Is It Over Yet?

Normally this would be a lament about the holidays and being overwhelmed with being cheery and bright.

But frankly I can’t wait for that shit.

No.

I’m on the “can this semester please be over yet?” tip.

I’m feeling pretty done.

I have to finish one book, which has been decent if not scintillating material, do one more big discussion post on that book, write a ten page paper, a twelve page paper, and do a creative piece (of my choosing, thank God) that encapsulates the material of one of my classes.

Meaning I have thee big things yet to do.

The book reading is just reading, it does involve effort, but hey, I can sit at the laundry mat on Sunday and kick it out.

The papers are where the big effort comes in.

I mean.

The things that I need to cover are deep and conceptual and complex.

I have to use language I’m just beginning to get the hang of and I have to write on concepts that are deep and multi-layered, plus, god damn, I have just read so much this semester I’m not sure exactly where to go for my references.

I have a lot of them.

I also feel like I’m going to have to go back in and re-read a bit, not heavily, I really don’t see that happening, but I will have to have a good sit down with my materials, articles, videos, books, and discussion posts and see what jumps out at me.

I am very grateful that I did my book review a week early and got it out-of-the-way.

I have already gotten quite a good amount of feedback from my TA in that class and my professor, who also noted that I had very satisfactorily submitted all the deliverables for the class.  I could probably send in a pretty picture and a poem for my final project and I would pass the class easily.

Of course.

I won’t do that.

I do want to do something that integrates my whole experience and I have a few thoughts and ideas to explore before I really have to knuckle down.

But as this project and the ten page paper are both due the 17th of the month I need to attend to one this weekend and then to the other next weekend.

I will use the time between at work for finishing reading and posting to my last, thank God, discussion thread for the semester.

I don’t really want to write the ten page paper this weekend, I really just want to chuck it all and go Christmas shopping.  I haven’t at all and I have just barely begun writing a few Christmas cards.

My mom sent me a message yesterday that both my birthday and Christmas presents are in the mail.

ARGH.

I have nothing in the mail.

Well, except for the three cards I have managed to write out in between supervision this morning and work, clients yesterday and work, therapy and being a therapist, and all the school work.

I am allowing myself a compromise as far as it all goes, since my Trauma training on Sunday was cancelled and I have five extra hours in my day that I wasn’t expecting to work on the paper.

Therefor I resolve to let myself go Christmas shopping on Saturday after clients and appointments.

I will try to do it all in one fell swoop.

I actually don’t have a ton of folks to buy for, so it shouldn’t be too hard, mostly I just like the idea of going out and buying some nice things for people I love and then maybe a little something for myself too.

I am on the fence about Sunday, as far as scheduling stuff goes.  Even with the Trauma training being cancelled I still have household duties to do and I’ll be meeting a lady in the afternoon to do the deal and my person in the evening and I really want to get my Christmas tree.

I am just wondering if I use it as a carrot or if I just get the tree early and then whatever time I have left in the day before I meet my person in the evening I will then devote to working on the paper.

Either way, it will get worked on.

I am not going to pressure myself to getting it all done, but I am going to take a really big swing at it and then give myself the week to let it stew and process and hopefully refine it as much as possible.

Considering that the paper is the only paper (well, I have written a lot in the discussion posts) example of my writing this professor is really going to get and he’s the guy that designed this PhD program, I kind of want to blow him out of the water.

Kind of.

Ha.

I really want it to be a good paper.

Which means I have to not do the whole thing in one fell swoop.

I can do that, in fact, I have done that for a number of the papers for my other classes this semester, but I usually have a plan and the papers tended to be towards creative things that I was able to crank them out.

This paper feels like it has to be a bit more thoughtful.

Anyway.

Enough with the school stuff.

I posted up another discussion before starting this blog, so I can say that with no compunctions.

I want to wrap up my day, I was up at 6a.m. for group supervision before work, and have some tea and watch some Peaky Blinders.

Yes.

Feeling Back To Normal

Even if my Internet is slow and wonky.

I’m feeling much better.

Today may be my first official “normal” day since the whole “she’s got lice” fabulousness went down.

So relieved to be back into my own regular schedule and getting out and about in the world.

Even if all the out and about was scootering from one hard ware store to the next.

I went to six, SIX, different hard ware stores trying to get the blue ceramic Christmas tree lights I wanted.

No one had them.

Sad face.

