Issues of Singularity - A Rant

I am about to turn 45 and I am single. Not in a relationship - of the "romantic" kind. Although I think that "romantic" is not really the proper term for it. It's not really about the romance, at least for me. That could be nice but I don't see that as the primary thing involved with those who are coupled or what I am particularly looking for. I am a fairly practical person and it would be really nice to have someone around who would make dinner sometimes, do some of the cleaning, help remember to pay the bills, help help help help. It's kind of a drag to do every damn thing all by yourself every damn day. It would be really nice to have someone to talk to at the end of the day as my job is really stressful. I am really good, I think, at being there for others but man it would be cool to have someone who had my back.

Much of the time not having a partner isn't really a problem, in fact I often think that it might be hard for me to adjust to living with some as I have only lived with roomates or on my own. I can be rather set in my ways, disorganized though they are. My brother and I have discussed the intricacies of living with someone and the things you didn't realize you cared about until the other did something different, or moved something. In fact, sometimes being single is just plain easy. No one to accomodate, coordinate with, no need to compromise. And yet....it gets boring sometimes. It would be nice to have a default date...someone to decide at the last minute, "hey let's just go out." To have some other music in the house. On Easter Sunday, not a holiday I celebrate, I was feeling rather alone. I was invited to dinners but the point was that it wasn't with "my people." Who are my people? My family is large and mostly east coast but even then my immediate family is rather small and both my father and brother have partners. I have many friends, again far flung and in various states of partnership/ family-dom. Even many of my single friends seem to have a group of regulars that they hang out with, do things with etc. My "groups" have always been more random, or diverse or something. Not really a set that gels and is consistant.

I really do have incredible friends. I am enourmously lucky in the friends I have and the longevity with which they last. And yet...when I go out of town I have to find someone to feed the cat. And now I have the goats as well. And I don't live in the city anymore. I don't know people out here. It's the freakin' suburbs. I have a business, that has animals that need care. I have taken this on myself. It saves my sanity on so many ways but it is so hard to do on my own. I now have a tax guy. WHen he tols me I was getting money back because the business operated at a los of such and such, at first I took it in stride as I know that it's the first year of a new business. And then I realized...I AM the business! How the hell did that happen? Where did that money come from? Ok I know where most of it came from but seriously? That much?

Every time I trim hooves, or buy hay, or clean the poo - I wonder where the help is. I get overwhelmed. It takes so long doing it by myself. It is so hard to get anyone to come out and help. Folks don't have cars or time or want to see the goats bu not do work. Not that I blame them - how exactly do you glamorize shoveling shit? I love that the goats want my attention, that they are bonded to me. And sometimes it feels like so much responsibility. Am I doing it ok? Are they happy animals? Am I really taking good enough care of them? How the hell do I get more jobs? Who will feed the cat while I have the goats in 45 min away? When am I going to exercise? Have I had a vegetable in the past week? And then there's the fact that I see desperate worn down people who have made some seriously bad decisions and are having to deal with consequences and need help 4 days a week. To pay the rent and bills and have health insurance and vacation days and because I believe in finding the best in people and helping those who are ignored and misunderstood. All I want is someone who has my back no matter what. I want a mutual leaning arrangement. Someone to integrate with my family and vice versa. I love my family and friends and want someone to create things with - not people - but other stuff. ;-) And I don't have the time to look - unless they happen to work at a feed store, own a home that needs goats or work in social services and aren't already married or gay.

Or maybe I am just tired and hormonal and it will all be ok tomorrow. I have made it this far, I don't *need* someone else, I just get so tired.

The times they are a-changin'

I can't believe how long it's been since I have posted. My Nana passed away almost 3 weeks after my last post and I am still feeling the loss. So much of my old life is changing, my reaining grandparent, my dad's mother, is now 93 and looking at moving into a supportive living community this summer. The old family gathering places are in major transition. My father is retiring this year as well. I am actually excited to see where this takes him.

Me? Well I got through the first season with the goat business! Didn't make money and got freaked out and anxious a bunch - but I have learned so much. And one big lesson is coming through today...I don't like my current job at all anymore. There are some good moments here and there but overall I am sick of dealing with the same shit day after day. And the reality is that HIV prevention and harm reduction just aren't inspiring me anymore. Hanging out with my goat "tribe" makes me happier than anything else besides hanging with my friends or family. March 5, 2010 was the day I knew I had to start looking for a new direction. Nearly 2 years later I am coming to the conclusion that I need to find a different "regular" job to keep me going until I figure out all the goat stuff and can make that profitable.

