From the perfect start to the finish line

I just turned in my two papers for my two classes that end tonight at midnight.  I have one class left.  One class until I can call myself a college graduate.  I will have my Bachelor of Science degree.  I will finally have finished SOMETHING.

Though this happiness and excitement has been tarnished by a falling out with a good friend.  Someone I have known and cared about for 18 years.  He was my rock, my shelter, and my best friend.  I am heartbroken and trying to make the best of it.

So here I am, trying to count my lucky stars because I am sososo close to being done with school.  I graduated 16 years ago this last May.  It's about damn time.

it's always darkest before the dawn...

I am so thankful.  Beyond thankful.  I am thankful to have lived in this country, under its leadership over the last eight years.  I am thankful a man who I fully backed was elected President of the United States of America, not once, but twice. 

I am thankful that my son, as of 2010, was able to have healthcare coverage that I paid for, as he no longer fell into the category of pre-existing condition.  I am thankful that when I lost my job, and I lost my health benefits, that in 2014, I finally had a way to get myself coverage.  

Very few things suck in this world more than a $250 yeast infection.  Yeah.  $250.  One office visit.  

I am thankful that I have a family who aligns with me politically so that I don't have to dread holidays, or events.  I am thankful that no one in my family would ever disown me even if we had those differences.

I am thankful that in 2013 I was able to go back to school.  I was able to qualify for Pell Grants, and financial aid, and I found what I was really meant to do in this life of mine.

I am thankful that in 2015, I not only was able to hold and love my niece for the first time, but I was able to find a career.  Employment doing what I love with amazing men and women who are working toward a common goal of helping other people.  I am so thankful that I was born to be a helper.  

I am thankful that this coming year I am going to be able to take another step forward with my little family, and buy a house.  Not just buy, but build, with our own hands.  I am thankful we will be able to help others, too, in their pursuit to build and own a home.  

I am also terrified.  In the last eight years, so much progress has been made. I do not live under the delusion that Obama was the Messiah.  I mean... wait.  Okay yes I do.This man brought the first president of African-American descent into the WHITE House.  And after eight years, he still didn't take away your guns, he didn't enact Sharia law, he didn't force women to get abortions, and he didn't unplug the machines of the terminally ill.  

What he did, was gave us hope.  More than anything that's what we needed, to be able to hope that this could, that this WOULD be better.  And it has been.  Nothing is ever perfect and everything changes.  But me and my loved ones are still side by side, healthy, happy, able to get by.

I am afraid that tomorrow I will wake up and the first strike against me is that I'm a woman.  Second strike, a democrat woman.  Third, single mother.  Fourth, pro choice.  But what it really comes down to, is what is between my legs, right?  Gotta grab me by the pussy and show me how things really are and what men really get to control in this great nation of ours.  

My mother and I made mid morning plans to go to lunch together for a sort of mother/daughter day.  We sat down, ordered, and I mentioned to her that I wished we had gone to the Women's march in Lincoln.  She said she wished we had, too.  We decided to get our food to go, and went on a two hour road trip, making it to Lincoln right around the time the march was starting.  We quickly realized that it was a lot bigger than we had anticipated it being.  We ended up in a crowd of several thousand women, and men, and children, and every color and creed and back ground.  

People had signs, supporting those things they found the most precious in their lives.  My favorite was a sign that said REVOLUTIONS are for PUSSIES!  the EVOL was reversed and written in red.  There were the "I support Planned Parenthood" signs.  We chanted, my favorite of which was "Show me what democracy looks like.... THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE!"  

We shut down a street.  We did it with great love, and zero violence.  We were inclusive, and supportive, and surrounded.

At these events, I am able to truly find myself, and this is where I am home.

New Year - plans for the new me 2017

Over the last four years, I have managed to pick my life back up, dust it off, and find a very happy-ish place in the universe.  I have changed jobs twice after getting a new one in January 2013, and where I ended up is where I am planning to remain for a long time.  I have gone back to, and am nearly done with school, and even though it feels so far away, and so much in front of me to still do before I am done, I am SO CLOSE.

In the last four years, I have also managed to lose a little bit of myself that I was very proud of, and that was the active and healthy life I had been leading prior to my world falling apart.

So, here we go, back to making goals and lists, back to taking it one step at a time.

Goals - 2017

Read - 2 books a month.  Even if they're for school, even if they are YA and brainless.

Write - of course this blog, but I would also like to get in the habit of writing prose again.  I have so many stories to tell.

Exercise - Three times a week at the gym, minimum, unless I'm being active outside.  I am NOT too fat to go to the gym, and I need to stop telling myself this.  Ideally, I would like to do an hour of cardio three times a week, and two days of lifting.  I just want to set my goal as something I can grown on.

Eat better - Stay away from soda, cook more meals at home, pay more attention to what I am putting into my body and in what proportions.  I know what I need to do, I just need to do it.

Lose weight - I am setting the bar low, 50 pounds.  This is a little under a pound a week, allows for weeks where I totally screw up and feel sorry for myself.  This is achievable, and in the healthy way.

Graduate College - I'm putting this here, because I'm scared that at the last minute, I am going to give up and walk away like I seem to do everything else.  I have two more classes.  TWO.  I need to do this.

Buy a home - being approved to do my sweat equity hours in order for approval for a Habitat for Humanity house is one of the biggest things to ever happen to me.  The hope is that by this time next year, Aiden and I will be in our new house, having completed 400 hours toward it, and it will be mine.

Become more active in local political activities - I am going to be so busy this year that I will barely be able to see straight, but I do want to become more active in the things that matter to me.

Continue and grow the breastfeeding support group - the best thing I have done over the last year, by far, is starting a local breastfeeding support group.  It doesn't earn me any money, it takes a big chunk of my time both online and off, but it has been something that motivates me to keep going.  I would like to see that grow.


These are the big ones.  Tomorrow, I will try to get January's goals typed up.  I would like each month to be more specified on what exactly I would like to accomplish, and how I'm working toward these larger goals, with some smaller self improvement things thrown in as well.

Wishing everyone a beautiful and peaceful New Year!

xoxo
-Sadie