Well, I'm in better spirits this morning than I have been in some time.
I'm sitting here, listening to Pulp's Different Class, and waking up thanks to some Italian Roast from Fourth Coast.
I think I had decent dreams last night. I mean, not only did I not have bad dreams but I actually had pleasant ones. Ones where all the crazy shit works itself out. I woke up early this morning, and when I did, everything felt like it fit fairly well together.
I went back to sleep and was awakened by the phone. It was the job I've been going for. They wanted to know the specifics of my hours, so they could send the new hire package to corporate for approval. That's a good deal. It'll be a good schedule. I'll be working from either 2 or 3 in the afternoon, depending until 9 in the evening. I'll do that Monday through Friday. I'll do that until I go to school in the fall, and then I'll cut my hours back a bit.
I still haven't mentioned the week off for Italy to the appropriate person, but I don't think that will be a problem. I forgot the first time and mentioned it (on the second interview) to the HR woman, and she told me that I needed to tell it to the department manager, so I figured it would be better to wait until I started. But I got the impression it wouldn't be a problem. They seemed pretty flexible.
Lately, I've been in a funk about school but I finally am starting to feel better. It wouldn't be accurate to call me directionless, but I've had this overwhelming sense of pointlessness, and creative frustration. This sense that nothing good can possibly come out of trying to do a job that will be creative in nature; it would end up in banality. But that anything where I'm not being creative would be depressing and distracting. So the whole school plan has seemed really moot. And on top of that, I have a general sense of exhaustion after finally bringing the plans of this move to fruition, and the last thing I want to do at this point is think about the future. I just want to experience the here and now, and gradually let everything sink in.
This sort of came to a head yesterday, but it seems to be working itself out. I talked to my brother for awhile on the phone last night, which was good. The fact that he and my sister in law successfully run an anime shop in a po dunk town in Pennsylvania is pretty damned inspiring. If they can do it there, there is no reason that I can't carve out my own ideas for things as well, and make it work.
And, well, if it doesn't, then it doesn't. But I don't want to spend the rest of my life thinking "maybe someday I'll do this---" . I want to try to do it, if for no other reason than my own self satisfaction and inherent belief that you need to always keep going after the things you want to do. When you just give up, fall into some sort of weary resignation, that's when it's all over for you.
I do think that I'm going to only go part time to school my first semester. I'm thinking that I'll take three classes: a preliminary drawing class, Flash and photography. I want to keep it fun, all the stuff that most interests me. I figure I've been out of school for awhile, and I can get back into the swing of it with stuff that interests me most. Plus, three courses is a healthy amount. It's enough to keep me feeling in the swing of things, without going through hell trying to juggle it all. I can always take a full load the following semester.
I still don't have my drawing table set up, so I've been doing a lot of stuff in appleworks' paint program. But I'm actually kind of proud of what I've done. I don't like all of it, but some of it is looking very strong. So, check out the visual section of my page, I have a bunch up there.
We should have the table together soon, and I can get back to work on the animation project, the story of Maria. That should be a good time.
Maybe now that I have a job, we can get the video machine together. That way, I can start putting some of my work up on this site.