Goals and Dreams

I was just thinking about how in my long life (yes long, I'm turning 60 this year) I've had so many dreams and goals, and I forced myself out, and made most of them come true. OK, so I never did the Alpaca farm thing or the bed and breakfast, but I did do a LOT.

I've never been one to sit still for long. I have this 7-10 year rule. Time to move on. Poor kids, I went back to school when they were young so they had to share me with projects and books. Then my new career when they were teens. Maybe that's why one of them had a baby before she graduated. Oh well, none of us are perfect, are we?

In high school, I wanted to go to school in Paris. It took a long time, but I went to Art School in France, Lacoste, not Paris, but I did get to Paris. I wanted to travel the world, and I have seen a lot of it. I spent a ot of time in China. I became the designer I wanted to be, but product design, not clothing. My daughter fills that position with her clothing designs.

I've done a lot in my life. I raised two kids, lived in the city, lived in the country, lived in a few different states, and spent some time in other countries. I've been a store detective, an accountant, sales clerk, a gas station manager, a jeweler, and a product designer, I even worked in a drapery sweat shop.

I live my life without many regrets. That's just the way I roll. I never wanted to look back and say, I wish I had done it differently. OK so maybe I wish I HAD bought that bed and breakfast in Geneva on the Lake and had a go at it. But then a few of my precious grandchildren probably wouldn't have been born. Someone else finally bought that house that had been sitting on the market for so many years. It was a mess, but I loved it. But 40+ windows that needed to be replaced, on top of other repairs, were just too much for me to handle at the time.

So what's left? I still haven't been to the Pyramids of Egypt. And I won't go until the country is safe. Although I had a friend who went with the Smithsonian tour and said they were well protected. I've been to Italy, but not Rome, to see the Sistine Chapel, but I did see a representation of it.

I want to build my own tiny house, but I have to buy the property and I'd better do it soon, before I get too old to move my body. I still have goals, like making my own business be a success. Oh yeah, and get a car that actually runs. Dreams.....

Goals and Tiny Houses - Setting and Keeping

Love this little cottage - click pic for more info

When I make goals, I do it in a big way. When the kids were little, I wanted to go back to school. I did  (even though it took me 11 years to graduate). In High School, I wanted to go to school in France, I did (Summer abroad in college). I wanted to become an artist/designer (from a very early age, maybe about 5) and I did. I wanted to travel around the world, and got to do that with my career. I've also started reading again, something I've wanted to do for years and made easy with my kindle.

It's really been about 5 years since I've had goals. I went through a period of depression when I lost my job, and decided I didn't want that life anymore. I really had decided it, before I lost the job. I hated working for the type of arrogant jerks that my business forced me to. It does seem, however, that working freelance, makes them a bit easier to work with. I recently returned to freelance and I get paid cash plus commission. I also have my online craft stores, as many of you already know.

There are still a few places I'd like to travel to. And when I can work AND collect retirement, I plan to do a lot of traveling. That will be soon. I will live meagerly so that I can travel, because my retirement will not be too great. Maybe my freelance income will pick up too. You never know.

I recently have set a new goal, but I'm not sure how I can accomplish it but I will figure it out. I want to build myself a tiny house, pretty much by myself. The issue is not so much the building of the house. I can do that pretty easily if I can do it fairly soon, before my old body gives out. The issue is finding a small lot, close enough to a city that will allow the building of a tiny, off the grid house.

Most cities have a minimum square foot limit, and I'm not even sure a trailer park will allow you to build something without wheels. There are small lots here, but our county will only allow a certain size lot for septic and well. They don't have provisions for composting toilet or water cistern, which I plan to use. I also hope to use minimal electricity via solar panels and maybe corn pellet heating. I'd also like to use as much scrap/junkyard material as possible.

This one is portable and has a porch - click pic for info

It's a dream, I'm not sure will come to fruition, but I won't give up on it. I would really love to design and build a house all by myself (cept maybe a little heavy lifting, like the tub. I built a big shed mostly by myself with one hand (the other was broken). I raised the walls myself with levers. The house I plan on building is not much more complicated than the shed. I can do wiring and plumbing too. Of course if you want to come and cheer me on, you're more than welcome.

Resources tinyhouseblog.com  - tumbleweedhouses.com 

I Want to be a Writer

I've wanted to be a writer for some time now. It's not like I haven't done enough things in my life that I need to be successful at something else.

Maybe because of the ADD, I really seem to like variety. I do a thing for maybe 5 to 7 years and then I get bored with it. I can't imagine ever doing the same thing for my whole life. So not me!

So I'd like to write, maybe a book. But what do I write about? How do I compete with all the other with all the other writers out there? There are so many writers, what do I write and how do I complete? I'm obviously not that great at competing in the handmade jewelry business. I am however, fairly decent in residential lighting design, as there are very few of those by comparison, but I've been doing that for 17 years on and off.

Maybe I need to do a little research and compare book subjects. I can pick a seldom used topic. There, that's it. Or maybe I could just spam away on twitter like others I get followed by do. Follow and drop, there, that's the ticket.

Or maybe I should just join a convent. I've never done that before. Are there convents for agnostics?