dreams Archives | Simple Life Farmer

gettin’ closer

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Its a year on from my “one step at a time” post – and I’m reflecting a bit about where I am now as opposed to this time last year.

Some things haven’t yet changed.

I am still at my job as a Manager, I am still working three days a week, and I’m still not a full-time HouseSpouse.
YET!

A lot has change though…

We have the house in town on the market – for sale.
We have moved full-time into the FarmHouse.
We have stacks of garden beds that are flourishing with edible produce, that fills our bellies with wholesome homegrown goodness.

We have enough surplus veggies that I am able to do canning so that our pantry shelves are stocked with a variety of foods that we know the ingredients of, and I routinely make our own bread.

We have chickens that supply us with all of our own fresh eggs, and we home-cook 95% of the food we eat.

I have managed to reduce our food budget substantially.
I have also paid off a lot of credit card debt, and will hopefully have paid off the remainder of it in less than a year.

We also no longer have cable tv or home phone line payments to have to find the money for.

I have reduced my clothing spending significantly, although we are going to need to buy some new-to-us work shirts soon, as the ones we currently share are getting a bit faded and threadbare lol.

And – we’ve reduced our power and water consumption!

I may not be as close to where I want to be as I would like – but I am certainly a lot closer than I was a year ago – and for that, I’m pretty darn proud of the headway I’ve made…

comparisons

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I’m having a bit of a ‘comparison’ dilemma at the moment and whilst I know that comparing oneself to others is never a healthy or helpful thing – I’m just not quite sure how to get it “out of my system”…

It makes it that much harder – because the person I am making the comparison with, is my Love.

My Love is 5 years older than me, and is a healthy happy vibrant person, who loves Continue reading “comparisons”

those that inspire

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A month or so ago, a girlfriend and I had a coffee-date at one of the lovely local cafes.

We work together, but don’t socialise much at work, because we both just tend to get busy, plus we work in different parts of the office – so when either of us has a break, we both tend to just zone out for that time period, and pretend we’re anywhere else, rather than spending it with others, being social in the staff room.

It had been almost a year since we last caught up outside of work, and we had a rather in-depth discussion about how we were both in exactly the same ‘place’ as we’d angsted about being in, a year earlier…
Still in the same jobs, still being miserable, and still talking about leaving.

But this time, unbeknownst to each other, we’d each been formulating a plan…

Neither of us had the details down pat, but we’d each decided that by the end of the year, we would not still be dreading that walk through those sliding glass doors each week.
We would not still be being consistently treated like crap, when we routinely went above and beyond…

My friend had a more time-specific plan than I – she planned for August 1 to be her end date.
My end date was planned to occur once our house in town had sold.

Last week was a particularly stressful and horrid week at work.
At the start of this week, my friend privately talked to me at work, apologised, and quietly told me that she was submitting her resignation on Wednesday morning…she just couldn’t hold out any longer…

I was overjoyed!!

There was certainly no need for her apology – although I deeply appreciated the sentiment behind it.
She and I “get” each other, and we have each others back.
We understand just what working in that particular pressure-cooker environment, with that particular mix of staff, is like – in a way that few others can.

So – here we are at Wednesday – and today she did it!!
She handed in her resignation.

I am so happy for her, and proud for her that she has taken this step.
She already walks with more of a lightness to her step – and despite it being another shitty day at work, I can see the ‘light’ returning to her eyes.

Yes, I am a little sad that in a few short weeks, she will no longer be there for me to roll my eyes at 100 times a day when something goes sideways, and I’ll miss not having someone there who has my back, and ‘understands’ – but I honestly could not be happier for her – that she has take the leap.

I can only hope that when that glorious day arrives for me, I can hold my head high and muster up just a tenth of the dignity and grace that my friend showed today…

She’s one brave, strong, inspirational Lady that one – and I just hope we don’t lose touch.