I began writing this post earlier in the day, but never had the chance to post it. Now that it is the end of the day, instead of rewriting anything I will tag the conclusion onto the end and call it a night.

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Wild Tuesday – Recovery Wednesday

Life can never give me a break it seems. Maybe that’s overly dramatic, but at the moment I feel I close on a project, or conquer something, only to turn and immediately have to face something else. Overcome some other obstacle, deal with some other minor crisis that takes energy I could be putting else where.

I started my Tuesday off with waking up from a dream well before my alarm went off. I was able to return to sleep quickly. To be honest I’m not sure I fully woke up, but regardless I slept deeply and felt fairly restored when I got up to begin the day.

I had a pb&j for breakfast. Not the breakfast of champions, but it was food that wasn’t completely terrible for me. It’s not like Bill Cosby giving his kids cake for breakfast. Milk, eggs, wheat… Nutrition!

On a side note, my older brother used to joke around about how Mt. Dew was a vegetable because it’s green. And since I’m tangenting I’m going to leave this here because logic.

Anywho… had breakfast and coffee. I keep meaning to say that I’ve gotten back into the routine of having my vitamin in the morning. For a while, roughly two months, I had skipped out on it since I didn’t really have a routine, and because I wasn’t ‘officially’ moved in I didn’t feel it was right to have bottles of ‘drugs’ around an apartment that wasn’t mine.

My vitamins are now on the counter, in sight while I am cooking breakfast, so I am much less likely to forget to take one in the morning. I’m giving myself a pat on the back for that.

I made it to school fine. I had unsettled feelings from Father’s Day, so I took the time to write that out. I got in touch with my instructor so I can retake the class. I’m still doing the assignments for this week, and I could still pass the class, but I want to retake it. I want to align myself with better intentions, ones not clouded with fear and insecurities and do the work over again.

It may seem silly, stupid even, but I don’t feel like my grades are clean. I did the work my self, I am proud of the work I did, and I may not really gain anything out of redoing the assignments, but it matters to me. I need to do this for my own peace of mind, so I am.

My instructor was understanding, so that is taken care of.

After work I meant a person I have been talking to online for tea at a café near school. I’m honestly not sure how much I should / am allowed to mention about it. I have not asked to write about him, so I feel saying anything further would be a breach of trust.

I will say Zane knows about and supported my meeting, and that it was a fun and engaging conversation. It was refreshing, and I enjoyed my time.

After my social event I went back to the apartment, which is where Life decided to have a go at me.

Universe: Hey Jen. I know you’ve been going through stuff. And I know I gave you some pick me ups along the way. Here, let me throw a wrench into your line of thinking just to keep you on your toes.

Zane and I were chatting in the kitchen discussing my outing, what we wanted to do about dinner, different chores that should get done. Normal stuff. We decided that we would spend a little bit of time together first watching an episode or two of Blade of Tempest before going about our separate tasks. Since it would be about an hour, we thought to pack a hookah bowl…

Except I was totally supposed to stop by the store on the way home to get more tin foil, and the dish drying rack that I wanted, since the one currently at the apartment is lame and I don’t like so I’m going to replace it with one I do like because I’m the only one who uses it. Yeah… No kitchen elite-ism there or anything…

/coughs

Moving on… So, I didn’t look at my to-do list before coming home, and spaced out on the fact that I was actually supposed to do other things.

Not to fear! I can dash back out across the street to retrieve the needed items and be back in roughly 20 minutes, most likely less. The day is not ruined and easily mended. /triumphant music as I gather my things

Five minutes later…

Me: Um… Zane… Have you seen my wallet?

Of course not. Why would he know where MY stuff is? My mom used to tell me that all the time.

Mom: What pronoun are you using in that sentence?

Me: ‘My’…

Mom: Exactly. It’s not my responsibility to keep up with your stuff.

Yes… I do need aloe for that burn…

Because of encounters like that in my childhood I tend to keep up of my stuff. During periods of transition, though, when all of my systems are screwed up, and I don’t have specific spots for things, I can seem super scatter brained. This time is no exception…

Except that I completely, totally, lost my wallet. Checked the apartment, check my car, checked my backpack, checked everything but the fourth dimension…

Even Zane looked and couldn’t find it. He asked if it was ok to check behind me, going through the car and everything after I did. I didn’t like the idea, mostly because in my head he was going to go out to the car and the wallet was going to be sitting on the passenger side seat in plan view with a neon flashing sign blinking, “Jen’s Missing Wallet”… or something to that effect.

But I would rather him find it and feel like a fool than have pride screw me over. So I said that even though I didn’t like it I would appreciate it if he did.

No dice though. He found nothing either.

So somewhere between walking to my car from the café and to walking into the apartment I lost my wallet. The only things that are really important are my debit card and my ID, but those are some pretty crazy important things to not have.

I even retraced my steps back to the café and left my number with them incase someone happened to turn it in.

