I know. It's not Wishville, but it's close. Were I more adept in graphic design, I'd beef this whole thing up to say "Welcome to Capitol Hill" with lots of big gay landmarks and stuff. QFC, table 219, a few tattoo shops... maybe that is season six level stuff. Where our heroine is back in the classroom, entrenched in term papers and thirsty for knowledge, has advanced her photographic prowess, and possibly has a real bedroom.
All that just made me realize that I have undoubtedly passed go, collected my $200.00 (and put it into a spreadsheet) and entered season five. Hi. I'm right here. You can eat now.
I just let out a big, contended sigh. Life's alright. (Suicide attempts a few hundred feet from my building notwithstanding.) I finally made a budget, for reals. Yesterday I was face to face with the prospect of attending three (!!!) Wrens shows in Hoboken during the first week of December, as they "retire" their early catalog and get ready to push forth into the newalbumosphere. And so I could go to the shows -- all of them -- on guest list, and stay with my cousin, and the airfare is only like $200.00 round-trip on the redeye both ways to Newark. Piece of cake, right? Right. I mean, I can find the money in my next paycheck.
Then I did my allocations off of next week's paycheck: bills due, recurring expenses, a start on the emergency fund -- and after it was all parsed out I had $421.00 left over. And I looked at it there, staring at me, and thought about it for a minute. Even if that happened every paycheck, the absolute best possible scenario, let's even round it up to $500.00 for the sake of math -- in the course of a year, that's twelve thousand dollars. That's like, a huge chunk of my debt! Like, close to all of it! And I sat there, and remembered hearing Kristin turn down going to shows, saying that she had other priorities even right now (even though said show would indeed be fully life-altering), and -- I just always wondered how she could put it down so easily. Now I know. I have seen endless, epic Wrens sets. I've been pulled on stage during a two-night stand in Chicago to play piano. I've fully lost my shit, covered in sweat, and experienced entire gear shifts in the mechanics of my existence. It would be great to see them again, but it would be even better to be out of debt and able to go see whomever I wanted, whenever I wanted.
Across the top of my budget spreadsheet it says, If you pay off your bills now, you will be able to pay for whatever you want. And it's true. And then it became easy to sacrifice, and to bite into not taking the trip (taking a trip, not taking a trip...). It also became easier suddenly to see a set of goals and an end point. With $400.00 left over on the next few paychecks, my car will be paid off. Done. Then that $300.00 a month will wipe out the next smallest credit card (especially with the extra $400.00 per check) and so on and so forth.
This all came about because (a) I got tired of being broke, (b) the cash thing is working for Kristin, so I tried it; and (c) the preliminary drive-by of a budget in my notebook one morning at the cafe had me sitting there, aghast, going, there is no fucking way I have $800.00 left over every month after bills, expenses, and even allotting for some miscellaneous stuff -- what in the fuck am I doing with my money?
And so it is. The workbook makes calculations and everything. With everything mapped out, five extra hours of overtime is like hitting the lottery.
Lottery. Sheeshus. I meant to write about being in like with my newfound dude-like emotional capabilities and how much fun it is lately to be having all the sex, but I guess I needed to write about that instead. But really -- it's so much fun to be having all the sex. I'll sit here for just a moment: yesterday, or the day before, I'm at Annie's and she goes, "How's Gary?" And I go, "How the fuck would I know, dude?" And then we both practically pissed ourselves laughing. Season five Victoria is a far cry from every other Victoria that's ever been. It's the little things like that that show me the difference between when I think I've got something figured out, and when I really actually believe something and it just figures out itself.
Oh, and the planets have shifted or whatever, PS. I suddenly got very unstuck, and actually found myself in the bathroom yesterday going, this shit isn't going to break me. Fuck that. over a particularly difficult set of tasks my boss had asked me to do. And I feel like that in a bunch of other subsections of my life too -- perpetually blissy, working hard, dealing with some hard shit but going through it all wrapped in this impermeable golden cellophane that keeps all the yuck out.
Sigh again. It's good to be back, you know, after the writer's strike and all.
xo
Viva.
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