I purchased my first domain name this evening and am unreasonably giddy and bubbly over this development. I'm still making choices about web hosting, but realized I could go ahead and get the name I wanted and fuss over hosting packages later.
Here I come Interwebs!
PS Any of you hosting personal or business sites with recommendations for services, I would be glad to hear your experiences.
More than three months ago, I shelved this blog in a fit of despair.* I needed to find some way to put my head down and make my life work, and I hope I am now arriving at that point.
To that end, I'm rebooting this Vox for the New Year and am giving it the following direction:
- My Vox is going to remain a personal blog, about the tribulations and festivities in the life of a near-30-year-old woman living in the Sunshine State, married, raising her brother, feeding the cats and overpriced terrier. When I burn a loaf of bread, celebrate a report card, or have a funny anecdote to share, it will go here. If I like a movie, read a book, or have to out my obsession with Project Runway, it will go here.
- I'm setting up another blog to chronicle my creative aspirations and my fledgling attempts to sell the goodies and oddities I create. If you want to see pictures of collages, messy journals, and stitchery, it will go there.
While, in general, I have a big o' fear of overlapping my personal and (ha!) professional personnas, I also plan to do a kind of monthly recap on my Vox of how things are going over in artsy land. Mainly for the purposes of hoping to shamelessly lure you to my Etsy storefront, obviously.
I'm also going to take the leap and start pointing people who actually know me (other than you, Donut Pusher) to this blog. If you went to school with me or know me from some other venue, gosh, I hope I didn't rant about you in this blog's earlier incarnation. I kid, I kid...
To those in my Voxy neighborhood: Hey, thanks for keepin' me in your loop. If you had a baby, opened a business, got married, ditched the jerk, or otherwise made huge moves in your life since September, I hope they have worked out for you, and I'm sorry I didn't write. Special shout-out to the very creative Lorri, whose Vox I wandered into whilst investigating other arty-crafty blogs for inspiration for my new venture. There are so many very talented people out there doing amazing work, it is both inspiring and scary to me!
More soon, including 2007's "mayfly." (Don't know what that means? Looky here. Want to read 2006's? Looky here.)
* "a fit of despair": This phrase makes it seem needlessly dramatic, but things were very low on that day in September, and I don't mean to diminish my emotions or feelings about life as I felt them then. We were unable to make mortgage payments on our house, my mother's life insurance policy had been denied, and, in a less than ten-hour window, both of our cars died. Life was not peachy keen, and I still own that feeling of damnation and don't mean to make light of it with these four words.
Gratitude
This year, I have tried to take the time and expend the energy to be grateful for many things:
- for the one friend who said "fuck that" when I said I didn't need anyone to come to my mother's memorial service.
- for the friend who didn't let me go to the grocery store alone. for at least a month, if not longer.
- for seeing one of my best friends get married
- for all of the little and large victories I've celebrated with my brother
- for my husband's compassion
- for the physical space to get in touch with my arty side
- for the new job
- for moments of passion and beauty, for laughter and great love
- for proving to myself I could lose 10+ pounds
- for having this outlet
Broke
Emotionally, physically and, yes, financially I am broke, broken, and just suffering from an utter lack of imagination on how things might get better. I wish I felt I was being dramatic, I wish I was discounting a guardian angel or fairy godmother, but I long ago came to accept Z and I had to make things work on our own and that path has only gotten lonelier since I lost my mother. For the past year, since moving to help my mother and brother, we have honestly been doing the best we can. Unfortunately, it's just not good enough. Even when fortunes seem to be turning (eg, I get a good paying, fulfilling job) we have a day like today.
Done
I am done with life kicking the crap out of me. I am done with every
possible happy moment being absolutely smashed to oblivion by some new
insult to my desire to live a beautiful, productive, creative life. I
am plain tired of thinking I have reached rock bottom and having the
floor go out from beneath me. Honestly, my mother dying was supposed to
be the fucking low point of my year, but life seems to have turned 2007
into a twisted joke where I just can't do anything right, just can't
get my head above water. I am done.
Hiatus
Obviously, life is not allowing this blog to be what I originally imagined it to be nor do I much imagine it is the insight people want into my life. Until further notice, my Vox is on hiatus and will not be updated. I am grateful for the kind and funny people I have "met" through this site, I appreciate the ways you have inspired me and shown me compassion. Thank you for all you have shared and thank you for reading.
When Z woke me up this morning, I was crying. Not quiet little sniffles, but actually outright bawling. In my sleep.