Missing my wallet also meant I was missing the $80 I had withdrawn for food and laundry for next week. That’s not as big of a deal. It would mean Zane would have to pay for all foodstuffs, but I / we can survive without it. It’s just super not cool.

So… without the wallet there was no way for me to get the foil, or more importantly, the dish rack. So I came home and did laundry instead with the money Zane put on the card.

That made me feel a little better. At least I was still getting stuff done. We made a game plan for what would need to get done if my wallet remained MIA.

I didn’t go to aikido. Between the Father’s Day feelings and the frustration of my wallet I didn’t want to be around people. So I went running instead. I can’t run away from my problems, but when I have music egging me on it feels like I can. At least for roughly 20 minutes until my legs decide that I’ve beaten them up enough.

My theme song for the day was Wherever We Being to Fall by AU4. It was / is connecting with something inside me.

I ran at a 16:30 average pace. That’s including warm up and a bit of a cool down.

Zane cooked dinner while I was at the gym, so once I got back I unloaded the dishwasher and cleaned the kitchen so Trevor could cook after us, then enjoyed drinking half my pitcher’s worth of water. I’ve been slacking on my water intake a bit and I could feel that last night.

Dinner came out fantastic. Zane used several spices in the rice, which I’ve never done before. It really added to the overall flavor. There’s two leftover tomatoes for later. Totally looking forward to them.

Overall I didn’t eat much yesterday, which is why I think I was a little sick feeling after the gym. I had the sandwich in the morning, then a Luma bar (which those things are actually pretty awesome, more on that later, maybe), and some chips with salsa. So there wasn’t really a whole lot of in take before going to them gym. I actually cut my stretching short because I wasn’t feeling well and figured going home was the better option.

Once I had more water and food I felt fine, so I need to be more on top of myself. If I’m going back to my small meals I need to be more consistent about keeping myself fed. Why are you so lame, body?

I didn’t fold or put the cloths away last night. By the time we were done eating it was 11pm, the time I wanted to be asleep. I didn’t end up crawling into bed until around midnight, with my alarm set for 4:30am.

I’m happy to say that I did get up with my alarm. I cooked breakfast in my own skillet, and I was able to map out my to-do list before making it to work on time.

Lab was super busy. Like, insane amounts of questions. Two of them were pretty awesome and I got to go further into the scripting stuff, and three of them were interesting errors that I had never seen before.

David and I were able to figure them out together, so that was awesome. I love seeing new stuff like that. But by the end of lab my brain felt like it had tried to cuddle with a baseball bat… while it was being swung at 90 mph… pardon me while I flat line for a little bit…

Before I left I looked up what I needed to do to replace my ID, then went to the bank to see about my debit card. Since I hadn’t heard back from the café I figured my wallet was lost forever in the realm where cats go when you actually want to pet them and the resting place for socks when the dry magically eats them.

The bank was actually a fantastic experience. I was helped by a lady that I see frequently. I didn’t have my ID so normally they wouldn’t have issued me a temporary card. Not cool, bro. But since the lady knows me so well she was able to list me as a ‘known well by associate’ case and got me a new card.

As I’ve mentioned before, my issue with Bank of America is with the corporation itself. I absolutely love my local branch. The associates are some of the nicest people I have had to interact with. If only they didn’t work for a blood sucking, crappy corporation who doesn’t care about their customers… No hatred or animosity. I promise I’ve worked past all of that… mostly… >.>;

So I have a temp card right now, and my new one will be mailed to me within the next two weeks. Huzzah.

I called the number I got offline to report my missing ID to which I was directed online to fill out a form. Which means that right now I’m back at school. I’ve filled out the form and printed it. So, in theory, I won’t have to pay the fee to get a new ID card. We’ll see how that goes. If I do have to pay at least I have a debit card to do it with.

I’ll be stopping by the store on my way home. And then putting the cloths away. And then I want to work on a new composition. I want to draw the path and iris from my dream the other night. I have a few other things to poke around at, but for the most part that is my day.

I can see it now. I’m going to walk out of the DMV with my new ID card and trip over my wallet… That would be my luck.

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The Conclusion

When I got to the DMV I had a 5 hour wait ahead of me. No joke. The cool thing about the DMV that I go to is the system they have in place. You enter the line by your phone number and they text you when it is close to your turn, or what window you’re supposed to go when your number is called.

So when faced with a five hour wait I decided to go to the store then to go home and try to nap for a bit. Or at least find something more productive to do with my time other than sit surrounded by rage and frustration at the DMV.

I went to Publix first since there was one literally in the same plaza as the DMV, but they didn’t have dish racks. Maybe it’s because it was a different store than the one I normally go to, or maybe I am delusional in thinking that they carry the type of dish rack I was looking for, either way, I didn’t pick up either of the things I wanted.

