A New Name, A Family Fund and other things

I woke up around 7:30am this morning. I know I didn't head upstairs until around 1:30a, so I don't know how much sleep I've been getting this week and last.

I don't feel particularly tired, but I think I ought to get more sleep. I keep waking up with my heart racing. I don't know if it's hunger or something else.

First, the other things

• After 2 voicemails and 2 emails (unread) from Wespath, I finally sent an email asking them to go ahead with the Direct Deposit tomorrow (Friday).  I really hope they do and I don't have to communicate with them anymore. This will be one less thing on my anxiety banquet.

• This limbo situation that I'm in - limbo between jobs; limbo between housing; limbo with COVID is slowly driving me crazy.  If you don't know me, I can tell you I don't do well in grey area.  
• So I've chosen to just give myself 4-day weekends from now on. That means Friday-Monday = do whatever I want...this mostly just means eating some emotionally satisfying foods, watching what I want, doing what I want and not doing what I don't want. Just taking it easier on these days.  I'll save Tues-Thurs for focusing on work and personal, financial, and business decisions. I guess, just saving big decisions for Tues-Thur, Outside of that, I don't have to think about it.
• Part of this is weighted by the fact that I feel there may not be another time in my life to take advantage of all this free time. So, I just want to take advantage of it and institute these mini-holidays. 

• Still haven't received my stimulus check.

• After putting a moratorium on signing up for new bank bonuses, I felt such a strong urge on Tuesday, it was crazy. It was literally the only thing I wanted to do.

• Call volume is starting to pick up. As I mentioned in another post, I think everyone is itching to get back to their regularly scheduled life. This will be good for me if I leave Call Center 2 because I didn't want to feel like I left a cushy gig behind. 

• I believe the Big Pharma background check came back with no follow-up required, but this morning when I went to log-in to complete some onboarding, I couldn't. So that automatically made me nervous. 

• In light of the grey areas surrounding job and the house, I decided just to make decisions based on my preferred outcome - staying in the house.  So ideally, when I ask myself, whether to buy the washer and dryer, I go with yes, because you're staying in the house. Easier said then done.  
• Part of the reason I want to get this done, now rather than later, is because I've already set the money aside for this task. If I were to commingle it with regular funds, I think I would get confused...

• I find myself eagerly wanting to check email every morning and every night before bed - knowing I am usually expecting nothing. This is a habit I've been trying to break for awhile now.  I finally deleted the Mail app off my bedside iPad (for the 12th time) to at least make it a little more difficult to scratch that itch. 

• I read to deal with a verbose talker - to contribute nothing. I think I will do a bit of that, and a bit of just trying to love them anyway. Accept them as they are. I just have to reconfigure their contribution to my life. It's been over a year of trying to navigate these two relationships, and I'm just tired of being frustrated. I've just been so desperate for human interaction, I'll take less than optimal ones.  One thing I am learning in adulthood, is that change is hard to come by and takes longer to take effect, so I have to remember that. 

The New Name

So if I'm choosing my own adventure, the next 1.5 to 2 years will be anchored by my Big Pharma Life.  As such, I decided to choose a new name. I picked out a new name 3 years ago - it was full of hope, and promise, and new beginnings. That life didn't work out the way I envisioned so I've put that name back into the vault.  

To commemorate this actual next stage in my life, though, I still wanted to choose a new name. I wanted it to capture elements of this next stage in my life. So the name I chose is an abridged, abbreviated, pragmatic, easy version of my old name. It's simple. It offers the option of hope, without the overabundance of hope we are all so quick to glom onto. I like that about it. 

So, let's say my name was Susana Johnson- Berenstein. My new name is Ana Joy. Short, brief, still professional, with a just a little shout-out to God.  I don't know how this will work with new job as far as documents, but my plan is to add it as as my preferred name and I hope it's at least reflected in my email. I won't make a big deal out of it; if asked I'll just say it's what I prefer to be called (at work).

Family Fund updated 14May2020
I just realized I forgot to talk about the Family Fund. In honor of my sainted Aunty MERJ, I decided to set aside ~$500/yr to help out family members. This is what I would hope to generate in savings interest if I were to put the $10k death benefit I'm slotted to receive in a high yield savings account. I know savings rates don't reach 5% APR anymore, but at one point they did.  When I became aware of all the people she listed as secondary beneficiaries, it just touched me and I knew I wanted to try do something for our extended family to honor her memory.

I'm not actually telling my family about the death benefit I received because some of them are funny about money.  But I do want to share with them when I do gift the money that it's in honor of Aunty MERJ.

Then my uncle died. I didn't know him very well, but my Aunt did. So I sent the first payment of $375 from the not-yet-established Family Fund overseas to help with funeral expenses.  As a matter of fact, I haven't even received the $10k yet - talk about counting chickens.  I really selected the $375 because that's how much I've made in bank bonuses so far. That's kind of the shell story I'm telling my family.