NYC.

That’s where the BFF wants to go.  That’s where she wants to move.  That is so, completely, 180 degrees, polar opposite of my life now.  I’ve never been there.  I have no idea if I’ll like it.  Our plan is to go visit around April and move at the end of summer.  She’s going whether I go or not.  I feel like this is a good opportunity.  If I don’t move with her, I probably won’t ever move at all, because I don’t have the balls to go it alone.  This is the thing:  I’ve been stressing about the decision to move to the city hardcore since she brought up the offer.

First, because I’ve never been there and it is so different from anything I know.  However, the fact that it is so different makes me excited.  I want change.  I don’t want to be stuck in this town doing the same thing.  Everyone does the same thing.  I want to be different.  I want to make something of myself outside of this place.  I’ve secretly always wanted to know what it was like to live there.  I’ve never had neighbors.  I’ve never been able to conveniently walk to anywhere I want to go.  I want my own little apartment, a roommate (the BFF), to be able to do anything whenever I want.  I’ve never had that freedom, that independence, to only have to take care of myself, to do whatever I want to do, no questions asked.

Second, it’s freakin expensive.  My friend says you have to be ready and willing to work your ass off.  Which I would be willing to do, if it was somewhere I really want to be.  And that I won’t know until I go.  My portion of rent there, would be twice what I was paying here.  I was barely making it by, although I don’t think I was working quite full time either.  The working hard thing doesn’t bother me, it’s the expenses.  I don’t want to just be making it by.  I want to be able to go out and enjoy the lifestyle I’d be working my ass off to live.

Third, my family.  The thought of being so far away and not having them to call on scares the crap out of me.  However, that’s also partly why I want to move.  I need to learn to take care of myself, by myself.  I need to make my own decisions without their opinions swaying me in a certain direction.  I want them to only know the information I’m choosing to share.

I never had the going away to college experience, and that really bothers me.  I feel like I missed out on a lot (which maybe I haven’t).  I want the challenge of taking care of myself, the responsibility.  I want to find myself, and I don’t feel like I can do that here.  There are too many things influencing me to live a certain lifestyle, to be a certain way.  And that life may be the life I want, but at this point in my life I’m not sure if it is, and how will I know unless I get away from it?

I’m a fighter.  I’m a strong person.  I need to make something of myself.  I feel like I’m meant for more than what I would get from here.  There are opportunities here, but they can only take you so far, and they’re all geared towards a certain direction.  The fact that I may go over there and absolutely love it scares me almost as much as going over there and totally hating it.  I think I could have an amazing life over there.  The one I’ve been hoping to have my entire life.  I would forever regret passing up this opportunity because I was too scared.  If I go and don’t like it, big deal I can come home.  I really want the experience, to learn from it, see something new, try something new.  It’s everything that excites me about it, that would drive me to go that scares me.  How can I make up my mind?

I may need to leave.

I went and picked up the BFF from LAX on Friday.  She’s moving home indefinitely, and I couldn’t be more happy about it.  We spent all weekend together staying up late, drinking, talking, watching Friends, dreaming, venting, listening to music, cooking, eating, and not much else!  It couldn’t have been better.  I am so glad she’s home.  Not only will I be less worried about her, but I think it will be a good transition period until she decides to tackle the next adventure, which we may do together.  Translation:  I may move.

I’ve been thinking about moving for awhile now.  I feel like it’s something I really need to do to discover who I am for myself without all the influences of family, friends, and the comfort zone of home.  It’s so hard being from a small town when you’re related to half of it and everyone knows everyone else.  I feel like every decision I make here is influenced by someone or something else.  I never feel like it’s my sole decision.  It constantly makes me feel like I am living for someone else or up to someone else’s expectations.  I want to be in control.

I’ve been here my entire life.  I’ve lived it out to this point.  It’s not a place to be young, free and independent.  I couldn’t have asked for a better place to be raised.  It was a great place to grow up, but I feel like it’s time to move on.  Home will always be here.  I can always come back.  I feel like it’s time to get out there, explore, live independently, work hard, make my own living, make a life for myself outside of this safety net.  I will come back here, one day, maybe raise my family here when that time comes.  Right now, I feel like I can find more happiness somewhere else.  I know the grass isn’t always greener on the other side, but I don’t want to be stuck wondering if I never give it a try.  People who grow up here, graduate here, go to college here, meet someone here, get married here, raise their family here, retire here, and die here.  Which is fine, but I think there’s more for me than that.  I don’t feel like I’ve ever fully just lived and enjoyed my life.  That’s all I want.

Winter Chills.

I don’t think I could ever live in a place where it snows.  Last night the temperature dropped into the 30s, and that was just way too cold.  Today I wore a sweater, jacket, and a scarf, and closed toed shoes.  Unacceptable!  This is California after all!  There’s frost on the rooftops and the ground in the mornings.  I can see my breath when I run (which I seriously think makes me more tired)!  My hands are always like icebergs also getting dry and itchy.  We have to turn on the heater as soon as it gets dark because the temperature drops dramatically.  (From cold to colder)!  Ahh, winter is definitely upon us.  (That nice 77 degree weather didn’t last very long).  I miss summer already…

When I was born…

A few weeks ago I was filling out this questionnaire for my chiropractor about health history.  One of the questions asked if you had any major surgeries.  I’ve had 2.  One was when I was 17 for a tumor in my uterus, the other was to attach my esophagus to my stomach when I was born.  My mom couldn’t remember what that surgery was called so she pulled out my old baby box.

I had seen a lot of the stuff in the box before, but then she pulled out a little bag of polaroids.  They were pictures I had never seen before from just a few days after I was born.  I had a rough birth and a road of difficult health issues right afterward.  I was born about a month premature by C-section.  I was born not breathing and like I mentioned, my esophagus wasn’t attached to my stomach.  I weighed a little over 4 lbs. My mom didn’t even get to hold me.  I was immediately flown by helicopter to the Children’s Hospital in Fresno.

This picture literally made me start balling.  I’ve heard the story about IVs coming out of my head, how my head was the size of my mom’s palm, and my index finger was as long as her fingernail.  That’s me, fighting for my life just a few days old.  It is an indescribable feeling to actually see it.  I will never forget this image.  No matter how rough the road of life gets for me, I am so thankful I am living it.

My little teacups.

The paint is called “Cherry Blossom,” so of course I picked it!  The white spots are actual crystals that melt into the white dots when you put them in the kiln to get the finished look.  I can’t wait till the tea pot is done.  Aren’t they just adorable!  I <3 them.

I am thankful.

Last night, I went out.  I rarely go out, but my sister dragged me.  It was bound to be a quiet night at a local wine bar with a friend and her boyfriend.  When that place was going to close, they wanted to walk down the street to a popular dive bar to see what was going on.  We look in the door and it seemed to be pretty mellow and there was an empty table, so we went in and snagged it.  My sister and I (before we went out) initially said we didn’t want to go to this place, because on the night before Thanksgiving it would be like a high school reunion.  Sure enough shortly after we got there, the people came trailing in.

I saw my ex best friend from 8th grade with her husband that we also went to school with.  FYI – I still don’t like her.  I saw my best friends cousin and he hung out with us most of the night.  Saw a lot of people we went to high school with that I just don’t mind if I ever see again, but in this small town it will happen.  We saw a lot of people from our old 4-H group from when we were in middle school.  It was total high school reunion.  I also ran into my bosses daughter.  She bought me drinks all night, and I actually ended up having a great drunken (buzzed, not plastered) time.  We all made plans to meet up again at another local dive bar tomorrow night.  So this Thanksgiving, I am thankful to return to designated driver tomorrow night!

Hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday!

Why I love California even though we can’t pay our bills.

The high today was 77 degrees.  Beautiful.

In lieu of a real post.

I’m a bad blogger.  I have literally at least 10 posts started, and I just can’t seem to finish any of them.  They have the most broad range of subjects, but I just can’t seem to get anywhere with them.  Sometimes I write a post and feel like it’s too personal to share, so I don’t post it, or I post it then delete it late cause I get all paranoid over it.  Lately I’ve been feeling as if my life is just not exciting enough to share anything at all.  I read other blogs and get ideas or jealous of their writing styles and their witty commentary.  I feel like my posts are boring and no one would take interest in them.  Which is fine because this blog really was just about a place to release my thoughts, but it hasn’t felt like enough.  I have a lot of things I’d like to share.  I have a lot of ideas for this blog.  I have a lot of ideas for posts.  It’s a great place to post my pictures.  But I just have no motivation to do any of it.  I used to have too much time on my hands, so I could blog often and about anything because I had the time to find subjects to write about.  Now, my time is limited.  I really only have the weekends.  I have time during the week, but not enough time to get focused and by the time I get to my screen and pull up the page, I’ve lost interest in what I was gonna post about or don’t feel like it’s worthy enough to share.

I don’t know what my problem is so I’m sorry my blog has been totally sucking.  The more I try to get better at it, it seems the worse it gets.  But it’s mine and no one cares, so I know I’m just really thinking too much into it.  I’m feeling like it’s time for a change, revamp, a new direction perhaps.  So if I disappear for awhile, please come back (to those few who already do).  I don’t want to not blog, because I have really enjoyed it, but maybe I just need to take a break from it.  Stay tuned.

Vent.

This evening my dad was making comments to my mom that I was going to wash and polish his truck this weekend since I didn’t have any other plans.  (He didn’t actually mean it, although he would mean it if I fell for it.  That’s just the type of humor my dad has that I don’t always find funny).  I took offense to his remarks tonight.  A few weeks ago, he actually did ask me to go get his truck washed and polish it.  I obeyed, but not without complaint.  A few weeks prior to that my mom and I washed and cleaned out the inside of his other truck.  He had been so busy working on my sisters house that he didn’t have time to do it, so we thought we would be nice and get it done for him.  I didn’t feel like it was necessary for him to volunteer my time to take care of his truck for the 3rd time, just because to him it appears I do nothing.  So I called him out on it and then we got in an argument.

I told him sometimes he acts like I’m up to no good, do nothing and it makes me feel worthless.  His response “Did I say you were worthless?”  No, but that’s the way it makes me feel.  He’s not here during the week.  He doesn’t know my routine, what I do.  I work hard all week too.  The weekends are my free time to do as I please, if that consists of sitting in front of my computer screen or watching TV then so be it.  That’s how I’m choosing to spend my time.  Then he goes into the “I own this house” defense.  Right!  He does own this house, this land, it is his responsibility to keep on it, not mine.  Then he said I should do things when asked, and I do.  I even do things when I’m not asked, it’s just that he’s not here to see it.  I make dinner during the week.  I do dishes.  I water the plants, feed the dogs.  I help my mom out a lot during the week.  The weekends are my time and that’s the only time he’s here.

The most irritating part of it all, is I’m 25 freaking years old.  Give me a f***ing break.  I’m sorry I don’t have friends, so I’m home all the time.  I’m sorry I exercise every morning, go to work every day, play softball Mondays, tennis twice a week and try to be in bed at a decent hour, plus all those other unexpected, unplanned things that come up.  My work weeks are busy and packed.  The weekends are rollover time to do all the things I didn’t get to do during the week.  A lot of it consisting of computer time, movies, and relaxing.

This issue takes me back to high school.  It is the exact reason I wanted to move out so badly.  I was never just left alone to do what I wanted, because I felt like he always felt like I should be doing something else.  That made me feel like I had to live my life the way he wanted, to his expectations which in turn only made me rebel and unhappy.  I refuse to go back to that place which is why I called him out on his remarks this tonight.  I’m determined to live my life the way I want, because that’s the only way I’m going to be happy.  Right now I need to live at home and save money, but I also want to live independently and guilt free.  I used to never stick up for myself, but doing that now makes me feel stronger, like I’m putting him in his place.  Yeah, he may be my dad, but I’m an adult now.  The line needs to be drawn somewhere.  Besides he’s not even around 2/3 of the time, so I really don’t feel like he has much room to say anything at all.

Internet makes me happy.

Internet in my room makes me happier!  This weekend my sister moved into her house, so I took over her room.  It’s about twice the size as mine, so I actually was able to go buy a few new pieces of furniture!  I’m a bargain shopper, let me tell you.  I have a hard time spending a lot of money on anything.  So while my sister was debating about whether or not she should buy a $500 TV stand, I purchased these cute little things for $60 a piece.  I actually go 2 of the one on the left.  I got 3 pieces for less than half of the price of her one piece.  Ha!

After hooking up my computer, to my speakers, to my tv, I found that this room actually gets internet!  Seriously, it made my day.  I literally could not wait to get everything done and for it to bed time.  Bed time = Hulu.  I’ve been waiting to explore the wonderful world of Hulu since I moved back home, and it’s everything I hoped it would be!  (Except I heard rumor they’re gonna begin to charge a monthly fee)?  Anyway, I put my cursor in the search bar and typed “Glee.”  I’ve heard good things about this show and was determined to see for myself what it was all about.  I watched 2 episodes before I was about to pass out.

Final result:  I think I’m in love.  (A show where they randomly break out in song = amazing).  Plus this man here, doesn’t make it so bad either.  (Good thing he plays the bad boy, otherwise he might be a little too pretty).