Musing Moment 0054: Challenge Update

I’ve sort of, kind of been a slacker on my challenge. I hadn’t done anything with it since Friday, but I got caught back up today. A bit of it has to do with the fact that I’ve done this challenge a handful of times, so I know which days actually have “important” information for me, or at least have the information that I want to hear over again for where I’m at in life.

For the most part this weekend was just “make your to-do list” days, which isn’t anything new for me. It’s part of my routine. There were a few points in the emails that I got caught up on that I feel will help me, though.

I want to become better / more diligent about when I make my to-do list since I’ve become lax about this. I prefer to make my to-do lists at night before going to sleep. It gives my mornings a more solid feel. I already have an idea of how my day ‘should’ go down, and even if the Universe rains all over my plans, I at least have an idea of what needs to get done and when.

Waiting until the morning can be rough. Sometimes I don’t have the time I need / want to make my list and I feel rushed, or it doesn’t happen until I get to work, so I feel like things are haphazard and like I’m jumping from fire to fire.

I think if I put more effort into creating my lists before going to sleep I would be able to sleep better, knowing that my day was already mapped out. It would give me a bit more time in my mornings as well.

I plan to focus on my certification testing to be my “research skill”. Now that I have the exercise files I would like to work through at least one section each day, preferably a bit more than that since the sections tend to be short.

It would be awesome to take my certification test by the end of the month.

That’s it for my challenge assignments. The only other thing is creating “triggers”, which help remind you to check the list throughout the day. I already have triggers, though. Any time I get into my car or change location, like going from one room to another. Also anytime I complete a task. When I check something off my list, I assess where I’m at and if anything else needs to be added, removed, shifted or revised.

I’m a pretty lean, mean, to-do list destroying machine when I want to be. So overall I think I’m doing well with the challenge. We’re at day 11 of 30 and I’m still holding strong.

Dragon’s Horde 0036: Monsters

Week 2 – Monsters

This past week was fantasy creatures / monsters. I didn’t get around to drawing everyday, but I feel I did fairly well on the days I did sketch.

These are some of the characters I’m proud of. I would like to come back and do character studies for some of them during later weeks.

Daily Post 0179: Possible Employment and the Weekend Recap

It feels like I have a ton to write about. I’m going to make a quick list so I can make sure I hit most of my marks.

Zane’s interview
CADLearning reply
Pathfinder game / date day
New class issue / worry
Weekly focus – painting

No hurricane
Conversation with Warren #1

I think that’s about it. At least those are the main points that I can remember right now. More things might pop up as I go through it all.

So, this morning Zane woke up to an email from the call center he applied to. He has a phone interview, which he can complete either today or tomorrow, and an in person interview on the 10^th. The position is paying full-time with overtime for a little over $13 an hour. The job would start on October 12^th.

It’s not official yet, but it looks really, really, insanely promising. We are both hoping it works out. We’re not counting on it. He still plans to apply to a few other leads that we’ve gotten. One is for 911 dispatch. The other is a part time job as a forum moderator online.

That’s actually something that I may be applying to as well. It’s a build-your-own-schedule sort of a job. Roughly 10 to 16 hours depending for about $9 an hour. I don’t know much about it. Zane is supposed to send me more information. After I look into it I’ll make a decision on if it’s something I want to do.

But yeah. Things are looking up in this area of life. Even if the job doesn’t start until October, it would be full-time for a decent wage, and it would give both of us something to hold on to. It would give us an end date for the stress and worry.

I woke up to an email from the CAD Learning site with a link to all of the exercise files that I need for my book. Woohoo! I’m not sure if I’m going to start work on them today. I sort of have my day mapped out already, as detached and jagged as it feels. If I find some down time then I make go back and do the two exercises that I’ve already read through.

Last night was the Pathfinder game and date day. Zane and I went to Zaxby’s for lunch, which was nice, but frustrating at the same time. It was a little crowded and loud, but since we had plans to do the last bit of grocery shopping after lunch we didn’t want to get the food to go since it would have to sit in the car. After a little bit a few of the bigger / louder groups left and it wasn’t as bad.

The grocery shopping ended up being a bust. The Publix we went do didn’t have two of the three items we were looking for. We’re most likely going to go to Walmart tomorrow since that’s my “late day” this month.

We stopped by Taco Bell on the way home and got a taco box for game night. I also had to stop by the bank to deposit $20. I had forgotten to use the cash in my wallet for pay for lunch and instead swiped my card. We’re doing good about sticking to the budget, though. We’re right on target for the “play money” I set aside, and for both gas and grocery we’re under budget.

Uke brought chips and soda for game night, and Zane used the extra pinto beans that we had from the nachos to make a bean dip. All in all it was a good night. Our party was attacked by acid spitting river drakes. We’re currently still in the middle of combat, but one of the drakes totally just got owned hardcore, so I think we’re doing alright.

