i am a bookaholic

It started when I was twelve years old. It was during summer vacation and my best friend then took me to the public library. I was the kind of kid who stayed home so I discovered places only when people took me to them. I was thrilled to find out I could get my own library card without much fuss. I did and that was the beginning.

Being twelve, I started off with the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. But those quickly ran out because I was a voracious reader. I read two to three books in a day or two and I had to go to the library at least thrice a week during the summer and twice during schooldays.

I began venturing into bookstores and touching the shiny brand new books on the shelves. I began smelling books and loved both new-book-smells and old-book-smells. When I was in high school, I asked that my Christmas and birthday gifts be books. Brand new ones from the bookstore. The librarians in the public library became fond of me, and waved away fines and gave me extensions and most especially, allowed me to take out more books than was permitted.

In college I was fortunate to get into a university with a very impressive library. I became its denizen and the librarians there also gave me the same privileges. I used up three to four library cards in a single semester.

Any extra money I saved up from my allowances I used to buy books.

When I started working, I spent a lot of money on books. At one point I had more than a thousand crammed in the tiny bedroom that I shared with my sister in the small apartment where I lived with my family.

I would buy books almost every week. Not just from bookstores with their brand new volumes but also from second-hand book shops. Then the internet happened and I discovered an online auction site for books and I outbid everyone else on the books I wanted. The owner of that site eventually became a very good friend.

Sometime in 1999 I sold off more than half of my book collection to fund a trip.

Two years later I moved to a higher-paying job and was able to replenish my personal library. It was even more intense that time, the book-buying, for the books took the place of everything else that work did not consume. Books became my lifeline to sanity.

Eight years later I quit the job that had been eating up my life and then I started selling off my books again to raise funds to sustain a freelancer's life. Now I wish I had been more discerning because there were titles I wish I never sold.

Three years later I began the process of recovering the books I had lost and adding new ones that feed my rediscovered passions. My library today has about 500-600 books, including those in my Kindle.

In the past three years I have simplified my lifestyle to the point that I have significantly reduced my monthly spendings and have channeled my retail therapy to just three things: books, writing materials, and art materials.

I particularly enjoy fantasy, fairy tales, mythology, basically anything with magic and supposedly impossible things. I also like a bit of philosophy and psychology. I like books on writing and poetry - Susan Wooldridge, Anne Lamott, Ann Patchett. I like the occasional chick lit and I like inspirational books along the lines of Julia Cameron, Zen, Anna Johnson, Paulo Coelho. I have favorites among the classics : Jane Austen's novels, Sherlock Holmes, the mysteries of Agatha Christie. I like food and travel books : Ruth Reichl, M.F.K. Fisher, Jamie Oliver.

In authors I absolutely love Neil Gaiman. Then there's Nick Bantock, Barbara Hodgson -- writers who are also artists. I love Sarah Addison Allen.  Joseph Campbell is right up there with Neil.

I admire bloggers who have become authors -- Holly Becker and Grace Bonney.

There are many others but I don't want to make this a very long list. I will write about most of them anyway as I read through the days.

My latest book loot is from yesterday, when I stepped out to air myself after being cooped up for two days because I was ill. I wandered into the secondhand bookshop in the supermarket and walked out with these:

The Ethnography book is just a geeky thing for me because it is part of what I do to earn a living. And it is ridiculously cheap at Php50.

The Dante Club is something I have been curious about and the copy was in very good condition for only Php148. I plan to read the original Dante before reading this one to enhance my appreciation.

The School Of Essential Ingredients is hardbound and I have a sample of it in my Kindle and it is on my to-buy list. I paid less than half for what it would cost me to purchase it on Kindle. A great bargain indeed.

This week alone I spent twice on books. But I don't splurge on anything else. No more clothes and shoes I would only wear once. No more wasteful time and money spent with pseudo-friends. No more unnecessary products in the grocery cart. Yes, it is all about books, writing, and art now. But most especially books.

Sunday Morning

April is not my best month. It started off with two trips out of town for fieldwork (for me that means visiting households to conduct two-hour interviews with consumers) which left me too exhausted to write or make art. Then it has been a mad rush to get things done before another wave of fieldwork comes in at the end of the month. This cycle will last until early July and I have been struggling with finding the time and the energy to write and make art. It is rather frustrating, and it reminds even more strongly of how work can eat up so much of myself.

