Hello, And It's Nice to See You Again

I've been away for a while.  I realize that.  I guess it's a little difficult keeping up-to-date on a blog when you're busy living.  Trying to keep up with the holiday craziness, working a full time job, running a house, organizing your boyfriend's life... ugh.  And I don't even have any kids.  Being a responsible adult sucks.

I don't know what has been wrong lately.  I haven't been happy but for no good reason.  Time passes and I feel more and more like I'm just wasting it.  I'm not any closer to knowing what I want than I was 5 years ago.  So I've decided to make some changes.  Over the next few weeks, I'm going to finally get my resume together and start applying for a new job.  I've been complaining about my current job for enough years now that I'm sure all my friends are tired of hearing about it.  Why haven't I left already then?  Because it's hard.  Because it's scary and I don't really know what I'm doing.  I know that I am capable of great things, I know that I can achieve my long-term goals, but I also doubt myself.  And I don't know how to get back into it.  This was much easier in college when I had an entire institution to assist me and network of friends going through the same thing.  I feel alone in this, but I know that tons of people in their mid-20's are in the same predicament.  Where do I want to go from here?

I haven't held myself to the highest of standards over the past few years.   I just felt like I needed a break.  I didn't want to have to think about anything too much or work on anything too hard.  I have wondered often what our lives would be like if February 2009 had never happened.  But that is a dangerous line of thinking.  Nothing good comes out of those thoughts.  We're coming up on three years now and it still clouds my mind.  I think it will take a few more years to fade away.  Or maybe it won't.  Regardless, I can't use that as an excuse anymore and I never should have.  It's time to be happy again.

Following the job, we'll see what happens.  I've always wanted to go back to school but that doesn't seem to be within my reach.  I just can't get $70,000 of loans to make sense without a clear plan of what I'd even do with the degree.  But I do want to move forward in my career and climb the proverbial ladder.  I don't need to figure that one out right now.  I can take a break for just one more night :)

A lot of things have been on my mind lately.  And I'm certainly very sorry if you ended up on the other side of that conversation at one point or another.  I think I'm finally ready to start moving on.


Oh, and here's some pictorial updates from the past few months to make this post more exciting:

Ok, now we're about all caught up.