1.5 Years with Katrina, 3 mos. Working
Katrina and I have been a couple for 18 months as of tomorrow. It has been working out wonderfully. We both stay present and awake for our relationship and are kind and loving toward each other. We are always willing to listen and to figure out what our real feelings are and how to meet both people's needs - all of the needs of each person are important. We try not to leave things unresolved... maybe overnight to get some sleep until we can think more clearly, but never longer than that. I predict a long and mutually rewarding future for us. :)
I have also thrown myself into my new job. It's a great team of folks, and we are making progress toward meeting our goals. The system is a large, impressive supermarket scanner with dozens of cameras and processors in it. As each alpha and beta release looms we are each contributing significant pieces. Mostly I've been cross-porting bits and pieces of experimental code into an application built on a commercial embedded Linux distribution, so that it may be compiled in the native development system, for an Intel Atom-based PC, and for a plethora of ARM-based microcontrollers. My experience with networking and system administration in Linux is also helpful. It is fun to be a part of this all coming together.
Time and energy demanded by work have left most of my hobbies and social activities aside. My photography is almost stalled as I do not have the quiet, unstructured time to post-process the photos on my computer. I will, however, teach a workshop on Better Dance Photography at Saqra's Showcase on April 28th. I still pick up the guitar a couple times every week. I have been trying to bike commute to work and look forward to more nice days on which to do so. I am hoping to get away to do some camping and backpacking this summer with Katrina.
I miss my Mom and brother. I now only get to see them about once/month, now that I live 120 miles South of them. I miss my Portland friends, too. I'm glad I get to spend time with my sister Cathy, her husband Jeff and sometimes their (in his 30s now) son Aaron, more than I used to (they live in Eugene).
My beautiful mountain home in Colton is still for sale. It went on the market four months ago. Realtor's listing, an awesome Video, and great photos by Kris Tabor. I'm guessing I am going to want to cut the price on it. I'm also considering having an art and music open house on June 10 featuring the photography of my friend Debi Friedlander. This would also give me some incentive to pretty up the place for that day. I'm thankful for my job so that I can afford to keep the mortgage going on this home, although I would love it if it could find new owners.
Life is always a compromise, I am feeling very happy. I love my life. I feel so fortunate.
