Life.. you effin b&@$?

Well this is going to be long post, read it if you’re bored or interested. guess you could say this will be “easier” given other people have posted issues with their lives. And by all means I mean no disrespect/hatred to anyone who has. Guess it’s time I share my crap if anyone cares. I say that because I’ve posted few times on this site and I’ve been ignored. No I’m not an expert/engineer/specialist by any means, but I am a gear head/diy at heart. I’ve made my first 3 $700 or less cars work.  Well let’s start put at I’m a proud stepfather to two beautiful girls. Been few years into marriage and I’d like to think we both are on a good open/communitive relationship with each other, sometimes too honest if you can believe that! I have a really decent job, wife stays at home for ease of our lives. I’ve stressed to swimbo how much I need a “project car”. My first 3 cars were bought for $700 and less, ask if you’re interested but might surprise you. I’ve done couple rally X and won 1st in class!! But can’t brag in a field  of few. we have being trying to get to point we’re I can have a “project” again, but life,you effin bitch keeps effin me!?!? I want to get into auto X, sadly closest place where I can is 100 miles from me. I could use my DD to satisfy me, but refuse to abuse me DD. Anywho if you’re still following along to my  complaint/rambling on post about BS. Longer story short, my wife’s best friend who is an absolutey POS(thankfully she doesn’t see this) completely ruined her own kids lives. Basically  we were put into position to “foster” two girls. So now I’m in position to take care of 4 kids, which I don’t mind because I know swimbo and me are better for theses children’s lives. So  we are a single income family,  4 effin kids to get into school and plus.. I’ve been dreadfullly falling into go to work and sitting down doing nothing before, but now 4 kids.. 4 kids who are female(no hate) plus the dog and cat are females.. I’m out numbered by long long shot. Sadly I can see us fostering these 2 kids, which I do not mind. Swimbo and me can give them a good/healthy life. I will never put these children into the system.. but screw me... I want my cake and eat it too... I want my family/home life.. but I want my cheap/crap car, I really want to race!!!! Every time I think I can finally get that life... So now, single income family, 4 effin kids. Yes we are doing the best for all of them.. but crap I want to race so bad... sadly I’m going to say this, but feel like any every post I’ve made here on this site I’ve  been ignored. No I’m not looking for responses to this post , just putting me .02

I can't tell if this is a rant post or a question for the hive post. Ok, now that you have edited your post, I'll edit mine. I do not have an easy solution for you and don't know why your previous posts have been ignored. However, it sounds like you are in a position to make a real difference to the lives of some girls and hopefully you can find some joy in doing a good job of that.  Is there any kind of kart club in your area? A good 4 stroke kart is pretty cheap and easy to transport. I own an indoor kart track and have a lot of customers with the itch to race but don't have the means to race their own so they come and race mine, is that an option? How about building a really nice racing sim and getting your racing fix that way? 

It’s more of rant. I want more in life but can’t really complain.. but I am complaining.. unfortunately where I live racing is far to get too.. but I want too badly... my main focus is all children involved. Children are children and  deserve the best. Adult/parents lives come after that

Focus on the positives and cut the negative stuff out your life. Kids deserve the best parenting, but that may not necessarily mean getting the best of everything. Parents have raised good kids for tens of thousands of years but somehow recently, people think that abandoning the old ways makes for better parenting. Now I'm ranting, sorry. 

Do you still have one of the$700 cars? If so what is it? Teach the young ladies to be self-sufficient and know how to fix cars. I am regularly told by ladies that some of their best memories are working with dad on the car or house. you have a great opportunity to make these girls independent and very happy. Time spent teaching is very rewarding for all involved

Braden

I was about your age when I had my daughter, first of three kids. Up until then, much of my life revolved around fixing up cars and racing. I've done zero car events in the last 10 years. While I would love to go racing again, I can't really say that I miss it. I could have continued, my wife is very supportive- but given the choice between spending my time and money on my cars or my kids, I'd chose the kids every time.  Now that they are getting older, we are starting to do car things together. I bought a fixer upper go cart for their project "car." Just tonight, they asked me if they could help me with my project cars that have been sitting. I can't wait to take them to an autocross. 

