Tag Archives: writing

Journaling My Year

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I start, on January 1, to keep a daily journal and 10 1/2 months later, I’m still at it.

Over the years, I have tried and mostly failed to keep a daily journal of the things going on in my life. I’d start with good intentions and then stop, mostly because I forgot to keep writing. Then I’d start up again, swearing I’d keep at it, but then stop.

What I Tried

I tried handwritten journals in beautiful blank books. Stopping midway through one of them was especially painful since I really wanted to fill them and have a record of a long, uninterrupted period in a really nice looking book.

I tried using calendar-style planners with a whole week on each spread. Not much space to write there; I could simply put down a few bullet points about my day. These suffered the same fate. I have many partially completed calendar books floating around my home.

I tried marble notebooks like the ones we used in elementary school. The local Fred Meyer sells them for just 50¢ each once the Back to School buying rush is over. I have a lot of them. (I have a paper addiction.) They fared no better than all the other handwritten options.

And yes, I tried digital journalling. I tried apps designed just for that purpose. (I was very excited about Apple’s Journal app until I actually tried it; what good is a digital journal if you can’t export or print it? How many people will be using the same Journal app in 20 years? Definitely not me.)

Scrivener Document Sidebar
As you can see in the sidebar for my Scrivener Journal document, I was very bad about writing journal entries.

I also tried using Scrivener, the darling of the writing world. I created a Journal file with folders for months and files for days. The screenshot of the document’s sidebar shown here should give you an idea of how that went.

Understand that my desire to journal every day has been very intense throughout my life. Heck, this blog was started as a journal of sorts. Not a daily journal but just a journal of the interesting things I was doing or thinking that I wanted to share.

That desire ramped up as I aged and I started forgetting about things I’d seen or done. The only remnant — or trigger, in some cases — of a memory was a photo I took at the time. But I don’t take photos of everything. I worried that I was permanently forgetting the things I did, things I might want to remember in the future.

Things that would be so simple to just jot down right after they happened.

In a journal.

Another Try

This came to a head when I was trying to write up the days of my Great Loop trip in the My Great Loop Adventure blog I created to document the entire trip. It isn’t easy to blog in detail every day so I slacked off. And then, when I was trying to fill in the gaps in the blog, I realized that I just couldn’t remember the details I wanted to share.

I needed to do something about this. My memory was starting to get iffy and I didn’t want to lose days of my life. I had to try journaling again and stick to it this time.

The Journal I bought
I bought a yellow one in the largest size; they come in a lot of colors and three sizes.

I started on January 1. I prepared by buying a very nice journal book on Amazon (don’t judge me) that had 365 pages. One page per day. They were not dated or numbered but they did have spaces for both bits of info. And lines close enough together to fit a few hundred words.

I started on January 1 in Key West FL, where I was on my boat with my friend Jason. And, for the first time ever, I’ve kept to it, providing an entry for every single day of my life. It’s now October 16 and I have entries right through yesterday.

Covid Entry
I backtracked to fill in the pages for days I was really suffering with Covid. All I remember from those days was sleeping.

I’ll be honest: I don’t always write every evening or the following morning like I want to. Sometimes I miss a few days and have to go back. I’ve found that going backwards from the current day usually helps. The only days when the entry is unreasonably short were the few days that I slept nearly the entire day due to my bout with Covid in August.

Why It’s Working this Time

Why am I finally doing so well at journaling this year? I think there are three reasons, one of which I already touched upon.

  • Motivation. I’m tired of forgetting days and weeks of my life. I’m tired of looking at photos I shot 3 years ago and seeing places I forgot I’d visited. I don’t think my memory is any worse than the average person my age — it’s not like it’s a problem — but the only way I see being able to remember stuff is to jot notes about the day at day’s end or the following morning.
  • Success leads to more success. After ten and a half months of keeping this up, I feel that I’d really be letting myself down if I didn’t continue to do it. So the more I write, the more I want to write.
  • 365 single pages to fill. The book’s design makes it easy — and, in a way, required — to journal every day. There are exactly the right number of pages to fill. (Actually, there were 366 days this leap year, but I can always insert an extra sheet if I have to.) Second, the pages aren’t that big. There are only 25 lines! That’s nothing for someone like me. And who says I have to use every single one?

