Looking towards the future, or trying to.

(Before I start this post I'd like to say thank you to: Lumi, Eni, Raccoon, Kraken, Selina, Grey, Col, Manu and my sister, for listening to me rant and/or showing your concern in your own way. It helps a lot. ^_^)

I think that I am done being angsty now. I hope. But I am tired of feeling helpless and not being able to enjoy everything about life that IS worth living for. At one point I just overloaded on stress (yesterday afternoon-ish) and decided I was tired of it. :P Besides, I was enjoying the RP and chatting with my friends! And why shouldn't I? D:

I do have to say that this whole immigration thing can possibly set me back in my life plans for several months to a year. But what can I do? I can get angry and blame Jon for not taking care of things right, or blame immigration for being unclear, or blame myself for my ignorance, but it won't change the fact that this happened. I can just lay down and die, or let them deport me, or I can TRY my best to make it right despite the setback.

Sometimes I just get so damn FRUSTRATED at how life tosses these hurdles my way when things are JUST starting to look up. "SURPRISE, HERE'S A STEAMING BOWL OF SHIT!" I guess that EVERYONE has unexpected crap happening to them at some point, though. I just make it worse for myself by suffering through it rather than thinking on what I CAN do now.

Also, I'm sorry if I've worried or frightened anyone with my last few posts or outbursts. I am just really terrible at dealing with stress. I can't stand when things go wrong and I'm not prepared for it. I either shut down or just lose my mind for a while, and it takes a little bit for me to get back to reality and think of what can be done. I just focus so much on how UNFAIR life is being that I get filled with such rage and bitterness and, if I let it go far enough, fatalism.

But it's ultimately a childish point of view. I am the first to admit that I am not really very good at being an adult. Quite honestly, I was coddled and protected much of my life, basically given the impression I'm not good enough at figuring things out on my own because x or y goes wrong. Growing up, I was never allowed to make mistakes. I had to do it perfectly or someone else would do it for me, AND punish me or otherwise strike fear in me for the consequences of my mistake (what peers will think, what authorities will think, etc. and so forth). So it follows naturally from that that I absolutely DON'T have any confidence in my instincts or decisions, and I freak out very, very badly when things go wrong in ways I don't know how to immediately deal with.

Too bad knowing myself this well doesn't mean I can just get better already, huh? :P I am pretty sure my depression doesn't help at all with situations like these. Would be nice to get therapy, but! =_= I just have to make do right now. Whether I end up back in the States or in Montreal I will have a better selection of therapists to choose from, in any case.

And I still have my husband. We are legally bonded. I just have to bet on the weight it has in immigration law -- whether it's Jon to the States or me to Canada. I think a lot of things in life would be a lot harder without him and my online friends to support me. At the same time... it saddens me that I'm drifting more and more from my friends and acquaintances back in the States. But I'm in this state of transition right now. I'm trying to figure out the person I will become, a person I can be PROUD of. Only then can I really have the confidence to go out there and be myself, and not feel like people will look down on me for my weight problems (which I am laboriously working to correct in any case), the fact I met my husband online (SO? I still did better with that than a lot of people with RL relationships), or the fact I don't have a job/degree (at least one of these will be fixed sooner or later, even if it takes me years).

Raccoon said it probably won't be as bad as I'm thinking. And he is probably right. Hell, it's not like life hasn't dealt HIM a nasty hand. I guess talking to everyone today just made me think, I ought to appreciate what I have more. And I can't let one setback (as intimidating as it is to be arrested and have my passport confiscated) completely CRIPPLE me from doing good things with my life, enjoy my hobbies and time with friends, and eventually *gasp* achieving true financial independence.

So... summary? I feel better. Not great, but better. I might regress into more depressive episodes later, but I think they won't be quite as bad or as severe. Slowly, I think, I'm starting to gain my strength. Just got to remember the good things in life, and the value I have in the lives of others, and the things I can do in the meantime. Besides pondering immigration lawyers, I still have plenty of time to work on my writing skill, on my website and sysadmin skills, and so on!

It would be nice, though, if Jon could start getting sound recording equipment so we could start on our music ventures, too. I really think Jon could be good at being a sound engineer. And I think he'd be a great composer, too. He said he already has in mind some songs to compose specifically for my voice -- I will say it's one of my dreams to sing on stage, or for a recording, especially after one guy I sent demos to basically said that I'd be best suited fronting a band ^^ I have the voice, and the vocal power to do it. So one day -- I will!

Jon's plan, actually, is to start as a sound technician, get some education and hopefully work experience, and eventually -- with enough expertise and connections -- start an indie record label. (That being Anthegenia Records. Which I mentioned once before.) We even have some music skill to serve as studio musicians (I can play piano/keyboards, given some time to practice again and an actual *keyboard* to play on, and Jon's a bassist who can also mess with guitar if need be). I always wish we could find someone like-minded to serve as our drummer, because I don't really like drum loops all that much.

As for myself... well, I want to finish my CS degree, as I've mentioned many times previous. I don't know if I will succeed, but it's worth giving it a shot, because it'd really increase my hirability in computer-related jobs. On the other hand, I'm not sure I want to work being a web programmer for anyone else. :P I think I'd almost rather be a sysadmin, if I had to work for anyone else at all. Or be a semi-private webhost, kinda like what I'm doing now (hosting my friends' sites), except with actual *gasp* money involved. I'm still not counting out sim-chan either, when things start looking up for Eni; I hope I can get over my coder inferiority so I can actually help with CODE, and not just the sysadmin stuff. (Admittedly, she says she doesn't like to bother with, while I think it's totally fun -- go figure! :P)

Other than that, I want to work on my dream of writing young adult novels (like, the target age of Harry Potter books, or Francesca Lia Block novels) and very possibly try my hand at indie tabletop roleplaying books (campaign settings and possibly even rules). I'm talking really obscure stuff, though, like that awesome Swan Song tarot-based RPG I bought the PDF of a few weeks ago. It seems like I am destined to be scrounging money off indie-projects for my entire life -- either that, or become a sysadmin and slave away for a company I don't care about. Maybe I can find something in between, though. :P That would be nice.

But really, I can't even think of all these plans I have until I can get over my anxiety and depression to a point I have the confidence to even START. That could be a long while still. I could not even reach the point I want my projects to be until my mid-40's.

Guess that just means I have to try living long enough to see it happen. :P