I was having a twisted variation on an old recurring dream. The basis of the original dream is that it is the end of the semester at college, and I'm supposed to be getting myself packed to go home. There are many distractions and obstacles, including a formal dance, an altercation with a girl--strangely, from high school--who thinks I got it on with her boyfriend (maybe I did?), and a staircase that is one part Tim Burton, one part MC Escher.
At one point, I am at the formal dance and one of my classmates points out a girl dancing with her not-from-these-parts boyfriend. This is significant because that man would later become my husband. In a strange meta moment, the person pointing Z out to me says, "You don't remember me doing this, do you?"
Put off by the person breaking my dream's third wall, I attempt to return to packing up my belongings. Instead, another friend drags me off to this metaphysical shop where there are all sorts of elaborate wands and boxes. She wants to buy a box to share with me, and we look at several before falling in love with a multicolored, inky set of boxes. At some point, I am concerned about having offended the shopkeeper, so I offer to tally up her receipts at the end of the day. While I am sitting at a table, her myriad of papers and receipts in front of me, and trying to concentrate on the maths to do the job, many people come up and say goodbye to me. Z is eventually there, too, and I address him not as a stranger (as he was earlier in the dream), but as my husband. I tell him that I never imagined going home to my mother's house without her there and start to tear up, but he shushes me. Eventually, one of the administrators from my college shows up and hurries me along; apparently, he's to take me to the airport so I can get home. I quickly gather up my stuff, leaving the shopkeeper's receipts half done, and chase after him, with a strong sense that I don't have everything I need.
When we're leaving the main hall of my college dorm, I see my mother and try to say goodbye to her, but she brushes me off. She's not callous when she does so; it's more as if she knows it's going to be emotional and doesn't want to endure that.
Somehow, and the transition here is unclear, I end up in a car with my mother, and she is dropping me off so someone else (the college admin from earlier?) can take me to the airport so I can go home. At this point, I am aware in the dream that my mother is dead and I do not want to leave the care, I do not want to say goodbye. She tells me that this is what I must do and gives me a quick hug, fighting back her own tears, but trying to be firm with me. I get myself out of the car, but try to climb back in -- but she shuts the door and starts to put the car in reverse. Some unknown Rod Stewart song is playing, and I start to waver. My knees give, I fall to the pavement, clutching my bags and breaking down in tears. The car pauses in its slide away, as I wake up to my husband wrapping his arms around me, gently shaking me, trying to rouse me through my sobbing.
Even writing this now, I get a little shaky and a goosebump-like sensation goes over my skin.
I am typing to you from my pleasingly new work laptop, a Toshiba Tecra with a widescreen, a fingerprint scanner, Windows XP Pro (yes, I am in full-on Vista Avoidance Mode) and a sad lack of customization.
So, gather round Voxers and talk to me of your favorite productivity apps and websites (this is primarily a work machine, after all) and extensions for Firefox and Thunderbird.
What I've got goin' on now:
- Firefox (sincerely, after I made sure my antivirus and Windows updates were in place, this was my first download)
- 1-Click Weather (Why, yes, tomorrow it will be 92 degrees...)
- Adblock Plus
- Adblock Filterset.G Updater
- Add to Netvibes (anyone else using netvibes out there? I'm interested in your tips and tricks for this, too!)
- All-in-One Sidebar
- Better Gmail
- BugMeNot
- ChromaTabs
- Customize Google
- del.icio.us Bookmarks
- EverNote Web Clipper (I <3 EN. I used to have dozens of poorly labeled and organized text files, but this program really empowered my note-taking and -keeping.)
- Fission
- Fleck (I haven't used it yet, but maybe it's useful?)
- IE View Lite ('Cos sometimes you need it)
- Image Save
- Link Alert
- Locationbar2
- Morning Coffee (The only add-on I discovered on someone else's Firefox!)
- OpenBook
- Thunderbird (I use gmail for my personal account, but wanted this to handle work mail)
- MS PowerToys (Taskswitch, TweakUI, ClearType)
- Fox-it PDF Reader (if you've not heard of this, I accept thanks in the form of Amazon.com gift certificates, chocolate, and art supplies)
- Launchy (my first go at this thing, but the Lifehacker.com crowd loves it)
- Miranda IM Portable
- assorted virus, spyware, etc. stuff
Things I'm specifically interested in are calendar apps and to-do lists/agendas. With the former, I think I'm leaning toward gcal vs 30boxes, mainly due to an impression of greater flexibility in the Google product. The field is much more open and diverse with agendas / to-do lists:
Feel free to discuss the options in the comments or send me a message. Cheers!
