Building My New Writing Studio

Kim and I moved into a new house on July 1st. Well, it’s new to us. The house itself was actually built in 1948 — or before. According to neighborhood gossip, the house survived the 1948 Vanport flood, was sawed in half, moved here, then put back together. (I’m not sure why somebody would haul this house twenty miles and up a massive hill, but maybe they got a great deal on it?)

Anyhow, when we moved in, we knew we were downsizing. The condo we’d lived in for the previous four years had 1550 square feet of space. We each had individual offices. This new place only has 1250 square feet, and there isn’t room for both of us to have an office.

After some thought, I decided it made sense to construct an outbuilding to serve as my writing studio.

Picking a Building

First, I had to research zoning laws in our area. Because we’re in unincorporated Clackamas County (and not inside any city limits), we don’t need permits to put up any building less than 200 square feet in size — as long as the average height is less than ten feet. (The building can’t have wiring or plumbing either. Those also require permits.)

With those basic parameters, I began doing some research.

First, I emailed my friend Pete (a.k.a. Mr. Money Mustache), who recently built a fancy studio of his own. Because Pete is handy — carpentry is his hobby! — he did everything himself. Having seen his studio first-hand, I can tell you it’s awesome. “That’s probably outside your skillset,” he told me. “I recommend you order a pre-fab building from a place online.”

Pete recommended a company in Colorado. While their buildings were indeed awesome, they were also expensive. I wasn’t willing to put $25,000 into my writing studio. But I might be willing to spend half that amount!

Further research online revealed even more awesome custom sheds, but always at custom prices. I was frustrated.

Then one day while at Home Depot, I noticed they had a bunch of garden sheds in the parking lot. Most weren’t really suitable, but a few were. I took home some propaganda. I also stopped by other hardware stores to see what they offered. Turns out there are lots of options. Most of these building are suitable only to store Christmas lights and garden gear, but some could be converted to use as a writing studio.

After a few days of research, I settled on buying from a company called Tuff Shed. I spent several hours on their website, playing with their custom design tool. (Fun fun fun!) In the end, this is the building I created:

Tuff Shed design

In retrospect, I could have saved some money (and headache) by reducing the number of windows, not choosing the sloped ceiling, and electing to paint the shed myself. But at the time I designed it, all of these things seemed awesome and right.

Waiting, Waiting, Waiting

After designing my Tuff Shed, I placed the order. And waited. And waited. I knew in advance that there’d be a lot of waiting, so that’s not the issue. The issue was that it was tough for me to be patient. I wanted the building now.

Ultimately, it was good that my shed wasn’t delivered until the end of September. Up until that time, our attention was wholly focused on remodeling the house. If the shed had arrived any earlier, there would have been some serious logistics issues. (We don’t have a big driveway, and there’s no place to park on the road. We would have had contractors colliding!)

While I waited, I leveled the spot I had picked for the shed to be built. We live in a very slope-y neighborhood. There aren’t any flat spaces anywhere for hundreds of feet. Our lot is no different. Because Tuff Shed requires a flat area to build the building, I had to spend several hours using a spade to dig things to level. It was actually kind of fun.

Tuff Shed prep

Finally, on a morning at the end of September, two young men pulled up with a pickup and trailer. While one guy hauled the pre-fab pieces to the bottom of our property, the other guy started putting them together.

Tuff Shed delivery

Tuff Shed base

When they were done hauling and piecing things together, I had an empty shed that looked more or less like this:

Tuff Shed construction

Now it was my turn to get to work.

Finishing My Writing Studio

I am not a handy fellow. Or, I should say, I never have been before. But the older I get, the more I enjoy trying to figure out stuff like this. I’m cautious with wiring and plumbing because there’s just so much that can go wrong, but I’m happy to tackle other aspects of home improvement. And when the “home” in question is a writing studio, the pressure is especially low.

First up, I knew I had to insulate and install some sort of moisture barrier. This is Oregon, after all. I spent a day stapling pink fiberglass insulation to the ceiling and the floors. While it wasn’t tough, it was a bit itchy and nasty. Next, I installed some rigid foam insulation in the floors. The stuff doesn’t have a high R-value, but it’s better than nothing.

Tuff Shed insulation

After the insulation was installed, it was time to put up the ceiling, walls, and floors.

For the ceiling, I opted to use a thin plywood. If I knew then what I know now, I would have made sure to cut the plywood to stud lengths first so that it looked good. But this was my first time doing anything like this, so I just nailed it up in 48×96 sheets. “It’s all wavy and warped,” Kim said when she saw it. She’s right. Next summer, I may go back and re-do the ceiling so it looks nicer. It’s not a high priority at the moment.

While hanging the ceiling, I sustained my first injury. I was using a utility knife to cut the thin plywood to size. I didn’t think my circular saw would handle the stuff well. While pulling down against the straight edge, the knife jumped up and sliced into the tip of my thumb. Oops. Bloody mess!

Next, I nailed sheetrock to the walls. This I did cut to fit the studs. I had learned my lesson with the ceiling. Hanging the drywall wasn’t tough — only time-consuming.

Tuff Shed drywall

At this point, I had to make a decision. Most folks would opt to tape and mud the drywall so that they could then add texture and paint. This sounded like a long, tedious (and messy) process, so I fished around for other options. My brother suggested using a type of panelboard with a faux distressed wood look. I drove 45 minutes to the only store that carried it, but ultimately decided it wouldn’t work for my application. But I liked the idea of a rustic wood look.

On the way home from this distant store, I remembered that I’d seen a bunch of cedar fencing in my local Home Depot. “I wonder if that would work for the walls?” I thought. I stopped to take a look. Sure enough! The cedar was just what I wanted. I crunched some numbers while standing in the aisle, then loaded up 960 linear feet of cedar fencing. I spent the next eight hours cutting the wood, then nailing it over the top of the drywall. In the end, it looked (and smelled) awesome.

Tuff Shed cedar walls

The next problem was the floor. What should I use? Carpet? Raw plywood? Something else? I had already nailed plywood over the insulation, but I decided I’d like something a little more “finished” to make the studio look better. In the end, I opted for laminate flooring with a hickory finish. Last weekend, Kim and I spent all Saturday (and many beers and curse words) installing the floor. It was frustrating, but the end product was worth it.

Tuff Shed unpacking

Finishing Touches

After the floor was installed, I could finally start shaping the space to be an actual writing studio.

  • When we moved into the house, the previous owners had left a corner desk from IKEA. I unmounted the desk from our guest room, then installed it in the corner of my shed.
  • I had planned to build custom bookshelves for the space, but eventually decided this would be both time-consuming and expensive. Besides, when I did the math, I realized I had exactly twenty feet of shelving already. The heights weren’t quite what I wanted, but it seemed foolish not to use my existing bookshelves.
  • Kim and I debated whether or not we should put a futon in the shed. In the end, I decided I wanted the easy chair and ottoman that I bought in 1993. The colors seem garish by modern standards, but I’ve read and wrote a lot in that chair. It’s a sentimental piece.
  • Lastly, I chose to move a small table into the center of the room. This IKEA table has been my writing desk for the past five years, but now will serve as a place for me to write by hand — or to play games when people come over.

These finishing touches really pulled the room together. It feels cozy and warm. I like it. The cats like it. The dog loves it.

Because I’m trying to keep things legally unpermitted, I didn’t run electricity to the building. So, how do I power my computers? A big-ass extension cord. I chose a cord that’s rated for outside use and which can provide sufficient power. My electrician groaned when he saw what I’d done, but after a private email exchange, he seemed resigned to my choice — as long as I’m careful about everything. (I turn everything off when I’m not in the studio. I’m going to get a cover to protect the joint where my two extension cords meet. And I’m going to get a low-power wall heater that my electrician recommended as a safe option.)

In the end, the Tuff Shed cost me about $10,000 to have built, delivered, and installed. I spent an additional $2500 to finish the inside. It cost me a total of $12,500 to build my writing studio, which is exactly half of what it would have taken to order from the place Mr. Money Mustache had recommended. That seems reasonable to me.

And best of all? I love the space. It’s awesome. It’s the perfect place for me. I look forward to many years of writing about money from my Tuff Shed writing studio.

Twenty Years of Blogging

Twenty years ago today, I started blogging.

I didn’t know I had started blogging, of course. Back then, “blog” wasn’t even a word. The other folks who were writing for the web — and there were plenty — called what they did “web journaling”. So did I.

At first, my web journal was solely about my weight-loss journey. I documented my daily exercise routine and wrote about what I was eating. I didn’t really have an audience in mind other than myself. And that was fine. Though it might be hard for younger folks to believe, in the olden days there weren’t that many people reading the web!

Although I didn’t start my first blog (or web journal) until 16 August 1997, I’d actually been creating websites for several years before that. My first page went up sometime in 1994. I was constantly posting new stuff but none of it would be what we would now consider a blog.

After tracking my fitness for a little more than a year, I decided to start a proper web journal, which I called Great Expectations. That lasted for about a month before I gave up. You see, writing and publishing entries to my web journal was just too tedious. I had to code everything by hand. This wasn’t difficult but it was time consuming. I didn’t like it. So, I let Great Expectations lapse.

Time passed.

Foldedspace

Sometime in the spring of 2001, I discovered a service called Blogger. This cool tool — although very buggy — automated a lot of the process behind creating and maintaining a web journal. (The downside? If you composed in the Blogger software itself, you were liable to lose your work because it’d crash. I soon started writing my material in a text editor, after which I’d cut and paste to Blogger. That remains my method to this day!)

