I’ve mentioned it off-hand a few times since last year, but I wanted to take the chance today to properly come out and explore it a little.
I’m bi. Usually this is short for bisexual, or bi-romantic. I like to use the shorthand rather than either of the longer terms. I feel that describes me best, given the way I understand and experience the different types of attraction.
The definition of bi(sexuality) that I like to use comes from the Melbourne Bisexual Network: “Bisexuality is romantic or sexual attraction to the gender the same as your own, and to other genders. Some people use it to mean attraction to two or more genders. It is not attraction to only men and women. The understanding of ‘bisexual’ as being supportive of gender binary is one that is from outside the bisexual community.”
I’ve highlighted the part of the definition that I usually like to use, as it sounds less clunky to me than the first sentence. Both of these definitions are true. In a plural form, “bisexualities” or “bi plus” it can also be used as an umbrella term for various types of multi-gender attraction (e.g. pansexual, polysexual), though each of those exist in their own right too.
Let’s bust some myths, shall we?
Bisexuality does not equal promiscuous.
Bisexuality does not mean “more likely to cheat”.
Bisexuality does not mean “confused”.
Bisexuality is not “a phase”.
A person does not need to have had relationships with more than one gender to call themselves bisexual.
A person does not stop being bisexual if they’re in a so-called “opposite sex” relationship.
A person coming out as bisexual is not jumping on a trend.
All being bi means is the definition above – being attracted to two or more/ your own and other genders. I am bi. I have only had relationships with (cis) men, though I have kissed a couple of women and gender diverse people outside of that. Even if I hadn’t, I would still be bi. I’ve also been in the same relationship, with a cis man, for the past four years, and we are very happy together. I hope it continues for good. This (again) does not negate my bisexuality, and the very idea that some would think my sexuality means I’m more likely to cheat on him is offensive to me.
But, how do I know I’m bi? Well, firstly, that’s a very intrusive question – please don’t ask it. Only exception being is if you’re extremely close with the person and they’re inviting questions. It should never be used as a “gotcha” or an “I know better than you” moment.
In the spirit of the day, I’ll answer. I know I’m bi because I find particular women, men and gender diverse people attractive, and I’ve enjoyed kissing people of all genders. It’s that simple.
I did not decide to identify as bi on a whim, but after a lot of questioning. Being bi is the best descriptor that fits me. I know my own identity.
I’ve thought about blogging, a lot, over the last few months. As things have happened, I’ve thought of blog titles or why I “really must post something about that”. However, blogging takes a specific type of thought, and these days, when work and life take up specific energy, I must prioritise what I do with my free time. Writing fanfic isn’t easier than blogging – but it’s more fun. Especially when WordPress has had issues whenever I try – I’m writing this on the desktop app instead of the web browser and that seems to have helped.
So, it’s been almost four months since I last posted. In that time:
We came out of lockdown, went back to work for a few weeks, then returned to a stricter lockdown – it’s been exactly six months today since that first Tuesday of lockdown in March.
I’ve had a number of professional successes;
I’ve continued to be disappointed, enraged and disgusted at the behaviour of JKR;
I’ve learnt a lot about my own resilience, privilege because of that, and how to use it, with my professional knowledge and access to supports, to manage my own mental health (a work in progress);
I’ll talk about all of these in future blog posts – right now it’s school holidays, and I’m hoping to type and schedule a few posts while I have the time.
The topic I want to highlight today is the cats of Tinykittens. Tinykittens is a not-for-profit cat rescue organisation based out of Fort Langley, BC, Canada. They’ve been broadcasting their rescue stories live for seven years now, and I’ve been following them, on and off, for three. They specialise in Trap-Neuter-Return/Adopt programs for feral cats in their community, and in educating others about how to help similar efforts in our own communities.
I’ve learnt a lot from them, like, how to care for and socialise feral cats. Tinykittens believe all cats, no matter how feral, sick or injured, deserve a chance to be treated with compassion. We can do more than just euthanising ferals. Read more on their website: http://www.tinykittens.com/projects
I first encountered Tinykittens in 2018, with Chloe’s litter, which included the remarkable Auracuda. Aura had a very large cleft palate, which was life-threatening. If she’d been born in the feral colony, she would have died. It was touch-and-go for a long time, with around-the-clock care with tube feedings. At 179 days old, she was big enough for groundbreaking surgery which gave her a donor cleft palate (from a dog!). She’s a medical foster at Shelly’s home still, and loving life – though it’s not without challenges.
