Shwooooops, missed the whole 'archiving' thing and whatnot... anyhow, let's reflect, shall we?

This last year has been pretty interesting. And by interesting, I mean much different than prior years. It seems like I have been through many transitory periods since graduating from college. Let's recall them:

1) Went back to Alaska, and applied for jobs. MANY jobs. And finally ended up doing corrosion testing on the slope (read: manual labor), which was soul eroding. Perspective changed to ideals, as I quit and decided to apply to grad school, and got in. Also worked a summer for big oil, which was fun.

2) Grad school. Very much intellectually stimulating, but soul eroding in another fashion. Decided real life was better than try to live through my ideals. Came back to Alaska.

3) Environmental science for Nana after applying for many jobs. For a whole year now, almost (!).

This last year has been great. Being close to family, friends, and Libby, and earning a decent wage while having variety in my work. And I have time for hobbies! Of course, living without having to worry about money is pretty awesome, and that's been the main change. Security. But in a big dumb life. I still somewhat miss the great PhD endeavor, but that just means I'll have to do something else to give back to humanity (working to remediate the environment is pretty cool, though, I must admit). The variety that my current has given me has kept me from trying to transition to yet another stage... but we'll see where the future leads.

I was recently reminded of a past era of my life, because I got rejected from 5 jobs I applied for in August 2009 about a week ago. Thanks for the timely response, State of Alaska. It was just interesting to think of that time, rather, those times in my life where everything was dangling by a thread. I know I don't ever want to go back to that. I guess I'm fortunate in a way, to have failed and picked myself back up through reinvention, so hopefully I've learned from everything that I've done wrong in the past. When times are good, it's so easy to forget about when things were less then ideal, and over this past year, I've been trying to fight getting too complacent with my position. For that reason, I've definitely been considering going for some further education (maybe a master's this time instead...), or at least trying to challenge myself so that I keep growing.

I'm rambling now, but I guess my summation is: life is good. But I don't want it to get too good.