There was a ray of hope sometime at the end of the second week when I got to talk with a dear friend from years back who is now top boss at an ad agency and was asking me if I would be interested in rejoining the workforce as part of their team. I had half a week to think about it. When time was up I told her I was interested in exploring the possibility further.

So what does it mean? It means leaving the home-based work setup I have had for the past three years. It also means faster savings for London which is the most important and biggest dream I have right now. It means funds for self-publishing my books. It means funds for setting up an art exhibit. (With my old self, money would simply mean retail therapy.)

But more than the money, I found myself looking forward to a new social group. The one I was hoping to bond with in the past three years has proved to be very disappointing. I had thought they were my long lost tribe but I was wrong. It was just like high school all over again with all the cliches and givens and templates. I was an outsider in high school. You get the picture. Heck, I could not even expect a decent reply to a text message. Few things smack of being totally ignored and unimportant as a totally unacknowledged text message.

There is also the advantage of learning new things, and a change of scenery.

However, it must not be misinterpreted that I am bored. I am never bored. And I don't miss agency life. It is more like I see now that it may be time to step back into the old fray as a whole person compared to what I was before and to go into it with my priorities clear and my goals clear. Maybe this time it will finally work with me instead of against me.

I have tried many times in the past three years to consider exploring re-employment but each time the answer from my heart and my core had been a resounding No. This time it feels different, so I finally said Yes. Maybe the lessons have been finally learned. It is Time.

I still don't know how it will all turn out, or whether it will even push through with this agency or another, or when it will happen. But it will happen. I know that now. I will flow back into the system but I will be different. I come from my personal hero's journey, a Wanderer who needed to define herself, and now getting ready to shift into a Warrior, someone with a context and a cause and a purpose. (References from The Hero Within by Carol Pearson - a great enlightening book!)

So these are my thoughts on this Sunday morning as I prepare for some deep working (delving into analysis and interpretation of data) to make progress with the project. I am hoping that having written this blog post I will be able to do some writing with my Camp NaNo stories -- I am way behind and in danger of not completing as I have only written a bit over two thousand words out of forty thousand.

And maybe I can sketch something during my fifteen minute breaks.

How is your Sunday going?

pretty please

I have always had some sort of grudge that shopping online is not a reliable or easy option for someone who lives where I live. Custom taxes will cost double your shopping or things get lost in the post office or post office employees will wrangle a bribe before they release your item. This is especially true if they realize that the items purchased are expensive or valuable.  And this is in addition to the much more expensive shipping costs.

I could also never avail of free shipping promos because my country is never part of that. (iTunes would not even sell songs or TV shows or movies to us.)

Currency conversion also puts me at a disadvantage. A dollar can cost me as much as 50 in my own denomination.

Okay, enough griping. I really started this post to share the bursting in my heart when I saw these pretty, pretty items from Anthropologie. I would have seriously purchased them if not for the above deterrents.

Extra Ingredients Measuring Spoons

Farmer's Egg Crate

Long-term Shakers

Lyna Butter Dish

Painted Amaryllis Measuring Cups

Perennial Mini Colander

Farmer's Market Basket

13 Things I Learned After Leaving My Job

When I left my job in 2010, the first thing I did was take a full rest and break from sixteen years of intense, high-stress work. I indulged in three months of doing nothing that had to do with any form of work. Instead I revisited all the hobbies and leisure activities I had neglected while I was neck-deep in deadlines. I caught up on sleep, I read stacks of books, I enjoyed my mom's cooking as often as I could. I also looked into some trips I wanted to take since I no longer have to worry about getting permissions to take a vacation leave.

After three months, I started to pull myself together and suddenly the future before me seemed like a vast expanse of possibilities and I didn't have a complete map. I knew I was going to set up my own home-based business eventually but the options to getting to that point seemed endless.

Now it is one and half year since I left the employed life and I have gone through a whole slew of trials and errors. I have had my successes and my failures. I got discouraged at many points but revived myself afterwards.

Here are some of the key things I learned and now try to live by as I continue to walk along that path to living a fulfilled life outside the conventional setup of being employed. I hope you pick something to inspire you along the way. :)

1

You need a structured schedule just like what you had when you were employed. Otherwise it will be quite difficult to get a lot of things done. Make lists! Invest in a happy planning notebook at the beginning of each new year.

