June is Busting Out All Over

June has always been a favorite month for me.  When I was in school, it marked the start of summer vacation.  Now that that monumental joy is felt a little less because I work 12 months a year, at least I can say that June's weather is usually pretty amazing.

This year, June was made awesome by this little girl:

This is Junebug...whom I casually call June.

I've been hoping for a dog for a LOOOONG time.  Dogs are magical to me in a lot of ways and not so much for the reasons people always list off.  Yes, they love you conditionally (because you feed them).  Yes, they are darn cute.  But I have been increasingly feeling that I need a friend who can help me stay in the moment.  I need a pal who is much more spontaneous than I am.  I need a pet who I can watch over.  All of these great caretaking tendencies in me, qualities I think are gifts, have not only gone wasted for probably 10 years but have started to turn in on themselves.  Over the past years I've felt myself harden, becoming edgier, crankier, and finding laughs fewer and farther between.  I've known for a long time, I could not nor did I want to continue this way.

So, magically, when my building suddenly wrote and said dogs were allowed, I started saving.  And about two months ago, when the aftershocks of change I wasn't expected hit particularly hard, I got online and got serious about a dog.  I needed something in my life that would be somewhat of a constant.

It was on June 9 that I saw this face online...and it wasn't love at first sight which was weird.  I was actually somewhat ambivalent but decided going to get a look in person at a shelter that was new to me would be worth the trip, if not just to get myself started.  2 1/2 hours later, this (shedding) furball climbed into the front seat of my car and we were heading home.  I'm not sure exactly what it was that moved me.  In some ways, I think I knew that I had to overcome any sense of hesitation that would always be there.  In other ways, when she came over to me and ever so gently but her head on my lap, I knew we had to be some kind of kindred spirits.  In a shelter that was nothing less than chaos, I found this one sleepy and gentle. "Okay," I thought. "The message won't get much clearer than this. Just do it"

It's now been more than a couple weeks and we're settling in.  Junie's a big personality in a smallish but very long body.  I like her.  And I think she likes me.  She now is the proud owner of a bark collar and a Furminator among a cadre of other squeaky chewy toys.  She is NUTS about peanut butter--both punny and adorable.  She does not love garbage trucks.  But every day that she's been here, I've gotten up with a purpose.  Maybe that, truly, was what I was seeking.

And with a face like this, how can I not sign on every day to this friendship?  

I feel like my old self again, before graduate school or dissertation, or failed jobs and failed friendships.  I think I've been given a chance to start over.  I'm taking it.  To Junie.  We'll have fun.

Thoughts on "Contemplating Being Too Much" and the Single Life

I've never had a period in my life that I haven't seriously (okay, obsessively) self-reflected.  I think this is a symptom of living a perpetually single life: I feel the need to "check in" or "check things off the list" to make sure I'm still normal.  I guarantee not all single people do this and, in fact, if I could let it go, I'd be happier.  If I could embrace the fact that I'm not normal at all but still living a fulfilling life, I'd actually be content.  That's a lot of big "if's."  Suffice it to say: I wrestle with wanting to be normal when, in fact, my life is not that typically experienced by most people...or even enough to say I can even qualify for normal.

So, that's a morass as I've adequately demonstrated above.  But I found an essay on this very thing that made me feel really much better about everything.  Say what you will about Blossom, Mayim Bialik interests me.  She's wicked smart, also cannot make claims to any kind of normalcy, and says some crazy shit sometimes.  But her essay on GrokNation entitled "Contemplating Being Too Much" articulately reflected on a lot of my most current worries.

I have always feared that I, like Mayim (and apparently lots of other women), have fallen into the "too much" category.  In fact, the list she ticks off including "too intense," "too loud," and "too opinionated" are all things I question myself on regularly.  Add to that list that I'm too curious, too serious, too intellectual, too funny...possibly too much of all of these things all at once...I also come to the conclusion that I am, likely, too much.  Yes, there are a lot of ways I can back it down.

But that's the rub, isn't it?  Backing it down isn't natural to me.  I'm "too much" in so many ways just being who I am (and I want more than that sometimes) that I can't even imagine what to pick to back down on first.  And when I imagine doing that or, on the rare occasion actually back down, it's exhausting.  I throw myself off balance.  It's not my natural state. Because of that, all the other parts of me also get thrown off balance and before too long...I'm miserable...and I can't get out of it. 

This is part of the constant conundrum, isn't it?  I'm not sure why.  It's pretty clear to me that the consequences of being too much are generally awesome in that, theoretically, birds of a feather will flock together.  Too much will find itself.  BUT, that also means giving up on the dream of normalcy.  (Wait, why is that a dream again?  Because it's secure?  Because it seems secure?)

For me, there's always a fear that if I fully embrace single life, that I'll go over the edge into craziness.  "The Cat Lady" is mere degrees away from where I find myself in this world right now.  Does the end of "too much" always lead to "too many cats"? (figuratively, of course, because I hate cats...)  And then there's also the fear that fully embracing single life is giving up on some of the things that fall into the normal "palette" that I might really want.  Have I "given up" anything simple because my life doesn't look like it "should" to have those things?

The essay Mayim writes concludes with the idea that there are a lot of powerful, interesting, fulfilled and fulfilling women that find themselves in the same boat and they need not worry: too much is actually just right.  That conclusion (so simple!) gave me the most solace because I don't need to be reminded of that.  I know that my "too muchness," in all of its forms, is an asset.  The truth is, I wouldn't be here where I am today if I didn't make choices that I believed in then and still believe in now that led me here.

I am my worst enemy in questioning that road.  But I am also my best friend in continuing to hope for a community of "too much" to surround myself with that will get me through when the going gets particularly rough.  It's just a road I hope not to walk alone.

We can all be too much together.  I hope.