Off to WEB2000 for the next 3 days. On the off chance that you know and recognize me, be sure to say hi—it’d be nice to see some familiar faces.
October 2000
Liz, this one’s for you: So I was noodling around in my bookmarks tonight, trying to find that hilarious Gore/Bush rapping Flash animation that was going around a while back, and I came across the pinnacle of all Flash animations. It’s been way too long since I laughed this hard. Warning: Do not listen to this at work!
A Little Something About Change
A topic that’s been on my mind a great deal of late, both my attraction and resistance to it. I don’t know if I will ever thrive on change the way some folks do, but one result of getting ready for this move is that I’m beginning to make my peace with its inevitability. My life will change whether I leave or not, just in different ways. And I have to remember that my complaint a few years back was that life wasn’t changing enough. I complained loudly and often about feeling stuck in a rut and unable to move. So it seems a bit pointless at this juncture to be loudly complaining the reverse. And the truth is, I am looking forward to the change. If it works out like so many other things in my life, I will dive right in once I’m up there and make the most of it, once it’s really come and all the horrible anticipation is over.
All this is really a roundabout way of reflecting on another big change in my more distant future: I’m going to be an auntie! Not a family friend auntie or even a step-auntie, which I was already looking forward to, but a full-on, oh-my-god-my-brother-and-sister-in-law-are-having-a-baby auntie. I got the call just a couple of hours ago, and I haven’t really processed it completely, so all I’ll say for now is congratulations to Lee and Tanya! I can really hardly wait to get up to WA and see you now!
I guess it was about time that I started having serious second thoughts about this moving business. I just wouldn’t be me unless I had a good knock-down, drag-out round of second-guessing right before I follow through on a big decision. So, for the benefit of all the little voices in my head (you know who you are), “Oh my God, what the hell am I doing?” (Hopefully that’ll keep the little buggers satisfied a while.) In the meantime, I will maintain my split personality, with one side of my brain in panic, and the other in blissful denial. As long as the see-saw stays level, that’s the main thing.
I am really getting to the point where the emotions are welling up about this whole thing. I want to document everything that happens, which of course interferes with it actually happening. I find myself sighing a lot, and trying to remember that while there is loss involved in a move of this magnitude, there were good reasons for the decision, and a lot of great potential adventures to look forward to.
But it’s hard, as a creature of habit, to deal with the change up front. For smaller decisions, it’s easier to pretend that things won’t really change that much. This one’s just too big to do that with, and so I’m going through these last weeks here very conscious of the ways friendships and family can change when the distance between them changes. And I worry, because I’m very good at it, that moving so far from my friends will cause some kind of irreparable damage. But I suppose that’s part of the reason I’m doing it in the first place: not as a test of my friends, but of myself and my own faith in the strength of relationship.
Another fine time last night—drove over to Scotts Valley for Heather’s birthday. The plan had been to go to Ciao Bella for dinner, but that was called on account of weather and the restaurant’s lack of contingency planning. However, I think that the resulting party was possibly even more excellent than that outing would have been. We ordered in from Dharma’s (mmm…Tempeh Reuben), Heather’s parents brought lots of yummy dippy things and a delicious cake, and we all spent the evening generally being silly, playing Gestures to great comic effect, and and watching Legend of Sleepy Hollow. And tomorrow she officially turns an ancient 30! Happy birthday, Heather!
Today was the first day I started packing things up. I brought home all of my toys from work and got them into a single box, and stripped down the desk in preparation for selling it. And garbage, more garbage! Lots of paper for the recyclers, and random remnants getting tossed. If I’m feeling really brave I may tackle the refrigerator. I also mailed all of the magazine address changes and paid bills. It’s good to get all of this done today—the top-secret project is heading into its final two weeks, and I’ll be gone most of this week at WEB2000, so not much is going to happen here at the apartment until Mom arrives next weekend. And then, a flurry of activity! I can’t believe it’s only 2 more weeks. Two Sundays from right now, I will probably be getting ready to stop for the night somewhere in Oregon.