Let's catch up...

I know, I know. I am a terrible blogger. My last entry was in March and I am sure I have kept everyone hanging by a thread in anticipation of what has happened to me and what path my life has taken now. No? Ah well, for my own amusement, I’ll summarize the last six and a half months.
I have moved. I have uprooted the two cats, the dog, myself and led our small family into unknown territory, following my boyfriend to Northern California. Justin recently graduated with his Masters in Urban Planning from UCI in June and happily accepted a job in affordable housing in Downtown Oakland.
Then the question came, do I go with him? Do I leave my job at UCI with the lovely scientists and amazing home cooked pasta gatherings? Do I leave my friends and my family and travel up north to the Bay Area with its promises of cooler weather, clear skies and San Francisco? And also, did I mention, I’d be unemployed? I would be a twenty nine year old, single -ish, ahem, girl, with no job, two cats and dog completely dependent on my boyfriend.
I recognize that people move to farther regions, people also may have to singularly support, say, a child, as opposed to my furry companions. But, it was a huge decision, and one that threw me into Jekyll and Hyde like fits during a two week span.
So, big surprise, I chose to take a chance on fate, and here I am, typing away while I stare out the window into the Alameda Bay marina. It’s foggy and raining, quite the contrary to what I have been recently told about Southern California’s weather at the moment. I take Basil on walks in the morning and evenings. We’re fortunate enough to live practically on the water so we watch boats and yachts cruise by. Basil likes to time it so that during these moments he’ll do his dirty business just in the moment when the boats onlookers see his good work and my even better work as a good Samaritan who cleans up after their dog. Thank you very much.
I’ve fortunately found a job in the School of Business at UC Berkeley and as a cardinal and gold blooded Trojan, (don’t strike me down when I say) Go Bears! Even though my Trojan sweat-shirted self has been glared at on numerous occasions when I go running in the city and the car has been “booh-ed” at the mall due to my SC license plate. Ah well, what’s the saying? You can take the girl out of Southern California, but you can never take Southern California out of ….never mind…
But the thing is, I took a chance, small, but it was a chance. And while I believe anything can happen in just a second, a moment, that can change your life, I’m happy that I chose to, and I am happy with the outcome.
Every so often a flock of Geese will fly by our apartment window, this usually terrifies the cats, and on my walks I’ll see tall long legged cranes searching the water for fish. My mom tells me these birds bring good luck. The air holds that hint of crispness to it, and you can smell the salt from the sea. Justin will come home with his bicycle helmet on, one pant leg rolled up (we sold one of our cars, we’re sooo Nor Cal now) and after he shoos Basil away from biting his ankles, we’ll smile, because we have each other and now we have a new home in the East Bay.

"The waiting is the hardest part"....thank you Tom Petty

Arrg! So, I applied to the Creative Writing and Literature Ph.D. program at USC for the third time. This is my third year in a row. I am now three years older since my first application and my first rejection. I go from hopeful to depressed. The stats, I've been told is that they get 300 to 400 applicants a year and only accept 3-5 people. Who am I kidding! Anyways, I still do not know what I want to do when I grow up, and yet, I'm at the age where I'm supposed to be grown up. I only know that I would like to write and that I would like to teach at the University level. I have been fortunate in the past to teach at the Community College level, which I actually really enjoyed but, then, budget cuts were made for school funding and many a class disappeared and with them, many a teacher's job...mine included. This left me to therefore enter the big bad world of corporate office work for another two years, and then, now at a University, but in the Administrative section, which, I have to say is much better, but still, leaves me wanting.
This awful sense of waiting and anticipation has sucked my soul dry. I am forgetful, clumsy and I slur words because I am so much in thought about "what if?" that I appear slightly drunk...which is really sad and disheartening, because there is no tendency to giggle uncontrollably at people's sentences or to dance at anything remotely resembling music..trash can lids being thrown...I don't know....sigh...
I come home and find solace in my pets... and then anger because the puppy has taken a disgusting liking to eating out of the cat litter box. I know he knows it's wrong because when he hears the regular "Why!", he retreats under the bed.
I dislike the waiting, it has lead me to write only about my dog eating cat droppings. That also is what my conversations have been reduced to. "Oh, hi, yes, yes, I'm good...Still waiting to hear back about school...probably rejected..you know my dog won't stop eating cat poo..yes, yes, disgusting habit, but I know he knows it's wrong..aww...cute little guy though, disgusting but what a cutie, huh?"
I have also picked up the habit of checking my horoscopes daily. One said that I would hear wonderful news on March 4th. Yes! I thought, that must be it...nothing...this feeling of the unknown is really unsettling. I know that no matter what happens it'll be fine, I'll just be miserable for a week and then slightly ok, and then I'll just have acceptance with a blank stare on my face.
It's just that life is nothing as you expected when you were a kid or in high school. You visualize it being a certain way, or that you would be at a certain point by now, but you're just still climbing, still trying to figure things out and still deciding where to go. The exciting thing is that a year from now, I'm not sure what I'll be doing or where I'll be. My boyfriend graduates in a few months and will be searching for jobs...but in the meantime, this "let's look at the unknown" as being exciting, is actually rather tiring...and if I buy the wrong juice again because I forgot my glasses at home again...