Talk Less, Smile More

 “Talk less, smile more. Don’t let them know what you’re against or what you’re for.”-Hamilton (the musical)

This past week has been one of the best weeks I’ve had at TLoTH. (Sidebar, my mom said “Tee-loth” and I wanted to give her a shoutout for saying the most adorable out-loud of an acronym ever.) Two things made it good:

• I stopped giving a fuck that no one expects me to do anything interesting. I’ve worked a lot harder to embrace the mind-numbing nothingness that is inventory and similar work.
• I trusted people who are becoming friends to take care of me.

My goal for the rest of my job is to get the experience of publishing a paper. I will try to prove something with my writing. But if I don’t prove anything, that’s OK. Scientific work that lives in a filing cabinet is useless. If I don’t have a great readership, that’s OK too. I’m fairly sure everything I write will be public so that’ll be cool!

Another thing that really helped was that two co-workers and I spent lunch last Tuesday going ice-skating. I often feel at work that I am inadequate because I do not participate in a sport (or at least one that anyone knows the rules to) or run or hike or climb or do anything active. It turns out, normal people talk about sports. A lot. It has certainly been to my advantage to pretend I care about sportsball at times. But on Tuesday, it was different. I was the only one who was good at ice-skating. I was the only one who was fast. I am never the fast one. I am always the pack-mule who’ll get there eventually and can carry boatloads of stuff but I’m never fast. But after practicing skating for months, I was actually able to be fast on ice. It felt FANTASTIC!

It also felt really nice to just be normal people with my co-workers. I didn’t feel like I was in any kind of weird social situation I couldn’t read. I was just with a couple of friendly people having pleasant conversation and we were all trying not to fall on our butts. Since then, I’ve felt less of a barrier between those two people and myself. I wish I could do something fun like that with the people who I have trouble understanding. Or even eat a meal with those people. Something where I have the opportunity to relax and be myself without being the scary, brass and crass asshole I can be when I get anxious.

The rest of the workweek was literally unremarkable. Doing inventory sucks, no matter where you do it. At least when I did inventory at TLoTH it was with other people. I remember doing a similar thing at BAU and I had to do it all alone. Just me and Sabrina the Teenage Witch for hours on end. Actually, it wasn’t so bad. But damn, some of the chemicals you find doing inventory in any lab are kinda terrifying.

Friday was my day off and I was very glad for that. I don’t always know if I like being on a 9/80 schedule but it pays off when you need to recoup from a week after being away for 2.5 weeks.

I went adventuring with a person I will call Elder Me because she and I are so similar. She is a geologist by training who did PeaceCorps (I did AmeriCorps), worked as a teacher, loves travel and avoids traditional living. We met in a theatre production that I was a <makeup artist> and she was a cast member who could do her own old-age makeup! I really appreciate talking with her because she’s made such different life choices than me, despite our eerie similarities. We went snowshoe adventuring. It was a very odd and unusually tiring experience. She wore snowshoes and I followed in her footsteps, literally. I had these weird things on my shoes called YakTraks that allowed me to keep grip on snow and ice. That was weird because everything about my experience hiking so far tells me that I need to constantly brace myself for slips and falls. Walking in someone else’s footprints also reduces user responsibility to step carefully.

We found some wonky old shit like a giant empty concrete cylinder with one end closed. I sang “Is there anybody OUT there” into the cynlinder thingy and she laughed. I need to make sure to maintain a friend-base that will always get when I quote Pink Floyd. We also found a spooky church that had broken shingles that looked beautiful in the snow. I should probably mention it was snowing hella hard the whole time. Then we explored down into a canyon and at the bottom we slid to on our bottoms to near the creek. Not in it, thankfully! However, it was very snowy (I don’t have snow pants) so the following conversation ensued.

Me: “Ok. In the most non-sexual way possible, I am going to take off my pants AS SOON as I get into your house.”

Elder Me: “Sounds good. In the most non-sexual way possible, I am going to swat your butt because it’s covered in snow.”

Good times.

Learned that the proper food after such an excursion is peppermint hot chocolate and fudge. Good to know for future.

Now I have to tell you the best part of my week! Yes, I have one of those this week.

I had a perfect day.

It was great! Saturday was perfect. Good things happened consistently on a pretty high level for the entire day. That is a difficult thing to achieve and I really want to thank and acknowledge it.

It was planned on Friday night that a group of us wanted to go skiing. The Tenor and The Outdoorsy Sage (TOS) are experienced folks at skiing and snowboarding and both wanted to hit the mountain. Myself and Triple Point Dude (TPD) were like…ehhhhhh? TOS told me that she would teach me how to ski. And the cost for the whole event would be less than $100. I felt like it was a very “when in Rome” moment and took a leap of go-for-it-why-the-hell-not. Later in the same bar, I ran into a dude who I’d met a few times and it turned out he also had to pick someone up at the airport on Saturday at the same time as me. We decided to go together so neither of us was lonely on that drive.