Develop a schedule and a routine that work for you which also allow for the flexibility that you've always wished you had when you were in an office.

Set your own deadlines. Procrastination is your hidden enemy. There are as many distractions at home as there are in an office - the sight of unwashed dishes, the silent call of the soft bed, the bookmarked page in the book you could not put down last night. Keep updated with your chores and include it in your calendar so you don't get to use it as an excuse.

2

Wake up early, start early. I thought I could get away with sleeping in and waking up late but I found myself scrambling towards the early evening to finish tasks. How come it's no different from being in an office? It's because the usual commute time was spent on sleeping instead of being re-assigned to more productive tasks so I was experiencing the same "time shortage".   

Waking up early means even if you have a routine to follow and a to-do list to complete, you will still have enough time left for fun and relaxation. One of my favorite feelings is completing the last task for the day while the sun is still out. 

3
You can still burn out. Do make time to stop and smell the roses. No paycheck and a solo business mean that the income is not predictable. Sometimes it's easy to get absorbed in the need to stabilize your financial status or think too far ahead into the future and worry about it.

Reward yourself, not necessarily with money or things that cost money. Instead reward yourself with time.  When I was employed I complained that I didn't have time even though I had a lot of money. Now since money has become something I budget very strictly, time has become the currency which I have a lot of. But like money I am learning how to spend it wisely.

I give myself a few hours, a half day or sometimes even a whole day free from the routines and the to-dos. Within that time I engage in activities that fuel my creativity or expose me to inspiring images and ideas. It could be window-shopping, or browsing in a bookstore, or even simpler things like reading or writing in my journal. It's time for me to process my thoughts and feelings. It's a time to recover and recharge.

4
You are living a different life now. Don't compare yourself or your life or your current achievements with what your employed friends have. There was a time when I refused to visit my Facebook because I felt bad that I could not keep up with the stuff that my employed friends are enjoying such as trips and new gadgets and eating in new restaurants. But then I reminded myself why I made this choice and that I knew what I was giving up and that I gave them up willingly.

Don't try to keep up the same level of lifestyle you are used to. For one thing, I found all the inexpensive versions of what I used to indulge in when I was in a high-paying ad agency job and was a walk away from all the glamorous high-end malls. I took a tour of our neighborhood and discovered spas, coffee shops, restaurants, supply shops, surplus shops. Everything was at least half or a third of the prices in the high-end malls but delivering good quality. It's not about giving up. It's about finding better and wiser options.

5
Dress up. Even when you will spend the day at home. 

I know that it is a common image that people who work from home enjoy the comfort of working in their pajamas in front of the computer. I learned early on that this is one factor that could lead to a slow progress or procrastination. You have to signal to yourself that it's time for serious stuff. It also affects mood and confidence when working on a challenging project.

It's also easier to follow up on errands and any emergency task that will require you to step out of the house. Sometimes getting yourself fixed up to be fit to be seen in public can be such a chore. Don't let it.

It doesn't have to be full outfit. For myself I put on a nice comfortable skirt or pants, a plain clean t-shirt in a matching color and I fix my hair (a headband or a clip that complements the clothes) and I put on some light powder and lip gloss. Believe me, the act of preparing yourself and the feeling that you look good and presentable can do wonders in energizing you for the day.

But do feel free to have non-dress-up days once or twice a week. I have them too. :)

6

Keep your social skills sharp.  The trap when working from home is getting used to the comfort of it. The change and the fresh air will do you lots of good. One thing that can undermine your confidence when working by yourself at home is the realization of being left out of the loop or out of touch. Your social skills also tend to get a bit rusty after a while and sometimes you can become more sensitive or reactive to other people. Worse, you become defensive of what you have done with your life.

Catch up and also share what's been happening with you. Always remember to present yourself and your current life as equally worthy as anyone else's who are employed (and believe it!). Some people will tend to assume that you don't work as hard as they do, or that you are not as serious about a "career". Don't be shy to assert and to show that more than a career, you are pursuing a passion.

