Making Plans. Yeah. Right.

Another glorious sunset...

It's been a busy few weeks, as my lack of attention to this site has demonstrated.  Not that I have millions of people out there hanging on my every word, but as I have learned over the years, writing is good for the soul.

We went to Denver and cleared out the storage unit, donating a pickup truck load of mostly clothes I'm way too small to wear now.  The moving company boxed up what was left, and the load has started the long journey to what has become our new(est) home.  

This has created a break point for us.  In the three years since we came to Hawai'i, it was always the plan to return to the Mainland (which is our term for the continental U.S.) at some point.  Having that storage unit there was a kind of promise that we would be back.  Now, that promise has been broken.  Having swallowed what feels like the world's second-largest mortgage, we are committed to staying here for the foreseeable future.  That's not a bad thing, necessarily.  We're both making enough to meet our expenses and continue to put money away for our retirement, whenever that day comes.  As long as we both work, we're good.  But if the day comes when one of us "has had enough," then we could be in a wee bit of a pickle.  

It's difficult to plan the unplannable.  If our recent history has proven to us, whatever we try to plan long-term, circumstance...or perhaps fate...has had a way of rendering plans irrelevant.  In defense, we've learned to be flexible; nimble on our feet to meet these new circumstances as they occur.  I suppose that could be called a strength.  What it is, is stressful.

We were able to spend time with our daughters in Denver, along with those two precious grandkids, who are growing up entirely too fast.  They are the kids of the COVID generation, growing up in the middle of one of the most serious public health crises in our history.  What stories they will tell their grandchildren!  

I think it's important to step back from the pressures of life and take a moment to appreciate the power of this historical moment.  It is a time to record our stories so that future generations looking back can uncover not just the large-scale facts, but the very human stories that we can leave to them.  I remember the impact of a book I read about the Dust Bowl, "The Worst Hard Time."  I can recount in general the facts of that meteorological and ecological disaster, but its important to know how those years affected the people caught in the middle.  So, I would encourage you to record your stories in a journal, or a blog, or somewhere where your great-great-grandchildren can access them and know in a very personal way what it was like to live during a pandemic.

I got to spend some time with our middle daughter, who remains highly intelligent, very sensitive, and always up for deep conversations.  I'd like to think we've both taught each other over the years.  Also, one of the things we did was prepare our youngest (a relative term at this age) to move to Hilo, on the Big Island where she is engaged in the clinical part of her training as an ultrasonographer.  She loves the field, and has nothing but good things to say about the town, way smaller than Honolulu.  It's nice to have her on this side of the Big Canal (Eastern Pacific).

To my great surprise, I was promoted at work.  I haven't been here all that long, but I like to think I've learned a lot in a short amount of time.  It comes with a pay bump, fortuitously well-timed.  We knew we were getting an old house, but we had plans for some immediate upgrades, like new windows and window air conditioners to improve the habitability during the summer.  This house retains heat like no place I've ever been, so we had to make that change anyway.  We had just paid for the second set of windows, when we noticed that the concrete supports holding up the carport roof were breaking apart.  Not wanting to see my Mustang crushed like a soda can, we engaged a contractor who quoted us a solid, if <gulp> expensive bid.  We have money in savings, but with this string of expensive hits, it's getting smaller than we feel comfortable.  Also, I start to draw social security probably by January.  That, plus the pay bump will lessen the pain of these expenditures.  We still have down the road some things that have to be done, re-habbing the existing bathroom and adding another one, as well as overhauling a 50's era electrical system.  That will come in time, provided we get through these current challenges.

It's been a complicated journey along a pitted and winding uphill path,  but we learn as we go, and hopefully acquire some form of wisdom along the way.  It's becoming scary to make plans, because of how badly they've been scrambled in the past.  But we can still dance to what has been a complicated piece of music.  

And here I thought retirement would be boring.