Cole Fox Hardware in Cole Valley.

Nope.

Ace Hardware in the Outer Sunset on Noriega.

Nope.

Ace Hardware in the Castro.

Nope.

The hard ware store on Haight, which I forget what the name is.

The hard ware store in the Inner Sunset on Irving.

Nope.

And more nope.

I even went to Sloat Garden Center.

Nada.

I know, it’s a garden center, but I thought, well, they sell Christmas trees, maybe they’ll sell Christmas lights too.

The one place I for sure thought I would be able to get them, Ace Hardware in the Castro, were out, and the check out person was sad too, “shoot! Those were the ones I was going to get too.”

Ah well.

Next year.

I did find some blue LED lights that will work, they’re going to have to, as they’re currently on the tree.

Yes.

I got my tree.

I just figured what with the lonely Thanksgiving I deserved some cheer.

I even did a tiny bit of Christmas shopping.

A little thing for my mom.

A little something for my friend in Wisconsin.

And my sister’s Christmas present.

I do like getting Christmas presents, cheers me right the fuck up.

I like wrapping presents and sending cards.

I’m a bit old-fashioned.

The running around to find the lights led me to the other shopping and I was grateful for that.

I stocked up on some lip balm that I can only seem to find at one or two places and never quite seem to be in the right neighborhood to procure it.

Today being in Cole Valley I popped over to the Upper Haight, ostensibly to check the hardware store on Haight, but being in the hood, I dropped into Loved to Death and picked up my current favorite lip balm.

My favorite they don’t make any more.

I still so wish they did.

But.

The one that I get is pretty dreamy and delicious—from Tokyo Milk.

I got one pot of Salted Carmel, one of Cherry Bourbon, and one Dark Cocoa.

Oh my, so very good.

Yes.

I taste good when you kiss me.

Heh.

Not that there’s any kissing on the menu, I’ve been so isolated these past few days I haven’t had a chance to get out there, plus, well, it’s not really sexy to go on a date and like possibly have lice.

I mean.

I needed to make sure I was not lousing up any one’s day.

Pun intended.

If you know what I mean.

Anyway.

So I got those and I picked up a couple of lovely little things for my mom and sister and best girlfriend in Wisconsin when I was in Cole Valley, at Pharmica.

Lovely little store I used to go into all the time when I worked in Cole Valley.

OH!

Shoot.

I know where I should have gone.

Cliff’s Variety on 18^th and Castro.

They would have had them.

Oh well.

Like I said, next year.

I did rather enjoy zooming around the city on my scooter though, ha, add another hardwared store to the list,  I also checked the hardware store on Divisadero and Fell, I really was all over the place, looking for the magical, mystical, fairy blue lights.

I did finally cave and I bought some regular LED blue lights, unfortunately they are a bit brighter than the other two strings of little blue Christmas lights I have, they are a tiny bit overwhelming.

Ah, nothing’s ever perfect.

It’s good enough though.

It really is.

And my tree is lovely.

It has a nice shape and isn’t too tall or too big for my little studio space, but it is bigger than the one I had last year, which was a gift from the man I was hanging out with at the time.

Irony?

He never saw the tree in my house.

That whole month we were pretty estranged, even with the plans to go to Paris.

I was emptying out my Facebook messages yesterday and discovered a cache of messages between the two of us.

Fuck.

That needs to get deleted.

Don’t read them.

Don’t read.

Don’t.

I , um, I started to read a few, then noticed something.

He had finally taken down the photograph I took of him on Christmas Day in front of the Temple Metro station stop in Paris that he was using for his profile picture.

So.

Yes.

Ugh.

I trolled his Facebook page for a moment.

Then.

I went back and deleted every message.

And I did not read them all, no, just the first couple, it was enough and I didn’t need to be feeling anguished, but what I did find, which was good and soft and tender and a tiny bit vulnerable, was that I hoped only for the best for him, that I wished him love and joy and that I was ok.

The reality is I learned a lot from the relationship, even if it some of that learning was painful, I grew like gangbusters.

Pain.

Great fertilizer for spiritual growth.

I mean, like Miracle Gro on steroids.

So.

Happy to be taking care of myself and be out in the world and though it didn’t go how I had hoped, when does it ever? I did have a good day, I got to a yoga class, met with a lady and did the deal, and I got my Christmas tree.

That’s a damn fine Sunday.

