New

A new year, although my own new year really starts with the winter solstice. That's one of the turning points of the year for me, the time when I ponder the past year and think about what I want. My birthday is another turning point, and then, because I have never given up on the academic life, even if I'm not living it, Aug/Sept. with fresh starts and back to school new chances. So, the calendar new year.... it's a date on the calendar.

That said, there are a few new things around. This is the bulletin board that lives next to my desk. I change it out randomly, but it stays the same for months at a time. It's a kind of inspiration board. The things I pulled off it were all about persistence and finding what you love. After my thoughts at solstice, I realized that for this year, I did not want to wait, that I wanted to live my life and stop waiting for perfection, or change, or whatever to do the many things I want to do. I like choosing an intention for the year, and a word to remind me of this. I thought about live as the word, but I wanted more. I have been living, and waiting to live more fully. I want to live big, to live authentically, to really push some things this year. So the word I went with is Fly. That's what I want for this year, to fly.

I found an awesome quote from Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon - "You wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down." So, stepping away from the shit that weighs me down, and seeing how far and fast and high I can fly.
We've had a couple rounds of snow lately, not much accumulation, but a beautiful snowfall. It remind me of a poem I've been thinking of a lot lately.

Manna by Joseph Stroud

Everywhere, everywhere, snow sifting down,

a world becoming white, no more sounds,

no longer possible to find the heart of the day,

the sun is gone, the sky is nowhere, and of all

I wanted in life - so be it - whatever it is

that brought me here, chance, fortune, whatever

blessing each flake of snow is the hint of, I am

grateful, I bear witness, I hold out my arms,

palms up, I know it is impossible to hold

for long what we love of the world, but look
at me, is it foolish, shameful, arrogant to say this,

see how the snow drifts down, look how happy

I am.
And I am, happy. I'm learning to be happy without things being settled into a pattern of predictability. I don't have to wait for a full-time job, and some sort of established career, or for all the things for which we have expectations - the things that we think society judges us on. And maybe some parts of society do judge on things - houses, cars, jobs, careers, possessions, money, prestige, being predictable.... All I have, really, is myself, so I am finally, finally, learning to trust my own heart, my soul, and to do what I need to do to live my own life, with the things my soul needs for flight. We'll see what happens now.

On an odd, and kind of related note, I was vacuuming yesterday with the little stick vacuum thing I have - an electric broom type of thing. It doesn't even touch the cat hair. I have stuck with it because I have a vacuum in Indiana with all my other things, and haven't wanted to buy another one. So, yesterday I thought to myself, it's time to just get a vacuum. I need one now, so I will have to suck it up and get one, and just have two.

Looking out the back window to see what the weather was like this morning, I noticed that the dumpster for the apartments behind me had a plethora of things in it - someone appears to be moving and dumping many things. And on the top of the heap, on top of what looked like a wooden table, was a vacuum. It's filthy and will need to be cleaned up, and have some maintenance type work done. It does work, though. I think with new bags, belt, filters, etc, it will be perfect.

And the table will make an excellent work surface in the kitchen. It also needs serious clean up (I wiped off the worst before bringing it in). And I will probably paint it for now, since it's been painted already (just the top and legs, though). Maybe this summer I will strip it down and refinish it. It's some kind of hardwood, and super sturdy/heavy.
So, happy new year to me! A little more work (I had to drag both of these up the hill to my house), and they should be useful additions to the household. Thanks (universe? person moving? who/whatever?).

And the days go by

I'm still in transition, from my library job to something new, from a set schedule to something flexible, from having an idea of where I'm heading to pondering future plans. I've been playing with beads, as I sometimes do when I'm trying to process through ideas and thoughts in my head.

copper chain with leather, with a stone pendant

two pairs of earrings

earring hanger/display (the Buddha doesn't seem to mind)

Only 9 working days until freedom....

and I'm still so busy that it really doesn't seem real. I have been waiting for so long to be free, and I have the feeling that the actual last day of work will be anti-climactic. I know that it will be like any other day, and that no one there will do a damn thing to mark the fact that I've been working there for 2 years and now will be done. I know this because they did very little (if anything) when another longer term employee left. That's the way the (non-existent) team spirit goes.

