Coffee Chat: Just Chatting

 

I hadn't checked the USDA guidelines for food costs in the last few months.  I watched a See Mindy Mom vlog this past week and she mentioned that costs for her family based on the Low-cost chart was nearly $1000 a month for a family of five.  I looked at the proposed costs for a two-person household.  I'm budgeting lower than they suggest I could be spending, but only just barely less.  Good to know.  I've only used those guidelines to ensure I'm not thinking in governmental spending terms. I noted that the site has added a new budget line for Alaska and Hawaii, where food costs are higher than in the continental U.S. 

Do you routinely check that site to see how your spending falls in line?

One of the most fun challenges I've given myself is using the older items in the freezer and pantry.  I have not begun to dig in the cupboards, though now and then in a week I'll think of some item that I know is near or just past expiration that ought to be used.  We've eaten some really delicious meals, too.  

Here's what I've learned about myself during this challenge. I  want to 'save' items that I consider more expensive even if I did buy them on sale.  Even if they cost less than items I'd purchased at full price that I consider to be frugal meal choices, like chicken or ground beef.  Kind of silly of me.  So rather than enjoy the excellent bargain-priced cuts, I'll keep making what I consider to be the 'cheaper' foods.  The result of this push to use up the saved items that had gotten old, but were not, thankfully, freezer-burned is that for the past month, we've eaten what my Granny would have called, "High on the hog", which means essentially that we're getting the good stuff and not the offcuts.

Where the pantry is concerned, I find the reason I have expiring items is because I've bought things that others recommended as good pantry items...even though we don't generally use them!  A second thing I've done is grab things that were on a clearance shelf because they are typically more expensive items that were reduced to an affordable price...See a pattern there? Yeah, me too. 

The third flaw I've found in myself: saving odds and ends and never using them.  Just today John and I noted we had about six bags of chips open in the pantry.  I'll lay odds that six of those bags are down to the crumbles at the bottom but frugality demands I hang on to those bits that no one wants to eat.

Now I'm scrambling for recipes to use these items and vowing to not repurchase them. I overbought a few items (hello, tomato soup, jello, instant puddings...)    The pantry items demand I get far more creative in my cookery, not the freezer items.

But true confession time, as much as I've enjoyed this challenge to use up foods that have lingered too long, I'm also tired of it.  I want some of our favorite meals instead of being endlessly creative.  That said, I plan to stick with it a wee bit longer.  I think it's a good exercise

I played with our budget for the second quarter. Not one penny more income is coming into this household. We do not have fewer bills. It was just a matter of determining what we wanted from the money coming in.  I knew we needed to create a gas and maintenance budget for mowing.  I looked at each item of our budget and made some hard decisions about what we were spending and how we could trim them a bit more.  I made it work.  

Now it never fails that if I find a little room in the budget I'll also discover that a bill has gone up $10 a month or there's a new item that must be added and the wiggle is immediately gone but that's okay.    How nice to see it there and then go "Oh okay, I can take that from here..."  In my experience, budgets are never stagnant.  They seldom stay the same for three months at a time.

However, one of the bonuses of the recent budget work was the choice to set aside a monthly amount towards a trip to St. Augustine.  Technically we've been saving here and there since December, but now I'm concentrating on it harder.  And when that fund is sufficient I'll amp up gift/birthday savings so that we can tackle Christmas without incurring expense.  We'll be committed to these savings rather than fritter our money away.  

And no we're not cutting out things we enjoy either.  I'm still buying flowers.  We still have an entertainment budget.  John is very adamant that both of those remain.  And I'm learning to curb his enthusiasm for spending on this and that.  Mind you he's not selfishly spending.  John never spends money on himself. But the man thinks nothing of giving a child $20 for a bookfair or fundraise, buying me a $27 bag of coffee, or spending $12 on out-of-season strawberries.  The trouble is that he never buys those things out of his pocket.  He hands me the receipt and I'm left to figure out where that bit is coming from.  I'm reminding him more often, "That doesn't fit in the budget and if we get it, we'll have to cut out something else, perhaps even something we need."

The yard at present is looking so pretty.  I've tons of Iris blooming in far more colors than I realized I'd had.  I have the white heirloom iris from Debbie, the golden yellow from Grandmother, a deep purple that I'm fairly sure was from Granny's as well as a pinkish-toned one, then a two-toned purple that I think I got from Mama's former next door neighbor and finally a dirty yellow looking one that Mama had shoved in a pot.  I have a maroon-colored iris from Angela that I am waiting to see if it blooms this year.  I can't quite remember exactly where I planted them, but I know they are somewhere around the Gingko tree.

