Moving away from Debt Reduction
We are in the middle of moving — packing, getting stuff into the new place, figuring out what to do with the stuff that won’t fit. It is wrecking havoc on my finances focus because there is so little time available to spend focusing on things I care about, whether or not to pay extra toward this card, whether or not to pay off one card entirely, what to do about the two cars that need replacing…
I know this is temporary, but it is still getting under my skin. I want to be working out the plan to get our budget under control and our debt blown away, but I can’t do that when all I’m doing is packing and moving boxes and the partner and I still haven’t combine money.
We made a large purchase recently that I would have preferred having more time to think about it. As I’ve mentioned, the partner has a lot of stuff — tons and tons, literally. He had been borrowing a pallet jack from work for a couple months and it has been very helpful. But, last week they noticed it was gone and needed it back. Somehow, the partner managed to talk me into us buying one. Now, they were on sale — though I hate that rationale for buying things — and it has been extremely useful, but I’m starting to wonder now if I would have said yes if we weren’t in the middle of moving and if our plates were not so full at the moment. Yes, it has been useful but we obviously got along without it. And, while I understand the flexibility it offers over the forklift, the forklift has served that purpose just fine for quite some time now. So, I’m feeling a little disappointed that I didn’t take more time to consider this decision before agreeing to it. Yet, I am glad to see that he felt the need to really consult with me and talk through this idea, even if I didn’t give it much time to consider it.
I think I need to set a date for when all this moving stuff needs to not be taking over so much of the rest of our life and for when we will finally join up all this money thing. August was the plan but with summer camp plans it didn’t happen. So, we must get things in order to start the new budget together by September. And then, when the partner asks me things like “How much should we put toward Chase this month?” — I will be able to answer off the top of my head because I’ll be in the know. For now, it is still just a shrug and a frown and I tell him to make up a number that sounds nice.