Instead I went to the Target on the way home and got what I needed. I even got the tupperware for the apartment that I wanted to get so the guys can get rid of the lunch meat and plastic Chinese take-out containers that they use. Again… no elite-ism I promise.

When I got home I brought in the last box of items from my car; my glassware containers and coffee cup.

Zane was up, so we talked for a bit while I arranged one of the shelves in the pantry to put my belongings for the time being. There’s not much space for food, but since I shop weekly I don’t have many things to store in that regard.

There are still two boxes to take care of in the room and the task of setting up the computer. But aside from that I feel completely moved in. It’s a good feeling. A solid feeling. I belong.

Zane’s brother ended up coming over around 2pm, so I went to the room to nap. I still had 81 people ahead of me in the cue according to my DMV text messages.

At 3pm I got a message saying I was next in line. Um… what happened to my other three hours?

Needless to say I scurried to get changed out of my sleep shirt and presentable so I could dash back to the DMV. Luckily there is an option to rejoin the cue at the front of the line, so I didn’t have to wait once I got back to the location.

I gave the report paper to the associate who saw me. Not surprisingly it meant nothing. Since my wallet wasn’t stolen, it was lost, I had to pay the fee to replace the card.

I had a new picture taken. Since I’ve lost so much weight I sort of wanted to do that anyway.

But yeah, $30 dollars later and some frustration I had all of the things replaced that I needed to. As I was walking out of the DMV I decided I would run out an get a new wallet to put my new cards in. A wallet I would hopefully not lose.

As I got into my car I noticed I had a voice mail. I almost didn’t listen to it, figuring it was the debt collator calling about the Verizon account.

Just to make sure that’s who it was I listened to the message.

It was the café. They had my wallet.

Are you for serious? Like, that’s awesome… but I literally JUST dropped $30. Why, why couldn’t I have gotten the voice mail 15 minutes earlier? Arg.

So… instead of going out and getting a new wallet I went to the café and retrieved my old one.

Amazingly it still had the $80 in it.

There was a guy waiting for his order at the counter when I came up and asked about my wallet. He said he had to give me a high five because he thought my wallet was the coolest thing ever. You can’t really go wrong with a Thundercats wallet. Just sayin’.

I don’t know if there’s really a moral to this story. I don’t / won’t carry a purse around. Sorry, not sorry. I think they’re bulky and annoying. Most of the pants I wear don’t have pockets. Normally I keep my wallet in my backpack, and that’s worked fine for me for years. I don’t think anything needs to change.

I think this was just one of those events that happen, and I think I handled it pretty well all things considered. I didn’t break down. I was able to get everything replaced on my own, and I still moved forward with life while things were working themselves out. Look at me adulting and stuff.

When I got home I told Zane the conclusion of the adventure and went back to sleep while he continued hanging out with his brother.

I slept until 9pm. I woke up for a little while do to a pretty intense storm. It was so intense you would feel the electricity on your skin. The air was so charged. I love storms like that. I thought about going outside to play in the rain, but that sounded like a lot of effort so I rolled over and listened to Mother Nature rage outside.

Zane had cooked dinner again while I was sleeping. I’m not used to this. I feel a bit like a slacker for him cooking so much. Because two days in a row is ‘so much’. He made his sriracha chicken again which we had with rice and veggies; broccoli, carrots, and mushrooms. Another fantastic meal.

We ended up using the last of the honey for the sauce. Instead of having a slightly dry meal, Zane went with me to the store where we got milk, minced garlic, and another container of honey. We also ended up getting a strawberry cheese cake because that was on the grocery list… I swear it was there before we went shopping. >.>;

After the past twenty four hours having an awesome meal followed by a wonderful treat while watching a few episodes of Blast of Tempest was a nice way to unwind. I plan to shower to wash away the day and go to sleep once this is posted, because I’m going to make myself post it tonight rather than tomorrow.

I need to reschedule the appointment I had to cancel this morning. As much as I wanted to go to it, I didn’t have a way to pay at 8:30am. Clavan didn’t come in early anyway, so I wouldn’t have been able to leave to get there on time. That’s another mildly frustrating thing. It’s the second time in a month that he’s said he would cover for me and then hasn’t.

Tomorrow is Shading and Lighting. It’s the compositing project tomorrow. If the students finish early they are allowed to leave. A pretty chill day overall. I’m going to start the Iris project during the lab I think.

I haven’t really looked at the day to be honest. And right now I’m ok with that. I’ll make my battle plan in the morning over eggs and coffee. Coffee from my little red cup, and eggs cooked in my skillet with my spatula.

I know it’s silly, and maybe mildly selfish of me, or materialistic, but it makes me feel good. I bought my cup for a reason. I’m looking forward to holding it in my hands, the steam from my coffee filling my lungs as I breath it in, waking me to start my day as the cup’s warmth seeps into my fingers and palms.

Things are ok, today was ok, and I am ok with another crazy adventure behind me. Another tale to tell.