This morning, as we were leaving home, I told John that I would have to divide my iris again.  This is something that is a continual thing.  Iris here multiplies quickly.  I said, "Perhaps I'll put some around that Chinaberry tree there in the middle of the yard and my husband shocked me.  "I think they'd be just beautiful there.  Do it."

I have dianthus blooming and coreopsis is up and budding.  The gladioli that refuse to be removed from the area right next to the house foundation,  have grown and grown this year.  Every year, I dig down and remove bulbs which promptly forget they grew in the poorest soil in the yard and die elsewhere, then the very next year there is a whole new crop of new glads up in the same spot.  This year I've resolved to leave them alone.  The very slow-growing Clematis has never bloomed but this year it's four times as tall as it was last year.  One day...as long as it is determined to grow, I am determined to remain hopeful that it will bloom.

And then there are the roses blooming.  That deep burgundy antique one that Nancy gave me years ago and the New Dawn has slipped in a few early blossoms.  The unnamed rose from Aldi showed up this time as a beautiful pinky coral and golden yellow.  I never know what bloom I'll get from that one.  I think there must be two or three grafts on that one plant.  The deep coral rose that blooms all summer that I bought from the clearance rack at Lowe's last year is looking lovely and has budded up.  Even that stubborn yellow rose is coming up between the porch floorboards once again.  When we get those steps redone I plan to see if we can't dig that root out from under the porch and then I'll plant it somewhere that it can just bloom for all it's worth and grow as it likes.  

The gardenia is putting out buds, the hydrangea is getting ready to push out buds, the phlox and salvias from last year (part clearance-priced plants, part sales plants) are all looking incredible as are the chrysanthemums and pansies from last fall. 

I told John that seeing all these plants makes me so happy and reinforces my determination to work on planting perennials that will bloom all through the summer.  

I mentioned earlier this week my disgust with USPS.  Honestly, I have a fondness for the USPS.  My dad was a mail carrier before his retirement.  So I have a personal attachment to the Post Office.  Mail in the rural areas is a big deal.  I well recall Granny receiving mail order packages from the mail lady.  It's one facet of shopping online I truly love. 

Our main mail carrier is a lovely woman who has worked this route for years.  She delivered Granny's mail, that's how long she's been on this route.  She is always friendly and upbeat.  Now the one who spots for her on her days off, you can have him.  He's prone to shove a too-large package in the box, or leave it propped against the mailbox pole rather than drive up to the house as Mary does.  And if he is forced to come up the drive one of two things will occur.  He'll leave a notice saying we weren't home when we are to avoid the drive, or he'll bring up the package but not the loose mail items which means going down to the mailbox to fetch them.  Mary will bring up the packages and the loose mail and if we are not home, she places the package on the back porch and loose mail in the box on her way back out of the drive.

I also like going to the post office or did.  Often it was a place to meet others and see people that one seldom saw otherwise, like going into the local stores or the library.  It is true, however, that most of the people I knew have died since they were all much older than myself.  The new employees are not friendly.    

The personal touch and human connection are quickly being removed from so much of our lives that I want to cling to what remains.   Everything is distanced, and self-serve (think ATMs and check-outs at the store).  I stubbornly refused to use the ATM for the longest time because I wanted personal contact with the teller even if it was through a glass window until they closed up the windows and put in vacuum tubes, a camera in your face that reveals you to the teller but doesn't allow you to see them and then I figured it was easiest to just use the ATM since I wasn't interacting with anyone anyway.  It was even worse during the trying time of our lives when doors closed and stayed closed far longer than suggested.  

I've heard much about the libraries Libby app which sounds perfectly nice until you consider that half the fun of going to the library was that it offered the opportunity to speak with the librarians who would make recommendations of books that fell into your preferred genres, or even shook you out of the ruts you'd gotten in by urging you to try something entirely new.  And then there's the whole sensory thing of handling the books and smelling the pages.  Alas, I get double vision if I stare at a Kindle screen too long and I have an aversion to the black screens with white type.  Don't ask me why but I find them mighty irritating.

