First I must extend my offer to my fellow deviants before they are gone:I have 5 of my limited edition show prints available on my My ESTY for a ridiculously low price like  third of what they originally sell for. They are all one of a kind as an element of them has been changed to be different from any other print made, "Spring" and "Angels Bleed in Gold" have hand painted effects on them as well . I am moving soon and trying to get them to a good home and out of my gallery storage. They come numbered and signed. I have already sold half of this gallery so get in on the deals .



Well to anyone who is following my "life" portion of my journal, do I have some updates for you!
It's been a long and emotional journey.
(see previous journal for a recap)

So it went like this.
While I was out in Oakland CA it struck me that, I didn't really want to be there. In fact when I first got there it struck me that i didn't want to be there, but I am someone who really has to give something a chance before I can really make a decision, I was there time to roll with it.
I sort of went at some prompting of my family members, who swore it would be a great opportunity for someone like me.
Where I can see how it would be, I just couldn't ignore my instincts telling me that the situation I was in
there was just not going to work out in the long run (due to several variables)
You see, within the first 4 months I was already dealing with horrible depression, and was rather lonely, I had left my boyfriend up North and was pining for him terribly. Skype helped in that but, at the same time, was a form of torture. Imagine the one you love being on the other side of a glass screen and all you want to do is touch them and you can't. I told myself I was just being a baby and that I needed to give this situation and location more time, I adapt well I will certainly get over this. Or so i thought. I got my job change and thought that that steady income and amount of hours would maybe help "fix" my emotional-ness in making me feel more secure about my income and job security. Alas, not so much. I was still getting lost. It didn't help, I couldn't shake my gut feelings. I worked at my new job which I did enjoy immensely because the atmosphere was great, but I still found myself wondering if I really wanted to be there. I used my job as a way of trying to silence my depressive thoughts, but at the end of the day they rang out loud and clear. I was still sad, still feeling lost, drowning in my schedule, and something new: wondering what I was waiting for. I began to feel like I was waiting for this experience here in Oakland to be over, so that I could continue on with my life..
It was that thought right there that made me put my whole problem in perspective.
I wasn't doing what felt right for me, I was doing what other people who don't know me, my passions or thoughts that well at all wanted me to do. That is so unlike me I can't even express.
That's when I essentially decided "fuck this" I don't want it, thank you for the experience, and the good times (there were some)  
but right now this is not for me.
See,
My goal for me is to get my BA in the next 2 years, and in order to live in the bay "comfortably" you have to be working full time plus overtime and it helped to have something that I could do to being in some extra income which is my art.

At the rate that I was working and how my schedule was set up there would be no way for me to take on the workload of one to two classes at a time. That means I would do nothing but go to work and school. No art (no extra income and no release), no traveling to see my love, no time to go out and do anything. for 5 years or more.. now Why? Why do that to myself? Why stress myself depending on an expensive living situation that left me little income to save for any moving I may have to do post lease to last 5 years? All it would take is one small thing to go wrong and BOOM !! It all falls down, and I am stuck in one of the more expensive places to live in the country.
Now please Do not get me wrong I would love to work a high paying full time job with all the stresses and trimmings, after I get my degree.  after I bang out my BA in 2 years (and then hopefully a masters). Yeah I could take the 5 year route some people have to. but those some people usually have children, or their job is their career and their job is having them earn a degree. I have no obligations but myself, so stressing myself to live somewhere I didn't really want to be, working at a job that had nothing to do with my career path, which could also be shut down by the feds any day (hint hint) didn't make sense to me.
So I moved. I lost a friend in the process due to her choosing, which is sad but if you say you understand and don't want to support, get off my train. I don't have time to cater to another's needs on that level.
Granted I miss the hell out of my mother and brothers and miss seeing them in the frequency that I got to. But it's only two years and then I can go anywhere.
But now I am back in the beautiful Northwest. I can afford to work part time, pay rent, do my art and go to school. No it's not the bay, but it feels more like home than anywhere else, and I am not even from here. I am already doing more in a month here than I did in 8 there.

What I learned: You have to follow how you feel, otherwise you will get lost. It may be scary and it may not seem like it's going to work, but it will because you want it for you.


And that's my life update.
Hopefully the next one will be less dramatic