Mid- way through June, I paused, and wondered – why was I focusing on little things during a month of big things? I hope that end-of-May-Cate realized that this was something that June-Cate would need to stay sane. This month’s focus gave me permission to make time for small, unimportant (but important to me), things in order that I wouldn’t get buried by the big things.
The big things were – launch. I’ve been working on Google+, it’s very exciting to share what we’ve been creating with the world. Unfortunately, my visa didn’t arrive and so I couldn’t be in California with the rest of my team (a big thing, yes, but one I can do nothing about. I’m trying to stay calm and wait it out). I’ve now started working on a 20% project, which is really cool. The article that I’ve been working on went through several iterations and will be out soon. I gave an Ignite talk (this has been a vague but big-scary goal I’ve had for a while, it was good to stretch myself in this way). And my co-author refined and I edited my first journal paper. Since he’s done most of the work for it, he’s first author – but still, exciting! Towards the end of the month, two other big things came up – first is the panel Serena and I are working on, and second is a web-profile, which I’m going to keep quiet about until it’s out. But still – exciting! Not exciting but still big things – I actually got sick, as in, go to the doctor, give me antibiotics sick. I tend to get the same couple of things again and again in response to stress, and I don’t think I’ve ever needed an emergency doctors appointment before. That sucked.
Anyway, in the midst of all this I read a lot of books – especially novels. Made time for breakfast at my favorite cafe a couple of times a week. Went to the gym. Went out to things happening around town. Applied face-masks. Walked to uptown for dinner. Tried a couple of new restaurants. Got a pedicure. Didn’t travel – June was my first month without a trip in… I don’t know how long. Had a guilt-free day off. Basically, I tried to carve out as much unstructured free-time as possible. It’s been great.
July may have to be the opposite. There are a number of bureaucratic things that I’m not on top of – filing my taxes, claiming health-insurance coverage, etc. I also want to get out and explore more – to that end, I may need more structure. My boyfriend and I are going to plan things for the weekends and go and do them, first up is an aerial exploration thing, but we’d also like to go canoeing and stuff.
So July’s theme is Organization. I’m not particularly excited about this, but who does get excited about filing taxes? Some things just need to be done. Exploring is exciting, but it’s easy for this weekend not to be the right time to do whatever it is, the point is to plan and make it the right time.
How was your June? And what are you planning for July?