I launched my first official Blogger blog in June 2001. Foldedspace was a place for me to write about cats, computers, and comic books — and anything else that crossed my mind. Again, my audience was mostly myself. I was okay with that.

Something strage happened though. In time, more and more of my family and friends began reading Foldedspace. We had some great discussions in the comments section, debating things like politics and religion and how awful the new Star Wars movies were.

Then, on 26 April 2005, something very very important happened. I published a post about personal finance. The article summarized several money books I’d recently read and it came to this conclusion: There’s no reliable way to get rich quickly; however, there’s a proven method to get rich slowly.

For whatever reason, my article about the basics of smart money management garnered a lot of attention around the web. It went viral — or what passed for viral twelve years ago. “Neat,” I thought — and I moved on.

Starting Over

On 11 October 2005, another important event occurred.

I had long ago moved from the clumsy Blogger software to a program called Movable Type, which I loved. But unbeknownst to me, Movable Type had a fatal flaw: it was buggy. So buggy, in fact, that after years of use it decided to corrupt the database that contained my entire blog. Without any warning, hundreds of articles suddenly became inaccessible.

To be fair, the articles didn’t become completely inaccessible. While I could no longer log into my Movable Type account to manage Foldedspace, my old articles were still there. Unlike modern WordPress, which creates pages dynamically, Movable Type created static pages. Once you published an article, it was there on the web. All of my old articles are still there, twelve years after losing them. But I just can’t access them via an automated method.

One of my long-term plans (and I’ve had these plans for a decade) is to write a script that converts these static pages to a format that can be imported to WordPress. Then I can republish all of my old posts!

Meanwhile, I was starting to turn my financial life around. I was on a quest to conquer my debt. As part of that, I wanted to make more money. I was already doing some computer consulting on the side, but I wanted to make even more money. To that end, I decided to start a blog with advertising. (I was steadfastly against advertising at Foldedspace.)

At first, I tried to write a blog about comic books. It seemed like a natural fit. I liked comics, and there were folks willing to advertise on comic blogs. The problem? I didn’t like modern comics, and nobody wanted to read about the old stuff.

On a whim, I decided to start a blog about personal finance. “People really liked my article about getting rich slowly,” I thought. “Maybe I could start a blog about money.” And so I did. On 15 April 2006, I launched Get Rich Slowly. I had no clue what I’d unleashed…

Get Rich Slowly

Get Rich Slowly grew quickly. Within days, I had a thousand regular readers. Within six months, I had over 10,000 subscribers. By the end of its first year, Get Rich Slowly was receiving over 250,000 visitors each month. It was crazy!

As the site grew, so did its revenue. Get Rich Slowly only made $8.29 in April 2006. But in May, it earned $85.03. In June, it earned $473.22. In October, it earned over $1000. By July of 2007, I was earning more from Get Rich Slowly than I was from my day job! Thanks in part to this new stream of income, I was able to pay off the last of my debt in December 2007.

In March 2008, I quit my job at the family box factory in order to blog full time.

A funny thing happened about this time: Whereas blogging had been a fun hobby, once it became my job, that job seemed onerous. It was just the same as any other job. Plus, as the site’s revenue grew, so did the pressure. I didn’t increase my spending, so there wasn’t any added stress there; nonetheless, I felt a drive to boost readership and revenue from month to month.

Before long, I wanted out.

At the start of 2009, a company approached me about buying Get Rich Slowly. I thought they were joking at first. After they submitted a formal offer, I realized this wasn’t a laughing matter. I recruited an investment bank to shop the site around and got an even better offer. On 01 April 2009, I sold Get Rich Slowly — but I didn’t leave the site.

For the next three years, I stuck around as the site’s editor-in-chief and primary writer. Eventually, in the spring of 2012, I decided I’d had enough. I retired. Sort of.

Money Boss

After leaving Get Rich Slowly, I continued to contribute the occasional article. Meanwhile, I wrote a monthly column for Entrepreneur magazine. I wrote articles for Time magazine’s money blog. Most importantly (to me), I started writing again here at this site.

In March 2015, my girlfriend began a 15-month RV trip across the United States. We documented our adventures at a blog called Far Away Places.

On that trip, while stuck for ten days in rural South Dakota, I realized I wasn’t done writing about money. I missed blogging. I missed interacting with an audience. Plus, I’d spent the intervening years developing a clear financial philosophy (as opposed to the piecemeal ideas I’d shared at Get Rich Slowly). In October 2015, I launched Money Boss. Today, that’s my primary focus.

What’s Next?

You might think that after twenty years of blogging, I’d be burned out on it. Truthfully, I do get burned out from time to time. My most loyal readers (and there are a few hundred that seem to follow me no matter where I go) have noticed that I go on hiatus from time to time. (Heck, I haven’t published an article here in nearly a year!) But make no mistake: I love to write — and I love blogging.

Even when things are quiet on my various websites, I’m often working behind the scenes in preparation for bigger, better things to come in the future.

Writing is in my blood. I can’t stop. It’s how I express myself. Plus, I love the spontaneous nature of blogging. I sat down at my computer an hour ago to write about my twenty years as a blogger; in a few minutes I’ll press “publish” and share this article with a couple thousand people. That’s amazing! Better yet are the discussions that arise in the comments section of this blog (and others). While many bloggers are killing their comments, I doubt I ever will.

So, what’s next for me?

I’m reluctant to commit publicly to anything because as you all know by now, my plans are subject to change. That said, I’ve been working this summer on developing a WordPress theme that mimics some of what Jason Kottke does at his site. You can see this new theme in operation at Animal Intelligence, one of my older blogs that I’m in the process of reviving.

If all goes according to plan, I’ll gradually roll out this template to a few of my blogs over the next twelve months. I want to be careful, though, not to take on too much at once. I have a tendency to way overcommit, then not follow through on anything. I want to take this slow and steady.

Meanwhile, after a slow summer at Money Boss, I’m ready to dive into that site full-time. And, believe it or not, I want to publish more often around here. (That should be easy. It’s not tough to publish more often than once a year!)

If all goes well, I hope to still be blogging twenty years from now. Who knows? Maybe on 16 August 2037, I’ll publish an article here entitled “Forty Year of Blogging”! A fellow can dream, can’t he?

How Blogging Has Changed from 2006 to 2016

Last week, I attended the sixth annual Fincon in San Diego. It was awesome. I love the financial blogging community. The people aren’t just colleagues, they’re friends. It makes me happy to see how sharing and supportive the community is, how we’re willing to help each other succeed.

That’s not always the case at blogging conferences. Many have a collective “scarcity mentality”. Not Fincon. At Fincon, there’s an “abundance mentality”, and that manifests itself in everyone being willing to help everyone else.

Note: I’m please to report that Money Boss, my latest project, won the Plutus Award for best new financial blog. Makes me grin from ear to ear, actually.

Because I’ve been dubbed the “grandfather of personal-finance blogging”, a lot of people ask me for advice. I’m always happy to help when I can. (My skills are dated, though. I haven’t run a site regularly since 2009, so I’m not current on things like SEO and social media and monetization.)

One question I get all the time is: “How has blogging changed in the decade between starting Get Rich Slowly and starting Money Boss?” To me, the biggest change is that people are more parsimonious with links.

SEO Killed Blogging

In the olden days, everybody linked to everybody else. (It’s that abundance mindset thing again, right?)

  • If my buddy wrote a good article, I linked to it.
  • If I found a piece about debt reduction that was better than mine, I linked to it.
  • If I thought something would be of use to my readers, I linked to it.
  • If I discovered an amazing new blog, I linked to it.

The rise of SEO seems to have destroyed this sort of sharing economy. Nowadays, bloggers are too worried about diluting the value of their links. Links, after all, are the currency of the web. A link to a post is like gold — especially when it comes from a high-value site. The game is to get as many links as possible to as many profitable pages as possible. And if you link out to other people, you make your own links worth less.

Or something like that.

Today in 2016, bloggers are far less likely to link out than they were in 2006. I’m talking an order of magnitude less. Maybe more.

That sucks.

In order for the web to be useful to readers, we have to help them find useful information. If we know where useful information is and we don’t share it, we’re doing a disservice to people who trust us. Where’s the good in that? I suppose it makes sense in some short-sighted way, but it’s not a good long-term plan.

This same problem manifests itself in reverse.

Money Before People

This morning, I posted in the private Fincon group asking for people to share one article they’d like me to link to. I’m setting up some automated social media stuff — because I suck at social media and need to make it automatic or I’ll never do it — and I wanted to spread the love. (Because I still operate like it’s 2006, not 2016.) I wanted to populate my social media queue with one article from each of my friends.

The responses I got disappointed me. Sure, some people pointed me to their best work. But many (most?) pointed me to profitable pages that they wanted to pimp more. Or SEO-laden articles that they wanted to give more “juice”. Instead of trying to make the web a better place by providing readers with quality content, a lot of people just saw an opportunity to get a quick link to make more money.

I hate that.

I don’t know the source of this switch. I don’t know why in 2016 we’re reluctant to link to others, and when we get a chance to have a link, we link to money not to content.

Honestly, the origin of the problem doesn’t matter. What matters is fixing it. That’s not something I can do alone, obviously. All I can do is call attention to it — and make sure I’m not perpetuating it. There’s no way I can convince other bloggers that they should link to other people more often and that they shouldn’t focus on money. All I can do is try to set an example.

