Moving On

So this is what they pulled out of our sewage.
Yesterday it was a leak in the soft water system. What next? 

The bank called to say that we can refinance at a lower rate if we choose too.
Just what we needed to push us towards selling, sooner than later, on a 7 year plan, instead of a 30 year plan. 
Make that a 2 year personal plan for retirement.

The plumber said it would cost $5400 to replace the ceramic sewage pipes with a stronger fiber glass one. This would prevent the tree roots from creeping through the shifting, disjointed ceramic pipe that will continue to clog the drains.
My husband said, "Just clean out the pipes, without replacing them, and we will take our chances on the pipes not shifting anymore.  What are the chances of that happening in earthquake territory?
So our, not so old house, has an old house problem.
Maybe, we should stop watering the trees so the roots won't grow through the cracks in the pipes.

The night before, my husband put in the new water softener;  but not before a slit to my wrist.
It's late, I need to make a salad. With an exacto knife, I am rapidly slicing through the water softener's cardboard box so it will fit in the recycle bin.  Although it's only a minor scratch from a misguided stroke, it drew a vertical blood line across by wrist.
Just thinking of cutting my wrist, I feel faint, as I apply pressure to stop the bleeding.

The following day the stock market plunged another 300 points for the week; including my gold that sunk $100 per share. At a meeting that day, I showed our financial adviser the blood line slit on my wrist.  An omen?  I didn't sell my gold. At it's lowest price, I can always make coin earrings. 
We are getting into annuities. I hear people talk about them all time, but it's a mind set you have to get into, in order, to go down that path. Although, a more secure return; investing in an annuity is not cheap. You have to find a company that has a history of integrity and management skills.  You have to know the people holding your money.


Thinking about moving on, from California to Montana, I have already started boxing up items to send to our Montana house. The hardest thing about boxing up stuff is knowing what to keep.


It's true that when I give something away, I need it the next day.
I forgot I had it, until I found it. Then I decided that since I didn't need it before I found it; why keep it now?
I don't go to Thrift shops anymore for fear that I will buy back that thing that I didn't need until I gave it away.

I kept my 1960's navy blue hip hugger bellbottoms for years, thinking that my girls may want them someday.  I finally decided I was tired of hanging onto them and gave them away. 
Around 2001, my youngest daughter saw a picture of me wearing them and said, " I wish you still had those bellbottoms!  I would love to wear them."
When we purchased our first California car in 1977, a banana yellow Nova with a V8 engine, my youngest daughter didn't want to be caught dead in it in 1993 when she was in the 4th grade. But in 2001, after I had sold it, she thought it would have been a great car to drive around.
I did hang onto my Maxi high school tweed coat and mother's 1950 fashionable winter coat that my daughter likes to wear.
I am always second guessing myself on everything. Maybe, we should have kept our solid oak, antique kitchen table or our old player piano.  Yes, I could have a storage room full of stuff.  
The "American Pickers" channel have people hoarding, for decades, original old signs and car parts; rusted out, but selling.
One person's possession is another person's desire.
The only problem is finding that one person with that desire.  In the meantime, it goes into storage for another billion years.
 
I am sure van Gogh is kicking himself for selling his Irises painting for 300 francs in 1889;
when he could have gotten 53 million dollars in 1987; but then, he would have been 134 years old.   
The chances you take. 
Moving on is not a risk when 'downsizing' from one life style to another in this uncertain global economy.
The risk comes from not knowing what to keep that will one day become more valuable.