Well folks, that’s a wrap on Florida.  After a stress filled and tumultuous month of May, I am heading home.  I have come to a standstill on the chest knot after having a diagnostic mammogram, an ultrasound, some x-rays and a CT Scan. The only thing I know for certain is that it is the joints of ribs 5 through 7 and there is absolutely no mass, tumor or cyst to be seen.  While I have not ruled out a form of bone cancer, I would not have the possibility of moving forward until the end of July so I feel okay picking the situation back up when I get on insurance in Tennessee.
 
The nail in the coffin of the state of Florida is the fact that I cannot afford my own place and I cannot find a room to rent either.  I crashed at one friend’s place for a couple of months and left once I thought I had found a nice place to stay through a friend of mine.  Unfortunately, it became very clear that this person had never had roommates before and tried to control my every move and so I had to leave because while I can understand a few ground rules, this person has no say on whether or not I call my sponsor every day, go to church every Sunday or go out to parties with them when they invite me.  So I find myself almost homeless yet again and now I have a different friend letting me crash for a few weeks.  Half of my stuff is on her back porch, part is in my trunk and part is in my room in bags or suitcases.  It is this whole continuing to be homeless scenario that has me ready to go back to Tennessee where I have a nice house I can stay in while I get back on my feet.
 
I have decided to treat my home city just like I would treat any city I have moved to – like I haven’t been there before.  I am going to find groups and Meetups to join, rediscover the churches and just see what happens.  Having my brother around will also be of great benefit since he does a lot of car and truck restoration.  He has already said he can get the water out of my door and fix my seal – something new I am dealing with until I leave rainy Florida. 
 
A lot of my friends are asking if I will be staying this time and all I can say is that I plan staying a couple of years, but you never know what’s around the corner – I could be gone in a couple months or stay a lifetime… I guess I will find out when I head north on 75 in a few weeks. What I do know is the person returning is not the person who left.  After living on the West coast and the East coast – I have changed a lot.  I am not the same person; I have new perspectives on so many things.  But one thing my adventures have taught me is paradise is nice, but it can also be lonely if the people you love are too far away to enjoy it with you.  So here’s to going back home and making the old new again and enjoying time with family.  Hope each of you has a great June too!

I don’t know who turned my timetable on its side, but whoever it was – Please sit it right side up!  Chaotic is the only word that comes to mind to describe my life right now.  Dead End is another good description for my life right now as that is all I seem to be encountering at the moment. 
 
I had to leave my rental situation of the last two years at the end of March.  I have never had any issues finding a room to rent, however, I have not been able to find a place this time around and so I am typing this blog from my friend’s dining room table.  I am staying with her and her fiancé for a few weeks which doesn’t sound too bad, but the house is tiny and they are getting married and about to have a dozen people staying here and so as I said timing is just horrible right now.  I also lost my roommate and my neighbor who have been a great help to me when it comes to my car of never-ending problems.  I helped her pack up some last minute things and drove her up to her new town and while doing so that wonderful Low Coolant Light started flashing.  The entire coolant system in my car is brand new including the thermostat and sensor so I really have to ask, What now, Chevy?  Maybe your new cars are award winning, but your old cars are far from it.  Problem is that I no longer have anyone to help me with my car.  It goes down, so do I. 

And of course, I had to say goodbye to the world’s greatest dog, Lilly.  As soon as I would open my door in the morning I would hear the thump, thump of her tail wagging on the floor.  At first sight, she would jump up and run to greet me and flop over onto her back for a morning belly rub.  She also helped me with my exercise by taking me on very brisk walks through the neighborhood.  She is a sweet girl and I will miss her and my roommate very much as they were both very good to me.
 

While I was going through all of this cleaning stuff out and packing stuff up and trying to find a place to live, my work asked me start working overtime.  Again, timing is just not working in my favor these days.  My work is asking the impossible of me, completely disrespecting me on a daily basis and they pay me quite close to nothing for all of my trouble.  I guess I should have never taken this job as it certainly has put me in a tight corner, but I didn’t know the financial issues surrounding this university until after I started work.  I have been trying to find a new job, but that too has been one dead end after another.  What do you do when all the doors are closed and your typically vocal gut is completely silent?  Well, I have been grappling with the idea of going back home to Memphis for a while, but I have been reluctant to quit my job, which would mean loosing my income and my health insurance.  I can only have coverage through a group plan or Obama Care since I have that ugly “C” word in my medical records.  Memphis is also a place where a lot of bad things happened.  While I do have family there, it is just a hard place to go back to due to all of the things that went so wrong there.
 
Unfortunately, my decision might be made for me shortly because if my car is going to start acting up again, I will have no choice but to abandon ship and go home.  It already has a starting problem and if I have to start putting coolant in it again and start taking it back up to the shop again I will have no one to help me out.  I will have to fork out money for a rental car every time as well as the money to fix whatever is wrong.  It would be far better for me to take it up to my brother in Tennessee and have him look at it and if needed have him help me find a tide-me-over car for a couple grand and unload this car of a million problems. 
 
