Absences, Abstaining, and Aberrations

June 13, 2022

This is the longest I've gone without doing much drinking. Aside from a drink here and there at dinners or lunches out (which are both rare), I don't keep any booze in the house to drink and I don't drink when I go out to the club (which is super rare). It hasn't been a difficult thing to do, but I also haven't seemed to experience anything new from the abstention.

May, June, and most of July are turning into a very introspective and creative time for me. I'm trying to make time to read, which I'm hoping will also jumpstart some writing. There is some of that already at play for my gaming table, but that's a very different kind of writing, but which is really forcing me to carve out some deeply interwoven narratives. It's been fun.

I took medical leave off from work for the entire month of May. The only vacation time I'd taken in the last year was to handle business surrounding mom's estate or my own new place up north. Very little of that time was set aside to simply relax; there was too much to do and too little time to do it in.

And so, I began the process of applying for short term disability and taking medical leave from work. And before I continue, understand that literally EVERYONE I spoke to in this process (across several companies/entities)...each person as absolutely lovely and super sympathetic and about as helpful as you could possibly be. But there was a LOT of incorrect information parsed between them all and I spent a good portion of my time off worrying about whether it was going to be approved or not. Two and a half weeks into it, I got approved. Which is lucky as I would've had to pay all that time back had it not been approved, a point of order that was not at all stressful when already dealing with absurd amounts of stress and anxiety.

I digress. The process was not the best, but the outcome was so very necessary and I'm glad I inquired about it and then was approved to experience it. For those reading, if you get to a point where it feels like every blood-vessel in your body is about to pop and your brain is stretching your skull out and beyond...talk to your HR department and see if some serious non-PTO and non-Vacation time off is right for you.

I spent the best parts of my leave watching horror movies and having literary conversations. I painted the hell out of some canvases too. And then I went back to the Bay Area for a homegirl's birthday. And I had some friends swing through and spend a few hours talking. My big days were the ones where I had to put clothes on to run errands (art supplies, groceries, dropping off paintings).

I blew my house apart too. While I wait for my back patio to be torn down and rebuilt, I got shelving for the spare bedroom so I could get the art overflow up and off the floor. Now there's room for a bed in there. I removed the single (stupid) shelf in the laundry room and replaced it with a five-shelf wire rack that's made all the difference in allowing for more storage space in the basement. I removed every book from every shelf in the basement area, dusted/cleaned every surface, and have rearranged the set up in such a way as to feel both massively spacious AND incredibly cozy. I'm very excited to have my players return in August to a new room with a new vibe.

Now I just need to put all the books back on the shelves and redecorate, which I'm sure will be done by the first week of July. Maybe.

Some new art that got completed since the last time we talked: