, because he never smoked one really, but, you take what you have…

Dad playing air piano at his Christmas party

Dad without facial hair in front of the fountain on BG’s square

Things might not have always been the best between me and my Dad, and they sure didn’t end how I would’ve wanted, but when he was good, he was great! For me, that was a LOT of the last bit of his life. I still miss him, the grief is still there, but it’s nice to get to reflect on the happy memories too. I finally got a tattoo as a tribute to him, of a mallard on the water with ripples showing forward movement, because I feel like I’m finally moving forward. Funny enough, no one knows WHY he likes ducks, just that he did. A LOT…

It got big pretty quickly, lol

5th Graders: A Lesson in Volunteering

It doesn’t seem like a year since I left my job, but we’re coming up on 13 months away from full time work! Whoa! That’s the longest I’ve gone “un-employed” since I started working at age 15. I made it a whole 54 weeks before getting any W2 type work. That gig is “guest teaching” formerly known as substitute teaching or “subbing”. With the stellar pay of $60/day it’s still volunteering in my book, lol. What have I done in the past year? A crap ton of volunteering, that’s what. I’ve also applied to 2 different jobs that looked fun, I got accepted for one of them, and I’ve come to find out that I like carving things with a chainsaw. Who would’ve thought? I also had a really valuable lesson taught to me about volunteering, by a 5th grade classroom I subbed for. What did they teach me and how did it cause me to re-evaluate everything I’m putting my energy towards? Well, that’s a pretty funny story.

Read More…

2018: The Year of the Lifestyle Change

What a year 2018 was for the SSC household. There was a LOT going on with the kids, the dogs, our house, and most importantly both of our jobs. At the beginning of the year we were designing a house to be built on our property at Canyon Lake and expecting to be in Houston for another 2 years. By the end of the year I wasn’t working and we were celebrating Christmas in our “new” house in Oklahoma. Wow! Just wow… Even for us, things seemed to come so unexpectedly the only thing that we knew to count on was that our plans would constantly be changing. Ultimately, it was the year we kicked off our dream of the Fully Funded Lifestyle Change (FFLC)!! There was a lot more detail than just that, so let’s get into the 2018 recap.

Moving Time

Early in 2018, Mrs. SSC landed a really sweet gig working at a well-respected University with a strong and established petroleum program. This forced us to move to Oklahoma and it wasn’t even on our radar for places to live. We found a great place out in the country with 2 untamed acres. On the plus side, we could shape it to be as wild or as manicured as we want because literally nothing had been done to the woods except let them grow wild.

Goodbye Green Wall of Doom!

The downside is that there is a TON of downed timber across that 2 acres, a lot of underbrush, and it isn’t anywhere I’d want the kids or myself wandering through in the summertime. I’ve been putting a big dent in clearing that brush, and I’ve cut down about 20+ trees already. I have marked so many more trees with flagging tape that I ran out of 200’ of tape. Yipe!

Selling Property Sucks

Our Houston house went on the market in mid-March and we figured it would be slow until summertime, but expected to be able to sell it over the summer. It went 90 days without a showing, in part I believe to the “okay but not great” photos that were taken. Pro-tip – interview multiple realtors prior to picking one. Ours was Mrs. SSC’s trainer and was convenient, but I feel like we could’ve found a better realtor and saved ourselves a LOT of $$ and anxiety. Mid-summer we got an offer and man were those buyers nit-picky. They argued over every single dime wanting us to put up more and more money. After a month of negotiations on post-inspection fixes, we found out these jack-wads weren’t even approved for a loan! How does that happen!? Well, they barely squeaked by for a pre-approval with a high 500’s credit score. Fast-forward 5 months and who has been missing car payments and racking up MORE debt? Those guys. Needless to say, their credit score had dropped to low 500’s and they couldn’t get approved for the loan. Thanks for keeping our house off the market the last month and a half of summer and being jackasses about EVERY single item… Ugh…

