View Full Version : Saying Goodbye to 2013
catherine
12-30-13, 2:23pm
What are the things about your 2013 that you are happy to say goodbye to?
What are the things about your 2013 that you are sad to say goodbye to?
What are the things about 2014 you are looking forward to?
For me,
Happy to say goodbye to the expense of my MIL's house. Good riddance!!!
On the other hand I'm sad to have had to say goodbye to two of my kids' SOs. The one I wrote a few times about is happy in LA now. The other relationship (DD and her boyfriend) is newly dissolved. Just two days ago they made the final, mutual decision to part for good, and again, my heart is very, very heavy. I truly feel like I'm losing a son. I wish him well, and of course, I wish DD well and i trust her instincts to make the hard but right decision for her. But, man, it s**ks big time.
As for 2014:
Looking forward to paying down debt aggressively
Looking forward to getting to know DDIL better.
Really looking forward to "meeting" Grandson #1!
Looking forward to the promise that awaits.
Gardenarian
12-30-13, 2:58pm
Happy New Year Catherine! Sorry to hear about the losses in your family; I hope your kids are coping with the changes.
In 2013 - I learned a lot this year, in many different areas, and I feel much stronger. But I continue to learn how much left there is to learn.
I feel like this year my dd really stopped being a little girl and is now a young woman - expected, of course! Finding ways to keep our relationship close and fun as she grows up - I guess that will go on forever.
In 2014 I look forward to renewed health and vigor. The past two years have been very difficult but I am hoping I am done for a while (I like to think I had my 60k mile maintenance) and that I can move forward, rather than one step forward, two step back, as I have been doing. Younger next year!
We have some fairly loose plans for travel and I am going to take the entire summer off to enjoy life and leisure and doing nothing at all.
I'm also hoping to get my next level of yoga teacher training completed this year, and with it some small wisdom and grace.
My plans are to keep on, moving in the general direction I think I am supposed to go. Last year was, like the ickiest, and I am doing my best.
I sort of wish that I had specific goals, or something, but except for the usual stuff like better health and fitness, finding some new friends (or at least deepening my connection to the city in which I now live), worrying less about money and keeping the door, and my heart, open to welcoming a new cat here. He/she can be a used cat like all of my other pets, but that sweet creature and I will be new to each other.
Simply Divine
12-30-13, 5:04pm
What are the things about your 2013 that you are happy to say goodbye to?
What are the things about your 2013 that you are sad to say goodbye to?
What are the things about 2014 you are looking forward to?
I am sorry to hear about the breakups. I ended a long-term relationship a few years back; it was rough for a while, but also one of the best decisions I have ever made.
As for me, I am happy to say goodbye to thousands of dollars of debt paid off in 2013. I would add it up for posterity but it would take a while, going month to month with various loans/bills. I'm not sure if doing that would make me feel happy it was paid off or sad I was in that much debt in the first place. :sick:
I am sad to say goodbye to my $45 cellphone unlimited month-to-month plan. The $45 is going to pay off debt. I am switching to a TracPhone (which actually is nicer and newer) but I will have to curb my data habit as I now have a yearly limit. WiFi and transferring from the computer is my modus operandi now.
I am looking forward to becoming more flexible and peaceful due to yoga and learning what "enough" is.
Teacher Terry
12-30-13, 5:08pm
Awesome that you have paid off so much debt:cool: Personally when doing that type of thing I like to add it up to see how much I have accomplished. But I could see where it might effect you in the opposite way too. I am looking forward to a vacation to visit 2 of my adult sons. We have not had one in a few years.
Simply Divine
12-30-13, 5:54pm
Awesome that you have paid off so much debt:cool: Personally when doing that type of thing I like to add it up to see how much I have accomplished. But I could see where it might effect you in the opposite way too. I am looking forward to a vacation to visit 2 of my adult sons. We have not had one in a few years.
I have paid vacation time and I have no idea what to do with it. It might end up being a "staycation" and I just do local things in the area for cheap or free.
