Even the Best Laid Plans...

I have high hopes for 2009. I want to do a lot of travelling. I want to go to San Fran, the Florida Keys, Scotland, and every other beautiful place I can think of and I want to take my boyfriend with me.

I think the universe may be conspiring against me however. I have some financial obligations that are starting to take precedence over everything else, ensuring that I'll have to work a little bit more to pay them off. My savings account has dwindled a little, as has my 401k so I need to work on replenishment. I need a new car. I need to pay off some purchases. Also, my boyfriend has had some changes at his job making it harder for us to do the things we wanted to do. I'm bummed out. I have noticed though that these workplace changes generally don't last longer than four months or so, so who knows, in June things might be different (and I might have some bills paid off and some money in the bank).

I'm tranferring to our Newark domestic base in a few weeks. And while I'm pretty excited about it, I'm also kind of nervous, because commuting is a pain and can be stressful. Concurrently, I'll be holding some pretty sweet schedules and lots of days off so that I can move some days around and ultimately work when I want to work.

I'll complete ten years at my company by the end of this September, which will bring me some cool perks. My favorite is that I won't have to pay to non-rev anymore. Commuting to work will be FREE and I can do it at my pass class seniority level. YAY. It's kind of amazing to me that I've been at my company for almost ten whole years. Almost a third of my life.

My boyfriend and I have been mulling a few things these past few weeks. The weather in northern Ohio is starting to get to us. The cold and snow has been neverending - in fact we had about two feet of snow on the ground for about two weeks. I can't remember that happening since I lived in New York. We are thinking about moving...south...someday. We kick around Columbus because it's closer to his kids. We kick around Dallas because it's warmer and my brother and sister law (and soon a new neice or nephew!) are there. Houston enters into the equation occasionally. (We don't consider NJ because while parts of it are pretty and we've both lived there in the past, we are probably priced out of living in a decent area.)

Sometimes, you just have to wait and see what happens though. I like being in control of my life, being the one who makes things happen. I'm not really what I would call a risk-taker but some of my plans haven't been the best moves (through no fault of my own, and I'm making do - you know, lemonade out of lemons and all that - and thanks so much, stupid crappy economy!) I've learned that the key to making myself happy is to not be afraid of making changes and to know what I want so that I can make a plan to achieve it. But sometimes, even the best planning doesn't account for every pitfall. So now I guess it's time to hunker down and wait.