Monday, January 01, 2018

Getting My Affairs in Order

If I have any resolutions (I don't really do them unless I do), it is all about 'getting my affairs in order.' People who are given a fatal diagnosis are often encouraged to do this. But we will all die. And I worry about troubling those I leave behind with pesky details.

I'll probably live another twenty years. (And outlive my money.) But you never know.

When FFP and I were first married, we read an article in a magazine. An elderly man had 'willed' himself to live during his wife's last fatal illness and then lived long enough to see her memorial headstone erected on her grave. I told FFP he needed to do that for me. I'd like to hold him to that only I worry about the things I do in our domestic and financial partnership that I haven't sufficiently explained. I worry about possessions that I'd leave behind that would seem burdensome. I went through first my mother's possessions, then my dad's and then FFP's parents.

We are taking down the Christmas decorations. The ones above are on top of a cabinet that you have to get the ladder out to reach. I haven't done that yet. What will someone make of all those bendies when I'm gone? And even more so, when both of us are gone. I'd like to get a jump on tossing stuff. (Although I think the Christmas 'toys' I put out this year are going to stay until I'm gone.)

I'd also like to feel like FFP could figure out the bills I pay, the WEB space and domains we own, how I organize various things, how I continuously balance our cash accounts, how I account for his Subchapter S business and communicate with the CPA to get all the tax forms done.

I don't know how many times I've started on this task and how many ways I've tried to do it. But maybe 2018 is the year. If I'm lucky.

Speaking of luck I ate black-eyed peas and cornbread and collard greens. We attended two 'good luck' New Year's Day parties. At one they grilled sardines which, I learned, some believe to be a good luck food. Fine by me because I love sardines and these were delicious.

And good luck to all the Holidailies folks out there who've been writing this month. I've enjoyed reading a few. Until next year.