I bring the journal with me whenever I know I’ll be away for more than just one night. I try to write my entries at the end of the day, but if I miss that, I’ll try to do it in the morning when I’m having my coffee in bed.

What I’ve got so far is a summary of what I’ve been up to so far this year. Sometimes I write about when I woke up, how I slept, and what I ate. Sometimes I write details about a travel day’s experiences. Sometimes I write notes to myself about how I have to do something or change a dumb behavior. And once in a while, I write what’s on my mind socially, politically, or romantically.

And yes, I can squeeze a lot into 25 lines when I need to. I don’t write full sentences. It’s not like it’s going to be published anywhere. It’s just something I can look back on in years to come to remember what those pictures I might have are all about. Or to fill in the gaps when I didn’t take pictures.

One thing is for sure: it’s definitely going to come in handy when I fill in the gaps in the My Great Loop Adventure blog.

Pronoun Woes

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This old reader/writer knows the difference between singular and plural pronouns.

I just finished an audio book that kind of bugged me. The problem: the use of plural pronouns to apply to a singular person.

It was jarring. Most of the characters had the usual singular pronouns of he/him/his or she/her/hers so the text I heard as I listened was extremely easy to follow when the reader read about those characters. But one main character used the they/them/their pronouns. As a result, anytime the reader referred to that person, it sounded as if he were talking about multiple people. My listening brain came to a complete halt every time.

I’m old school. Although I understand the reason why people don’t want to use a male or female pronoun, I really wish we’d come up with a pronoun that didn’t already exist as a plural.

It’s difficult to understand text that refers to one person with a plural pronoun when the text could easily refer to multiple people. Many times that the reader referred to this character, I had to figure out if it was just that one person or multiple people. It was extremely distracting from the story.

I want to blame the writer, but I know why he did it. He wants to help make gender neutrality more acceptable to the general public. He wants us to get used to it. It’s a noble goal. But it drives some of us nuts. I would definitely have enjoyed the book more — with a lot less distraction — if he stuck to standard pronoun usage for his characters. Hell, he already had two lesbian couples in the book. How much did he need to support gender issues in what was basically a science fiction drama?

And now I know folks are going to step forward here and comment that we’ve been using “they” to refer to singular unspecified gender individuals for years and that it’s in the dictionary or that it’s in some widely used style guide. But it’s only been in common usage for people who don’t want a specific gender identity for a short while now. And I’ve been reading and writing for more than 50 years. It’s not as if I can flip a switch in my brain and it all works out fine for me. “They” refers to more than one person in my brain and most of the brains out there.

Clearly, we need a new set of singular pronouns. Can we fix this please?

Facing Retirement

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“Retirement,” which seemed so far off just last year, is now close at hand and remarkably easier than I thought it would be.


John’s Carver at its slip in Charleston, SC, on the night I boarded for our five week trip together.

Back in Spring 2022 — just 14 months ago? — I was on a cruise with Capt John on his 36′ Carver Aft Cabin cruiser on a trip up the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW). (You can read more about that in my Great Loop blog.) It was April and I was trying to enjoy the cruise while worrying about a bunch of work-related things back home:

  • Cherry season was coming up and I had all the usual concerns about the season. Would the cherry crop be viable? Would all my clients sign up? Would I get back clients who hadn’t signed up last year because of the frost? How much acreage would I have to cover? Would I need pilots in Wenatchee, Quincy, and Mattawa or just Wenatchee and Quincy? Would I be able to find enough pilots?
  • My helicopter N7534D, was aging and had just 20 hours left until a required overhaul that would cost $270K. I had already decided to sell it after cherry season, but was 20 hours enough for the season? What would I do if I flew that off?
  • Would I be able to sell my Part 135 charter business (which had become a pain in the ass because of the ineptitude and spite of inspectors at the Spokane FSDO) with a nearly timed-out helicopter? Would the guy who kept claiming he wanted to buy it all actually come up with the money?
  • Would I be able to find another helicopter to replace it without going back into deep debt? Or should I just retire from cherry drying? Would I be able to sell my cherry drying business to someone else who wanted to take my place?

