The dance of the happy synapse

I've been going through waves of feeling as my full-time job nears the end of the line. I'm scared to death about money. I'm nervous about having to go into interview situations and babbling about how qualified I am. I'm also sort of excited to have a few weeks of free time - so far, none of the lines I've cast out into The Sea of Jobs have had any nibbles, so I feel like it's kind of inevitable that I'll have some downtime.

The thing I'm most excited about is getting to try new things. I made a point of finding a fitness class that I loved in 2013 (so far, Nia has been doing right by me, and I even made it through a Zumba class without getting suicidal), and some friends and I have committed to a monthly writer's group. Those little creative steps have left me longing for new stuff to put on my life-resume: I keep daydreaming about stained glass classes, about paper crafts, about knitting, about writing out workshops plans, about applying for grants, about painting our apartment, and about a thousand other things.

A few weeks ago, I vowed to myself to stop reading wedding blogs. It was a colossal waste of time, because it left me fixated on a thing that wasn't for me. And I'm not mad at married people, or engaged people, and I'm certain that I'll sneak a peek here and there, but the mental energy I was expending on reading about floral crowds or how to handle nasty bridesmaids has now been transferred to thinking about projects that are for me: knitwares and pottery, how to incorporate more sculpture into our house, and texting my mom every time I kill it at a workout. And, you know, never say never: when I do get engaged, I'm sure I'll head back to that blog, but for now, I want to focus on stuff I can make/do.

And there's so much out there! My brain is doing the dance of the happy synapse. I read Northlanders and realized that Becky Cloonan's gorgeous, heavy-lined art would make an amazing jumping-off point for stained glass. I'm creating Valentine's cards in my head. I'm thinking about training to teach Nia.

I'm considering my options in a way I haven't really done since high school. In university, being an English major meant that everyone assumed I wanted to teach; nope, I just wanted to read, preferably in bed, and off the syllabus. I want to try different things and I know that I won't be great at many of them. But I recently read (on a wedding blog...sigh) that "the best is the enemy of the good," and I definitely need to put that backwards on several tee-shirts and then stare at myself in the mirror until I get it.

So I have a curious brain, and I'm learning to trust my instincts, and I want to play. And learn. And so that means shopping at new stores, making new dishes, figuring out a way to spend a Wednesday night that doesn't involve turning on the TV. I'm experimenting with style. I'm thinking outside the nine-to-five box. And it feels invigorating, like maybe, I was waiting for this the whole time.