Saturday morning I got up unusually early, like 7 am. By the time TPD the Tenor picked me up I was like a happy puppy. I was going to learn how to ski! I found my field rain pants so I would be warmer than the previous day when I wore jeans in the snow. Note: I still intend on making field gear/rain gear for women with real asses. I had no mobility because my ass is so fabulous that it took up the whole pants and my legs had to fight for room. Turns out this is a problem when skiing. Another note: fleece lined leggings are THE BEST.

Lift tickets and gear rental actually totaled less than $50, which was a great start to the day. The boots were tricky but I got them to work eventually. They make you feel really weird, like you’re pitching forward and ready to fall. The rental people gave me tiny skis. I used poles, though I don’t think they were entirely necessary. TOS met us once we geared up and she taught TPD and how to do pizza and French fries. We practiced on a baby little slope next to the lift and then went on the lift. Ok, WHO THE FUCK INVENTED SKI LIFTS? They are terrifying. I’m not usually too bad with heights but being held on with one point of contact and people below you with sticks in your hands…it was not cool, man. Most of the times I went on the lift I spent the entire time squeezing the beam of the frame and pretending the spooky clouds were friendly cloud monsters. I have to hand it to TOS, though. She did an amazingly excellent job describing exactly what was going to happen when we got to the end of the lift. She was calm and encouraging and we talked about how anything outdoorsy can become disastrous when approached with a machismo attitude. If you set specific and realistic expectations of what’s going to happen, it is a lot easier to be ok with whatever does happen. What excellent, wise advice.

It helped that she also had whiskey. That helped a lot with the fear.

Turns out I’m pretty good at skiing. I didn’t really expect this. I thought skiing was for skinny rich kids. Turns out you just need a strong ass and decently strong legs. Those I got. The muscle groups used were very similar to muscles I use in derby so thankfully I have built some muscle in those areas. I went down the hill I think 6 times and I only fell twice. Like I said, the whiskey helped. I like going fast but I hate being out of control. Once I learned how to turn, I could do both speed and control(ish). Seemed pretty straightforward after that. It’s really fun to hang out with friends on a snowy mountain.

TPD fell pretty hard and that ended our day. I found out it’s called a “yard sale” when all your gear goes flying everywhere and you have to pick it up. He hurt his ankle and I felt sad for him. But I was going pretty fast down the hill and I don’t have control so I just kinda awkwardly passed and waited at the bottom of the hill. He and I went home and The Tenor and TOS kept going to do more challenging stuff.

Showering after going skiing is one of the best sensations in the entire world. It’s not quite on par with snuggling after sex, but it’s not as far away as you’d think. As I got dressed (I got dressed somethin’ fierce for no reason other than I was clean) I listened to the soundtrack of Hamilton. And now suddenly I can’t wait for the Tonys!! If you haven’t heard of this musical yet, it is “the story of America then, told by America now.” It is about the founding fathers of the United States portrayed by a mostly Black cast and almost all of the music is hip-hop inspired. I was really surprised that I identified so much with the main character. The refrain spoken to him throughout the play by Aaron Burr is “Talk less, smile more. Don’t let them know what you’re against or what you’re for.” Miranda realistically (from what I can tell) develops an antagonistic relationship between the two men so it makes theatrical sense that Burr beats Hamilton in a duel, ending in the latter’s death. But Hamilton continues to not give three fucks about what he’s told and maintains a rogue-ish attitude the whole time while doing what he believes is right for the situation. It felt really good to see some aspects of what I struggle with in my professional life portrayed so accurately in a play. There is definitely going to be some point in the next few years that I will be very poor for a while after seeing this musical and never complain about it because it will be worth it. ^____^

Then I went on a driving adventure down towards the airport. I’m going to call this new friend the B-Boy Dancer We had a sincerely thought provoking discussion about why would hiring managers ever care about diversity. That encouraged me see the issue in a different light. If you look at it from an investment perspective, there is no motivation to go beyond quotas or make risky investments in employees. I don’t agree with that attitude, but I can kinda see where they’d be coming from.

We investigated the store where this state hides all of their Asian food. I was more than a little bit in heaven. I bought pho, ramen and soba noodles. SOUP FOR DAYS!!!! I got so much and it cost so little. Next time I pick someone up from the airport, I will sincerely make an attempt to go there again.

We picked up friends from airport and then had some equally deep convo on the way home. I realized through this conversation that my definition of success is as follows:

“Travel. Meet new people. Make deep connections. Eat wonderful food.”

I have not had the opportunity to do many of these while at TLoTH. I have travelled a lot but it has mostly been in escape of the place, not because I was necessarily exploring the area. I need to keep this definition (or redefine as appropriate) in mind while making my next couple of life steps. I appreciate quieter people who allow me think through my thoughts before speaking because I don’t feel rushed. That is a quality I need to work on, but I love talking too much.

To wrap up, I want to say a quick note on David Bowie.

I found out David Bowie died this morning and I guess it didn’t really hit me. I talked about it with co-workers and they acknowledged him as a singer or maybe they brought up Labyrinth but they weren’t attached to him so his death wasn’t devastating. Only when I got home and saw the amount and type of outpouring on my Facebook feed did it hit me. A lot of my co-workers are straight. Bowie does not have the gravitas as a cultural icon to the mainstream as he does to the LGBT community. It was such an unexpected and grief filled moment to realize that David Bowie is one of the few celebrities who has been openly bisexual. There is no real cultural way to be flamboyantly bisexual. Bowie embodied the grapple between two sets of expectations in many ways from costume and hair down to his two very different eyes. His “oddity” has been a beacon to the queer community for decades, saying: “It’s ok to be different. It’s ok to be so different it feels like you’re from space.”