Grandpa Remembers

Some people will say, “Yeah, but you made bank with Get Rich Slowly. Aren’t you being hypocritical?” No, I’m not.

  • At Get Rich Slowly, I threw links around like they were nothing. Readers loved it. Sure, they left my site. But they also came back because they knew I’d point them to good shit. (At Money Boss, I still throw links around like they’re nothing. I even have a blogroll in my sidebar. How quaint is that?)
  • At Get Rich Slowly, I didn’t write articles purely to pimp affiliate links. If I wrote about something and there was an affiliate program, I might join the program and make some money. Or I might not. But I certainly never altered the content to emphasize the money-making opportunity. (At Money Boss, I’m only just beginning to monetize — but selectively. Only if doing so helps my readers.)
  • At Get Rich Slowly, when somebody requested a link for a blog carnival (remember those?) or a roundup or anything else, I didn’t just give them a sales page. I gave them whatever I thought their readers would find most interesting and/or useful. Then it’s a win-win-win, right? A win for me, a win for the other blogger, and a win for the readers. (If I were to give a link to a sales page, it’s only a win for me.)

I didn’t get rich quick at GRS with a scarcity mindset. Jim didn’t get rich at Bargaineering with a scarcity mindset. Harlan didn’t get rich at Consumerism Commentary with a scarcity mindset. It wasn’t intentional, but we each operated with abundance mindsets and it helped all of us.

Long-Term Beats Short-Term

Look, I don’t mean to sound harsh. As I said at the beginning, I love my Fincon family. These people are awesome.

But I hate the trend in modern blogging to focus only on the short term. (And trust me, SEO is all about the short term. It’s sneetches in action.) I want bloggers to provide long-term value. A lot of times, that means making choices that aren’t optimized for the short term. And that’s okay.

When you write a blog, there’s always a balance between what’s best for you and what’s best for the readers. Finding that balance is key. It’s different for each person and for each blog. (But some things are fundamentally always reader-hostile. Pop-ups, for instance — I hate SumoMe.) Your job, as a blogger, is to be as reader-friendly as possible while still meeting your goals.

Back in Savannah, I had a sign above my desk: “Is this in the best interest of the reader?” It was meant to remind me to write high-quality content and not just fluff, but I think it applies to all aspects of creating for the web. Answering it honestly leads in the direction of an abundance mentality. Tha means thinking long term, not short.

Tracking My Time: How I Found More Hours in My Day

Since arriving home to Portland at the end of June, I’ve felt frustrated. There’s so much I want to do but never enough time to do it. At the same time, I feel like a total whiner. I mean, how lucky am I to be in this situation? I have tons of free time, no job, and I’m really able to do whatever I want. I’m damned lucky is what I am.

Yet it feels like I never do what I want. It feels like I’m always doing things I have to do or things for other people.

A couple of weeks ago, I was talking with my friend Paula Pant about this problem. “I wish I could figure out where all of the time is going,” I said.

“You should do a time inventory,” Paula said.

“What’s a time inventory?” I asked.

“Well, you know how the first step to losing weight is tracking calories? And you know how the first step to getting out of debt is logging how much you earn and spend? Well, a time inventory is sort of the same thing. For a certain length of time, you write down exactly how you’re spending your time. Here. I’ll send you a link.”

Paula pointed me to Laura Vanderkam’s website. Vanderkam offers free downloadable PDF forms and spreadsheets to help people track their time in fifteen-minute increments. As you go about your day, you jot down what you’re doing at various intervals.

Paula recently performed this time inventory exercise in her own life and found she was wasting almost eighteen hours a week on mindless stuff. Sounds like a lot, right? Well, last week I logged exactly where my time has been going. I’m afraid my results are worse than Paula’s…

The Good

First up, let’s look at what I’m doing right. The results of this experiment weren’t all bad, after all.

For instance, I’m getting an average of one hour per day of exercise. Last week I went to Crossfit three times, yoga once, and enjoyed a few bike rides. That doesn’t include all of the times I walked to do errands or took the dog for her exercise.

Note: I haven’t mentioned it here, but Kim and I got a dog. Near the end of our trip, we stopped to visit my cousins in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. They had a littler of seven puppies, and Kim fell in love with the runt. We adopted her, named her Tahlequah, and brought her along for the last three weeks in the motorhome. Since returning to Portland, Tally has probably been the dominant theme in our lives. Puppies need a lot of attention.

Speaking of the new dog, Kim and I also adopted two kittens recently. According to my time inventory, I’m spending a full 2-1/2 hours per day with the pets. The cats don’t require much effort, of course (although they’re happy to play with humans), but Tally takes 3-5 hours each day, which Kim and I split between us. She needs two daily walks and plenty of play around the house. So far, we’ve been great about engaging with her. We hope this produces a happy, healthy dog in the long run, one that needs less time. (Fingers crossed!)

Finally, I’ve been averaging one hour per day with family and friends. On paper, that doesn’t actually sound like a lot, but turns out it’s actually quite a bit compared to most people.

The Bad

I wouldn’t be writing this post if I were doing a good job with time management. I’m not. I’m wasting more than thirty hours each week on non-productive activities. Like what?

Like, I spent an average of 2-1/2 hours each day watching TV and movies. Yikes! For a guy who says he doesn’t watch much TV, that’s an awful lot of TV. All told, that’s 17-1/2 hours I could have used for something more rewarding. To be fair, seven of those hours came when Kim and I decided to have a movie night. And two more were devoted to watching my Portland Timbers defeat the Seattle Sounders. But still…

But that’s not all.

I also frittered away thirteen hours and fifteen minutes on what I consider computer-based time-wasters: browsing Reddit, playing Hearthstone, and so on. That’s nearly two hours per day of time lost. Not good.

Aside from thirty hours of total wasted time, I lost hours in other ways.

For example, I spent a total of four hours in the car last week, which is just over half an hour per day. That might not sound like much, but it’s a lot for me. That’s time I’ll never get back.

It took me over eight hours to do chores and errands last week. That seems like a lot. Now part of that was because I did a deep clean of the house on Thursday, it’s true. And another part is because I tend to walk for my errands, which means they take a bit longer. All the same, this seems like a lot of time to have used for menial tasks. Maybe I can find ways to be more efficient?

Finally, I averaged nine hours and twenty minutes of sleep per night. WTF? When did I start hibernating? In the olden days, I was perfectly content with 7-1/2 hours per night. And often I could get by with six hours per night. I’ll bet that I could still get by with less sleep, but I got into the habit of sleeping tons during our roadtrip.

The Ugly

So, that’s where my time is going. And it’s not pretty. But perhaps even worse is where I’m not devoting my energy. My stated number-one goal is to build and promote Money Boss, my new financial blog. But am I doing that? No, I am not.

Last week, I only spent 7-1/2 hours writing material for Money Boss — and most of that came on Sunday morning. I consider this my top priority, yet I’m not treating it as such. This needs to change.

I spent another 7-1/2 hours working on Money Boss business matters last week: answering email, preparing talks, tinkering with the website. That’s a total of fifteen hours devoted to my business. I want to double that. I want to spend 30-40 hours each week on Money Boss and related projects.

Meanwhile, I’m not taking care of me. Over the past seven days, I allocated a mere four hours to personal care and self-improvement — and most of that was stuff like showering and shaving! I did take an hour to practice Spanish mid-week, and I took my usual hour to work on my personal finances on the weekend. But that’s it. This too needs to change.

Time to Change

In order for an exercise like this to be useful, you’ve got to be completely honest about your habits. And you can’t try to make changes during the assessment period. When you initially log your spending, your eating, or your time, your goal is to document what you’re doing in normal day-to-day life. If you try to make changes during the assessment period, you’re defeating the purpose.

Now that the assessment period is over for me, it’s clear what I need to do.

First up, I’d like to find at least two hours more per day to devote to Money Boss. And I’d like that time to be structured so that I know it’s there and I can use it productively. Those are two separate problems.

I feel like there are several ways I can approach the first part of the problem. Just as you should tackle the big things in your household budget before trying to pinch pennies on the smaller line-items, I’m going to start by trying to trim the biggest timesinks.

I can create more time in my day by:

  • Sleeping less. I should be able to easily move to 7-1/2 hours of sleep per night, which would free up nearly two hours per day. Boom! There’s fourteen hours per week — almost the amount I want to find for working on business.
  • I don’t want to eliminate TV, movies, websurfing, and videogames from my life. I like spending a bit of time on those hobbies. But do I need to spend four hours and twenty minutes per day on these things combined? Hell no! If I budget two hours per day for time-wasters, I think that’s plenty.

With these two changes alone, I’d free four hours and fifteen minutes each day to spend on more important things, such as business and personal growth. For instance, if I take three of those hours for Money Boss, that’ll give me 36 hours per week of work. Perfect. And if I use the other hour and a quarter I’ve freed up to work on becoming a better person, that’ll give me nearly two hours a day for self-improvement. Nice.

The second part of the problem is more difficult. Where do I put this time in my schedule? The ideal situation would be to wake early or go to bed late. I like going to bed with Kim, so that means my only option is to wake early. I’ve done well with rising early in the past, but by that I mean 5:30 or 6:00. To do what I want to do, I’m going to have to wake even earlier. I’m going to need to get up at 4:00 or 4:30, make coffee, and get directly to work.

