I'm wearing a ratty old tshirt from a long-past sales conference, a pair of oversized sweatpants (frayed at the ends because I had to cut off five inches of fabric to render them midget-sized), and a brand spanking new pair of slingback open-toed heels. I figure I should make a small attempt to break them in before I wear them to the management offsite I'm going to in July, which was enough an excuse to liberate them from their box, caress them lovingly, and slide them on. Granted, wearing them while sitting in a papasan probably doesn't do a lot to break them in, but I'm in love! Whether my resolution to wear more professional-looking clothes to work on a regular basis lasts beyond my first 60+ hour week remains to be seen, but for now I'm excited about looking like a productive adult rather than a sleep-deprived college student. Of course, right now I look like a sleep-deprived college student with a strange penchant for shiny heels, but I'll get the rest of my outfit put together before I go back to California.
I really need to start packing, I suppose; my room is starting to drown under a tidal wave of rapidly-accumulating piles of stuff, and I need to start putting stuff in order, figuring out what to take and what to leave, etc. But it's so much more fun to do what I did today -- sleep in, take some pants into town to get them shortened (leading my brother to snidely remark that it would be cheaper for me in the long run to do the excruciating leg-stretching procedure than to keep getting pants, skirts, and tops shortened), read a book in the sun, and visit my sister and her kids. In fact, I'm hoping to have a similarly-relaxed day tomorrow; I'm going to try to get up earlier and start organizing my room, but I also want to spend some significant time in the sun and get back to editing my novel. Grand goals, eh?
I'm excited to see my friends, and it will be nice to work with people again -- but it's a shame that I can't be perfectly happy in either Iowa or California. When I'm here, I thoroughly love the laid-back pace, the wide-open spaces, the frequent brushes with wildlife (both animal and human), and of course spending time with my family, but I miss having friends and eating salads (shocker, I know, since I usually disdain salads, but salads in California are way better than salads here -- and my doctor wants to check my cholesterol when I get back, and I shudder to think what it will be after six months of eating steak, brats, hotdogs, tenderloins, bologna, hamburgers, bbq pork, etc.). When I'm in California, I love the social aspects, the easy access to tons of different cuisines and lots of nice cafes, and the winter weather -- but I grow to despise the constant hum of civilization, to the point that I sometimes have to take a drive up into the hills or over to the coast just to get away from people for an hour. The problem is that I don't know where the happy medium is; Des Moines would give me a lot of the advantages of a city, but I don't have any friends there either. And California is too far away from Iowa to live there forever; it would be ideal to be within a day's drive, or at least with an easily-accessible direct flight.
I need to stop thinking about this. I've made up my mind to go back to work, which is the right decision for now, and I'm excited for the next period of time I spend in California, even though I haven't yet decided how long it will last. I need to focus more on what I'm doing with my life rather than where I'm doing it; and that means finishing the romance novel, starting to write the next one, and searching for an agent and a publisher. It also means deciding what types of jobs I want to pursue at work and committing to keeping myself more balanced than I was before. And none of that is going to work itself out tonight, so I'm going to go to bed!
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