OF course I have moved as well. Closer to the goats and am finding that I don't really miss living in the city so much. I wasn't really availling myself of the benefits of city living so there really isn't a loss. And I am there 4-5 days a week anyhow still. For work and whatnot. Things seem to be happening in 2 year cycles so I am gearing up for planning what comes next...if I don't I will lose my mind.

Managing my life

Or not. My Nana, (mom's mom) was in the hospital earlier this week, probably still there. Again making me realize how far away from family I am. I have had lots of thoughts to post here but they are not coming to me at the moment. Thinking about relationships of all kinds. What kind of life I really want. I am glad to be going back east for Thanksgiving. That is always a good time for connecting. And now that this business thing is going on it should be really interesting. I will also be going back to the family house for the first time since Janet moved in. My brother has been there several times and now seems to be more at ease there and with my father and Janet. It was really good talking to him the other day and not feeling like we had to battle or debate about relationships with our father.
I am struggling on the food stuff. I am not eating well and I have been off of one of my supplements for at least 2 weeks and I think it is having an effect. I am so sluggish. I slept all day on Veteran's Day. No really - ALL day. Part of it I know is the weather getting colder and wanting to hunker down - but ALL DAY? I have way too much to do to be sleeping my days away. I have been eating an awful lot of refined sugar and caffeine lately as well. Cupcakes do not constitute a meal. I need to cook more and eat out less. Broken record there. Keeping my apartment clean would help I know. So hop to it girl!
Gotta get on the combining of retirement accounts as well. I want to be able to put that money into the business if I can. And accupuncture for my hands. And the gym. And running. So much to do....feeling sleeeeeepy.....

The ways of change

It's been a while since I posted. Lot's going on. I left work today and headed down to Pier 70 by the Sculpture Garden on the waterfront and Myrtle Edwards Park. I bailed on plans with someone feeling rumbly in the tummy and then also realizing that I wanted to be by myself but outside with people. It was a gorgeous evening. The sunset was majestic settling over and behind the Olympics. A cargo ship in Elliott Bay. The twinkling lights of Alki Beach in the distance and as it grew darker - the lighted ferries slipping across the water to and from their destinations. 3 people each with a Golden Retriever chatted near me, a 4th wandered by at one point. They attracted the attention of passers by. A slightly chilly evening, not too bad but enough that I was glad to have a fleece on, especially near the water. People talking as they passed by walking, running, biking. The water lapping on the stony shore below. The gulls cried out as they moved from place to place - directions to each other? Above there was the occasional sound of planes flying, ubiquitous around here. Then there was the the call of an approaching train behind me, the lights and warning noises for the cars and the steady pulse of the chugchugchug of freight being hauled or people traveling. Looking out at the intersection of mountains, sky and water from my fixed point on shore with all of this business around me, I remember why I am here. In this particular place, this geographic point. The moon will be full in a few days, beneath it hangs 1 star. Very still directly below the moon like a pendant, with bright clarity. Peacefulness can be found amidst the chaos of the comings and goings. There is such beauty in the simple observations. In fact, with the right focus, all of that "noise" can be felt as the rhythm of life, the pulse of a city that is alive and active. Sometimes this gets to be too much when my vision is foreshortened by staying in my office without windows, talking to people who are desperate and staring at my computer screen hoping that it holds the answer, at least one. My physical space needs to be opened up more. I need to be out in the world more, literally. It is too easy to be inside, within walls, in the "safety zone." My mind works better when it can breathe. When I can breathe. When I can see what is around me. I believe that is a major draw of the goat business. Being outside, connecting with nature. Able to be amongst people but not having to constantly be talking. I talk too much as it is. Maybe. Maybe it's what I am saying that needs to change not so much the quantity.
My co-worker and I have been talking to our boss' boss about stinky behavior and it seems as though something might happen. We'll see. It feels good to be talking about it though, lifting a weight off. We have each other and that is so helpful. I don't know that either of us would be able to do this alone. The problem is so long-standing and has affected so many past and present staff it is deplorable. I was actually wishing my mom was around this evening. In her corporate life, she trained managers how to be better managers. I want her to come teach my boss how to treat his staff better. He doesn't seem to know anything about managing people, or he's forgotten it all.
I am going to try to build a "Life Plan." Similar to a business plan but about the parts of me & my life that are involved in neither the business or the current job. That part has been lost in the frenzy, pushed aside, ignored. I don't remember what I like anymore. I don't go see movies, listen to music, explore the city, read fiction. Read much of anything. I live a cluttered, unbalanced life of adrenaline and crashing. Though not bi-polar I seem to run my life at these extremes. And it is exhausting. I don't want to grow old in this current way of operating, it does not sustain me, it drags me down. It makes every part of me feel heavy.

