The End of an Age

Today is a big day for me. It's hard to process all the thoughts running rampant in my head and harder still to siphon out only the ones worth sharing and assemble them into words and sentences that form coherent thoughts rather than inane ramblings but I'll try.

Six months ago was the day that Greg and I finally took the step of filing paperwork for a "Dissolution of Marriage" (which seems to be a much more fitting term than "divorce"). We'd been decided for almost a month prior to that and just... well, I don't know why we waited. I think there was a period where we both thought we might change our minds or realize that we were making a mistake but all that month did for us was continually reinforce that we just weren't right for each other any longer, we weren't in love anymore. It was a really hard realization to come to... not in that it was necessarily difficult to realize that we didn't love each other, although it did take a while, but in that it hurt us both to know that it was mutual and it hurt to realize that after all the hard work and tough times we'd made it through together, this was going to be the last of those.

The last six months have been a ridiculous rollercoaster of emotion for me. The first couple months were undoubtedly the hardest, having to deal not only with not having that one person who'd always been there for me around to help me through it but also dealing with moving back in with my parents, who I hadn't spoken with in over a year and a half. Things obviously turned around; I found a new job, moved into my own apartment for the first time ever and went through a lot of personal growth and change. I also really came to realize what amazing friends I have during that time-- without them, I wouldn't be where I am today or be the person that I've become, which is happily a person that I really like for the first time in more years than I'd care to admit.

The realization that today was approaching started around the time of what would've been our two year anniversary last month, a day that passed with more ease and less heartache than I'd imagined it could (his 30th birthday was undoubtedly the most emotional). I've run the whole gamut of emotions about it... from being terrified of the finality of it being recognized legally, even though it had already been final in our lives for quite some time, to being excited and happy and full of hope for what's to come and the choices I'll get to and have to make in the future to missing the good times we had and the obstacles that we managed to overcome together. I'm still mildly terrified of taking my maiden name back; it's got nothing to do with the actual name and everything to do with how much I've changed and grown from the person I was when I had that last name, which I didn't really like, to who I've become and am still becoming. I realize it's just a name, a couple letters tacked onto the end of my first name, but there's a certain significance to it that's hard to escape.

Today has been delightfully normal. I made a phone call to the paralegal who filed our paperwork and all that's left is to take our Request for Judgement to the courthouse downtown and with that simple act... it's done. Greg and I spoke briefly through text message, without any arguing or resentment... more with a weird feeling of camaraderie that I think we've developed through this whole experience. I think we're both at the point where we realize that even if this isn't what we'd pictured for our lives, this is how it is and we've got to do the best with what we have. I don't know what the future holds for Greg and I; there've been many conversations about trying to remain some sort of friends but if that's not meant to be, it's just not, and I firmly believe that things will work themselves out the way they're supposed to. I have no doubt that there will still be bumps and hard times, but I sincerely feel like the worst of it is over and I'm just excited to see what the next couple of years hold in store.

Santa Cruz (You're Not That Far)

The Thrills had it right...

This weekend started just like every other weekend: breakfast with Ericka at The Fresno Breakfast House (yum!) and then spending most of the rest of the day running errands, cleaning and putting together my new bed frame (since I FINALLY got my mattress)! A successful day overall, but what made it even more successful was Ericka's 9 o'clock phone call asking if I wanted to go to Santa Cruz-- right now! So her and Billy got themselves packed and picked me up and we headed to Santa Cruz! It was fun to be so spontaneous!

Santa Cruz is about three hours from Fresno, probably a little faster with Ericka driving and the complete lack of traffic so when we got to town and checked into our hotel, Ericka and I spent a while walking on the beach (about a block away from our hotel room!) and the wharf before calling it a night. Funny thing-- on the way back to the hotel there was some sort of surfing... dummy... doll thing on the roof of the building next to the hotel-- I about had a heart attack! It looked like a real guy was on the roof! We felt the need to preserve the memory of our scared faces, as you can see... (yeah, we really like pictures!)

The next morning we got up and had breakfast (Billy and I had these amaaaazing smoked salmon omlettes, even though they got our orders backwards and Ericka had one with..... crab, I think? They were delicious!) before heading toward the pier! We got there early enough to walk around and look at all the rides and booths and stuff before it got too crowded since they didn't open until 11am and when they did open we waited in line for all of 15 minutes or so to go on the Big Dipper-- a really cool roller coaster that's made infinitely cooler by the fact that there's a fantastic view of the beach from it! Riding a roller coaster on a beach is definitely something I'm glad I got to do... ahh, I love the beach.

We spent the rest of the afternoon driving around taking in the scenery. This picture is from our very brief stop at National Parks State Beach (I think that's what it was called) where it was increeeeeeeeeedibly cold! We didn't stay long, just enough to take a quick picture and continue on down the coast. We stopped for a lunch break before finding a relatively un-crowded beach to lay out on for the afternoon. I got some quality napping, book-reading and walking on the beach done... my kind of Sunday!

Overall, a pretty fantastic way to spend my weekend. It's so nice to be able to just pack up and go somewhere for the day and to have great friends to do it with! I think we all came home with sunburns, despite the fact that we used sunblock, but it'll go away soon enough and it was worth it just to get out of Fresno for a weekend-- at least in my opinion!

Oh, and here's evidence of my amazingly retarded sunburn... yes, I was wearing a t-shirt since the weather was supposed to be chilly!

I also can't resist posting a picture of my bed-- I'm so proud of myself for putting it all together myself and excited to finally have the bedset I've been wanting for a year! And, the best part, it didn't fall apart when I slept in it last night! Yay! Now to finally get around to making my room look a little more... lived in. :)

The Hangover

Funniest. Movie. Ever.

If you haven't seen it, go! I saw it with Ericka and Billy on Friday night and we literally laughed from start to finish. By the time we left the theater, my stomach hurt from laughing so much.

Seriously, no other words will do this movie justice so just go see it if you haven't yet!

Comments!

So apparently there's been something wrong with posting comments on here, even though all the settings looked like they should allow anyone that wanted to to post. It seems to be (maybe?) related to the template I'm using. It should be fixed for now but I guess maybe I should figure out how to make it allow embedded comments... or find a new summery one! :)

iPhone 3G S

I was trying to resist blogging about this since it's incredibly nerdy of me but I figure if Jenny can blog about fish and Ericka can blog about larynges (how sad is it that I know the plural of larynx?!) then I can blog about my nerdy interests too!

So for those of you who haven't heard about it yet, lots of news came out of Apple's WWDC yesterday-- laptops, the new OS coming in September and of course, iPhone news! While the laptops are interesting enough in their own way, I don't need one of those and the OS upgrade (that'll only be $29, yay!) in September will be great for speeding up my computer and getting some space back, with few to no actual new features.... I'm drooling over the iPhone updates, especially since my current iPhone is a) 1st gen, b) incredibly beat up (I'll try to remember to post a picture of the missing chunk later!) and c) becoming hazardous to my health... or at least my fingers!

Here's a rundown of the new features that I'm most excited about:

Faster speeds for everything from internet to opening apps and increased battery life!

Video! Capturing, sharing... it's all here!

Voice commands for dialing, searching, controlling music.

Spotlight! I'm forgetful so being able to search across any application is amazing!

MMS! It's ridiculous that we can't do it now... even cheap pay-as-you-go phones can send picture messages, why should I have to look up all the carriers' emails to do so?!

A better camera! More megapixels + tap to focus = win!

GPS! Yes the 2nd gen iPhones had this, but mine didn't! I get lost enough for this to be a great investment!

Tethering, yay! Not so important right now (especially since AT&T dropped the ball and isn't ready for it yet) but would be nice when school starts in the fall!

Copy and paste! And an undo!

Ok... I'm done being such a mondo nerd, I suppose. I just needed to get it out of my system! Besides, I know at least a couple other people who are just as excited as I am-- Jackie told me she had a "phone-gasm" while we were both reading the liveblogging of the keynote address yesterday! haha...

Oh yeah, here's a link to watch the keynote and a site with a good summary of the features new to the 3G S if anyone else is as nerdily interested in it as I am.

Did I mention that I'm nerdy enough that I'm planning to wait in line for it again... yes, I waited a couple hours for the 1st gen when we were in RI but this time there's an AT&T store like 5 minutes from my house and I hear they'll be opening at 7am on release day-- just enough time to snag one before work, I hope! Just trying to decide if I'm getting a 16g or trying to justify a 32g to myself... we'll see! :)

6.02.09

The last week or so has been blissfully uneventful, un-blogworthy and drama-free except for a couple minor things that are hopefully being quelled before they turn into full-blown drama-- we are so too old for this crap now! Even so, it feels like I still have a ton on my mind and I'm realizing that as hard as I try, I don't always handle that particularly well. I guess these things take time to learn though... maybe I just expect too much from myself too fast.

And in other non-news, I'm not only completely obsessed with the Twilight series right now, but I also found the episode of The Office that I hadn't been able to find online so I'm partway into the 5th season now and having a hard time tearing myself away from that too! It pretty much makes me a hermit, I guess.

Watching Twilight with Ericka last night after finally reading the book was pretty much the funniest thing ever. I felt a combination of "Oh, this make so much more sense now that I've actually read the book and realize the parts of the story that the movie doesn't have time to tell us!" and "Wow, the book is so much better than this that it makes the movie seem kind of silly..." Realizing that Jasper looks a little like Q-bert was one of the highlights of the movie for me-- I wish I had a picture of B so I could post a side-by-side comparison!

Anyways, enough rambling! Here, watch the trailer for New Moon!