My work schedule is the same this month as it was last month, just on opposite days. So Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays I’m going to be working 9pm to 1am. It’s sort of annoying having to work that late on a Saturday. It means I can’t stay up crazy late on Sundays since I have to be to work a bit earlier on Mondays, but that shouldn’t be too bad. Uke starts classes today, so he won’t be able to stay over crazy late, which means the games will have to end at a decent hour for both of us.

I logged into the online platform for my classes today and saw that I was scheduled for two classes rather than one. I emailed my Faculty Affairs contact about the issue to see if it was an error. It was and we got it straightened out already.

I guess next month is supposed to be an actually brick and mortar class for me. I’m not sure if I will be able to do that with my schedule. All of my remaining classes will be on campus classes. When I first signed up I didn’t have an issue with that, having been online for so long now, over a year, I’m not sure campus classes work well for me. I like the flexibility of online. It doesn’t interfere with work or the gym.

I might see about switching to the online degree. I’m going to do a bit more research before inquiring about the change.

Since it is the beginning of a new week I have a new focus as far as the art side of things goes. I’m going to be digital painting this week. I’ve already spent some time online looking at coloring book pages and line art. I have a folder full of things that I want to color, so now it’s just picking one or two pictures a day to color.

I hoping this helps with my shading / coloring abilities, and keeps me fresh with Photoshop and using my tablet since I haven’t been in the program for a bit, or used my tablet for much of anything recently. I don’t want to get rusty, and this gives me a break from my art book.

I need to get a new one at some point. I only have five blank pages left. New graphit pencils would be awesome, too. : x

So Florida is not going to be getting a hurricane. I’m not sad about that fact. It’s been raining off and on, which is nice. I like listening to the rain. I got caught in my car for a little bit though on Saturday. When I was on my way home from the store it started raining super hard. Like, driving with your hazards on hard. It was still pretty intense when I parked at the apartment, so I hung out about 10 minutes for it to lighten up enough for me to dash inside with my backpack and the grocery bags.

Saturday I ended up getting a message from Warren #1, my first boyfriend, on Facebook. I haven’t talked to him in almost a year. He’s doing well. We ended up chatting on the phone for about an hour. There was a development in his life that he wanted some advice on since it was in my ‘realm’.

It was good to hear from him, and Zane didn’t mind that we talked.

Zane and I actually went through his coin jar the other night and put all of them into rolls. He ended up having $13, $4 in just pennies, so he bought pizza with it for Saturday night.

I got my credit and debit card from the bank finally. Both of those are activated and good to go.

Mom is most likely on a plane to Vegas right now. I’m going to message her later to see how she’s doing, and to let her know that life doesn’t suck as much right now; that things are looking up.

Nicole started her first day of work at her company in Tennessee. I’ve already wished her luck.

I feel a little scatter-brained today. I keep bouncing around on my to-do list, but I’m plucking away at it, and I guess that’s the important thing. I might not be flowing with seamless grace from thing to thing, but I’m not a train wreck, either. I should get points for that.

TLDR: Friday through Sunday was great. And the week is looking pretty good from where I’m sitting.

Daily Post 0178: The Recap of Spa Day

We’ll see if I can get through all of this in roughly 30 minutes.

Yesterday was great. In my last post I said how it was basically going to be like spa day for me since I didn’t have work or any unwanted obligations, and I was going to have most of the afternoon to myself.

Oh, man. It was fantastic.

Zane woke up shortly after I finished posting. We chatted for a bit. Eventually I showered so I could start my day. First I went to the bank where I got the money order for rent and withdrew all of the cash I needed to for the next two weeks, including food. I stick to the budget better when I use cash rather than using my card.

From there I got flea medication for Shadow and Scarlet. Zane said to add the cost of Shadow’s mediciane to the money he owes me. With that task accompoished I got gas for my car. I only used about half a tank the past two weeks, so it was a $12 fill up. Huzzah. I love my car so much.

By then it was around 1pm. All of my errand chores were done and it was time to head to my sports bar. I got to sit in ‘my’ booth and my server, a relatively new girl, remembered me. She took my order and I got to work on my other tasks.

I went through my email, cleaning out the spam and trash folders. I had paid bills earlier at home, so I organized all of my screenshots of the payments. Since I don’t have a printer I use the screenshots as receipts. I went through my downloads folder and organized my desktop. Then I set the trashcan on my computer to empty…. Over 7,000 files. >.<;

I’ve been such a slacker in that department.

I cleaned up my notebook and made a sheet specifically for reminders of things I need / want to do. I bought the text book for my certification test. More on that later.

I added the milage and gas info to an Evernote that I have, so I can track how my car is doing, and I updated my ‘Money Owed’ excel sheet.