The new adventure

I have a houseguest for 2 weeks. My cousin has arrived from Japan to establish himself here in the Emerald City. In part because I am here and have experience working with people "like him." In other words...addicts. He drinks and hasn't been on his other meds and his marriage fell apart in Japan so he is back in the states now. It is an interesting thing this dealing with family. In part I think he needs my Social Work side but because he is family he is staying in my home. Part of me wants to give him all the freedom I would any guest. But he is not just any guest, he is not here for a visit, he is here to establish himself and thus has no other place to go. He has a spotty work history, a trail of very poor behaviors and decisions with other family members and, I assume, like other addicts, he will be on his best behavior for a period of time and then it will get easier to fall into old patterns again. It is so hard to maintain behavior changes. I haven't been putting the effort into staying on the South Beach diet and I know that it affects my health and mood - in a negative way, but it seems easier to blow it off then to stick with it. I drive too often to work when I have a bus pass that will get me there for free (!!!). So I end up being a single occupancy driver taking up space, polluting the environment and paying through the nose for parking - triple whammy! And yet I continue to stay up too late and wake up late and panic and drive to work.

Behavior change and motivation. What makes it click for any one of us? What is the breaking point and why do we often have to hit it so many times before we really change for good? Can humans ever change "for good"? As I get older I keep coming back to the fact that it (change, life etc) is all a process and one that we have to re-dedicate ourselves to every day and sometimes more than once a day. It's about having more good or "on" days than bad of "off" days. It is hard to live a life of absolutes, of nevers. Even peope I know with dietary issues sometimes fall "off the wagon." They pay a price but it will inevitably happen again. It is also about habits. I can't think of the last time I so much as pulled out of a parking space in my car without having my seatbelt already on. It's weird to me that this habit seems so easy and yet putting on the running shoes seems so hard.

I am also thinking a lot about what surrounds behaviors people want to change. I want to eat more healthily and yet I end up in the cupcake place often. And I realize it's not just the cupcakes I am after (though they are SUPER delicious), it's also that I know the guys that own the place and several of the folks that work there now as well - and they no me and what I am up to. It's a friendly exchange with folks whom I don't need to help, who aren't in my social circle per se but with whom I have regular encounters and we talk about events and my goat business and they are supportive and it's fun. I have proven that I can go in and just get coffee but the cupcakes help me linger longer and really, it's like an alcoholic going into a bar when they are freshly sober. I mean, I hid the liquor while my cousin is here - why tempt him? So I want to keep stopping in to the cupcake shop cuz it's more than the sweets but it's so hard to not get them. Maybe it's like telling drug addicts they have to get new friends. That is hard. Even if the friends weren't much as friends it would still be hard to not go to the same places and be with the same people but if you do, there are the drugs.

That's part of why my cousin says he is here and not where the rest of the family is and where he has spent so much of his life. He knows people, there are "triggers" all over the place for him. Here he may find what he craves but there aren't the emotional triggers and familiar people. So the hope is that he can make some new habits before he engages in any old behaviors and any triggers can develop. Unfortunately, alcohol and baked goods are all around and easy to access. We both have battles. Here's hoping for both of us.

effity eff

So I am off the South Beach diet. I am indulging in cupcakes again. This is me emotionally eating again. And I am noticing the effect on my mood and body - sluggish and irritable. My boss is driving me crazy - so hung up in numbers. I have asked to be cut down to 32 hours at the beginning of the year and now he wants fucking numbers to back up what day I want off even though we didn't do any of this when trying to figure out which day my co-worker would take off when she came back from maternity leave at reduced hours. grrrr. I did go to the gym tonight, only because I missed yoga cuz I was staring at my damn computer. I really do need to use timers when dealing with screens. I am Wondering how the hell I am going to manage 2 weeks of having my cousin here. He is young and his own family is fed up with him and he could be my client if he wasn't my family and I just hope he doesn't end up being both. I have new neighbors moving in upstairs this weekend as well.