The suggestion above about Indoor carting is a good one. I have done that a coupe of times to scratch the itch. My local place has kids carts too, so we make it a family event.

Does your region have a junior kart program?  In mine (Philly region), cheap racing + kids = karts.  

Some foreign dudes once said that "You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes you might find you get what you need."

What is it that you like about project cars? Is it the sense of satisfaction from making something better than it was when you got it? Sounds to me like you just got 2 big new projects. They're going to take up a lot of time, money, and energy but making them better than when you got them, and seeing them be successful will satisfy that same part of you that enjoys developing a project car into something more.

We all have to put our interests after the needs of others from time to time. Doing that makes you a decent human being. I agree that going karting or something might be able to scratch your itch for competition/driving. You can do it alone if you need an escape, or you can make it a family thing and bond with your kids at the same time.

A couple thoughts to scratch the itch.

Find a buddy with a project car locally you can wrench with. It's not the same, but it's still working on a car.

Does it have to be a car? What about a bike (motor or not) or lawnmower or other smaller mechanical thing. It takes up less space and less money. My current long term project is an 81 Goldwing. I may never ride it and that's ok. :D I have yard and house improvements which are a higher priority, so I don't spend much time on it. That being said, it's not in the way because it's 1/3 the size of a car.

Some people on here also fiddle with plastic models and rc cars/buggies. Again, less space and cash required. 

The positive side of this is that you have enough people for a full racing team.

Pete

Its a confusing post for sure. 

Are you saying that you want to race but money is tight? Or that you have no spare time? 

How old are the girls? Are they interested in motorsports in any way? Can you spark that interest by maybe taking them to a race? 

I thought you sold the Forester to Mdeuce, that would have been a cool rallycross car right there. 

In reply to Papabishop :

I feel you, PB.   Life just dumped a metric crapton of excrement on me in the last few months as well.  I won't go into that.  My bottom line on your situation is that you deserve major kudos for taking on the other kids.  That's the important thing.   You can always "race", even if it's just slot cars, RC cars or karts or whatever else.  There's something for your budget, but if you allow yourself to think, "But that's not what I want to do..." then you may not ever be satisfied and that will start to eat you out from the inside.   I hear you.  I understand where you are, but in my case (and I think in yours) the welfare of the kids (yours AND hers) come first.   Be patient.  We have good people here.  I expect that somebody here will be able to help you scratch your racing itch in some capacity, but helping the kids helps make the WORLD a better place.   You'll never know how your efforts with the kids may pay dividends down the road, maybe even after you're gone.   That's where you spend your finite time and resources.   You can PM me if you'd like to compare notes.   Gird your loins and take on the good fight.  It's worth it. 

It may seem to you, right now, that you're going to have a house full of kids forever. Trust me, you'll blink, and they'll be grown and gone.

As others have mentioned, a project car doesn't need to be a money sponge. Getting the girls involved with a low budget project whatever could be a very worthwhile endeavor.

Good Luck!  

Man...you're captive at a total estro-fest.  Need a guy buddy to spend time with.  But good on you for being there for the girls.

In reply to Papabishop

:As a long time member of the minority in the sorority. I clearly understand your feelings.  

How to race in that case?  Ya gotta find the near freebe car.  My daughter is giving away a Saturn  to someone in her church.  

That’s where you start.  Go talk to your priest rabbi minister or whoever and you explain that you need a second car.  Now that part is true the rest about using it to race isn’t Relevant. Since you don’t tell everyone about your sex life you are not under any obligation to tell them it’s for you to race any more than you need to give graphic details.  

So you get a granny car, 4 door automatic?  How about using that as your daily driver and your daily driver as your race car?  

