grapevines

The vines are turning. They are turning all colors of yellow and orange and red and purple. Few of the vines are actually still clinging to the last tasty sweet grapes. We rode our bikes through the dry creek valley today taking note of the changes. One bright red old-vine-zinfandel with a twisted base, fields of yellowing leaves.

I met Andrew at work and we rode from there. His boss O, was just getting out of a meeting with a client as I pulled up. I greeted them. O's wife, H, introduced me, and wandered off to show them the property. As the clients left, the man asked me if I was a landscape architect. He then proceeded to tell me that he is a friend of the woman I interviewed with at the kickass firm here in town.

She said she was very sad she didn't have a position open, because she really wanted to hire you. he said. That is a great firm.

and that felt really good. now, I would like to actually work for them.

my motivation is orange

Car payments scare the shit out of me. Somehow my mortgage does not. I can fill my house with great people that help me pay it. We split utilities and garbage and share the bounty of the garden. Yes, waterlines may break or the floors may be scratched. A fire could take it all, or a leak could cause some damage. But my house has been standing for more than 80 years.

But the bottom line is, my house does not fly around on 4 wheels at high speeds narrowly missing other houses and other crazy drivers. If I fall asleep in my house, it just stands and creeks and keeps the raindrops off my brow. The people zooming up and down the street do not seem to pose too much of a threat.

I keep having nightmares of people hitting my car, keying my car, breaking into my car. This could be a crazy overreaction to the fact that I've had some not so great car luck in the past few months, and the reason I have a new car at all is because the magnet was totaled. This was never an issue before. I owned a beater car whose value would not change if someone hit it. Trucky was never shiny or new. It never looked like it had anything valuable in it.

Needless to say, this situation has hit some nerve that has sent me into high gear.

High gear seems to include jaw clenching, sleepless nights and ceaseless urges to apply for more and more jobs. I applied for multiple coffee shop jobs, and a UPS job and a seasonal wine industry job. I applied for more landscape architecture jobs. All in one day. then i started eating mac and cheese for every meal. Then I went camping.

I had two interviews this morning at coffee shops, and I am now unofficially an employee at one!! I also agreed to at least one bike tour this week and possibly a few more in the next couple of weeks. And car payments still scare the shit out of me.

norange and ollie

magnet is sitting in what is currently the purgatory for totalled family cars: our farm. It will soon be transformed into a hay truck or my 5 year old nephew's first car, or a parts bucket. and trucky, after its most recent painful journey home is parked just next to it.

My dad spent all of sunday working on trucky trying to make the gurgling and sputtering and fluttering noises coming from the engine disappear, but as one loud noise was silenced, he could then hear others.

in a fit of panic induced by the loss of two old friends: magnet and trucky, I bought a new car. I spent the next 5 hours or so feeling queezy at the thought of car payments and increased insurance and the look on Andrew's face when I tell him I bought a car even though i'm broke and unemployed. But all else seemed to lead me to this decision. it was going to have to happen sooner or later. The north bay has no comprehensive public transit system. As far as I can tell, they are planning LA in the north bay: widening highway 101, encouraging suburbia, running over cool little towns with new rapid development and terrible transportation planning.

okay, enough planning rant.

trucky wouldn't pass Caltrans emissions standards even if it was running great, and magnet is uninsurable = I have no car to drive in California if i plan on moving there. so... I found myself the cutest little low emissions vehicle that gets nearly 40-50 miles/gallon, can turn into a giant bed inside, or a giant backseat for jerry dog or bike. and it is orange. and it is almost identical to my dad's new car. In fact, i almost insured my dad's car instead of mine.

but Ollie has a pinstripe. Norange does not.
this pic soon to be replaced by an actual picture of Ollie.

what she said.

http://nonagonal.blogspot.com/2007/09/hang-in-there-little-tomato.html

psych evaluation

I suppose I'm due for some shitty cards, as I've had some amazing luck in my life, especially in the past 5 years: the Grand Canyon, grad school, teaching fellowships, great friends, international experiences, a perfect boy...

I'm normally a glass is half full kind of girl. I almost always look at the bright side, even if I briefly complain about the bummer side for just a few seconds. But I have to say, I'm getting a bit down, and once again nightmares of Boulder are coming flooding back. Not from the relationship perspective, but from a financial and emotional perspective.

I find myself filling my days here figuring out how to make money. I could pawn some jewelry, sell some outdoor gear, or have a garage sale, even though I know this would make my parents angry. I look for jobs online and in the newspaper and in the windows of stores. I look for envelopes in the mailbox, hoping tenant's rent checks or utility checks have come so I can cash them and contribute something more than pasta for dinner. I shift money around in my accounts to avoid bouncing checks. I keep hoping the fastcash button on the ATM will just give me a free $40, but that doesn't seem to be working either. My parents are the fastcash button. And I hate that feeling.

So, today I applied for two more jobs: one in my field, and the other in the toy industry. I was giggling at first. Thinking how silly it would be to be stocking shelves with toys in a corporate chain store on the strip in Santa Rosa. I would laugh my way though the day helping customers find GI Joes and Barbies and bright red and blue trikes. Then as the application process drug on and on.... and on and on..... I began to wonder about my decision to even apply. They wanted to know everything about me. They wanted to know whether or not I agreed/disagreed with the following statements, or whether I strongly agreed/disagreed with them:

* You have friends, but don't like them to be too close

* You act quickly without worrying too much about whether you are doing the right thing

* Many people cannot be trusted

* People are often mean to you

* There's no use having close friends; they always let you down

* You give direct criticism when you need to

ummm... Is this a psychological evaluation? For an off hours shelf stocking job at toys r us? They asked me three times if I was a criminal. Twice if I was a citizen, twice again if I was eligible for foodstamps. Then this:

The information in this section will enable us to perform a Criminal Background Check prior to finalizing an offer of employment.
	*Note: the existence of a criminal history will not automatically disqualify you from the job you are applying for.