All this was going through my mind as we cruised at 6 knots up the ICW, spending a few days at stops along the way. To be fair, my cherry season stress normally starts in March and April, but this year it seemed more stressful than usual, mostly because of the age of the helicopter and its upcoming need for an overhaul.

My idea of “retirement”

Wonder why I keep putting “retire” and “retirement” in quotes? It’s because my idea of retirement isn’t the same as most people’s.

I’ll never stop working. Whether I write or make jewelry or do odd jobs in the gig economy, I’ll always have something to keep me busy that brings in a few bucks. (Hell, this summer I’m even selling eggs from my chickens at $5 a dozen.) I’d already considered getting my boat captain’s license — yes, for a boat I didn’t even own yet — and doing charter cruises to earn cruising money.

I won’t stop working until either my mind or body makes it impossible. Working keeps us alive; you can ask my wasband about his dad’s short retirement to get an idea of what I mean by that. (I hope you’re resting in peace, Charlie.)

In general, although I had thoughts about retirement, it was still far off on the horizon. I couldn’t imagine being “retired.”

I did, however, have a rough plan for buying my own boat and cruising the Great Loop in it. I’d even looked at boats. But I couldn’t buy a boat unless I sold the helicopter and I still couldn’t buy a boat if I wanted to get another helicopter and stay in the business. So I figured the boat purchase would be sometime in 2024, after that cherry season. Maybe that’s when I’d “retire,” too.

Everything Changes

Everything changed with a phone call. A guy with a lot of money offered me a lot of money for the helicopter if I sold it then. He wasn’t interested in the charter business, but the amount he offered for a helicopter that I was hoping to unload in a few months anyway was too much to ignore. On May 6, I watched it fly away for the last time with the money secured in my bank account.


It was a lot easier to say goodbye to this helicopter when the money was in the bank and my thoughts were on the kind of boat I’d buy to replace it. Also, no more $20K per year insurance bills. Yippee!

I arranged to lease a helicopter for the season. (There were problems with that, but I won’t go into it here.) I got contracts, I got pilots. The season started off good and then fizzled out in mid June when it stopped raining. The season ended in August. I heaved a sigh of relief again.

I listed my charter business with a broker. I knew that I’d have to get a helicopter to keep my Part 135 certificate and I’d decided that I was done owning helicopters. The broker listed it for a lot more than I expected.

Meanwhile, with all that helicopter sales money sitting in the bank, I started shopping for a boat. By the end of August, I’d made a deal on one.

Around that time, the broker found a few buyers for my company. One backed out. The other was an idiot tire-kicker who called me directly with a crazy lowball offer. But the third was serious. As I was signing papers on DocuSign to buy the boat, I was signing other papers on DocuSign to sell my company.

And suddenly, I found myself with a nearly new Ranger Tug, a new company that offered just cherry drying and aerial photo services, and a bunch more money in the bank than I expected to have at the end of cherry season. I’d also shed a costly-to-keep helicopter, a charter business I no longer wanted, and the anxiety of dealing with unreasonable, demanding people at the FAA.

I celebrated by spending September learning to cruise in my new boat. Then I shipped it to Chicago and got it on the Great Loop.


While I’m home this summer, I can be reminded of my first day on the Loop with the new Home Screen on my phone.

I named my boat Do It Now. Frankly, I was done waiting. Hell, I’d been done way back in 2010 but had a husband to shed to move forward. It had taken me 12 years to get through the divorce debacle and become financially secure in my home — which I’d paid off in July 2022 — before I could get back on track for what I wanted out of life.