Buyer #2

The next buyers wanted our property, but didn’t want to make an offer until their house sold. However, they wanted us to take it off the market and hold it for them. Can you hear me laughing? That was rejected, and the house stayed on the market. Another buyer put in an offer and had the inspection done, then pulled their offer 3 days later. Their main concern was having to replace the water pipes due to the amount of rust coming out of them. We were puzzled and then remembered we’d replaced the main shutoff and the plumber told us to run the water to flush any rust/sediment/etc… that had gotten knocked loose and that it may look dirty until it gets flushed. We asked our realtor to do that and he had done it, according to him. Those pictures of the bathtub with rusty looking water said otherwise… Ugh…

Third Time’s a Charm

FINALLY, we got another interested couple, they made an offer, were easy to negotiate a price with, and we were under contract. We waited for the inspection and heard nothing. Literally nothing. We contacted our realtor and he said that they’d gotten the inspection and didn’t have any follow-up requests for us to fix. Yay!! While we technically closed in 2019, we did finally close on that house and that 2018 contract went thru. Yippee!

Leaving My Job

Me leaving work was a little tricky due to the fact that I had to prep the house for sale, keep it under wraps, AND spend time driving up to Oklahoma for house hunting, home inspection, and closing. It was easy enough to tell work that I’m “taking time off” but everyone was convinced I was interviewing at other companies. That was just fine with me, because what do I care what they think? I’m leaving in 3 months.

 

One Friday, I was at my desk and get a call from my boss to come to our bosses office. I get nervous and then think, wait, why am I nervous? I didn’t do anything wrong. Then I got excited thinking I might be getting laid off and could get a severance package. Buoyed by that prospect I went in, sat down and was told I was being promoted to my bosses position but for our Texas-Delaware Assets. Hooray… Ultimately, I declined that offer, and you can read more about it here. Since my upper managers now knew I was leaving in August, I wasn’t getting any more additional work or put on other special teams. Double yay!!

When the time got nearer for me to leave my boss proposed a 3 month remote work assignment to help with reserves. It got approved and ultimately we had 3 more months of pay, health insurance, and a little extra $$ we hadn’t counted on to help with the “new” house projects. It turned out to be a mixed bag that you can read more details about here, but ultimately it worked out well for everyone.

Money Pit

The new house is the last big topic of 2018. When we moved in we knew it needed some cleaning and maintenance as it looked like it hadn’t been maintained in the 16 years it has been around. We got the ducts cleaned, I vacuumed the walls, and I dusted and cleaned every other surface and Mrs. SSC was still having troubles with allergies and breathing. The previous owners had a cat, so I suggested that we replace the carpet sooner than later. We did that and her breathing got immediately better. Hooray!!

The house temp wouldn’t get cooler than 83/84 F on days when the outside temp was over 93. We had an AC inspection and it was working correctly and pumping out cool air, but that wasn’t the issue. The issue was that it was a 3 ton unit and this house needed a larger unit than that to be effective… I shopped around 4 different contractors and found a great deal on a higher efficiency unit than we previously had, and after it was installed problem solved.

I also noticed that the upstairs bonus room was a heat/cool sink for the house. Everywhere else appeared to have adequate depth blown-in insulation but the walls for this rom were only 4” thick. I wanted to get some more insulation and add it to them along with some other spots I’d noticed that had thin blown in insulation (4” or less). On Black Friday, Lowe’s had 30% off their insulation. Score!! I bought 24 batts (11 pieces in each batt) of R-30 insulation for ~$1k discounted, installed it myself, and have seen some great results. Plus, now I can keep the heat off in the bonus room. On the coldest nights it gets down to 58 but mostly stays between 60-64 without any heat on. Double Score!!

Summary

That’s the very long recap of our year. I’m sure I may have missed some things, but those were the biggest ones for us. So far, we’re loving the town, country living, the kids school, and our neighbors. While this state wasn’t even in the running for places to consider living in, we are really liking it. There’s more topography than we expected, especially in our home area. The people are super friendly and it feels like it has a great sense of community about it. I can’t wait to see what’s in store for 2019! Be on the lookout for a “new” home spending post. There’s way too much to put into this one, and it is ridiculous…

Hope your 2018 went as great for you as it did for us.

