Movement: a Post in 8 Acts

via Giphy

First: Happy October everyone!!!  This really is the best month.  Cool nights, warm (but not hot) days.  No one looks at me funny when I display my witchy accessories.  Halloween.  It's all just fabulous.

Second: As of today I've gone four full weeks without a cigarette.  I'm super excited about it!  Seriously.  I've been trying to quit smoking for years and I've never been this long without before.  I won't say I've kicked my addiction, but I'm pretty sure I can refrain from here on out.  Yay!

Third: Still no luck on the job front.  Hiss!  I continue to rethink my desire for a real job.  I mean, I need one.  Desperately.  But as job after job passes me by, I become more and more convinced that it's never going to happen.  So I need another option for making a living.  So I need to start actively pursuing other options for making a living.  It's going to be hard and I'm terrified that I'm going to fail, but what other options do I have?  And until I succeed in my "other option" I need to continue applying for real jobs.  Blah.  I hate that life's so complicated.

Fourth: Moving the odds on the job front in my favor a bit is the fact that my local county library system is opening up a new branch and will have LOTS of jobs open for application at the end of the year.  Also working those odds is the fact that the city library for which I work will be having a number of full time jobs open up at the end of the year due to retirements.  Possibilities abound!

Fifth: Despite the fact that I just ate nachos made by my younger brother, this month I'm focusing on cleaning up my diet.  I really want to feed myself a mostly plant-based diet of minimally processed foods, you know?  I feel better when I do.  Plus, I want to lose some weight.*  I'm also thinking of starting intermittent fasting for spiritual purposes, but I haven't decided on that yet.

Sixth: I've decided to go deeper into my spiritual and magical practices.  Actually, I've been working on this for the past few months and I've come to something of a crossroads.  Now it's time for me to take the next step** and start actively becoming who I want to be.  So I'm taking a greater, more active*** hand in my life and recovering much that I've lost to depression these past almost two decades.  I will no longer sit on the sidelines of my own life.

Seven:  Even though I'm basically broke because my uvula thing last month caused me to lose nearly a week's worth of work and thus a week's worth of pay, I managed to come into some spending money today so I purchased the Samhain Ritual Vault and some Flying Ointment from Skelton Key Shop.  I'm pretty excited about it, and already have plans for use.  The bath bombs in the Vault won't do me any good since I don't have a tub, so I'll gift them to friends that do.  But everything else will come in very handy.  I'd like to subscribe to Moon Box as my two best friends also subscribe to it, but I'm not confident I can afford it right now.  Maybe next month.

Eight: My memoir writing class starts this Tuesday!  I'm prepared.  Mostly.  I'm excited.  Also extra hours mean extra pay in November.****


*Okay, I want to lose a significant amount of weight, but "some" will do to start.
**This is the overall theme to my life right now.
***I guess the keyword here is "active"
****Yeah, I only get paid once a month.  Have I not mentioned that before?

Mercury in retrograde strikes!

Colors of Mercury 
Image Credit: NASA / JHU Applied Physics Lab / Carnegie Inst. Washington

Usually I don't notice the affects of a retrograde Mercury.  So much so, in fact, that I've been fairly skeptical of just how much impact the stars and planets have on our lives.  I just haven't seen much value in the study of astrology.  I'm less skeptical now.

You see, I'm writing this post on my kindle fire because my laptop is no longer taking a charge.  Yay!  As of yesterday my laptop battery is at 70% and, well, like I mentioned earlier, not charging.  I've an appointment to take it in on Tuesday and I'm really hoping that whatever is wrong with it is a relatively easy (and cheap!) fix.  I'd be writing on my parent's computer, but it died a couple of weeks ago (at the beginning of this retrograde, actually).  Double yay!

Hey, at least I still have my phone and my kindle.

Still, this sucks.  I really can't afford to get a new computer until I find a new job, and though my mom has basically offered to purchase a new computer for me I am just not comfortable having her do that.  She's old, she feeds me, and right now she's letting me live in her house for free (well, for access to my Netflix subscription, but you get the picture).  I'm a grown-ass woman and shouldn't have to rely on Mama for everything.  I mean, I do, of course, because no matter how grown I am I'm still broke as hell, but I don't like having to rely on her largess.  Here's hoping (1) my computer is cheaply fixable, and (2) I find that elusive full time job soon.  I really hate being such a burden.

As right now I have nothing better to do (it's really annoying trying to navigate the interwebs on my kindle and I've been trying to cut back on my phone time), I've been thinking about the details of my life.  Trying to find small changes I can make to it to improve it.  Well, that and looking at my previously broken vows and promises to myself, my friends and family, and the gods and spirits that I honor and occasionally make promises to.  Promises that, at the time, I fully intend to keep.  Unfortunately, that rarely works out.  I don't really know what happens, but somewhere in the middle of whatever it is I'm doing with those aforementioned vows and promises my attention gets lost and those promises get broken.  It's silly and stupid and careless of me, but it's also very, very human.  I mean, how many of us keep our New Years' resolutions?

That's what I thought.

Anyway, it turns out that most of my broken promises are things that I really, really want to do.  You know?  They're actions that would improve my life and maybe make me like myself a little more.  And a lot of it is simply stepping up things that I'm already doing or trying to do.  It's just s matter of taking those things a bit more seriously.

So I thought I'd do something like a "boot camp" for the month of September, and maybe jump start some of my longer term goals.  To that end, here's what I'm doing for the next 30 days:

• Quitting smoking on the 3rd.  I actually picked the 3rd to do this weeks ago when I decided to finally and for real quit smoking.  It works out best for me because Labor Day gives me three days off work in a row, and I know from past experience that the first three days are the days when I'm most irritable and not fit to be around other humans.  This way I'm only going to be around family, and I'll be able to retreat to my bedroom when I find them completely maddening (which I will).
• Yoga every day for at least 10 minutes.  Right now, as poor of shape as I'm in, I think 10 minutes is probably the most I can do.  My friend Leanne and I are participating in a challenge of some kind that she found on Instagram.  I promised her I would do this so I will.  Besides, I rather like yoga.
• Walking every day.  This I actually started in July and managed to do almost every day for about a month (barring inclement weather, of course), until a series of storms drove me inside and I didn't pick it up again.  I was actually considering throwing in some jogging to get more of a work out, before ruining everything by sitting on my ass for the last several weeks.  So, I'm starting over from the beginning.
• Finding an exercise that I can do indoors to replace walking when the weather is terrible, and adding it to my daily routine anyway.  I'm hoping to make whatever I land on for this a regular addition sometime around the middle of the month.  I'm thinking maybe 30 minutes of cardio step, since I have a step I got a few years ago.  It's time again to get some use from it.
• Daily meditation, at least 10-15 minutes, to clear and organize my thoughts.
• Daily language study.  I am determined to learn Irish.  Determined enough that I study on a fairly regular (though not daily) basis anyway.  I'm stepping up my studies!  If this goes well and I think I can handle it, I'm going to pick back up with Mandarin Chinese in October too!
• Eating a healthier diet made up of real food that I cook/prepare myself.  Lately (as in the last several months/years) I've been eating nothing but highly processed crap.  It's ridiculous!  I'm not going to worry about calories or fat or carbs or anything like that, but I am making a commitment to eat more vegetables and fruits and food I prepare myself.  I'm also going to be watching portion control since I WAY overeat.  I do want to lose weight.  I am going to lose weight.  Plus, I've noticed that I think better (more clear, and less depressive) when I eat a healthier, more balanced diet.
• Journalling.  Every day.  At least a page.
• Properly cleaning my teeth every night.  I do this on a fairly regular basis anyway, and of course I brush my teeth every morning as well.  My "proper cleaning" includes brushing, flossing, and mouth wash.  Right now I sometimes go weeks without doing all three.  That's got to stop.  I am going to floss and use mouth wash every night this month.  I'm fairly certain I have 3 cavities right now, and I can't afford ANY until I get that elusive full time job and have dental insurance again.  I'm determined that my teeth don't get any worse until then.  (Another reason to cut back the sugar and nutritionally barren crap food.)
• Weekly offerings and prayers.
• Weekly tarot readings.  Did ya'll know I've been reading tarot for nearly 27 years?  I've let my practice fall to the wayside, mostly, I think, due to depression, but I've been feeling the need to pick it back up.  So I am.
• Weekly and daily rituals.  Larger and small, respectively.
• Practical magic. Just to help with my odds.
• Write.  It's what I actually want to do with my life (career-wise) anyway.
• And I have a loose goal of applying for 30 new jobs, but that really depends on the jobs that open up, you know?  Still, I need to apply for a significant number of jobs, even if I'm unsure of the exact number.  When I get my computer fixed I'll rebuild the database I destroyed in a fit of pique a few years ago as I closed on 1000 jobs applied for and denied me.

So that's it.  So far.  That's my list of stuff to do this month.  My little things to make my life better.  It's a nice mix of a continuation of things I've been doing, things I've been planning to do, and things I used to do and have wanted to pick back up.  I think they're small and doable and not overwhelming.

Wish me luck!

I really need to do this:

This post is to remind me of something to do that will both benefit the library and look good on a resume for a future (maybe local) full time library job.

I want to put together a list, a pathfinder, or even a website like my Gothic literature website compiling every author I can find who has a connection to my area.  I don't know how far out I want to go with this, whether, for instance, I want just authors from the Kansas City metropolitan area or all authors from Kansas and Missouri.  Nor do I know whether I want to list authors who were born here (or around here) but were raised (and/or lived) somewhere else, or vice versa.  I'm leaning towards an all-encompassing list incorporating Kansas and Missouri in their entirety.

Things to include:

• biography
• bibliography
• links to author site
• links to free reads (if any available)
• links to library systems in the states? maybe
• links to booksellers

Any other ideas out there?

Discipline

My life of late has been chaotic, messy, and really no fun.  There are a lot of things that I can't exactly fix about it: the job situation being one of them.  Oh, I can work towards a solution, but it still depends on other people giving me a chance.  That is some thing that is pretty much out of my control.  So I've been trying to figure out what is in my control, what I can change to make things better.  And I'm thinking that I can use a bit of discipline - not the fun/sexy kind - but the bone-deep fortitude of knowing oneself, the strength of being.

I'm not entirely certain how to learn discipline, but I know I need to try.  It's no secret that without the regulation of school, I've been drifting, falling apart.  I don't know what to do with my time.  For a while, the freedom I had with my free time was thrilling, but now it's stifling.  I've been filling it with work, and that's no fun.  Especially since my work is not fulfilling.  Part time gigs when you want a full time job rarely are.

I interviewed for a part time job in the library of one of the local community colleges.  Afterwards, well, I went to my gig at the library, but when I got home I wept over the interview.  I really don't want it.  It's not worth the hassle.  Not giving me enough hours or enough money to really justify giving up one of my current jobs.  The only thing is, is that it's a "professional" position, meaning it requires an MLS.  What the hell kind of part time job requires a fucking Master's degree?  Talk about devaluing my profession.  I'm hoping they don't offer it to me.  I don't want it.  I know I'd be miserable in it, because 90% of the reason I'm miserable at my other jobs is the fact that they are part time.  If I'm offered the job, I'll take it, maybe, but the slight raise in pay and hours means that: 1) I'll lose my current ACA benefits and have to pay more for insurance, negating the pay increase I get, and 2) I'll lose the only day off a week of work I have (also my planned vacation at the end of August, and the long weekend in September I'm taking to go to my best friend's baby shower).  Misery stacked on misery.  But, as I said, if offered I'll take it, even though, at best, it's a lateral move that offers me no extra benefits.

Of course, I've basically been unhireable since before I graduated, so the likelihood of being offered this job is practically negligible. /rant

Anyway, back to discipline: I've tried before - many times - to introduce some semblance of rules in my life, and it really hasn't worked out.  But I need some type of structure to be able to both better my situation and follow my dreams, and since I'm a list-maker I thought I'd start with lists of what I want and need to do:

Needs:

1. Clean bedroom
2. Sand & paint bedroom walls & trim
3. Lose weight
4. Trim & tone my body
5. Quit smoking
6. Meditate regularly (for stress relief & other benefits)
7. Exercise regularly: yoga, aerobics, strength, stamina
8. Find/create social life (I'm so gods-damned lonely, you wouldn't believe)
9. Buy a new car
10. To weed and organize personal library (books & DVDs)

Wants:

1. To write
2. To dance
3. To celebrate my gods and the changing of the seasons
4. To garden
5. To have sex again, relatively soon, and on a fairly regular basis
6. To have tea on a regular basis, like with a teapot and quality tea

My upcoming/ongoing projects will revolve around these wants and needs.  Tomorrow, I've decided, will be my last day smoking, as it's long past time I quit.  I'm going to try to work out a schedule so that I can meditate, exercise, write, work, socialize, and sleep.  A couple of rules to make things easier:

1. My computer will no longer be housed in my bedroom, but at an actual table somewhere else in the house.  At least, until I rearrange the furniture and find an "office" space in my bedroom to house it, and maybe not even then.
2. I will work on my computer (writing, researching, not playing solitaire or dicking around on the internet) at least 2 hours nearly* every day, but no more than 5 unless the writing is going well.

Let's get schedule-ish too:

1. Poetry Wednesdays are back on this blog.  Every Wednesday a new (and original) poem will be posted.
2. Fiction Fridays are being introduced.  The last Friday of every month, starting in August, a new short story will be posted.
3. Regular (non-poetry) posts at least once every two weeks.
4. My bedroom will be cleaned and decluttered by mid-August; the walls will be sanded, washed and ready for painting by the end of August.  (My parents are having new siding put on the house in early August and painting shouldn't happen before that is done).
5. A new car will be purchased some time before the end of the year because my current car is not going to make it much longer.

That's it.  I'm going to have to think about this more, and discover, for me, what discipline really means.

*"Nearly" because 2-3 days a week I work 10-12 hours and I don't know that I'll be able to keep myself from just passing out after getting home, especially if I throw exercise into the mix.

Places I'd like to see before I die

Croatia: Specifically Ogulin, Croatia in the shadow of the mountain Klek about which there is the most fascinating mythology . . . Plus a faery tale festival (and that is so me).  Also, I'm fairly certain that Ogulin is where my family is from, so it would be nice to visit.

Barbados: No particular town, just along the coast somewhere . . . And I don't really have a reason other than the main character from one of my favorite childhood books was from Barbados.  It just seems like a nice place.

London, England: Okay, I know I've already been there, but I'd like to visit without getting the plague and being forced to wander the streets like a zombie.  It seemed like a nice place, but I wasn't able to fully enjoy it because of my aforementioned case of the plague.

Ireland: Maybe County Cork or County Kerry or really anywhere.  I like the sea, so the coast would be nice, but whatever.  I'd be thrilled just to be in the county.  Though I may have simply read too many Nora Roberts books (many of which are set in Ireland, or have protagonists that are Irish/of Irish decent).  I just have to be sure to avoid it if I'm pregnant, because I have no wish to be murdered by their idiot medical system if something goes wrong.

New Zealand: Just 'cause.  Okay, okay, it's because of Xena, the Lord of the Rings films, and no snakes.

China: Because the history of the country is so cool and I'm learning the language (or one of them).

Iceland: Because it just seems . . . awesome.

That's all I can really think of right now.  I'm sure I could probably add more, like pretty much all of the Scandinavia or more tropical islands or wherever, but, truth, a simple two week vacation to any of the countries/cities listed above would sustain me for years.