It's been a long December...

...and there's reason to believe that maybe this year will be better than the last...

 I keep thinking that this month is December, although it is February. It's the coldest Winter I've ever experienced and usually the coldest month of the year is December, so I'm calling this Winter December Extended. Oxford, MS got ten inches of snow and it's colder here now than it has been for the past three years I've lived here. Yes, the title of this post is a Counting Crows song and it's been one stuck in my head since the beginning of December.

 2010 was a rough/great year for me. I finished my Master's and I experienced life on the West Coast. I saw Lake Tahoe and the Sierra Mountains. I got a taste of the feeling of being thrown into a professional atmosphere, and promptly failed at rising to that occasion. I had to move back home to Mississippi and file for unemployment. Finally found a job at a bookstore and am now waiting to hear back from PhD programs that would start in the Fall.

 There's a feeling I have that as rough as a start that January 2011 was for me, that it will get better. Yes, I still live with my Dad and that so far has been quite a challenge (I would say more on the subject, but he will probably read this, so I won't). Yes, it's been a hard thing to reconcile that I failed at doing something that I was enjoying so much. It's a hard experience to fail at anything, really. Being turned down from jobs and told I can't do things I love are two things I hate the most. My self-confidence in 2010 and early 2011 definitely took a hard hit.

 Good thing I've always bounced back, and stronger when I do. Being resilient and stubborn is actually serving me quite well at the moment. I've got the gumption to go out, when all things seem like they're failing and say to myself, "I can make this happen." I follow up on leads for opportunities to serve and opportunities to get paid to do things I enjoy (for example, teaching guitar and writing). I find what I can do well and see how I can manage to get paid for it. That's what I do and how I roll...

 ...and hopefully the funk from 2010 and January 2011 will roll right off my back..