This year, the first lockdowns coincided with “kitten season”, the time when the bulk of Tinykittens’ fosters and TNR efforts are focused on pregnant feral cats. They trap the pregnant feral and hope to socialise the mama and babies for adoption. If the mama proves unwilling to “hand in her feral card” as the TK volunteers and chatters call it, she’s spayed when the kittens are old enough and returned to the colony she came from, where volunteers provide food and socialisation every day. (The hope is that eventually, the mama cat will show signs of being happy with humans – she can then be re-trapped, and fostered to adoption.)
The kittens are socialised from birth, and when old enough are adopted in pairs. I’ve seen four litters go through this process so far this year with their mothers. Twenty cats in loving homes instead of running feral and contributing to the cat overpopulation problem.
There are currently another four litters of kittens at Tinykittens HQ. They share time on the two livestreams. Two sets in particular are ready to go home, and I thought I’d profile one of those today: a mother cat, Caramel, and her boy kitten Salty. They are a very social, playful pair. All they need is an adopter. I don’t know if I have any followers in Canada, especially any who are in BC. But if I do – or if you know someone who is – maybe you or they have a cat-shaped hole in their life?
So, it’s been a while since I posted. Let me tell you why:
The pandemic and shift to working from home (which began properly the day after my last post) has meant what I do with my days off has shifted and I have less energy for writing & posting;
What energy I have for writing things is getting funnelled either into my Twitter interactions, or other projects that I don’t want to lose steam on (fic writing, for example);
And – the big one – I have this tendency to avoid stuff if I’m already late with it…the ‘pressure’ of coming back after I miss self-set deadlines is annoying, so I avoid and continue to do so, by letting 1 & 2 distract me.
Going forward: I’m going to try to aim for one to two posts a month. Anything beyond that is a bonus.
The creek at the bottom of the street near where I live. These paths have been lovely to walk on during this time.
So, what have I been up to since April? Lots of things. Let’s start with work.
I was in a hands-on role prior to the lockdown, which has changed to a mostly admin/ support from afar role during this time. For nearly seven weeks (not counting the extended school holidays) myself and the team have been supporting staff, students and families by offering programs to assist regulation, ideas for things to do with household items, and most recently, info sheets about different body skills and senses. It’s been a lot of fun at times, but also a bit of a drag at others – I get my energy from working with the kids, so not being able to be with them has been hard at times.
In that sense, I’m glad that I’ll be going back to work onsite next week – the Victorian government has told all special schools to go back this coming Tuesday. Mainstream have different arrangements depending on year level. Returning to work onsite means a number of other good things – like having regular driving time again, as I work towards my licence by driving to and from school on my work days. It means a return to the physical separation of work and home, with my routines around that.
But we’ll go back to a changed environment. It’s not going to be “straight back to usual”. The rest of term – four weeks of it – will be spent re-adjusting and taking things as they come, with specific health and safety measures in place. After all, by Tuesday, we’ll have had ten weeks off – students were last onsite on Monday March 23, while staff switched to WFH from Tuesday March 24. This has been the longest that students have had off, ever. Longer than the usual summer holidays. Add that to the new health and safety measures and it makes for an interesting few weeks ahead.
A colleague reminded me that the best thing is to focus on the positives, while keeping our expectations low. Be kind to ourselves and the students while supporting our and their wellbeing. We’ll get there.
Also, big ghost/ Jedi/ virtual hugs to everyone else out there who’s worried about all the things, especially if you’re in a country overseas which is struggling more with this thing.
You can’t feel it physically, but it’s there!
What else have I been doing? Hmm. A few things.
This lockdown time has reinforced for me how my neurodivergent brain works and what it needs to be happy. Many, many routines were lost and disrupted with lockdown – like choir being cancelled (and possibly remaining so for longer than other things, due to the way the virus spreads). Also, work (naturally), church and not being able to go to gym/ BodyPump. I’ve had to find new ways to do things and acknowledge my hidden supports.
