Tag: #California

  • New Stress

    I have been gone for some time, and the reason is that life has become a little difficult.

    Mainly, my wife lost her job. She was laid off the week we returned home after being evacuated for the wildfires, so that was a particularly awful week. We have been dealing with it.

    It has made us face some of the very harsh realities of living in California. Unfortunately, we aren’t in a position where we can get by unless we are both working. They gave her a little severance, which has made things easier, or at least manageable, to get through the Holidays.

    What this feels like is that we have been under constant stress for a solid month now. First, the thought of losing everything we owned, then being faced with the fact that we don’t have a support system in the place where we live. It made us feel very isolated, and that feeling has been shucked off still. With her job gone, and that was one of the big reasons we moved here, it has created a “come to Jesus” moment for us; why are we here, and is this really what we want to be doing?

    It has been a month where we have been fighting more than normal. Nothing serious, but we have increased the frequency that we pick and nag each other. I even noticed that the kid has also started acting up, when she would never do that before. The stress has affected and infected all of us.

  • Diversity

    Why do I strive for diversity? And for that matter, why do most people my age and younger feel the same way?

    I have been thinking about these questions often, not only for the political environment that we are in now, but also when it come to my child growing up. I want her to be exposed to as many different people as possible. In New York, that was pretty easy, and I might add happily, diversity is California has been wonderful as well.

    I think that this desire for diversity in me comes from attending integrated public schools, from kindergarten to my senior year of high school. That was 13 years of being exposed to kids that were nothing like me, and at the same time, we all behaved like kids. I have a picture from the birthday party where I turned 10, and in that picture are six boys, each of a different ethnic background. And I know that I am not the only person who can say that from where I grew up.

    Sadly, I now realize, the first time that I started hanging out with only white people was when I went to college. University was so completely socially segregated that now it seems odd that no one ever brought it up.

    My point is that I believe that it is vitally important that kids be exposed, and learn with, as many different children as possible. What scares me now is that I see parents, through gentrification, creating segregated schools again.

  • Walking

    So… I have been doing the video work out stuff, and I pretty much hate it. I’m doing it, but I hate it. And again, it’s the fake level of excitement of the people in the videos that really bother me. Now, I freely admit that the system works, so it’s just the thing I have to deal with. I hate working out, but I want to lose weight and live for a while.

    I have been following the routine for two weeks. I have also adjusted my diet, and focused on getting 8 hours of sleep, and no more late-night snacking. And the results…

    Nothing…

    I have neither gained or lost weight.

    Last time I did this, back when I was living in New York, I saw results in two weeks. I could clearly tell that positive changes were having an effect. So, why is there no change this time around?

    I thought about this for over the past few days, specifically what are the changes from the last time, to this time?

    And then it hit me.

    I checked the pedometer on my phone…

    In California, I average 500 steps a day.

    In New York, I averaged 8,000 steps a day.

    I have lost the linchpin of my ability to get into shape; having to walk everywhere.

    Looks like I will have to get back to running…

  • Positive Thinking

    I just have been thrown off with not finding a job right away out here. I was told the California market was a good place, but I have been here a month, and still no job interview. I sort of thought, clearly incorrectly, that having experience in New York would at least allow me to get my foot in the door.

    Not so much.

    In my other career, I had hired a good number of people over the past seven years. I thought that this would have given me the ability to know how to work and handle presenting myself in the best possible way to employers. That logic hasn’t paid out, and I am a little confused.

    Part of my confusion also comes from the fact that the longer I look for work, the more I start to think that there is something wrong with me, and that I just might never get a job again!!! It’s a downward spiral, and the more I sit around looking for a job, the more I start to think that my situation is hopeless.

    And that is the real trick is life; staying positive in difficult situations. (Again, a skill I thought I had, but maybe not so much.) Maybe I was positive in an abstract sense, only about things that touched the periphery of my life. When things get bad, I say the positive thing, but harbor the negative thought in the back of my mind.

    But, as I have left my old life, and I am starting a new one, then I have the opportunity to lead a positive thinking life. (See how I did that?) And then that makes me think that positive thinking is actually faith and hope that things will be better.

    Rabbit hole here…

    I just need a job…

  • DMV And Mass Weed

    So, if it has DMV in the title, I bet you can see a cliché story coming about waiting in line for hours.

    And you would be partially correct.

    I now live in California, and I needed to go and get myself a California drivers license. To speed up the process, California allows you to fill out forms online, and have them waiting for you at the DMV. They also let you sign up for an appointment, this way you don’t have to spend hours waiting in line. I took advantage of this and filled out the form and requested an appointment. The earliest I could get into my local DMV was January 24th, at 10am. I love the irony of how they created a system to cut down on the waiting time, which has a two and a half month waiting time.

    I went to the DMV this morning and waited two and a half hours just to be seen by someone. It turned out well, I have acquired a California drivers license, am registered to vote, and am an organ donor.

    While I was waiting for two and half hours, I scanned the news and tried to catch up on my reading. A story that caught my eye was about how Massachusetts legalized the sale of weed today. They are now the first east coast state to legalize, which is cool, and I think also shows that it is only a matter of time before it is legal everywhere.

    The aspect that I found interesting was the timing of all of this. Massachusetts allowed sales to start two days before Thanksgiving; a holiday that revolves around food and family. I mean, being high does make you wanna eat, and most people I know need to be high to deal with their families.