How to Top 2012? More Love and Less Legal in 2013

Lady Bird Lake in May with all us Cap2Kers

2013 has snuck up on me fast and furiously.  I think I could hear the brakes squealing as November and December roared up, but I wasn't ready to have 2012 down in the memory books.  It was a whirlwind year.  Aside from all the stuff going on with Sinatra, mainly the legal shenigans that were a constant thorn in our sides, we managed a pretty good year together.  

Work rolled along steady, nothing new there.  I am actively searching for opportunities in teaching in my field but dutifully doing my same-ole, same-ole to keep the status quo.  I'm involved on the board of my state's audiology group and that has been an eye-opener in the span of my field's future.  No more head-in-the-sand mentality here.  Seeing how I'm slated to be the Prez next year, I've committed to staying informed from here on out.

I was able to get ready for my tri season with several long runs including a half-marathon and a 10-miler, a 2K lake-swim for prostate cancer, and a 150-mile bike ride for multiple sclerosis.  The tri season began and I went to a new level (for me) and competed in larger races to challenge myself.  I began swim lessons three times a week, and celebrated the year that had passed since I was dealing with breast cancer and going to radiation every day for 6 weeks.

Team Mighty Fine Cycling before the MS150

Travel was yet again my saving grace.  I was able to fit in two ski trips, one to Tahoe just Sinatra and I and our also-kidless friends, and one to Colorado with all the kids.   June brought another travel experience.. .Hello NOLA!  New Orleans with old high school buddies and lots of unmentionables.  Yes, at age 42+, we can still  have a weekend where we party like its 1986....we regress that much in a matter of a few hours and a few cocktails.

Sublimely happy to share this view
 with my girls

Late summer, Sinatra and I did a camping weekend with the kids, which was really a staycation in Waco for us. Its just too expensive and hard to please everyone to plan an elaborate week-long travel trip for a second time in one year.  We expend ourselves doing it for the ski trips and need a year to recover.   We managed a water park and cooking out and smores and sleeping 8 in a camper.  All in all super fun and hopefully a memory for them to cherish.


Side note: Does anyone see how many times I'm writing "we"? After my divorce it took a LOOOONG time to stop saying "we" and start saying "I" about everything I owned or did.  It used to be a conscious effort every time.  Guess that's all for nothing now that I'm back to a "we".  Its ok, I like it.

To cap off the summer Sinatra and I flew to Costa Rica.  Paradise, indeed.  It was a trip offered by my former boss and his family, and we couldn't refuse.  So glad we didn't.  My inner spirit was rejuvenated as we experienced the carefree beach life in Jaco.

Welcome to the Jungle....

The Fall is time for end of season triathlons and my racing buddies and I spent our last weekend in September making the most of a small-town but big-time tri, ignoring the wind, rain and cold, and warming up at one of the many wineries nearby in between events.  Enduring the weather during that sprint tri and relay-half-iron was its own tough-it-out challenge, but the company I kept made me so fulfilled and thrilled to be there.

This is me, looking for the wine.  Its promise led me to the finish, I'm sure 

They call this Smart Ass Red

Thanksgiving and Christmas rolled up, with both my girls' birthdays the end of the year is always here and gone in a blink of an eye. I will never have a breathe-easy, relax and think of the Reason for the Season as long as those girls keep having birthdays.  I told them this year, now that they are older and more interested in moula than toys, if they'd consolidate their birthday parties into a smaller group of girls, maybe out to dinner and a movie, rather than a huge production (we did TWO of those in a matter of 2 weeks), they might get some cashola in their stockings instead of Dollar-Store trinkets. 

At least that's what Santa told me.

But now its the new year, and since Sinatra's custody issues have been worked out, we are both much lighter for it.  His coming here bi-weekly on his off-kid weeks has been the best of both worlds.  I'm at work, he's working here when I get home, and its been real normal and calm.  Its a weird surreal feeling to be living in this new-fangled limbo, somewhere between living together and non-marriage, but then again, there isn't a timeline anymore and there isn't any rules we must adhere to, so who's judging?  

He's commuting for me and also his work, but since I'm not planning to make any moves closer to him either, then this is it.  Not really limbo.  Not really final either.  I sometimes allow myself to wonder how long can we do this?  Anything can change in the amount of time it will take for some or all of the kids to finish school.  But I will continue to hold onto this place we have created.  I admit I have my down thoughts at times when I miss him, but mostly I am doing well with our time together and our time apart.

