Obstatunity Comes from Strategery: Part II

Back before we moved out here to Arizona I wrote a post on Matt's working situation which I just went back and re-read as I tried to decide if 'Obstatunity Comes from Strategery' could have a sequel.  As you brilliantly surmised from the title of the post, yes, yes it can.

Only this time it’s my freaking obstatunity.  And I'm planning to run with it.  But first, seeing as though you already know me and know the way it works around these parts, I'll give you the back story.

A year ago I started classes at Ashford University as most if not all of you know.  I Googled the school, read good things, did my research and all that stuff.  But I also did the same for the couple other Universities in question.  I'd been paying back student loans for a couple years from my 2 prior failed attempts at higher ed-u-ma-cation so if I was going to go back it needed to be the right thing.

When it came time to choose I went with a couple factors:
1) School needed full accreditation
2) School needed to have the program I was looking for (BA English)
3) School needed to be fairly well respected

There were 2 out of 3 with my old University that I'd had phenomenal success with - the Art Institute.  Sadly, the one thing it didn't offer was a BA in English.  I narrowed down and chose Ashford. 

For about the first 5 or so classes I was happy with my choice!  Some of the Instructors seemed invested, the course work was recoculously challenging and I actually felt as if my dollars were going to something worthy.  Not to mention Ashford used almost all of my AI classes as transfer credits for all my needed electives so I was already a junior level when I entered.  Right where I'd hoped to be after already investing far too many years in higher learning.

I dove in and studied my fucking ass off, I blew off plans with everyone in order to study, I popped at least 3 veins in my brain while completing the course work to maintain my 4.0 GPA.  And I did.  That accomplishment alone made me proud of myself, and it made me realize I was on the correct path in pursuing a Writing career.

Then suddenly last fall I started to notice that more and more Instructors started to care less and less - as evidenced by their blatant lack of response in class and outright disappearing acts.  I also noticed the course work was snore provoking.  As nice as it was for the first class to go from studying a literal 45 hour week down to 10, by the fourth I was getting frustrated.  But I only had a year to go until that degree was in my hot little hands.  I kept pushing the brick wall.  Kept talking myself into the fact I needed this degree, that I had to have it.

Then all this utter bullshit happened and I really started to question:
1) The need for the degree in the first place
2) The dedication level I'd really have if I stayed
3) The validity of the degree in question.

I was torn not only just on paying the non-existant bill but on staying at the school even if I did.  I had no clue what to do, I was at an impasse in my brain.

Then all of a sudden I realized (with a little help from a friend) that if I keep going to school the only thing I'm going to get is more debt, more popped veins and a degree from a shady University that I won't even really want to tell anyone about.

Instead, it would be far more worth my time to study at the University called the World, read, write, network and publish my fucking book, man.  I'm so far in the hole enough already that I can hardly see how to get out.  But then I feel like I caught sight of the first rung and it feels great.

Do I feel like a failure for withdrawing at the end of this class?  I did before but now I just feel like all the time I'll get back for myself will be better spent creating my own obstatunity - the one where I actually Write for a living, sell my writing, create contacts, network, whatever the hell other Writers do.

Obstatunity - Continuing my education by reading the shit I want to read.
Strategery   - Using that education to further my own career and pay back the exorbitant loan money I already owe without taking on even more debt.

I started getting serious about writing not too long ago and now I'm just looking at all of this as my glowing neon sign to get out and get on with my life.  I'm not getting any younger and a degree from Shady University will do nothing for me in the long run.

It’s not giving up, it’s changing my mind.  Because it’s time to evolve.

Getting Through It

I turn thirty eight in a couple months. To some of you that might not sound very old and in reality I agree with you, but I just keep thinking that at this age my mom had a fourteen and eleven year old.

(Good fracking Lord, I can not even begin to imagine what my life would be like if I had a teenager. I mean I’d most likely be on welfare seeing as though our apartment barely holds us and we pretty much just get by with necessities. Well, either welfare or I’d be dead of cancer by age 50 because of all the chemicals in the cheap crappy food I’d have to eat so my baby could have a chance at eating healthy…)

Regardless, when I went to my first prom my mom is in some of those pictures with me and is about the same age as I am now.

