I stay home most of the time. Number one, I'm a homebody, and I like wearing comfortable clothing and eating and drinking for a reasonable price without tipping someone for taking care of me. Number two, while I have a lot of potential earnings that may be realized this year, it has been very lean for several months and I don't have money for coffee shops and concerts, restaurants, bars, theater, the movies, etc. Movie night here means I pop some real popcorn (cheap! healthy!) and we rent a movie on Amazon for a couple of bucks - I still also occasionally reserve DVDs from the library and watch those.
In the winter months, I avoid the gym like, well, the plague, which I don't care to get. I got my 2nd round of covid late last year and the gym is about the only place I went without a mask so I felt certain I got it there, and I didn't want to repeat that so now my motto for winter months is outside only or inside the house. I have a variety of hand weights, bands, and a cheapie walking pad/treadmill as well as an under-desk cycle I bought when I had a good paying job, and that's my exercise for those months.
But I do get bored, and extremely restless, especially once climate change begins showing super early signs of spring like green shoots in my yard, sunshine, and temperatures over 50. My son informed me this morning that his Spring Break week is with me, and I wish I could take him somewhere fun.
I am trying to plan one single vacation this year with him but that won't be until June. It will be warmer and better to take the trip then, if I can pull it off with the help of friends and some creative planning.
I hate to think of him rotting all day in his room watching TV or his phone while I continue to pound away on the keyboard trying to get someone to pay me for my words. I do this every day and a break would be nice.
I'll probably try to come up with something small we can do that isn't too much money. A day trip somewhere funky, maybe one overnight at a hotel (he loves hotels). But I'm so tired of cheaping out. I've been cheaping out most of my life.
Sometimes I wish I didn't care about shit like so many other people and I could just run up a giant fucking credit card bill and take him to Los Angeles or Phoenix or something. A big trip with lots of memories. The time is slipping away where I have time to do stuff with him. In three more years he may be gone from home for good. I wrestle a lot with an indulgent splurge that I could charge up and pay off over (hopefully) a year's time or continuing to pinch pennies, come up with stupid crap for us to do in the town we're tired of looking at, let him rot while I rot.
I was thinking yesterday about how much I wish I didn't have the hangups I do. I imagine other people without said hangups live a freer, more active, and fuller life. I see lots of friends taking couple trips, solo vacas and family vacations to places I'll be lucky if I ever see. Friends going to packed concerts without a concern in the world about getting covid and dying. Friends going to theater regularly, supporting the arts and staying networked and involved. Does everyone just have more money than me and I'm a failure? Or do they just not give a shit about debt so they're charging life so they can live it fully?
My son wanted McDonald's after the band concert last night and I took him. I got some fries and ate them and then felt guilty the rest of the night, and still today, for a single indulgence in something that many people eat several times a week without guilt or shame.
And what is all this for, when we will all end up the same place?
Sometimes I want to say fuck it and blow my entire credit card budget doing fun stuff. But I kind of did that in my 20s and all it got me was a lot of debt that I carried for decades before I had the money and discipline to pay it off.
I don't have any answers today, just a lot of questions and discontent.