Why hello, end of 2010.

I really should use a much doomier voice than that.  Anywho.

Ok, so with what little brain energy I have left, I will attempt to cover the past year as it has happened because let's face it.  It was yet another big life bending mind altering year.  Holy bajeebus.

Last winter was a little chaotic.  Noah and I were moving from NW into NE with our friend Tim, Noah had JUST gotten a job at Quizno's, and I was recently jobless (again).

I had also just recently (last Fall/Winter) protested Toast & Pho for royally fucking over myself and a few other employees, earning a lovely article in The Mercury and a little bit of spotlight with KBOO radio.  PRWA (Portland Restaurant Workers Association) was a peach about the whole thing, and I would like to thank a certain guy by the name of Ryan Wisnor for helping me and a few other employees understand just what exactly was going wrong.  But I would have never met those guys had it not been for David John, a supremely stand up guy who fought for his rights and wasn't afraid to clutch onto them with an iron fist.

Moving day was stressful to say the least and literally took all, fucking, day.  Not to mention we were moving out of a really old moldy apartment (3D green scuz and everything!) up and down three flights of stairs WITHOUT an elevator.  But luckily for the most part we tetris'd the hell out of the moving truck so  there wasn't really another trip that had to be made save for coming back and bleach bombing the place to land-lord corporate satisfaction.

New house!  New beginnings!  New jobs.

I had gotten myself two jobs last spring and was balancing that while going to school full time.  Needless to say I was constantly burnt out, and was a raging unpleasant bitch of a woman to almost everyone around me. It was a dark and scary place, but something that had to be done.  I've never been worked so hard without a break before.  Good.  Knight.

Summer was pretty keen as school had ended and I could just focus on work.  So I was essentially working every day with half day offs and finally whittled it down to ONE job just this past Fall so that I could sanely finish school and the rest of my tom foolery in peace.

All was not well come October (it's just a creepy month for me, I swear) when my boss from Nicholas Restaurant called me up and took me off the schedule because "October is a slow month and there's really no reason to have so many people."  Aka, laid off.  Great.

Thus began another slough of job applications, and I'd lost count of the floods and floods of emails and paperwork I'd filled out just to find anyone who would take me and pay me.  My standards were hitting a dangerously low point, but on the plus side I kept getting interviews up the wazoo.  So I was hopeful.

In the meanwhile I would drift from kicking ass and taking names at school to screaming in academic mental emotional agony over why the hell I was being made to do any of this crap and dear God dear God when does it end.  Miraculously I got away with two A's and a B, bumping up my GPA.

And work?  Sweet savory Moses that business rolled in like a boss and gave me a job at See's for several weeks, and then I scored a job as a nanny for six kids (though really I'm responsible for three).  NOW, I've just recently landed a job as a receptionist at a massage spa and wellness center and will begin training for being a substitute teacher at one of the daycares my nanny boss runs.  Three jobs!  Three!  They're all baby jobs, sure, but someone decided to cut me a break for once.  It pays a bit to be a jack of all trades and master of none sometimes.  And in this case...I rolled lucky sevens ten ways till Sunday.

Back to school.  PSU was lovely enough to tell me there was a hold on my account to prevent me from registering for Winter term.  When I went to go investigate the matter, I discovered that my FAFSA had run out for me as a dependent, and I wouldn't get any more money until I became an independent.

After much hair pulling and collapsing into a ball of misery, I worked out a deal with my folks to co-sign a baby loan to get my butt back in school.  Sallie Mae took forever and required me to sign away my soul five times over to be SURE I wanted this loan and to BE SURE that this is the magic that's gonna happen for me.

Result?  Not going back to Winter Term.  It wouldn't be worth the stress because it's so late in the registration game.   And yes I could pull out my last trick and hover like a vulture in the classes I want to take but yet at the same time...I'm gonna look at this as a blessing in disguise.  I'd been talking about taking a break from school for a while.  Not to the extent of a year or two off, but to just SLOW, DOWN.  I'd like to not hate the universe and burn out on a regular basis.

Spring Term?  Oh yea you'll be seeing me soon.  Soooooon.....

Somewhere in there I made it to my two year anniversary with Noah which is my LONGEST relationship ever, and I've been tickled pink over the whole ordeal.  We've been through one HELL of a journey together, and I don't think we're gonna quit for a while.