Like, working at a school means, in usual circumstances, I work in a really structured environment – three sessions a day, specific windows of time for morning tea and lunch, and so on. Then I’d added further routines on top of that – for example, driving the same route to and from work every day and only wearing my name-badge and visuals lanyard on school grounds. My work days were my biggest step days as I walked between office, classrooms and staff areas.
Losing all of that meant I had to create my own structure and find my own ways of getting that movement into my day. I’ve used Google Calendar and reminders on my laptop as my own visual schedule. I kept my morning wake-up routine, albeit a little later than usual. I did things like have a specific Chrome window for work-related internet stuff, only using/ opening work-related apps like Outlook and Webex during work hours. Regular walks became a thing, with plenty of pictures taken to mark the things I saw (two of which have featured in today’s post).
Another image of the creek at the bottom of my street. Taken a day or two ago after all the rain Melbourne had this week.
I ordered some gym weights so I could keep up with that, because I find it grounding. I joined in on a couple of virtual choir events, have been to regular virtual church services and video-called people or chatted over Discord to feel connected. LaTUCS has maintained a regular Wednesday social time on Discord since we had to stop meeting in person, which has been lovely. I’ve also found lovely online things to provide good feels (though sometimes sad, too). Like this cat-cam YouTube channel, advocating for a Trap-Neuter/Spay-Adopt-or-Release approach for feral cats. There are so many kittens on the two channels right now, with the promise of even more joining them in a few weeks. I love watching them and definitely have my favourites.
Health stuff like psych appointments became virtual, too, with telehealth.
This will continue for me for some time yet – I’ve decided that how i’m going to handle the anxiety of work going back is to recognise that this acknowledges schools as essential workplaces, with staff as essential workers. I am going to still keep physically distancing myself from most things except shops and work, at least until the end of Term 2. We’ll see how it goes. But I am proud of how I’ve managed myself during this time and want to continue that.
The other thing that’s been occupying my time is fandom. In times of stress, fandom is one of the big things that give me joy and make me feel safe and happy – though it can still be its own mess, at least I can carve out my own corner and defend/ fix it. It’d be nice if there was more to claim for my corner and less to fix, but still. Taking part in fandom in a critical way makes me happy.
That’s meant that I’ve been reading and writing fic, retweeting pertinent views on Twitter and engaging with people. I also did a few nice things for Star Wars day. I wore my hair in Rey buns (I tried Leia buns but that was too tricky *sadface*), wore my BB-8 earrings and edited some photos from Supanovas past into little flipbook movies with accompanying music. Thread here. Fun!
I think photos from this year’s Supanova count as my “last normal photos”, which is a thing that went around social media last week…people posting photos from the last “normal” thing that they did before the lockdowns. It’s rather fitting that my photo is related to fandom:
One of several photos from this year’s Supanova, where I cosplayed as Rey Skywalker. I wish I had a BB-8 of my own….
Recorded here so I can remember it for next time, and the time after that.
Yesterday, I decided that I was going to do some of the “usual” Easter things that I’ve either done in the past or have been new additions to the Easter routine in the last few years. So I bought myself some Easter chocolate, watched my church’s online Easter service, and, in the evening, cooked a roast chook we’d bought the day before.
First note: make sure you allow enough time for cooking the whole chook! I misremembered the cooking time and got started a bit late, so was very hungry by the time it was all ready. The packaging the chicken comes in should say how long to cook it for. Ours was 25-30 minutes per 500g.
So, the recipe. I began with a recipe from my Great Australian Cookbook, for “summer roast chicken”. Then I adapted it a bit.
Ingredients:
1 whole chook
1 lemon
2-4 garlic cloves
breadcrumbs
mixed herbs
paprika, salt & pepper
canola oil
potato, carrot, other roasting veg
corn, peas, Warrigal greens & other veg for steaming
Materials:
roasting tray(s)
chopping board
knives
bowl
spoons
Method:
Take chicken out of its packaging and let it rest, out of the fridge, for 15-30 minutes before preparing it.
Preheat the oven to the required temperature (this will also be on the packaging).
Halve the lemon and skin the garlic cloves. Set aside.
Make the rest of the stuffing: in a small bowl, combine breadcrumbs, salt, paprika, pepper and a little oil. Stuffing should be fairly red in colour.
