Wednesday, May 18, 2005

10 Years of Mishka

Stole this from Joanne, who stole it from Cat.

10 years ago:

I was twenty-something.
I was living on the East Coast while my husband of three years attended school.
I was missing my family on the West Coast a lot.
I had a lot of debt and not much money.
I met a lot of my husband's family for the first time.
I had just discovered email.
I visited Washington DC, and New York as we drove up the East Coast for Christmas.
I had only one cat named Madison who I had had since high school.
I watched my sister go through the worst year of her life.
I had a bachelor's degree under my belt.
I had only a few close friends, one that was local.

5 years ago:

I was in between twenty-something and thirty-something.
I was living on the West Coast.
I had two cats, one named Madison, one named Chase, who we had just adopted.
I was getting ready to move to Japan.
I had a network admin certificate under my belt.
I had a pretty good job with easy hours and fun people.
I was playing soccer again pretty regularly.
I was living in the house we bought three years before.
I was spending a lot of time with my family.
I was becoming very skilled on computers.
I was not writing, singing, doing art, or playing music much.
I was too busy a lot of the time to really enjoy things.
I finally paid off my school loans and we were completely out of debt (minus the mortgage).

3 years ago:

I was thirty-something.
I was living in Japan.
I had started my graduate program.
I had both kitties, they made the trip with flying colors.
I had my house on the West Coast rented but was not happy with my rental company.
I was writing and reading more.
I was exercising more.
I was skinnier than I had been in a while.
I was tanner than I had been in a while.
I had been to Thailand a few times, and was getting ready to go to Cambodia, and Vietnam, and Australia.
I had a close knit group of friends.
I was having a lot of fun and adventures.
My grandmother on my biological father's side died.
I was playing soccer on the weekends.
I was investing pretty heavily in our futures.
I was experiencing some amazing cultures.

1 year ago:

I was thirty-something.
I was living in Japan but getting ready to move back to the US.
I was planning our trips to China and Tokyo.
I had both cats but was only a few weeks away from finding out terrible news about Madison and having to put her to sleep.
I had refinanced our house on the West Coast but it wasn't rented.
I was playing soccer.
I was still tan and fit.
I was still doing the graduate student thing.
I built my own computer and it worked great.
I was stressing about the move enough to make me vomit and feel terrible.
The close knit group of friends had dissipated but I had made two new fabulous ones.
I was being creative again for the first time in a while.

Today:

I am still thirty-something (and plan to be so until the end of time).
I am living on the East Coast again.
I am still doing graduate school but at a slower pace.
I am living in the second home that we have purchased.
I still have the home on the West Coast and it is rented to some great people and our rental company is much better.
I am missing Japan, my friends there, and my family an awful lot but am getting accustomed to my new surroundings.
I am writing more than I ever had.
I am reading a lot.
I am still exercising but did gain some weight over the winter (nothing drastic, but I noticed it).
I am so much paler than I have been in 5 years.
I am getting ready to celebrate my 13th anniversary this year.
I only have one cat, Chase but she is enough to handle right now.
I am getting excited about having our first visitors to our new location this summer.
I am looking forward to some new adventures in this part of the world.

6 comments:

SJ said...

Will you be thirty-something forever?

... said...

Actually, I thought I was being funny. Age doensn't bother me as much as my listing would have you believe.

There was a point in our twenty-somethings, that my husband and I switched ages. We were born in the same month, two years apart and it was fun to pretend for a while that I was the younger one.

In reality, we don't have to really pretend because I act much younger than he does...everyone always thinks he is older. Guess that is because he is shy and more reserved than I am.

cat said...

did you like living in japan better than the US? it sounds like you did. i am curious as to the reasons. (i like to know all the differences between places, i'm funny that way ;))

i never actually got my bachelor's degree. i hated school so much that it was making me suicidal. ugh.

... said...

I wouldn't say I liked Japan better, it is just different than the US. I love the US, don't get me wrong, but I think because I probably won't go back to Japan (at least not any time soon), I feel like I have closed a book on a portion of my life and that makes me miss it. I always knew I would be back in the US, not to mention that I flew back every six months to deal with a house we own in the NW, so I just didn't miss it as much while we were gone.

There are things about living any place that are awesome and not so awesome. I think living there was like an escape from reality for a while. The area that I am living in now, is not my favorite place in the US and I think that is part of why I miss Japan a lot. If was back on the West Coast, I am sure the culture shock would not be so stark.

Now that we have been here for a while and have finally settled in, I am finding wonderful things to enjoy and experience here too. I think it has just been an adjustment period.

Living in a foreign country, especially one so differently culturally from your own is always an experience of a lifetime and I would highly recommend it to anyone.

Joanne said...

I loved visiting Japan when I was little. I don't think I could live there because I like beef too much and fish not at all, but it would be a great place to go back and visit again. I've thought off and on about living in another country, but the logistics of it come across as so daunting... finding a job and all that.

... said...

Joanne- they have lots of steak in Japan, that is where Kobe steak is from...but I love the fish too. Sushi and sashimi are two of my favorite things to eat now.