Long Time No Speak

Ah, where to begin other than "It's been a while, eh?". Well, it has been a while and I have been rather busy, but now I actually have some time to write...

We're officially living in New Mexico now...and it's definitely not Belgium. Truth be told, I miss Belgium with a passion like you wouldn't believe. I've met some wonderful people here so far, but, I'm not a fan of the heat. Or the drivers...the ridiculous amount of time it takes to get from one side of town to another. Just..meh. I miss the lush greenery of Europe in addition to how slow paced it is. New Mexico..uh, Albuquerque to be specific, is a whole different beast that will take some getting used to, that's for sure.

Since we're going to be here for a while, we ended up buying a home which is now my personal project. We STILL have stuff in moving boxes since my attention had been divided between working and painting projects. Now, I'm no longer working due to a Viper infesting the work environment... I didn't get paid enough to put up with constant verbal abuse. So, I opted to leave and start my painting business that I had going when I lived in California. Hopefully that will pick up some speed and I can rely on that for a main source of income rather than being someones personal whipping bitch. Besides, who wouldn't want to be their own boss and do something they love? Plus, now that we're back in the States, I can get my camera fixed and get back into photography since there's some pretty interesting desert scenery to capture on film.

There's so much more to catch up on, but frankly, I don't have the focus right now to type out everything. Lots and lots are going on at the moment, but, I figured I'd at least do a post so people knew I was still alive and kicking.

Now that I have time, I should be able to post more consistently.

Take care,

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Moving Mayhem

Aye Aye Aye! I'm sorry for the lack of posts, but I swear, I've been a very busy little bee. Between being in Scotland for two weeks (got stuck there longer due to bad weather) and the movers packing up our house, I've been trying to catch my breath.

So, here we go! 

Last week, the movers arrived bright and early to get the whole show rolling. Truth be told, I barely prepped at all. Call it laziness, call it procrastination...frankly, I just didn't care. Yes, really. With all the things that are going on, I just don't care. I realize it sounds bad, but, I think all of us hit that "wall" at some point where you throw your hands up in the air and just deal with whatever happens. I *was* responsible and put our important documents to the side so those didn't get packed, hid suitcases with prepacked clothes in addition to hiding the dogs carriers.

Bright eyed and busy tailed, the moving company descended upon our house with their prepping van and moving truck. Oh my gosh..my street is kind of narrow, so it was interesting to see other large lorries roll down the street and squeeze past our temporary road blocks. The guys were having a little team meeting when it came to figuring out how to attack our stuff..then started the mayhem.

The four man team rolled through our house like it was nothing! All the boxes throughout the house started giving me flashbacks to when we were moving from Vandenberg to here...it's crazy how fast time flies! 

The living room

Kitchen

My office

Macie & Izzy inspecting the movers packing job..

Of course, harassing the poor movers all day long really tuckered out the ankle biters:

Over the course of three days, they got everything packed up, shifted around, and then loaded up into the massive moving lorrie. There were some items I was extremely curious about them getting out of the house since we had a heavy chair in addition to a large table on the 2nd floor...and they intended on removing them through the window. Yeah..that boggled my brain a little bit. Turns out, they have this hydrolic lift that they set up in order to bring down multiple boxes in addition to furniture. This...this I've never seen before, so of course I recorded the guys in action: 

The crew was very nice and made sure to take extra care when it came to wrapping and packing up my pottery, antiques and travel trinkets. I think it's because Eric and I did some schmoozing by stocking our mini fridge with all sorts of drinks, making coffee & tea for them in the morning in addition to buying them lunch every day. Hey, some people think it's silly to do that because it's their job to move our stuff, but it doesn't hurt to be nice to the guys who are handling YOUR valuables. 

While they were packing and making more boxes, Eric and I became a little obsessed with their tape dispensers  Yes, really. If you pack and ship stuff as frequently as we do, then you know how much those dispensers with the handles are a major pain in the ass. These guys had something that was SO incredibly simple, I'm shocked that I haven't seen 'em in the States before. 

By the time they were all finished up and ready to roll out, they actually gave us two of the contraptions  because they really appreciated how much we took care of them in terms of food / drinks. Normally, I'd tell them not to worry about it..but we wanted those dispensers, LOL. So, yay! We'll be keeping one while the other goes to my Dad since I know he'll use the hell out of it.

The only casualty out of the whole packing event was our kitchen light. Truth be told, I hate that thing... it hangs down low enough to where you smack your head on it despite being vigilant of your surroundings. Apparently I wasn't the only one having issues with it since the movers cracked their domes on it several times each...

So, our stuff is on it's merry way to the States and we should hopefully be reunited with all of it sometime next month, or possibly April. Is it sad that I'm already dreaming of when I get my beloved bed back? Well, and my kitchen.....mmmmmm...large kitchen space......

