Category Archives: Life Plans

Looking Back, Looking Ahead

Last year I wrote a post about my goals and stuff, cleverly titled Goals and Stuff. Some years I meet my goals, some I don’t, but I like setting them anyway. If things work out well, I can be all “Hey! Look at me, making stuff happen WOOHOO!!!” But if I fail to accomplish things, I have created something to beat myself up over which is one of my favorite hobbies.

In 2014, I set out to do three things: finish the first draft of the memoir manuscript, lose 50 pounds, and empty my house of all nonessential items. I didn’t do any of them, but I’m not quite ready for self-flagellation. I am going to (you might want to sit down here and brace for the shock) cut myself some slack.

The manuscript: I have over 90,000 words and I would say, since I’m in a generous mood, I’m about 90% done with the draft. I’m not even slightly pretending that it doesn’t need tons of work still but most of the story is down. When I decided to really get serious about it last January, I had bits and pieces and a loose outline but no idea what I had in any measurable way. It’s not done like I’d wanted, but I feel like I’ve made so much progress and it’s not a wishy-washy “I want to write a book” type goal anymore.

Weight: Let’s just not, okay?

Empty the house: I had planned to focus on the attic and the basement. The attic is about 90% empty (seems to be a common number for me…). All that’s left is one piece of furniture I have to take apart to throw out (so lazy though), the comic book collection (which will probably stay there permanently), my wedding dress, and about half a dozen bins of pictures, keepsakes, and my mom’s stuff. Considering it was so full I could barely walk up there last year, this is a huge improvement. The basement has been emptied by about 50%. There is still stuff down there to donate or sell, keepsakes and Mom’s stuff to go through and various household items. I can’t empty it fully, but there’s still plenty of work to be done.

So what’s on the horizon for this year? I’m keeping the 3 goals from last year but adding a few more areas of focus.

1. Finish the book. Not just the first draft but all the drafts.

2. I need to do something about my weight and health in general. I need coping strategies that don’t involve pizza. I need to exercise regularly.

3. Keep getting rid of stuff. Organize what’s left. Get rid of more stuff.

4. Get paid to write. I landed a few paying gigs in 2014, but this year I’d like to expand on that. It would be wonderful if I could write full time as opposed to finding another insurance job and I suspect that may not be something I do this year, but I want to get closer to it.

5. Read more books and watch more movies. Not a fancy goal, but one that will make me happy.

This year, more than anything else, I want to focus on the stuff that matters most to me. I want to stop killing time. At the risk of vague-blogging, I have goals much larger than what I could put into a year-in-review/resolutions post. You’ll have to take me at my word that I’m going to keep working on them. If every day is spent focusing on the big picture and not immediate gratification, it will be a successful year.

Thanks to everyone who reads this blog regularly. When you tell me that you enjoy my writing, when you encourage me to keep going, that you can’t wait to read the book or just that you liked this post or that one, it means so much. Writing feels like it happens in a vacuum sometimes and knowing that people are looking forward to hearing what I have to say is invaluable. Hopefully I won’t let you down in the coming year.

Unwanted.

When I was a tween, I was recruited for my first job. The lady who lived two doors down asked me if I’d like to come with her to the senior citizen building around the corner and help her clean apartments and do laundry. She paid me an amount so small that, more than thirty years later, I can’t recall it, but at the time it was my surefire ticket out of my house and into an apartment of my own. I had big dreams back then.

From there I babysat until I got a job for five seasons at the local Dairy Queen. When they would close for the winter, I worked in a drug store and the mall (selling engravable gifts, lingerie and books, not all at the same time). Finally, in 1995, I landed my first office job filing and opening mail. It was supposed to last a few months, but I kept doing more stuff and they kept paying me and I didn’t leave there until 2007.

When I did finally leave, I had a 95% sure thing waiting for me. I popped into that job two weeks later and stayed for more than five years. My last gig started about 19 months ago and allowed me to work from home and gave flexibility in my schedule to deal with a child in elementary school.

I have always kept going, kept pushing, kept working. Whether I liked the job or not was irrelevant. I was supposed to work and earn money and so I did. Always.

That last job was working out well for me until, about two weeks ago, they let me know they eliminated my position. They told me not to take it personally, but that’s easier said than done. I’ve never not had a place to go or something coming up over the horizon. My ego is healing from the bruise of being unwanted but I’m done with wallowing. I’ve always taken the safest routes and it has gotten me nowhere. Now is the time for change.

