I've re-read the thread I made the other day, about leaving the country, all the responses and everything a few times over and I really appreciate the advice and perspectives. Everything from francopoli telling me to look into cost of living situations to kleinbl00 telling me to take things one step at a time to briandmyers subtly suggesting that America isn't necessarily the greatest country on earth (nice try there buddy). Even though I didn't respond to the comment, in thread, I gotta say I also really appreciate goobster's response, both for the good advice in general but also for a second message that I need to take to heart and that's not being afraid to try, because if I'm resourceful and stick with it, I'll come out on top. I think I'm at a lot of pivot points in my life, living situation, career situation, and social life situation and I dunno. This shit is hard to figure out and I feel horribly overwhelmed. I found my hubcap collection the other day, took a good long look at it and realized I don't need it, so I'm gonna go through some of my other stuff and figure out what else to let go of. I know I've been talking about selling my antique books for forever. Going through my stuff might help me think. Anyhow, I think I'm gonna cut back on my Hubski time a bit so I can focus more on life. I'm not disappearing altogether, hell, I'll probably lurk quite a bit, but we will see where things are going. I hope this doesn't sound mushy. I'm trying to not sound mushy. You guys are all awesome by the way.
My ex-wife and I split up after five years on New Years Eve. We just called it quits, sitting at home together, talking it out, and decided to split up. March 11th I was on an airplane, moving to Budapest, Hungary. A place I'd never been before, I had no connection to, and had never even heard the language until the flight attendant gave the pre-flight pitch in Hungarian. It just fucking happened. Like, 24 hours later I was standing in a shop in Budapest with a handful of weird-looking money, trying to buy some chips and a Coke, or something, and looking blankly at the shopkeeper as she spoke to me and I couldn't even fathom what she was saying. She gave a little exasperated sigh, gently took my hand, took the proper money out of my hand, made change, and put the change into my hand. Then she gave me a gentle smile, and ... I had just purchased food. In a foreign country where I knew not a single word. And I wouldn't starve to death in the next few minutes. Life was good. We all make jumps from time to time. The further you jump, the more amazing it will be when you find yourself standing on your feet. Good luck, my friend. (Oh... and I dumped my Bots Dot and License Plate collections when I started purging... they suddenly just didn't seem so important any more.)
Weird question. What did you do with your license plates? My dad has an absurdly huge collection of them.
To add to your book list I really found this one profoundly useful, particularly as it relates to "stuff." Ariely demonstrates original research that establishes how much more value we place on something just by having it. He demonstrates that holding onto stuff allows us to pretend it's worth more than it is, so we cling to things we don't even want. And he shows that the more stuff you have, the less of it you value individually - "prized possessions" lose their luster when you have to choose between too many. It's funny. I consider our house to be cluttered but then, my in-laws score a 3 on the hoarder scale. We had movers come to look at our stuff when we were in LA and two of them called us "minimalist." Did you know that Frank Lloyd Wright deliberately built his houses with almost no storage? Wright's philosophy was that if you needed to hide it away, you didn't need it. Certainly more extreme than I'd go but I doubt he'd be horrified by our off-site storage culture. Food for thought... Good luck and don't be a stranger.