Winding Down 2010

2010 has been an incredible year - the highs have been higher, the lows have been lower. At this point, I feel like I should give it a huge long entry - I have definitely learned an incredible amount. As it stands, however, I think I'm going to summarize it with just a few bullets, and some photos of the wedding, which somehow made everything else worth while.

Here are a few of the highlights:

- Stood up to my parents for something that I believe in
- Brought my family and friends together in ways I could never have imagined, by being true to myself
- Started renting my first home
- Planned my own wedding
- Got married (THANK YOU, to everyone that came out to help make that day special for us - we love you all)
- Moved out of my parents house
- Giants won the World Series
- I wrote a rough draft of a novel (in 30 days!)
- Got some kick-ass new reptile tanks
- Celebrated two years as a preschool teacher
- Husband got a new job, that he absolutely loves
- First Xmas as a married couple

Well...That Was Interesting

When I was a kid - maybe seven or eight years old, could have been a little older or a little younger - my parents got involved with some 'transformational' work; sort of like life coaching, but on a group level. They're still involved with this, and over the course of the time that they've been involved with it, it's made an incredible (positive) difference in the quality of their lives, and in my own.

It's a field that offers an incredible range of tools, and there's something in it for everyone. I'm not really sure how it works, only that it's one of those things that - if you put your all into it - you will get something amazing back.

I've never been particularly adept at describing the remarkable things that people get out of it and discover for themselves, so I'm not really going to try - it's not necessary here - I'll leave it that I've never seen anyone walk away from one of the weekends without something that they can take and put into use.

I've done a number of their courses; one of them I did on at least three occasions (I think it was actually four or five) as a kid, and two other ones as a teen/adult. Every time, I threw myself into them; I never did a half-assed job on any of the work.

It's also a program that I continue to have a remarkable resistance to registering into. Every time I'm approached with it, a number of conversations come up. Some of them are issues I've had with the old format of registration, some of them are more personal.

I remember having it 'pushed' for a long time and my natural rebellious streak kicks in - having done it before, though, I know that they've provided some amazing tools for me in my life; that's a relatively 'easy' conversation to dismiss.

I remember the childhood feeling of having my parents be gone on weekends, that fear of abandonment and anger - again, I can recognize it and move around it with relative alacrity.

I remember the feeling, both as a child and an adult (completely unrelated to any of this work) that there was something wrong with me; that I was somehow different, broken. I remember feeling separate from people, unable to connect, 'unlovable', 'not good enough'.

I remember my parents suggesting the work to me, knowing that it makes a huge difference for people.

I remember feeling like maybe if I did enough of the work, that I would be 'fixed'. I remember walking away with an amazing amount of tools, a lot of things that were very helpful, a brand new lease on life... And still feeling isolated, different and broken in a lot of ways. (I've since found a way of living that has alleviated that.) I remember - in continuing to feel 'broken' in the weeks following the courses - the feelings of disappointment, let down, and of being deceived.

I remember my friends rolling their eyes at me, and being made fun of for taking part in those courses.

That last one is still particularly painful.

I didn't even know that I was carrying those last two around until my dad offered me a registration into a course that's coming up that would be paid for, half the length of the typical course, and much more workable hours (in other words, the 'usual' turn-offs were already managed) - and I still had a whole bunch of stuff come up.

Whether or not I registered, I figured it was definitely worth taking a look at what was being triggered.

Either way, it was a nice reminder to take a look at the tools I have and - well, maybe /use/ them with a little more frequency. ;)

Still kickin'.

Well, I completed that NaNoWriMo novel. I also managed to complete it within the amount of time allotted - 30 days. I'm pretty impressed with that.

W and I are starting to get our feet back under us again; the wedding made it a phenomenal year, and, in a lot of ways it has also been one in which we've felt an awful lot like we keep getting kicked while we're down. I'm sure I'll post more about that as we start to get some of those things resolved - until then, I'd prefer not to go into details on the internet.

Also got those tanks I ordered back in July, and so my reptiles are back at home with me; this feels very, very good.

Definitely enjoying it.

I'm sure there will be more later, and right now, mostly, I'm exhausted.

Over and out.