My Dad’s Suicide: 10 Years Later

I’m reposting an edited version of this because I noticed I missed World Suicide Prevention Day yesterday. I was dealing with my own depression and finding someone to talk to. I’ve dealt with depression and anxiety a lot over the years and there have been times that I’ve had suicidal thoughts and ideations. It gets overwhelming. It’s physically, emotionally, and mentally draining and is very hard to convince yourself to reach out when you’re at that point.

If you are feeling depressed and want someone to talk to, reach out to someone close to you and be honest, be open. If you don’t have anyone to reach out to, then call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255. If talking isn’t your thing, they have an online chat. If that doesn’t work you can reach me on twitter @coffeesippers. DM me and I will send you my # and we can talk, I can listen, whatever you need. Remember, once you’re gone, there’s no coming back.

My dad committed suicide 10 yrs ago this past July and the sadness never really goes away. Yeah, I’ve “dealt with it”, and those emotions are settled, mostly, not really, who knows? Ten years on and at times it sure as shit still feels like it just happened yesterday. This isn’t really about typical suicide prevention, because I don’t know how to stop it. I’m not a professional therapist and I feel like telling someone to “talk about it” is akin to telling an alcoholic to “just stop drinking…” It’s just not that easy. Not when you’re at that place in your head.

This is how I felt after I found out that my dad committed suicide.

Disclaimer, there’s no PF spin or $ talk today, so feel free to delete and move on if you’re not interested, my feelings won’t be hurt a bit.

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Why You Should Never Settle.

Recently I have had some interesting discussions with Mrs. SSC, friends, and even people around the office. I asked them a fairly straightforward question, “If you could go back to your high school self and let them know where you are today, how would they respond to the news? Would they be surprised in a good or bad way, or nod knowingly and say, “Yep, that’s pretty much what I expected to happen?” Would your highschool self even think that you might have not tried hard enough and just settled for the easy route?” The answers have been pretty varied.

Mrs. SSC is of the opinion that her high school self wouldn’t be too surprised about her situation and would fit into the “yep, that’s about what I expected would happen” category. Meaning that she was pretty driven during high school and college and that drive to excel is what got her to where she is today. She might be more surprised at leaving a megacorp oil and gas job for teaching, but not once she explained to her younger self that at some point in life, happiness trumps making more money. Overall, the trajectory of her life seems to follow the path she set it on at a young age. Mine however, couldn’t be more different.

If I was able to tell my high school self where I was right now at 40, with family, education, career, and what shape our finances are in, first I don’t think he’d believe me. After I convinced him that this is legit and we really did “make it”, he’d be ecstatic. High school me would jump up, give me a big hug, a high five and hop around screaming, “F*** yeah, we did it! We DID it!” Quite honestly, even now I have to take a moment to reflect on where I’ve come from and really appreciate being in the spot I am today. I know that if I had been able to write a successful life story for myself back when I was in high school, I would have set the bar so low that I wouldn’t have achieved anywhere near where I am today. I would have settled for a way less comfortable and successful lifestyle in SO many ways.

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Goodbye Quinn

Well, 2017 started off rough as we had to put our oldest dog Quinn down yesterday. She’d lived a long life of over 16 years and fortunately didn’t go through the cancer issues that her sister did 2 years ago, but it still sucks. It sucks saying goodbye to a good friend and it sucks seeing someone you know age. It’s hard making that choice too. Is it too soon, is her quality of life diminished enough to justify this decision, are we being selfish keeping her around a little longer? Lots of questions; questions you don’t really get to make with people. If she was a person, she’d be in a home, just waiting to die, getting visits from us on the weekends, if we weren’t too busy, but maybe I’m more of a pessimist in that regard.

Such a sweetie!
Such a sweetie!

I remember when I first met Quinn and Harley, 2 sisters that Mrs. SSC rescued from the streets of Chicago 15 yrs ago. It was my first visit to Mrs. SSC in Chicago after our internship and we’d gotten back to her apartment, a nice 3rd floor walkup, and as she opened the door there was a ton of barking and 2 dogs jumping up on me wanting to know who the new person was in their place. They were a great pair of dogs but they couldn’t be more dissimilar. Harley had the nickname dingo because she looked and acted like one of the crazy hyenas from Lion King, and Quinn was a cuddler and a “soft whore” always looking for the next best soft spot in the house to lay on.