Back to the chicken. If you have sensory sensitivities, this is the step where things get gross and messy for a bit, FYI.
Dislocate the leg bones at the top of the thigh to flatten the chicken; also, remove the wishbone.
Open the cavity and stuff a lemon half and half the garlic cloves in, so they’re right at the end of the cavity.
Add the stuffing. Pack it in.
Shove the other lemon half and remaining garlic in, then close the skin flaps over the hole. If you care about properly closing it, seal the hole with a skewer or toothpicks (keeps more juices in).
Now for the outside of the chicken. Drizzle oil, salt and paprika over the outer surface of the chicken. Use your fingers to smear them into the skin. Phew! Wash your hands! You’re finished with the messy gross bit!
Put the chicken in the oven for the required time in a roasting tray.
Prepare your root veg for roasting and put them in later. They’ll need maybe an hour, it depends. (I’m still figuring this bit out!)
Prepare and steam the other veg in the last half an hour of the roasting. Steamed veg shouldn’t take more than 12-15 minutes on the stove in a steamer pot.
Test the chicken for readiness by sticking a knife or skewer into the breast and seeing if the juices run clear and the meat around the incision is white.
Serve!
Rubbing the oil and salt and paprika into the chicken skin gives crispy, seasoned skin (it literally cracked open when I stuck my knife in to check for doneness!). The lemons, garlic and paprika mix give a zesty, flavourful stuffing. The chicken meat inside should be tender and juicy.
Image description: a whole roasted chicken with reddish brown seasoned skin rests on a white plate. The plate is on a brown table.
My next project is figuring out what to do with the juices that leaked out during the cooking process…I’ve got enough for a stock base or something. Any ideas?
Hi all. Well, it’s been over a month since I last posted. *sigh*. I wanted to post more thoughts, sooner, but got caught up in work stuff and when that happens, I don’t want to think enough for blogging on my days off. Motivation goes away. Then the whole thing with this virus started.
I have many, many thoughts, but these days it’s often easier to share them in short-form conversations, such as Twitter threads. You can follow me there if you like. (I’ve been very into fandom on there lately!)
This post was started two to three weeks ago, but then WordPress had a hissy fit when I tried to post it and refused to save. I’m just hoping this one works. It feels like it’s been three months since then, not three weeks. Supanova feels so far away too…
Supanova Melbourne is going to be my marker in all of this in terms of when things started. I attended with some caution, but on the second weekend of March, cases in Australia were still limited to international arrivals. I’m also privileged in that I’m not immunocompromised or otherwise at risk, so the risk felt minimal. A week later, Supanova Gold Coast only went ahead because our Prime Minister decided to time the first community restrictions to start on the Monday, not the Saturday. If Supanova GC had been first and Melbourne second, I wouldn’t have gone to it, because things changed so much so fast in that first week. It’s surreal.
How are we all going, people? Hope you’re as okay as possible, right now, physically and mentally. In Victoria, it’s week three of shutdown. (Australia, too, but the way this crisis has been managed so far, the states have had to take the lead and done everything slightly differently to each other, so I’m referencing my home state only.) No-one’s allowed out of the house unless it’s for one of four very specific reasons, with specifications in the fine print. We’ve been told to expect changes in some form for at least six months.
Councils have closed libraries and pools/ activity centres, initially until the start of April, but now indefinitely. University choirs, including my local one, LaTUCS, have paused or suspended activities. (Even this year’s national intervarsity choral festival has been postponed and won’t happen this year – a first!) My church has gone virtual, live-streaming pre-recorded services. Schools will be operating with online/ remote learning procedures and end-of-year exams have been postponed.
Despite the inevitability of the Victorian shutdown decision, its suddenness still took me by surprise. While I’m very pleased it happened – it gives me confidence that our premier and his government are on top of things as much as they can be – it’s still disconcerting.
My brain thrives on predictability and certainty. I was anxious during the week prior to the shutdown due to the uncertain circumstances. I had a meltdown after I went home on the last day of onsite school work actually, because it had built too much. It’s still unsettling that this is going to continue indefinitely and I don’t know when I’ll be able to be physically close to my friends, family and colleagues again.