Four Weeks

I apologize for my absence; it's sort of funny to me that I feel the need to explain my lapses of appearance, as if there is some sort of giant web following that hangs on the edge of their keyboards, waiting, just WAITING for me to post something again. I'm spending this month focusing on my current project, writing a NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writers Month) novel. The goal is to produce 50,000 words in 30 days - so far, I'm right on track.

I started on this undertaking on November 4th, with approximately 4000 words already written (I used something that I had already started, but was still behind in word count compared to days - by the end of day four I needed to have 6668 words written in order to be on target for finishing on time). Today is November 7th and I am currently ahead of word count (by a negligible amount), clocking in with 11,980 words total. (That is approximately 29 full pages, single spaced.)

While I was debating what to write about (and having posted to Facebook to see if I could get some suggestions from friends), I had a number of very cool ideas thrown my way - one that seemed appropriate to be writing about in here, though, was "What is the first month of marriage /really/ like? Is it a love fest or is there a back story?"

Personally, my first month of marriage has definitely been 'interesting'. We'll start by discussing my allergy medications. I have really horrendous allergies, to who-knows-what - it starts with a post-nasal drip, and ends with pneumonia unless I keep things under control and stop the drip before it starts. Just before the wedding (about a week prior), the medication that I was on stopped working for some unknown reason - my body acclimated or something, who knows, I'm constantly having to rotate through medications to find one that will work again - and so I switched from Loratadine to Cetirizine Hydrochloride. For those of you that have never had anxiety/paranoia as a side effect to a medication, let me just explain it this way: If someone I trusted had told me that the government was bugging my house, I would have believed them. I had a variety of thoughts, from "My boss is going to fire me" all the way to "My husband is gay" - all of which I was absolutely CERTAIN of, with NO backing what-so-ever. The one saving grace to it is that I could at least see myself being ridiculously irrational. Being that I started taking it the week before the wedding, I hadn't noticed the paranoia so much - I'd chalked it up to wedding related stress. It took me until the middle of the third week of being married to finally get the heck off of that stuff, and start feeling more normal-ish. Thank goodness. Poor W was a huge sport and didn't give me a hard time at all about any of it, which is entirely to his credit - I was a nut.

The most noticeable change that I've seen with myself in regards to being married is the inexplicable sense of calm. Not from the lack of wedding planning and frenetic activity related to such, but more of an emotional sense. Dad put his finger on it exactly when he said that its like 'being grounded in the universe' - it gets rid of that sense of drift that I had as a single person (even in a relationship). I'm not sure what it comes from - the sense of being grounded - Dad suggested that maybe it was a sense that life is working out, having the answer to that question of 'Will I find someone who completes me?', knowing that someone is willing to promise, "Yes, I will be your best friend, period, forever," and legally bind themselves to that. I don't know. I just know that its brought an overwhelming sense of calm and peace, and helped me feel grounded in ways that I didn't know possible.

There's been some 'big' little stuff too - stuff that I'm not really comfortable disclosing on the internet because it's not about me, it only affects me. There's been financial stuff; who pays for what, how much do we each pay, where does it come from, what do we do with combined money vs. our separate accounts. There's been health stuff - things that can be scary if we let them, and frustrating 'what is' scenarios when taken from a more factual standpoints.

I think about it though, when we're spending time together - especially with W being as much older than me than he is - what are my memories of married life going to be? Right now, they're absolutely wonderful. I don't so much remember the stressful things as I do the moments where we're lying on the couch and W decides that out of the blue he's going to tickle me. I remember him waking me up at two in the morning when he came to bed (I go to bed earlier than he does, that took some getting used to), talking to me about the day and our roommate and things that were going on with life and me finally stopping him and saying, "Baby, I've got to get to sleep." I remember that in the morning, he had no recollection of any of that. I remember lying in bed with him one night, talking for fifteen minutes about absolutely ridiculous things - a conversation that would make so sense if you weren't the two of us. I'm sure that half of it wasn't even really in English. I remember stepping in pee on the bathroom floor after W had been in there before me half asleep, and being irritated, yes, but noticing that he'd taken the time to make sure to wipe the seat. I remember hiking around Yosemite, and sitting at dinner for hours in Mariposa just talking and cuddling and being the best friends that we absolutely are.

