life is very yay
A very tired but happy contessagrrl took a break from Burning Man prep last night to chat with me a bit. While I watched her nearly accidentally invent the peanut butter and marinara sandwich, she told me I seem really happy lately. Actually, she said, "Every time I talk to you, you're like, 'Whee, I have bluebirds flying out of my ass!'" And when I IMed B. the other night to ask how he was doing, he asked if I was drunk, just because I was so cheerful and goofy and exclamation pointy.
I don't know exactly where my life is going right now, but it's pretty darn awesome. For one thing, I am back in California, and even though I'm already missing some of my Boston friends a lot, it feels great to be back here. It's really good to be catching up with friends here. And it's great to be spending time with B. in person, instead of mostly talking to him in the abbreviated snatches while he drives home from work in the evenings (though it's odd not to talk to him while he drives home in the evenings!). Also, the weather is awesome, even when it's hot -- the relative lack of humidity means I'm much happier than in Boston. I'm looking forward to running and biking and generally being outside more now that I'm here. And I'm looking forward to being able to visit my family in Seattle a lot more easily, too.
Another thing that causes bluebirds to manifest from my posterior (apparently) is that I'm working on an exciting business venture that I wholeheartedly believe in, and I'm doing it with one of my closest friends. It's really hard to beat that. I hope we succeed in turning this into the awesome and useful tool that we're envisioning (and make it profitable enough that we can keep working on it). So far, I'm having a ton of fun in the early stages of the process even though it's a lot of work, and the workload will only increase from here.
The other thing that I think is making a great deal of difference to my mood is that I successfully defended my thesis. My feelings of confidence and competence and general good spirits increased by several orders of magnitude pretty much overnight when I defended, and have kept improving since then. Turning in the thesis was a huge hurdle that I wasn't sure I'd ever get past, and that made feel pretty darn good. But when I defended, I got a whole bunch of feedback that helped me see my work through others' eyes, and I realized that my committee and a lot of other people thought I'd done some great work. I think they're right, but it had been hard to see that during the months and years of dealing with so many small things not working right, so many things being really hard to get through, and being so focused on the details and on how unhappy I was at various points in time along the way. Now it's easier to see the big picture, and the results of all the effort. It feels amazing to be done, and far more so than I had ever predicted. I'm even in a pretty cheerful mood about writing the three journal articles that I'm turning my thesis into.
In summary: yay! There's a lot to figure out about the immediate future, but I am very optimistic that things will work out well, and very much enjoying myself in the meantime.
I don't know exactly where my life is going right now, but it's pretty darn awesome. For one thing, I am back in California, and even though I'm already missing some of my Boston friends a lot, it feels great to be back here. It's really good to be catching up with friends here. And it's great to be spending time with B. in person, instead of mostly talking to him in the abbreviated snatches while he drives home from work in the evenings (though it's odd not to talk to him while he drives home in the evenings!). Also, the weather is awesome, even when it's hot -- the relative lack of humidity means I'm much happier than in Boston. I'm looking forward to running and biking and generally being outside more now that I'm here. And I'm looking forward to being able to visit my family in Seattle a lot more easily, too.
Another thing that causes bluebirds to manifest from my posterior (apparently) is that I'm working on an exciting business venture that I wholeheartedly believe in, and I'm doing it with one of my closest friends. It's really hard to beat that. I hope we succeed in turning this into the awesome and useful tool that we're envisioning (and make it profitable enough that we can keep working on it). So far, I'm having a ton of fun in the early stages of the process even though it's a lot of work, and the workload will only increase from here.
The other thing that I think is making a great deal of difference to my mood is that I successfully defended my thesis. My feelings of confidence and competence and general good spirits increased by several orders of magnitude pretty much overnight when I defended, and have kept improving since then. Turning in the thesis was a huge hurdle that I wasn't sure I'd ever get past, and that made feel pretty darn good. But when I defended, I got a whole bunch of feedback that helped me see my work through others' eyes, and I realized that my committee and a lot of other people thought I'd done some great work. I think they're right, but it had been hard to see that during the months and years of dealing with so many small things not working right, so many things being really hard to get through, and being so focused on the details and on how unhappy I was at various points in time along the way. Now it's easier to see the big picture, and the results of all the effort. It feels amazing to be done, and far more so than I had ever predicted. I'm even in a pretty cheerful mood about writing the three journal articles that I'm turning my thesis into.
In summary: yay! There's a lot to figure out about the immediate future, but I am very optimistic that things will work out well, and very much enjoying myself in the meantime.