Happy times...yes, we are a happy "we"

Someone recently asked me how long ago I divorced.  I responded "almost 6 years ago" and she said she remembered I was married, but wasn't sure when or if I divorced.  She noticed on Facebook how NON-married I acted with the man in my life, in the posts and pictures.  How revealing!  How I am nice and loving to him in the online public, and a married person noticed the difference and assumed correctly that this man is NOT my husband.  What to think about that? Hmmm.

One marriage down, I learned a few things about how to treat a partner.  I have learned to be more patient and more considerate, and not say every nasty thing that jumps into my mind when I'm irritated, and to shut the bathroom door when I go.  I try to make things even-steven financially, work-wise, and with the kids.  I remember the resentment when I wasn't being heard and I try to voice my issues in a way that demands attention but not anger.  Sinatra is even better at all of this than me.

As I have been a mother for over 14 years now, I can reflect on how my girls are becoming interesting and responsible little ladies, and I am pleasantly surprised as the days go by and they grow up before my eyes.  We have our fights and our fits but our happy co-dependence on each other in this household when it is just Us Women makes us recover from strife quickly, and there is plenty of laughter.  Our days are knee-deep in cheer, piano and volleyball and I love watching them make their way.

Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dah

I'm blessed to have a New Year to spend with this FAMILY that I have.


Here's to soaring off into 2013....

Wheeeeeeee!

The Walking Spenders Need a New Year Resolution

Is it over yet?

This holidays are supposed to be devoted to family gatherings and parties and shopping in crowded malls, right?  Then why do I feel like a zombie pushing my cart through HEB or walking from BFE in the mall parking lot?  For the past few weeks, I've felt like boarding myself up in the house and waiting until it all blows over and Spring Break has arrived.


I  did some of my Christmas shopping early, as I do every year when all the stores start to lay out giftboxes and play Christmas music.  I get in the mood like everyone else a week or so before Thanksgiving, and the emails with free shipping and exclusive offers and fairydust start popping up in my inbox.  I get some of it done because my girls have birthdays in November and December and its imperative that I get those out of the way early so I can concentrate on actual Christmas shopping.  The gift deluge before the gift deluge.  Its insane.

At least I don't do the Black Friday Invasion, mainly because I work that day every year, but also because people are generally stupid when a coupon or sale ad is screaming at them they MUST buy, like right now.  As if there won't be another sale in the coming weeks.  Waiting in lines wrapped around the store for another TV for the house, or a video game their kid will die without.  Save on the sale price but buy three times as much. Seriously. Not. Smart.

Zombies, that's what they look like waiting in those lines and wandering around the malls this time of year....or sitting in their cars in the extra-traffic that somehow invades our city this time of year.  I get it, Austin is cool as shit, but its time to Go Away.  We have enough Weirdos here without all the relatives of the Weirdos traipsing all over our Zilker-lighted tree and wreath-adorned Congress Avenue.

If forced to go in a mall, this is me.

The after Christmas-rush is just as bad.  Never mind that there really could be a zombie invasion some day.  I watch The Walking Dead, so it seems like the folks I see shuffling around may have already been bitten and have "made the change".  The return-lines, the giftcards you feel pressure to unload, the after-holiday "sales". It makes me want to stab myself in the head to end it all.

Its all so ridiculous.  We don't NEED anything.  I'd love to use my end of the year bonus to pay off the bills I've created all the rest of the year.  NOT to create even more bills with over-spending all in the matter of a six week time-span.  Fiscal cliff or not, we Americans, not just our President and Congressmen and women, but us regular Joes and Marys, are spending whores.

We all should be thinking of a New Year Resolution~ during the holidays, stop buying trinkets that nobody needs, and use your saved money and bonuses to pay off credit card debt.  Or better yet, pay down someone else's debt, and let them pay on yours.  Wouldn't that be better than another set of slippers?

TO: Uncle Charlie
I paid $50 toward your $697.49 VISA card balance
...dang, what have you been buying?
FROM: Your Niece

We will still buy things for ourselves, things we need and things we want, so the productivity and supply-demand will not go down.  My plan is economy-friendly.  There just won't be as much stuff for garage sales as there used to be.  Ebay may suffer.  We will have things we wanted, we had money to buy, or had a credit card without a high balance to charge.

I think its genius.

Anyone want to get started with my amazon.com VISA?

Let's get this Show on the Road!