There's been a lot of stuff in being married, and we're bumping up already on our first month together, which has absolutely, 100% FLOWN by. All in all though, I highly recommend it. If you're with your best friend, go for it. You've got the world to gain.

Prop 19

I'll start by stating the obvious: the idea of Prop 19 passing here in California makes me highly uncomfortable.

Not the idea of legalized marijuana - that I can understand, and in some sense, even support. The idea of cutting off funding to drug cartels, and taxing the living daylights out of it to assist the state economically... those seem like reasonable things to do, to me at least. Other countries have well enforced, well regulated legalized cannabis - it's not that humans are fundamentally incapable of managing it.

The part that I have a tough time with is the way that this legalization is being done - specifically that they're allowing personal private ownership of small quantities for personal consumption, rather than making the business a state run institution. How about something like a bar, where people come in, order what they want, and smoke it there? Just check their keys at the door.

It also does relatively little to address the unintended results of such legalization; it seems to me that the vast majority of people who want to legalize this are socially irresponsible, emotionally immature individuals. Allowing that maybe my sample population is off (it could be - maybe there are a ton of socially responsible, emotionally mature people that want this stuff legalized too)... Should our society, our kids, and myself personally be at effect of people who abuse the legalization of this substance? Do we really want to make a gateway drug legal? Underage drinking is a rampant issue, as is drug use by high schoolers (they buy it from dealers, or - shy of that - raid parents medicine closets, sniff glue, etc)... do we really want to make it easier for kids to be using this stuff?

It's not like we're legalizing it in a way that kids would be introduced to it in a safe and sane way - it'd be illegal for people under 21 to possess it - we're just making it legal for the adults. In making it legal for the adults, and confining it to private areas (like the home), we're now potentially legalizing the exposing of all those little babies to the second hand smoke of marijuana.

How about those people who are in recovery? All those people in rehab/drug programs/etc who are trying to get their stuff together - do we want to make it harder for them? By making it harder for them, we make it harder (and more expensive) for ourselves as a society.

What about people who don't follow the new regulations, and don't contain it to their private quarters? With law enforcement already stretched its limits with emergencies and violent crime, laying people off left and right, I find it hard to believe that they'll be responding to calls that sound like, "Excuse me, there's a gentleman toking on the corner of 7th and A Street. What? No, he's not hurting anyone, but it's illegal and it offends my olfactory senses."

I don't see this being regulated anywhere near as well as people seem to think it's going to be.

And how about the unforseen medical expenses of health issues down the line? Who's covering those? I have a hard enough time already knowing that my tax dollars pay for people's medical expenses whose diseases are self inflicted (from smoking, overeating, drinking too much, etc)... I apologize for sounding insensitive, but I'd really rather not add one more thing to the list of ways people can harm themselves at my personal expense. Illness you didn't do anything to get? Sure, no problem! When you do it yourself? ...Idiotic and irresponsible.

I love a lot of things about California.

This is most definitely NOT one of them.

I really hope it doesn't pass.

No on Prop 19.

A Little Overwhelmed

You know... I'm married now.

It is strange, and a wonderful feeling.

It's really nothing that I could ever describe; there's so much going on in my head.

I am overwhelmed with emotion.

I regularly want to cry.

When I realize that I've promised to spend the rest of my life with my best friend. When he comes to bed after me because I go to sleep before him, and he drapes another comforter around my shoulders to keep me from getting cold in the middle of the night. When I wake up at two AM and find his arms still wrapped around me. When he tells me that he loves me, for no reason at all.

When I realize that people flew in from three different countries, and unknown numbers of states to be at our wedding. When I think about all of the feathers I found; when I think about the hawks playing and calling and blessing our ceremony. When I think of all the love and beauty that surrounds me, all of the people that turned out to show their support as W and I went from "he and I" to "us".

When I realize that - due to circumstances beyond anyone's control - a tab is running up against my savings until such circumstances get ironed out. (Eventually, that money will make it back in there, and until then, it's a balancing act of trying to know at what point do I say, "I cant run the tab any higher.")

Between the wedding, the moving, and legal fees associated with the move, W and I are absolutely stretched to our limits financially.