Being a bisexual woman in a long term heterosexual relationship makes my relationship to my sexual orientation a topic that just doesn’t come up. And it shouldn’t. But I want to be a role model to people and maybe I’m not trend-setting in Lycra but I want people to be comfortable being themselves so that they can continue making awesome stuff and saving this planet from our own destruction.

Here is my new anthem:

And a tribute to Bowie that’s been floating around the internet today:

Homesick

Coming back to TLoTH after winter break is a pinch to the left of unbearable. It does not cover it to say “I had a good time” or “I enjoyed seeing my friends.” It was more the pain of hearing someone say “Welcome Home” at shul the night before I left. I don’t even know how long it’s been since I’ve written, I didn’t need to. Writing is a hobby of pain and instability. Editing is a hobby for sober, normal people. Maybe I’ll edit things one day.

Random poll, actually. If I turned the story of the past year into a book using material from my blog, but more…cohesive, would buy it?

I’ve been thinking a lot about publishing. If I do anything like a New Year’s resolution, it’s more like a mix of intention setting and goal making. My dream possibility for the year is to publish 4 times.

Publication 1: Turn my work at TLoTH into a paper for a peer-reviewed journal. Embrace the expertise and knowledge of my mentors and glean experience where they care. Even if I don’t have anything interesting to say, I will go through the process of putting together a manuscript and figuring out where to submit it.

Publication 2: Publish my thesis. I will have to draft the manuscript on my own but hopefully my inevitable return to the Sunny State will give me proximity to the professors I worked with at Big American U. I realize I can publish my work without them, but I’m not sure I want to burn the bridge with quite that many fireworks.

Publication 3: Already in editing stages. It’s a museum display I researched, wrote and designed for my department at BAU. It needs to be readable to the public but also accurate. Proximity, again, can help me push it into a printed reality. Once it’s up, I plan on entering it in a competition for museum labels. Because why the fuck not?

Publication 4: Turn blog into book. This is the most challenging and possibly the least relevant to my career. I do not deceive myself and think that I can put together and publish a book in year. However, I can commit to spend 5 hours a week (at least) to working on it. I need to research how the industry works, how to reach my target audience (women in undergrad STEM programs? Millenials interested in what actually happens when you land a “relevant” job that requires relocation? Ex’s interested in what’s become of my life?-OK, that one’s not enough of a pool to break even on material so…meh). If it becomes possible to up the allotted time to 20 hours a week, I’d totally be up for that.

My intention for my return to the Key Route City was originally to work part time and use the rest of my productive time researching relevant grad programs. I plan to take a GRE prep course because even looking at the prep book makes me nearly shut down with anxiety.  I can’t do grad school alone. I can’t be so alone with my depression and expect to move forward. I need to be home.

However, this optimistic and selfish plan may not work out. It kinda hinged on PartnerPenguin being BreadWinner#1 for a bit. Unfortunamently, the company PartnerPenguin’s been working for laid him off the Monday before Christmas. He doesn’t seem to be taking it very personally but I guess it’s harder for me to be super chill about it. He’s good at saving (I’m not) so we’ll be all right for a while. We’re still going to Europe after my term at TLoTH. I’m just going to be broke and he’ll be coasting. We’ll return stateside with both of us unemployed, so that’s pretty non-ideal. So if I do write a book, I have to decide how it will help with my career or else abandon the fancy.

But honestly, 3 publications all geology in subject is a pretty fucking lofty goal to meet anyway.

My New Years approach to tending depression is as follows:

Before any interaction with a computer:

*Mindfulness/meditation for 2 minutes

*Read a book 5-10 pages

*Address physiological needs like eating and stretching.

If I start to feel anxious, especially if I find myself compulsively checking Facebook—MAKE SOMETHING! I’m trying to be less judgmental about finishing things (it’s happened once this past year) and just produce.

Here is my current book list, if you’re interested. Yes, I read all of them at once.

*Social Blunders by Tim Sandlin

*Every Time I Find theMeaning of Life, They Change It by Daniel Klein

*Cryptonomicon by Neal Stevenson

* “Breasts” by Stuart Dybak (Best American Short Stories 2004)

*Come As You Are by Emily Nagoski

In case I didn’t emphasize enough you NEED to read Come As You Are. Especially if you are a woman. Or have sex with women. Gay men would also probably appreciate the information. The thing I like/appreciate is that the author explains some of the ways I’m deeply messed up with words I understand in an order I haven’t heard before. It is deeply validating to read that I am not alone. That things I’ve just assumed were broken within me are actually normal human responses. This book, combined with Brene Brown’s have actually changed how I view myself. For the better.

Apropos to nothing, here is a ladle dinosaur drinking out of my glass.