I think the FAFSA is a shorter application, and less probing. I think i'm more scared of Toys r Us at this point than the government.

unsigned

A couple days ago I tried to buy a $3.00 bag of candy with my debit card. I was confident for the first time in a while that it would work because I had driven all the way to Eugene just to put my paycheck in the bank from the bike tour job. My card was denied. Twice. I used my other card, hoping it would work. I walked away with my candy and called my bank.

The check did not have an authorized signature.

Not my signature, right, I signed it, right?

Yes, your signature was on it.

My bike boss did not sign my check. He also didn't want to pay me for one of my days of work. I question whether or not he forgot to sign it on purpose. So, my unsigned paycheck is in the mail back to my boss who owes me for another couple of days work.

And I was hoping that my recent interview would help pull me out of the terrible employment history I have had my entire life. But the letter I just got in my inbox told me that they couldn't hire a newbie right now. Beh. Do they know I would work for free?

mess

The summer is winding down and the fog is rolling in. the fluffy layer of cold and gray doesn't burn off until around noon these days. The leaves are turning all shades of orange and brown, and the acorns are falling with audible thuds onto the street, and onto expensive cars.

Usually this time of year my biology takes over and I start nesting. I get out my big heavy blankets and make a nest of my bed. I clean the house and rearrange my room. I get all my finances and schedules and projects in line. I start thinking about what to be for Halloween, what to make people for Christmas.

But this year I'm tying up other loose ends. My thesis doesn't seem to want to write itself, and my committee doesn't seem to be on the planet as of late. So I'm stuck in this strange place, wondering if I really am almost done, or if I've fooled myself into thinking I'm almost done. So, I've taken to forming an honorary committee:

One kenny h: faculty member, who is still in Italy

One jerry-o: my Uncle, who did his undergrad at Yale in English literature and his masters at Berkeley in ceramic sculpture

Partner in crime Jules: LA extraordinaire, superhero of cover letter editing, and fellow ruin explorer

Partner in crime Jenn: superhero of the pdx brownfields division and fellow ruin explorer

Is this thing over yet?

Putting my life back together

There is a certain necessity every now and then for things in life to fall apart just so you can put them back together. If the falling apart were always intentional, I would be worried, but if it is your typical falling apart, new opportunities abound. I'll try and remind myself of this if I'm not feeling this positive tomorrow, or if I don't get the job.

A certain amount of falling apart happened after my undergrad, and halfway through my first year of graduate school. And a bit of falling apart has been happening for the past few months as I have been separating (unhappily) from my house and thoughts of living in Portland and being coerced into ill-advised adventures with a certain couple of crazy kick ass gals.

But a certain amount of putting the pieces back together has to happen at some point. And I've been working hard on making that happen. and I've submitted to a bit of self pity. And I've tried to be easy on myself in my apathetic and somewhat lonely state. Because I'm usually so hard on myself I make things worse. Then I really down the ice cream. Even though it makes me sick.

And yesterday I had my second informational interview with the firm I am most interested in. a firm that posted a picture of Mr. Bean along with the photos of the other employees, a firm that does amazing public, civic, institutional, and ecological work throughout California. At first I met with only 2 of the principles talking endlessly about how their firm distributes projects, what type of projects they work on, the personalities of the firm. And by the end of the two hours they spent with me, I had met every employee, talked about UO faculty, and my home town, and Andrew's boss and irrigation plans and the third principle's outdated waterproof Sony walkman. You know the one I'm talking about.

So, this morning I called to reiterate my interest in a position at their firm. And after that I registered for my final 3 credits at UO. And this afternoon I opened a new bank account that I can access outside of Oregon. And I set up a new short-term health insurance plan. And just now I made a list of all the things I need to pay off, and the monthly bills I have to manage.

These things probably seem really boring to most people, but to me they have always been extremely satisfying if they work out, and today they have. and so the un-falling-apart begins. I hope.

homeless

I spent my birthday driving a totaled car to my parent's house. I spent the next day driving to Eugene and moving my belongings to a different bedroom and doing this uncomfortable separation thing from my house, from Eugene. And when I came back to california, Andrew told me about how he felt when he got home from his backpacking trip. It didn't feel like home.

I am a big fan of traveling. I am a big fan of forcing myself into unique, uncomfortable living situations in many different regions, in many different countries and cultures. I am a huge fan of living with as little as possible when I travel. I have a crazy knack for packing up one tiny backpack and living in foreign places for months on end. But I am also a big fan of having a home. I am a big fan of having a cozy bed and a pile of blankets and pillows to make a nest with, and a bookshelf for my books, and a place to keep my bike, but most importantly, a place that feels like home.

So when I went to Eugene, I tried to embrace my separation with the house I spent so much time and energy with. I pretended to make up my new room in the back bedroom with my other belongings but it felt like a skeleton of a room. It had no soul. I packed up a few things I didn't need, things I just wanted to have with me. My pillow. The jar my mom made me that I filled with coins. A wooden bowl my dad made me for my birthday. Plant books, landscape architecture books, knot books.

But there is no place to put these things in my not-so-home in Santa Rosa. There is no room for another bookshelf or another jar of coins. There is no room for negotiation of the few pieces of furniture Andrew has in his room. And I feel like a spoiled brat asking for more space, asking for a room that is part mine. But I have made a commitment to live here. I have given up a lot to be here, and I would love to have a shelf for my books, a place for my jar and bowl.

And now, I'm going to snuggle with my pillow, because at least that feels like home if I close my eyes.