Doing Things

Impulsively, I bought a ticket to the FKA Twigs performance in Chicago on November 15, and used travel funds from a canceled flight from last February to buy a plane ticket, and reserved a room and a car, and arranged to go to Chicago from Nov. 14 to Monday, Nov,. 18. In typical fashion, I am now feeling anxious about that maneuver. I have another couple of days to cancel the trip for free, and I'm tempted. It's weird, too, because I also really want to go. I am alternating between feeling like it'll be a great thing to do and you only live once, versus a sense of wanting to consolidate, save money and energy and "be sensible." I did work in a brief visit to the Chicago Botanic Garden, where my application for a post doc is being considered, and the PI with whom I would be working is interested in meeting with me, and introducing me to a student of his who is working in Cactaceae. But it's not a scheduled interview and I am not feeling like I am a strong candidate for that opportunity, so, really, I mostly did that just to try to justify the trip. The room is only about $225 for four nights, and it's in a guesthouse a block from the lake, in what looks like a great neighborhood. 

Still don't know what to do, but maybe I'll decide or just let inaction decide for me and just go. 

Prostate cancer follow up was good news, with PSA levels back within the relatively normal range, at 3.6. I still might have the one year follow up biopsy, or I might wait for year two, which is the conservative recommendation these days. Consultation appointment for cataract surgery tomorrow morning, and it will be great to ge that out of the way. Manuscripts moving toward being ready to submit for publication. 

A friend of mine is visiting from the 8th to the 11th, and then another friend is visiting the afternoon of the 11th, and I met yet another friend for lunch yesterday, so it's been weirdly social. The friend visiting from the 8th to the 11th will be staying here, and we've skirted romantic interest in each other for years, but this visit feels 100% platonic, which seems to be the only thing I can handle these days, battered, bruised and bewildered as I am. She and I have always been 100% up front about where we are in life, and I find it so much easier to enjoy people's company after a couple years of CoDA recovery too. "I am not emotionally available and look forward to seeing you but I don't think I'll want to be physical and I'm absolutely in no shape for a relationship." Sentences I have traditionally not been able to utter. I feel capable of causing a lot less harm than I used to, which harm often arose out of my selfish desire to get what I wanted without regard to either my own or the other person's well being. Combined with my tendency to want to be nice, and do what people want me to do, so they will like me; a tendency that also causes harm. I also will have to work while she is visiting, and instead of being weird about that, I communicated it, which helps relieve a lot of my anxiety. In the past, I probably would have thought I had to clear the schedule for the visit but then been anxious and wishing I could get some work done the entire time. 

I finally girded my loins and bought a new(ish) car, a 2013 Subaru Crosstrek. I had been wanting a Toyota Tacoma, but the Crosstrek is pretty highly rated for offroad, and it has great gas mileage. The one I snagged is in great shape, it seems, knock on wood. It's so weird to be driving a car with air conditioning, a stereo, etc. Like, a rental car., But it's mine. Well, it's the bank's. 

The next thing on my list is to buy some clothes. The last time I bought myself a new shirt was 2011. People have given me shirts as gifts or whatever. Well, I did buy a special button down shirt back in August of 2017 sort of in response to a request, but that shirt accrued some weird symbolic significance and last New Year's Eve I incinerated it. Haha. So, I want to get some new clothes. Maybe I will be more comfortable and confident at interviews if I look a little bit less like a poverty stricken grad student, although I'm sure that people, especially interviewing for post doc positions, are used to that. It amazes me how expensive nice shirts are though. Wtf? It's a shirt. But it is what it is. 

One other self care thing I've continued is canceling all screen time about 90 minutes before bed. I cheat sometimes, but in general, I haven't had any technology in the bedroom with me at all, overnight. That has been very helpful. Facebook continues to be a mixed bag. Sometimes it can still feel so fucking toxic, but generally my approach has been to post and run, and not get into much stuff with anyone. I do sometimes scroll through other people's posts, but that can be fraught. 

Storage unit now for down comforter, car title, printer. Doing things. Might as well. Why not?