I live in downtown Vallejo, California, but I spend my non-workdays with Matt at his place outside of Lodi. CA. The two houses are over an hour apart so I do a fair bit of driving every week.

I drive up from sea level, over the hills through Suisun City, across multiple bridges over branches of the Sacramento river delta, and over to the central valley, where my heart waits for me in Woodbridge.

I am completely comfortable there. I just miss my stuff, and Emily. Matt’s cat, Katita, doesn’t like Emily at all (which is strange, because Emily is perfect) but we cut her some slack as she is partly blind and extremely set in her ways. It’s her house, ya know…

So, as I split my time, I’ve realized that I paint on the weekends, but all my paints/supplies (except what I carry on my Art Bag) are at my place, where I stay during the work week.

Thus, I am packing 2 storage bins of supplies to take to Woodbridge tomorrow night.

I’ve made a list so I can have what I need without bringing extraneous items I don’t need to use right away.

Ex: Bringing paint/canvas/stencils but not all the stuff to make candles…

This feels a bit odd to me, moving in with him in increments, but we do what we can until I get to move in for good and all.

I have been drawing, but I’ve done little art lately otherwise, but I plan to get back into it on this upcoming 3day weekend.

Other than all of the above, I am well and healing from my bicycle wreck 2.5 weeks ago. I have a scar to talk about…

Emily is doing well…she is the queen of my bedroom, where she stays for the most part. She’s not particularly interested in my roommates, so only comes out when they are gone or sleeping.

I have dear friends dealing with a myriad of issues and complexities in this crazy world right now and I’m doing my best to be there, available, for them. Meanwhile, I have been digging into some heavier traumas in my life and working through even part of them is exhausting but important to me.

I want to live my life free of the weight of these things in my past. I refuse to bury the past, as the feelings can jump out at me, appearing without warning, scaring everyone.

My mental health issues are mine, but I am able to be pretty open about it all because I generally do a superb job of keeping it all to myself. The ability to share my feelings with folks I trust is paramount to my progress.

I have a Therapist, Psychiatrist, medical team, loving friends and stellar family to talk to about all of this, and when I feel the downs, I avail myself upon them.

I am blessed and lucky.

I’ll post more art as I make it, and I’ll post my video tutorial from work as soon as it is edited.

PLEASE VOTE!!!