On the other hand, there will be people who will wish they had your courage and will ask you for advice on how you do it. Give them realistic advice and don't give in to the temptation to feed that illusion of freelancers or solo business owners getting to do what they want all the time. Don't make it all about the hardships either. Give a good balance of the good and the challenging.


7
Learn a lot. Study more. You train yourself. You teach yourself. In my case I even gave myself a workshop and bought myself books. I also signed up for free online classes, as well as affordable e-courses that could help me evolve and grow continuously. I cannot afford to go back to school so I make do and make my own curriculum. I also learn by advice and example from people I admire.

You cannot get by forever with the stock knowledge and skills you gained from your previous job. Especially if what you wish to pursue now is different, you will need to work a bit harder because there is no one else backing you up. Your credentials will start looking a lot different.


Make sure you take time to understand things. You will save more time and effort later on. True, experience is the best teacher but it does not mean that you should plunge in blindly. There are enough lessons left behind by those who have gone before you.

Oh, and read a lot. I read books, magazines, websites, blogs, articles --- anything that could lead me somewhere new. I even read my old journals and notebooks for ideas that were shelved for lack of time -- I have time now.

8
Spend more time with people you really care about, like your family and very close friends. These are the people you don't have to justify yourself to. These are the people who help you regain your balance when everything seems to be lopsided.

One of the things I appreciated when I stopped going to an office is the time I get to spend with my parents. They are now in their sixties and I would like to be with them more than just buy things for them with a big paycheck. My grandmother, who is now 90 years old, is the last of my grandparents still alive and I now visit her regularly. She has been delighted when I asked her if she could teach me and my sister  her knowledge about craft-making.  Cherish those moments. Collect all those happy memories. They will boost you up for the rest of your life and through every difficult time.

9
Travel. From a simple walk in the neighborhood, to actual trips taken on a well-planned budget. Traveling takes care of a whole chunk of stuff in this list : catching up with events and people, learning, discovering, relaxing, taking time for yourself, meeting new people, dressing up, etc.

At the start of the year I plan trips with my sister and look for special promos, especially in airfares. My trips this year only cost me half or a third of the amount in plane tickets.

Local trips also include visiting stores I've always wanted to visit, especially those discovered online. I have a fondness for dessert cafes and vintage shops as destinations.

10
Know what you want and where you are heading. At some point all that supposed freedom and control will actually weigh on you. When the initial euphoria of making it on your own settles down, you are again faced with that vast expanse of possibilities.

Take time to pause and take stock of things. Ask yourself the important questions: Are you happy? Are you satisfied? Can you see yourself along this path in five to ten years? Or are you thinking of something else? Be honest.

The whole point of leaving my job was to find myself a happier and more satisfying way of living. So if I am not getting that then what was the point of leaving in the first place? Sometimes it will need a whole re-evaluation of your priorities. That's okay. Better be sure now than sorry later.

11
If necessary, don't be afraid to change your mind and the course of your life. Don't settle just because you are worried about what other people will say. Or maybe you are losing confidence that you can pull it off at this stage. Or maybe you feel that you will have wasted all your previous effort.

If you are truly certain, and if you truly know yourself by this time, then you do what needs to be done. Your previous efforts will not be wasted because you will have learned from them and most probably it is through them that you are having these realizations now. Everything happens for a reason, my sister always says. Nothing is ever really wasted if we pay attention to the lessons that every experience brings us.

I thought my original business plan is it. I had grand plans and they consumed me at the beginning of my journey. But along the way I discovered that there are other things that I am passionate about. I had to take a full review of everything, my old plans, my financial goals, my skills. I can see a very tough path ahead but I also know that I will sleep better at night even just admitting to myself what I truly love and want to do.

12
Have a plan (or plans). Map out the options you have, but most especially the options you are willing to undertake. Always have a plan B, or even a plan C stashed somewhere. Not that you lack confidence in plan A happening, but it is like a psychological buffer in your head that can actually help you push forward because you've got everything covered. It works for me anyway. :)

Have a plan but also be flexible. Allow for synchronicity and serendipities to weave their own magic. While you acknowledge your own strength and power, you also have to give the powers-that-be their due, depending on your faith and beliefs. Do not fully rely on yourself. Plan for those times when you will need help. Ask for help.