I’m sure I’m not the only one struggling with feelings around this. In these times, we all need to be gentle with ourselves. We need to support those who work in essential services, like health care workers, cleaners & garbage collectors, posties, and supermarket (etc.) workers. Give them a smile, don’t be a dick to them. The current chaos isn’t their fault.
Honour your own feelings at this time. It’s scary, frustrating, tiring, sad. I’ve found acknowledging the feeling and brainstorming what could help is useful. As well as things like seeking out favourite activities, watching calming/ funny/ moving videos, snuggling with warm (and/or weighted) blankets, taking warm showers and listening to music. All the usual advice applies about trying to get enough sleep, food, physical activity, mental stimulation and social contact. Keyword there being “trying to”.
I’ve been creating daily schedules for myself using Google Calendar. They’re loose and flexible but provide my brain with the structure it needs. I schedule needed activities first, so I can reward myself with the wanted ones after. I also make sure to include reminders for breaks for food and movement.
One of the things I’ve organised are scheduled “virtual café” catchups with friends and family. The idea is we each grab a beverage of choice then phone or video call at a pre-determined time. I love having catchups with friends, and moving this online during this time seems like a great way to stay connected when every other way of socialising is restricted.
Another idea is to do something like what’s suggested by the Black Dog Institute in this article: a self-care plan. They have a template you can follow, it’s quite easy. Give it a go; we all need to think about taking care of ourselves in this time, especially if we’re supporting others.
Everyone needs to figure out how to do stay connected during these times. What works for you? (Please comment! I’d love to get some virtual conversations going!)
I’m going to aim for blogging once a week – I want to get into the habit again. Until next time, remember you can find me on Twitter, like I said at the start of this post.
Please read this, especially those, like me, who are white women in fandom who think/ thought of fandom as “having problems, but still a great space for all to create our own worlds etc.”. We have to do better and ask ourselves – who is the “all” we speak of? What real-world biases are we bringing in to our creative spaces?
We need to start paying better attention. We’ve had the privilege of not noticing fandom racism. We have to start noticing because others don’t have that privilege when it’s aimed directly at them.
Content notes: As with a majority of my pieces, this one focuses closely on antiblackness including the antiblackness inherent in weaponizing white womanhood to excuse dogpiling and slandering John Boyega as a misogynist, as a potential sexual predator, as a bunch of other gross and untrue things. I talk briefly about some examples of Rey/Kylo fics from the fandom’s past including non-graphic (I believe) mentions of sexual assault and include links to a recap of one and an image of the other.
White women have most (if not all) of the actual observable power in transformative fandom spaces.
White women are the image of the typical “fan” in Western transformative fandom spaces.
They are frequently the most popular Big Named Fans (BNFs) in online spaces, the people who dominate discussions about and displays of Being A Fan. If you’re in transformative fandom and you see a particular set of headcanons…
It’s that time of year again – the time when I look back over the past year and decide what were the songs that mattered to me. Previous soundtracks are pre-2015, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018. The first soundtrack post is also an exploration of how I engage with music.
Firstly, songs from AIV2019:
Seal Lullaby by Eric Whitacre
despite being on the list last year, it gets another ‘honourable mention’, because we sang it in the concert as well as while floating in the sea at a social event.
Magnificat by Kim Andre Anderson
A beautiful work that set the words of the magnificat (Mary’s glorious speech from Luke’s Gospel), in Latin, to music. The work was six pieces long, with different tempos, a soloist and choral soloist (from the choir), and was very fun to sing.
Stars by Eriks Esenvalds
A beautiful work that set the words of a poem by Sara Teasdale to musical accompaniment made by tuned wine glasses, filled with specific amounts of water. These glasses were played by running a wet finger around the rim of the glass, and the amount of water in each glass corresponded to a different pitch.
Sure on this Shining Night by Morten Laurisden
A beautiful song musing about the beauty of faraway stars. It has some lovely lyrics, for example, “I weep for wonder, wand’ring far alone… / for shadows, on the stars…”
This song is included on the list, however, because at the AIV camp revue the Perth University Choral Society (PUCS) performed a filk of it – keeping the tune and pacing, but with alternative lyrics. To give you a hint, the title was “Sure on this Friday Night”, with the alternative title “Maccas Run”. We then performed this to the conductor later, just for laughs. Loved it!