My twenty year high school reunion is coming up this fall and I just keep thinking ‘but I’m not old yet, right?’ I keep having to remind myself that middle age is just a big load of crap no matter what we read in my Psych class that age 35-65 is considered middle age.

Really, Psych books? Sixty five? I can’t peg any 130 year olds that’s for sure, but I have known quite a few seventy six year olds so that just reinforces my thoughts that its all a quick slide downhill from here for me. Sorry sixty five year olds, I’ll be catching up much sooner than I’m comfortable with, believe me.

As I look back over this first half of life I’ve led, there isn’t anything particularly earth shattering or grandiose that I’ve done. I was born, got picked on in grammar school, made new friends in junior high, had a steady boyfriend through high school, did sports, went to work, withdrew from college, moved in with a boy, ran a retail establishment, drank and danced way too many weekends away, moved out on my own, had a lot of sex, met & married Matt, renovated a 150 year old house, started a company, wrote a couple manuscripts, filed bankruptcy and skidded into today with a lot more gray hairs than I had twenty years ago.

My chest hurts just thinking about it all.

But not to worry, not having a heart attack, just a little heartache for how quickly life really does pass by I guess.

So as I look back over all of these times in my life there have been a vast number of people who have been there with me through certain things. But, I rarely asked for help dealing with stuff. I liked to just kind of live my life according to my own terms and requesting advice or accepting assistance from others meant I was living according to how they wanted me to live, not how I saw my own life going.

In the end, I guess, to answer today’s request for a photo -- a picture of the person who has gotten you through the most -- I have to go with, me.

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Catch up on anything you missed  30 Photos, 30 Days
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Measuring a Summer’s Day

Tangerine, my favorite Led Zeppelin song of all time, comes to mind at this very moment because it just so happens I’m eating a fruit of the same name. At this time of year they’re everywhere in mesh shaped nylon baggies so no matter what store I find myself in, if I’m perusing the produce department, a bag of these juicy little balls of happiness are definitely coming home with me.

Some folks could probably have named this post Oh My Darlin’ but to me tangerines just make the world a little juicier than a Clementine. Maybe it’s because of Page’s stunningly simple lyrics full of complex visuals (if you know the song this should make perfect sense), or the delivery of those words through Plant’s haunting reflective tone, or maybe its that Jones & Bonham come in at the exact right moment to bring stability to the growing legs of the well timed guitar solo. Maybe the reason I love it is because it isn’t perfect but it’s out there to be loved anyway.

Or maybe I love the song so much because it reminds me of a nostalgic love so strong it could never be forgotten, and the person it holds in the palm of its hand was that very thing to me.

Innocent and stupid and new, ready to grab the world by the scruff of the collar and drag it along behind us as we blazed a trail. But at some point I realized he wasn’t with me anymore so I looked back to try to find him but he had mysteriously disappeared. Then I spent so long watching behind me for where he had gone that I missed the fact that life fell out of my hands and passed me ages ago.

If only things could stay so simple as Bonham’s back beat. But they rarely do, if ever. So at this time of year I find myself reflecting voraciously, as if it was an activity I’d never done before and may never get to do again.

It always starts out with the year that has just flown by in the blink of an eye and all the things I remember about it, and then it spirals into a trip down the cobble stones of memory lane.

Of course this year was struck with tragedies of massive proportions that would be hard to ignore, like earthquakes and oil spills. But it was also filled with amazing things of beauty like a close friend having a healthy baby girl or seeing a double rainbow in upstate New York.