Option 2 

Find out where cars are donated around you.  Schools? charities,  Body shops,  etc.  

option 3

go to co-part website and buy a damaged car and make a cart out of it.  ( there are a couple of Corvette cart’s on here) but a Corvette likely is too expensive.  You want something at scrap metal prices.   Hyundai Audi VW Kia etc   Something that all the fenders are crunched  but the 4 wheels are reasonably close to straight.  

Option 4

build your own kart/ locost.  How? Find some old geezer like me willing to teach you and share tools and knowledge with you. 

We don’t stop loving this stuff. Some just lose the ability to get a medical or get tired of doing everything themselves.  Some just want to give back and others  may just want their old car to go to a few more races. 

Option 5 

Go to the race track and ask if anyone  would like to share  ride in exchange for some help?  

Thoughts, in no particular order.

1)  100 miles is way too berkeleying far to drive to autox.

2) There is nothing wrong with using a DD as an autox car.  You aren't beating on it.  Maybe with the exception of ProSolo events.  (This is assuming you can have a DD that makes a decent autox car)

3) Racing is crazy expensive and time consuming.  Lots of people reach a point where they give it up due to family obligations, house bullE36 M3, financial reasons, time, kids, etc.  Nothing wrong with that.  Some scale back, some just decide not to do it.  IMO, if you find a cheaper/more project (time consuming) car to race, you will only add more stress to your life.

4) Compared to actual autox, an iracing/pcars/etc. rig is really berkeleying cheap.

I did buy his Subaru. I could sell it back to him for the same $500 and I don't think that would solve his problem. I've been pretty close to where his is now but from a different angle. 

I had a pile of small kids, and a single income, but I was the one staying home. I wanted to race. To get out of the house and hang out with friends and spend 40-60 seconds at a time not dealing with the things that I dealt with every day. We looked at the budget in a very modern way. It's not just about paying the mortgage and keeping food on the table. You need proper insurance. Kids NEED  to go the dentist and the doctor and even with insurance one of the little buggers is going to have a cavity that will require a co-pay. The beginning of school each year brings a school supply list from the school and it's not cheap. There is only one way to be a good parent when you're faced with $100 in school supplies and it's not buying Rose Art crayons to save $0.88. Your daily driver is wearing out. Your house is wearing out. Your lawnmower blade is getting skinny from another sharpening. 

And you want to go racing. 

If life is going well you look at your "extra" money and your look at your kids and they're doing well and you want them to have choices when they're looking at schools. Autocross entry costs $35. You've committed to putting $50 in a college fund. For each of them. And you try to figure out if you switch to generic cereal if you can save $35 for next month because your kids eat a LOT of cereal. 

Because you want to go racing. 

Watching kids at home is hard. Mentally. Whether you or your wife does it you still have someone who's brain is jello at the end of a week. How much Candy Land can you play? My kids are in high school and I can still recite The Cat in the Hat by heart because I use to "read" it with my eyes closed. The house is the ring and this is a cage match and someone needs to tag out if we want to win. The house isn't clean. Doesn't matter if you cleaned every room every day, entropy is exceeding all theoretical estimations. 

And you're going to take a whole day to go racing? 

A $500 race car is never a $500 race car. It's registration and insurance and tires and gas and time. But it's also the creator of dreams. You put every autocross and rallycross on the calendar right up there with doctors appointments and field trips. Three weeks until the next event. They two. You invite the kids out wash the car even though the paint is long long past actually looking better by being clean. You discuss tire pressures with friends online. Look at the past months results. A second and a half will get you one of those little plastic trophies if you can find it. The night before an event you lay awake and go over the course map in your head and think that this month is when you're going to try left foot braking so you can get your car to rotate better because there is no way you justify a bigger rear bar when two of your kids have birthdays next month. 

I can't imagine a world without racing. 

