INTERESTING TIMES

I am grateful for:
--homemade pecan pie and popcorn
--movies on the computer
--neighborhood parks
--someone to do orthopedic exams on
--someone to snuggle with
--bright colored scarves
--being able to sing
--radiant heat
--my favorite news weekly
--filing cabinets for all my notes
--phone calls from distant friends and family
--being able to read and write

Just finished the histology lab exam and I did reasonably well. As always when I am given a picture and asked to produce words, I blank out on one or two. This time I blanked out "zona pellucida" which I know well and have studied. I know the location and function and duration of it, but I still could not dredge the words out of my memory for the exam. The ZP forms around an oocyte in the ovary when it matures from a primary to secondary follicle, and serves later to prevent double fertilization. When the head of the sperm dumps its chemicles into an oocyte, the zona pellucida immediately changes to prevent any more sperm from getting in.... The rest of the words dredged up OK tho, so I'm sure I passed.
( more )

I just wanted to say thanks to all of you who have been reading and communicating with me recently. I try sometimes to avoid the computer because it seems to suck me in, but in truth you guys are the only friends I have right now. Suzanne and a few others call me on the phone, and you are here with me by livejournal. So thanks for being there. You are my reality check, my encouragement, my hope and my joy.

I never thought my lifeline would be on the internet. Just shows what you know, from any given point in time, about the future.

Probably the biggest holdup on my decision to go to graduate school has been the uncertainty of how I would pay for it. I have lived in fear of the debt, and in the knowledge that our economy is going to continue in a generally downward trend for the rest of my days and beyond. But this experience of moving has been....moving. I am surprised and grateful at all the contributions I have received toward my moving a school expenses. THANK YOU to everyone who contributed in their own small way to help me make this move. It was time.

If you take the feng shui perspective on my relocation from Flagstaff to Portland, I just broke loose a whole lot of "stuck" energy and released it into the universe. The Universe responded by sending lots of energy my way--in precisely the form that I needed it, and that is, money.

So now that I have landed in Portland I find that I have landed in a dump of nasty unconscious bachelor energy. It will take some work, but I will carve my niche of beauty and consciousness out in these surroundings. The raw materials are here. Men more often fail at the most basic level of feng shui, and that is fundamental cleanliness. This room, and especially my tiny little bathroom, were nasty. The bachelor looks at it and says it is clean. So this morning I am cleaning, because no amount of prayer and incense will clean the atmosphere of a place if it is covered in piss and spiderwebs.

There is a beautiful back yard here, but it has become a dumping ground. It will become my yoga space, in time. He put his grill out there and thrown wrappers from meat in a plastic planter, and tarped over unwanted rusting furniture under the porch. There is a yard sale here this coming weekend, and WE are going to participate in it!

There is an upside to this bachelor's lack of care for his homespace. It means that there is little competition for the space. Lisa is the other female housemate, and Brian brags that "her hobby is cleaning". I see why. There has been no conscious woman's touch here in a long time. Once I get my room cleaned and set up, I'll branch out into other parts of the home, brightening it without the resistance that I got from my territorial neighbor in the Barn.

My counselor has given me the assignment of writing a list daily of everything that I am grateful for. I call it my "gratitude list". I have found it useful as a means of treating, of reversing my depression. She specifically told me to list things about myself that I am grateful for. That seems to be the hardest part of the assignment. She gives the example that I could be grateful for my strong legs that allow me to ride my bike up the hill to her house. OK then, I am grateful for my strong legs.
( more )