Happy New Year!

So, my last post was in August of 2015... Now it's 2018 and I'm going to do something INSANE....

I'm getting personal up in here...

I would apologize for waiting so long to post, but I really don't feel guilty about it. I have had things to write about in the past two and a half years, but I've lacked the inclination or time to actually write it. First, most of my posts in 2015 were my desperately trying to ignore that I was suffering from major depression. I stopped posting when I finally lacked the energy to keep on... keeping on. Not long after that, I sort of lost everything...

And then I started working at Frisch's Big Boy Restaurants. I sort of dived in with the hopes that if I could prove I was a good Frisch's employee, then I could get my old life back. That didn't really work out well, but I did work at Frisch's from October 2015 until September 2017... so I was a good Frisch's employee for nearly two years. Of course, working at Frisch's didn't actually turn things around for me. That was a pretty bad incident.

I got a job offer in June 2016 that would have essentially lead to me going back to my old life. I would've worked at Axogen, a company that repurposes neurological tissue from deceased humans and pigs for surgical use in living humans and pigs. It was going to be perfect. I was back on track. For three blissful hours, my life could go back to the way it was and Frisch's would've just been a blip on the radar of my life...

Then they called me back a few hours later. They had heard from someone (an old coworker from Community Tissue Services) about my last six months at the Tissue Bank. They had liked me enough at the interview. I had told them that I had been ill though I'd kept mum about the nature of the illness. Mental illness is still illness. I don't care what other people say or think. It didn't matter. They heard about my depression and the way the medicine had made my work erratic... and decided to rescind the job offer because they felt it would simply not be a good idea.

I was heartbroken. I was torn apart. Everything I had been working for... was gone. If Axogen wouldn't hire me, even after everything. Well, Community Tissue Services certainly wouldn't rehire me. I was back at square one.

Worse, I was back to where I was in January 2013 with no job prospects, not nothing.

That same day, I got a phone call from Dr. David Garippa at Southern State Community College. I had expressed interest in the Biotechnology program at the college that he built. He was returning my call. We made an appointment to meet. I took two semesters to complete the program. I didn't really get any immediate job offers from the schooling. In fact, I was pretty much in the same place in June 2017 that I was in June 2016, but my perspective was different.

In June 2016, I was still beaten down. I had no real confidence in myself. I was participating in a weird sort of insanity, trying to do the same things I'd been doing and expecting a different outcome. In June 2017, I was ready and prepared to start something new. I'd spent a year learning new things, rededicating my brain to science and understanding the universe, the very best of pursuits. I wasn't treading in death and creating things from death anymore. Instead, I was looking towards light and starting a life just by creating, just by being.

Doctor Garippa did that, and I'll always be grateful to him. He gave me a chance to prove myself and I did. He's now pushing me to go on to a Master's program and beyond. I really don't know if I'll do all that, but the fact that he believes in me means something.

I now have a job at a company called Mane, Inc. in Lebanon, Ohio. I work twelve hour shifts, and I have a lot of fun making flavor capsules. I basically run a giant machine even though I never had very much mechanical aptitude, I'm starting to understand the blasted thing. It's all in the plumbing. 

I have a boyfriend who is crazy just to want to be with me, but I'm pretty crazy for loving him too so that's okay. He's a huge comic book nerd... so I'm getting further into comic books, especially Green Lantern.

Also, after working with plants and bacteria at school, I decided to try my hand at herb gardening and I went a little overboard last year. I plan to be a little better this coming year. Not at many. I was thinking I would like a basil, a lemon balm, some lavender, calendula, chamomile, cilantro, sage and mint. Oh, and I want to successfully propagate black cohosh even if I have to bleed to make it happen. It's personal now.

The little bastard will grow and give me DNA. You just watch.

Oh, and my boyfriend has a daughter who is eighteen. My boyfriend will now be referred to as JV. The daughter is Princess. Well, Princess is interested in Wicca. So, I've been acquiring books for her. I found one by Christopher Penczak called "The Inner Temple of Witchcraft" (more on that later... like it's own little blog post). That began a journey I have taken into Paganism (more on that in a future post to). Needless to say, I am reading a lot of books and my personal beliefs are taking an esoteric turn. So, there's also that.

Now what about writing?

Well, I am still writing. I still come up with ideas, but I haven't come close to writing any books since I finished NaNoWriMo in 2014. So, I'm just bobbing along, doing my thing. I want to start a fictional blog. I'll post more on that when it happens. However, for now, I need to get back in the practice of keeping this blog. So... here's to future posts!

Happy New Year everyone!