I’ll take it.

Please.

And.

Thank you.

 

Hey

What’s up?

I was waiting for the Uber to come and grab me–I left the bicycle at the work place over the weekend since they had me work late on Friday.

It was a friend from the neighborhood going my way.

I cancelled the car and hopped in.

It was a lovely surprise.

I forget that when I really need people, they will be there for me, even when I am not expecting them.

I get these little God shots when I am overwhelmed and I suddenly run into someone who I haven’t seen in awhile or I look up and someone across the street is smiling and I am just reborn.

The ride and the company were a great way to start my day.

A day that had started hours earlier, three or so, with a nice bit of quiet time, then breakfast, coffee, and reading for school.

Yeah.

I do have some this week, but it’s to review and skim.

I have the big stuff done.

I left my final project presentation alone.

I did not want to look at it again.

I gave myself a day of rest.

I did not slough the work though, I read one chapter in a book very thoroughly and then skimmed a second.

I checked my syllabus on line and discovered my readers and syllabi are up on the site.

Wow.

That was fast.

I could go buy my readers tomorrow.

I am not going to though.

I am spending my hard earned money elsewhere at this time.

One of the perks of my friend picking me up was that I got to work a half hour early and was able to swing into a shop around the corner and get the rest of my mom’s, sister’s, and youngest niece’s Christmas presents.

That felt really nice to do and I wrapped them tonight when I got home from doing the deal.

I had fun.

I also hung my first Christmas card on a curled piece of evergreen twine with a wooden clothes pin.

Yeah.

I’m like that.

I’ve pretty much finished my Christmas cards.

I did them this weekend when I was taking study breaks.

I had a couple more to do this evening and wrote them out as well.

I love Christmas.

There really is just something so god awful special about it.

I love the lights and the ribbons and the boxes and bows.

And.

The glitter.

Heh.

I have glitter all over me right now.

Haha.

Oh.

I amuse myself.

I am unexpectedly stressed, a tiny bit, not really, it’s just, well, there is one person who I don’t know what to get.

Sort of like that person who gets for themselves everything they need or want and I just don’t know how to do it.

I mean.

I have had ideas, but nothing that says, yes!

This!

I’m good at making food.

I thought about that.

Of course I’m not sure when I have time in the next week what with it being a school weekend and all that.

I am a bit flummoxed.

I want to do something special for this person.

They have done so much for me.

My heart hurts sometimes when I reflect on it.

To be loved and given to and to receive, to accept another’s gifts, it can be a challenge for me and I have learned a lot from this person about how to give and to receive.

I want to give back.

And I want it to be special.

That’s just how I roll.

I don’t know what it is yet, but I will when I see it.

It may not be a present, it could be an experience, maybe I make something, that is most likely what I will do.

A combination of making something and sharing an experience.

I have had an idea.

I shall keep it under my hat, it’s early in the making.

The best giving I have is to give my service.

Or share my experience and that has been a joy.

I also have had a lot of help from others in my community with help staying connected while doing this thing called grad school and I want to give back there too.

Which at the moment is showing up and doing the deal whenever and where ever I can.

The showing up is the biggest thing.

Just show up.

The rest will follow.

I will do that for school.

I will do that for work.

I will do that in my relationships.

That is really the best I can do.

“Thank you for breathing tonight!”  The woman next to me said with a radiant smile, “I forget how to breathe and when we did the meditation I could hear your breath, in through the nose, out through the mouth, it was so relaxing and helpful.”

Fuck.

I was of service just breathing.

Rock on.

I love that.

Sometimes just sitting in the same chair, the same place, week in and week out, is a service.

A comfort.

I want to comfort and care for and love those about me.

Even when I want those things most for myself, I realize, again and again, rather, it is in the giving of the comfort that I receive the most.

That is probably why I like Christmas so much.

It’s an excuse to give the way I really like to give.

To dress it up in brown paper wrapping and string.

Nestle it deep in tissue paper.

Curling ribbon pulled with a scissors.

Bows.

Gift tags with glitter and swans.

The “x’s” and “o’s” on the package.

The stamping the red envelopes and sealing them all with a kiss and love.

I get so much from giving.

It blows open my heart.

So grateful for this life.

This year.

This Christmas.

This.

Precious.

Amazing.

And.

Beautiful.

Moment.

Oh.

And.

You.

Yes, you, always, you.

For you.

So much love.