might write soon

Okay so I just got the internet cooking again. New netbook = teeny keyboard = crampy hands. My Indian name could be Not Quite Acclimated.

I moved, not quite a week ago. Much harder than I’d anticipated. My Indian name could be Not Quite Acclimated.

So I’m back online again (yay) but gimme a few more minutes. It’ll start to smooth itself out.

I can’t write.

My computer broke. This is my work computer, and I have an iPhone (thank goodness). I want to write more, but until I figure out my plan (and I’m moving in less than two weeks so cash flow is occupied), I’m limited.

So hang out. I’ll be back around eventually.

the end by rkl.

Peacock, phase 2

2:30 this morning; we’d just finished. Phase 3 (and/or4) will be a background of oversized cherry blossoms. No idea when, because, y’know, oww, for real.

Exhaustion real and true

It’s Sunday night and I am painfully exhausted but the right kind of exhausted, for a change. I filled up on weekend.

Thursday and Friday nights I worked late. Last week, the first work week after the holidays, was the longest week in the history of weeks (to steal from a friend). In particular I had a terrible time all week wrapping my brain around my work–I just kept spinning (in my head) and not getting anything done or even getting to a point where I had an understanding of what needed to be done. It was so bad that the Thursday late night turned out to be a complete waste–I stayed for hours and accomplished next to nothing. Which was horrible; quite upsetting. Friday night I finally, finally focused. I don’t know what I did to successfully shift that. I wish that I did know. I think there’s a degree of brute force, honestly. The point is though, that when I left late Friday night, I had made a dent in my work and gotten a thorough grip on what tasks remained for me. And that felt goood.

Saturday morning I met some friends for breakfast and from there went to their house where I filled up my car with cardboard boxes–they had just moved into the house a few months earlier, and were happy to donate.

The plan was to go home and start, finally, to pack. Instead, the rest of the afternoon I did some visiting (there was an impromptu gathering over at mom’s), and then meandered home where I did my nails and just rested up. That night my friend Peter’s new band was playing and I really, really wanted to go. For weeks I’d felt too sick to even want to leave the house, and I wasn’t out of the woods yet, but when it was time to get ready, I actually felt up to it for the first time in several weeks. And I went not just out but very, very out. I ended up going from the one bar with the one band to another bar with another band (another friend of mine) and then back again and then to a diner and didn’t get home until after 4:00. And I knew that was all a bit too much but I was just so happy to be out among the living and having a blast.

Also there’s maybe a new guy in that mix. We’ll see.

Oh and also there may be a new and incredibly potential-filled musical/comedy/theater partnering in the works. This is 100% separate from any of these guys–this was an online connection. We’ll see about this one as well.

This morning I woke up feeling surprisingly fine, considering all that–just a bit tired, but once I was fully awake I realized I felt a little less unhealthy than I had the day before. And I did some lounging and loafing, but also finally got my teeth into some packing. Today was an official, non-impromptu gathering at my mom’s (my stepsister Victoria is heading to Afghanistan for work–oy!) and I brought 5-6 boxes to her basement. Part of the challenge of this move will be the downsizing. Some things I need to just get rid of, others I need to store. The slow-down aspect will be the deliberation–I tend to get a little daydreamy about stuff. But today I made some solid decisions. It wasn’t much but in fact, the shift from haven’t-begun-to-pack-at-all to set-in-motion is an enormous one. So yay.

The afternoon/evening at mom’s was lovely. It was a nice combination of people, and Benjamin and Evy are just beyond adorable. Ben will be 4 in April and Evy turned 1 in November. They are both extraordinary and fun and funny and delightful and reeeally beautiful. I spent a lot of time with them, but also had nice visits with everyone there, and got my laundry done to boot.

So exhaustion real and true. But this all feels exactly like how I have expected 2010 to begin. Lots is being accomplished, and new people and opportunities are surfacing.

And–exhaaale.

Our offices closed early on December 24th, and reopen tomorrow morning. And in fact I was out sick the 23rd and 24th. Unfortunately, I have not fully recovered–I missed all the parties and celebrations and gatherings with the exception of New Year’s Eve at Ray and Tracy’s, which is a very low-key event. And that wore me out. I’ve been partially functional for awhile, and did a lot of apartment hunting, but no packing. I still feel like sleeping all the time. I’m not doing it, but I want to. The bad news is, back to work tomorrow with no sense of a vacation (though certainly a sense of a break), and also still just not feeling well. The good news is, I found an apartment I think I am going to love.

The point is, I have given myself until tonight to complete this end of year wrap-up, because in all practical ways, tomorrow starts the beginning of the next year.

One of the surprise gifts to me in 2009 has been facebook. I got active on there late 2008, and this year it has been a big part of my life. Now sure, some of that has been time-killing, attention-deficient obsessive-compulsive indulgence, but some of it has been the cultivation of real connections. Rediscovering old friends, accelerations with newer ones. And also, as a very social character who is alone a lot, facebook soothes my inner yente. It’s sort of like being at a party or a bar or even at work or school, where you sort of jump in and out of little conversations that you happen to catch. Bottom line, it keeps me company, and that has value.