The void it leaves is bigger than the dead spot in the grass that lingers for months after you sell your race car. The family budget is bigger. You know you'll have just a little more breathing room when the county sends your property tax bill. Do you cross every event off the calendar or just buy a new one. There's no way you can stare at those events. You're happy. You teach your kids to ride without training wheels. The yard is looking better because the kids can help rake now. Your wife is beautiful and happy........as long as you don't bring up buying a new race car. She doesn't understand and it hurts. She can't understand because it's your dream not hers and you feel like every cent that is spent and saved and wasted is fueling the dreams of everyone else in the house leaving you just a bit more hollow that you want to be. Are we ever really complete as a person when we're not chasing a dream? 

Maybe I've projected a little too much of myself on this? I had a rough time emotionally when my kids were little and money was tight. I'm lucky that we came out of the money/time crunch at about the same time and I was able to ease back into autocross, then rallycross, then track days and One Lap and dear God I'm a lucky man. I just used the word lucky twice a the same sentence I feel so lucky. I can also see the flip side where you look at your life and your job and your family and you KNOW that the money and time will never be there. Not in the next year. Maybe the next decade? You start wondering if there is enough padding in your Social Security to buy race tires. When you've worked hard to get to a position where you family doesn't have to wait until the second Friday of the month to buy groceries but you know that best case scenario next year's raise will be slightly below inflation. I've been lucky, but I KNOW that not everyone who loves racing is going to be and I don't have a solution. You can be around racing for free. Watch it on TV, go to local events and watch, ride along, volunteer to work. But to race, to sit in the drivers seat with your helmet fastened watching the raised hand of the starter and trying to remember to breathe takes at least some time and money and I don't know any way around that. 

First of all what you're doing for those girls is incredible and may have changed the trajectory of their lives.  It doesn't sound like you're overlooking that right now, but don't forget it.

That said, I can understand that may fulfill a part of you, but not all of you.  I'm grappling with that myself, but with half the amount of kids.  Like others have suggested though, there are cheap ways to get into motorsports.  Some you don't even need your own car.  Ever thought about co-driving?  I know your autox venue is far, but I can only assume there may be people in the rallyx community looking for a partner.  Also, crewing for a Lemons/Champ team is an option.  Driving may be expensive, but if you're just there to help then you're still part of the action and depending on the team may have your way paid (lodging, meals, etc.).  Also, having an excuse to get away for a weekend can do wonders...  Just saying. 

edit - Mdeuce hadn't posted yet when started writing mine.  Man, that guy is hard to follow up!  Well said sir. 

mazdeuce - Seth said:

My kids are in high school and I can still recite The Cat in the Hat by heart because I use to "read" it with my eyes closed.

Yes, but what about Fox in Socks? 

Any chance you could race...an R/C car? Many places have a stock class like dead stock Traxxas Slash, limiting costs and mods. Take the kids with, if possible.  Cheaper, with less consumables, especially if you aren't looking for the nth degree. It's fun even if your just screwing around in a parking lot, and at the end of the run, you throw it all in the trunk and go home. 

Don't underestimate the mental, marital and emotional benefits of having a real budget.   Both a monetary and a time-itary one.   I understand that, like Deuce, everyone can't be as lucky as I am to have my cake and eat it too,  but even with all 5 of my kids, I still have a few grand built into our yearly budget that goes towards the racecar & events.  Every month, there's x amount allocated, but that can only happen because we have money automatically set aside into a replacement fund to cover when the fridge dies, or the roof needs replaced in addition to transferring some to the savings account so it's there in case of emergency.   Let me know if you're interested in the spreadsheet I use.  It has completely removed that part of stress from our marriage as well as the feeling of guilt when I buy a few hundred dollar widget for the racecar because it was a good deal.

