hello 2020

 

Wow. I haven't used this blog since 2013. Seven flippin' years. According to researchers, the body replaces itself with a largely new set of cells every 7 to 10 years. So, that means I'm a brand new person since my last blog post. Sorry, it's just science. 

It's actually kind of wild. In January of 2013, I was a 29 year old college student; I was a senior and in my last months of hell. I was living in a large, yet somewhat dumpy apartment in Lindenwold, NJ with only my little black mess, Gizmo. I was working part-time at DSW and trying to work out a way to get an internship in California. Now, I'm 36 years old and I'm living in a smaller, yet nicer apartment in Long Beach, CA with only my little blonde terror, Harvey. I'm working (from home now) full-time at Roland U.S. Corporation and working out a way to not lose my mind. A lot of things have changed and yet so much has remained the same. 

I could go on and on and pick apart the expectations I had at 29 vs. the reality of 36, but I don't know how productive that would be. I'm not sure I'm ready to throw myself off that cliff. I'm trying to keep myself on solid ground. I stopped documenting my life in order to keep my head above water. I was a journal keeper most of my life, but after a few months of living in California, writing about my days got me in a very dark place. Documenting that I did nothing and saw no one was defeating. Dictating all of my heart breaks and disappointments got to be too much. I came to California with a lot of optimism. I was looking forward to leaving a lot of ghosts in NJ, living closer to my mother again, and getting a fresh start in the sunshine. It'd be an understatement to say that things didn't turn out so sunny.

I didn't open this old blog to rehash the last seven years. Overall, what's done is done and cannot be undone. But maybe in order to regain my former self, I have to regain parts of myself I've left behind. Maybe I need to have something to read in another seven years, even if it's only me who's going to read it.