Back when all of this upheaval started, I asked God what in the world was going on and what I needed to do about it.  Thus far, He has only stated, “ You need to learn to ride the wave.”  I am literally flying blind and just taking each day as it comes and trying to understand that any control I thought I had now seems to be gone.  Circumstances are taking over and ushering in a new reality.  I have known that I was racing against a ticking time bomb with my car, my job and my finances and it appears the bomb is starting to detonate, it appears I have lost the race, it appears that I am watching myself crash in slow motion… But I have to continue to ride this wave to its destination leaning not on my own understanding and trusting that the wave will take me to where I need to be regardless of how uncomfortable I am while in transit.  
 
God may call it riding the wave, but I think I am learning how to trust.  My trust meter is really low for myself and for others.  Erwin had this to say recently, “…many of you are wondering where your opportunities are, but they have been there all along, you just treated them like giants and ran from them in fear…” This is especially true regarding some opportunities that have come across my path.  They were awesome opportunities that any sane person would jump at, but I would find a list of reasons why I might not be a good fit.  As I said in my previous post, I have burned a lot of lies I have believed about myself – the easy part.  Now, I have the hard part – the part where I have to start acting as if the lies really are lies which, means stepping out of fear and into faith and facing these so called giants head on and trusting that I am fully capable.

New Everything seems to be on my docket for 2017.  It’s an everything must go sort of season in my life.  For starters, the house where I have been room renting, is going on the market this month and it is being listed at base price to sell quick!  Second, my car appears to be on its final leg.  I own an Impala and anyone with an Impala from 2000 to 2005 probably knows what I am going through.  Actually, most of you have probably already gotten rid of your Impalas.  According to the Chevy forums, there is nothing that can be done, unless of course, God reaches down from Heaven and puts a stop to all this crazy coolant system nonsense.  Third, after having spent a semester in my new job, I can tell you that I must leave this place!  There is no money at this institution and moreover, people in my department haven’t seen a raise in five years!  That’s just plain crazy.  I do love the holiday shut down and time off structure, but that can be found in other institutions that actually pay their people so ya know… I will be leaving.
 
Change is everywhere right now and I do not know if I will land on my feet or crash on my butt.  The only person I can blame is myself.  I left Los Angeles for some financial stability, but the decisions I have made regarding employment have not exactly helped me attain much of anything close to stable.  So now I find myself at a dangerous cross roads.  I have a decent amount of debt to pay off and am in need of a new car and a new place to live and a new place to work.  My brother has been pushing for me to come back home for a year and while he does make sense numerically, I don’t want to move without a job, which would put me in the realm of blowing my savings.
 
So with all that said, let’s talk New Year resolutions.  You do have them right?  Mine are simple this year and fall into two categories: Finances and Fitness.
 
Financially, I need to get the rest of this debt paid off so I can buy a new car!  And of course, a house would be nice too! The main way to do this would be through a new and better paying place of employment.  I am geographically open, though I would like to move closer to my mom and brother.  I would also like to be in an area with a lot of hiking.  One doesn’t really hike in Florida.  There are tons of trails here, but it is more nature walking so to speak.  Plus I haven’t really been able to find a good hiking group or find any outdoors buddies to go exploring with so I have been at a loss in terms of one of my favorite past times.  I am a professional when it comes to living on nothing, so the challenge will be to keep living on nothing until the debt is gone.  AKA, not buying new things, which is very hard to do once those credit cards start lighting up with zero balances.  Self Restraint is needed indeed.
 
The second category is fitness.  I am not necessarily trying to loose weight, but I do want to be healthy!  I need to get back to eating mostly fruits and vegetables and zero sweets.  I am trying to follow the adrenal body plan which means I need to add in protein.  I have toyed with the idea of bringing seafood back into my diet, but I just don’t feel right about it.  I mean if I can talk to it, I shouldn’t eat it. Right?  I also need to up my morning and evening workouts.  I do yoga every morning, but I need to start getting up earlier so I can get more time in on the mat and I need to be doing an hour of cardio and/or strength in evening when at home.  Once my debt is paid off, I would like to join a gym or program where I can be taken through a series of exercises.  I just do better with someone telling me what to do and making me do it when it comes to workouts.  I am good at doing the workout, but I am also good at making every excuse as to why I don’t need to give 110% or why I need to do the beginner version or the low impact version or ya know whatever.  I have decided to take a picture of myself on the first and last day of 2017 to further motivate me to eat healthy and keep up with the workouts.  Perhaps I’ll share my results with you this time next year. 
 
I guess I do have a third category in terms of New Year resolutions, but I feel that it is going to have to take a back seat until I am in a new job.  The third category would, of course, be my creative endeavors.  I have a few ideas that involve a second blog that is topic focused for 12 steppers and a YouTube channel and I do want to get back into my writing.  Since this is more dependent on the first two resolutions getting off the ground, I will dub this a bonus resolution, which in turn gives me more motivation to make the first two resolutions happen.
 
I wish all of you a Happy, Prosperous and Adventurous New Year!