Hi People,
It's been a serious amount of time since I have actively used Steemit. Reasons are quite a few. I had some urgent but important matters to solve. On top of urgency, one of the issues required critical financial management. Unfortunately for me, the crypto market went down like crazy and the recent revival took a long time to come. Unfortunate because my money is either invested in crypto or was loaned out.
I was in dire need of money and had to get a chunk out of my longterm savings to solve the crucial financial problem at hand. Actually, I had planned to buy my first ever car in March, 2018 as a part of my 2018 goals. I really wanted to go ahead with my plans but finances were bleak. I requested people to return my loan but to no avail. Along with that, I kept waiting for the crypto market to yield some profit; also to no avail.
The obvious mismatch between my goal to buy a car and the financial circumstances took quite a toll on me. I must say that navigating through such a situation was very difficult for me as I had to make some urgent, bold, and risky decisions. Some of the decisions have paid off. Some could have paid off a little more.
One such decision was to sell all of my 900+ SBD not for cashing out but to invest in a more promising cryptocurrency. Even though I was in need of cash, selling my hard earned crypto asset at that petty price was simply not an option for me. The little financial intelligence that I have did not allow for such a stupid action. I, alongwith my friend 
We got itchy about SBD's situation due to its confusing position is the Steem blockchain and the apparent pegging to USD. We took a decision to sell our SBD to buy some coin at its lowest and expected to rise. SMART was a good decision. However, the day we sold, SBD pumped nearly 100 % in two days. We could have waited for just one more day and made a lot of profit. But as
So, whatever SBD I had, I have put it in other cryptos; mainly SMART. I had some Steem too which I sold twice at the pump to buy some other coins and wait for Steem to dip. It had dipped and I am looking forward to adding back at least the amount that I have sold. The only chunk of Steem that I have sold for cash it the lastest 221 Steem transfer to Binance. I needed to clear the final leg of pending payments for now and get things in order.
These final payments are for my first ever car. It has arrived at the showroom but is being registered with excise and insurance agencies. I hope to get my hands on it for the first time before this weekend. Whatever I have earned from Steemit has contributed a lot to my first car. Not so much directly but I could rely on availability and the expected appreciation of my crypto assets to get loans. I got some money out of my savings to clear these short-term loans (from friends only and interest free). When crypto rises back, I hope to be able to fill up my savings, as well as pursue my pending goals.
Waiting for the white one to be mine. ;)
The process has been going on for a few weeks now, almost corresponding to the duration of my absence. I knew in my heart that I was wasting every passing day because I haven't been this inconsistent ever on Steemit. The market situation disheartened me a bit as well. There were other reasons for my absence too but this post is focused on letting you know what I was up to.
One very positive and satisfying thing that I have been doing on a daily basis is reading books. I am close to finsihing Saladin by John Man, which is an epic story of crusades and how Saladin became the focal point of Muslim revival. He's praised by Muslims because he conquered Jerusalem and by Christians because he was a generous and kind conquerer; unlike the crusaders who filled the Holy City with blood and dead bodies when they first arrived in 1098.
I hope to be active again, reply to your comments, upvote them, visit your blogs, share my thoughts with you, bring back the community element and, of course, Steem on!