Harley, the crazy quiet dingo.
Harley, the crazy quiet dingo.

I remember when we tried to save money and shave them ourselves in Mrs. SSC’s apartment one summer. Harley worked out fine, except she got these “racing stripes” down her back that never seemed to grow right again, adding more weight to her hyena personality, and Quinn… Oh Quinn… The 5″ of fur that we tried to take of of her started to pile up, float around the apartment, and bog down the clippers and we weren’t even halfway through shaving her. Once we finally finished, we vowed to never try that again and stayed successful, until that point where she didn’t handle the groomers well anymore. Then I gave her a couple of hand trim shaves at home, but it’s way easier when you have a yard and aren’t trimming her inside a small apartment.

She never did seem to recover well after the loss of her sister 2 years ago. They’d been together since birth and after Harley was gone, she just seemed to be more distant. Not wanting pets as much, not wanting to snuggle as much, and kind of distancing herself from the family. Lola helped some, but it probably wasn’t the same. They played well and got along well the first year, but after that, even Lola was too much for Quinn. Getting old sucks.

Lola, the new queen of the castle
Lola, the new queen of the castle

Of the two, Harley was definitely my favorite, but Quinn, was definitely the cuddler. I’ll miss having her come up to me looking to get petted and snuggling in to hang out. I’ll miss her bouncing around on those rarer days that the temperature gets cold and she gets to enjoy being outside with that massive fur coat of hers.

I’ll just miss her period. She added a lot to the household and was great with the kids, and pretty much, I’ll just miss her.

You’ll Never Know if You Don’t Try…

Over the weekend, I was catching up on some recordings of Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency and I was struck by a conversation that went on during the show. The really short setup is they’re looking for something based on a map they’ve found, and they have been digging holes, fairly randomly at one of the “X” locations. When Todd wants to quit digging and look somewhere else, Dirk points out that they’re in as good a place as any to look for their treasure, so why quit. As he puts it, “What if you’re only one shovelful away from finding it but you stop. You’ll never know, will you, because you gave up. What you’re looking for could be right there, and you walk away right at the worst moment. I’m trying to say, You’ll never know if you don’t try.” That last part really stuck with me in relation to our Fully Funded Lifestyle Change (FFLC) journey, recent career changes, and even a new venture concept I came up with a few months ago. Let’s start with the FFLC aspect.

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Time Changes Everything: 2 years blogging!

I can’t believe it’s been 2 years since we started the blog! Okay, it’s actually 2 months late, but, close enough for me. Going back thru all of our earlier posts and reading them (yeah I read almost all of them – again) I realized, “Holy Cow some things have changed a LOT since we started writing. Here’s what I found has changed in our Financially Independent Retire Early (FIRE) mindset, our myriad of plans, my comfort level with leaving the workforce at my peak earning years (who does that?!) and even how our timing has changed over the years. Before we get to the changes, I just want to say THANK-YOU to everyone that’s followed the blog, makes comments on the posts, and retweets the scant few things I put out there! You guys are an awesome community and I’m glad to be a part of it!

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Suicide Never Goes Away

With it being Suicide Prevention Day recently, I’ve been thinking a lot about my experiences surrounding that topic. It’s worse than an earworm of a bad/not bad song (Tom’s Diner anyone?) that you hear a small snippet of and sure enough, pretty soon all you keep hearing is the droning melody of all the events that have played out over the past 8 years. Yeah, you’ve dealt with it, and sure, those emotions are settled, but it sure as shit still feels like it just happened yesterday. This isn’t really about suicide prevention, because I don’t know how to stop it, and telling someone to “talk about it” is akin to telling an alcoholic to “just stop drinking…” This is me finally getting this story out to more than just a few close friends.

Disclaimer, there’s no PF spin or $ talk today, so feel free to delete and move on if you’re not interested, my feelings won’t be hurt a bit.

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