Oh the Babbling...

I've been doing a lot of thinking over the past couple of days (which is not really such a strange thing since I seem to over-analyze pretty much everything), and I've come to the conclusion that life is weird. How do you like that? At 31 that's how I sum things up. Life. Is. Weird. Profound isn't it? Marvel and the depth and nuances of meaning. Whatever. I've been trying to take an objective look at myself and my life and see what to keep, what to change and what to jettison entirely and it's odd. I guess I spend so much time wrapped up in the little everyday joys and traumas that I forget to look at the big picture. The big picture is so much better.

So anyway, here's what I've discovered. I've been thinking to myself everytime something happens that makes me feel icky or sad or whatever that I should've stayed in Japan for another year or two despite the Kohsuke debacle so that I could've saved up some money and maybe gotten myself a little further out from under this crushing monolith of debt that is my student loans. That would've been smart. And then I think that if I absolutely had to come back to Canada I should've gone with my first instinct and stayed with Marla and Adam in Surrey (shut up) until I found a design (or other) job and got back onto my feet. And never in a million years should I have come back to the island and isolated myself to the extent that I have. I mean Duncan? Seriously? Mind you, it was never meant to be for this long. The plan was to move to Victoria. Which, if you have to live on the island (don't get me wrong, I love the island...I just like the city too) is the place to be. And then there's my personal life. Let's just say I've made some extraordinarily bad judgement calls there and leave it at that.

But while I was sitting around mulling, sobbing quietly into Lilo's wookie fur (she totally has wookie fur! especially the feet) and watching bad romantic comedies (Just Like Heaven anyone?) I started to notice that for every crap decision I've made, something really good has come out of it as far as the big picture goes. Leaving Japan when I did led to me getting in touch with Doug which led to my design work at the college and the teaching thing which is what I had planned to do at some point but didn't have the means to pursue. So that's a big plus. It's also led to me applying to grad school much sooner than I had planned, which if I get into the program I want will be a very good thing. A saving my brain kind of thing. Because right now, I'm not so much with the intellect really. I'm becoming less and less s.m.r.t. everyday. It's troo man. :-) And staying in Duncan led to me living completely on my own, sans man or roommates for the first time ever and it's good. So good. A little lonely maybe but for the most part, great. Being in Duncan has also led to me taking up running which makes me feel so much better it's ridiculous. And while the extraordinarily bad judgement in the personal life department has led to a pretty big hit to the self-esteem (ouch, my feelers!), that hit has consequently led to a greater motivation to keep running and taking better care of myself and get back to being that strong funny woman I seem to remember I used to be. Didn't I? What do you think? I'm kidding. I've discovered that letting your guard down is good, but letting it down to the point that you forget that you can actually take care of yourself is not so good.

And what else? Well, I guess this whole situation for the last year and a bit has given me breathing room. It's forced me to just stop moving for a bit and face up to where I'm at and what I need to do to get to where I want to be. To actually sit down and make some decisions in my life rather than just reacting in a kneejerk fashion to whatever comes my way. And that's definitely a good thing. A scary thing, but good nonetheless.

I've also discovered that I like saurkraut (even if I can't spell it and still don't know how to make it) and brussels sprouts which makes me feel a lot more grown-up really. Don't know why. It just does. Which is good because it's a rare thing for a girl with an apartment full of toys, who is currently wearing pink, glittery skull and crossbones earrings to feel grown up in the slightest. :-) Yay me!