Happy 2010!
I passed my boards!!!!! EEEEEE!!!! I'm a licensed nurse anesthetist with a job waiting for me in Orlando. For me, this is the true start of the new year and of the new decade.
In 2001, I graduated with my first degree. I had gotten into a difficult program, and I thought it was what I wanted to do for the rest of my professional life. It wasn't. I spent the rest of the decade in search of a profession that would give me the freedom and flexibility I wanted (mostly to write books). I moved a lot. I tried a lot of things. I traveled every chance I got. I kept writing. I discovered that, although I can do anything, I can't do everything. Endless possibility becomes exhausting. I became depressed. In 2004, I decided to become a nurse anesthetist. There were a lot of steps to that process.
Around the end of 2005, Hughes and I moved out to Portland. We spend 2 glories years with our friends here, and I remembered how it feels to be happy. I had almost forgotten what that felt like. I wrote a book I am exceedingly proud of in 2007. Then Hughes and I accomplished our goals, and everything changed. He married the girl he was chasing. I married the program I was chasing. He and Laura moved into their first house, and I moved into a little one-bedroom apartment to spend 2 1/2 years in intensive study. We were deliriously happy, but in retrospect, it was the end of something precious. I wouldn't change a thing, but I'll miss that time. My other friends here all bought houses and started having babies about the same time. Suddenly, I was the only single person in our group. I was terribly busy, still not as lonely as I'd been for the first half of the decade, but stressed and tired and isolated.
When I got a good job offer in Orlando a few months ago, I decided to go for it. The market for CRNA's in Portland is poor. In Orlando, I can pay my loans off faster and live near friends I've missed. I hope that I return to Oregon eventually. Portland feels like home to me like no other town ever has, and I will miss Hughes and everyone else here more than I can say. Still, I'm excited about a change of scene, about sunshine and warm seas and tropical plants and awesome people I haven't seen much for the last 4 years. You never find Narnia in the same place twice. If I am happy in Portland again, it will not be in the same way or the same situation. No point trying to recreate what I had 2 1/2 years ago. Time to do something different for a while.
Anesthesia boards are hard. They have gotten harder recently, as the council on accreditation makes an effort to give them more teeth. I have been studying since Thanks Giving for 4-12 hours/ day. I spent most of the Holidays telling people that, even though I'd graduated, I really couldn't spend a lot of time doing stuff with them. My masters is worth nothing without a license. So, I'm half-crazy from being locked in my apartment with my textbooks for the last 6 weeks, but I now it's over, and I passed. Now I've just got to pick up the pieces of everything I've been neglecting here and say good-bye.
I haven't written any new books since I started anesthesia school, but I have written short stories and I have done creative projects. Over the last two years, I sold some stories, podcast one novel (The Prophet of Panamindorah), and began a full cast audio production of another novel (The Guild of the Cowry Catchers). I got involved with the podcast community, have done voice work for The Drabblecast and The Dunesteef, went to my first convention with fellow podcaster Chris Lester, and cannot wait to go to Dragon Con this year and meet more of these people! I feel like I have an extended family scattered all over the country. I have several hundred devoted listeners and several thousands casual listeners, and I I LOVE creating content this way. My apartment in Orlando will have a podcasting studio.
In addition, I think I'm going to love my job. I truly enjoy the complexity and responsibility of what I've been trained to do for a living. I'm looking forward to getting back into it, while also having more time for my hobbies and personal life. 2010 will be a good year and a good decade. I wish everyone who's still reading my journal a very happy New Years!
In 2001, I graduated with my first degree. I had gotten into a difficult program, and I thought it was what I wanted to do for the rest of my professional life. It wasn't. I spent the rest of the decade in search of a profession that would give me the freedom and flexibility I wanted (mostly to write books). I moved a lot. I tried a lot of things. I traveled every chance I got. I kept writing. I discovered that, although I can do anything, I can't do everything. Endless possibility becomes exhausting. I became depressed. In 2004, I decided to become a nurse anesthetist. There were a lot of steps to that process.
Around the end of 2005, Hughes and I moved out to Portland. We spend 2 glories years with our friends here, and I remembered how it feels to be happy. I had almost forgotten what that felt like. I wrote a book I am exceedingly proud of in 2007. Then Hughes and I accomplished our goals, and everything changed. He married the girl he was chasing. I married the program I was chasing. He and Laura moved into their first house, and I moved into a little one-bedroom apartment to spend 2 1/2 years in intensive study. We were deliriously happy, but in retrospect, it was the end of something precious. I wouldn't change a thing, but I'll miss that time. My other friends here all bought houses and started having babies about the same time. Suddenly, I was the only single person in our group. I was terribly busy, still not as lonely as I'd been for the first half of the decade, but stressed and tired and isolated.
When I got a good job offer in Orlando a few months ago, I decided to go for it. The market for CRNA's in Portland is poor. In Orlando, I can pay my loans off faster and live near friends I've missed. I hope that I return to Oregon eventually. Portland feels like home to me like no other town ever has, and I will miss Hughes and everyone else here more than I can say. Still, I'm excited about a change of scene, about sunshine and warm seas and tropical plants and awesome people I haven't seen much for the last 4 years. You never find Narnia in the same place twice. If I am happy in Portland again, it will not be in the same way or the same situation. No point trying to recreate what I had 2 1/2 years ago. Time to do something different for a while.
Anesthesia boards are hard. They have gotten harder recently, as the council on accreditation makes an effort to give them more teeth. I have been studying since Thanks Giving for 4-12 hours/ day. I spent most of the Holidays telling people that, even though I'd graduated, I really couldn't spend a lot of time doing stuff with them. My masters is worth nothing without a license. So, I'm half-crazy from being locked in my apartment with my textbooks for the last 6 weeks, but I now it's over, and I passed. Now I've just got to pick up the pieces of everything I've been neglecting here and say good-bye.
I haven't written any new books since I started anesthesia school, but I have written short stories and I have done creative projects. Over the last two years, I sold some stories, podcast one novel (The Prophet of Panamindorah), and began a full cast audio production of another novel (The Guild of the Cowry Catchers). I got involved with the podcast community, have done voice work for The Drabblecast and The Dunesteef, went to my first convention with fellow podcaster Chris Lester, and cannot wait to go to Dragon Con this year and meet more of these people! I feel like I have an extended family scattered all over the country. I have several hundred devoted listeners and several thousands casual listeners, and I I LOVE creating content this way. My apartment in Orlando will have a podcasting studio.
In addition, I think I'm going to love my job. I truly enjoy the complexity and responsibility of what I've been trained to do for a living. I'm looking forward to getting back into it, while also having more time for my hobbies and personal life. 2010 will be a good year and a good decade. I wish everyone who's still reading my journal a very happy New Years!