Ok focus. One of my colleagues is looking to run the Rock-n-Roll marathon here in Seattle next June and I may have a new running buddy for long runs! That would be cool! I am finally getting motivated to do something with my 3 lacking retirement accounts. I collect them like I do pint glasses. None of these ones have very much money in them so I am hoping to roll them all together and get something I can borrow against for the goats. I am missing goats this week. Got to babysit the boys last weekend and that was good. Get to take Riley out for his birthday outing on Saturday - my cousin had to come in late enough that I could do that.

The best news is that my father is giving me a significant amount of money to start the business and that takes a big weight off - now I just have to get cracking on getting shit done. I decided last weekend not to go to Spokane for a beerfest - wanting to save money, wasn't feeling great and really the only reasons for going were to have a road trip and to see the bartender I crush on but with whom there is really no chance of anything more than that. I'll have to do a road trip some other time. The guy I am "sort of seeing" doesn't act like a boyfriend and even though that is really what I want - a partner - I haven't stopped seeing him primarily because of the sex. Which is damn good. I am still pissy over the other guy running off to another state to be with another woman. I just don't get it. I am scared going into this goat thing all by myself and yet I feel like it is something so totally my own.

I feel like I am never getting enough done on any given day to feel like I am making progress on anything.

Feeling Bi-Polar

What seem like rapid mood shifts between total elation/excitement and sadness/depression - pretty much all weekend. The ups have been - surprise - all about goats and my developing business. I got to work out at the New Moon Goat Rescue and Sanctuary on Sat. morning and see the famous abandoned goat Betty White. She is beautiful and skittish. I loved being around all the goats with their personalities and antics. The woman who runs the place has her own horses and goats and one of the horses gives one particular goats "kisses" all down it's back. So very cute! So I got some horse love as well as much goat love on Saturday. Hanging out with the other volunteer and her daughter in the sun with the animals was so peaceful and good for my soul.

Which was important since I was practically in tears on the drive up and later that evening. Through the magic of Facebook I figured out that a dear friend of mine is getting married and moving to another state this week. Now this friend and I have a rather torrid history and have a profound love for one another but for many reasons it has not led to an actual relationship. We have been intimate in person but that was, in many ways, the smallest part of our time in relationship with each other thus far. Even when he lived not far away in Seattle I rarely saw him. I have only seen him once since he moved to the east coast but in the back part of my brain/heart whatever, I have been holding out hope that he would return and we could get this thing right for once. That isn't going to happen now. And the thing is it's probably better this way. Who I want and who I need in a relationship have thus far been different people. I go for the ones I want but aren't really right for me. I don't really know if I have passed up any of the "right" ones because I didn't want them. I think that for the lasting connection there has to be a high percentage of both want and need (good for me-ness) for both people. No one and no relationship is perfect but all of mine have had fatal flaws that cannot be overcome simply by my wanting it to be different. The true reciprocity is what has been lacking - it's always been that one is more into the relationship than the other. Or it's not been working for either of us.

The cool thing is that this person and I had a long conversation and I cried, he felt bad and we know that we will stay friends. And I want him to be happy and this relationship-soon to be marriage- I think really has the potential to meet his needs and make him happy. By being married, he is fully off my radar of potentials. It's just how I work. I will re-adjust and hopefully be able to find the "right one" without now wondering about he & I. So it is a loss, but it's also freedom that I wasn't willing to give myself.

Then today has been the great goat business naming venture. I love my friends and family. They are creative and excited for me and supportive in this venture in a way that would not happen if I was merely changing jobs. I meet a friend for coffee this morning and she said that she hasn't seen me this happy in years....years! Another friend told me by phone a few weeks ago that I am sounding "like myself" again. This is fabulous for me to hear and it bespeaks the drag my current life has had on me. I am encouraged that I am on the right path for myself in the feedback I get from others not just about the business itself, but the impact it's having on me and the way I am being perceived. Truthfully I am getting super nervous about things, being in charge of that many live animals and their well-being. Mostly though I am giddy with the excitement of it all and the balance and peace I feel being around these amazing animals. This coming weekend is the annual adventure to the Puyallup Fair with my dear friend and our crazy rituals. More livestock will be pet. We will "Free our Glee" - as the tag-line incites us to do, and we shall do so with gusto!