You think you're normal. You think you're having a normal night, doing normal things. You chat with friends, kiss your husband goodnight, and think you are contentedly working on a sewing project. In the midst of this project, you realize a specialized sewing foot would solve some problems and go digging through the sewing supplies, trying to find said sewing foot.
Instead of a sewing foot, I found my mother's purse. The bloodwork from her last doctor's appointment, the funky coin purse she loved so much were inside. I discover she had $2 in her wallet when she died, a plethora of credit cards and a blank personal check (just in case). I find grocery receipts, shopping lists, and a receipt from the craft store visit when she bought a jewelry kit to make for her best friend. That project was never completed, like many others, and my mother isn't here to help me find the sewing machine foot, to teach me how to handroll a hem. And, like so many strange and unexpected things, it makes me miserably sad. Like the typically thick book she was reading around the holidays, her bookmark still in place. I found that, too, along with memories of reading the book aloud to her in the hospital when I had run out of other things to say.
Like I love you.
I miss you.
I found birthday cards your friends sent to you at Hospice and, finally reading them, see how many of them were trying to say goodbye in those inadequate Hallmark vessels and admire those who could see what I could not. What even now has the ability to bring me to my knees, to feel a primal pain and render me speechless.
Like so many things in the last week or so of your life, this is something we only share with each other. No one else is around to see me on the floor, clutching your purple bag and just sobbing. Your name is on my lips and you fill my heart, but it is nothing compared to having you here, to even be able to take your assistance for granted. Such a simple, yet impossible wish.
When my mother was diagnosed with cancer, she started using the phrase "the new normal" to represent her acceptance of how the disease impacted her life, but also wasn't going to stop her completely in her tracks. Instead of struggling against changes beyond her control, she embraced them--the new normal. And that's what I have now in my life--moments of fun, even happiness, but also the acceptance that these things can come from nowhere, filling my eyes with tears and stinging my chest with sorrow. Laughing and crying, missing you and yet picking myself up and moving into a new day--the new normal.
What do you have, what do you need and what do you want?
Submitted by Miss Scotch.
From the instant I read Miss Scotch's post, I knew I would have to make my own version of this list. I'm glad it got to be a QotD and will, hopefully, inspire others.
What I have:
A job, for the first time in almost a year; despite my fears of circumstances forcing me to take any ole job, I am actually doing work that challenges and inspires me; I am learning things and hopefully making a difference for the better. A brother I'm raising, a sister I'm getting to know, a husband who amazes me with his commitment and love and the world's best in-laws. Supportive, amazing friends, including a morning coffee buddy, people I can cuddle with and a best friend getting married in seven days. A bicycle, an iPod, a gazillion different mechanisms to cut paper. A decent ability to read people. A strong sense of right and wrong. Playfulness and a sense of adventure. A healthy and open attitude toward sex. A wish for people to be more
understanding of one another (remember Atticus' advice, peeps). A suit to get the job in, a dress to wear whilst accepting an award and another to be sexy in, and a bikini I love. Self esteem. Skillz and know-how to make my own web pages, paper, beer, clothes, beauty products and mixed drinks.
What I need:
A way to get to Virginia next weekend. More money coming in than going out. To have my mother's estate and life insurance resolved. Continued space to grieve. A recommendation for a good dentist who accepts payment plans. To trim the cats' claws and take the dog to the groomer's. To complete my thesis. The confidence to sell my crafty makings online and at fairs. To be a good and aware parent. To renew my auto tags. More role models and mentors in parenting and living my dreams. A longer attention span.
What I want:
To lose fifteen more pounds (ten down since June). To do shockingly well at my new job. To raise my brother to be a compassionate, confident young man. To have a respectful and communicative relationship with him, always. To have more patience. To go to Chicago and meet my sister. Another day with everyone I've lost. To make a habit of getting up early and exercising. To forgive my father and maybe have a relationship with him. To be the best friend I can to everyone who has helped me through this year. A tattoo and another piercing. To be surrounded by friends and family this holiday season and cook them an outstanding meal. To live up to my potential, express my creativity and make my mum proud.
What clothing item do you wish could be banned?
Submitted by Mike E.
Repeat after me:
Other people do not exist for my aesthetic pleasure.
Other people do not exist for my aesthetic pleasure.
Other people do not exist for my aesthetic pleasure.
Yes, I did write a big ole rant about this QotD, but I decided it was needlessly angry. Instead, I've whittled it down to it's most enlightened bit, posted above.
If I had been born XY instead, there was a chance I'd be known as Darth. Go ahead and guess what my last name sounds like. ;)What other names did your parents consider for you?