I am happy to say goodbye to 2013 in general. It was a hard year, although a big one for growth.
I am happy to say hello to my newest baby, Veronica Rose, who will be joining us in March. She is happily and anxiously awaited by her sisters, brothers, parents and grandpa.
I am looking forward to the treatment my sister will be getting that could hopefully help reverse some of her paralysis. I am also looking forward to spending time with my nephew when we fly him out this summer. He is like my extra kid. We have a ton in common and he is such a sweet, creative, interesting kid, who has weathered more in 12 years than many people have in a lifetime. He has no other aunts, uncles or cousins other than us and he asked if he could come and spend time with us this summer because he needs to feel that support.
Gardenarian
12-31-13, 4:30pm
Stella -
just want to say hi and that it is so nice to have you back. I look forward to hearing about your children and your new baby (and what a lovely name you chose for her!)
I'm so sorry about your sister's health problems.
Bless you for providing a haven for your nephew. You are always an inspiration.
Thank Gardenarian! It's good to be back with all of you, too. I've missed you guys.
gimmethesimplelife
12-31-13, 4:58pm
I am very happy to be saying hello to community college and goodbye to food and beverage. I am happy to be reaching ever closer to the age of 50 with each passing day and to realize I've still got baggage from the past I need to work on. I'm happy to say goodbye to grieving that few of the plans I had when I was young worked out - time to let that one go. Rob
Simply Divine
12-31-13, 5:57pm
I'm happy to say goodbye to grieving that few of the plans I had when I was young worked out - time to let that one go. Rob
+1 Letting go of old dreams is something I need to work on.
2013 was a pretty good year for us. I can't think of anything I'm saying good-bye to other than numbers.
Like Rob, I am excited about going back to school. I started taking some classes at the community college in the fall and rediscovered my love of science. I have no desire to return to my prior engineering focus, but am going to take all the life science background classes I would need to apply for a PhD program at the university in a couple of years. I'll probably finish that course of study about the time DD goes to college.
And that's a big reason why I've not been online much in the past few months. I'm between classes now, but the spare time to read and study had to come from somewhere.
catherine
12-31-13, 6:11pm
I love this, which I just got on FB from SustainableMan.org
http://www.thethingswesay.com/img/4170.jpg
AmeliaJane
12-31-13, 7:27pm
On the personal side it's been a good year--healthy family, a nice summer vacation, and a new activity that I am really enjoying. But on the work side, I am happy to move on to 2014--we have a small division, and a key person passed away quite suddenly. We were not personally close but he was always good to me and had been at the heart of operations for over 30 years. Then we had another person quit, and it took us several months to fill that spot and we are continuing to train...another team member lost a parent after a long illness; our parent organization is also going through major personnel transitions in the wake of the first leadership change in decades which is having ripple effects on many of our projects. A lot of the changes will be good in the end, and we have had successes also, but it has just been one of those years when everything is three times as hard as it usually is and nothing comes easy.
Good effing riddance to the year of the CancerDance. May I never go through it again... though I sure did grow in my marriage & as a person. And deepen my commitment to constantly falling in love with The Long Now. Ah, life.