Another option is to wake at 4:30, go to the 5:00 Crossfit class, come home and walk the dog, then sit down to work from eight until noon. Actually, thinking out loud, that’s probably the best option. It’ll suck at first — no question! — but in the long run, I’ll be much more productive.

The Ideal Schedule

So, there you have it. After all that, I’ve arrived at an “ideal schedule”. It looks something like this:

Monday, Wednesday, Friday
04:30 wake
04:45 drive to gym (sorry, Mr. Money Mustache)
05:00 Crossfit
06:15 drive home
06:30 take the dog for a walk
08:00 grab breakfast and sit down to work
13:00 end work, eat lunch (with somebody, if possible)
14:00 personal development
16:00 go into evening mode

Tuesday, Thursday
04:30 wake, grab coffee, start working
06:30 take the dog for a walk
08:00 grab breakfast and resume work
13:00 end work, eat lunch (with somebody, if possible)
14:00 personal development
16:00 go into evening mode

Look at that! With this schedule, I’ve built in 29 hours of work — and that doesn’t count afternoons or weekends. I love it. I’ve also built in ten hours for self-improvement. Yay!

I like this schedule because:

  • I’m free to do as I please after four o’clock every weekday afternoon.
  • Aside from Crossfit on Saturday mornings, my weekends are entirely free.

The challenge for me is to be militant about protecting my mornings. That’s my time. No meetings, no appointments, no errands. Only my priorities. It can be done. (I’ve done it before!)

Today is my second day on this ideal schedule. Yesterday morning, I woke early and went to Crossfit. I didn’t make the 5 a.m. class, but I did make it to the six o’clock session. Then I came home and walked the dog. Then I worked until one. And this morning, Kim and I got up together at 4:45. Here, two hours later, I’m done with this article and ready to take the dog for a walk. (She’s ready too!)

I have high hopes that this ideal schedule will allow me to get stuff done and give me plenty of time left over for play.

Note: By chance, my pal Chris Guillebeau recently published a related article: Eight ways to have more time.

Learning to Live in the Here and Now

Guardians of BeingSince arriving home from our cross-country RV trip at the end of June, Kim and I have both been overwhelmed by modern life. We’re overwhelmed by the busy-ness of it all: the pace, the scheduling, all of the requests for time and attention.

“Why is this so tough for us?” I asked the other day. “We didn’t have problems before we left.”

“I don’t know,” Kim said. “But it sucks.” She’s right — it does suck.

This morning, I was reading Guardians of Being, a short book that mixes the philosophy of Eckhart Tolle with the animal art of Patrick McDonnell (from Mutts). Tolle, of course, is best known for his massive bestseller, The Power of Now, which encourages readers to get out of their heads and be more “present in the moment”. I was struck by this quote from Guardians:

Most of us live in a world of mental abstraction, conceptualization, and image making — a world of thought. We are immersed in a continuous stream of mental noise…We get lost in doing, thinking, remembering, anticipating — lost in a maze of complexity and a world of problems.

While we were on the road, Kim and I lived in the Now. We were always present in the moment. We might have vague plans for where we wanted to be in a few days or a few weeks, but mostly we made things up as we went along.

“Where do you want to go next?” Kim might ask, and then we’d pick a spot.

“Where should we camp tonight?” I might ask as we drove to the new town, and Kim would find a campground. “What should we do for dinner? Should we visit that park? This site is awesome — let’s stay a few more nights.” Nearly everything we did was spontaneous. We had no plans or commitments and it was wonderful.

But back home, even without jobs to go to (yet) and few plans, the pace of modern life is staggering. We’re always doing something with somebody. We schedule appointments and anticipate commitments. We have to-do lists. We go to the gym three mornings a week, take the puppy to puppy classes, agree to help colleagues, and so on. There’s so much going on that there’s never a chance to simply be present in the Here and Now.

And the stuff! There’s so much stuff! We had few possessions in the motorhome; we didn’t miss what we did not have. Here at home, even though we own less than many folks, we have tons of stuff. Tons of stuff! So many books! So many clothes! So many dishes! So much in every closet and cupboard.

Kim and I are overwhelmed because we’ve made a sudden transition from doing and having very little to doing and having a lot. All of the stuff and commitments comes with mental baggage. It takes brainwidth.

Be present

Last week, I met with my friend Michael. He’s a career and marriage counselor. I told him how overwhelmed we are. “We feel like we need to move to a small house in the country,” I said.

Michael nodded. “I can see how that might help,” he said. “But you know what? I’ve found that many of my clients who crave change can find happiness closer to home. They think the grass is greener on the other side of the fence, that they’ll fix things by making big moves.”

“What do you suggest instead?” I asked.

“Something less drastic,” Michael said. “I try to get folks to find ways to shape their current situation to meet their needs. If they want a new job because they think it’ll allow them to be more fulfilled, I ask if there’s a way they can restructure their current position so that it gives them that fulfillment. In your case, I’d suggest you don’t need to buy two acres in the country to get what you want. You can probably find ways to stay where you are — because you have a great home in a great location! — while simultaneously reducing the stress and the stuff.”

I’ve been thinking about Michael’s advice for the past week. He’s right. We do live in a great spot. We both love it. It’s not the spot that’s the problem. It’s being surrounded by so much stuff in the house, and by the sudden need to schedule our time. We can’t remove all of the stuff and we can’t live completely free of schedules, but we can certainly be more judicious with both. We can guard our time assiduously, which would allow us to be more spontaneous (like we were on the road). We can purge some of our possessions, then be cautious about what we allow to come into the condo.

Here’s another quote I liked from Guardians of Being:

We have forgotten what rocks, plants, and animals still know. We have forgotten how to be — to be still, to be ourselves, to be where life is: Here and Now.

While traveling the country for fifteen months, Kim and I learned how to be Here and Now. It was awesome. Now the challenge is discovering how to be Here and Now while living a modern life in a modern city. We need to ignore (or reject) the hustle and bustle, to embrace the stillness.

Michael is right: We don’t need to move the country to reduce complexity. We can do it here. And now.

Just bee

American Nations: Why the U.S. is So Divided — and Why It Always Has Been

Several years ago, our book group read American Nations by Colin Woodard. The book has a fascinating premise: While the United States is nominally a single unified country, it’s actually a conglomerate of eleven smaller “nations”, each with its own unique history, culture, and attitudes. The U.S. is more like the E.U. than we think.

I’m not going to go into the details of the eleven distinct cultures Woodard posits. Instead, I’ll simply share a map and some brief descriptions:

American Nations
Click for a larger version.

Here are how the eleven “American nations” differ (these capsule summaries are taken from this Washington Post piece):

    American Nations

  • Yankeedom — Founded by Puritans, residents in Northeastern states and the industrial Midwest tend to be more comfortable with government regulation. They value education and the common good more than other regions.
  • New Netherland — The Netherlands was the most sophisticated society in the Western world when New York was founded, Woodard writes, so it’s no wonder that the region has been a hub of global commerce. It’s also the region most accepting of historically persecuted populations.
  • The Midlands — Stretching from Quaker territory west through Iowa and into more populated areas of the Midwest, the Midlands are “pluralistic and organized around the middle class.” Government intrusion is unwelcome, and ethnic and ideological purity isn’t a priority.
  • Tidewater — The coastal regions in the English colonies of Virginia, North Carolina, Maryland and Delaware tend to respect authority and value tradition. Once the most powerful American nation, it began to decline during Westward expansion.
  • Greater Appalachia — Extending from West Virginia through the Great Smoky Mountains and into Northwest Texas, the descendants of Irish, English and Scottish settlers value individual liberty. Residents are “intensely suspicious of lowland aristocrats and Yankee social engineers.”
  • Deep South — Dixie still traces its roots to the caste system established by masters who tried to duplicate West Indies-style slave society, Woodard writes. The Old South values states’ rights and local control and fights the expansion of federal powers.
  • El Norte — Southwest Texas and the border region is the oldest, and most linguistically different, nation in the Americas. Hard work and self-sufficiency are prized values.
  • The Left Coast — A hybrid, Woodard says, of Appalachian independence and Yankee utopianism loosely defined by the Pacific Ocean on one side and coastal mountain ranges like the Cascades and the Sierra Nevadas on the other. The independence and innovation required of early explorers continues to manifest in places like Silicon Valley and the tech companies around Seattle.
  • The Far West — The Great Plains and the Mountain West were built by industry, made necessary by harsh, sometimes inhospitable climates. Far Westerners are intensely libertarian and deeply distrustful of big institutions, whether they are railroads and monopolies or the federal government.
  • New France — Former French colonies in and around New Orleans and Quebec tend toward consensus and egalitarian, “among the most liberal on the continent, with unusually tolerant attitudes toward gays and people of all races and a ready acceptance of government involvement in the economy,” Woodard writes.
  • First Nation — The few First Nation peoples left — Native Americans who never gave up their land to white settlers — are mainly in the harshly Arctic north of Canada and Alaska. They have sovereignty over their lands, but their population is only around 300,000.

In the book, of course, the author goes into greater detail about the differences between each region.

When I first read American Nations, I was skeptical of Woodard’s divisions. Even early in this RV trip, I didn’t agree with how he divided things. Now, as we near the end of our journey, I’m beginning to think he’s more right than wrong.

