Building

Another year is behind us.  And it's been a weird one.

In many ways, 2014 felt just like a continuation of 2013, with many of the same accomplishments and many of the same struggles.  While 2013 saw the beginning of a concerted effort toward self-awareness and self-improvement, 2014 saw this effort continue.  Some days, in some ways, it feels like I'm leaps and bounds ahead of where I was then.  Others, it seems like I haven't moved at all.  Mental health is a tough thing to maintain, especially in graduate school, and the calendar year doesn't necessarily offer the cleanest points of comparison for progress.

That said, over the last few days, I've been blessed with the ability to disconnect (at least partially) from my day-to-day duties, which has helped me step back and assess my life, where I am and where I want to be.  It'll be a big year for me in 2015, as I keep molding myself bit by bit into someone I'm ever more proud to be.

Random tangent: We're more-or-less back full-circle to watching Ryan Seacrest's show this year, with the exception of a few musical acts, despite the fact that we can't stand Fergie.  Carson Daly's countdown show has just become dry, and after several disappointments including not even getting to see the ball drop one year, it was time for a change.  At least a higher proportion of people are on board with "twenty-fourteen" and "twenty-fifteen" this year.  Slowly but surely.  Habby Nerrrrr!

Bloggy is Nine!

It's cake day!

Yes, this oft-neglected blog has, in fact, survived another year of existence.  Believe it or not.  Bloggy is nine now.

And so, faithful as always, I'm celebrating the ninth cake day of Randomness by baking it a bloggy cake.  (And unlike some years past, this one was actually really quick to bake.  All of the necessary ingredients were pretty easily located this time.)

With the passing of time, it's increasingly difficult to tap into what my goals for this blog were way back when I started it in 2005, but recently I've had a couple of hours-long conversations with a friend that have got me thinking about the last nine years of my life as a whole unit, a single story arc.  And a lot of the things that really threw me for a loop at one time now make much more sense in that broader context.  I'm not sure if I want this blog to take on a "memoir" role... but I can see how much I've left out over the years, either because I didn't feel comfortable sharing it at the time or because I didn't understand it myself.  I can also see that I actually have some life experiences now that might someday be worth contributing to society at large.  But for now, those will remain topics for another heretofore undetermined day.

In any case, though, I suppose I should at least take this opportunity to give a brief life update, since it seems all I do here anymore is show off my not-that-impressive Photoshop skills every few months, then write about how I'm too busy to write, and leave without having offered anything of substance to the readers.  (Yes, people still show up here from time to time.  You are reading this after all, right?)

Anyway, I'm still doing the grad school thing, with taking classes and teaching being my two main priorities and serving the Computer Science Department as president of its Graduate Student Organization filling in a lot of the cracks.  Since most of my friends from my undergrad years have moved away (and I miss you all dearly), and this has left me feeling isolated at times, I've also been trying to branch out socially and am pleased to have found a couple groups which I'm feeling more a part of each week.

That said, managing all of this while still trying to maintain composure and achieve personal growth is a tough task.  As a result, at many times over the last two years, it's felt as though I've been working myself into the ground in all sorts of capacities — as a student, as an educator, as a professional, even as a friend — and in many cases, that's been true.  So, while I've still got work to do this summer toward finishing my degree, since the spring term wrapped up, I've been taking some much-needed time to myself, just to regroup, rediscover my inner strength, and recharge for what lies ahead.  It's very easy to lose one's self-confidence when there's a near-daily chipping away, which makes times like these all the more important and worthwhile.

And so, over these last couple weeks, I got to spend some quality time with lots of family, including my great-grandmother, Esther, who turned 100 on 4 May, which is just incredible!  Here we are together on the big day!

(I probably should have baked her a bloggy cake or something.)

I also got to spend time helping out my aunt and uncle a bit with accounting-related stuff for their business, participating in my hometown's collection for the National Association of Letter Carriers' food drive, and actually writing a somewhat substantive post on this blog for once!

All in all, I'm doing pretty well.  Thanks for asking.

2014

Here it is: The first post on this blog posted in a year ending with a "four". And that completes the cycle. I can now officially say that this blog will be turning 10 next year, which is... interesting.

I don't know why, but I think I'm going to be okay with it being 2014 this year. Last year, I wrote about how it was going to take some work to wrap my head around 2013. And indeed it did. Consider that I still wasn't quite comfortable with it being 2013 even yesterday. Case in point.

My mother says she's always preferred even-numbered years, that they've felt more "right" or "comfortable" than an odd-numbered year. I've generally regarded that as silly, but now I'm starting to think there might actually be something to that. Or maybe I'm just more comfortable going into even-numbered years because I tend to be more positive heading into them? I have no idea if that's actually a long-term trend in my life, but just thinking back to where I was at this point in past years, I think it's safe to say that it's been true since at least 2010.

Maybe that says something about the cycles experienced by my emotional state. Maybe it's just that certain things happen in certain years, and it all sums up to one big coincidence.

Regardless, it's that time again when I spend a little while trying to remember where everything is in Photoshop to create a doodle capturing my hopes for the new year. Twenty-fourteen, like its predecessors, has a lot of unknown ahead for me, but I'm excited!

Random tangent: I've really been trying not to get hooked on new television shows lately, but holiday breaks always have the possibility of ruining that. Reruns of Brooklyn Nine-Nine help, too.