Always be open to the many ways that your plan can happen. Don't think it can only happen this way or that way. Do not lock yourself in certain ways of thinking that could only lead to disappointment. Don't be impatient. Things unfold accordingly in their right time. Be calm. You have done your part (the plan), now let it happen.

13
Never regret the decisions you have made, most especially the one that made you lose that paycheck in the first place. It is not a healthy and productive exercise. I came close to regret at one point but I pulled myself back in time. When I did, I found out that an opportunity was already around the corner and I would have missed it if I had wallowed in regret.

Regret is what will waste all the lessons you have learned in every step you took, and will invalidate all the joys you have experienced, and all the good you have gained. Believe that those decisions were timely and were needed for you to grow and move forward even if the way had been difficult, or even painful, in some cases.

Re-align yourself with what is important to you. Point your inner compass to your true North and move forward. :)

~*~

Yes, this is quite a long baker's dozen for a start! But I hope you were able to learn something, or maybe even comforted by the knowledge that you are not alone in certain situations. A new baker's dozen comes out next week!

a thirst for learning

I have decided to avail myself of A Beautiful Mess's Dream Job e-course.

At this point in my life I could use all the help I could get from the people I admire. Just as I took Holly Becker's Blogging Your Way e-course (which has proven to be super-rich and super-satisfying) to help improve my blogging, I am now looking into useful lessons to help me realize my dream job.

I have friends who are fortunate enough to have the financial capacity to take courses in real schools or go abroad to study and train in real places. They can afford to take that much time off from work to immerse themselves in study. With my solo business I can't yet be as free with my time or money. Thus, I am very grateful for the generous souls who offer their own lessons and wisdom online and who spend so much time and effort producing really good e-courses.

My next course to save up for is Raining Umbrellas - Lessons in Creativity. I hope I scrape together enough to be able to sign up before the class gets filled up.

Meanwhile I have been slowly applying what I have been learning to real life. It's slow going because there is a lot of thinking and processing involved --- which is good because it really forces me to pay attention to what is really important. There are some hard decisions to be made, as well as a lot of hard work. But I am determined to have something to show for all that studying and effort sometime in the near future.

How are you doing with learning and living? Any good e-courses you can tip me off with?

survived a work day

After the long holiday I felt the weight of work descend upon me. I did my accounting updates to be sent to my accountant for a more proper recording. I had bank errands done and was able to avert a potential disaster when the bank immediately credited a check so now I have money for tomorrow's research session.

I prepared all the equipment, charged the cameras, reviewed data, confirmed schedules. I even prepared throat-soothing candies because I will be doing interviews all day.

The whole day I have been in a bit of a daze since I hardly slept last night - my sister slept over because I needed some girl talk about certain stuff and while she helped me process some things we didn't get to sleep.

Mostly we talked about the idea of settling and the idea of how far can one go in pursuing a fairy tale story or a dream. We also talked about the excuses we make for ourselves and it made me think of how we grow less brave as we grow older. Also how we get tired and impatient so easily. Been there, done that. Comfort zones versus stretching the boundaries of our spirit.

Would you go for cozy and nice and safe? Or would you risk a leap into the void?

i want to go out

But I can't be going out and spending money on stuff like brewed coffee and cakes. The checks are a bit slow in coming so in the meantime I have to hold on to the cash as long and as tightly as I could.

I can't stop thinking of being out in a park though. Quiet with a cool breeze. Safe and comfortable. Unfortunately such places are rare in this city.

People flock to cafes and tea houses because that's where it's safe to hang out until the wee hours. Except it costs you.

Although I wouldn't mind a cold glass of milk tea with pudding. Or a black out chocolate cake with my brewed coffee.

But not yet. Not until those checks are safely in my bank account.

a few questions

If so many things have been causing you too many delays, what do you make of it? How do you deal with the frustration and exhaustion? Just how many deep breaths can you do before you just yell your heart out?

Just curious.

*takes deep breath*

last-minute magic

I was bracing myself for not going. There was no way I can swing it.

As I cleaned and cleared my closet and dusted off my travel bag, a memory surfaced. There is this one project that I have shelved in my head but which still owes me a decent amount of money. I could get paid for it within November if I push hard enough for the project implementation (I have not pushed hard enough because I never liked pushing anyone into anything except maybe pushing myself). On the other hand, I realized that if I am going to be serious about making proper money from this business I should level up my aggressiveness a few notches.