I have rediscovered girls this year–getting the gay feelings. I sort of fell in with a little pack of lesbians, and I have had a few crushes, including on one really really dykey woman who I just adore. We’ve become great friends, and, like so many of my great friends who I crush on, she knows I’m pretty much a pushover when it comes to her. honest. to. god. she is like my perfect boyfriend. She’s got a girlfriend, who is terrific, really fun–thank goodness she is not single. Because really, we could wreck each others lives if the chance were there.

So I got tattooed.

Now, it’s been an intense year. It started in January with the tattooing weekend at O and Christine’s, at which I completed my breast tattoo which has been in progress for about 15 years (it was finally all complete at one point, and then I got the breast reduction, which sort of changed the canvas), and that weekend led directly to some of the relationship stuff of early last year, which led me to and then away from Joe. Then there was the magical meeting of Mason, right into Free Spirit and the amazing shamanic chakra work I did. And it was at Free Spirit that I handed Gordon money (Gordon who had also assisted in the shamanic ceremony–see how it all ties together?) and said, We’re doing this.

Breathe into me.

There were deaths in 2009. Stevie Wineburg, Jyoti Crystal, Paul Ducharme. I found out Dave Addams had died a few years back. Stevie, my baby nephew, will always missing from us, and his death is a reminder for me of the lack of predictability in life, and the lack of fairness.

The others–also just sucked. None of these were old people. Two were peers. I’m well into my 40s, and these are the phone calls that come, starting now. I have friends who have survived cancer, one who is dealing with extremely high blood pressure, kidney problems and a frigging brain aneurysm. Lots of us are on medication. Mortality not to be taken for granted. I’m starting to get that.

My job.
My creativity.
My love life.
My family.
My friends.
My growth.
My health.
My fun.
My home.

We had an amazing journey in the world of Mad Men. The success of Basket of Kisses seems to have hit critical mass.

still catching my breath…

…quite literally, as I’ve been sick with bronchitis for a week. And I expected to get better more quickly than I did. Ahh, expectations. They’re so adorable when they’re little. I was down solid for five days; missed a couple days of work, missed several Christmas events including the one with my Christmas-’brating branch of the family. It sucked. I’m now up among the living (still symptomy and quite tired) and I am apartment hunting. I will be keeping my date with New Year’s Eve–a house party, good friends, low-key.

I have been actively in the midst of this reflection, trying to make sense of this year. Being home sick has helped with that–there has been a real halt as this year comes to its end. The thing is, this year blew my mind in a lot of ways, and didn’t make any sense to me at all as it was happening, but it finally has a cohesion to me now. There was a lot of intensity; little bursts of reemergences and occurrences from various directions that would seem otherwise unrelated except for how they related to me and the timing of it all. It was exhilarating and fun and scary and exhausting. It was a year of long dull patches peppered with storms of accelerated experience and lesson-learning. And right now I am, to an extent, tying things up and making new plans. I think that 2010 and I will be breaking new ground, and 2009 has been laying the groundwork (this is a devolving metaphor usage). Or 2009 has been a readying of the ground (I can’t seem to stop) that I have been laying down for the last, honest to god, ten years. Six in the very least.

Something has changed within me. Something is not the same.

Elphaba, Wicked

Joe and I, very very early in our relationship, the same weekend we saw the peacock tattoo that inspired the tattoo I just got, discussed our roles in each others lives. And we determined that we were likely walking each other, hand in hand, to the next portal.

starting to catch my breath

So shines a good deed in a weary world.

Willy Wonka, upon receipt of Charlie Bucket’s “Everlasting Gobstopper”

A friend of mine said something to me today about my having had a good 2009. It has been a very strange year for me, but overall I think he is right. It’s reflection time, folks.

A year ago my job was on the line, because my unhappiness with one aspect of it was infecting me and my performance. I have worked incredibly hard to turn this around, and it has paid off. I’ve never felt this good in a job, even when the job itself kicks my ass. I own the position in a way that surpasses what was asked for, and I have gained so much respect and feel genuinely good about what I bring to the organization. There have been many changes since I first started, and there are many more to come, but I have been assured that I am part of those changes. It feels amazing to be safe and valued.

You know, I always form connections. This has never been a problem for me. I always have a few friends at my job; plenty of people to talk to. But socially, I haven’t had a circle. My two closest friends no longer live in the area. And I don’t always notice that I’m missing just–someone to hang out with, to hit a diner with, or catch a movie. This year for the first time in a long time, I’ve made friends in a way that has genuinely expanded my social circle. There are some new terrifically precious people in my life.

Romantically it has been a complicated year.

As long as I live

I will never understand the sharp contrast of the top-of-the-world nothing-can-go-wrong feeling that comes with confidence, to the I’m-a-fool-who-was-I-fucking-kidding that comes with even the slightest rejection.

Not grounded.

Nope.

I have a lot that needs to be restored or even first built in terms of balance and focus. I’m swinging from tree to tree these days, and I need to ground.