As many of you know by now instead of mailing out Christmas cards I have taken what I would have spend on cards and stamps, doubled that and donated it to a charity. When we got married this practice grew from suporting one charity for the holidays to two.
This years we are supporting the Red Cross and the War Amps. Now the Red Cross is a repeat, and a charity I often support because every time the is a disaster somewhere in the world they are the first there. I have seen this organization in action and have so much to thank them for. The War Amps is a charity that offers programs and service to those who have lost limbs. Not just soldiers, but children and civilians and it is a charity that has touched our lives in the past few years. Seeing people get back up and back into life is inspiring and we’d like to help that cause.
We are so happy to have everyone in our lives and so happy to share this time of year with you, even if it is through a computer and the internet.
Every year when talking about the holidays I will drop words like Epiphany, Kris Kringle and Kings Cake only to have baffled looks from people I am talking to. My family celebrates a little weird, no big shock there, we do everything a little weird. Many of our traditions come out of necessity, being the 7th of 9 children it makes very little sense to buy a gift for every sibling. Some of our traditions just came out of us being us. To explain last year I made a comic on Bitstrips, you can see the whole comic by clicking on the thumbnail.
As with many families we are growing and spreading out. Most of my family is back in NY, one section is in CT and my husband and I are in Canada. This makes the holidays interesting. This year was my grandmother’s 100th birthday and so we all (except my mom, then pregnant sister and niece who had to run track for college) traveled down to florida for it. We had a great time but it meant my husband spent the days he would have spent on Epiphany off work on that, also, we spent the money we would have paid to travel on that. Still, we are traveling, just not to my family. For Christmas we are spending it with his family in Ontario, and even better we are meeting our very good friend who lives in BC and spending all that time with him. Batman (the nickname online I use for this friend) is awesome and we miss him lots. Since he moved out to BC we don’t get to see him much so this will be a great trip. Already we are making plans for D&D and ShadowRun games, viewings of Tron (Original and the new one) and so forth. I can’t wait.
For Epiphany, I will be traveling to NY alone and while my husband really wants to go and be there this is one of the sacrifices we have to make. We have to get used to it, we live really far from both our families and he is in the military, so there are sacrifices to be made.
We have no need for a tree since we won’t be home, the lights, stockings and decorations will all stay in the box in the basement this year.
While some of my family and friends are celebrating Chanukah and others are getting their trees up and decking the halls I have been plotting and scheming. I love giving presents, LOVE it. This year we were able to get a lot of it done early, as of today there are only two gifts left I think to get. Oh, and presents for each other. My husband already knows what he is getting from me, and even though the money I was hoping to pay for it didn’t come in yet, I think I am still getting it for him. A PS3, it’s a big gift, it costs way more then I should be spending, but, it will make him happy and I’m amazed he held out this long on buying one. I will need to have something for him to open on Christmas though, a trinket of some sort. Other then that, my plotting and scheming continues for the last two gifts, I love playing Santa.
What I hate doing is waiting to give people their presents, I want to give them now. More then getting anything I love giving presents, seeing people’s faces light up when they open something I know they’ll love. It makes me so happy to give them that smile.
So, what’s your favorite part of the season? What does your family do differently?
There is a project called “It Gets Better” It is where LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, BiSexual & Transgender) people record videos to teens telling them It gets Better. What gets better? Life does. Life is not high school, life changes as you grow up. This is all in response to the teen suicides that have been happening, caused by kids who are being bullied for being gay. Not that these types of suicides haven’t happened before, but there is attention on them now and it is a good reason to send this positive message.
You can find many videos by going to http://www.youtube.com/user/itgetsbetterproject and there are lots of really neat videos there, including one from Rick Mercer which he aired on his show (RMR) as one of his rants, and a 30 second clip of Sarah Silverman saying how if adults are going to tell Gays they can’t marry or server their country then is it a shock that kids are bullying other kids for the “crime” of being gay? I watched, perhaps 20 videos today in one sitting. I watched a few more through the last few days.