 

My current approach to grief is re-watching movies I like. Maybe you, the reader, feel like my use of “grief” is melodramatic. Well, fuck you. It feels like I am re-experiencing all of my traumatic up-rootings again and re-losing all of the stability a “home” provides. My favorite descriptor of experiencing grief is simply: “Grief herds.”

Every time one person dies, you may remember others who have passed. I’ve lost my home too many times so intentionally leaving it (read: him) elsewhere makes me feel completely lost again.

Anyway. For many reasons, Across The Universe is one of my favorite movies. It’s got some of the best drug scenes that are interesting but not claw-your-face-off-horrifying. ::ahem, Pink Floyd’s The Wall movie, ahem:: Bono is a singing Timothy Leary and fucking Eddie Izzard is the KING of ALL DRUGS. But the movie also has one of he most powerful grief storylines that I can stomach presently. (Up obviously wins but is entirely too heavy hitting right now. Ditto for Big Hero 6.) If you haven’t seen the film, there is a scene where they overlay “Let It Be” with a riot. It lose it every time. And Pandora, of course, cues up “Let It Be” on my Simon & Garfunkel station. Also, I give mad props for that movie because for the most part they filmed the songs on set. Thanks Blockbuster, for repeating that tidbit every 20 minutes for 8 hour shifts. Stunning singing and really masculine ballet.

I spent all of my money on sushi, burritos, sushirritos, Ethiopian food I can’t pronounce, papusas, ramen, pancakes, burgers’n’shakes and boba tea. So now I’m broke but everything was completely worth it. Here is a moment of inspiration from another movie I’ve been re-re-watching:

And of course, your musical education continues with these two drastically different pieces. Have a great week!

Where People Love You the Most

Is there such a thing as a trauma treadmill? I’ve been reading about and experiencing the hedonic treadmill. If you’re not familiar: it’s when you acclimate to certain levels of comfort and that becomes your baseline, leaving you wanting more. Being a very poor college student for a very long time, my medium-well paying job has put me in a new level of treadmill. I feel a bit revolted but also a bit proud of myself that I bought a backpacking backpack. But I also feel like I’ve acclimated to certain levels of trauma, even within the past year, that I do not know how to unwind/recover from. I don’t think that these things are related. Just that maybe there is a similar mechanism.

I have been grappling with a lot since landing in the Sunny State. But for the first time in months, I have also been able to help others. Helping other friends, feeling like I am a worthwhile human being and feeling like my ideas matter have been making me feel like me again. It’s so painful. But it’s also so joyful.

On Friday I spent most of the day in the Oroenpaz City. There was a large conference that I couldn’t pay to attend but I hung out in the lobby anyway. No one seemed to give a fuck. I caught up with a bunch of people and felt grounded in that.

Among the people I hung out with was a friend named Dr. Bow. I call her this because she always wears a bow in her hair. She reads my blog (shoutout!) and so we delved immediately to the hearts of my issues with TLoTH. Dr. Bow then joined me as I met with my work colleagues to go to lunch. She observed something very astute:

“It’s really nice to let you be the ringleader. I mean, I love having my friends around me but it’s nice to turn that off and go on autopilot.” Dr. Bow and I have similar leadership personalities but instead of competing, we are able to just turn off the Ringleader role and be content when hanging out with the other woman’s “crew.” This possibility is actually extremely wonderful to savor because I know there are other women leaders who I can feel close with but not competitive.

Dr. Bow parted ways and I spent some time with my co-workers. This proved to be very problematic for me. Firstly the two peer-age co-workers hated the city. They pointed out things to hate about it that I would never have thought about let alone consider for any length of time. It felt like personal attacks because this city is one of my cities. My personality is developed from it and other cities like it. There seemed to be some acknowledgement but a dissonance about this linkage with me because the co-workers said things like “I see why you like it” or “It makes me think of you.” I don’t think they intended to, but they were saying more clearly than ever that I am different and they don’t like me because of my difference.

Second, one of my peers informed me that TLoTH offered her a permanent position. We are both in the same intern-ish-but-paid position but now they’ve offered her to stay. She said it in a skirting way, like she’d been hiding it from me for months but she knew I’d have to find out eventually. I felt a lot of envy that this permanent position was offered but also a lot of anger that she was so blatantly favored. She has been there longer and doesn’t ask too many questions like me. I appreciate, to some extent that she’d hid it and wasn’t bragging. But it made me feel worse that I don’t have a Long-Term Plan.

The third issue didn’t really actively happen while I was with the co-workers but rather after. It wasn’t very specific to a moment, but I had this persistent, gut-wrenching terror for the whole afternoon that what happened at TLoTH would happen again in Orodepaz City. I was panic-stricken and horrified that all my friends and loved ones would secretly turn out to hate me. And then sit me down and tell me.

I was afraid of this when I arrived at shul, probably one of the places I feel the most safe in the world. Fortunately, the clergy are sensitive to people who feel out of whack. They must teach “Identify Out-of-Whack Congregants” in clergy school. There is a new Rabbi who gave me some excellent advice about compassion. Then the Cantor arrived (I sang in the choir that night) and I admitted to her my fears. She seemed hurt, almost physically, to hear my pain. She gave me a hug and we sang songs and I eventually felt better.

