Turns Out I am a "Workaholic"

Somehow,  I have managed to land myself an awesome, grown-up, job that I love - and the result of that has been an immediate upheaval of my life. I have always been very good at leaving work at work. The second my time card would hit the time clock was the second that my brain would completely stop any and all thoughts related to work. This was probably how I somehow was able to stay relatively sane for the last decade or so of my life. 

I can no longer do that, and that is a tragedy. 

My life- all of it - is taken up by other people's rafting trips. I suppose there is some deeper meaning to this, and some psychological goodness to this,and maybe even a metaphor for growing up in this. I could really not care less about any of that though, I am just sad that this is what all of that results in. A viewpoint that probably just proves that I do indeed have a Peter Pan problem that I am frequently accused of, and only  occasionally admit to.

I am, however, planning on keeping said life encompassing job for the next couple of years at least. Which leads me to the conclusion that I need to just suck it up, put on my big girl panties, and adjust.

One thing that I am trying to squeeze into this new life dominated by work is my training for the LA Marathon this next year. My friend, Becky, asked me to do it with her, and I am SO glad that she did. I even have a 40 week training plan that I am trying to implement that will get me to marathon distance by the new year - which will be awesome if I can actually get it done! I could mark that off my bucket list, and with a sigh of relief be done with that!

I am not putting this much effort into life for nothing though, obviously, but I actually have a great goal in mind! Last year I was lucky enough to get to do a 9 day kayak trip in La Paz, Mexico. After I got home from that I decided that I needed to actually go places. At least once a year - more if possible.

This year.... 

GREECE!!!!

I am going to hit this deliciously ancient/ modern city at the end of October. Rafting season will be over and I will be basking in the awesomeness that is the off season. What better way to bask than to go to the Mediterranean? I have a couple of friends that are telling me they are going to come with me - but I have a sneaking suspicion that this will be another solo adventure. Which is fine. I should probably get used to that. All of my travelling buddies are getting married or gaining other significant responsibilities. 

I, on the other hand, am going to be getting a tan, seeing awesome wonders, gaining knowledge at the conference I have signed up for, and just plain have the time of my life! 

My long-term goal on that front is to fill my passport before it expires in like 6 years. I am pretty sure that is doable. 

Overcoming the Fear of the Journey

I am not quite certain what the theme of this post is. There is so much that I have going through my head, my life, and my dreams that it may seem a bit jumbled. I promise that if you bear with me for a minute something good will come from this. 

(The above picture I took on a sea kayak trip just off the coast of La Paz, Mexico)

"I knew that if I allowed fear to overtake me, my journey was doomed." - Cheryl Strayed "Wild"

There are so many places that I had imagined I would have seen by this point in my life. If you had spoken to me a decade ago as I was graduating from high school I would have informed you that I was basically going to conquer the planet in the next five years. 

So far, just getting a Bachelor Degree seems to be a lofty goal. 

My move to Portland has proven a few things to me:

1) Moving to a city does not mean that I am not still secluded

2) Going back to school does not actually mean that I will magically like it this time around.

3) There is choice in every thing that we do in this life - EVERYTHING

4) When an opportunity presents itself - do not hesitate

5) Moving backwards to be a person you used to be can be extremely damaging, yet moving forward to be a person that you never wanted to be can be just as harmful.

6) At no point should you pay more than $700 to live in a small hotel room.

7) One must leave ones apartment to experience the world when one is trying to conquer it.

8) I am only ever as secluded as I want myself to be

Lessons I have learned - some more than once now - and find that I do not regret my time here in this city, that quite frankly is just a little baby when it comes to having a personality of its own. Going to school here has been fine. If I could get a BS only taking writing classes, and at no point having to take a Shakespeare or poetry class, than this would go much smoother for me. Basically, I just like my writing classes. But those classes have afforded me with a few things that I find invaluable, not only to my craft, but to life in general. 

1) I am fully capable of making this a living - I just am going to have to put my whole being and copious amounts of blood, sweat, and tears into it to do so. 

2) Fiction is a bit like playing the game "two lies and a truth" (the brother game to two truths and a lie). There is truth in the stories I can tell. If I do it right, there will be anything from profound truth that my readers will find stays with them after they are finished, to funny/ light-hearted truths that will get a chuckle, a head nod, and maybe even spark an internet meme. 

3) There is a point at which knowing a character, and engrossing myself in their life is too much. Self experimentation is not always the best way to deepen the connection. 

I recently learned the hard way that my craft has a downside - if I let it. I was in the process of deciding that I was going to take a break from Portland, and feeling a little sorry for myself, and also writing everyday for not only my class but my own personal goal to do so, when I made the decision to do an experiment. In part for research into a story I was writing and in part because, it fed my loneliness and slight depression. I wanted to prove something to myself, even if I was going to be hurt in the end. 

The story I was working on at the time involved a woman living alone in the city (sound familiar?) who is witness to a crime and is kidnapped by the perpetrator. She has minimal contact with people, even her family, and knows that she will not be missed. So, of course she must kick ass and save herself, but when she returns she realizes that the entire time she is gone (which is like a month) not one person noticed her absence or worried about her even in the slightest. The rest of the story is about her going into witness protection while trying to build a life of meaning.

My experiment basically involved me not initiating contact with anyone that I consider close to me. These people mainly consisted of immediate family members and my four best friends. These are the people that I would assume would miss me if anyone snatched me off the street. After the first week of silence I was getting a bit ticked-off. What the hell kind of loved ones are these? That is when I went one farther and decided that I would only answer back to any communication if it was a second phone call. That meant that any emails or texts may as well not have happened. I wanted to know how a true absence would affect my relationship with any of these people. 

I made it a little over two and a half weeks before my friend, Karin, called me. The worst thing is that she only called me because I am staying with her pretty soon when I go to Utah for an old roommates wedding and she wanted to know the exact dates I was planning on flying in and out. There was no concern for my safety, just wanting to know when she needed to get me. 

As you might imagine, this test was a major blow to an already shaky ego. NO ONE would miss me if I disappeared today, until the rent check didn't get sent in and my land lord finally called my next of kin to track me down. 

I have become a victim of my own anti-social shyness. Everyone that I know lives in a different state than I do. I have lived here for six months now and, conscience or not, I have made exactly zero friends. I leave my classes with talking to little or no classmates. I chat politely in my church meetings, leave immediately, go to no extra activities, and lets be honest - I can recognize maybe a handful of them in a setting outside of church, and I know maybe a quarter of those people's names. I spend an awful lot of my free time in my apartment.  I really only leave to go on my jogs, go to Powell's for author events (which is actually something I am really going to miss because they have really good ones here), or am going to school. Part of it is due to me not being able to find a job here, which means I am living off student loans, which means I have no money.

Mostly though, I made a bad choice. I set myself outside of my immediate community, and set up an outside community that is too far away to be more than an encouraging phone call for a few minutes a day.

And it is all my own fault - my choice.

I am always only as alone as I wish to be.

While this was all going down most of my time was then taken up my reading and writing and entirely too much Netflix. I wanted to escape my life, still do a little, and indulged that with more than a few internet searches on places around the world that I want to go... I want to lose myself in, because losing myself in a foreign country seems so much more legitimate than being lost in Portland, OR. The whole time yearning to go, and knowing that I have exactly zero money to get myself there.

Finally, two things happened. First, I realized that if I want to be connected to others, than I have to do the connecting. I am my own responsibility. The more I was thinking and focusing on how alone I was - the more alone I became. I finally pulled myself out of the rut... well, I AM pulling myself out of the rut. Second, I read  a book that has been in my bookshelf for an unknown amount of time. I have no recollection of ever getting this book. I remember meeting the author for a different book she wrote, but not for the one I read. 

The book is called "Wild" by: Cheryl Strayed. It is awesome and inspiring. 

Cheryl lost her mother in her early 20's and part of her healing from that was to hike the Pacific Crest Trail by herself. The Pacific Crest Trail is a trail that goes from the border of Mexico to the border of Canada (it may go a little inside Canada). This appealed to me because I would love to hike the PCT. It is on my bucket list. Her account of her summer trekking from somewhere just before the High Sierra Mountains to the Columbia River that serves as the border between Washington and Oregon was well written and engaging. I read it in just over three sittings. 

I recommend this book to everyone.

The whole time I was reading this I kept asking myself if I could do it. Could I go and backpack across the country by myself? I want to... not sure if I actually could. I would definitely love to do it on with a friend or two. 

The best thing about the book came to me on pg# 51 when she says, "I knew that if I allowed fear to overtake me, my journey was doomed."

There are times that I am reading when things are just so poignant to me. This is something that I think will stay with me for a long time. 

I sometimes wish that that fear that always seems to rear its ugly head when ever I want to go and do the adventures that I want to do would just not come. That I would not think twice about saying yes to. That comfort zone is soooooooo appealing. Fear is the most dangerous thing in this life I think. Fear can block so much truth. It is so worth it to overcome the fear. This life is so full of possibilities that to be bogged down for too long will only foster more fear. 

I am a true believer of the concept of "Like attracts like". I have written about it on here a couple of times. I would say that in this case, the more fear you overcome and work around, the more fearless you will become. But the more you let your fear grow, the more fearful you will be. 

I am here to tell you, that it is my goal, and hope yours now too, to overcome that crippling fear. 

The journey of this life it too precious to squander. We are of infinite potential. I must (We must) set aside the fear.

OH JANUS HELP ME!

New Year. New You. New Me. If all of us did everything that we said we would do at the beginning of every year – New Society. I know that I tend to make some pretty lofty goals that, if ever I was to fully implement, would make me into a pretty fantastic person. Even this year, I had set out to make the minimal amount of goals; goals that were attainable, goals that were semi-part of my life already, like three tops. Yea, that did not happen. I am currently at 16 goals for 2014. Even as I sit here looking at my list five days into the year I cannot think of one that would be acceptable to take off. If I was smart I suppose I would just chuck the whole thing, but there is that little part of me that fully believes that I will of course be able to do all of these things that I have said I will.

         
              Interestingly, the tradition of making lofty goals at the New Year is not a new one. The Babylonians would make promises to the Gods at the beginning of the year (the beginning of their year was apparently in March though) to return borrowed objects and pay their debts. Not having the problem of keeping crap I borrow, I can’t say I relate directly, but to me that sounds a lot like the “I will run everyday” promise I like to make.

            Then Julius Caesar aka Roman Empire changed the beginning of the year to January to get the calendar back in sync with the Sun. This is also when the citizens of Rome would pledge themselves to the Emperor. Fun fact: January is named after the God Janus. Janus is the God of gates, doors, and new beginnings. He is depicted with having two faces because through a gate or door he can look both behind him and in front of him. That is where the new beginning thing comes from, because you have to walk through the door to get to somewhere new. It invites the contemplation that we all seem to go through at this time of year.

         
            Revisiting/ analyzing/ un-healthily listing all the things that we see wrong with ourselves is what the tradition has turned into. Janus was a God to be called upon with the new – everything; new day, new baby, new house, new job. He would bless those who called on him to be prosperous in the new undertaking. I wonder what he would say about the resolutions that we all come up with in our modern world. No longer are we happy with good fortune in the endeavors that come to us naturally. Now we (*cough* myself) go out to that proverbial wheat field that is our selves. We have planted, watered, tilled, and weeded this field all year long. We have taken out the plants that are no good, the ones that were beaten down by the storms; we even took the time to plant some new ones in their place – they are small and just learning how to soak up the sun to make themselves strong, but they are there. We go to our fields and we see the growth and say “NOPE, not good enough!” and some of us take a torch to the wheat and watch the flames take out all the plants that suddenly are not what or how we want to be. We don’t want to be wheat farmers, we want to grow banana trees, or something else that is completely different from what we previously had. To make this happen we throw out a few banana tree seeds and hope they fill up the whole field, only to find in the new year that our field is full of wheat again, that we have loved and cared for after the banana trees failed, and we are okay with that for most of the year.

          
           I think that we have so much potential as human beings. There is not nearly enough emphasis on looking back at the year and seeing all the wonderful things that have helped to form you to be who you are at this moment. I envy those that do not buy into the resolution craze every year. I can’t number myself among them, but I think that shows certain strength of character – at least a happiness with one’s being as is.

         
           For myself, the list of accomplishments is short. I started this year living on a resort ranch in nowhere, Arizona. I completed a “Warrior Dash” race, got into college, made some headway with being sure of my spirituality. I took advantage to go on my first real adventure on my own and out of the country and spent a couple weeks in La Paz and Cabo san Lucas, Mexico on a kayak trip. It was beautiful and I am so glad that I went. I cannot wait to go on another adventure. My summer had me in nowhere, Alaska on a remote fishing resort. I was surprised at the changes I found in myself while I was on that small island. Being there makes me think that sometimes I am supposed to be in certain places at certain times to meet certain people. Then came September, and I moved to Portland, Oregon. Finishing off my year with a sense of rejection and wasted money and effort, and hoping that, in my limited view, I am missing the good this is doing for me. Ending my year on such a depressing note probably has not helped me with my intentions to burn down my own field, but part of me just wants a chance to better plan the planting of the new wheat.

         
           Most of my personal goals for the year consist of exercise and weight loss. A new twist for me is that I am going to be actively pursuing my writing. That means book clubs, writing groups, and, of course, a new blog to document my efforts. It is called Scratches or Scribbles and you can access it on one of the page tabs on the top of this blog.

A whole new year has been opened up to the world to be screwed up and twisted into a confusing ball of ups, downs, victories, depressions, hormones, and probably (for me) a few moves. As I am thinking to myself now how I plan to concur the mountain that is 2014, I am hoping and praying that I will come out the other side without too much scarring, a fertile wheat field, and maybe - if I am lucky - a banana tree or two.

Places I found some of my information:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Year's_resolution
http://billpetro.com/history-of-new-years-resolutions
http://phys.org/news/2013-12-ancient-traditions-year-resolutions.html
http://www.novareinna.com/festive/janus.html

The Inner Circle of Life

It is still a bit of a mystery to me how my friends come into my life. The best of them, the ones I would consider to be my inner circle, were almost immediate. They all have similar stories: we would meet in various ways, be aware of each other but have no real interaction, and then one day we hang out and never stop - not really. It is instinct. I am not a believer in fate, no choice in the things that happen in my life. But, the automatic way that these people entered my life, like it was supposed to be, unquestionably going to happen - is enough to make me think twice about Fate.

I do believe that we are meant to meet certain people, but it is always up to us how that meeting turns out, how we let them effect us in life. For me, it has turned into how I let them effect my interaction with other people.

I noticed about a week or so ago that I am alone for a good portion of my day, everyday. It took me so long to even think about it because I talk to one or two of my best friends every-single-day. They just happen to all live in different states than I do. Which is also why my being alone doesn't bother me. 

I choose to give my friends power. 

Maybe it is because I am an introvert who has very few actual friends. When I say friends, I mean that a friend be classified as someone who knows things about you because you tell them, and that you hang out with them because you actually like them. These are the people I would take a bullet for. I have one friend who I went to visit and we ended up spending two nights in her apartment doing not a lot except hanging out with each other and talking, because I missed her, because we were true friends. 

My circle of friends is small, but they have such a huge affect on me that I am starting to wonder if it would be smarter to add people to it. The fewer people that have an opinion I actually care about - the more those opinions actually matter. 

I am so thankful for the people that I am fortunate enough to have in my life, in that inner circle. It is a relief when someone actually understands my kind of crazy.

\

"Second Hand Spirits" "In a Witch's Wardrobe" & "Tarnished and Torn" by: Juliette Blackwell

Every so often I come across a series of books that I love and end up reading all of the books in the series even if I didn't start at the beginning. The Witchcraft Mystery series by Juliet Blackwell is one of those. They are not long, complicated books. I would put them in the "Bubblegum Mystery" category. They are just fun, easy literature that adds a little dessert to my day. :) 

The opening book to this is Secondhand Spirits and it introduces us to the main character Lily Ivory and her vintage clothing store she has recently opened up in San Francisco. She gets herself into a bit of trouble trying to rid a neighborhood of evil, but finds a bit of a family in the process. 

There are a few books between the first installment and In a Witch's Wardrobe but since there are only a few things that are continual in all of them, that didn't seem important. I actually read this book before Secondhand Spirits and fell in love with it all the same. 

In this one Lily attends an Art Deco Ball that gets her into trouble. She is like a supernatural "Murder She Wrote". Helping and hindering the local police at the same time while in the end catching the culprit almost all on her own.

Tarnished and Torn is the latest book in the series and has Lily attending an antique jewelry fair and in the process gets mixed up in what may - or may not - be a modern witch hunt! She gets to show us why she is one of the best witches in the business. 

One of my favorite things about this series is her side kick ... a pig who is actually a gargoyle thing. 

I would recommend this book to anyone who likes mysteries. I can't think of anything that would make it inappropriate for any particular age group, but I would say High School or above just for comprehension and being able to relate.  

NEON RUN 2013!!!!!

I love doing these fun runs! When I signed up for this one I was actually planning on doing it by myself, but then a couple of weeks ago my brother, Jacob, decided to sign up himself and his son, Kayden. So, I had people to hang out with while I was there... 

I was stupid and didn't take my camera on the actual run... silly Tamera... next time

This is Kayden while we are all getting decked out in our glowing gear

This is my niece, Payton, she got a glowing wand

This is Keaton , nephew, he did not run, but he was loving the neon body paint!

This is my brother, Jacob, and his wife, Karen. Not sure why Jacob is giving a stink face.

Here we are pre-race.. the boys are very intense.

Yea.. that's me

Everyone lined up to start the race

Kayden after he finished ... embarrassingly faster than I did

Kayden and I after

The three runners! Yea.. I had on neon nail polish just for the occasion

Jacob photo bombing me and looking a bit like a ghost coming out of no where with no arms

The smoky area is where they had the stage and the DJ

The finish line!!!

My time ... it's embarrassing really.... but oh so fun!!!

Exactly Where I Want To Be

(October 1, 2013 - Photo of the Day)

Have you ever looked up from what you were doing to suddenly realize that you were in fact very grateful to be exactly where you were in that moment? To not want to be anywhere else at all? Today I had that feeling. In my ever snaking path of life I find myself in school once again, and at one point I looked up from my walking in the “quad” (for lack of a better word) and could not think of any place I would rather be at that moment then on that path, on my way to class. Which, quite frankly, was a bit of a shock to me after the last few days. It seems like every other way I turn my education is just getting in the way of the rest of my life.

Is it worth it?

Is it REALLY worth it?

This education that I have been drilled to believe that I will be a better person for. That I have convinced myself that I will be smarter, more attractive, better paid and an all-around more productive humane being for having finished.  

In the process of pursuing my education I have moved to Portland, Oregon. It’s a good city. But by no means is it a great one, and I have yet to feel any sort of connection to it. There is a blog, a truly fantastic blog that I love, called “Awash with Wonder” by a woman named Shannon. She recently wrote about her feelings toward San Francisco compared to her current city of Orlando, and the language she seemed to share with San Francisco, that she has been to only a few times – but not with Orlando, where she has lived for years now (the post is called “When a city feels like home” if you are interested). I am feeling a bit like that now. Only I have yet to find my true home. Portland and I definitely do not share a common language. We share a respect for what the other has to offer the other, and a few similar interests that keep us entertained. Unfortunately, Portland is my friend who is my friend because we happen to live in the same neighborhood and know some of the same people, but have no real particular interest in the other.

And then I have moments like today.

I am happy here. I am even involved here. I have no job yet – which may be part of the problem – but for once I have moved somewhere new that did not involve a pre-setup plan and I feel like I have a place here. A self-appointed place, but a place all the same. Portland has given me an outlet for all of the things that I have wanted to try over the years that are just not available in those itsy-bitsy towns I have a habit of living in.

My life so far has been a series of hopeful and sometimes glorious starts, very short middles, and sudden and complete stops so that another tangent can be explored. I am in no way prepared to give up my exploring, and feel like it would be dishonest to myself to do so. This City has given me yet another new start, which to the untrained eye may seem pretty par-for-the-course, but in fact is completely different. In everything that is truly embarrassing, I have to admit that I have put and exceptional amount of laziness into my life. I do not mean that I am an inherently lazy person – I always am trying to do something – but no real effort toward my life as a hole. Now, I have to choose to get up at 7am to be to class so that I may eventually get that degree and have something to show for what I am doing. I am joining groups and making long term commitments here. Ones that I would under no circumstances have joined in any other place before now because I knew a head of time that I would be leaving it all behind in just a few short months.

That translates into a few things happening. Those groups I am joining? They are writing groups, and racing groups, and groups that choose a time to dissect fairy tales. I am going to be signing up for Krav Maga here soon. I am making commitments to things that have always been close to my heart, and I find that I love that. When I first planned on moving here I figured it would be for the 9 months of the school year. Take the summers off, help keep the sanity of a very transient person in a very permanent place. I do not think that that is what will be happening now.

Because if, you haven’t noticed, it is when the insanity is at its peak that you look up and find yourself exactly where you want to be.

"The Book of Blood and Shadow" By: Robin Wasserman

"The Book of Blood and Shadow" by: Robin Wasserman

The Book Jacket:

" "You don't even know that you're living in a before until you wake up one day and you find yourself in an after."

One night. One body, Broken in a pool of blood.
One killer, lost in the shadows. One girl, left behind. Left alone, to face the consequences. To find the truth. To avenge the dead.

One night is all it takes to change Nora Kane's life forever. Her best friend is dead;her boyfriend has vanished. And the trail of blood leads straight back to her: The person who might be responsible. The person who might be next.

Desperate to save the people she loves and determined to find justice for the ones she's lost, Nora unearths a dark web of secret societies and shadowy conspirators, all driven by a mad desire to possess something that might not even exist. Something to which Nora herself might hold the key. It turns out her night of blood is just one piece in a puzzle that spans continents and centuries-and solving it may be the only way she can save her own life."

I am a bibliophile. Unfortunately for my bank account, maybe I am too much of one. I will soak in the written word anyway that I can. Including listening to it. "The Book of Blood and Shadow" was one such unabridged audio books.

The thing about audio books is that they are LONG. Probably because they can not speak out loud as fast as I can read a page, so these books tend to be in my life quite a bit longer than any other ones. I actually finished this one a few months ago while in Alaska, but it had been apart of my life for so long that I need a little break.

Here I am, back to tell all of you what an awesome book and author this is.

I would put this in the Young Adult / Thriller / Super Natural category.

I rather loved it. From the very beginning the author has you entranced with the back story of this girl. It takes a little bit to get to the actual story, but not too long, and once you are there it is a steady stream of clues and ancient history and what every conspiracy theorist would tell you is the actual history. I never wanted to take my ear buds out of my ears to go to work (and I may have kept them in a few times anyway).

There was a twist as well. One I did not see coming. As an avid reader these twists no longer come as frequently as they used to. This was a doosey though. Well done there Wasserman.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is a Junior in high school and older. 

Someone Much Wiser than I Once Said...

The world sees each of us in such situational light that we sometime forget to take the masks off.

To let people see us for who we are - really 

I Moved to Portland

I moved to Portland, Oregon this week.

I suppose that it really is not any different than any other move I have done in the past. I am leaving behind everything that is normal for me… again. This time, though, is different. This time I am making the move to enter into “normal” society.

When I say that I left everything that I know behind me, I mean a complete change-not just the same job in a different state.

I uprooted everything. I went through every single box that was in my pile of crap in my parent’s garage. I had to find an apartment myself. I bought a bed. A real bed, not just a blow up bed (which for the record I have slept on an air mattress for as long as nine months straight).

I will be finding a real job that will be expecting me to probably stay longer than a “season”. I will be going to a full load of classes that will further my degree and my hopefully my future income. Because, let’s be honest, I really am only returning to school so I can potentially get paid more in the long run.

None of that was going through my mind in the early hours of Friday the Thirteenth though.

Because when it comes down to it, as much as I detest packing all of my stuff up, I LOVE unpacking it all. Suddenly, it is Christmas again – and I am giving myself all of the presents. I get to re-evaluate my life. See what is important to me, what I started and never finished, I remember things that I should always remember, and remember a few things that are painful to bring up.

In my head there is a truly beautiful video montage that plays all the highlights of the last few weeks with very inspirational music talking about being strong, moving on, and being happy.

You should see it – it is awesome.

In a strange turn of events I had the urge to bake some cookies tonight. A sort of christening I suppose. I walked the two blocks to Safeway, got some cookie dough, and came home and baked them. My apartment smelled fantastic. Like a little homeyness in my new home.

I have quite the project ahead of me. That is for sure.

Did I burn the cookies?

Yes, I did

I choose to not take that as a bad omen for my life here though.

I also chose to move onto an ice cream snack

Ice Cream never lets me down