 We are losing much with all of this contact-free business.  What's next?  Will we sit down before a machine that will automatically cut our hair based on a pre-selected style?  Will we lose the ability to make small talk with strangers?  Will we forget the common human courtesies?  What if we did the radical thing and opted to wait in the long line with a clerk who would ring up the groceries?  And what if we dared to say, "How's your day?" to a perfect stranger?  Or smiled and thanked them?  Gasp!  Could we survive doing such as that?

Don't get me wrong.  There is much to love about the online world.  I can find nearly anything my heart desires or something I need without hearing, "Oh we don't carry that.." "Sorry, but we can't get one in on the next shipment."  I love having information and knowledge at my fingertips.  I'll be the first to take up my phone and look up a new word or a quick study on a country I've never heard of, or to discover a musician or artist that is mentioned in a book or on a blog.   I still love mail-order clothing.  I just do, because it's a nostalgic thing for me and it saves me countless hours driving.  But I am also nostalgic for things like friendliness and neighborliness and people who know their business and can actually give you an answer.  And for faces that recognize you and smile when they see you approaching.  Those are all disappearing far too quickly.  Say what you like, it's just not the same when a computer program pops up a box that says, "Hi, Terri..."

I know that things can't always be as they used to be.  Yep, got that memo a long time ago.  But it's not going to stop me missing chatting with the clerk. The world is getting increasingly lonely for many people and part of that reason is generated by the push to do more online activities.  

Since I'm no longer keeping Caleb, and I only have Millie for a couple of hours here and there, I've been trying to find my way in this season of life.  So much changed over the two years we had Caleb.  I mentioned that Sabbath candle lighting fell by the wayside.  John was invited to participate in a ministry that takes up a Saturday each month.  While Caleb was here we found that unless we left home on a Saturday, we ended up 'babysitting' just as we'd done during the week.  Not saying Katie expected it but Caleb did.  He'd follow the weekday routines and he expected us to be there to give him that structure.  We wanted, Katie and ourselves, for him to see his Mama as an authority figure and to form a routine with her while she was off.  So we left home, which ensured that Katie had time alone with her children and had the opportunity to be a prominent figure in that little boy's life.  After Katie moved, she asked us to plan to come by on Sunday for dinner after church.  She wants the children to have that routine visit on the weekends.

When Katie moved, I didn't even blink.  Between renovations, holidays, and resettling the house after the renovation work was done, there was no time to wonder what this new season would look like.  Now it's impacting me.  

At the same time, as I look at the amount of work that has typically fallen to me (painting porches and sheds, routine cleanings, gardening), I find that while I very much want to see those things done, I don't have the inclination nor the time to work as hard as I did four years ago.  In fact, it's necessary to work at a much slower pace.  Add interruptions from John who has no respect at all for my busyness, days that are often unpredictable based upon who needs me that day, or what John has planned to do, and the usual amount of stuff that must be done, I often wonder if I'll ever again catch up on things.

The truth is that now that I am seldom alone, my time and energy are stretched to cover far more than before. Once I find a recognizable rhythm I might get more done.  But right now, tas I write this,  I am looking for ways to make the work I do more lasting so that I have to repeat things like painting less often.  Plant more perennials and fewer annuals.  Find a paint that doesn't show dirt and mildew as easily as what we have now does.  Ask for John's help.  That is one I find hard.  I'm accustomed to doing things myself, doing them in my way, and accepting that he wasn't here to help.  Only now he is here.  He's not going to help with the gardening part.  He's made it very plain that he has no interest but he will help with other tasks.  

But I'm also having a hard time getting my head organized.  What exactly do I want my life to look like?   We've had to abandon so many plans.  Not enough time, not enough money, not enough want to...but there are many things we both want to do separately and together.  We are finding it necessary to be selfish with our time, as we were when John worked a demanding schedule and our time alone was so very precious. We grew accustomed to being 'on demand' during the past four years for various child- care duties.  Now we're reassessing how often we say "Yes".    We want to spend time with the grandchildren.  We want to spend time doing some of the things we want to do.  We are in a limited time frame.  They will grow.  We're getting older.  We may not be fit to do the things we hope if we push off our plans too long. It's a constant tug back and forth to try and decide how this time in our lives should look.  Frankly, that is not what I expected it to look like from this age.  I thought of it more as freedom, both financially and personally.  I hadn't realized that we'd be looking through the narrower end of  the telescope in so many ways!

Well dears, I've chatted as long as I can.  Time for me to get busy once more.  I hope you've enjoyed your coffee with me.  It won't be long before we're chatting over iced tea!

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