Reflecting on 2014, Family-building, and Possibilities

With the new year on the horizon, I've been in a little bit of a panic. I am no stranger to anxiety and panic attacks, and while this hasn't risen anywhere near to the level of panic attack (with work over the years, those appear to have mostly been dealt with), the anxiety is nevertheless present. I just cannot believe 2014 is over! Where did it go? I've been feeling like I must not have done anything with it because it barely seems to have existed! 2013 was by far one of the worst years of my life - I lost a baby and my dad, among others. I remember being at the end of 2013 and thanking God for both the blessings 2013 had brought (my sweet, silly kitty, for one), and that it was OVER. But this new year's eve, I feel so desperate for MORE of 2014! 

Then someone reminded me of some of the great pictures I'd posted through the year, and I decided to go back through them and make a collage for myself of a handful of amazing moments and memories from the year. I am SO glad I did!

Of course this year wasn't perfect. I lost a grandfather. And amazing experiences don't just fall into your lap (98% of the time). You have to work for them, persist, and be ready for the unexpected. That's exactly what I did. At the beginning of the year, I had several goals: Become a life coach by taking and finishing the UC Davis program (done), incorporate my business (done), become a public speaker (not yet), finish a first draft of my first novel (not yet), put our house on the market so we can by our dream home (done), pick an adoption agency (done), finish our adoption agency application (not yet), plan and take a 3-4 week trip overseas (done), visit my husband's side of the family (done), work on a few close friendships (ongoing), and lose 15 more pounds or 1 more clothing size (LOL).

You can see that some goals were met while others weren't. To be fair, though, it was a bit ambitious. Probably unrealistic. But OMG, what an amazing year it led to! I made incredible friends in my coaching class, and got to see things out in the world that so overwhelmed me, I was overcome with tears of joy while in their presence. No wonder I want MORE of 2014!

On the one hand, my list, as a set of goals, was unrealistic and overwhelming. People ask me why I haven't made more progress on the adoption paperwork - why I seem to be putting it off. Some of it might be that I'm procrastinating from a fear of failure, but honestly, it's because when it comes to building my family, well, I have more control over the outcome of other things. Admittedly, we need a better support community for us to move forward through the adoption process, so that's something I'll be looking for in 2015.

But if, instead of viewing my overwhelming, unrealistic list as one of goals, we view it as a list of possibilities, then WOWZERS! Anything can happen!

People are different, and while some do well with goals, some of us, including myself, thrive under a looser construct. We need space for creativity and bounce back faster from the unexpected when we aren't constricted by what we see as boundaries and rules that our Gremlins tell us we should be following and make us feel bad if we don't.

My resolution for 2015 is this: Instead of goals, I will have possibilities. Because that's really what they are anyway.

Are you more motivated by goals or possibilities? How did you do with them last year? How do you think this applies to building your family or coping with infertility?

I'm a big flake, and I hate the new ATMs

Yes, I know, back in February I said I'd come back and write about my own personal love story, but then I stayed away for four months. What can I say, I'm a big flake. I'm sorry. I am now trying to be more consistent, so hopefully it won't be four months before I'm back again.

Today, my focus is on the new ATMs my Bank has installed. When they first put them in some months ago, I thought, "Hey, these are great, no envelopes to cause litter and waste paper, and I can get a little miniature scanned copy of the checks I'm depositing - nifty!" I think I even told my husband how happy I was about this, because it meant I could take my business checks straight to the ATM to deposit and didn't need to scan them in at my home office first. Then yesterday happened.

On Sunday, the 28th, my dear husband was obviously stressed about how low our checking account was, since he had automatic billpay set up to come out of the account on the 30th. I told him I probably had a check sitting in my P.O. Box that I could pick up and deposit on Monday morning, and another check already in hand. He instructed me that it needed to be done right away.

On Monday afternoon, at about 4:30 and on the other side of town, I remembered this needed to be done. I made it across town, picked up my mail at the Post Office, and made it to the ATM at 5 minutes to 5pm. I thought that I had to get the deposit in before 5pm in order for it to count that business day.

Superbly pleased with myself for my speed and efficiency, I inserted my ATM card in the machine and pushed the required buttons. Then, the slot popped open and the machine asked for my check. I carefully slipped the edge of the first check in, and it grabbed it from my hand and sucked it inside the machine. Then it spit it back out. So I tried again, with the same result. "OK," I thought, "maybe it doesn't like that check because it had been folded in half and had a crease in it I couldn't get rid of. At least it's the smaller check, so I'll try the other one that's so nice and flat."

I again pressed the demanded buttons, the machine grabbed my check out of my hand, and then try to spit it out without the slot fully opening. The check jammed up against the "lips" on the slot, and as I tried to reach in and grab it, the machine continued to suck it in, spit it out, suck in, spit out, and so on, making the jam worse, but slowly getting enough of a corner to stick out so I could finally grab it and pull it out. At this point, the check was torn and crumpled, and there was no way I was going to try that check again.

"Well, maybe it's just this particular ATM." So I tried the one next to it. No luck. At that point, the branches were closed, so I couldn't walk in to make the deposit, and since the ATM change, we no longer even have the option of using an envelope. Poop. I was just so pissed that after all I did to try to get the deposit it on time, the stupid machine wouldn't let me. So, I called my husband and told him about my adventure and apologized for not being able to get it deposited, and could we reschedule the payments so that we aren't overdrawn. Then he tells me we aren't going to be overdrawn, just low on cash. Great. Thanks for clarifying that before I had a freaking stroke!

I think I can reliably say that I will not be using the ATMs for my deposits any longer. Add to these problems the fact that there are no longer any mirrors for me to be able to watch the scary person who is wandering around behind me, and I doubt I will be using the ATMs at all. Hey, maybe I can help keep a human being employed. Silver lining!