Ruts, School, House, and God

Five days seems like a long time to be away from blogging, but things have been in flux. School has started, and vacation has ended. The hardest part of any vacation is returning to work, and finding your rut. 

The house has moved up in priority. The daycare that Row attends has stopped their after-school care, which means that we don't have a legitimate reason for a school transfer. We have been paying the daycare a small fortune to transport Row to and from school since we both work and have a "transportation problem" with getting Row to his assigned school. Our "assigned" school  is mostly minority (80-90%), on government food assistance (95%), and scored the lowest possible grades for educational success among the students. The daycare has provided us with a valuable service of a better educational opportunity for our oldest son.

Next January, when we start the yearly paperwork for a school transfer, we won't have the legal documentation necessary. We have been window shopping in the area of Row's current school, and the house are about the same price range. The big problem is selling our current house with a lot of houses on our street for sale, and affording the new one in the better school area while all on one income. We currently owe only $40,000 on our current house, but the problem is affording two houses while the old one is on the market. In the spring, I'm on track to take 18 hours next semester, with the additional senior level class, studying for my national certification for radiography, and moving the household across town. I've thought about putting the extra class on hold, but don't want to put my MRI certification behind a year.

So....here I am. I'm taking 16 hours while trying to get the house in marketable shape. My wife is working 2 extra nights a week so that I can get an education without going into debt. I'm "working" (read: no pay intership/clinicals) 24 hours a week while studying for four classes. Two of the classes are going to require at least 10 hours a week to get a B or better, and of course, I want the A.

The world's smallest violin

I know that God isn't supposed to put any more on a person than they can handle, and that does give me comfort. It still doesn't stop the worrying, or a few sleepless nights. When I started school, our pastor had a sermon on getting out of your comfort zone, and I felt God's tugging at my heart to get out of the restaurant business, and use my brain that He gave me. I took a step of faith, and started school. The restaurant that I started working at 24 years ago closed their doors about a week ago. They almost made their 25th year anniversary by three months. The smaller original Grill that I worked at remains open, and helped support the larger albatross of a restaurant. While I don't want to talk bad about my former boss, he has been too kind-hearted to a lot of people that should have been gone a long time ago. Of course, other things come into play such as increased competition, demographic shifts, and city expansion away from the restaurant, but not insurmountable if they had been dealt with early.

My scholarships have miraculously appeared when they were needed, and other things have fallen into place at the appropriate times. All of these things have encouraged me, and leads me to believe that He has a plan for me.

Anyways, I wasn't my intent to unload on the unsuspecting visitor, but rather put my thoughts into written form. Thanks for listening reading.

Keep Right On Prepping - K

Faith...

Please don't let the title of the post scare you off.

Faith is one of those things that I have a hard time grasping and keeping at times. I am a concrete sequential kind of guy. I find it easier to do algebra than geometry. I like my CDs in alphabetical order, and also by release date, if that gives you any clue as to how I roll.

I started college after hearing our pastor deliver a sermon on "Getting out of your comfort zone". I had been at the same job for a little over 23 years. I had gone through several bouts of burnout, and finally resigned to the fact that I had reached my apex at work. I hadn't had a raise in over seven years and had just found out that, "due to the economy", the one week paid vacation was gone.

The meat of the sermon was that if you aren't growing, you are becoming stagnant. He was talking to me. I talked with my wife about going back to college, and I started in the fall of 2010. I took six hours since it had been quite a while since my last period of education. I had stepped out on faith...this is what God wanted me to do. Not an "audible", as my pastor calls it, but that feeling or voice inside your brain.

At church, we had attended a Dave Ramsey class, and applied his principles to our lives. During these prerequisite years at college, we cut a lot of fat out of our budget. We paid off all of our credit cards and managed to save six months living expenses.  I started to find good deals using coupons and a log book, to build our stockpile for when I started school full time.

We gave up a lot of "fun things" to achieve our goals. We cut out a lot of eating out, dropped pay TV, worked extra jobs, and learned to live more frugally. I also received a $2000 grant this summer session, which helped to bulk up our one-income fund.

I quit my job about a month ago to take care of things around the house, and to go on a vacation. Hey, I wasn't going to be paid for anyways. We paid my tuition with a check on Wednesday, and Thursday I got an email from the lottery scholarship. After applying in December of 2010, I had finally made it to the recipient list as a non-traditional student.  It will cover all of the tuition and leave me with a surplus of $104.00/year.

Anyways, this post really isn't about my budget, but rather about listening to God, your inner voice, your gut instinct, or whatever you want to call it. Faith is a "belief that is not based on proof", but the results can offer proof of your faith.

A prudent man sees danger and takes refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it. ( Proverbs 22:3 )

I also have a gut feeling or faith that things are going to get a lot worse. Please get yourself in a good place, so things aren't as bad for you and your family. Buy a little extra water and food, get rid of debt. Mostly get ahead of the horde. Get yourself in a good situation, and get prepped. Listen to your inner voice. Faith is a "belief that is not based on proof", but the results can offer proof of your faith.