With all of that done my day was pretty complete as far as tasks go. I had spent a fair amount of time in the morning searching for reference images for my drawings, so once I was done eating lunch I took out my sketchbook and drew for almost two hours. Yesterday ended up being satrys and fauns.

I realized that I need to spend a lot of time working on the proportions of the face, so that will most likely be what I do next week. I ended up going back to a more cartoon like style and I love, love, the way one of the sketchs turned out. It made me really happy to see such improvement in myself.

By that time I was pretty much done with being out and about.

Oh, one other thing I did was go through a message a ton of people on Facebook. Nothing fancy. Just wanted them to know I was thinking about them and that I hoped they were doing well.

Anywho, before I left I messaged Zane to let him know I was on my way home. He asked me to pick him up something to snack on. I agreed to, so I stopped by Arby’s on the way home to get a roast beef sandwich combo. I gave him the fries and drink while I had the sandwich, since he doesn’t like them.

Yeah… I had stayed at the sports bar for so long I was hungry again. >.<;

I ended up going running at the gym followed by my 15 minute yoga podcast since I transferred the file to my phone. My legs are still sore today, but I’m sure they’re not hating me as much as the would have if I had done no stretching at all.

I was at a 17:30 mile yesterday. Still improving. Woot.

When I got home I took burger patties out for dinner. Zane and I talked about our grocery list. It seems like it’s going to be a pretty small one again. No complaints. We also talked about going shopping either Friday night or Saturday since Sunday and Monday it is projected to be super icky with Hurricane Erika heading our way. So that might happen today.

We had thought abut doing date night Friday instead of Sunday for that reason, too, but we were both feeling anti –people / world. So we stayed home instead.

I sautéed mushrooms and onions after showering, and cooked the burgers. I worked through a few of the sections in my Maya book. Or rather, I read through them. When I got to a section that talked about exercise files I had to figure out where they were…

Which apparently they don’t exist… There’s a link in the Introduction of the book that says to go to a website to download them. I go to the website and the only thing I can find is a section which talks about purchases course tutorials. Not what I’m looking for…

So I sent the website and email asking for help locating the content. All I can do now is wait. I went to bed shortly after getting through the second or third section of chapter two. There are 8 chapters, roughly 170 pages, with lots of pictures and fairly large font.

It’s a pretty decent book so far, and I think the $20 was well spent. It’s a good resource. I just want all of the files that go with it so I can do all of the things I already know how to do. XD

This certification is listed as ‘student’ level. So it’s something that recent graduates would benefit from. I’m hoping that I blow through it. Which so far I am. It also has information about schools becoming test centers, which was one of the things I wanted for Full Sail. Once I go through the Certified User and the Professional User exams I will bring it up with my Program Director, since I’ll be familiar with the process. I think that would be a great opportunity for our students.

And I’m going to have to stop writing for now, otherwise I’ll be late for the gym. Kickboxing at 9:45. I’m hoping I’m able to crawl home in time for work.

Daily Post 0177: Spa Day… Without the Spa

This whole “writing halfway through my day” thing is getting confusing for me. I keep having to go back to remember where I left off and what I haven’t written about. Not that rereading my posts is a bad thing, but it’s a little aggravating.

Luckily today I really haven’t done much of anything before hand. It’s still ‘morning’ and the day hasn’t fully started yet.

So let’s see… yesterday…

I’m pretty sure I wrote during SAL. Oh, and this is me not going back and rereading my post because I’m a slacker like that, so I’ll most likely be backtracking a bit.

So yeah, I wrote, checked up on my personal email, work email, Facefail, all of that social media stuff. There wasn’t a whole lot since I’ve been keeping up with it more. I messaged Nicole to see about meeting up one last time before the end of the day.

I listened through my Discover Weekly list from Spotify. There’s a handful of good songs on it, so I have new artists to look into as far as music goes. I sketched for a little while. Yesterday was baby dragons. There were a few that came out fairly well.

I began grading the project 2 assignments. I only had seven to do, which was way less than I thought I would have. Clavan said he would take all of the assignments that were late or had extentions, so I guess that’s why. The ones I graded were pretty good. Three of them went above and beyond the requirements of the projects, which was awesome to see. I also happened to get most of the files that I wanted to grade since they were the students I interacted with the most. It all just seemed to work out well.

I graded four assignments before packing up and heading out. I needed food and a change of location by that point. I saw Nicole outside of school with Marc. We got to hug one last time and I wished her a safe trip. I’ll message her tonight to make sure she arrived to Tennessee safely.

I walked across the parking lot to Crispers. It was happy hour over there so I was able to get a bowl of soup for $3. I had my water bottle with me, so it was a pretty cheap lunch / dinner. I ate and then finished the grading.

After that I went back to the breakroom, hoping to have it to myself. No dice, though. Ari was there. At first I was uncomfortable, but I set up my stuff anyway. I needed to email the grading spreadsheet to Clavan and post the project comments online. Ari was in the middle of doing her own thing, so we actually didn’t talk all that much and I ended up relaxing as the minutes ticked by.

