The State of the Vera Address

Clearly, you've noticed that I'm posting again! Here is the State of the Vera address for May 2011.

School:

I'll be done with my biology track very shortly. I'm still loving my time at PCC. My biology instructors have been lovely. This summer I'll be taking a distance learning Human Development class. It'll be my first distance learning class, so I hope I'm capable. I still turn into a blithering mess when confronted with a term paper, but I have to write one every term and I'm getting better and better. I have probably a year left before I start to apply to Naturopathic schools.

Work:

I'm still doing inventory and database maintenance at my job, worked in to two vet tech shifts a week and one and a half reception shifts a week. I've gotten really, really efficient at keeping things together, but not being there every day, things still fall through the cracks. My shifts are long and I always come home exhausted.

Music:

About the same time I started to look for a place to make music, Kendálin found me. I've been attending two rehearsals every week and most of them have felt self-indulgent and fun, like going for a hike up a deserted mountain, or spending an hour in the hot tub. The other women I'm singing with are pretty spectacular and we're making some kickass music. I'm very much looking forward to our coming concert in Salem next month.

Home:

My apartment is still a lovely place to live, but I occasionally fail to take care of it for a week at a time. Right now, there are marauding piles of laundry that threaten to eat my cats. I keep track of what days I put effort into cleaning, but they are still few and far between. I moved my computer out into the main room and that has helped me keep things straighter. One of these days (when I have free time?) I ought to go through my stuff and get rid of things I have no use for.

Family (near and far):

My far family is all wonky. My dad moved out last November and has been living in an apartment near his work. Mom still lives at home with the cat, but travels a lot for her musical group Russian Duo. I don't talk to either of them enough. Dad visited earlier this year for a weekend and we had a great time driving around in the hills. Mom will be here for our college reunion next month.

My near family just keeps getting stronger and stronger. Since my last address, two new family members have been added since Megan and Beth both had a baby. The Monster Palace started a new tradition of family dinner on Sunday nights and it's been pretty excellent. I'm so grateful every week to have somewhere to go for a few hours where everybody supports each other and celebrates each other. And eats delicious food.

Spirituality and Sanity:

A few years ago in a State of the Vera address I declared that I had my depression licked. Right now, I find that hilarious, but I am certainly less depressed now than I was then. I can only attribute that feeling back in 2009 to some decisions that I had made about taking greater control over my destiny. I've been implementing that plan since then (with varying degrees of rigor) it's been paying off. The current form of the plan is to find things that fulfill me and do more of them, while phasing out things that don't fulfill me. It's so simple, right? And yet it's so hard to do, with all the feelings of should and should not.

Retrospective of 2009

It's not a real vanity blog until I apologize for an extended absence at least once. I've been meaning to restart Flying Tiger for a few months, but couldn't figure out the proper way to do so. (Just write the damned post, you may exclaim!) So here's what I came up with: a retrospective of the past year.

January:

My car's radio stopped working, but I got my old laptop to boot in ubuntu, doubling my computer power. It was a month of insomnia, culminating in a horrible work week where Stacy came and got me from work because I was too exhausted to drive.

February:

Matt and I split up and I moved in with Beth, Jeff, and Kevin, stranding my cat at Stacy's house. Living with friends was really great; living without Zhenya was really hard.

March:

Then unexpectedly, Stacy's house was being sold and I needed to move Zhenya very quickly! I finally settled on moving her in with me at Beth's and then went to visit my folks in Cleveland. A good time was had by most.

April:

I had started seeing my friend Jason in Seattle, but before it got terrible serious, I started dating Paul in Portland. We're still dating. I'm still friends with Jason. :)

May:

I went to Renn Fayre in my scrubs! I sang in a small concert, too. And then the rest of the month was basically devoted to moving out of Beth's house and into my new apartment, Sanctuary. Stacy moved in to Beth's when I moved out. At the very end of the month, there was some drama at work that affected my employment (I got many more hours) and free time (I got very fewer hours of that).

June:

I took on more hours at work and took home a day old kitten who needed constant care and supervision. I also started my first term at Portland Community College. What was I thinking?! I got next to no sleep.

July:

Still wrangling extra hours at work, clashes with coworkers, school, tiny kitten, and a heat wave. I don't remember much of that month because I was constantly rushing from one place to another.

August:

Mom came to visit! She met Paul and they got along great. I picked up yet more responsibility at work and the kitten kept growing.

September:

I went to the Penny Arcade Expo with Paul and Amariah! I hadn't been to a convention in a long time and it was great. I had a party to celebrate the five year anniversary of leaving Crossroads. It was called the "Get to know Vera better party," though we spent most of the evening talking about cults. I finally got around to writing an essay about what happened five years ago. And then I joined a chorus!

October:

New term at PCC coincided with me suddenly getting half a promotion at work and picking up more hours permanently. Somehow I thought I could juggle these, but it didn't go as well as I would have liked. I declared social bankruptcy and didn't do anything fun until I was done with all of the homework and work work I needed to do for the month.

November:

I turned 26! And slogged around in schoolwork until I hated myself. Somehow I pulled through and got a 4.0, but that's really next month.

December:

Is still happening for a few more days! So far I've decided to take a term off of PCC and gotten a new attitude about my new responsibilities at work. Overall, my plan for this year (which was for it to be RAD) was a success. My plan for next year: be RADDER and carry less stress than 2009 did.

Welcome back, Flying Tiger.

State of the Vera

Well, apparently I didn't make it very far with my gratitude posting month. I'll probably do more of it, but every day didn't work out this year. So instead, today I'll post a State of the Vera Address:

Jobs:
I've been temping since we moved to Seattle. It's been a mixed bag of fun, horror, learning new skills, and just slogging through. I'm about to move back to Portland where I don't even have a good prospect at the moment. There are plenty of maybes, but maybes don't pay the rent. So I've been freaking out about that a little bit. I'm pretty confident that once I start walking into vet clinic and handing them resumes, things will loosen up, but since I'm living up here and can't physically do that, I just have to sit on my hands and surf Craigslist. Hilarious fun!

Housing:
Matt and I just nabbed a gorgeous house in NE Portland for a little less than the one we're in now in Seattle. It's biking distance to a number of friends and walking distance to the Kennedy School and New Seasons. It's bigger than this house (by a small amount), has a fenced back yard, and butts right up against Wilshire Park, where there's an off-leash area. It's wonderful! It's beautiful! And there've been a variety of interesting kinks in our plan to move there. It's not worth going through every gory detail, but every day brings a new emotional roller coaster of housing.

Sleeping:
I finally got my sleeping habits under control. For a while there, I had insomnia like whoa. I think it was mostly related to anxiety and I got that under control after a while with cunning application of tea and therapy. But here it comes again, just in time for us to move. Woohoo! In related news, I've learned that energy drinks are awesome, but I crash really hard after they're out of my system.

Depression:
Wow! I really kicked it! Well, mostly. I'm learning some coping techniques. Some are really mundane, like calling a friend for a quick kick in the pants, or going for a walk with the dog. Others are a little more maintenance, like eating balanced meals. But every day I wake up and tell myself that today is a good day, and usually it is.

Bad pun moment:
The state of the Vera is Washington, soon to be Oregon.

Today's Gratitude:
I managed to start turning my life around before age 25. Albeit, it was just a few months shy, but I'm still glad I did it.