I went to a late dinner with my Fourth-Cousin-Twice-Removed. We decided this was our relationship because neither of us understands what any of that means but both of us adopted the same person as our Saba (grandfather). He (the “cousin”) is a cool guy with silly hair that makes him look more emo than he is. Good times.

Saturday morning PartnerPenguin went with me to the Greyhound and sent me on my way to Porn Town. PartnerPenguin had planned to see his brother, Human, but those plans fell through. He took me to the bus all the same.

There are some interesting challenges about getting across the Sunny State. You can travel and maximize for cost, time or reliability. Pick two. I usually go for cost and time but this trip I went for cost and reliability. In reality, this means I spent 20 hours of the past 96 in transit. If I count 25 hours of sleep, that’s only 51 hours of awake time for a trip that cost $140. Grump grump grump.

It was actually a completely fabulous-tastic trip. My friend Sleaze in Porn Town hosted a kick-ass metal-ukelele show. This woman is a role model and I am so proud to call her my friend. She is pretty committed to the whole “practice what you preach” deal and lives very authentically within the bounds she has established for herself. I admire that she brought out several artists she liked to the show and then went shopping at their booths afterwards (in addition to LOUDLY telling everyone else to also partake of their wares). She bought out most of one artist’s prints and pins. When the artist expressed that the money from the sales would allow her to eat that week, Sleaze just kept buying and was like “ok, how much is this?” I also bought a pin from this artist (will post a link here if I find one to her other work):

Sleaze and I had some good talks and she was so excited and happy when I explained that I’m married. She also pointed out that my ring looks like a vulva. Now I can’t unsee it.

One thing I love about staying with Sleaze is how many books she has! Last time I read Cunt and that was pretty foundational and fundamental. This time I picked up Come as You Are and now my whole perception of my own sexuality is changing. The part I like the best is finding out that I’m normal. There is nothing wrong with me. And there are words to help me figure out some of my relationship things. The relief of this discovery makes me want to cry happy tears. Additionally, the freedom to just sit quietly and read is a beautiful thing.

Sleaze let me borrow the book and dropped me off at the train. I sure as hell hope my luck with transit continues because I’ve barely made all of the planes trains and automobuses I’ve had to catch.

My next destination was a Quaint Little Gated Suburbia (QLGS) to visit my friend StarStorm. Star was my field partner in class. For those who are not geologists, your field partner is the person you map with and share responsibility of your grade with. We work well together, Star and I. Recently, she had been making a life for herself in China and got what she thought was a minor sprain. It was actually a bunch of icky stuff that needed surgery so now she can’t walk and is staying with her parents in QLGS. Just the thought of any of these things makes me shudder.

I was actually able to find a lot of peace and fulfillment from the trip. I scared/intimidated her parents but they were mature enough to try to get to know me and allowed me to be vulnerable and honest. I felt such gratitude from Star herself. She and I were able to set out some actionable items to abate the crushing isolation that comes with a sudden lack of autonomy. I introduced her to The Fresh Prince, which somehow she missed. We laughed (a lot), we cried and we just simply were. She organized a lovely get together with friends and I (unsurprisingly) stripped and jumped in the ocean. I get cold super easily but for some reason never when I strip and go in the ocean. Maybe it’s feeling safe. Or whale jizz.

I also saw my friend, the Bicoastal Bisexual. We went to the strip mall that approximates as QLGS’s town center. We rolled down a grassy hill (Mabel voice “Yaaaay! Grass!”) and talked about our lives. It’s interesting seeing someone in such a different environment from where you met her. You find out where they made out when they were 15 and the movie theatre they snuck ice cream into. There’s a sense of nostalgia overlain upon otherwise replicate-able suburban box stores. The part I didn’t like was the PetSmart. Too many living things in cages. I did like Pier 1. They have smelly candles now that are fully inauthentic. They are neither smells nor actual candles. They are LEDs with oils named things like “Paradise”. It was silly. The Bicoastal Bisexual is one of the people I talk to frequently on Facebook and she also reads my blog (shoutout!) so it felt like we hadn’t seen each other in a month or so, when in reality it’s been over a year. I do appreciate when social technology can successfully do that.

Anyway, I’m super tired from travelling so I’ll leave you with a song that Sleaze covered because I can’t find the recording of her doing it. Yay, this song!

Making the Plane Home

This week has been a whirlwind, almost literally. I almost feel like I don’t remember it very well but I’m on a plane now and so I have a little bit of uninterrupted time to write and I’ll try my best to remember.

Yup. Not really remembering what happened between the last blog post and Friday, but I’m sure it wasn’t worth noting. It’s possible I just cleaned my house and watched Friends.

Friday: It was my day off so I tried to salvage White Car. Yes, the same White Car that got totaled six months ago. As I may or may not have mentioned at the time, the car belonged to my dead father-in-law so the title was in his estate. To call the estate complicated is a flattering compliment and does not begin to cover the tangled mess that it is. Anyway, PartnerPenguin was FINALLY able to get me the title and I was ready to salvage the car.

Except they didn’t have anyone available until Tuesday.