Once the task of grading was 100% complete I decided to work a bit more on my homework assignment. It was either that or sit in rush hour traffic to get to the store… No thanks.

I had a reply from my instructor saying to send him a link to a Dropbox folder with my file in it. That way I could still get a critique. I created the folder and put my original submission in it, along with my updated version so he could see the progress I made. I finished adding the sounds that I wanted to, and tweaked a few of the ones that were already there.

I feel that I’m pretty much done with the assignment. I’m going to hold of on submitting my work until I read my critique, but yeah, overall I’m happy with it. I think there will be very minor issues, most of which I’ve already addressed. We’ll see though.

Once that was done I packed up to leave school for real. Got in my car and headed over to Hell on Earth… I mean Walmart.

I got coffee creamer and bread since we ran out of it last night, and because the thought of killing people at 8 in the morning due to lack of caffine doesn’t sound all that awesome. I got a can of olives while I was out as well.

Sunday is supposed to be game night, so Zane and I were talking about what food would end up being. We have a ton of pinto beans left over from when we made nachos so I suggested doing a bean dip, as long as someone bought a couple bags of chips, and I would pay for a family taco box or something from Taco Bell. So that’s our game plan.

The olives are supposed to go in the dip I guess. It’s Zane’s dip, so I have no idea what’s going to be in it. Hopefully not arsenic.

With the task of shopping complete I was able to go home. I put the little bit of grocery away, loaded the dish washer, and set it to run. I got to play Witcher 3 for a little while. Zane ended up walking to Publix because the spinach we had was starting to go bad, and because he wanted milk. It was actually really nice to not be the one to go out to the store.

He made chicken sandwichs again. And once again they were fantastic. We finished watching Aldnoah Zero last night. The ending totally didn’t answer any questions or explain why Slain turned into a total jerk during the second season. Overall, the series was good, but I’m left sort of disappointed. I want my answers, and I didn’t get them.

It’s one of those series that I wouldn’t watch again, and most likely wouldn’t recommend just because there are better ones out there.

After finishing the series I ended up going to sleep. I was super tired, both physically and mentally. I had gotten through, literally, everything on my to-do list. It was a great feeling. I felt accomplished, productive, and happy with myself. I had done yoga, so I did a bit of working out. I had taken care of work and school, and even got leisure time into my day.

Zane had taken care of his interview and felt that it went well. So he was in good spirits as well. He ended up falling asleep on the couch again since he stayed up past when I went to sleep.

So far today has been low key. Zane is still asleep in the room. I’ve set up shop at the kitchen table. Bills are paid. I made another batch of oatmeal. I’ve had breakfast and my vitamin. I’ve had a bottle of water already. I’ve talked to my brother about paying part of the storage unit since he owes me for last month and this coming month. He said he would pay next week since that’s pay day for him.

I pretty much have my day mapped out, and even though it seems like there’s a lot, a fair amount of it is low key. I talked to Zane yesterday about going to my sports bar alone so I can have a little bit of ‘me’ time, and he was ok with that. So I’m really looking forward to everything.

In a way it’s like a spa day for me. No work, all relaxation, and only the things that I want to get taken care of on my to-do list.

And with that I’m going to go shower.

Daily Post 0175: Opportunities

There was a lot of writing yesterday. There was a major, massive fight with Zane, too. Yet, despite that, yesterday was awesome.

Shortly after writing my daily post Zane woke up. I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t pretend to be ok because I was still bothered. He asked why and I explained that his comment bothered me.

In all of our previous ‘fighting’ there has never been raised voices. There’s never been cursing. Really, they’re not fights even though in my irrational right brain they are.

Zane doesn’t count them, and on the logical side I don’t consider them fights either. There’s emotional discord inside of me during our spats. A metric crap ton… but it’s not like when Warren #2 and I would fight.

This was closer to a real fight. Our voices were raised, not yelling, but it would have woken up the roommates if we had gotten into it during the night. There wasn’t cursing, which I’m grateful for. Really it was pretty civilized. We let each other talk loudly without interrupting. Polite fighting… who knew…

There were tears on both sides. We really threw everything down on the table. He kept saying that it didn’t matter what he wanted because it wasn’t possible. That he was going to have to accept a shitty job because he doesn’t have marketable skills. That he was going to have to work minimum wage for forever.

He told me to leave the room. To go away. So I did. I sat in the corner of the bathroom because it’s the only other room in the apartment where I can shut a door and feel like I have privacy.

I wasn’t going to feel sorry for what I said. I wasn’t going to feel bad about being angry. I wasn’t going to feel bad that he wanted space because I wanted it, too. There was so much. Anger, hurt, exasperation.

The only one saying it’s not possible is you! >.<; Arg! So much frustration.