As much as I would tell you that I wished I had free time to do whatever I wanted to do, there was a certain comfort in not having to make that decision for myself. The reason my book wasn’t done? The job. The reason I didn’t write more for pay or otherwise? The job. The reason I couldn’t exercise, plan better meals for my family, volunteer more at the school? The job. Always the job. It was a ready made excuse and I used it to the fullest.

Now I have all the time in the world. I’m faced with an uncertain future and forty-five unstructured hours per week to fill with trying to accomplish my goals. The universe stepped in and told me that if I really want to do big things, here’s my chance. It’s exciting and it’s scary. If I fail, I have no one to blame now but me.

So I will make myself wanted again. I will push through the self-doubt. I always knew I was meant for something more.

It’s now or never.

Blog Forward Challenge – Third Installment

It’s time for the latest installment of the Blog Forward Challenge by ZonePerfect! (There’s a giveaway at the bottom, but you have to read the post to get to it. Promise you will?)

This is my third post in this series. You can read the other posts here and here. We are more than three-quarters of the way through the year. It’s time to check in on those resolutions!

So… the resolutions… well…

You guys, I have no excuses. I mean, I have plenty of them. They just all stink. I weighed myself recently and I weigh almost exactly as much as I did in the beginning of the year. In a way this is progress because last year I put on weight instead of losing. This year I maintained. Baby steps, amirite?

I could rehash all my shortcomings again, but why bother? The issue is that I have some pretty big hurdles between me and my goals and I haven’t come up with effective strategies to deal with them. In this post, I’m supposed to tell you how I plan to recharge and reignite some of the excitement I had earlier this year. The truth is I have no idea. The days are getting shorter, it’s already colder than I’d like it to be, and a schedule change has made it impossible for me to work out at all during the week (not that I was working out, but the possibility is killed dead at this point). In fact, I’m going to have to learn to be one of those people who cooks and preps food on the weekends just so I can keep my head above water during the week.

I guess my plan is to figure out how we’re going to eat mindfully when I don’t even really have time to make a grocery list.

(When I no longer have a lunch break most week days, the ZonePerfect Bars are going to come in handy what with their not needing to be cooked and requiring no clean up! Go ZonePerfect Bars!)

I’m also supposed to revisit the letter I wrote to future me earlier this year. In case you missed it, here’s the letter:

Dear Future Me:

Hey, what’s up? I hope you’re not still fat. Haha, kidding. Sort of. Seriously, did you get your act together? I hope so. You need to be strong and healthy to watch your kid grow up, write your memoir, and empty your house.

Wait a second, how old are you now Future Me? If this is 6-months from now Me, it’s fine if you didn’t accomplish this stuff yet. But if you’re 5 years from now Me and this stuff still isn’t done, what the what?! Come on, Me. You had 3 goals in 2014. I’m disappointed in you.

Oh. This letter was supposed to be encouraging. If you did the stuff, yay you! And I know you did because Present Me was pretty adamant that this stuff would get done. Past Me was the one all about slacking off. I hope you’re on to newer goals and newer challenges. You better be.

Don’t let us down, Me. Keep growing, or some other inspirational message. Also, work on your pep talks.

Kind regards,
Present Me.

Obviously I’m pretty disappointed in myself for not accomplishing what I wanted to but the year’s not over yet, so there’s still some hope. Let’s go with that: There’s still hope!

As previously mentioned, I’ve got a giveaway all lined up here. One lucky winner will receive a well being essentials kit provided by ZonePerfect. Your kit will include a tumbler suitable for all* your drinking needs, a pedometer, lip balm, hair ties, hand sanitizer, a box of ZonePerfect bars and a coupon so you can buy more at your leisure. All you have to do is leave a comment on this post. Comments received by 11:59 p.m. on Saturday, October 18, 2014, will be eligible.

*I have no idea what sort of things you might want to drink but this is a cup and so I assume it will work for you. But if it doesn’t, sorry.

Mandatory disclosure is required for every program-related post. Although I have entered the program and received complimentary product and ZonePerfect promotional items, I am free to comment about ZonePerfect in a positive, neutral or negative fashion.

AND THE BIG WINNER IS… Rachel!! Congratulations on winning the wellness essentials giveaway! I’ll be contacting you by email to claim your prize!

Adapting the Talk.

I recently took a trip which was to be exactly what I know I needed: time to recharge, time to think about, talk about and be inspired by writing and creativity, and time to work on projects that are important to me. I thought I returned home motivated and ready to take on the world.

But returning home, in reality, meant jumping back into a world where creativity and personal projects get put on the back burner. Things like a sink full of dishes, a hamper full of laundry and a day job that pays the bills all get in the way of doing what I actually love to do. Returning home meant being faced with new challenges and new drains on my time. How I feel about the challenges is irrelevant. Sometimes you just have to do the things you don’t want to do.