I have been sitting on this post because the idea of “It Gets Better” is about LGBT telling the youth of today that it is OK and things will work out, I am not L, G, B or T. I’m not even Q (Questioning). I was however a bullied teen. Heck I was bullied for many reasons and very often called a fag, called a dyke, a lesbian you name it. I’m not, that didn’t matter. My friends today say I am the gayest straight girl you will ever meet. Perhaps this is true, perhaps the kids back then were grasping onto something evident then… truth is they were kids, they picked on me for everything. They teased me for being fat, for being poor (which as an adult, looking back I realize I was far from it, but as a kid, I thought I was, partly due to the bullying. Partly for other reasons not related to this post). They teased me for my hair being oily, for my pimples, for my clothes, they teased me when I was flat chested, they teased me when my boobs grew. If I had old dated clothes, they teased me, if I bought new hip clothes they teased me. It didn’t matter what I did, they teased me. Oddly I don’t have many memories of being teased for having ADD, one would think that would have been the easiest to make fun of, that I had an extra class to learn to study, or that I took my tests in a different room. For me the worst part of childhood wasn’t high school because by then I knew, and hoped there was something else, there was an escape. I knew, when I graduated I would never have to deal with these people again. The worst part for me was between 6th and 9th grade I think. Between when it was names, taunts and only mild physical bullying, to the time when I could see the light at the end of the tunnel and I had somehow got it in my head that what these people thought of me didn’t matter. Those three years things got really harsh, it was when the insults were terribly personal and the bullies seemed to do research to figure out how to unhinge me. When they would use other people to get to me, when they found ways to make me hate myself. I wish I could say it was only in school I had this sort of unwanted attention. Things also got pretty physical. It could have gotten really out of hand too and I often attribute a moment of me losing control and letting my temper show in school… that and the bully not wanting anyone to know it was me that hurt him… but that was small. This is when I learned that gum stuck in your hair needs to be frozen with an ice cube before you can begin to try and save any hair from it. How hair spray can get paint and ink out of your clothes, because people put it on your chair when you went to the restroom and then pointed and laughed that you menstruated on yourself. (Being a late bloomer it was just one more thing I was embarrassed about, and there really was no defense from that). I learned that when people give you compliments it is just them setting you up to make a bigger, meaner joke. That one stuck with me for so long that it is hard to accept compliments. I remember in college someone telling me I looked pretty and I bit his head off for it, because I expected it was a big joke. I look back at photos and I wasn’t any of the things that they teased me for. Sure I was weird, but I wasn’t the huge freak of nature I thought I was. I cried myself to sleep thinking about how I made everyone’s life miserable… What I couldn’t see then was that it wasn’t me.
Bullying is never about the victim, it is about the bully. Bulies bully because they are miserable, it is about them. They are out there trying to make you feel as bad as they do. Or, they are deflecting, they feel fat, ugly or weird and so they point out you are to keep the attention off them. Some bullies bully because they are being bullied elsewhere. They are getting hit at home, or something else, so they come into school and act out the same abuse they are receiving from the people who are supposed to take care of them. Then there’s the worst one to come to terms with, the bully who doesn’t know they are bullying. There was a kid in my school that no matter what I said, anytime I spoke up in class he would mock me to the whole class and continue for the next few days. Much later, I was in college and he was working with my sister, when talking he told my sister that for some reason I hated him. When she told me I was shocked, because his case in point for me hating him had nothing to do with anything. It was a small little thing that happened once… I simply responded to him being an oaf (and a homophobe if I remember) and called him out on it. One of the few times I spoke up for myself. As anyone who knows me, you know I like to talk, I have the gift for gab, the fact that I almost never spoke in school should let you know how much I was conditioned to not speak up. Point is, this guy didn’t know he was a bully to me, didn’t know that since grade school he had been making me the big joke, he was clueless. Sadly, I think most of the kids who were my bullies, didn’t realize they were. They just went with the crowd, everyone thought I was weird and picked on me, so everyone thought I was weird and picked on me. I learned once from someone that when she first moved and came to school she was told to not be my friend, if she was she wouldn’t have any others. In school I only had one “friend” who in truth wasn’t a friend and was using me. Still, I had one. Just one. Suppose I might be lucky for that, who knows.
High School as I said was a changer for me. First off, my niece was born, and that opened my eyes. I saw the world in a different way, I could see that there was a lot more to life then what I was seeing. Taking care of a little baby can do that to you, it changes everything. I changed a lot of things thanks to my niece. I got my temper in control thanks to her(long story) and I started looking towards the future. By the time I graduated I had my eye on the prize, perhaps a little too much. In college so much of what I was doing was all to make sure that as an adult I had everything I needed. A degree, work skills, good references, you name it. I might have missed out on some of the slacker behavior my peers did… course that didn’t mean I didn’t party and have fun.
After college though, it just got better and better. College was great by showing me that my mind was not wrong, I was not a freak for reading all the time. Liking star trek was not the end of the world. By the time I was out and hanging out with metal bands and out with lots of friends I found that some of the coolest people were like me. Weird. Being weird is good. Being a geek is good. Thinking for yourself and coming up with your own opinions is good.
It gets better, and it is awesome.
I’m so glad I never fell as low as far too many kids do, I wish I could let kids today know that it does get better. I wish they would believe me.
This weekend there were many Cons, Dragon*Con, PAX, WorldCon, you name it. While all of those conventions sound like fun Labor Day is never a good weekend for me, it is pretty expensive and to tell the truth, I am pretty scared about the crowds.
