Catching Up

It’s September, and we all know what that means.

Back to School!

Summertime is over. Here in SoCal, that doesn’t mean the end of swimming, weekend bbq’s, hiking, or trips to the beach. Nope. It was 91* degrees here yesterday, so we’re hoping to see some cooler days in our near future.
What it does mean, is more traffic. Since schools are back in, the freeways are completely stopped in the morning, and the city streets are more crowded from the people trying to avoid the freeway. On-ramps are stopped because the freeway isn’t moving, which backs up traffic into the regular streets as well. It’s a frustrating thing we deal with here every day. And I can’t wait to move away from it all.

Lil’ SS started 7th grade this year (YIKES!), and RJ started 11th (HOLY COW!). Both of them started new school’s, and while Lil’ SS is adapting well, RJ is having a bit of a harder time. :(

School is closed. With about a week’s notice that the school might close, us students were left wondering, “What do we do now?” 15 months into my 21 month program, the school has left me with two options.
1- transfer a couple of my credits to a different school 45 minutes away, take more classes that weren’t needed in my previous program, and graduate from new school.
2- contact my student loans and apply for loan forgivness because school closed, and continue working at current job.

Neither option is what I want, I’ll be honest.
Back to the drawing board of what I want out of life.

Change

“We cannot become what we want, by remaining what we are.” 
-Max De Pree

Change is scary. For me it is. The fear of not knowing what’s going to happen next is real, y’all. And I haven’t been able to hide from it no matter what I do or try.

It’s been one week since I walked away from The Ranch. The place I’ve called my second home for eight years, has now become a place in my past.  Boss #2 wasn’t willing to accommodate my school schedule any longer, and since school is something I’ve made a priority in my life today, I wasn’t willing to quit just to satisfy her selfishness. My future is important to me and only me, so I needed to act as such.

For over a year, the unhappiness of being there was beginning to show. I would dread pulling up in the morning, and would be more than willing to leave early every chance I got. The stupidity of the people I dealt with on a daily basis, just got to be more than I was willing to handle. Not to mention the yelling I would have to put up with from irritated agency producers. I became bitter watching the trainers go out on jobs making $50+ an hour, while I sat in the office getting yelled at, lying to people over the phone about why Boss #2 couldn’t talk to them, and, and, and for 1/3 of that.

“If it didn’t matter, you wouldn’t be scared.” 
–Unknown

I have finally come to the conclusion that perhaps a change was better for everyone. I’ve had a few people tell me that better opportunities are out there for me, but believe me when I say it will, without a doubt, be an uphill struggle to get through it. I’m scared. I’m unsure. And I’m doing it alone (despite the number of loved ones around me). I’m headed into unknown territory, but am determined to not fail. School is a year and nine months of my life. I can do this.

I. Can. Do. This.

So, it turns out, you’re never too old to go back to school.

Finally took the plunge and dove head first into the pool they call college.

Electrical Engineering – Wikipedia’s definition is a field of engineering that generally deals with the study and application of electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism.
However, it has now subdivided into a wide range of subfields including electronics, digital computers, power engineering, telecommunications, control systems, radio-frequency engineering, signal processing, instrumentation, and microelectronics.

In normal people talk, I’m going to learn to play with some pretty cool equipment.

When I was a kid, I would spend hours taking things apart and putting them back together. StepDad used to get so irritated with me, until he started to realize that time after time, I was able to put things back together without extra parts. He encouraged me to continue to take things apart and learn the inner workings of things, and so that’s just what I did. I learned to take computer towers apart and rebuild them into better and faster computers. {Thank you to The X for helping me learn that.}

It’s a little tough to get into a different routine. There definitely wasn’t extra time in my previous schedule for four hour long classes and study time and homework and drive time to/from class. But I’m determined to  ensure that the outcome will far outweigh the inconvenience it currently causes.

Decimal, Hexadecimal, Octal, Binary – not my favorite things to learn, but it’s definitely interesting.

Back to School

RJ is back to school. He’s okay with it, and his first homework assignment…done.

Back to School (from my soap box)

A few days ago, RJ went back to school. Another year came and went, and now the beginning of another year means he’s growing faster than I could have ever imagined. I can remember him crawling around on the floor, trying to get into anything and everything, and wondering to myself, Will there ever come a time when I can get some sleep? Will he ever slow down? Well, I did eventually get some sleep, but he hasn’t slowed down.

Fifth grade can be a scary place. It was for me. It meant I got promoted from the “small” playground to the “large” playground. It meant I got to experience different teachers for different subjects, not just the same teacher all day. It meant I could really get into trouble if I did something wrong, not just get a slap on the wrist and told “You shouldn’t do that”. It meant I was expected to do more. It meant Algebra. It meant having to do Science projects on my own, without my parents’ help. It meant interest in boys. It meant more grown up friendships with my friends. It meant so much, and as I think about RJ going into the fifth grade, it scares me that my “Little King”, isn’t so little anymore.

**Side note: His name means Little King, and although I know he wouldn’t be little forever, I knew when I named him, he’d always be my little man.

I called him on Tuesday to see how his first day back to school was, but The X didn’t answer the phone. I left a message, but did not receive a return call. I sent an email to The X, letting him know that I had left a message and that I would appreciate a call back, but nothing. I called twice the next day, but again, nothing. I have yet to, three days later, speak to my son about his first day, and now, his first week, of school. I made sure I wished him a wonderful first day back on the blog I created for him, but I’m not even certain The X allows RJ to see it, ever. One day, he’ll see it, and know exactly just what was going on. And one day, he’ll see this blog, and know that although it may seem like I wasn’t there, I really was.

So, to all the kids that went back to school, or started school for the first time this week, I wish you the best of luck throughout the year. Choose your friends wisely, and obey your teachers.

I love you, RJ, and….

 -Valerie