GOALS!

A while back, I wrote about all these goals that I have  I know.  What’s with me and the goals?  I just like them, ok?  They keep me warm at night.  Not really, but if I work hard enough at it, they might.

1. Growing hair out really long.

It is going slowly. I’d give myself a grade of C in achieving this goal.  My hair is super thick and curly, which sounds good in theory.  But in actuality, it causes my hair to grow sideways and just become wider rather than longer.  And what I end up with is a clown wig.  I am currently in clown wig stage.  And I think I’ll be here for several more months.  But after that, I’m inviting everyone over to braid my long luxurious hair.  That is my goal.  A braid.  I think my hair was made to be braided.

2. Fitness.

Dudes.  My gym sucks.  I know I said I was going to stick it out, but I haven’t.  What I have been doing is staying at my gym so Sam can have his 3 months of free swimming lessons and going once a week to read books while I drink coffee and someone else watches my kids.  And then I have been working out at home.

I’ve been doing The Shred with Jillian Michaels which is an excellent workout, but pretty much requires like 5 minutes total of jumping.

Sidenote: Apparently, the look of me doing The Shred is very disturbing  to two year old.  I have to spend a great deal of energy reassuring him that I have not indeed gone insane, but I am exercising.  He tries to hug my legs a lot and anytime I have an exercise where I lie down, he immediately sprawls himself across my body and says “Mommy give you hug.”

Not only is all this jumping scarring my child, but it is also destroying my feet.  But because Jillian Michaels growls things like “There is NO MODIFICATION.  I’ve got 400 pound people doing this.  If they can, YOU CAN!  NOW MOVE IT!”  And so I do.

My depressing old lady feet have returned.  I’ve taken to icing them with frozen soup cans all evening long, sleeping with a special boot on, and walking around with my orthotic inserts in my gym shoes. Though I think I’m now required to call them my tennis shoes.  It just sounds older.

But yesterday, after considering calling Craig to come and pick me up at Target because I didn’t think I’d be able to walk myself to the car, I decided that Jillian and I needed to break up.  I took a tour of a gym that I was really excited about.  So, I think I’m going to go sign up there sometime this week and do things that won’t hurt my foot as much.  Like, sleeping?

So, I would say that things are going moderately well on goal 2.  Still exercising hard.  But injuring myself in the process.

As an objective person, I would give myself a lower grade.  But, no.  I will not endure this foot pain and receive lower than a B minus.

3. Diet

Sigh.  The 17 Day Diet successfully got me to lose like 14 pounds, and then I gained like 7 of those back because oh my god no carbs forever and ever and ever and I can’t eat another slice of ding dang deli turkey or i am going to lose my ever-lovin’ mind.  But I’ve not given up.  I am still working hard and am currently using this site that helps me track my calories and all that. But I don’t like it.  Fucking losing weight.  It’s sucks.  I don’t trust people who tell me that their diet is so easy or that now they look at a piece of cake and it makes them sick to think of eating it when they could have a nice crunchy apple.  These people are smug and LYING.

I would have to give myself a D in this particular goal.  Which is, frankly, a better grade than I’ve gotten in the past.

The weird thing is, I keep getting hoardes of compliments from friends and family on how I look.  “You’ve lost so much weight.”

I’ve trained myself to at least just say “Thank you” quite simply rather than going into details on how I’ve actually NOT lost weight.

Well, 7 pounds, but big effing deal.

MOVING ON!

4. Returning to paid work

This one is the most nebulous one of all, but I feel the best about it, I think.  After the closing of ICT, I sent out resumes to about 20 theatre companies with very specific tailor made letters to each, a sheet of my critical praise, and some production stills from past shows I’ve directed.  I was expecting not to hear from any of them.  But heard back from about 1/2 of them in really encouraging ways.  I was invited to come talk to a VIP at a VIT (very important theatre) and I think that interview went really well.  Most likely, no work is going to come from any of these theatres until next season (a year from now) because by the time I sent out my materials, everyone had been hired for the current season.  But I was really pleased with my response to that mailing.

I did book a job at a nearby college directing my first musical next summer.  I am very excited about this opportunity.  It’s a cool show, and once I sign a contract, I’ll give you all sorts of details.  I get to work with a good friend, possibly two; do something new; and I get paid. 

I have another interview later this month for a possible gig with a company that I deeply admire.  Cross your fingers for me.

I am hopefully going to be a high school speech team judge (also paid!) starting in November.  And am hoping that I can use that opportunity to both make some moolah and meet some cool people who may need me to coach next year or direct one of their shows.  It’d be nice to find work close to home too.

So, I feel like this is probably going the best. A solid B, maybe?  Which seems odd since I haven’t actually brought home a paycheck yet.  But, I was really encouraged by how receptive people were to me.  I didn’t feel like I was starting over, you know?  It made me feel pretty hopeful that I might be able to navigate the scary world of freelancing.  The only downside is that the job search never ends. 

Good thing I like goals so much.