Moved into a new house, and the energy couldn't be any more savory sweet if it tried.  My insides are happy.

So the new year starts off with an opportunity to collect my feet back under me and continue moving forward.  With the rate at which my undergrad completion is going, I figure it'll probably be best to apply to grad school straight away.  East coast is my dream land but unless there's a hefty grant or scholarship waiting for me in several years I'll be at Marylhurst (still a damn fine school) finishing my MFA in Art Therapy.

Did I mention at some point that I wanted to be a certified ASL interpreter?  That's kinda still in the cards for me.  I don't see why not, honestly.

Will I be buried in loans forever?  Probably.  But to just let life punch me in the face and me put up with sitting there like a whiny bitch moaning over how I'll never get anything done isn't an option.  I'm going through what a lot of people are going through, but I still plan to come out on top.

Is 2011 gonna be my year?  Well, if not by nature then I'll just bend it that way.  I will not drown, I will not back off.  I'm gonna strap on my helmet and give this year an ever loving beat down.

Speaking of helmets...skating gear should go with that because I'd also like to join Roller Derby.

Bad ass for life?  I think I am. :)

Another blog? Geesh.

So, like most folks, there's that "steady stream of consciousness" thing that happens, and so far I've been writing to myself in my journal because it allows me to 1. remember what it is I've thought and felt, 2. work on my censor. Or, rather, to work on not having one.

And yet at the same time, part of me misses the act of blogging personally. I mean I've got my side project for my future webcomic going, and it's great because I've been desperately wanting to get this thing going for almost a year. So in Teresa-land, that means I am meant to make this happen.

I've kept many blogs in the past, going through the phases of LiveJournal, Xanga, AsianAvenue (pre-n00b status, i.e. we had to create the html ourselves to make the site bad-ass), and most recently, MySpace. I've been skirting the blog-o-sphere and letting myself be public again because I've been enjoying the past 2 -3 years of being private. It was a habit that needed practicing because the very fact that I needed so much validity from others to commentate on how my life was going was inevitably leading me to very low morale and self esteem.

And it's average enough, thank you very much. Or better than, I suppose.

So...to give a summary about the things that have happened recently:

I'm finally sticking to a career choice and not putzing around with school anymore. I've picked my focus, which is Arts Practices (meaning that I can pick almost any art classes I want and add up the score at the end to say "I win!" and get my degree). I'm minoring in Psychology and when it's time to get my tucus to grad school, I'll be going into Art Therapy. By the time I'm done with all this I'll be in my 30's, and while some people are grumbling and mumbling about how they wish they could be back in their 20's, I'm looking forward to when the hum drum of school gets left behind. I'll miss it, for sure. And I'll reminisce on bygone days when I was an irresponsible (sort of ) hooligan. But I know I'll be grateful for the present and look onward towards the future.

I'm in a lovely committed relationship with my partner, Noah. Come November we'll have been together for two years. TWO. YEARS. Longest relationship of my life. And his, coincidentally. It's been quite the gender bender since we've gotten together, and I find myself feeling more or less content with my identity and how I sit inside myself as a human. Part of me wants to say I've finally reached my peak and realized that I finally know for me what "queer" means...but I know that it'll turn itself on its head in the future and to that...well, we'll see what happens.

Somewhere in this silly month was mine and my second husband Tim's 5 year anniversary of being besties. (Noah's the first) After being in each others' orbit for this long we finally become roommates. Which was about damn time, in my opinion. Because I'm loving my refurbished family. Two cats, two husbands, and while I'd like to say I'm the ringleader of it all, I prefer to be the one who exists in this strange and adventurous land. I'd give it a title, but I can only call it...This Land. ;)

I'm 23 years old, and while that's decently young part of me feel more than decently seasoned. People say I act like I'm 24 - 25, so I wonder what'll happen when I reach that? Silly business.

Work is steady again, finally. After almost two years of absurdity and bouncing around from job to job I'm ready for some stability. I love my co-workers, my boss is rad, and the hours are where I want them. It also seems like I'm here to stay, so hopefully I won't be looking at potentially getting shafted again. It's been a big fear of mine for a while, but after 6 months I think it's finally time to relax.

I'm currently immersing myself in comic culture, meaning that I'm trying desperately to brush up on my history, learn the ins and outs of "the greats", and in the process create, create, create.

I guess that's it for now. Until next time.