So I remembered that project. And if I just do a couple of days' intense revisions to the materials I could push for a project implementation closer to my terms but which will benefit both parties. Hence it will not be too much of a stressful thing.

And if I am able to push for that project I can get paid. Then that gap in my budget which prevents me from crossing over to helping the trip happen can be filled enough to make me manage.

I did not practice kendo to reserve my energies for work and preparations. I scoured the Internet for hotels and I found a good promo deal from a 4-star hotel right along Nathan Road and right within the area of one of the walking tours that my sister and I want to do. We filled up the forms, reviewed options, changed our minds, searched, repeated the process, repeated it again, and lingered over the "confirm" button until we decided to press it together by 8:30 in the evening.

Then it was just the spending money, of which we need just a little because we were willing to survive on 7-eleven meals.

Our dear, dear friend Peter Paul got wind of our plans and casually mentioned he had some Hong Kong dollars stowed away. He offered to lend it to us, let us use it, and have us pay only for the exact amount we actually consume so we don't have to spend any extra for foreign exchange (of course we return all the extra dollars to him).

And that solves our daily cash dilemma. We have more than enough for meals, getting around and a few cups of good tea or coffee. Most of the time we intend to do walking tours, read in the parks, maybe visit a museum, take lots of photographs, write in our journals, and simply savor the deliciousness of being someplace else. This will be a strictly super-budget trip and I would like to see how savvy we can be on the thinnest of shoestrings. Maybe you can pick up a trick or two later on.

With everything being last-minute, I am now on a deadline to get packed and fully prepared, plus take care of some work details like emails to clients to remind them that I will be out for the week. Flight is at 5:40AM tomorrow.

I'm still not absorbing the fact yet 100%. But I will be going to Hong Kong tomorrow with my sister. Yaaaay!!!

here's to being hopeful

I spent a good chunk of the morning looking for solutions and computing for budgets.

I even braved checking online for the last few available rooms in affordable decent hotels. I did find one and there are only three rooms left.

I have computed my budgets and it is such a tight squeeze that I could not breathe very well. But I remain optimistic and have proceeded to cleaning my travel bagua and taking out my suitcase.

a jolt of sadness, a grab for a miracle

I was browsing through my inbox and found an email advisory from the airline informing me that I could do an online check-in for my trip to Hong Kong on Monday.

Early this year, around February I think, my sister and I jumped at a ticket sale for Hong Kong scheduled for next week. We were positive and confident that we would have the means to go on a trip, that we would be getting enough projects and making enough money. We did the same for Singapore in April and it was a success. We knew we would make it again for Hong Kong in October.

It is now two days before the trip and we have not reserved a hotel nor have enough money to fund the trip. My sister has been alternately sad and hopeful for the past month and has worked her fingers to the bone on writing projects. But as of this point, there is just not enough money to safely get us through.

But it is only Saturday. There is still today and the whole of tomorrow.

Yesterday as I was resting in between grueling interview sessions, I looked out the window and gazed at the busy business district outside. I could be going to an office like that everyday and have more than enough to pay for next week's trip. But then, I might not have the time to actually take the leave to go on a trip next week. Or I would be too tired and stressed to enjoy it fully. And I would be feeling the pressure of the work pending and waiting for me to come home. I've been there.

Yesterday, Ms G and I talked about giving up paychecks and what we got in exchange for it. Family time. Creative time. Waking up without feeling your heart hammering through your tightening chest in anticipation of the stress ahead that starts with the morning rush hour traffic. Sleeping through the night without worrying about the next day and the next week and the next presentation.

I told Ms G that when I stopped working in an office and started to visit my parents more, I was shocked to realize how old my parents have become. I have been too busy and I have just always sent them a lot of money and thought they must be happy and comfortable enough.

I also told Ms G how, since I left work, the money I needed came in at exactly the right moment just when I thought it would never do so.

It is only Saturday. A lot of things could still happen.

will be office lady today

Drinking a hot cup of coffee while I slowly nudge myself to full wakefulness. I will be out all day today, and I will be working in an office --- a place I have rarely been in the past 1.5 years! It's for a project where all I have to do is interview groups of people for a research study. It will be a bit of a long day -- I leave by 9AM and the interview sessions begin at around 10AM. Estimating by the schedules given to me I will finish at around 8:30PM, or even 9PM if things get delayed along the way.