I decided to get the fuck outta dodge anyway and go down to another city. I’m pulling off the freeway and I see a guy who looks like a friend of mine. I pass him and it is a friend of mine! We hung out for the rest of the day until I drove us back to TLoTH and went to derby practice.

Saturday: Baaaaasically didn’t do anything. It was glorious. Oh, and I also talked to PartnerPenguin about adult stuff like retirement. Who the hell am I?

Sunday: At derby in morning, I paid my dues to the league and got to pick my nickname. I am so happy. It is:

Orogenous Zone, or Ozone for short. And my numbers are 215. Watch out world!!!

After practice I prepared for a belated Friendsgiving. I dressed real fancy because 1) I was getting out of my house and 2) I showered and sometimes I don’t like wearing normal clothes after I shower. I found a garment that makes me feel extra protected and I wore that. It’s a pashmina scarf that has beautiful gold woven into a paisley pattern. Once, I was at a doctor’s office and I saw a woman wearing a beautiful scarf. I said “That is the most astonishingly beautiful scarf I have ever seen.” Much to my utter shock, she gave it to me. I mostly wear it when I feel like I need strength but it turns out it’s also brilliantly warm because it’s wool. So I’ve been wearing it a lot lately.

Friendsgiving (new word I learned this year!) was really fun. First of all there was turkey, twice in a month, which is always great. There was a pretty well balanced meal with vegetables and mac’n’cheese and of course stuffing and mashed potatoes. I knew about three quarters of the people there so it was nice to see them all together. It’s always weird when people you know from work are actually roommates of people you know from theatre. It’s also really interesting to see how different geographic locations discuss software development. “Coding” at TLoTH seems to mostly mean the languages Fortran, C, maybe some C++, Latex and other serious science languages. I am accustomed to listening to PartnerPenguin talk about Ruby on Rails, Java, and Javascript (it’s like the difference between Ham and Hamster). Not only does no one care about ‘user experience’ here, they don’t even write adequate documentation. I’m sure some people do, so my sample is biased but I think it speaks a lot to the way that business is conducted on the hill: the mechanics are solid and impressive, but there’s not enough ability to communicate to the public.

After the get together (all the dishes were done upon our departure) I hopped a ride with this dude I’m going to call The Tenor. The reason for this is…and I don’t know how this happens…but the dude has close to perfect pitch but has never sung in a choir or really had any formal music training. I resisted telling him that there are literally men who would kill to have that kind of talent. Anyway, I recently introduced him to Gravity Falls because Gravity Falls is THE BEST. He learned the theme song on the piano.

(Sidebar: DID I MENTION HOW DEVASTATED BUT ALSO SATISFIED I AM WITH THE FACT THAT GRAVITY FALLS IS ENDING NEXT EPISODE? If I haven’t, now you know. And if you haven’t watched it, watch it.)

So we hung out for a bit and watched season 2 of Gravity Falls and I had a whole bunch of plot epiphanies. I don’t typically re-watch shows or if I do there is a good amount of time between the viewings. But as this show comes to a close, it feels good to get all woogedy about plot items I missed. I was also hella nervous for Monday so we had some good real talk and I felt better about my life and started the week strong.

Monday: Monday was a big day for me. Remember when I went to that <conference> in the Key Route City? When I went, I promised to bring back to TLoTH some of the things I found out. In very un-typical lab fashion I decided to take the event in a totally different direction. I have very detailed notes from the event but I decided to print out copies of the notes for people to read and then just have a discussion. I titled the event and asked simply: “How can inclusivity become a mission-critical attribute?”

The turnout was great! There were 20ish people and almost all the cookies I brought were eaten. It was my first time moderating an event and I felt very nervous and apprehensive. I didn’t have a specific direction for the conversation to go which was both a good and a bad decision. It was good because things came up organically and people spoke honestly and eloquently. It was bad because there were fewer actionable items at the end of the conversation than I had hoped to achieve.

But the content was great. It took me a couple days to synthesize but I broke it down into 5 categories.

1. Current Success
2. Culture of Respect (focused mostly on bullying behaviors): current problems and possible solutions
3. Flexibility as it pertains to retention: current problems and possible solutions
4. Attitudes: current problems and possible solutions
5. Recruitment: current problems and possible solutions

I felt very hyper after the event and let all my wooglies out. I get stage fright after I perform. It’s like insta-overthinking in retrospect. The hyper/mania feeling didn’t go away for an hour and half so I took half a Xanax. Man, what a weird drug. It’s very unpleasant and it sedates me all right, but while on it I am not funny. Non-ideal, man, non-ideal.

Tuesday: So at work we’re doing this thing called “12 Days of Christmas” where each co-worker brings in a meal for everyone else for one day. Being the only Jew in the building, of course I made latkes. My co-workers also requested that I bring in a menorah and explain the holiday. Wednesday was my day to bring food so Tuesday night a co-worker (hmmmm. Let’s call him Triple-Point-Dude [TPD] because he looks at mineral phases under high pressure and temperature) came to my place and helped me prepare the food. He shred the potatoes while I cleaned house. Then he shred the onion instead of dicing it and I laughed at his tears.

