Tarot card: The Chariot

On this day, at 3:25 am, 32 years ago, I was born.

I asked my dad if he remembered anything about that day, and he said he remembered driving mom around in the car awhile before going to the hospital. She dreaded the hospital, so the less time she spent there, the better. He said as little girl I was talker. My younger sister, Rachel, would get made because she could never get a word in when I was around.

Overall, this had been a good day. Andy delivered me a special meal, filet mignon, served at our dinner table (we usually eat in front of the TV unfortunately). I got presents, too: a grill from Andy's mom and stepdad and from Andy, the third season of Buffy the Vampire on DVD. I love this show, and I was so sad to see it end this year. I have such a soft spot for Buffy/Sarah Michelle Geller, and seeing her sweet and impossibly pretty face on the cover made me feel so happy.

Because it's my birthday, I've been thinking a lot about my life - what I've done, what I haven't done, what I'd like to do. I've set a lot of goals for myself, some embarrassing(lose 40 pounds), some spiritual (practice magick every day), some creative (write every day). I decided that part of my fullfillment of that last goal would be this journal. My goal is to write a little something each day (and every day) for the next year, birthday to birthday. It's a challenge I hope I'm up to facing.

The tarot card above is the symbol not just for this day, but my whole year, according to Angeles Arrien, the author of The Tarot Handbook. She says it means change, amd that in times of change it is necessary to incorporate "quietude" with activity. This is a year of big changes, she says, which could mean moving or changing jobs, but that changes should be positive and "nuturing."

Well, I don't want to move. I love it here in this home that Andy and I have made together, and I don't want to leave it any time soon. As for my job, well...I wouldn't want to leave the university without getting a Master's Degree first, if I could at all help it.

But I have been thinking about my job. I don't hate it, but I don't love it either. I was reading an article in Wired that made me think about what I would like to do a little more closely. The article was about Silicon Valley and the GenX people, like me, who lost their jobs during the Internet bust. The people interviewed talked about their new jobs and said things like, "It's just a paycheck now."

The article was supposed to be somewhat positive. In the context of the whole article, this attitude was a good thing, because it meant that people weren't married to their jobs or going crazy creating start-ups that would ultimately flounder and leave them penniless. But what it also meant was that they weren't in love with their jobs either.

I was in love with my job, and two years later, I still mourn it. I never thought that I could have a job that I honestly and truly loved. I felt so damn lucky that I found something that stimulated me, that allowed me to be creative and enthusiastic and to learn something every day. Looking back on it, I should have seen the warning signs. I was blissfully unaware of how the company (actually, companies) was run. It didn't matter to me that I had coworkers whose job titles were nonsense and whose job descriptions were vague. I could give a rat's ass less about what anyone else did as long as I was allowed to code in peace. I dreamt code. I lived to see a site go live, to type the URL into the address line of the browser and see my work "in the flesh," so to speak. This still excites me to this day, to see the sites I work on as freelancer come alive.

My job at the university is stable, but my heart is definitely not in it. I know this has to change, because it is affecting how I feel about myself. Andy tells me all the time that I am not my job - and he's right - but considering that I spend 40+ hours per week there, more time than I truly spend with Andy or my friends or my family, I can't discount any longer the effect it has on me. I have to move forward.