5 things about me
What will almost certainly influence what I write about here.
I recently stepped back from political life after two terms as a city councilor. I opted to not run for a third term, but I kept my signs from my last run in case I decide to step back in again later. I am proud of my service and encourage everyone that may be overwhelmed by national politics to remember that most of what impacts your everyday life is local politics. Things I am especially proud of are working on tenants’ rights in our city, being the voice for understanding why childcare is economic development on the council, and being the person1 who understood that the proposed skate park design was absolutely terrible, and advocating for the skate park that was finally built - and is in constant use.
I love to sew and quilt2, and this year started doing embroidery. I find it very stress relieving to focus on making something that will add beauty and warmth to the world, when there is so much working to take all that away. Ayelet Waldman wrote an essay about just this, for the New Yorker - Piecing for Cover: At our darkest moments, why do so many of us take up quilting? Let’s just say, it resonated, and I expect the next four years to be prolific as far as my creating goes.
I am low-key obsessed with IKEA,3 for many reasons. I have a small 50s house, and their furniture fits the scale of our home better than a lot of other manufacturers, and their prices fit our budget better, too. Two years ago we did a full renovation of our kitchen and dining area using IKEA cabinets, and I spent a LOT of time (years!) leading up to being able to do the reno doing a lot of research on kitchen design and efficiency. Our next IKEA project is building PAX wardrobes in our primary bedroom to bring actual closet space to the house, as we have just 3 reach-in closets that are supplemented by giant dressers. The dressers are going, the built-ins will provide more hanging and shelf space. My kids’ rooms are furnished with ikea and I joke to my friends that we are basically a local showroom at this point, and if anyone wants to come see anything in person before making the drive or placing an order, to just come visit.
I am a benefits nerd. It is a joke that my Plan B is to go into HR and benefits administration. If you want me to help you understand your health insurance options4, I have a whole spreadsheet for that, that I now have on a Google site where I show comparisons I’ve done for others to explain how wildly different options can be depending on employer selections. (Medicare for all, really, and I hate that healthcare is so tied to employment.)
I read every single night before going to sleep. I read on a Kindle Oasis (RIP) and I regularly worry that because my kids don’t see me reading that I’m not modeling the reading life well! I track all of my books on Storygraph as well as in my planner, and I post my current read on my office door, to try to show a reading life beyond textbooks and assignments - you know, reading for pleasure!
I would very much like to go back to the early 90s, when I was hanging out with my skater friends, smoking cigs and listening to Jane’s Addiction and getting kicked out of store parking lots, and show up as a time traveler in my business casual and graying hair to let that version of myself know “hey, these moments here are going to inform you as an elected official in 30 years, NO, you are NOT hallucinating, I swear, this is true.”
I have found a longarm quilter so I now send out the actual *quilting* to be done for me, but I do everything else - pattern and fabric selection, cutting, ironing, piecing, and binding.
My daughter’s college is very close to our nearest IKEA, which is 230 miles from our house, and in the search she asked me if I only liked it because it was so close to IKEA. (It was a pro, for sure, but I liked it for many other reasons beyond IKEA proximity.) I also tell HER if she’s homesick, to just go to IKEA and visit all our furniture for comfort.
TLDR, if you have the option of an HDHP + HSA, it is almost always the best deal in both best and worst case scenarios, and I recommend that folks contribute the difference in premium price between the HDHP and traditional offerings to the HSA to reduce taxable income.