Wow! So much has happened in the past two months: professionally, personally, health and adulting-wise, and within my family. I told you big things were afoot last month but it didn't seem right to write about them while they were still developing and I still had strong feelings about them. Life has settled somewhat this month, certainly my net worth has hardly changed!
The biggest change is that my manager quit at the beginning of this month to explore his gender identity. He was a super interesting guy, and I respected how he always went out, took classes, tried different things, and welcomed new perspectives. I felt close with him, he knew not just my work but also my feelings about my work. He had taken coaching sessions and I enjoyed the times he coached me at work, he made me realize some things about myself which made me smarter about my attitude towards work. For example if I feel my life is heading in the right direction I am often content doing less impactful tasks at work, which could be holding me back professionally. I continually need to keep those insights in mind and keep acting on the learnings by making sure I am working on the tasks which will deliver the biggest impact for my company and my career. The senior-most engineer on my team went through manager training and will become our new manager and a new engineer will transfer to my team next month.
In my personal life I feel closer not only with my boyfriend but also with his family. His sister graduated with her masters degree in mid-May; I flew and attended her college graduation. Afterwards she moved in with my boyfriend and they are both job-hunting so I try to help her by giving her my transit card and referring her to my company. My boyfriend received a job offering 240K/year in total compensation (base salary, bonus, and stock) but turned it down because he didn't like the teammates on the team he would be joining. I hope he studies hard and accepts a job at a place he wants to work in July, I know he is more than qualified and prepared. He took up the ukulele and practices it for 1hr every day, if he also prepped interview questions for 1hr every day that would be enough for a really nice offer with a good team and company in the next month.
I am taking a more hands-off approach with his job search nowadays, it's healthier and less stressful for both of us this way. Meanwhile, he is actively thinking about my development all the time. In May he told me, "You're a woman now. You never put time or effort into physical appearances before. But it's time to let that identity go. You have no limits." and he gave me a portrait session and brainstormed how I should pose at work to look like an alpha female. I love this boy so much! (^_^)
On the health front, I hardly exercised the first half of May. I've been taking advantage of the awesome weather and catching up on missed workouts since then, but I'm going to miss exercising again next month since I'm going on vacation. I got my annual physical, blood test, and dental cleaning (everything's normal), and ordered traveller's diarrhea pills to take on vacation (just in case). I also bought a scale which estimates body composition and started creating Fitbit competitions every week. I am close to last each week but it keeps me paying more attention to how much I walk on a daily basis, especially compared to others who also have full time jobs.
I'm definitely maturing because I took extra care of my car this month. I shopped around, bought new tires, and filled out a mail-in rebate for them. I took the car into the dealership for a recall and basic regular maintenance. I had bought ding-and-dent protection on the car and I actually made use of it by getting all the exterior dents fixed and the interior stains removed at no cost to me. These fixes cost as much as I had paid for the ding-and-dent protection, so I'll count that as money well spent. Finally, I paid off my car loan!!! My 5 year old car would look new were it not for my friends breaking two grab handles. My boyfriend broke one coming back from Clearlake in mid-May and a girlfriend broke another this past weekend getting into the car while tipsy. D: Oh well, so it goes. *shrug*
Lastly, I got sent the save-the-date for my cousin's wedding in November. My aunt just called me today asking if I could participate in a dance in the wedding reception and filling me in on the dates of the different events. And my cousins decided to plan a bachelorette party next month, it's going to be five of us cousins and cousin-in-laws flying to Denver for a weekend. Between my July 4th vacation and this, it's going to be a hectic July.
P. S. : In mid-May, I took two weekend trips to Clearlake with my boyfriend. The 4-hr one way drives gave us ample chance to re-acquaint with each other. In one discussion he said, "The same way economics trumps racism, necessity trumps toxic masculinity." to which I replied, "De taali! (Gimme five!)". But he was like, "What!? No! No taali!", and made me chuckle. So he's a feminist but not excited about being one. lolol
<3, Labangel
06/27/18 |