So far

I turn 44 today. Beyond that statement, I’ll set aside the cold metrics of life evaluation. How does one quantify joy? Sadness? Accomplishments, rage, grief, disappointments? Contentment, heartache? So let’s leave off the numbers. My specialty was always qual, anyway. This past year has been, without question, the worst I’ve lived so far. (I say…

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Dandelion dreams

I fell asleep on the sofa and woke up at half-past three in the morning. I don’t remember dreaming. I take my final on Tuesday, official grades post on Wednesday, and my pinning ceremony is on Saturday. I graduate, and I’ll be one exam away from my license and being a registered nurse. Things feel…

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as the hours wind down

I can feel Yom Kippur approaching. The turn of time is inexorable and I feel the gathering up of whispers, susurrations of lives lived and days spent, the rustle of divine fingers on the Book of Life and the Book of Death, turning pages. My thoughts are somber, and my mood is odd. I am…

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on turning 35

I turned 35 today. I am extraordinarily okay with that. That’s good, as there’s really not much I could constructively do about it, else. The thing that’s different about this birthday versus my previous ones is that I’m living in a new city far away from most of my people. Granted, I spent my thirtieth…

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wonder, and adapting to a winter clime

It’s snowing and the sky is luminous. The night air is cold, but bearable, and soft to breathe. It’s not the now-rare sharpness of my childhood crisp winter mornings in the Valley. No, this snowy air is gentle. This is the first time I’ve lived in place where snow isn’t a once-maybe-twice-in-a-decade occurrence. Sure, it’s…

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busy, busy, busy

There’ll be a real post later this weekend, but for now some highlights: I’m furiously trying to get content up on my new official website. By which I mean, I’m grabbing stuff from [there] and trying to make it all coherently organized over [here]. My apartment is full of boxes. Boxes everywhere. But I was…

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new in town

Okay, I’m living in Portland. I’m also kind of quietly freaking out. If you know me, you should know that when I say “kind of,” I really mean “totally.” It has to do with the whole never having lived so far from my folks before. Right now, it’s feeling like the second and third days…

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capitulation

I hired movers. They’ll pick up my stuff here in Lesser Outer Heck, and then go on to San Francisco to get the rest of it. I’ll just worry about getting myself, my car, my art, and a few boxes of fragile things up to Portland. I’ll drive by myself. I was going to do…

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I’m kind of freaking out

I’ll be living in Portland in about a week–which is cool. That’s not the freaking-me-out part. Honestly, it’s just the move. Actually, it’s the packing up. By which I mean, holy crap, it’s the whole leaving California and living somewhere else. Which is what I’ve been wanting to do for ages. But also? Kind of…

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decisions

So, living in the Central Valley has been exceedingly difficult. There have been some great things about being here–I love the time spent with my family–but I miscalculated how miserable this place makes me and how long I could stand it. Thus, I have decided to finish up my current semester and move to Portland…

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