But I didn’t think that I was one big step closer to “retirement.”

Retirement Thoughts Kick In

It wasn’t until this past winter that I started thinking about the possibility of tapping into the retirement money I’d been saving in earnest since the late 1980s. I own some stock — including Apple stock I originally bought at $13/share in the mid to late 1990s that had grown substantially with numerous splits and stock price increases. And I had some savings. And my living expenses were pretty low since just about everything I owned was completely paid for.

I’d been under the impression that I had to wait until I was 65 to start tapping into my retirement funds. Or maybe it was 62? I asked a knowledgeable friend. No, he told me. 59 1/2 is the age you can start using that money.

Holy cow. I was there.

I had a great winter cruising on the Great Loop in Do It Now, covering 3000+ miles, mostly solo. I made friends, saw a lot of new places, and met challenges along the way. I took a seven-day captain’s license class and passed the test.

But as March and April came along, I had the same cherry season worries as usual, but with a twist: I didn’t have a helicopter to fly. How was I going to deal with that?

Various solutions came about and I explored them all. But it wasn’t until I started contracting with clients that I realized what a non-issue it would all be. One of my clients did not sign up again. Since he accounted for about 2/3 of the acreage I cover, my season would be a lot shorter with fewer pilots and less revenue to pay them. I’d be able to keep a lot less money.

At first, I was angry. But then I reasoned it out. I wanted to to retire at the end of the season anyway. I was hoping to be able to sell the business, but if I had a good enough season, I might talk myself into keeping it and doing it again. But this one client had helped me make two decisions that took a lot of stress out of my life:

  • Without the added acreage, the business wasn’t worth selling so I didn’t have to stress over finding a buyer (or dealing with the tire-kicker who claimed 3 years ago that he wanted to buy my whole business).
  • With less revenue coming in, it was less attractive to keep doing the work. I was no longer tempted to do it another year. Retirement at the end of the season was a definite.

And I’ll be honest here: the client who had backed out was a pain in the ass anyway. Now I wouldn’t have to deal with his antics.

No, I haven’t been drying cherries for 25 years. It was only 15 years. Before (and during) that time, my summers were ruined by book deadlines, mostly for Quicken Official Guide, which I wrote the first 11 editions of starting in 1998.)

I was looking at the reality of having a summer off in 2024 for the first time in 25 years. It took no time at all to imagine my trip up to New York that summer for the ultimate Champlain, Erie, and Severn Canal cruise in my boat.

And with that, I had scheduled my retirement: August 2023. I would be 62 years old.

The Money Stuff

The question was, could I afford retirement without changing my lifestyle? I have to admit that cruising in a boat thousands of miles over the course of months is not exactly cheap. If I wasn’t going to make enough cherry drying money this summer to cover the next year of cruising, where would the money come from?

The answer was easy: my retirement funds.

They’d been growing and shrinking and growing and shrinking but mostly growing over the past 30 years. If I continued to earn some income from other sources, I wouldn’t need much every year — probably not even enough to start getting social security anytime soon. After all, other than cruising my cost of living was modest. (It really pays, folks, to eliminate all your debt before you retire.)

I had a talk with my accountant yesterday and a “retirement specialist” at my investment firm today. I discovered that my lowered income would save a lot of money on taxes, get me a better ACA health care subsidy until Medicare kicked in in 2026, and enable me to make retirement plan withdrawals without huge tax hits. I also discovered that tapping into my IRA would be as easy as filling in a form on my investment website. The money would arrive within days as a direct deposit to my bank account.

Of course, the money I’ve invested in my retirement funds is not unlimited. I will eventually run out. How quickly that happens depends on the stock market and how much I take each year. But I still have Social Security waiting for me and can always sell my home on the next market upturn. I think I’ll have enough for the rest of my life.

That is the goal, isn’t it? To die with just enough money to dispose of your body and give your friends a big party to say goodbye?

Facing retirement? Yes, but also embracing retirement. I just didn’t expect it to be this soon.