Moving away from AIV, the next songs are a set of three about being true to myself. That was one of my themes for 2019, building on previous years. I haven’t shared all of that journey with you, but I think I’ll be ready in 2020 to do so. Starting now.
You see, I’m bi – and probably demi, too. Not to mention doubly disabled, having Dandy Walker Syndrome and being autistic. I’ll share more of my journeys of understanding those parts of myself with you in other blog posts. Now, onto the songs:
Brave (Sara Bareilles)
This song was first in my 2017 list, but it became more powerful for me in 2019. This song is a song that Sara wrote for a friend who was worried about coming out of the closet. Sara wrote it to encourage the friend to feel safe with her. This song is huge for me.
In 2017, I identified with Sara, though I was beginning to identify with the nameless friend. Now, I identify with both. I came out about my sexuality to my “choir family” at AIV, telling my truth as an intro before I sang Brave to them. I then repeated the song as a solo performance at the semester 1 LaTUCS concert. While the intervarsity choir community definitely isn’t perfect, without their support, it would’ve taken longer to discover who I really am, I think.
Welcome to My Truth (Anastacia)
A song about being true to yourself, despite everything that gets thrown at you, and living your dreams. It’s about finding the courage to take off the “mask” you’ve been wearing as a disguise, to show and be proud of your true self.
I heard this song when I was about to come out as bi to other important family in my life. It reminded me that whatever the outcome, I know myself and my dreams – and what I don’t know, I’m finding outfor myself.
Bohemian Rhapsody (Queen)
LaTUCS sang this song as part of our semester 1 concert. (We also watched the movie later.) I identify strongly with parts of this song for similar reasons to the above song.
It’s a well-known song, but if you really listen to it, it’s also a song about pain, rejection, loss – and choosing what matters to you and how you recover from it. In a way. I certainly took it that way when we ran through it at choir the week after I’d had a particularly important conversation that led to a rejection of part of my identity by others.
In 2019, I trialled going to two intervarsity choirs each week during semester. While I don’t think I’ll do the same this year (it was a bit much for me to continue on a regular basis), it was still fun.
MonUCS songs:
One of the MonUCS songs I did was Song of the Dragonborn (Skyrim: Main Theme) (Lindsey Stirling, Peter Hollens).
We did plenty of others, including a performance of Brahms’ German Requiem, but that’s the one that sticks in my head most.
LaTUCS songs:
Songs sung by LaTUCS this year included:
Counting Stars (OneRepublic),
Northern Lights (Ola Gjello),
What a Wonderful World (Louis Armstrong),
True Colours (Cyndi Lauper), aaaand:
The Four Chords Song (Axis of Awesome).
Do yourself a favour and check out the latter here. It’s cool.
Edited to add: I can’t believe I nearly forgot the Come From Away soundtrack. I’m going to put Welcome to the Rock and Me and the Sky in here too.
That was my soundtrack for 2019.
In 2020, I hope to stop procrastinating and purchase songs on my to-buy list, keep singing in LaTUCS, go to QIV2020, attend other choral concerts and singing opportunities, and keep developing my appreciation for how music moves me. In that light, I thought I’d end by quoting a blog post I wrote back in October.
I have several passions …. [including] music; listening to it, relaxing with it, and performing it.
Last Friday’s [Brahms] concert was fantastic. It was hard work – I wasn’t as relaxed as I was in other concerts. But I feel really happy about it all the same. The reason for that is …. a number of people were there who’d personally either bought a ticket from me, or came at my recommendation, because I was singing.
Afterwards, they were of course the people whose opinions I cared about the most. So to see their happiness and excitement at what we’d performed – pardon the pun, but it made my heart sing. When someone else gets a thrill from watching me do something I love and do it well – it makes me very happy. It fills me up, completely.
Partly, it’s because it is a gift that is shared. I am forever sharing “me” through my passions. But society’s rules and expectations, the way that quirkiness is looked down on because it’s different, meant that I struggled with fitting in for a long time. Anxiety, especially social anxiety, is a leftover gremlin from that. Finding LaTUCS, then the rest of the choir network, helped me become more comfortable in being “me” – because in the choir(s), we’re united through a love of music and a love of sharing that through choral singing. Regardless of our differences.