There will be things I miss, like my actual work duties, and all my pretty old books, and dealing with the people at the state library and historical society, and even CONTENTdm. I will not miss being in a work environment which is a staggeringly poor fit. That makes me even MORE determined NOT to do this ever again - not to take a job where the fit is bad. In this case, I did get to discover where in the library universe I want to be, and I did get experience that I will be able to use elsewhere. Still, I wonder if the tradeoff, experience for self-esteem, was totally worth it. I feel like I'm barely holding the shreds of my self-esteem together.

Having a very low pressure job, where people actually appreciate me, and where I'll be able to work in more of a team atmosphere will help me as I knit myself back together. So far, I'm really liking the people at the temp gig, and once the research is done and we are able to start doing more writing, I'll enjoy the job even more. Big bonuses are that the hours are flexible, I can wear what I want, there's an office dog, and I can work from home most of the time. Plus, I just found out that if I want to, I can extend my time with them past mid-August into December-January. It's nice to know, that I have a backup backup plan. (and that someone actually wants me, and would offer me more money to stay - which helps build the self-esteem back toward the plus side of things)

Minuses are that stress is still wreaking havoc. I ended up on antibiotics for yet another sinus infection. My eating is really out of control; I've tried sitting with myself, listening to the fears and pain and total loneliness that I feel, but it's so overwhelming that I bury those feelings in food. Because work triggers all the unsafe, self-hating feelings, I've made my peace with the fact that things will be out of control for another couple weeks. Once that huge stress is gone, I can sit with all the feelings that these past two years have brought up, and painfully process through them all. I just can't do that now, knowing that I still have to go back into that place. It's not safe emotionally, because these feelings tap into bigger and blacker places. I can't open myself up in the way I need while still working in crazyland. So, the future should be very interesting.

Longing, survival, and life

My week of flu has left me tired and unsettled, in only that way that more lengthy illnesses can. The physical tiredness mirrors my emotional tiredness, and together they break through some of the barriers I've put up while in survival mode. Tiredness + reading a book at the right time for it to connect violently to current emotions = a storm of weeping, followed by a few epiphanies.

1) My current situation of trying to weather a horrible job situation in order to get to a place I want to be reminds me of two other bad situations/times in my life - waiting for high school to be over so I could move on to college, and waiting to get out of my marriage.

2) Waiting for college left me in a deep dark depression, from which I am really amazed that I emerged alive. Trying to get out of my marriage threw me into an emotional eating hole that took a long time to calm down into something like normal.

3) I am back in an emotional eating hole, and teetering in a place that could throw me into a deep dark depression. These are both places I recognize, both places I vowed to myself to avoid, and both places which surprise me by their proximity.

4) Being in a situation that feels like trapped + waiting + longing for the future = bad, bad news for me.

5) I have 89 more days to wait.

6) I have to figure out a way to take a new path, to find new survival methods for this situation.

7) This will move me out of the comfort I've been trying to pull to me, and force me to try something new, which will not be comfortable. All this makes me long for that fragile, storybook place of "normal," in which it would not feel so difficult to interact with life in a "normal" way.

8) All my feelings of loneliness and alone-ness and fragility are pulled up and dragged to the surface by having the walls of survival come crashing down. And I long to be in a place where I have people, friends, family near me, people who can be strong for me when I am too tired to be anything but broken and not enough.

8) The Time Traveler's Wife has the same feeling of longing that so suffuses my own life at the moment. All I have to do is think about the book, and I am overwhelmed by a need to weep. This book will stick in my head and pop in at moments both opportune and inopportune (just like The Lovely Bones).

9) I am glad to have Callie. Her furry love is enough to pull me forward on days when it feels like I am walking through wet cement in steel-toed boots.

I think I've been here before...

So, gave my verbal notice Monday that June 30th will be my last day. I have known this in my head for some time, but wanted it to be made real. I also wanted to shut the door firmly on the possibility of staying. I'd found myself thinking, well, if nothing else comes up, I could always stay a little longer. No, staying longer is not an option. I fit into this work environment like someone slamming an octagonal peg into a circular space with a sledge hammer. Not well at all. The fit is not there, and it's wearing on me.

I'm happy to have everything out in the open, and am working on my future plans. I can't really share them here yet, but hopefully will be able to do that soon. Meanwhile, I am trying to get things organized at work so I can finish all the things I need to in the next 3 1/2 months. I'm getting ready to present at a conference in April. Life will be interesting. I'm curious to see what new adventures it will bring.