It feels awkward and vulnerable to put that out there, to acknowledge publicly and to the Universe, "Hey, I don't know how this is going to work out here. I don't know where to draw the line. I don't even know if there's a line to be drawn. I don't know that there's a 'right' answer, I don't know that there's a 'wrong' answer, I don't even know that there's an answer. I could use a little bit of clarity...maybe some relief here."

It feels a little bit sad; I miss my parents' house, and the security (or at least obliviousness) of being under someone else's roof. I miss my dog and my reptiles; I hope that the tanks I ordered are ready soon, so that I can move the scaly babies into the place that I am living in now.

The help comes in faith I guess. Remembering that life has always worked out - that the universe has always worked /for/ me, not against me. Remembering that somehow, the ends have always been kept together long enough to get them tied.

I am uncomfortable; I wish I could make that feeling go away, and I figure that the best I can do right now is to simply acknowledge it and know that this too shall pass.

It is Sunday, it is drizzly and gray; there is nothing to be done but enjoy the day.

The rent check is not due for another two weeks, doesn't need to be written for a week and a half. Things will be done before then, maybe bringing some clarity, some relief.

I saw my parents and my animals this morning, and I'll see them again in not too long I'm sure - they're really very close; I could literally walk over in less than an hour.

“The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning. Uncertainty is the very condition to impel man to unfold his powers.” -Erich Fromm

A Collection Of Thoughts - Six Days To Go

Here I am, six days away from being locked into holy matrimony with my very best friend - you would think that, more than anything, I'd be a mess of excitement, nervousness, and anxiety about the upcoming nuptials. This is what I've been led to believe, anyway, through love songs and televisions series, and the various people peppering me with questions about the wedding and my emotional state upon approach.

The reality tends to be something less than expected (by myself, any ways); it's exhaustion (both physical - from burning the candle at both ends with planning and preparation and allergies, and mental - the stamina required to do wedding planning in nearly all of my down time for the past several months is incredible, and I'm about running on fumes at this point), anxiety (not about the wedding, but about moving out of my childhood home), childish anger, incompletion, and resentment toward partners from past relationships (one in particular), and a very deep seated calm (as if I am doing exactly what I were placed on this planet to do).

There are moments of excitement, some moments of nervousness (closer to a doubt, really), some rare moments of all of the above... and mostly, a forward look to the relief of being able to take a breather from this sort of activity once everything is done.

There's also the knowledge that this sort of thing (hopefully) comes once in a lifetime, and that it might be worth living all of it up - soaking in every moment of logistical nightmare, ex-hating, anxiety-ridden-packing, frenetic scurrying back and forth to make sure that we have everything we need for the big day...

There's a sort of humility in knowing that we're going to stand up there and declare to the Universe, "Forever!", and hope that the Universe nods and goes, "So it shall be." To hope that the both of us continue to place our relationship at the forefront, continue to build walls where there should be walls and windows where there should be windows, and not take our eyes off the blueprint of partnership and love.

There's a lot of books on marriage - how to keep one healthy, how to avoid damage, how to repair and rebuild... I don't see that stuff in wedding planning books. Maybe its because I'm not looking for it, maybe its because I'm looking in the wrong places, but I think that there are a lot of things that aren't addressed... There's an entire romance about weddings that - while necessary, and exciting, and - well, romantic - is detrimental I think, in the sense that people don't acknowledge that it's only a part of the story.

People don't talk about how to keep a family from crashing and burning when they don't like your chosen partner, they don't talk about the mental overload of details, they don't talk about maintaining stamina, or going into debt, or nearly going into debt, or the strain that can put on people. They don't talk about how to say no, or how not to lose yourself, or how not to live through your children; they don't talk about boundaries and space and time and how to be good to yourself as best as you can, or how much time planning will take and how to work that in on top of your already jam-packed schedule. They don't talk about meshing cultures as seamlessly as possible, or how to be okay with other people being angry at you while they process whatever it is that you're doing; they don't talk about how to stick to your guns without drawing them on someone. They don't talk about coping with your parents being angry, or unsupportive, and they don't talk about how to respect your child's wishes, and treat them like an adult in the truest sense of the word.

There's just a lot of things they don't talk about.