A few days later, it was time to ship off my beloved Big Blue. The last time we did that, I was a little scarred by the whole experience since the shipping port in California was run by some massive assholes. This time around, the guy we worked with was extremely nice, had an awesome sense of humor got us all taken care of. He even let me go give her a hug, and tell her my good-byes. Go ahead and laugh at me, but she's my baby.

The plus size to shipping off my Xterra is that the interior has been completely detailed...I don't think shes looked that nice since I bought her! The downside is that I gotta buy gas the second we roll out of the pickup place because you can only turn your vehicle in when it's almost empty :( Nice fat gas bill in California...yayyyy. 

There you have it! A little run down of all whats been going on. Lots of stress, lots of cleaning, and lots of sleeping on uncomfortable surfaces. Only 11 more days till we're stateside bound! 

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Footing

Oh goodness...where do I even begin. 

*DEEP BREATH*

I haven't been too active lately when it comes to writing some beefy or interesting posts for my blog. Honestly, I've lost the desire to write. I don't want to really do a whole lot of anything anymore. Hell, I even gave up on my camera...I don't even know where it is..it's somewhere around here. Oh, and my home businesses...given those up as well. All three of them. Buh-bye. 

It feels like I've hit this imaginary wall of total bull shit and anxiety that I can't seem to move past...I dunno what it is. Actually, that's a lie. I know exactly what it is, but there's a whole lot of "nuthin" I can do about it. For the last several months, I've been fighting some serious depression which has made me feel like a shell of my former self. I don't want to go anywhere anymore, I talk to a very limited amount of people, I suck at getting back to people via email, I screen phone calls, and I have a ridiculous amount of anxiety when it comes to going anywhere near individuals I don't want to be around. 

I'm told "Oh, it's the weather that's making you feel this way". No, no it's not... it's the people. At my ripe age of twenty nine, I'm still learning that the only people you should rely on is family, and friends who are family. Over the last three and a half years, I've definitely learned who my friends are and who was a complete waste of time. I've learned who my true friends are, who is a friend out of convenience, and who has forced me into viewing them an enemy. It sucks, especially since this is somewhere where I've made fabulous memories with a variety of people...and I am now forced to wipe some them from the adventures. 

In my eyes, I'm a push over. I put up with peoples bullshit and lies for the sake of not causing waves. I get told that I'm "too nice". Is there something wrong with being nice and going with the flow? I'd rather invest my time with making memories, having laughs and all that other fun shit. But, apparently that's not how it goes...at least that's how it seems for this place. Where I was hoping to make a gaggle of new friends, I've made a few good ones...but others have showed me how sharp they keep their daggers when the time comes to plunge it in others backs. It's depressing and makes me wonder about myself.... THIS is the type of person I hang out with? What the fuck.. 

At this time, we have eight or nine months till it's time for us to move elsewhere. I'm excited all while nervous because, to be frank, I don't want to end up at another small base where women are catty bitches. It's a constant grind and emotionally draining. I don't want to put my self "out there" anymore..I'm perfectly content with what friends I have. I'm sure that probably sounds so "woo is me", but I've just had it. I've had enough with people lying to me, letting me down, falling through, flaking..oh the list goes on and on.....and on..

In addition with that weighing my heart down, I'm also addressing some health things that have made me wanna curl up in bed & not do anything. Since November, I've been in and out of the doctors office to figure out what's going on with some severe pains I've been experiencing in my stomach / intestines. Thanks to socialized medicine, it takes 10x longer to be seen, hear results, more blood work and all that fun shit! In March, I was rushed to the emergency room because I had a serious infection in my large and small intestines in which they took blood samples and did ultra sounds. Found nothing aside from the infection...yay? Once the infection is clear, the pains are still happening and causing extreme discomfort. Finally get an appointment to have a biopsy done (that happened in April) and I just got my results back on May 3rd. The doctor still can't find anything, but has decided to test me for Chrons disease, which frankly scares the shit out of me. So, between getting poked, stabbed, scanned, popping medications and avoiding anything with flavor..it's all wearing me down.

I'm twenty nine. Come on now. 

...I'm just trying to get my footing back. 

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Itchy Trigger Finger

Sorry it's been a little bit since I've blogged. Between running around and taking care of errands, then my stomach problem flaring up, I haven't been feeling too motivated to sit down and type out a bunch of stuff. So, my bad!

Let's see here... we're basically a month and a half away from potentially finding out where we're going next for our new base. I'm rather excited about it since I actually like (yes!) moving to experience a new place. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Belgium and all it has to offer, but I'm ready to find a nice place to settle down, buy a house somewhere and just have our solid foundation for "home" set. I guess Eric missed the window to where he could see what our overseas options were (oh well), so now we're just hoping for the best when it comes to stateside. Sure, there are bases that we specifically have in mind that we want verses ones we want to avoid like the plague, but that's all up to the Air Force in terms of what we're dished out. 