Note: Kim and I have now experienced all eleven of these American nations. Of them, we vastly prefer New France (in the form of southern Louisiana), New Netherland (in the form of New York City), and the Left Coast (where we were both born and raised). We “get” The Far West and El Norte. But much of the rest of the U.S. — meaning most of the eastern half — seems foreign to us, especially the Deep South.

There’s a common misconception that the United States was once united. Everyone I know complains about how our national government is so contentious and unwilling to work together. Donald Trump promises to “make America great again”. We have a sort of shared national dream that we were once a unified whole. I’m not sure that has ever been the case.

From my reading, it seems like the United States has almost never been united. Our history is one of division rather than unification. We’re always fighting with each other.

One place you commonly see the myth of American oneness is in reference to the Founding Fathers. People from both sides of the political fence like to claim things like, “The Founding Fathers believed X.” But you know what? The Founding Fathers didn’t agree on anything except that they wanted to break away from British rule.

A decade ago, I read a great book from Joseph J. Ellis. In Founding Brothers (which won the Pulitzer Prize), Ellis tells the stories of George Washington; John and Abigail Adams; Thomas Jefferson; Alexander Hamilton; James Madison; Benjamin Franklin; and Aaron Burr. I came away from the book with a better understanding of just why U.S. politics are so contentious. The division and arguments are actually baked into our Constitution. They’ve been here since the birth of the nation.

Here’s an extended passage from the beginning of Founding Brothers. This is long but it’s important. Reading it will help you better understand the U.S. political system.

It is truly humbling, perhaps even dispiriting, to realize that the [modern] historical debate over the revolutionary era and the early republic merely recapitulates the ideological debate conducted at the time, that historians have essentially been fighting the same battles, over and over again, that the members of the revolutionary generation fought originally among themselves. Though many historians have taken a compromise or split-the-difference position over the ensuing years, the basic choice has remained constant, as historians have declared themselves Jeffersonians or Hamiltonians, committed individualists or dedicated nationalists, liberals or conservatives, then written accounts that favor one camp over the other, or that stigmatize one side by viewing it through the eyes of the other, much as the contestants did back then. While we might be able to forestall intellectual embarrassment by claiming that the underlying values at stake are timeless, and the salient questions classical in character, the awkward truth is that we have been chasing our own tails in an apparently endless cycle of partisan pleading. Perhaps because we are still living their legacy, we have yet to reach a genuinely historical perspective on the revolutionary generation.

But, again, in a way that Paine would tell us was commonsensical and Jefferson would tell us was self-evident, both sides in the debate have legitimate claims on historical truth and both sides speak for the deepest impulses of the American Revolution. With the American Revolution, as with all revolutions, different factions came together in common cause to overthrow the reigning regime, then discovered in the aftermath of their triumph that they had fundamentally different and politically incompatible notions of what they intended. In the dizzying sequence of events that comprises the political history of the 1790s, the full range of their disagreement was exposed and their different agenda for the United States collided head-on. Taking sides in this debate is like choosing between the words and the music of the American Revolution.

What distinguishes the American Revolution from most, if not all, subsequent revolutions worth of the name is that in the battle for supremacy, for the “true meaning” of the Revolution, neither side completely triumphed. Here I do not just mean that the American Revolution did not “devour its own children” and lead to blood-soaked scenes a the guillotine or the firing-squad wall, though that is true enough. Instead, I mean that the revolutionary generation found a way to contain the explosive energies of the debate in the form of an ongoing argument or dialogue that was eventually institutionalized and rendered safe by the creation of political parties. And the subsequent political history of the United States then became an oscillation between new versions of the old tension, which broke out in violence only on the occasion of the Civil War. In its most familiar form, dominant in the nineteenth century, the tension assumes a constitutional appearance as a conflict between state and federal sovereignty. The source of the disagreement goes much deeper, however, involving conflicting attitudes toward government itself, competing versions of citizenship, differing postures toward the twin goals of freedom and equality.

But the key point is that the debate was not resolved so much as built into the fabric of our national identity. If that means the United States is founded on a contradiction, then so be it. With that one bloody exception, we have been living with it successfully for over two hundred years. Lincoln once said that America was founded on a proposition that was written by Jefferson in 1776. We are really founded on an argument about what that proposition means. When shown in this light, it all makes sense to me. The friction between Republicans and Democrats, and the structure of our two party system, is not something to chafe against; it’s inherent in our political system, it’s an integral part of our Constitution. It’s as if there wasn’t one country founded as the United States, but two, and they’ve been living together, hopelessly tangles, for two hundred years. It’s like yin and yang. It’s like a schizophrenic child. We cannot have one without the other. Democrats need Republicans, both for balance and to provide a source against which they can contrast their own ideas. Conversely, Republicans need Democrats for the same reasons.

Taken together, American Nations and Founding Brothers combine to paint a portrait of a country divided…and united at the same time.

Founding BrothersMy RV trip around the country has made this intellectual idea more real to me. When you spend a year (or fourteen months, in my case) traveling from state to state and city to city, you begin to pick up on subtle differences — everything from food, to race relations, to appreciation for nature, to friendliness, to respect for the rule of law.

For me anyhow, seeing these differences makes me much more empathetic to different ways of thought. Do I agree with the political ideas that hold sway in the Deep South? I do not! But having lived there for six months (and traveled there for an additional three), I get it. I get why the people think and behave the way do, and I can’t fault them for it. (That said, I can’t wait to get back to my home on the Left Coast!)

A couple of weeks ago in Gulf Shores, Alabama, Kim and I had drinks with a couple that had driven down from Jackson, Mississippi. They too had traveled the U.S. extensively. We discussed the differences between the states. The man in the couple then gave us an important insight into the Southern mindset.

“We don’t like being told what to do,” he said. From his perspective, the rest of the U.S. is always trying to make the South over in its image. This goes all the way back to the Civil War (or the “War Between the States”, as they still call it down here), if not further. It continues to this day. Southerners just want to be left alone, but they feel like other parts of the country are constantly trying to change their way of life.

Kim and I keep going back to this conversation. Whenever we see something we don’t like about the South, something we’d like to change, we remember what our acquaintance said. And we haven’t been able to think of a single way in which the South has imposed its will on us out in Oregon.

Interesting stuff, right?

Over the past fifty years, there’s been a huge unconscious push toward “same-ification”. (This is due largely to the omnipresence of television, I think.) But I’m not sure homogenization is such a good thing. I like the parts of the U.S. that feel different and unique. I like when we work together despite our differences. In fact, I think it’s all of our differences that make this nation great.

But how do you find a balance between respecting cultural differences and respecting each and every person? I don’t know. I’m not sure anybody does. Still, it’s a worthwhile conversation for the American nations to have.

The Best Films of the Past Five Years

While browsing elsewhere on the interwebs (reddit, perhaps?), I came across David Ehrlich’s picks for the best films of 2015. For the past five years, he’s compiled his annual list of favorites into a short (roughly ten-minute) videos that highlights why he loves these movies.

Because the Oscars will be announced today, I think it’d be fun to share all of Ehrlich’s picks for the past five years in one place. For a few of the movies, I’ve included my own comments.

More than anything, the following lists are a resource to help me find movies to watch. I hope you find them useful and interesting too.

So, here they are, the best movies from the past five years (from 2015 to 2011 in reverse chronological order). Titles in bold are films I’ve seen.


The Best Films of 2015

25. Girlhood
24. Tangerine
23. Mustang
22. Junun
21. The Forbidden Room
20. James White
19. The Mend
18. The Hateful Eight
17. Heaven Knows What
16. Black Coal, Thin Ice
15. Listen to Me Marlon
14. Anomalisa
13. Tokyo Tribe
12. Magic Mike XXL – So, Kim and I saw this in South Dakota. I was dreading it. I mean really dreading it. Turns out, I thought it was damn good, a celebration of female sexuality rather than something exploitive.
11. Clouds of Sils Maria
10. Mad Max: Fury Road – The reason I saw Magic Mike in South Dakota? This film. Everyone loves it, I know, but Kim and I thought it was awful. After I dragged her to see it (I’m a fan of the Mad Max series), she made me promise I’d see three chick flicks with her. Magic Mike was part of that payment. I’ve since re-watched Fury Road and I still don’t like it.
9. Mistress America
8. Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter
7. Eden
6. The Duke of Burgundy
5. A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence
4. The Look of Silence
3. Phoenix
2. World of Tomorrow
1. Carol


The Best Films of 2014

25. Lucy
24. We are the Best!
23. Timbuktu
22. Selma
21. Love is Strange
20. Listen Up Philip
19. Godzilla
18. Starred Up
17. Why Don’t You Play in Hell?
16. Mommy
15. The Babadook – Kim and I watched this on Halloween. Creepy.
14. Palo Alto
13. Ida
12. Goodbye to Language
11. Boyhood – Love all of Richard Linklater’s work, including this. So ambitious!
10. The Tale of the Princess Kaguya
9. Force Majeure
8. God Help the Girl
7. The Double
6. Only Lovers Left Alive
5. Gone Girl – I like David Fincher’s stuff and this was okay, but hasn’t stuck with me.
4. Nymphomaniac
3. Under the Skin
2. Inherent Vice
1. The Grand Budapest Hotel – Stylish and fun, but best of the year?