My neighbor Dori and The Tenor showed up and we all hung out. TPD is going to room with The Tenor because the latter has a spare bedroom. Seriously, real estate? That’s a thing you can do here? Anyway, we gave up on latkes pretty quickly because I didn’t have beer and nobody is patient. I should note that despite making TONS of food, I didn’t actually eat dinner.

We confirmed that the pub next door (part of why I live downtown, the very little nightlife available is next door) was doing karaoke and we walked over. We had a blast. I sang “Come Together” by the Beatles and TPD said that I didn’t ruin that song. Which is impressive! It would be a very fundamental song to ruin. TPD also bought me a second shot of HoneyJack so I was pretty shmamammered pretty early on. And I didn’t have dinner. :<

I ALMOST FORGOT TO MENTION, I SALVAGED WHITE CAR ON TUESDAY. Here is a picture of its final ride:

I think that’s why I was a little irresponsible and irritable on Tuesday night: I did too much adulting on Tuesday day. Anyway, I got to a level of drunk I’ve really only achieved once before: I got truth drunk. I’m a pretty honest person most of the time, but when I get truth drunk, I just tell odd and sometimes scary truths about my life. Last time this happened I told my classmates about how my next door neighbor growing up murdered someone and then tried to cut up the body with a chainsaw.

I don’t think I said anything that bad this time, but I was very honest. Fortunately, there was a lot of stuff going on so I mostly thought my truths to myself. Dori tried to sing the man’s part for “Baby It’s Cold Outside” and it was hilarious. She also sang “Johnny B. Goode” which was awesome and everyone started doing the twist. There was a pretty excellent rendition of “Du Hast” and some pretty pitchy Adele covers. The Tenor sang “Beelzebub” with a couple of the metal dudes and…wow. I have never heard that song before but what the hell, Tenacious D?

I got home and ate some food but it took me forever to get sober. Meanwhile, I was making the rest of the latkes so sometimes they were barely crisp and sometimes they were charred. Good times. I think I got to bed close to 2 am.

Wednesday Of course, Wednesday morning I was the Queen of Hangovers. Shockingly, I was actually able to knock out a really good synthesis of my notes from Monday and I wasn’t interrupted too much because my supervisor was away. Amazing how work happens when you’re not interrupted.  With a couple minor revisions, I felt pretty confident to send it out. I’m proud that I felt good about it because there’s a serious possibility that the notes will circulate pretty high up in management. I’m still nervous about having my name on everything because it means I’m responsible. But it also means I’m responsible if good comes of it. Risk is hard.

The lunch went well. Everyone ate the latkes and said they liked them. Who knows. I had a menorah and explained about the holiday and why you light candles. Then I sang the blessings which was a little weird but cool. The rest of the conversation was about Star Wars and how no one at the table had been alive when the first one came out. Yay! Students outweighed managers!

Thursday: Ok, so I’m now a new level of exhausted and I have to get through one more day. I packed this morning and put on fresh sheets in case a friend stays there while I’m gone. I feel like a disaster when I have to clean and pack at the same time. I also planned to take two checked bags of summer stuff and books so I wouldn’t have to ship them later. Ehhhhhh. That didn’t happen.

I sent my notes to the participants of Monday’s event. I’ve gotten REALLY good responses so far. They mostly include “that was really well done” and “do you mind if I send this to my managers?” Yaaaay!

Anyway, even though I left nearly 2 hours for an hour and half drive PLUS an hour of wait time at the airport, I almost didn’t make it. There were two accidents on the major freeway so what usually takes 45 minutes took two hours. I usually park in the super econ lots but I arrived at 6:02 and the flight was due to leave at 6:25 so I found an “economy” lot at the airport itself. I ditched the two checked bags and just ran with my backpack. (Sidenote: I bought this backpack last night because someone was moving away and selling her really expensive backpacking backpack. Seriously, I got it for 40% original price.) Good thing for derby, I was more successful than usual at running and I got the very last ticket for the plane. And now, yay! I get to see PartnerPenguin when I land!

And tonight, for those who are into Star Wars

A Hannukah Miracle: A Glimpse of Mental Health Stability

Hello Friends.

Thank you for being so patient. With me. With my antics. With my depression. With my very grown-up tendencies to wear a panda snuggie and slippers to a movie theatre. I am a proud Hufflepuff, suck it Gryffindor.

As we plug along in the festival of “Keep the Drapes Far from the Menorah!!” some Jews reflect on past miracles. I’d much rather reflect on present ones and let others rehash tales of bygone sieges.

My current miracle is that I feel well. Not 100%, but maybe like… 75-80%. I’ve been coasting and bumping along between 20-40% for the past months and 10% since the fiasco at work two weeks ago. So 75% is passing like a boss.  There are several contributing factors so I will document them because maybe they will help bring me back to this when I’m back at 10%.

Physical Activities

By far, the most successful thing that’s made me feel better overall has been increasing the amount of physical activity. However, this is also probably the most difficult thing for me to do. I have so many mental obstacles before I actually do something; I think that’s part of the appeal of derby. There are established times for me to show up and that’s all I have to do. At practice on Friday I skated 27 laps as one of the first things I did back on skates. But it was so worth it to receive praise from everyone afterward! I freaking love praise. It’s the shit.

