when it comes to the suburbs, i'm the original.
i finished my first painting in three years yesterday:
kurt vonnegut, jr. 14"x18"
it is by far the best painting i've ever done, and i am pretty happy about it. i'm also happy i finally finished a painting after so long, and hoping i will get on finishing the other two i started in the past three years.
here's the progression, i'm guessing it took about 20 hours total:
also, for the month of april i assigned myself the project of writing a flash fiction piece (roughly 500 words) every day. it was by far the best thing i've done for my writing in a long time, and i highly recommend it. i managed to only miss about three days, and doubled those up anyway, so i now have 30 flash fiction pieces. some of them are obviously terrible, but there are several i am pretty excited about and have been revising. more than anything, it renewed my faith in my own brain/imagination/writing and got me excited to write way more regularly. and i've been in a writing group since january that has been really awesome and helped me keep working and get more perspective on my writing and writing in general. i even talk about writing now, and voice my opinions and beliefs, which i was so terrible about while at reed. the plan is to start seriously submitting my stuff this summer and see what happens.
i'm going on my third month volunteering at the humane society, and i would also recommend it to anyone interested. it's totally, totally rewarding, and, beyond my complete willingness to spend all waking hours with dogs, it's really, really heartening to see people care so much about something and work hard at it and succeed. the building is really well planned out and innovative (there's a giant toilet in the floor of each pod for flushing poop more quickly so adopters don't overlook any dog!), the people (who are, incidentally, almost all female) are awesome, and everyone gets really creative about thinking up new ways to make things better for these animals while getting them placed in new homes. there are classes on all kinds of ways to help, including dog massage, even, so you can go in, learn how to massage a dog, and then just chill with the dogs and make them feel better while they wait to get adopted. totally amazing, inspiring, and really helpful in making me not feel like a waste of a brain/body/the good life.
i had a good renn fayre last weekend, too. it was great and ridiculous and horrible, in all those ways only rf can be. my highlights include meeting chopper the bulldog and getting to show stefan my tattoo, a lot of really amazing hugs, beautiful fireworks that made me feel at one with everyone/thing, emilys h and c, mindy, an amazing (if totally poorly serviced) and heartening brunch with mindy (for every drunk girl in a bar there is a brunch with mindy, an aim conversation about feelings with emily, a delicious salad on the backporch with deb), and some seriously nice sunday weather. i don't think i will go next year, but i guess that's what i said last year.
i got my csu financial info and they are not giving me any funding, which maybe decides that whole thing for me. mostly, i would've been going to a#1) be near my parents (god i would love to see my family once a week...) and b#2) show other people that i am not a complete failure. and only the first reason is valid. my dad is still really pulling for it, but i already feel so much better about my writing than i did last fall, so i don't know. i think maybe i want to wait and try again. see how the publishing effort goes, and decide based on that? i'd really like to have something to be heading off to, but i also really love portland and my job (god i love my job...) and feel like i am doing pretty well just working at things on my own for the moment. we will see, i guess.
i'm pretty exhausted right now, and am tending to feel slightly overwhelmed at all times about all of the things i'd like to be doing and the general uncertainty and confusion and ambition of life, and so i think it will be a get-yourself-together-a-day-May for me. i'm always a little tired, but i feel like i am getting things done and learning and trying to figure myself out. emily c will be here all summer (!!!) and the weather will be consistently better soon and i am reading a lot and i just learned how easy it is to make hashbrowns (the hardest part is having potatoes in the house!). what's not to look forward to?
so that's where i'm at. how is everybody else? i would like to know.