Being able to share that with the people I love, my friends and family, is wonderful. So I say to you: support your friends in their passions. Go see us perform, or ask us about our current project. Watch us light up and understand: It means the world to us. Often, we’ve spent a long time hiding or minimising our passions and ourselves. Being supported and seeing our friends enjoy what we do? It makes us feel seen. And loved.
I thought I’d schedule this as I’ve been reflecting lately about milestones.
Everyone is doing that “10 years: then and now” thing on social media, posting photos of themselves and reflecting on where they were in 2009 compared to now, in 2019. People are getting sentimental about the fact that it’s another decade passing.
Really, though, as much as I like number categories, especially round ones, anyone can celebrate decades passing and milestones. It doesn’t have to be neatly packaged into dated decades. We can celebrate the little and big things all the time.
Humans love time and rhythms. It’s why we love doing the “look back” thing, I think. It’s also a form of processing. I like to remember things – heck, I keep a daily journal because of that (and for processing them).
Just remember, we aren’t our successes or failures – and each person’s story is different. It’s what makes us who we are.
Having said that, I’ve written down some milestones below. There are many milestones I could pick out. I’m young and have been fortunate.
“Little” ones include going to some lovely musicals and participating in lovely choral performances myself, as well as trying new things, like fencing, BodyPump/ gym and the SCA.
Other (bigger?) ones include:
joining my university choir (LaTUCS) and travelling interstate to attend my first intervarsity choral festival;
meeting my partner there;
becoming LaTUCS vice-president then president
through these and other roles, learning how to better work in professional teams with people in real ways that uni doesn’t always teach you, including some hefty conflict management.
beginning to move out of home, learning how to best take care of myself and what works for me.
This year/ in the past twelve-ish months, I:
finished uni and then graduated with a double degree in Bachelor of Health Sciences and Masters of Occupational Therapy Practice
moved in with my partner in Melbourne
got a job in a specialisation of Occupational Therapy that I really love: Paediatric OT, working with autistic kids.
As of Friday the 20th, I’ve officially had a full year of employment as well as four school terms of work. Awesome stuff.
bought a car together with my partner and made great progress with getting my drivers licence (I’m hoping I’ll get it in the new year)
Throughout it all, I’ve done a heckton of development in understanding myself, including my disabilities, my sexuality, my faith and mental health – and from that, I’m learning what self-care works for me and how to get it.
I’ve struggled at times, but fortunately I’ve usually had supports around me or have gained access to them. I’ve come through okay.
I hope you have too.
Here’s to the past, the present and the future, for all of us.
Hi all. Just a short note to say happy holidays, whatever that looks like for you. I’m heading off on a road trip with my partner and family to Townsville for a few weeks. The road trip will take a few days. I have posts planned (scheduled or mental drafts.) See you on the flip side.
I’m writing this on a lazy Saturday afternoon. Thank goodness for those, because the rest of the weekend is busy – the week has been too. I’ve had choir rehearsal three times since Tuesday, a work end-of-year event last night, and the first carols concert today. Tomorrow is the big concert – if you’re attending the Monash Carols by Candlelight event at Jells Park, you’ll see me as a soprano as part of the choir. Should be fun, if a bit exhausting. I’ve already scheduled Monday as a crash day. I love singing and carols but I need my downtime too, especially when all the events are on the same weekend. What’s your favourite carol?
Throughly fed up with politics at the moment. Australia is led by a fascist government. If you’re in the UK, vote so Labour will win – politics is not a bloody popularity contest!!
It was International Day of People with Disability on Tuesday, a day to “to promote understanding of the issues facing people with disability, and to push for change”. On that theme, if you want to read a couple of young people’s perspectives on their disability, check out Ben’s and Carletta’s stories from the Every Australian Counts website.
I’m relaxing this lazy Saturday afternoon by listening to Queen videos. If I had a time machine and money, I’d go attend famous musical performances, like Live Aid. That reminds me… I need to create my 2019 song playlist.
The holidays are nearly here, meaning that in two weeks I’ll have completed a year of work! I’ve learnt a lot during that time. #proud
Hope your lead-up to the holiday period is smooth, that you have enough time off, and your holidays are relaxing!
myzania 