About Me

So I guess I should talk a little bit about who I am. Like I said in my first post, I’m 30 years old and recently married. I work in HR in northern CA for a non profit, but I’m not going to say more than that about my professional life, because I don’t want to get fired. Also, I signed a confidentiality agreement, so they could sue me, and that would suck. I’m not 100% happy with my career path, but I’m still trying to figure out why that is. Do I dislike the work itself? Is our population too challenging? Is is the just the batshit crazy co worker who is the bane of my existence that makes me hate my job? I’m not sure - that’s one of the things I hope to find out.

Also, I’m really underpaid. Yeah, I know, wah wah wah - I have a job “in this economy” and health insurance and stuff. I get that, I really do. But. I’m also currently being paid $.04/hr above the very bottom of the pay scale for my position, and this is after 5+ years of service to the company, in which my position has undergone several shifts and during which time I’ve acquired greater and greater responsibility. So the pay part stings.

I was raised in a very religious, very fundamentalist family. I was homeschooled from the time I hit kindergarten, until I went to (community) college. And yes, I was your stereotypical homeschooler - super nerdy clothes, read a lot, very few friends, not good at math or science. Sounds like a barrel of laughs, yes?

Religion was huge growing up. Huge. We went to several different churches, each more conservative/liturgical than the last, finally ending up in Russian Orthodox Church when I was 14 and where I spent the next 8 years. No, I’m not Russian. Anyway, along with the religion went conservative politics, so I spent a lot of time going to Operation Rescue Events, the annual “Life Chain” (a "peaceful" anti-abortion protest) and talking about Republican politics. Later, when we went to Orthodox church, we stopped going to political events, because we were supposed to be working on fighting our own sins, and that didn’t give much time for political stuff. We did confession and fasting and prayer instead.

At some point, I really want to tell my full anti-fundimentalist, anti-homeschooling story, but I’ll have to do that later (see item # 6 on my life list).

Anyway, all those years of religion and isolation left me pretty messed up. I had two really bad bouts with severe depression (that I now believe was situational, not chemical, but I wasn’t sure for a while). I had to heal from a massively abusive relationship in my (very) early 20s. I had to learn how to be gentle with myself, since years of religion and confession and such had left me with the the belief that unless I was perfect, I was worthless. And I’m not talking about *looking* perfect, I’m talking about *being* perfect. I had to re-negotiate new relationships with my parents, who went through such massive changes themselves that I feel like I have brand-new parents (parents 2.0, anyone?). So, I pretty much spent my 20s going to therapy and trying to figure out how to live my life, free from religion and abuse.

I also met my now-husband when I was 22, and he’s been nothing but supportive of me. I don’t want to get too mushy, because that’s not my style, and this isn’t STFU Marrieds. But, he’s incredibly good to me, and loving, and kind. And he’s funny. Mostly we’d rather laugh than anything else. I trust him, and he’s the perfect man for me. He helped me learn about setting boundaries, and going on adventures, and music - everything from Classic Rock to 80’s punk to current metal. He protects me from the mosh pits at concerts. He’s also teaching me about sports and to root for the Giants - so, uh, Yay Giants!

I’m a very domestic person at heart - I love baking and knitting and cooking and reading books and wearing aprons. I even like cleaning the house, provided I have a hot ‘n steamy historical novel to listen to while I clean. I have crazy girl crushes on Julia Child, Jane Brocket, and Alicia Paulson. I try to make our home comfortable, not necessarily fashionable or “decorated.” I hate, loathe, and despise drama in any form, particularly when I find that I’m participating in it. I know next to nothing about technology. I like watching offbeat documentaries about, say, the Miss Gay USA pageant, or gymnasts in North Korea, or a funeral home director in the Midwest. I’m a firm believer in HAES (health at every size), and the fat acceptance movement. I like wearable fashion, not the runway stuff, and I’m still trying to break out of the black/grey/brown rut I got into after spending time in Russian Orthodox Monasteries. Oh, I haven’t mentioned the monastery thing yet? I’m sure I’ll write more about that later, but suffice it to say, monasteries and nuns *really* mess with a girl’s fashion sense.

I earned my BA in English from our local state university back in 2002. I was really drawn to people’s stories, fiction or not, so that’s why I chose that major. Well, also, nothing else sounded interesting. I really love literary analysis and studying gender as portrayed in literature. But I’m not good at spelling or poetry or meter, and sometimes my (spoken) grammar isn’t so good, something that my husband loves to tease me about.

So that’s me.