The Best Films of 2013

25. Frances Ha
24. The World’s End
23. The Broken Circle Breakdown
22. The Bling Ring
21. Pain & Gain
20. The Great Beauty
19. Blue Jasmine
18. Nebraska – Another great film from Alexander Payne.
17. Beyond the Hills
16. The Great Gatsby – I liked elements of this but thought much of it was just too gaudy, but that’s surely intentional based on the source material.
15. Stoker
14. The Act of Killing
13. Laurence Anyways
12. The Wolf of Wall Street
11. Upstream Color
10. Post Tenebras Lux
9. Leviathan
8. A Touch of Sin
7. At Berkeley
6. Spring Breakers
5. The Grandmaster
4. 12 Years a Slave – This film wasn’t bad but I didn’t think it was great either.
3. Inside Llewyn Davis
2. The Wind Rises – Although I love Hayao Miyazaki’s work and own this film, I still haven’t seen it.
1. Before Midnight – This series — Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, Before Midnight — is amazing. This installment is heartbreaking. I can relate to it so much…


The Best Films of 2012

25. Sound of Noise
24. Cosmopolis
23. Policeman
22 The Avengers – This film combines two things I hate: Joss Whedon and over-the-top CGI. I didn’t like it.
21. Shut Up and Play the Hits
20. Moonrise Kingdom – I’m a fan of Wes Anderson, but I haven’t seen this yet.
19. Oslo, August 31st
18.
Tabu
17. The Deep Blue Sea
16.
Skyfall
15. Cloud Atlas – One of my favorite books but I’m reluctant to see this.
14. The Cabin in the Woods – Did I mention I don’t like Joss Whedon? Kim and I started watching this on Halloween but didn’t finish.
13. Goodbye First Love
12. Wuthering Heights
11. Alps
10. Girl Walk All Day
9. Anna Karenina
8. The Comedy
7. Something in the Air
6. The Master
5. Django Unchained – I didn’t expect to like this nearly as much as I did.
4. Zero Dark Thirty
3. Amour – Kim and I watched this after it was on many “best of lists”. It was interesting but ultimately pretty forgettable.
2. Like Someone in Love
1. Holy Motors


The Best Films of 2011

25. The Descendants – Love Alexander Payne, and I love this movie.
24. Buddha Mountain
23. The Trip
22. The Time That Remains
21. Drive
19. Pina
19. We Need to Talk About Kevin
18. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
17. Shame
16. How to Die in Oregon
15. Footnote
14. The Interrupters
13. A Separation
12. The Turin Horse
11. The Adventures of Tintin – Are you kidding me? Look, I’ve loved Tintin since discovering him in the fourth grade. I’ve read all of his adventures and used to be a serious collector. This movie sucks. It’s a lousy adaptation that utterly fails to capture the spirit of the Tintin stories.
10. The Girls with the Dragon Tattoo – Excellent.
9. The Skin I Live In
8. Miss Bala
7. The Loneliest Planet
6. Hugo – A lot of fun.
5. Melancholia
4. The Arbor
3. Kill List
2. The Tree of Life – I enjoy Malick’s films and their thoughtful pacing, but I haven’t seen this yet.
1. This is Not a Film

As a footnote, my favorite movie from 2015 was Ex Machina, Alex Garland’s exploration of what it means to be human. Ostensibly, it’s science fiction. In reality, it’s more about psychology and philosophy. I really enjoyed it, and would love to see a sequel.

I liked the new Star Wars too, of course. How could I not? I’m a nerd, and this was a return to the vibe of the first movie, which wrapped me in its arms when I was but a wee lad…

My 2015 Year in Review

This has been quite a year for me. In 2015, I did a couple of Big Things that pushed me outside of my comfort zone. They were scary — but fun. And while my life was mostly awesome, it wasn’t perfect. (It never is, right?) I’ve struggled with my fitness, especially.

By far the biggest event in my life this year was our RV trip across the United States. Kim hatched this plan in early 2014, and after we realized we really wanted to do this adventure, we spent the rest of that year preparing for it. By early 2015, we’d begun shopping for a motorhome and planning for six months of travel. In the middle of January, we bought a used 29-foot Bigfoot for $38,000.

Bigfoot
Bigfoot, before the adventure began…

I don’t think I can convey just how nervous it made me to buy this vehicle. Motorhomes combine the worst aspects of owning both houses and cars. To me, making this move felt — and still feels — like a a huge risk. But calculated risks, life lacks zest. (Plus, we have high hopes that we can recoup much of that $38,000 when it comes time to resell the rig.)

Kim and I spent most of February and March preparing for our trip. We arranged for our friends Tyler and Jess to housesit our condo in Portland. We packed away all of our stuff (except our furniture). We outfitted the RV. Kim quit her job — a big leap of faith on her part. We took a couple of weekend test trips to nearby campgrounds.

Then, on my 46th birthday, we drove off for what we expected to be six months on the road.

Things got off to a rocky start. Kim and I don’t fight often, but there was some definite negative energy the morning we left. That bad vibe lingered as we drove south through Oregon and into northern California. But by the time we reached the Redwoods, we were back in sync. With a couple of exceptions, we remained in a good groove for the next nine months — despite being in constant close quarters and having nobody else to hang out with.

Bigfoot, at home in the Redwoods

After a week in Wine Country, we moved on to California’s Sierra Nevadas to explore Kim’s childhood stomping grounds. We visited her friends and family. We explored Yosemite.

Kim plays with her nephew, Porter, as a thunderstorm approaches

Yosemite Falls in the Yosemite Valley

By the middle of April, we’d reached southern California. We parked the RV in Palm Springs for a week, which gave us time to explore the surrounding area. We visited Joshua Tree. We drove around the Salton Sea and through Anza-Borrego. We spent time with more of Kim’s family in southern California.

J.D. stopped to take MANY photos
We were lucky to tour the park when it was cloudy and rainy.
The weather added texture to everything.

From there, we moved on to Arizona. Arizona! Wow, what a lovely surprise. The state is absolutely gorgeous.

When she was younger, Kim lived for a year in Flagstaff, Arizona. But at the time, she and her husband hadn’t had the time or money to really explore the region. This time, we spent nineteen days sampling the state from south to north — and still didn’t see half what we wanted to.

We loved the funky charm of Bisbee, the mining town built into the side of a mountain. We enjoyed the hospitality of her aunt and uncle in Tucson. We made a quick pitstop for Chinese Mexican food (yes, really) at Chino Bandido in Phoenix. We spent a week exploring the area around Sedona. We camped for free in the national forest just outside the Grand Canyon.

Devil's Bridge behind Sedona
Devil’s Bridge behind Sedona (click for larger version)

Greetings from Forest Road 688F
Forest Road 688F, just south of Grand Canyon!

Grand Canyon is Arizona's most-famous (and most-visited) landmark
Grand Canyon is Arizona’s most-famous (and most-visited) landmark.

The canyon is vast almost beyond imagining -- 277 miles of fantastic formations
The canyon is vast almost beyond imagining — 277 miles of fantastic formations.

It's the Colorado River far below that has carved this region's landscape
It’s the Colorado River far below that has carved this region’s landscape.

The views are so vast that you can watch the approaching weather
The views are so vast that you can watch the approaching weather.

But the biggest surprise of all was probably Page, on the Arizona-Utah border. This town came into existence during the construction of the much-maligned Glen Canyon Dam. It’s surrounded by astounding geologic formations, including the jaw-dropping Horseshoe Bend and the famously photographed Antelope Canyon, both of which are well worth the time and effort to visit.

We're happy to have seen Arizona. Now it's on to other states!
Overlooking Horseshoe Bend near Page, Arizona.

Antelope Canyon is a crazy kaleidoscope of shapes and colors.
Antelope Canyon is a crazy kaleidoscope of shapes and colors.
Between the two of us, we took over six hundred photos!

After a quick stop at the relatively disappointing Monument Valley, we spent a week in southwest Colorado. Again, more amazing scenery. From the ancient cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde to old mining towns like Silverton and Rico to the fantastic Rocky Mountain peaks around Telluride and Ouray, we loved soaking up the history and the views. Top highlight? Probably the afternoon we spent at the “clothing-optional” hot springs outside Ouray. We spent several hours reading in the mineral pools, getting massages, and experiencing a fantastic thunderstorm.

The train followed the bank of the Animas River
Riding the Durango narrow-gauge railroad next to the Animas River

Ouray, Colorado is tucked into the Rocky Mountains
Ouray, Colorado is tucked into the Rocky Mountains

Black Canyon of the Gunnison
Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park

From there, we moved on to the Fort Collins area, where we enjoyed ten days with Kim’s mom and stepdad. We biked around the town, ate and drank too much (a theme for this trip), and got to visit with friends like the Mr. Money Mustache family. A great break after the first stage of our trip.

Atop Rocky Mountain National Park
Atop Rocky Mountain National Park

Financial friends in Longmont
Financial friends in Longmont: Derek and Carrie and the Mustache family.

By early June, we had a feel for how this whole motorhome thing worked. We left Colorado and drove northwest into Wyoming, where we explored Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons for a week. Again, so much beauty! The western United States has some world-class destinations for nature lovers.

Old Faithful in action
Old Faithful is neat, but Yellowstone offers much more

Grand Prismatic Spring is gorgeous!
Grand Prismatic Spring is beautiful…

The magnificent Tetons
Morning in Grand Teton National Park (photo from top of Signal Mountain)

After a minor mishap on our way to Sun Valley, Idaho — we managed to run out of gas while driving the back way into the resort town — we settled in for a quiet week in a small town.

A long way down...
The drop down into Sun Valley on Trail Creek Summit Road

From there, it was north to Montana. The end of June found us camped on the shores of Swan Lake, a great base for exploring Glacier National Park and the surrounding area. We spent a lot of time on the water, basking in the sun — and dodging mosquitoes. (From the time we reached Fort Collins at the end of May until we settled in Savannah in early October, both of us constantly sported bug bites.)

Boondocking at the base of the Bitterroot Mountains.
Boondocking at the base of the Bitterroot Mountains.

The cold, cold water of Swan Lake in northern Montana
The cold, cold water of Swan Lake in northern Montana

Glacier National Park
Glacier National Park, as seen from Going-to-the-Sun Road.

The first three months of our road trip had been spent exploring The West, a region we already knew fairly well. (In fact, we had never left a place that Kim did not know.) Now it was time to head into the unknown. Our first stop? The Dakotas. We passed Independence Day in the Black Hills of South Dakota, a wonderful vacation spot.

Mount Rushmore!
Mount Rushmore would have been neater at the start of our trip. By July we were jaded.

We darted down to Nebraska to visit Kim’s close friends and spent a night parked on the edge of bluff overlooking Badlands National Park (just a few miles from the infamous Wall Drug, perhaps the country’s top tourist trap). Here we reached Peak Mosquito. The nasty bloodsucking menaces were so thick that we could not walk from the car to the RV without getting new bites. Crazy!

Sitting on the edge of the Badlands
Sitting on the edge of the Badlands…

Parked on the edge of the badlands!
Our best camping spot on the trip if not for the bloodthirsty flies and mosquitoes.

It was here that our troubles began. Driving east toward Minnesota, the motorhome’s engine blew. We found ourselves stranded for ten days in the small town of Plankinton, South Dakota. While the fine folks at Overweg Auto installed a new engine for us, we took the time to visit the home of Laura Ingalls Wilder, see the Corn Palace in Mitchell (meh), and watch a lot of movies on our laptops.

Stranded!
Prepping to tow an injured RV back to town…

The Ingalls homestead
The real-life Ingalls homestead. Laura first met Almonzo in the slough behind this white building.

It was in Plankinton that the seed was planted for my new financial blog, Money Boss. While hosting a financial webinar for my friend Leo Babauta, I realized that I really do love reading and writing about money, and helping others improve their finances. So, after years of saying I was retired, I put the wheels in motion to get back in the game.

With our newly-repaired RV, we got back on the road and tried to make up for lost time. I visited my friends Joel and Aimee who live smack dab in Garrison Keillor country. (Seriously, they live just a few miles from the fictional location of Lake Wobegon.) We parked for a few days near Duluth, Minnesota, where we got out first introduction to what passes for scenery in the East. (Sorry, folks, but it’s not nearly as scenic as the West!)

The sea caves at Devils Island
The sea caves of the Apostle Islands. Like a submerged Sedona. [click for larger version]

In the Land O’ Lakes, we started dropping in on friends. We spent a few days with Jim Collins on the shore of Lake Michigan; we saw Shannyn in Chicago (our first real city since Denver two months earlier); we camped for a week near the Amish enclave of Shipshewana, Indiana where we enjoyed the hospitality of Phil and Kathy; we visited Adam Baker’s family in Indianapolis. It was all great fun, but Kim and I were both interested to see that once we had crossed the Great Plains, it was as if we’d entered another country. Again, the eastern U.S. is very different from the west.

J.D. and Jim, walking the beach...
J.D. and Jim, walking the shores of Lake Michigan…

The river tour of Chicago's architecture may be the best such trip I've ever taken
The river tour of Chicago’s architecture is an excellent way to learn about the city.

An Amish farmer works his field

Adam and J.D. and three Baker girls
Adam and J.D. and three Baker girls

Next, we moved on to Ohio. We stopped near Cincinnati for four days, where we had three great social experiences. First, we met Chris and Jim (a.k.a. Geeks on Tour). Then we enjoyed a home-cooked meal from Amy Finke. Then we enjoyed another home-cooked meal from Andrea Deckard.

J.D. and Andrea are very tired...
Can you tell how hot and tired Andrea and I are in this photo?

In fact, the 24 hours with Andrea had a profund impact on both Kim and me. Over dinner, she told us about Steve Chou’s course on how to open an online store. Kim has been searching for some way to make money online, and this sparked something inside her. The very next day, she had begun researching how to make this happen. (Unlike me, Kim is not a natural internet denizen. She doesn’t enjoy computer work. This is a whole new world to her.) The next morning over breakfast, Andrea gave me some not-so-gentle prodding to start my new website.

These 24 hours with Andrea completely changed our plans. We’d already realized that this six-month trip across the United States was going to take at least a year, but we’d had no plans to stop. Now, however, both Kim and I became distracted. Instead of being in the moment, enjoying where we were and what we were doing, we were thinking about other things. She was thinking about what to sell online and how to do it. I was drawing up plans for Money Boss.

Thanks to Andrea, everything changed on August 14th.

We left Cincinnati and drove deep into West Virginia, a state of mountains and trees. Although this was probably the most beautiful place we’d seen since Arizona, neither of us was fully engaged anymore. Instead of exploring the world around us, we were spending time in the motorhome, working on our projects.

West Virginia is beautiful
The lovely misty mountains of West Virginia…

The New River Gorge Bridge

For the next two weeks, we tried to explore the places we visited. We took a tour of the West Virginia State Penitentiary. In Cleveland, we took a day to ride the roller coasters at Cedar Point. We also visited the Pro Football Hall of Fame (very disappointing) and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (better than expected — great, in fact). We parked the RV at a winery in northwestern New York (dangerous!) and biked around Niagara Falls. (So far, Niagara Falls has been the most impressive geological feature we’ve seen in the East. It’s pretty neat. If it were in the West, it’d be a National Park.)

The West Virginia State Penitentiary
The penitentiary building, as seen from the mound across the road…

Harvest Host parking in New York
Our RV spot (and fire) at Freedom Run Vineyard

Niagara Falls from the Canadian side
The incredibly beautiful Niagara Falls (click to enlarge)

As a sign of how much we’d lost our enthusiasm for the trip, we skipped New York’s Finger Lakes, a region we’d been looking forward to visiting. We did stop in Cooperstown, home of the Baseball Hall of Fame (again, underwhelming). This area was far more beautiful than we’d expected. We both thought we could live here.

While the next two weeks weren’t miserable, they were certainly the least enjoyable two weeks of the trip. We spent four days in Pennsylvania’s Poconos, a place I’d always thought was some sort of resort get-away. Turns out it’s a dirty over-commercialized tourist trap. Then we spent ten days in an RV park near Atlantic City, New Jersey. We ventured outside the motorhome only rarely. Instead, we cooped ourselves up inside and worked on our projects. By this time, my plans for Money Boss were in full swing. Meanwhile, Kim was receiving a crash course in internet marketing.

We did take time for two visits, however. Our friend Harlan drove out to see us one afternoon. And my little brother Tony happened to be in town for a business convention (which was why we’d picked Atlantic City as a stop in the first place), so we spent a day with him. It was awesome to see both guys.

Tony and J.D.
Brothers with beer.

Harlan and J.D.
Business buddies.

After Atlantic City, we parked the RV at Jim Wang’s house outside Washington, D.C. We drove the Mini Cooper to Charlotte, North Carolina to attend two conferences: Digital CoLab and Fincon. This week with friends and colleagues energized both of us, and reinforced the idea that it was time for us to take a break from our travels.

But where should we stop? Where would we live? What would we do with the RV? How long would we stay put? What would we do for money? Is it possible to simply set down roots all of a sudden with no plan, no preparation?

Turns out, it’s surprisingly easy to do so.

After exploring Charleston, Savannah, and Orlando, we decided to settle in Georgia for six months. We rented a fully-finished condo in Savannah for six months and settled into a routine.

During October, Kim and I were both good about exercise. We’d gained weight from too much food and drink (and not enough exercise) during our six months across the U.S., and we aimed to fix that. At the same time, we both dove deep into our businesses. Kim ordered lots of different products from China to test their marketability online. I worked on content and design for Money Boss.

In early November, Kim’s brother flew out to visit us for a long weekend. We played tourist in Savannah and had a great time trying restaurants and touring the historic sites.

Doug and J.D.
Doing the tourist thing with Kim’s brother, Doug.

After Doug’s visit, I reverted to bad habits. You see, if I’m not careful I can become a workaholic. And that’s what I did. I spent the entire month with my head down in front of my computer. I stopped going for walks. I stopped lifting weights. All I did was work. In some ways, this was productive. I created an excellent (IMHO) ten-part series that summarizes my financial philosophy. And just before Thanksgiving, the Money Boss website went live!

Money Boss screenshot
Money Boss is live! So excited for this new site…

On the other hand, all work and no play makes J.D. a very dull boy. I lost my fitness gains from the month before. And after getting into a good groove with my writing, I fell into a mental funk. The first couple weeks of December weren’t good.

Kim, on the other hand, was a machine. She was exercising. She was working on her online business. And most impressive (to me) was the fact that she had hustled to get her Georgia state dental hygiene license, distributed her résumé to offices around town, and now was picking up all sorts of fill-in work. Her hustle is amazing.

