This little light of mine... I'm gonna let it shine

My day has been awful and wonderful and liberating all at once. I am in that magical moment near the end of the movie where Frank and Dwayne are bonding on the pier and Dwayne says, “You know what? Fuck beauty contests. Life is one fucking beauty contest after another. School, then college, then work… Fuck that. And fuck the Air Force Academy. If I want to fly, I’ll find a way to fly. You do what you love, and fuck the rest.”

I just took the worst exam of my life and I am horribly behind in all of my classes but one. And, you know, I have been mostly keeping it to myself and blundering on with all of my damage control techniques and not asking for help and not communicating a whole lot with the outside world. I have been doing these things because a person who does work of the caliber I usually do always rebounds from this kind of thing and manages to get A’s and B’s anyway. A person like me goes and talks to the professor and explains how the food poisoning incident followed by the TWO major computer malfunctions got her very behind in her work and how the timing of midterms just made everything cave in on her. Then the professors understand and give that person more time to kill herself over the A+ work she is obviously going to turn in.

Yet all I’ve been able to care about is that I haven’t had time to run or go to the gym or do anything about my dream. I ran a marathon, I hurt bad for a few days, and then then a full week went by where I not only took zero steps toward that dream, but I let myself backslide because of things I frankly don’t care as much about. Because it’s what people like me do in school. When you’re smart and do good work, it’s what you’re supposed to do.

And here I am, thinking back to when the semester was still flying high and how I found myself in increasingly uncomfortable situations as my performance got better. Every new thing I did well led to another ‘suggestion’ that I rethink grad school or working for the highly coveted government agency that has been trying to offer me a job, or to pursue a different line of study in grad school to get my current job to give me a fellowship so I can do this kind of work forever. I keep thinking it feels really awful because these are people who really care and it just feels shitty to say no to something that is generally considered a good thing. But it’s not why I feel awful. I feel awful because I can’t wait to get out of here and, for once, it would be kind of nice to not do so well so that people would stop wasting my time by encouraging me to pursue things I have no interest in pursuing.

So, fuck that. The most beautiful thing about this little light of mine is that it’s mine... and fuck the rest.

happening in my life, but I also think that the goal “Get Excited” is just more important to me right now, and positive things in life are also exciting. To see a goal titled “Get excited” encourages me to be more exciting, which is so important. They always say if you are bored, you must be boring…
and with that in mind, I will continue to let my light shine!

My motivational muse has kept me on track with my writing…. maybe a little too much. I have been spending about 5-7 hours a day writing. Of course, this includes being on 43T in which keeps my creative juices flowing. I consider my little entry bursts on this site to be a good break as I slave away at it. I think that any form of writing is a contribution to the end result, be it blogging, computer research or hammering away at your project. My dad is extatic that I have finally gotten back on track. He tells me, “Just never forget where you get it from…” A true mentor, indeed. I remember my dad typing away on his manual typewriter until sometimes 2:00 am.

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree!

I am going to reserve this goal for happy moments in my life. To reflect on the positive in a sometimes negative society…. a very nice thing happened to me today, quite by coincidence.

I began unpacking some of my things. The things that I boxed up first, but really needed the most these past five months – my writing & crafts.

I pondered as to why we were stuck here, and why I was putting myself through this. The reality is that we aren’t moving and it may be God’s will for us to stay. As I pulled out some projects that I was working on back then, I came upon some old notes that I had written for a group that I starded some years ago. It was a women’s group that was designed to help meet our goals and face our fears. I took a good look at the material and remembered all of the great times that we had, and I decided to write to some of them & see what they were up to. One wrote me back right away, and invited me to a book club that she’s in.

How ironic, in exploring my past goals today, I have been invited to fulfill a current goal (Create a Tuesday Night Book Club) http://www.43things.com/things/view/813421. It may not be on a Tuesday, but I may be able to check this one off of my list!

I am getting used to the idea of staying put until the market picks up. Maybe this is the universe’s way of telling us that we’re not ready. Oregon is now a world away and getting farther, so I need to find solitude in the place that I now call home.

For this, I am changing my goal, “Escape from California” to the current goal and try to focus on the positive things about living here for now…

Since my husband has lived on a boat & sailed the world, he has a respect for island hopping. So he is throwing another wrench into the works with the option of living on a boat in Maui for a while. We are partial to Maui since we were married there & have gone back many times, so we know the island well. We are SOOOO ready fo some exciting adventure & wherever life takes us, I want to run with it!

I just found out that my husband is reconsidering relocating to Europe. If we move out of the country, I want to go to Costa Rica. I know CR & have done years of research on shipping our things & getting residency there. I have lived there for a short time, & have some very good friends that I’ve made there over the years, so it just makes sense for me. On the other hand, we know several families in France and they can take us under their wings. I do not know how do speak French like my husband, so it will be a lot harder for me. I am just so sad that we won’t be able to move to Oregon after all.

Gosh! It’s been so long since I’ve been online, it’s been hard for me to get back into the habit of journaling. I am still in California despite another trip up north. The market has come to a screeching halt and people are SO flaky! Agents go through the trouble of making showing appointments and then never show up! We’ve had 4 of those in the last month, so nobody has actually showed the house in a long time…

Still frustrated, I am determined to push through this bad luck and think positive. It’s all out there in the universe “Be Kind To Me!”

Finally – had to buy a new laptop :( Still here in California! The market has completely stopped here. Although, new homes are still going up all around us… it makes no sense! We took another trip to Oregon and found a house that we love… I hope something will happen soon!

My Dell laptop has died (well, the internal charging unit) and I’m running on borrowed time (borrowed computer). Frustrating – I have a dilemma… the battery has 3 min. left & I can’t charge it, so I have to either… borrow a battery, or borrow another Dell to charge mine so that I can back up my stinking work!!! What’s so frustrating is that I can’t do any research, writing, email… basically everything! I will sooooo miss 43T. But I’ll be back as soon as I buy a new laptop.

Later – Surfer