When I was a kid, just like any other, I didn’t want to do anything that didn’t immediately please me. “Tough shit,” my mother would say. “If you’d have just done it instead of complaining about it, you’d have been done by now.” Homework, a chore, grocery shopping or errands, it didn’t matter, this was my mother’s response.

When her health declined so much so that her responsibilities became unmanageable for her and therefore became mine, her tough-shit-just-do-it attitude didn’t wane. She just mixed up the words.

“Sometimes shit happens, ‘Chelle.”

So I do my chores. I’d be lying if I said I did them with little complaint but they get done. I do them first so that they will be done, the implication of my mother’s words of wisdom having lead me to believe that once the chores are out of the way the fun times can begin. That may have been true at one point, but it certainly isn’t true now.

By the time the chores are done for the morning it’s time for work and then when work is done it’s time for chores in the evening and when those chores are done it’s time for sleeping. But sleeping is just for me and for no one else and it’s not a job someone pays me to do so it’s supposed to count as leisure time, right? And when I get done with sleeping: chores.

And I know that this is the same for every working mother. There are often more obligations than there are hours in the day. I know for some it’s easier and for many more it’s harder but I don’t think it actually helps any of us to know this since knowing we all have to do the dishes and fold the laundry doesn’t actually get the dishes done or the laundry folded.

What I want to know is how they all manage their dreams? We obviously can’t have it all as we may have been told, or at least not all at once. Do I need to just wait and my time will come or is that just another lie I tell myself so I keep getting up to do the dishes?

My mother’s dreams died while she sat on her couch. If I could tell her now that I have dreams, would she adapt her tough shit talk once again?

It Doesn’t Always Feel Like Progress.

There’s a line from The Glass Menagerie, or part of one anyway: Please don’t think I sit around.

It’s important for you to know that when I think of that line, I think of it being performed by The State. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, that’s really sad because The State is awesome.

So anyway, I haven’t been writing as much, but please don’t think I’m just sitting around. Quite the opposite actually, and I have the aching hips to prove it. And knees. And ankles. And back. And shoulders. Pretty much the only thing that hasn’t been hurting lately is my hair. What’s that? You’ve seen my hair? Oh, then you know that’s been hurting, too, just in a different way.

My word for 2014 is Purge. I’ve been working on purging our house of every inessential thing. That has made me very, very busy.

I recently had a yard sale. Here are two of my massive piles of stuff:

And here you see it all on display on my front lawn. And my driveway. Not pictured is the other side of my lawn and my neighbors driveway. That, my friends, is A LOT OF STUFF.

I’m happy to report I sold about 75% of it. I mean, who can’t do without a little extra income, right? I donated a full (and I mean FULL) carload as well, so I would say about 90% of what I started with did not come back inside. 100% would have been better, but there wasn’t any room left in the car.

After lugging stuff out of the attic, down to the first floor, and more from the basement up to the first floor, then outside, then some of it back in, then out, then even-less-but-still back in, it took me 3 days to be able to walk up stairs without wanting to cry.

This weekend I have to work on my son’s room which feels like a landfill sometimes. He’s sloppy and has a lot of toys and such, which becomes a deadly combination. You can have a lot if you’re neat. You can be a little sloppier when you don’t have that much. But you can’t be both. I mean, I guess you can because he is, but I can’t deal with it in my house.

The other task for the weekend is prepping my basement for a revamping of our French drain, adding an additional 19 feet to it, and installing a new sump pump and well system. I have to move everything from the walls (more than you’d think) and make sure the workers can get where they need to be. It’s more work than I feel like doing, but it needs to be done.

Why do I tell you all this? For a few reasons:

1. This is what I’m doing instead of blogging. Obviously I’m blogging right now when I should be doing those things, but give me a break, would you?

2. This is all part of my path to a more minimalist lifestyle which I’ve decided you all need to read about.

3. It’s all I’ve been doing and I’ve neglected the blog, so…

4. (Here we are, bringing it full circle back to the title!) Sometimes it just doesn’t feel like I’m making any progress. I do and I do, and I go and I go, and the next morning I look around and there is all this doing and going that still needs to happen. But that’s life, I suppose. If you’re feeling it, too, I guess it’s good to know we’re not alone. If you’ve got a story to tell me about how you were once like me and you ran out of things to do and reasons to go, I’d love to hear it.

The purge is on, my friends, even when I’m too tired to tell you about it.

I’m adding my post to the moonshine grid at yeah write. You can read more posts by clicking the badge, or you can add your own!

Michelle Longo

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