A Window of Opportunity

We had some dudes come over this morning from a Major Home Improvement Retailer to give us the skinny on replacing our shitty windows. Our house was built in the 50s, and I'm reasonably certain no window has been upgraded since then. Of course our delightful MHIR salesperson drew up a quote with their "recommended" window brand, which comes with the top-of-the-line quality windows and a 20 year warranty to boot. That's all good, but I'm not planning to die in this house, and if we happen to sell in less than 20 years, I'm not really interested in giving our buyers my window warranty and getting little to nothing back on that particular investment. So I had him re-do the paperwork with the standard, subpar, shitty windows, because at this point, we could tape plastic Target bags over holes in the walls and be better off. The end figures were a lot better than I'd originally anticipated, but still about five times what we can reasonably afford. We've decided to go ahead and replace at least the windows in the three bedrooms (one child's window won't open; the other's won't close), figuring that's where we lose most of our heat and therefore, cash. And at least now we know what it will likely cost to replace the windows in the rest of the house, and next year's tax refund is earmarked for that purpose.

I'm still nervous about handing over that kind of cash given our financial situation at the moment. We're surviving--but barely. Our situation is such that in the event of an unexpected major expense, we would be up shit creek sans paddle. We're not able to make much of a dent in our credit card debt, either. I had hoped to have all of that out of the way by the end of this year, but considering I'm spending about twice as much on gas just to get to and from this fantastic new job of mine, it's not going to happen.

And I feel guilty about it all. I feel like I put us in this position because I'm too big of a baby to suck it up and take one for the team. Yes, my last job was dehumanizing, demoralizing and made me want to kill myself on a regular basis--but at least we were starting to make headway at the salary it paid. I'm definitely happier in my current position, but the cash situation is stressing me out to the point I have to wonder...was it worth it?

Ben had an interview at one of his former employer's competitors last week. The prognosis is positive that they will at least call him back for a second interview. He's hoping an offer for a substantially higher salary is a possibility. I certainly hope so. But just like I don't plan our budget around the child support payments that may or may not be made, I can't count chickens that are yet to hatch and feel good about it.