While we’d settled in Savannah, we continued to explore our surroundings. For Thanksgiving, we drove to Orlando to spend the holiday with our friend Toni and her family. We also spent a night in St. Augustine, Florida, the oldest European settlement in the U.S. (We’re heading back to St. Augustine in a few days to help celebrate Toni’s birthday.) In early December, we drove two hours north for a weekend in beautiful Charleston, South Carolina.

The Angel Oak
The massive Angel Oak is a Charleston landmark.

The Old Sheldon Church
The ruins of the Old Sheldon Church between Charleston and Savannah.

To end the year, we booked a week in New York City. Kim had found a Groupon for a cheap hotel near Times Square. (The place? The very European Row NYC, where rooms are small and functional because you should be out enjoying the city.) We flew up for Christmas week and had a blast. The highlight was an evening with blogging buddies Harlan, Miranda, and Athena. (Trivia: We’ve now seen Harlan and Miranda each three times on this trip, the most we’ve seen anyone.)

The Statue of Liberty
The Statue of Liberty.

NYC Street Scene
On the street, somewhere near Harlem.

As I say, it’s been quite a year. When we think about it, Kim and I are blown away by how much we’ve done in the past twelve months. Seriously. With zero experience, we bought a motorhome and launched on the adventure of a lifetime. We explored half the United States. We settled in a new city (if only for a few more months) and both started big new projects. Through it all, our relationship has only gotten stronger, which is something that wasn’t a given. (Many folks find that RV living harms their bond rather than helping it.)

That said, our health has suffered. We’ve enjoyed trying the food (and beer) from around the country. Our bellies are good barometers of just how much that’s true. We’re not worried, though. We know we have the drive and ability to shed the weight once we establish some sort of routine. Unfortunately, that might mean when we return home — next October.

2015 Travels
Where we’ve been in 2015. So many places!

What next? Well, Kim will continue doing fill-in dental hygiene work in Savannah. She’s shocked by how well this has gone. People love her, both patients and dental offices. She has more offers of work than she has days in the week, and she’s getting more all the time. (She’s even getting calls from offices she never applied to; folks are referring her to each other!) Meanwhile, she’s about to place her first order for product from China. She’ll be selling teething necklaces (!?!?!) on Amazon.

Kim's eCommerce Stuff
Our kitchen table is filled with Kim’s ecommerce stuff.

My work is focused solely on Money Boss. Now that the site is live, and now that I’ve finished writing my ten-part “crash course” to my financial philosophy, it’s time to settle into a writing routine. The challenge? I not only need to produce articles for now, but also articles for when we’re on the road. Once we resume our RV trip, I want to devote my efforts to that. I don’t want my attention to be divided. It takes the fun out of things. That means I have to create twice as many articles (or three times as many articles) as I need for the immediate future.

Fortunately, I have tons of ideas. Plus, during my years of “retirement”, I saved up lots of notes and half-completed stories. I shouldn’t have any trouble coming up with new stuff to write. (First up? Tomorrow — on New Year’s Day — I’ll write my article for April first. It’ll be an update of a GRS classic: Lifestyles of the Rich and Stupid. Very eager to write this one.)

We plan to take a two-week trip through Florida at the end of February and beginning of March, but other than that we’ll be camped here in Savannah until it’s time to hit the road again. After the huge St. Patrick’s Day celebration — the biggest such event in the U.S., bigger than New York or Chicago! — we’ll start packing up the motorhome. Our plan is to hit the road by the time the lease on the condo expires on March 31st.

We’re not sure what route we’ll take. We skipped some places we wanted to see when we got burned out at the end of the summer. But we don’t want to drive all the way up to New England. (I’ve promised Kim that I’ll fly us out to see the fall colors in 2017.) We’ll probably start in Washington, D.C. (Maybe we can park the RV in Jim’s driveway again? Or maybe we’ll drive the Mini Cooper up and rent a cheap hotel? AirBNB?) From there, we want to explore the South.

We know we want to hit Kentucky in late April or early May. Kim wants to see horse races! We want to see Nashville and Memphis. I have a college roommate in Huntsville, Alabama and I’d love to reconnect with him. Kim has never seen New Orleans, and she really ought to do so. Our friend Bret will kill us if we don’t spend a week in St. Louis. I have a cousin in northern Oklahoma. The state of Texas is h-u-g-e and might take an entire month to explore. Kim wants to see New Mexico, and we’d both like to visit her mom again in Colorado on the return trip. Plus, there’s Arizona. Arizona! We want to see more of what that state has to offer.

Our only real timeline is that we have to be in San Diego for a conference in the middle of September. (I’ll fly home to Portland for World Domination Summit in August, but that shouldn’t affect our travel schedule.) After that, we’ll drive north to Portland. We should be home in early October. We can’t wait! The U.S is amazing, but Portland is home and we miss it. And we miss our friends. Our only other plan for 2016 is a trip to Ecuador for the fourth annual chautauqua on money and happiness.

So, there you have it. A busy and blessed 2015 with more to come in 2016. If I could get my eating and drinking under control, my life would be pretty much ideal. I hope your life is similarly wonderful, and that you and I will continue to become better people together as time goes on.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Long-time readers know that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.

Despite attempts by retailers to turn the weekend into some sort of extended consumer orgy, I’m grateful that we set aside a day each year to remember the good things we have.

Make no mistake — if you’re reading this, you’re among the world’s wealthy.

Here’s an over-the-top appreciation of the Thanksgiving Day from 1951:

Maybe a bit sappy but certainly sincere.

This year, as in years past, I want to share an 88-year-old poem that I read to myself every Thanksgiving. It does a fine job of encapsulating my philosophy of life. I’ve de-versified it and converted it to prose paragraphs. I like the way it reads this way.

Desiderata

(Max Ehrmann, 1927)

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly, and listen to others — even to the dull and the ignorant — they too have their story. Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism. Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love, for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

I am thankful for all that I have.

I’m thankful for my health, for my family, for Kim, for our extended safe passage across the U.S. this past year. I’m thankful for good friends and great colleagues. I’m thankful to have found my calling in life, and to be able to do truly meaningful work. And I’m thankful for you, the folks who read what I write.

It’s been a true pleasure getting to know so many of you, and I look forward to making more connections in the future.

Happy Thanksgiving!

How I Got My Groove Back

It’s been an interesting week here in Savannah.

After Kim and I settled here six weeks ago, I slipped into a sort of routine. I’d get up in the morning, answer email, do a bit of work, go for a five-mile walk, come back and do more work, and then call it a day. Much of the time, I struggled to get my writing done. It felt like everything was rusty, like I was trying to remember how to make things move again.

That’s changed now, and in a big way.

For the past four-and-a-half days (it’s almost noon on Friday), I have been a writing machine. I haven’t been able to tear myself away from the computer.

I get up in the morning and sit down at my desk. I sit there, clacking away at the keyboard until dinnertime (with only a brief break for lunch). I’m not going for walks, I’m not answering email, and I’m not getting anything else done that needs to get done.

This will be a problem if it continues indefinitely, but for now I’m just riding the wave. It feels so good to have my groove back. This is what Mihály Csíkszentmihályi means when he describes the psychology of flow. I’m doing meaningful work that challenges me, and it makes me feel terrific.

Note: As you might expect, 95% of what I’m writing is for Money Boss, my new personal-finance blog. The site went live this week, and I’ve been backfilling the archives with bits and pieces I wrote this summer. Plus, I continue to write long essays as part of the “financial freedom crash course” I’m sending people when they sign up for the email list.

What was it that helped me find flow once more? It was a combination of a few things.

  • First, I’ve begun reading about money again. After I left Get Rich Slowly, I stopped reading personal-finance books. It was as if I took five years away from immersing myself in the subject. Now, though, I’m re-reading classics (like The Millionaire Next Door), finding new favorites (like the Warren Buffet biography The Snowball), and searching for other books about wealth. The stuff I read is constantly triggering new ideas for articles. I love that!
  • Second, I’ve been talking about money with readers and colleagues. I’ve always been piss-poor at answering emails, but when I started Money Boss I made a vow to reply to as many messages as possible. (This is something Chris Guillebeau does that makes a big impression on his audience.) So, I’ve been reading the email people send me, answering their financial questions, and sharing stories and ideas. This too has given me lots of ideas for articles.
  • Lastly, I’ve been freewriting. One of the sucky things about being a writer is that the stuff you produce when you’re “cold” usually isn’t very good. In fact, it’s often terrible. But novice writers — or experienced writers who have forgotten — don’t realize that it’s this shitty early stuff that sets the stage for the better stuff later on. You’ve got to push through it. You’ve got to produce a lot of words that will never see the light of day before you get to the gold. I’m finally getting to the gold.

The bottom line: I’m churning out articles at a terrific rate, and it feels awesome.

Meanwhile, Kim is experiencing a similar resurgence in her own world.

When we arrived in Savannah, she started the long process of getting her dental hygiene license in Georgia. She’s been working on starting a side business (selling stuff online), but that’s not really her passion. In fact, she kind of hates the internet. But she loves people (and people love her). Working with patients puts her into a flow state of her own.

On Monday, Kim’s hygiene license finally came through. On Tuesday, she hit the streets, going door to door across Savannah, dropping off her résumé and chatting with doctors. On Wednesday, she worked her first fill-in shift — and she’s already scheduled for several more. She even has an interview for a temporary full-time position!

When Kim came home after her first day on the job, she was glowing. “I missed that,” she said. “I missed talking with people and doing something that I’m good at.”

I know what she means.