Simplemind
12-31-13, 11:13pm
Is it possible to spend an entire year holding your breath? Is it possible to be tense for so long that it becomes a normal state? I keep getting told that I have carried a lot but in fact I have carried nothing. Not a single thing that happened in 2013 was within my control. That is hell for a control freak...... Why do we want to control? Because we are afraid. 2013 was the year of button pushing fears. That is my glass half empty speaking. The glass half full learned to live in the present instead of regretting the past and planning the future. I learned that it wasn't possible to plan the future. I had to stay in the day we were in. My husband had a stroke (in retrospect, plenty of warning signs two doctors missed), lost his job, was not able to claim unemployment benefits, was denied disability and hired an attorney. My son became the man of the house, went out and got a job with benefits (we lost health insurance when DH lost his job). Husband did not recover as he had wished and began to have other problems, again missed by his doctor who continued to treat him for indigestion for two months until I put my foot down. He narrowly missed having a heart attack. The cardio told us he would have had it within the week had it not been caught. The couple days waiting for the surgery were like sitting on a time bomb. When he woke up the doctor told him he was going to feel a helluva lot better. Boy did he!! Within a week of the surgery we also got the news that he had been approved for disability. We now know what our finances are going to be (lost 80K a year) and we can live within them. He still has a long way to go on recovery but now we can concentrate on his recovery instead of worrying about money or me trying to find a job to cover the insurance. We didn't realize how stressed out we had been until we got word and the first check came in. This past month has been bliss because we were able to let that breath out. 2013 was spent grieving the life we had planned and learning to accept the new one. 2014 will be putting one foot in front of the other and walking towards the new one. We are feeling very blessed tonight.
What are the things about your 2013 that you are happy to say goodbye to?
Well, it's not a done deal yet but I will be ecstatic to say goodbye to the Phoenix house. Like your story of the money pit, complete with renters who caused > 3 month's rent worth of damage and other renters who were drug dealers. If we as a country are saying goodbye to the housing mess then that's great too.
I'm happy DH said goodbye to his psychotic coworker (OK, maybe no actual episodes of psychosis but probably histrionic personality disorder, possibly narcissistic and/or borderline coupled with pathological lying) when she was finally fired.
What are the things about your 2013 that you are sad to say goodbye to?
My grandfather passed away, our little 14 year old Shih-Tsu didn't make it through the year, and areas near me that were damaged by the flood are forever changed.
What are the things about 2014 you are looking forward to?
Hopefully finishing the selling of the house! Getting more involved in restoration work. Planting way more stuff in the garden/expanding the garden. Seeing if the fruit trees and bushes do OK over the winter. During 2013 we got a puppy who is now almost grown and bought a used SUV so I'm looking forward to having fun with both of them!
Teacher Terry
1-1-14, 1:55am
Simplemind, no one ever knows what will happen. My dad had a massive stroke at age 59 & could never work again. Due to good money management/frugal living & pension/soc sec my parents were ok. We are all one accident/illness away from not being able to work. It does not matter how much education you have-think stroke or head injury and you can be unable to work. Working in human services for the past 30 years has taught me this. Although I have saved & planned etc things happen that are outside of our control/finances no matter how frugal we have been. Life happens & I can be as judgmental as the next person when I see bad decision after bad decision but we all have to acknowledge that some things are out of our control. Really there is no right/wrong/black/white when really bad things happen to really good people.
I learned a lot about some of you in this thread. Thank you for sharing.
2013 was an ok year, not the most incredible or amazing or unique, but not near to what any of you have dealt with. It was more pedestrian than anything. I expect 2014 to be far different with baby arriving in April. In fact, I think I have finally chosen my phrase for the year - have been thinking about it for a few weeks. With the baby coming and changes at work and having had for quite a while now a gnawing desire to do something different for my contribution to breadwinning, I have chosen "be open." I can't control what motherhood, work or the way I feel about any of it will be like, can't control the offers of help and gifts and food and whatever (sounds dumb, but all of which are stressing me out) and need to be open to what will come and not try to so fiercely control everything, even controlling/planning my way out of every action. That includes letting my husband move ahead on the basement remodeling, a project I totally want to do but have been allowing anxiety to block any action (actually I think the anxiety is physiological and not really about the basement at all). So: "be open" = my mantra for 2014. Runners up included "flow" and "flexibility."
Welcome to a fresh year!!!
What are the things about your 2013 that you are happy to say goodbye to?
2013 wasn't bad for us, but the things we would have been happy to say goodbye to do not have really happy endings (the health of some family and friends and the divorce of some good friends of ours).
What are the things about your 2013 that you are sad to say goodbye to?