Out of a joke a wonderful thing happened, Dragon*Cant. It is a virtual con for everyone who can’t make it to the big cons. There were panels and readings on ustream with a fun chat going on at each event. There was a dealers room (though limited) and even con badges, virtual ones of course. If you are on my twitter stream I am sure you have heard me tweet about this…. I am also sure I annoyed some people to no end due to my excitement, but I am just as sure that many on my feed were happy to get those same tweets so… If you don’t like me tweeting about what excites me unsubscribe. I may not always be excited about the same things as you, but sometimes I will… I digress.
The people who put together Dragon*Cant did this all in three days, three days! That is sick! They got around 5K visits to the site, 39 FB fans and tons of tweets. It is kinda inspiring, and it made me think about next year. I want to get involved, and I think it could be fun. At first, I thought “Who are you to do a panel, you are no one.” Then I thought, “why not me?” So my thoughts are to somehow figure out how to do a drawing or some form of art panel next year. It will be a little tricky as I don’t really draw on the computer, like MANY people who do drawing ustreams do, I would have to hook up the webcam aimed at my sketchbook, and not move it. An interesting thing to take on.
Tonight, while Sandra Wickham was doing her reading I started sketching her. I then inked it, thinking it would look good comicy. I ended up scanning that and coloring it in photoshop. I added the book her short story was published in, Evolve, as the background. I hope she likes it.
Yesterday I read a twitter from a young woman lamenting that she was still a teen and in debt and this got me thinking about debt and the current state of the economy. Everyone is crying about debt, upset at how things have turned out and yet it is clear that many people (not all) have made a lot of bad choices.
A few years ago SOMEONE asked me how I manage on such a small income (at the time she and I made the same and she still lived at home while I had been out of the house since I was 19). I told her that if she followed my practices not only could she pull herself out of debt but that she could be buying a house not long after. If she and I had the same going in but she had less NEEDed finances then she would have no trouble saving. She was interested and I started with the rules.
get rid of all your credit cards (always have one for emergencies but NEVER use it)
only spend what you have, if you don’t have the money you can’t spend
write down everything you purchase, everything.
remove your monthly expenses ahead of anything else, rent, phone, student loans, other debts already made. You only get to spend the left overs.
She then asked me about shopping, and clothes and when I explained how being careful with your washing means you don’t need to buy new clothes every season she just started shaking her head. She couldn’t follow my rules, couldn’t live without shopping or credit cards.
Three years later, everyone including SOMEONE is singing a different tune. It’s no longer about who your wearing or what your driving, it’s about paying your bills. Now the push is to spend less, be green and to be less extravagant. My way of thinking is much more accepted. Retail Therapy is now a dirty word. People are finally realizing they don’t need the latest dohicky. Of course we still spend, and people aren’t living as monks but has improved tons.
I admit it, I have debts, but all of my debts work for me. My car was financed, my interest rate is lower then the rate of inflation, so I have paid less for the car over the years then I would have if I bought it out right. My student loans give me good credit and help me out at the end of the year with taxes as all the interest I do pay is a write off. My wedding costs were low in comparison and put on a line of credit, paid most of it off and the interest is very low and being paid off monthly. Debt isn’t evil, it helps give you credit and helps you in the future, getting buried under it is evil. When you’re spending you need to think “Is this NEEDed? And will I regret it next year while I’m still paying it off?”
Tips:
don’t buy lunch, brown bag it
the food will be better and healthier also
don’t drop 100 bucks at the club on drinks
drinks at a club and bar are way over priced, if you must drink, prime at home before you get to the club
movies are fun but costly, only see movies that seeing them in the theatre makes a difference
skip the drinks and popcorn too, look for daytime showings or half price nights
coupons, coupons, coupons
don’t feel embarrassed, feel empowered when you whip those bad boys out at the cash register
AAA
got a AAA or CAA card? You’ll be amazed how many places give you a discount with that. I use mind for 10 percent off dinner all the time
REBATES!
most electronics have mail in rebates, that’s free money, don’t forget to submit those
bring back your cans
you paid the deposit, why not get that money back? Do you like throwing nickels in the trash?
Walk instead of driving
short trips and walking distance, why not walk?
brew your own coffee
why spend 3 bucks for a five minutes of coffee
second hand stores are your friend
bring your old games in for cash
buy used games & movies
buy in bulk
group up with your friends, a family of three doesn’t need 18 chicken breasts, but you can split up those big packages among families.
save your MPG
cancel satellite radio and start downloading podcasts
half the shows on satellite are available for download anyways, why pay for it
Do you have more tips? make them known in the comments section of this post.