I have decided to wear a nice pair of jeans (since I will be interviewing mostly college students and I don't want to go all formal on them -- I want them to feel relaxed and comfortable with me) and a plain soft slightly frilly top paired with a chunky necklace for a splash of color. Hopefully this achieves some sort of dressed-up casual that will not intimidate nor alienate the young people I will be talking to. (On the plus side, this top is super comfy, which will matter after I've been sitting for more than six hours in the same room asking the same questions.)

This necklace is a steal -- I bought it during one of my out-of-town projects in Davao City. There is a popular strip of stores selling local goods and I bought a string of these beads and had them made into a necklace. It came out much much cheaper than if I had bought a similar piece back in Manila. I hope to go back there and buy more "raw" beads for my crafts.

Have to get ready now. Hope to have some sanity and strength left to write again tonight!

a little freshening up, a dozen donuts and making lists

If you haven't noticed yet, I've changed some fonts and colors and even put up a header with an image! The header is still a work in progress but I think it is much better than a plain scrawl of text, don't you?

My sister and I swam today and then I had a donut and a cheese sandwich for breakfast. The donut was from a lucky purchase last night -- I dropped by the supermarket to pick up a couple of items and Dunkin Donuts (a favorite) just opened up a stall in the supermarket on the same day. As a treat to opening-day-customers, they offered a dozen donuts for the price of six. How could I resist? I shared the dozen with my parents and my sister and took home some for my own.

Today I have to make preparations for a project I will do tomorrow. It's a one-off thing -- I show up and facilitate some group discussions and then I am done. I am being paid for my expertise in interviewing, a skill I have developed and honed while I was working as a consumer research expert.

Today I also update my lists as part of my practice in organizing and prioritizing. I have always been a list maniac but even lists have to have some semblance of art and science to it or they will just be another source of clutter. As a freelancer I also have to keep track of more things so random post-its won't cut it. My calendar planner sometimes looks more like a collage than a calendar but that's the way it works for me.

Be back in a bit.

a good morning

Suddenly there are projects happening. So my November bills should be safe and taken care of.

Meanwhile I am sticking to my resolution to manage my time wisely so I will be fair to everything that needs to be done. Especially preparing for the December sale. It's such a challenge since my sister and I are practically starting from scratch!

But somehow I can also feel that it will all turn out fine. It always does. Especially when you least expect it. So I try not be worrying obsessively about the "how". Everything in its own perfect time.

beginnings

About a couple of weeks ago, I decided (and realized) that I can, and should, pursue more than one job. For one thing, the business I am running now is still very much my old life with a few modifications. If I really want to try and do something really different and new I should ease out a bit from that comfort zone. At the same time, I should pay more attention to what makes me happy and excited to work on every day.

I have fallen in love with vintage and the idea of domestic bliss. Add to that a layer of being more earth-conscious. The whole thing put together paints a picture that is almost an antithesis of what I have been doing for the past sixteen years. It  was a difficult thought for me to grasp because I do not do very well with transitions. I like and welcome change but the journey from A to B tends to pain me a lot.

So two or three weeks ago I had a talk with my sister and we mapped out our lives and our hearts. We were both surprised at what we discovered and what we had to accept, and therefore what we have to take action for if we are to lead fulfilled lives and not waste our time.

One result of that is the decision to slowly build a small shop of pretty things (handmade/recycled/repurposed) and vintage. We will try out the whole concept in a garage sale-type set up on the first of December. Then we will work out the kinks and test drive it again about a month or two after. We will do this until we work out the formula and then we officially launch. Now all we need is a bit more capital. Plus a lot of research and studying.

Meanwhile, with the initial cash we have put aside we have started buying inventory and collecting raw materials. Lots of hard work and leg work! But at the end of a really tiring day the feeling of satisfaction I feel is fresh and different. It was a bit of a revelation. I thought I was set for the past sixteen years. I realize I was not.

Yesterday I stumbled into a midnight sale at the mall and was able to get a cheap clothes rack. When I got home my sister and I eagerly hung our first few pieces and imagined a happy future.

I even got some music to play in the shop ^_^