Like… “I want to throw a brick at your face,” level of frustration. Where there’s a will there’s a way. I can’t be that will for you though. You have to want it bad enough to see the opportunities and motivated enough to put in the effort to make it happen. I can’t make it happen for you.

After roughly 10 minutes I heard him open the bedroom door. There was a knock on the bathroom door shortly after that. I had curled up on the floor, using my bath towel as a pillow. I was calmer. I felt cleaner because I had said what I wanted to. I didn’t feel bad or depressed. I felt justified. I actually felt pretty strong and resolved. In what I don’t know… Maybe myself. My beliefs, my feelings. I felt right.

“Come in.”

Zane opened the door and saw me on the floor. He was sort of quiet. He said that one of the call centers he applied to had emailed him. They wanted him to complete a video interview for the position he applied for.

He said from now on before we fought he had to check his email first. I like how we can ‘fight’ and still smile at each other in the end. How he tried to help me off the floor and I was a brat and tried to pull him down instead. I like how we hugged and said how we’re both a pain in the ass. How we deserve each other.

I’m glad he has this opportunity. Even if it doesn’t pan out. I think it’s giving him hope. If he heard back from one place he can hear back from others. It’s not a wasted effort.

We ended up having lunch and watching an episode of Aldnoah. We talked more afterwards. We both agreed that the fight wasn’t bad. That we’re ok. We both agreed that it had needed to happen.

I worked on my homework afterwards. I actually went back through and replaced all of my sounds with Zelda sounds. I might post it just for fun. I’m pretty proud of how it turned out. Still a few things I want to go back and tweak, but overall it’s a success in my book.

That took longer than I thought it would so I missed out on kickboxing. I went running instead. I was doing really well until my last two intervals. My knee buckled twice. Much lame.

I was glad that I wasn’t going faster. I was able to recover both times, and nothing felt like it had been hurt. After the second incident I figured the Universe was telling me to stop it, so I did. I finished my session with walking, then walked back to the apartment, being mindful. The walking at the end put me at a 19 minute mile, but like I said, in the beginning I was doing really well, so I’m ok with it.

I showered, ate, then headed to work. I sketched for most of the lab. This week is supposed to be monsters. Instead of big, scary monsters though I’m doing adorable baby monsters. Yesterday I did griffins. There’s a few that turned out super cute and I’m extremely pleased with them. : 3

When I got home I was insanely tired. I cooked scrambled eggs, had more water, then went to sleep shortly after. Zane went out to the living to finish watching Critical Roll because I was being grouchy. I guess he ended up falling asleep on the couch. He woke me up around 7am when he came back into the room.

This morning started around 9:30 for me. I had a bottle of water while poking around online. I had oatmeal for breakfast with my coffee.

I was planning on going to the gym for a yoga class at 11. Instead, Zane woke up around 10 and agreed to do a yoga podcast with me at the apartment. It was a quick 15 minute podcast. One that I had never done before. I really enjoyed it though. It was part of a chakra flow series, so it was the root chakra today, which focused on being rooted and stretching out the legs. I needed that so much.

There was a fair amount of child’s pose as well, which helped stretch out my shoulders. They’re still sore from kickboxing.

Zane said we should do yoga together more often. That he really enjoyed it. I’m pretty sure he genuinely means it, too. He’s not one to say things just to make other people feel better. He definitely wouldn’t suffer through something he didn’t like.

We had lunch and watched another episode of Aldnoah. I showered, and now I’m at work.

Zane is supposed to do the video interview while I’m away and finish the application for the post office position. I have to complete the grading for project 2 today and run by the store before going home. Today is Nicole’s last day in Florida, so I need to see her one last time. I have sketching to do, and I would like to finish working on my homework assignment so it is done. That would leave tomorrow fairly clear since I do not have work tomorrow night. Huzzah.

I found that out yesterday. Best day ever.

There’s two episodes left in Aldnoah, so Zane and I will most likely try to finish that tonight once I get home. I wouldn’t mind doing another yoga podcast before going to sleep just to keep everything stretched out and limber.

I’ve been doing well with the gym / working out which makes me feel good. Things still haven’t changed, but they are looking up. I feel good. I’m hopeful.

I’m going to make today a good day.

Dragon’s Horde 0035: Flora

Week 1 – Flora

I recently began trying to draw a little bit each day. To stay inspired I decided to give each week a theme. This past week was flora and these are a few of the sketches that I and happy with for different reasons.

I forgot how awesome and crafty it feels to have dirty hands at the end of a project. It makes things seem more real in a way.

Musing Moment 0053: Public Promise

I had a realization yesterday when I sat down to do my “Challenge Homework”.

Yesterday was supposed to be the day that you make the push goal you have picked out a public promise. Basically you’re giving your word that you’ll achieve whatever goal it is that you set for yourself, no matter what.

My realization?

I really don’t care about my goal all that much. Not enough to promise I’ll achieve it.

Ok… back to square one I guess…?

I don’t think writing stories for commission money is going to make me feel like a better person. I don’t think it factors into personal or spiritual growth. It helps solve my financial issue, which is a big thing, but it doesn’t do anything for me specifically. And yeah, right now I want to be selfish. I want to do something for me, only me, and screw the rest of the world. So much of my focus and stress is caused by external sources right now. I don’t want to focus on the outside. I want, need, to shift my attention inside. I’m allowed to focus on myself.

I need to focus on myself.

So I really think that my push goal aught to be “work out consistently”. That’s something that I want to promise. That’s something that works on my physical health, my spiritual growth, my personal growth, and my emotional health. That’s something that’s actually important to me, and it’s something that is helping me deal with the financial stress of my current situation. It’s keeping me sane.

Another thing I realized was that I would have to make a promise to someone. But I really don’t want anyone involved. This is a very internal thing for me at the moment. I don’t want to be around anyone. I don’t want to talk to anyone. I don’t want to be accountable to anyone. Again… going back to that whole screw the world thing.

I’m in hardcore introvert mode. If it’s not an obligation, it’s not happening. And even that’s dodgy. Right now I don’t care if I let anyone down. The only person I’m concerned with is myself. I need to make sure I’m ok, before I worry about if other people are ok.

The person my choices are going to impact the most is me. So, instead of promising a whole bunch of people that I’m going to do something, I’m going to promise myself, that vulnerable part of me that has over 9,000 feet worth of concrete wall around herself because right now she’s the only one I’m worried about.

Hey you,

Yeah you.

I promise that I’m going to take care of us. I promise that we’ll be ok. I’m going to start going to the gym everyday again. I promise that we’ll be able to run a 10 minute mile like we’ve always wanted. I promise that as soon as we can, we’ll get new running shoes because we deserve them.

I promise that I’ll make you proud. That I’ll be the super hero you think I am. I promise I won’t let you down. I promise that we’ll make it through this, and that even though it sucks, that I’ve got your back.

You can count on me. I’ll always be here for you, and I’ll always try to do the best thing for us.

I love you.

Sincerely,

Yourself

Daily Post 0174: Leading By Example

It’s 10:30. I’m sitting at the kitchen table since I cleared off a space on it. Zane is in the room sleeping. He was up late and isn’t ready to wake up yet.

Yesterday was another day that started well enough and then ended badly. For both of us.

There was an off-handed comment, I’m sure it was meant to be self-depreicating and a ‘joke’, But it wasn’t funny to me. And I don’t know what to do with the swarm of anger and sadness inside me.

I scanned my artwork yesterday before leaving school. I got to see Mike, a co-worker who was moved to a different department. I got to see Sean as well and split a cookie with him since there was leftover food in the breakroom from some meeting that had happened.

I went home and was able to go to kickboxing. It was a good workout, but the sound system kept messing up so it was a little frustrating. I came home and had time to spend with Zane before showering and going to dinner.

I had a wonderful evening with Nicole, Marc, and Desiree. I might be seeing Nicole on Thursday before she leaves town at 3 in the morning on Friday. She’s nervous but excited about her move. I’m hoping everything works out for her. She deserves it.

I came back home afterwards, and that when things got a little icky.

The sink was full of dishes, and none of them were mine. I had cleaned the kitchen before I left for work, and it had been empty before going out to dinner. Zane was in the room watching anime. He had drawn a little bit earlier in the day while I was at work, and I actually like how his sketch turned out, but he had said job stuff would happen and it didn’t seem like anything had.

And this was after I had a conversation with my mom where I said I felt like the situation was different. How I reassured her that even though the situation was rough and sort of sucky, that I felt like leaving would be the wrong thing. I felt like I was eating my words.

Zane asked what was wrong, I mentioned the kitchen, which he said he would take care of. I asked about job applications. He hadn’t done anything. He would tomorrow.

I said ok.

He asked if I was alright. I was quiet for a little while, then I said that I didn’t know how I was supposed to feel. That I didn’t want to be angry, but part of me was. I asked what he would feel if he was in my situation.

His answer was angry. I nodded. Scarlet was in the room, sitting in front of me as I sat in my computer chair, contemplating my situation. I ended up curling up on the floor with her so we could cuddle. It was comforting to feel her purring next to me.

Zane actually ended up filling out a few applications while I was spending time with Scarlet. There was silence which I was thankful for.

One of the applications he is in the process of filling out is for a post office position. It pays 15 an hour, but I guess the application is beyond annoying since it is a government job. He ended up getting frustrated because he has to call a number to get some information, so he didn’t finish the application last night.

Instead he stopped. He would finish it when he woke up since the place he needed to call wouldn’t be open at midnight. We watched an episode of Aldnoah. Three more left. We’re supposed to finish it today, but I don’t think we will. I don’t think I’m up for it. At least not right now.