I'll squeeze it in here because the date is so close; our neighbor lady passed away a couple of days ago from kidney failure that really was the end of a long chain of illnesses. It's comforting to think she's no longer hurting, but it leaves a big hole in her husband's life. We hope to be able to help him in that journey. Otherwise, I don't think there was anything exceptional that ended last year.
What are the things about 2014 you are looking forward to?
Our car loan finishes this year and, with that, we will have only our mortgage and the investment property to think about. We are planning to cruise the Panama Canal with some long-time friends later in the year. I've never been near Central or South America, so I'm very much looking forward to the trip.
I'm also looking to forward to ramping up my photography business. I have one client now and may be landing another soon. And I haven't begun to promote the business yet.
First, want to say my sincerest sympathies for those who have struggled in 2013 -- Simplemind, so sorry to hear about everything your family went through in particular, and hope that things will now be on a permanent upswing for you in 2014 and beyond!
2013 was a year of transitions and surprises for us.
The first few months of the year were consumed by the effort of deciding on a new school for our kids. There were a lot of ups and downs as we evaluated different programs and tried (unsuccessfully) to secure financial aid at our top choice. In the end we decided to bite the bullet and go with the school that felt like the best fit, despite the cost. That meant needing to dramatically decrease the amount we were putting in long-term savings (retirement, college, and "pay off the mortgage any time" reserve fund), which was hard to accept (still haven't quite accepted it). In the end I think it has been the right decision, though, at least for now. The school isn't perfect, but it is MUCH better than where they were before and both kids have adjusted smoothly both academically and socially. DS is MUCH happier/more challenged and doing very well academically.
The financial blow of paying 50k+ out of pocket for schooling was offset nicely by the roaring markets this year, both stock and real estate. Our net worth has hit amazing heights with an increase of 27% this year on an already very strong base, and after running numbers over the holiday I have determined that we are more or less FI should we decide to quit our jobs and leave Beijing (though we could not sustain our current lifestyle here on our stash). A lot of our net worth is tied up in our pie-in-the-sky-lotto-ticket-of-a-luxury-apartment in Beijing, which makes me a bit nervous. We are closing in on the 5-year anniversary of our purchase, which means we could sell without taking a huge tax hit locally. What we decide to do with that depends largely on...
My career situation, which also is in major flux. My boss announced his departure very unexpectedly in the spring, and I was asked (and agreed) to step in as interim director of our office. I have applied for the permanent position but am not sure what will happen with that. If I get it and can get the significant increase in salary/benefits that should come with the new role, I will likely stay on for at least another 3-5 years. Not so much for the money (though earning more will certainly be nice!) but more for the challenge and adventure that comes with more responsibility and the opportunity to lead our organization into some new things. If I don't get it, I will need to see who they bring in and what they are like to work with. If good, I may still choose to stay on. If not, I will need to discuss with DH long-term planning. I would be fine with quitting, selling our apartment and leaving Beijing. He seems less willing to do that. I'm not going to push anything for now, as there is no point until I have a better sense of what I want to do.
The other major thing that has been in flux this year is MIL's health, and that has a huge impact on our long-term planning. Actually it isn't so much in flux as on a clear downward trend. While she doesn't have a fully confirmed diagnosis, we suspect that she has Parkinson's. She is declining both physically and emotionally and it has been very hard on DH, who is the oldest child and only son. He wants to be doing more to support her/the family, but that is hard to do from a distance. One of the options I suggested to him in conjunction with our FI status was moving to their town, but there are no decent schooling options for the kids there and he is not willing to consider homeschooling. Again, not going to push for something until I know what I want/need to do careerwise, but one possibility would be for us to set up a school ourselves. Nothing I am going to jump into now, but something for the "wait and see" files.
Given all of the uncertainty in our situation I don't really have a good sense of what 2014 is going to bring. I like fidgie's motto of "be open" and will just be trying to go with the flow as much as possible. We need to rein our spending back in after a very spendy 2013 (splurged on a family cruise that was worth it, but that blew our vacation budget sky high). Also focusing on health and wellness goals.
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