Of course when you're trying to mentally brace yourself for a big move, especially when it involves changing continents, you go through all the motions of deep cleaning / purging anything and everything under the sun you don't think you'll need / want / use. So far, I've purged my office...in which I didn't realize I had as much crap in there as I did! Next I'll be working upstairs in the "man cave" since I'll have a lot of time on my hands for the next several weeks, then slowly moving towards the garage since there's tons of stuff that hasn't been used in, well, years. Of course I can't really conquer that area with Eric's seal of approval since there's a lot of his goodies and collections boxed up. Heaven forbid if I toss any of those by accident. 

And, I'm guilty of house hunting & day dreaming of our new place. It's a little sickening. Since we have absolutely no idea where we're going, I've been looking up real estate for the bases we want to see what the housing markets look like. Odds are, we won't live on base since we both didn't like how the base housing was at Vandenberg when we were stationed there. Given, every base is different...but the outcome is usually the same: small housing for Enlisted folks and the homes are pretty shitty unless you're way up on the food chain.  Not to mention, we have a fair amount of fur balls that probably wouldn't be allowed on base, lol. In addition to that, *I* like having my privacy, which is a sparse luxury when it comes to living on base. Given, you can have nosey neighbors when it comes to living amongst the civilian population, but it's different. I don't know how to explain it, really. I would just prefer to not live in a confined military community, especially since Eric has just a little over four years left. I'd rather enjoy the last years, lol.

I'm ready to get this show on the road! It's hard to plan for things when there isn't solid ground to build it on!

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The Oak Tree

The Oak Tree

by Johnny Ray Ryder Jr.

A mighty wind blew night and day.

It stole the Oak Tree's leaves away.

Then snapped its boughs

and pulled its bark

until the Oak was tired and stark.

But still the Oak Tree held its ground

while other trees fell all around.

The weary wind gave up and spoke,

"How can you still be standing Oak?"

The Oak Tree said, I know that you

can break each branch of mine in two,

carry every leaf away,

shake my limbs and make me sway.

But I have roots stretched in the earth,

growing stronger since my birth.

You'll never touch them, for you see

they are the deepest part of me.

Until today, I wasn't sure

of just how much I could endure.

But now I've found with thanks to you,

I'm stronger than I ever knew.

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Art is not a thing; it is a way.

Some of my readers have known me for years (prior to starting this blog), while others have known me since I've moved to Belgium. For the ones that have known me for quite some time, you know that I did paintings, sculptures, restoration pieces and a lot of other types of media art pieces. I absolutely loved where we were in California because I loved painting Golden Poppies, enjoying the cliff side landscapes near the ocean, or just enjoyed making random doodles and coming up with spinoff designs. 

When we were in the process of moving here, I was extremely upset that I couldn't bring any of my paints. NONE of them. I have hundreds and hundreds of dollars worth of acrylic and oil paints that are in storage (and most likely unusable whenever we move back to the States) in addition to a lot of my other supplies. I managed to bring my conte' crayons, pastels and other "solid" work mediums with me, but it's upsetting to have to buy the majority of the stuff to replace what's missing. Sure, I can buy stuff on the economy here, but, it's expensive. Given, good quality art supplies are expensive as is, but with the exchange rate sucking right now (and in general), I end up having to pay more for simple things.

Despite living in a beautiful country, traveling and seeing fabulous places...I've been in this funk where I haven't really been too motivated to work on any pieces. I can honestly say that a lot of it has to do with my Mom passing away. Most of the pieces I did after her death were not along the lines of what I normally produced, which caused the majority of them to get tossed. I essentially "retired" from doing anything since I wasn't in a good place of mind. . Most of my pieces are in storage back in California, or I sold them off to friends in the process of moving since we were wanting to get rid of extra weight. I think there's only 1 of my paintings up in our current house, and it's actually in my office rather than in the hallway or the living room...I suppose I see it as good enough for my office for me to see, but no one else. As I was working in there yesterday, I pulled out my "tackle box" of supplies to see what all I still have on hand, found my easel and sketch pads...it's interesting to see what your "mood" was several years ago when you see it reflected in a scribble.

I'm getting the "itch" back that I used to have. That's a good thing, right? Some days, I feel like I can verbally express myself when it comes to how I'm feeling, while other days I feel like it's a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" kinda thing. It's easier to just keep what I have to say to myself verses actually just saying something, because, everyone..in some way.. gets themselves involved in something even though it doesn't involve them from the get go. Know what I mean? Maybe, maybe not. Stress relief, I suppose. Seems like everyone uses me as their venting well or secret keeper, which there's nothing wrong with that because I appreciate that they feel they can trust me...but, I can't seem to get that respect in return. Nothing is ever really kept "between" people, in a sense. I dunno...I'm rambling, but I don't feel like I have that sort of "reliability" with people, so I rather invest myself into my old hobby / profession verses setting myself up for additional headache and drama. 

On that note, off to scribble my cares and worries away..

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