When the episode was over we started talking. He’s upset and frustrated. He doesn’t want to get a part time job because it won’t be enough money. I had mentioned applying at the grocery stores or other businesses close to the apartment. He doesn’t want to do that. He doesn’t want to work in fast food. He doesn’t want to have to go through that for the fourth time in his life.

I can understand that. But I can also see how it’s not fair to me. He doesn’t feel like he deserves this hardship in his life, but I don’t feel like I deserve it either. I don’t think it’s right that I sell valuable items to cover someone else’s life because they don’t feel like they should have to work a part time minimum wage job while I go to work and not only deal with my stress but the added stress of figuring out how to support someone else.

If he had been working part time minimum wage for the past two months he would have his bike fixed already. He would be able to apply to more jobs because travel wouldn’t be an issue.

I told him that if he worked at all, that the money could go towards the bike. That I would keep covering as much as I could of his expenses so he could get it fixed since that’s one of the main issues.

He said ok. That he would apply to more places.

I don’t know how it came about, but he ended up saying that a solution would be going outside and stepping into traffic but at midnight there wasn’t traffic. How then he wouldn’t be a burden to those around him.

I was furious. I was hurt. I still am.

I left the living room. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t have anything except blind emotion. Righteous fury blended seamlessly with ice cold depression.

I went into the room and had an angry cry where I felt like my actions aren’t enough. My effort and caring aren’t enough. My support isn’t enough.

I can’t be his will to live. I can’t be his will to change. He has to want that for himself. He has to want to be in a different place in life rather than sitting and wallowing in icky, murky water.

Just like me. We both have to want to change, and to actually do things to alter the situation.

I feel like I am. I feel like I’m working on myself, and putting in more effort into maintaining emotional stability. I feel like I’m doing better with the gym and that plays a huge role into it. I feel like I’m trying.

I can’t be the change for him. I can only be an example.

I wish this didn’t hurt.

Daily Post 0173: On the Other Side

Yesterday was good, yet bad at the same time. It wasn’t ‘my bad’, though. It was hard to realize that. It was hard to keep the emotions separate from mine and to acknowledge that I actually did the right things yesterday, and that nothing needed or should have been different.

I didn’t realize it was ‘bad’ until the end of the night.

Zane woke up yesterday as I was finishing my goal writing around 1 in the afternoon. We cuddled on the couch together for a few minutes before he got up. The chicken for dinner needed to start defrosting so it could marinate and the pinto beans needed to soak so they could be cooked later as well.

I finished my writing, then went to the gym where I ran a 1.15 mile. I averaged an 18 minute pace, which after not being able to do a solid mile a few days before I felt was fine. Not my best, but improving. It felt like a good run, and when I got home I iced my shin for a little while, which I think is a huge factor of why my leg feels fine today.

Once I had eaten and had a few cups of water I went back into the room to work on my homework. Zane stayed in the living room playing Terraria.

I’m really not a fan of the art style of the game. I know it’s supposed to be 8-bit and low quality, but you can still do 8-bit and have it look nice. The graphics just don’t do it for me from an artistic stand point, and the sounds seem more like random noise and aggravate me. Just not my cup of tea.

Anyway, tangent.

I got most of the sound FX placed for my file before submitting it. This project is more of a ‘check up’ rather than a final submission. We do what we can, get a critique, then make the suggested changes. There’s a few things I want to go in and add, but for the most part everything is complete.

I ran into issues exporting the .m4v file, so I made a .mov which seem to work fine. I don’t think it uploaded properly though, so I have emailed the instructor. Currently I’m waiting on a reply to see if my file is ok.

After completing my school work for the day I showered then ran out to the store. We hadn’t been able to pick up everything we wanted on Sunday, so while Zane went ahead and started cooking the rice for dinner, and getting everything ready I went to the store to do the last bit of shopping.

Our main meal this week is going to be chicken nachos essentially. We have all of the mixings for it, so when it comes to be dinner time we heat up the filling and add whatever toppings we want, and poof. Dinner.

I had to go to Walmart for the burger I want for later this week, and trash bags. I got tomatoes and mushrooms while I was out as well. All in all I only spent roughly 5 minutes gathering the things I needed. Didn’t even use a cart or basket because I picked up so little. It was still about a 40 minute ordeal due to the amount of people. Arg. So frustrating. I despise having to go to that store.

It’s not that I dislike all Walmarts, even though I do try to avoid them as much as possible. I just really, REALLY, dislike the one that happens to be closest to me. It’s always messy, and crowded. Much lame.

But, the adventure was a success and mostly painless. I returned home with about an hour and a half to kill before going into work. I played Witcher 3 for a bit until dinner was done at which point I had enough time to eat super fast then head out the door.