In the past year:
♥ a good friend moved back to the area
♥ I completed the edits on my first novel and started shopping it
♥ continued to play drums every week
♥ went to countless shows (including finally seeing Bushwalla live on his own, Seth Glier, DMB, BNL and Jason [of course])
♥ one of my favorite actors died (Haim)
♥ saw my sister on her coast
♥ spent time with friends and family (on the other coast and mine)
♥ finished helping to clean out my grandparent’s place
♥ watched the final season of a long favorite television show (Lost)
♥ took on a few paint jobs
♥ walked to support Alzheimer's research
♥ spent tons of time laughing & joking with Matt (in the car and at home)
♥ went fishing (and actually caught some!) with old friends
♥ witnessed the kids in my life get even smarter as they became another year older
♥ saw a couple Sox games live at Fenway & a few Bruins games live at the Garden
♥ dealt with a flood in our basement
♥ experienced a summer full of hot sunshine (bliss!)
♥ started an extreme exercise program (P90x - bring it!)
♥ joined a Book Club
♥ signed a lease for a second year in the same place (call Ripley’s!)
♥ drank with the local townies at the Jersey shore
♥ sold a few things at a craft fair
♥ wrote most of my second novel
♥ kicked Matt’s butt repeatedly in Scrabble
♥ and so many other awesome things I couldn’t begin to list more

Well I could but would any of you read a day by day accounting of my lame-ass life? Probably not.

As I spent the last year getting healthy in mind, body and soul it started becoming more clear that my life is longing for another grab it by the balls and have at it adventure. I know there’s still a couple weeks left this year so I don’t completely rule it out for happening in 2010 but it just feels like 2011 is calling to me from the future. That next year is where the great escapade will be found.

Become a published novelist? Celebrate ten years married? Get my body back in shape? Quit smoking? Something else? The world is open, and so am I, to the possibilities that exist. Bring on the adventure 2011, even if that adventure is wrapped in a moving truck traveling 3500 miles across this great country to the Valley of the Sun!

Someday I will no doubt look back on that journey and think about me and Matt taking it together.

“Does [s]he still remember times like these?...And I do.”

The Effort, The Voice, The Missing Pieces

Like Aerial in The Little Mermaid, I feel as if my voice has been literally pulled out of me. All of my words are seeming to fall short or are far to convoluted to complete a train of thought that anyone can follow other than me. In times like this I tend to turn inward, review myself and eventually everything comes spewing out in a matter of a couple days but it has been far longer and I can not wrap my head around anything because everything is up in the air and out of place.

Life will never be the fantasy world I want it to be because I am not the only one living it; true I am the only one living mine but with seven billion-ish people on the planet that is quite an array of outside influence in my choose-your-own-adventure story to make things turn in ways I never considered. This is not a scripted movie. At least I hope its not. Never in my life have I lived with regret and I do not intend to begin doing so now. I have to persevere and contemplate but make my choice for myself without looking forward or back. I can only do what is right for me and I can only live in the moment right now. Changing the details of the past or mapping out every aspect of the future is impossible.

My life is in flux in many ways right now and although it is all connected it makes me feel as if every wire has been pulled out of my personal circuit board and left exposed to create sparks separately. Individually they are basically harmless but blend all the sparks together and that will create a level of voltage that I have never quite faced before. Instead of dwelling in the drama that comes along with life’s currents I have made a conscious decision to cap off the ends of those wires and shove them back inside my brain as I throw the switch to kill the power.

At this moment I am going to shake it off completely, continue to load up on analogy but relate to nothing other than my own heart and mind. I will not speak of it anymore because I need to figure it out without the billions who live for themselves telling me how to live for me. Moments of fun seem far gone and I want to get them back.

In the spirit of that, here is a story to break the tension and perhaps help my mind relax back into its old comfortable place of goofiness. This is created completely from the 41 words on our Scrabble board and fifteen additional words so the story flows. Where I have added words they will be underlined. Enjoy!

Delay icy exit, or dote as chefs amp the crew with a dowel. Find the ream in a bin. Tug it down dazed, jot XI in ink on the keg. He gave no rune? Oy. The fib is flat as a rug or bib. Even a trio of grazers get whiny in the attic. Los squalos, la puma.

Squalos is not actually a word but I am sure we used it as if it were something in Spanish before acquiring a dictionary. Does any of it make sense? Not really but then that is what I feel for the world right now, this just brings me back to a simpler time and makes me feel like maybe there is still a fun loving and loved person trapped inside. Like a New York bagel; crunchy outside, all squishy and warm on the inside.