Whoops! Here's a picture of a flower I took from the dentist to help you get over it.
I think as more time passes and I keep up with writing these updates (or kind of keep up with writing them), the format continues to change. I used to give a detailed account of what I did throughout the month, maybe bookending it with major events and a few thoughts scattered in between. But as of late I've really just felt like writing more about my mindset and less about the things that occurred. I s'pose I decide the format so what I say goes, but I just felt like looping you in on that.
Geeze, don't jump down my throat!
The thing that struck me the most in March was the passing of time. You can look at that in a whole manner of ways but the one that it boils down to is that I've lived in Wisconsin for 18 years as of March 15th. That's a long time. Probably not a long time if it's where you're going to spend the rest of forever, but from the day we moved here in 1997 I thought about moving away. Initially it was back to Southern California, then for a long long time it was Chicago, but since 2009 it has been Austin. When I set my mind on things I have a hard time letting go of them. You know this.
So that being said, since I met Derek I've been thinking more and more about leaving Appleton. More and more about getting on with things, with life and my book and work and all that jazz. So, in order to get one with the easiest of those things, I reached out to the powers that be and scheduled everyone to come and shoot the final pieces of my book covers. We had some re-shoots to take care of as well as a new character to figure out (ears, I tell ya, make things difficult). As happened last summer, I had some booze and snacks and it was really just a couple of hours spent with really great people having a really great time. Sadly @klreynol could not be present but she was there in spirit!
Saphrinity Nargos
And also as happened last summer, I got a little emotional seeing these characters come to life once more. It's an interesting thing to write so much about people that are not real, in places that certainly are not real, and then see "them" standing in front of you. I love the silhouettes so much because they allow me to imagine these characters exactly as they are in my mind. It wasn't a ground-breaking idea but it was a good one and I'll never re-think that decision. You get an outline of a person and then you can fill in the rest of the details yourself.
To me, the worst thing about books being made into movies is that you have to let your own vision of that world die. Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, The Hunger Games, etc; they are all great movies in their own right but they are not necessarily accurate to the books. They aren't what I thought they would be.
I know the cheese doesn't stand alone.
The Onyxus Chronicles: Episode II main characters:
Saphrinity Nargos, Aurora Genesis, Banning Sol and Tristan Nargos
But we did get the shoot done that night, I put on the mantle of "Banning" one last time (yes, I'll reveal officially that I am him (like you hadn't figured it out (surprise if not!))), and then that was a wrap. I spent the morning of the next day photoshopping to get everything ready to send off to my brother for "assembly" of the cover, and then it was time to hitch up my suitcase and climb aboard a plane to finish the biggest part of the month.
I'd been planning since @klreynol left town in October to visit her in Arizona, and decided in January that I would actually do it and then slingshot over to Austin to visit my brother. It was early February when Derek decided he'd go to Austin with me to explore and see if it could be a potential place for him to live, as I so often mentioned it was for me. I would fly to Mesa on Monday the 16th, then to Austin on Thursday the 19th to meet Derek, and then we'd fly back home on Monday the 23rd.
The best
The weird thing about @klreynol and I is that for as hard as it was to say goodbye six months ago, we not once spoke on the phone between then and now. We texted fairly frequently, had long conversations online, but never chatted with our voices. I suppose that harkens back to how our relationship really began? Rambling on AIM and whittling away the hours of the night because we had nothing else to do. Of course I missed her (and she me I assume), but that's not something that can be cured by hearing a voice. If it is, then that part of me is broken. A text message does just as much for me as a quick phone call would. More, actually, because I can just walk away at a certain point and not have to do the awkward dance of trying to hang up.
The BEST thing about @klreynol is that no matter how much time passes between seeing each other, there is no awkwardness at all upon reconnecting. We slip into our old groove as if no time at all has passed... we just have a shit ton more to talk about. And that's how the visit went. Very smoothly, nice and warm weather, and plenty of conversation to fill a book. I got to see her husband, her adorable little boys, and of course her immediate family that moved down as well. It was a great trip and one I will make again sometime in the near future, after I get all of my other little duckies in a row of course.
It's a lot cheaper to fly to Arizona direct from a larger airport anyway (c;
Atop Mt. Bonnell
Now I hate to disappoint anybody that was potentially looking for a full detailed account of exactly what Derek and I got up to while we were in Austin, but I'm not going to rehash it here. 90% of the trip was spent doing things I'd already done down there. I just wanted to share them with him so he could experience them and hopefully be as wowed and impressed as I was. And he was.
I suppose the biggest take away is that we went down there together to see if it was somewhere Derek wanted to live, and the answer is yes. And we will. The current plan is to get down by August/September, which is kind of scary to think about when you realize it is only 4 or 5 months away. It's something that has been building for a long time and I am just lucky to have someone to do it with me when I was so afraid to do it alone. @klreynol and I always bonded over the fact that we hated going to new places alone for the first time (i.e. experiencing new things alone) and that was a big inhibitor for me going into this.
But then someone like Derek comes along and everything feels like it is just going to work. Effortlessly, simply, and finitely.
A kiss that launches my heart (c:
Y'know, the other day I told him to meet me at the mall after work so we could go pick out some clothes for a special event coming up. Derek doesn't normally meet me at work, there isn't any reason to, so it's not a place I ever actually see him. I was standing around talking to my co-workers and saw him walking in and my heart jumped up in my throat.
I didn't tell him at the time because I didn't want to give him a big head (kidding), but I went into the backroom to get my things and told a co-worker about it because I was all flustered. I think with this officially being my second-longest relationship, it's a good sign I can still get nervous and excited and sweaty when I see him. The trip went better than I ever anticipated it would. We had a blast on our own and with my brother, his kids, and my former sister-in-law. I'm so excited to start planning for my future and I'm so excited that it is finally time to do so.
When we got back to Appleton, Derek officially moved in. And in the words of Carrie Bradshaw, that's just fabulous.
So what else happened in March? I started physical therapy for my constantly sore back, finished Episode II of my book, wrote the outline for Episode IV, and successfully visited the dentist and left without any problems. Downsized my movie collection by about 500 movies, decided I hate Frontier Airlines, and started to love my job once more. Celebrated a few birthdays, let go of a few insecurites, and in the end got back on track to living my life the way I had gotten used to after four years on my own. The only difference is that I share it with someone else now.
Toodles gang (c:
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