The other part of it is that you and your wife both have to talk to about realistic goals and the fact that, as Deuce said, you both need some time to be yourself. Not Dad.  Try to figure out what NEEDS done on an weekly basis, and make sure that both your wife and yourself have some special event to look forward to.   It's amazing how much we do that doesn't need to get done right now, and some mental health would be worth more in the long run.  I feel bad for my wife since we have 6 month old twins, she can't get away for more than a few hours without them going hungry, but that'll change soon and I still made time for her to go to skating lessons earlier this year, she makes time for me to hit up a Track Night and occasionally a full track day or Champcar race.  She's been eyeing up weekly cooking classes with a friend and I'm fully encouraging it once the babies can go a few hours without needing mama.

ProDarwin said:

mazdeuce - Seth said:

My kids are in high school and I can still recite The Cat in the Hat by heart because I use to "read" it with my eyes closed.

Yes, but what about Fox in Socks? 

mazdeuce - Seth said:

Watching kids at home is hard. Mentally. Whether you or your wife does it you still have someone who's brain is jello at the end of a week. How much Candy Land can you play? My kids are in high school and I can still recite The Cat in the Hat by heart because I use to "read" it with my eyes closed. The house is the ring and this is a cage match and someone needs to tag out if we want to win. The house isn't clean. Doesn't matter if you cleaned every room every day, entropy is exceeding all theoretical estimations.

Oh man, I had to quote this it's so true. My wife and I spend an hour+ every single day cleaning. And yet the house doesn't look any better from day to day. We have two kids (3 and 1 year old) and it's a constant fight against roaring entropy to keep the house from looking like a pack of wild boars have been rooting in it. We trade off taking care of the kids and going to work, and even on a good day the one with the kids is a wreck at the end of it.

Balancing kids / life in general and cars or any expensive and time consuming hobbies is tough, man. Do keep in mind that they're only home for a few short years, and for the most part once they're gone, they're out of your house for good. You'll miss them. So enjoy that time and don't think of it as denying yourself but rather prioritizing something different. I went from racing 6 lemons races a year to zero. It's tough, and I will get back out there, but at this age there's just not the time and resources to spare.

I also sympathize with the gender thing. We share our house with another family; a couple and their daughter. Then my wife and I had two daughters. Even the cat is female. I wouldn't be surprised if the mice in the attic were exclusively female.

I've been setting aside time in the evenings, after the kids are asleep and after the kitchen is clean, to go and work on car stuff. I'm not able to do it every day, but every couple days, otherwise my wife gets lonely. Sometimes I even lay in bed with her until she's asleep and then get out of bed and go out to the garage. You do what you got to do to keep sane. I may be so tired and just don't feel like it but then I remember that feeling of "all I did today was feed kids and clean up from feeding kids" feeling and it helps motivate me to turn some wrenches.

ProDarwin said:

Yes, but what about Fox in Socks? 

A muddle puddle tweetle poodle beetle noodle bottle paddle battle.

In reply to Papabishop :

I just mostly want to write so that you know people are listening.  Your getting a lot of good from many who are more eloquent than I am.  

I came to GRM a long time ago when I was autox'ing a lot, way back in like 1995 w/ my '90 Miata.  Over the following years, cars took a back seat to racing sailboats.  Sailboat racing has online communities but I never liked them as much as GRM so I always came back here. 

From '05-'09 had the ability to race sailboats on all 4 coasts of the US, each year.  In '06 I locally raced boats every weekend expect 2 between May 15th and Oct 15th.  Take those as examples that sailboat racing had become my life and I was WAY into it.  

In 2011, major job change that was not my choice.  By '12 I was back climbing back up.  These demands took away a lot of sailing time and travel ability.  In '14 we adopted a little girl.  That changed everything.  I greatly regret that I had to pass on an opportunity to sail from Lake Erie to Chicago.  I also passed on an opportunity to sail to from Annapolis, MD to Bermuda.  

Just recently, life dealt us some more cards and another baby.    It ain't gonna be easy...we'll survive.  

My days now are filled in finding joy in other ways.  As an example, I know all of the best playgrounds in my local area.  This was supposed to be "the year of the new powerboat" but it is now "the year of the new baby."