That part of the day was a little frustrating because Zane and I were in the middle of finishing our cooking when Danielle and Trevor starting doing their own dinner, so four people were trying to do four different things in one small, confined space… Shoot me in the face now. >.<;

On top of having to deal with constantly running into people or having to wait to rinse something off, my dinner was rushed so I could make it to work on time. I had been hoping to relax and enjoy it while watching another episode of Aldnoah with Zane, but time constraints didn’t permit that.

As I was leaving Zane hugged me goodbye and said that he was lonely, that he had been all day.

That’s when things went bad for me.

I had thought yesterday was awesome. I had thought we were doing really well. All of our interactions had been playful. There had been lots of smiles. I had been super productive. I was going to go to work and he was going to work on game stuff, and apply for jobs and all of this awesomeness while I was gone…

But instead I found out, right before I left, that he had been depressed all day. And I had had no idea. He had been sad. While I had been out, doing the things I wanted to do, he had been sad.

I felt awful. And I stayed that way for the rest of the night.

I was able to figure out my schedule for next month while at work so I updated my calendar. It’s going to be a lot like this month, which I’m ok with. I went through and critiqued all of submissions for last week’s project for my audio class. I got caught up on messages and emails. But I didn’t have it in me to do the artist stuff I had wanted to get to.

And at the end of the lab I was too tired to care about scanning my artwork. I just wanted to go home. Zane had said we would talk when I got back.

When I got inside the first thing I noticed was that the kitchen was still a disaster, and Zane was still playing Terraria. No job applications filled out. No chores done. I was frustrated, and hurt.

What was I supposed to have done differently during the day? How did I mess it up? He was lonely and depressed because I had spent time doing the things I needed / wanted to do. I had gone to the gym and worked on homework. I had played Witcher 3 because he was playing his game, and then cooking dinner. An hour and a half wasn’t really enough time to get anything completed, so I didn’t want to start a project. And I didn’t want to be in the way in the kitchen.

I hadn’t been upset with him playing the game during the day while I was working on homework because he had said he would work while I was gone. So we wouldn’t be in the same room distracting each other. But none of that happened.

I was angry at him about that, and angry at myself for not picking up on his pain. We both spiraled pretty hard last night.

I guess it all came back to a misunderstanding earlier in the morning when he had first come out of the room. He had mentioned how he had woken up lonely, so we were cuddling, him laying on me with his head on my chest so I could hold him. While we were talking I mentioned that the beans needed to be put into water to soak, and that the chicken needed to defrost as well.

He took it to mean that I didn’t want to cuddle anymore. And then for the rest of the day I was busy with other things.

Last night I was too caught up in my own emotions. Logically I knew what type of emotional state he was in, because I had been there just a handful of days ago. Stuck in a consuming sadness.

When he told me that he felt I had pushed him away in the morning I felt even worse than I was already feeling. I felt like a failure, like it was my fault. That the voice in my head was right. I always mess everything up. I had said the wrong thing. I had done the wrong things. I’m thoughtless and careless. Heartless.

I know I’m not. But last night it was really hard not to believe that. We ended up making amends, but emotional pain for me doesn’t just disappear, and while I had come to terms with what happened on an energy level I was depleted and needed time to recover. I ended up going into the room and eventually fell asleep.

I’m not sure when Zane came to bed, but I woke up when he did. He said to wake him up when I got up so we could do breakfast and yoga together; something I had tried to get him to do with me the day before, which is why I went to the gym to run instead. He hadn’t been interested.

We didn’t cuddle or touch, but we were together and I was reassured by that.

I woke up at 6 again, had some water, checked my email then went back to sleep until 10:30. I poked Zane gently until he woke up, too. We were quiet for a while. Then we talked.

I had woken up still bothered by yesterday. It was still really close the the surface for me. I didn’t feel ok. But after talking things were better.

We both got up. I unloaded the dishwasher. Zane had oatmeal while I had a tuna sandwich. After a couple cups of water I had my cup of coffee. We watched another episode of Aldnoah, so we only have four more episodes left. At the moment we have tentative plans to finish the series tonight.

By the time the episode was done I had enough time to shower and head to work, which is almost over.

I’ve already been fairly productive today. Kickboxing is at 6 tonight, which I would like to go to. I never heard back from the dance studio, so I’m not going to be going there today. I’m actually sort of ok with holding off on doing that for now. I want to focus on a few other things first. One iron at a time I suppose. I think I’m going to focus on the certification for Maya first.

I’m happy with the gym, and once I start doing yoga again, I’ll be happy with that.

I have tentative plans to talk to Tre tomorrow. Nicole, Marc, Desiree and I might be doing dinner tonight since Nicole is moving to Tennessee at the end of the week. I still have a bit I want to accomplish today, but so far it has been good. Zane and I seem to be on the same page. He seems to be feeling better.

Hopefully it is a good day for both of us.