My bike is operational again (yay!) so I tried biking to work. Mostly successful! I wore my pajamas over my skinnyjeans-which was probably not a great decision since the Midget Mafia (those responsible for all bike-related bruises in the shin area) tore them up. But they kept my legs warm-ish. I wore some leather work-gloves and a bandana under my helmet. It was still 25 degrees so I was pretty cold. But I biked to work and back. Next time: tights under not skinnyjeans.

On Saturday I texted a work acquaintance to see if she’d like to go ice-skating with me. She said no but would I like to go for a short hike instead. I know the law of improv is “Yes, and…” but sometimes the law of making someone struggling with making friends is “No, but let’s do this instead.” The thing I was most proud about this hike is that it was completely dark before we got back to the road and I didn’t have a panic attack. Yay! Then she made soba soup and we bemoaned the lack of dim sum in this state. Seriously, if you live in a place that has dim sum, go eat some for me. Oh damnit now I’m hungry.

Side note: I have this co-worker who I eat lunch with almost every day. She has this really amazing knack of making me hungry while I’m eating. Like, I have a perfectly lovely meal in front of me. I’m enjoying it immensely. And then she tells me about something fondu-ed in cheese or schnitzeled and I’m more hungry that I was when I started. It’s impressive.

Ok…where was I. Oh yes. I miss food I don’t have to cook.

After soup I went home and got ready for the first (that I’d heard about) DJ’d party in TLoTH. There is a little bar/co-op deal with beers that are stronger than they ought to be. I started going there more often during my play because a cast-mate and I usually grabbed drinks after rehearsals. But they entered into the big-leagues this weekend by actually locating and booking a real DJ! Ok, so it was a 19-year-old kid with rich parents, but honestly I didn’t care. He was pretty decent. And shockingly... people danced! Initially there was just me and some other women on the floor. Then this one really charismatic dude broke it down and BAM! Dance floor full.

Everyone is always more attractive when they dance (even badly) but I have to pause for a moment and acknowledge that there was a man who looked EXACTLY like Captain America. He had the chiseled Chris Evans face with the leather jacket. I really wanted to go over to him and say “I’m team Cap, 100%” but finally decided that would be too creepy so I didn’t. On another bright side, I now know who my co-workers are dating (spoiler alert, it’s not quite each other). I love dancing and someone made sure I drank beer so I danced without inhibitions. Also, I wore my new(ish) corset because I don’t wear it enough and I was feelin’ it on Saturday. It was remarkably comfortable to dance in! Now I remember that I bought it for back support, not just to be sexy. But being sexier is an added bonus. Contemplating wearing it to work, loosely tied.

Speaking of backs…

Medical

I saw a chiropractor today. Turns out the chiro I’d seen before was a fru-fru kind of chiro and this lady was all business. She cracked me a lot. Except my hips. My hips are crooked and stubborn. Though she made me remember that fru-fru-chiro once replaced my femur in my hip socket because it had been chillin’ outside of the socket for a while. Who knows how long. WHY BODY? A friend recently likened my body to the city of Kuwait: beautiful on the outside but the infrastructure sucks.

Relationship

Without going into the content, PartnerPenguin and I have been having a series of remarkably difficult conversations. I super applaud and love him for allowing himself moments of complete honesty and true vulnerability. In my opinion, there is nothing more sexy than a man I love being honest emotionally with me. We have an excellent relationship, but the distance has shown light into some of the holes and they are rather larger than I originally thought. That in and of itself it painful to acknowledge, but mending the holes is more painful. But that’s why we’re so creative. Feeling optimistic and grounded about my relationship is a major contributor to my increased mental health.

Work

I have been inventing a new thing at work. I have been working with a new team for this project. The scientists on this team are letting me pretty creative with how we approach the problem. I got to sew at work. The thing I sewed didn’t work, but that’s OK! It was just an idea. But then I had a couple more ideas. Combined with the ideas of other team members, we are working towards a solution.

Ironically, I’m doing mechanical engineering. Lol. Geologists, what will you come up with next.

Of everything I’ve done at the TLoTH, I hope this eventually comes out to the world at large. If it works, it will become scaled industrially and that would be hella cool if my name was on a manufacturing procedure. It’s also OK if it doesn’t, it’s been a fun project.

In other work news: I used our X-Ray machine so much I burnt out the tube. This happens in science.

Social

I think one of the proudest thing I did this week was I had guests over for Light Candelabra Festival. Due to some hilarious miscommunication, the original friend who asked me to make latkes never showed up on Sunday. But I was really glad I’d invited the two friend-moms that I had. I felt for one of the few time in this town that I could let go if I needed to. I clearly communicated that I was not feeling well mental health-wise (this was hours after the difficult discussion with ParterPenguin) and they respected it. We talked about it, in a productive manner. I felt like they cared and I mattered. It was beautiful.

Monday was also latke night, with the friend who originally requested it. She’s pretty awesome and radically accepting too.

FRY POTATOES AND EMOTIONAL SUPPORT ALL AROUND!!

The following were brought to you by the letter hey. The friendliest, but most shy of all letters because it’s usually silent but says “ha” when it decides to talk.

So this exists: 

And so does this: