"So come pick me up. I've landed."
-- Ben Folds, Landed

As i was poking around on the Tufts University website searching for the course catalogue, i was tempted by the big red candylike button (or blue, as the case may be) that announced that there are, indeed, Careers at Tufts. I hit it. The top position posted for the day was an Adminstrative Assistant for the Residential Life program there. Huh.

Huh.

My mind raced. I love colleges and universities! I could take classes foR FREE! It would only be a 5 minute drive or a 20 minute walk to work! WOW! i wanna work at Tufts! So i redid my resume and submitted it online. I also put in two cover letters -- one totally professional, and one more personal explaining that i really want to work for THEM in particular.

Haven't heard anything back yet, but that was only Thursday.

A little early to be looking for a new job? Well, i'm not looking exactly. This was a job that jumped out in front of me. But what gave me the licence to apply after only being at my current job for four months was this... i'll tell you the analogy i like so well:

Global Protection was like a family. An abusive family. This is not news to anyone. I loved it so much because of the false sense of security, and i hated it because of how i was (mis)treated. It kept me so stressed out that i didn't have the energy to go anywhere else. But i finally did. I went to the hospital. FMC provides me with what i needed to heal. It doesn't ask me to get emotionally involved with what i'm doing or who i'm working with. It's a sterile environment, nurturing, quiet and peaceful, easy to get along with. It doesn't ask me to do anything i can't do.

I have learned a lot in my time there -- as useful skill set to make me a more rounded person after years of abuse. And it's been a good recovery. And now that i've had that recovery, i'm ready to leave the hospital. I thought, when i started there, that it would be a good place to stay for a few years. But that was from the perspective of having been beaten for a long time. Anywhere looked like a better place to be for a few years.

Now, i can see it for what it is -- a good place to have been. A successful healing grounds. And definitely a good place for me to be until i find the right situation for myself. For example, it would be really nice if i didn't have to factor in an hour and a half to get to the hospital and an hour and a half to get back. Either way you cut it, i have healed, and i am ready to go out and be challenged again -- to work for a place i believe in again, and this time, i'll have the skill set to really leverage myself to get a happy medium of challenging and healthy at the same time. I'm ready to go back out into the world.

I don't want to get too involved in a job search, because that would require more emotional effort than i want to put in -- where i am right now is a perfectly acceptable place to be. And it's hard to feel ok with where you are if you're constantly thinking about getting out of it.

I have friends on the outside helping me though -- it so happens that one of my friends was recently hired as a staffing agent, and loves the job, because she gets to help people all day. They get a lot of jobs for colleges and universities. Huh.

Huh. She has my resume.

BY THE GRACE OF THE GODS!

Hear ye! Hear ye! The Tetris Gods have heard my prayers! No sooner did the game arrive, and did i set my prayers upon them, that they then showered their grace and good will upon me! I now have the good fortune of a functioning Original Nintendo! With the help of round two of the Holy Can of Air, the Tetris Gods bestowed upon me the status of Tetris Priestess, and i am now the keeper of Original Tetris, to be played at least once a day until the end of time. This is my duty to the gods who have made my life worth living.

Praise be to the Gods!

Good Idea, Bad Idea

Good Idea:
Me taking a course this fall at Tufts Urban and Environmental Policy program this fall:
http://ase.tufts.edu/uep/academics/course_catalog_results.asp?semester=Fall&year=2005 (scroll down to UEP 207). This ought to give me enough hands on information and experience to decide whether to apply for the masters program there.

Bad Idea: Getting an Original Nintendo on ebay when the seller hasn't play-tested it for 2 years. It doesn't work. I have to get it cleaned.

ORIGINAL NINTENDO.

it has arrived. original tetris will be coming separately soon. good luck getting ahold of me for a while...

i guess i should eat something green before i hook it up though. all i've had all day is chocolate. god bless PMS for justifying it. AND for allowing chocolate to ACTUALLY make me happier during days like the one i just had.

Divine Intervention

a couple of non-sequitors, though all important.

1. i realized the other day that it is only through Divine Intervention, every single morning monday through friday, that i am able to make it out of the house in a relatively timely fashion. i came to this realization when someone asked what exactly i do before i leave the house to go to work, and i couldn't rightly remember. it's as though something else acts through me, and the longer the day goes on, the less i remember about what exactly happens. Divine Intervention.

2. my friend and co-worker has recently been diagnosed with stomach cancer. this is terrible news, of course. she started a blog partially as therapy and partially to offer information about the process. it's intellectually fascinating, as well as amusing -- i must say she is in extremely good humor about the whole thing, and in addition to being informational, it's good to read. check it out if you would like. i've updated my sidebar, but here's the link: http://jennys-belly.blogspot.com

Sorry it took me so long...

my day has been pretty good. right now things are great. i have the house to myself! i have suffered from having very little alone time, and it's hard to get your thoughts in order if you don't get that. at least, i have a hard time with it. but daN is helping aria get a desk from brookline, so i'm here at home baking bread :) it's wheat free! i think this one will turn out well. i tried to make some yesterday, and the dough fell after rising for too long, plus i used too much yeast, and i am embarrassed to say that it really ruined most of my day. it's too bad, too, because daN and i were having such a lovely time up until then. he dealt with me magnificently though, and i told him how thankful i was. we finished reading harry potter 6 to each other a few days ago, and we miss reading to each other, so he started reading the first one to me yesterday afternoon to help me get over my funk. (fortunately, the bread right now looks EXTREMELY promising. i'm excited).

otherwise, we've been attempting to deal with the heat. it's just been so miserably uncomfortble recently! i'm sure that didn't help my mood.

last night my friend laura took a couple of young women out for drinks on a gift certificate she got to this southern bbq place called redbones. it had a really cool atmosphere. the nachos were great! and so were the mojitos... :) had a couple of those. i was glad i didn't drink too much last night, too. another not so great moment in my recent history is that i got really drunk at the company party (like everyone else did) and i lost my glasses. (did i already tell you this?... sorry if i did). the good thing that came out of it is that i got a new eye exam and found out that i need reading glasses TOO. so, now i have one pair of glasses for reading and another pair for distance (which should be coming in the mail very soon now). ah well.

AND i bought an original nintendo with some games on ebay! i am so excited! i don't like new video games very much, and i've been wanting to do this for LONG time. i got it all for 50 bucks! such a good deal!

what else? i've been busy. i've been doing something every night, and i can't tell you what. i've still been taking yoga occassionally, when i can make it. let me tell you, my body notices when it's been a couple weeks. i think i can make time for it tomorrow. i need it. i've met people for drinks/dinner, i've been talking with professors at tufts, and i've landed myself a spot in a class at tufts in the department of urban and environmental planning and policy. YAY! that department looks fantastic, and the issues they discuss will be more useful to me for a career in maine than the classes at any of the other university departments in this area.

i guess i should check my bread. i think i might also make this really yummy granola bar thing. i've been needing to create things a lot lately. it must come from a general need to express myself or something.