So I started working on this site right before Christmas '24. I don't remember a lot about the months between then and now (this is pretty normal for me— which is a large part of why I wanted to start writing blog posts to begin with, so I could remember things about my life better) and I don't know how much of what I do remember I want to talk about or summarize.

I know that in December, my dog needed eye surgery, and got her eye removed completely. She had glaucoma, which the vets assured us was genetic and there was nothing we really could've done about it. We handled it as best we could. It was super stressful. I didn't realize how much more weed I was smoking than usual to cope with the anxiety until my partner told me to tone it down. She's doing well now, but her surgery required a revision because they left tissue in there on accident that got infected, so it was pretty scary for a while.

Other than that, I don't feel like much about the end of 2024 was memorable. I started learning to crochet and trying to re-teach myself how to knit, and I'd like to eventually get back into that, but I ditched it almost as soon as the new year started. I crocheted so much when I was in the car in the vet parking lot waiting for our dog to get out of surgery, and then just kind of stopped. It makes me sad when I lose focus on my hobbies. Hopefully getting off of social media (which I'll get into later) will help me return to doing things of actual value.

If you asked me to recount what happened between January and April, I wouldn't really be able to do it. My memory mostly kicks in around the first week of May, when my partner and I went to the aquarium to belatedly celebrate my birthday.

I'm much heavier than I'd like to be and not regularly active, so I was scared about whether I'd be able to walk around the aquarium, but we were there for about 2-3 hours and I was actually fine. It was really nice. I wish there were more and bigger sharks, but they had a beautiful sea turtle and that was pretty great. The sea lions and penguins were also highlights of the trip.

Then at the end of May I started having mental health issues again. I mean, I exist in a pretty consistent state of "mental health issues", but it got worse. I ended up admitted to a partial hospital program (PHP) for the third or fourth time to work on my trauma and whatnot. I don't really want to get into gory details about my trauma and such on this site if I can help it, but the PHP was quite helpful this time around. The problem with me is that something will help me feel better for like a few weeks, and then I'll fall out of my routines and go back to not cleaning consistently, not taking care of myself, not doing my therapy homework, and that all leads to bad thought patterns. I got out of the program at the end of June and here I am a few weeks out, not doing great.

I decided to ditch social media completely. That's sort of a huge reason as to why I'm even making this blog post, because I want to make myself get into the habit of doing this instead of shitposting on Tumblr and doomscrolling on Twitter. I'd like to actually write about my life in a more long-form, purposeful way. I'm not going to write daily blog posts or anything, but I want to do it whenever I have a lot on my mind or something I think is relatively thoughtful/interesting to put somewhere. In general, too, I want to read (I haven't read a single book this year) and post my reviews/thoughts on this site as well, and I want to work on my shrines and other pages so things are more complete.

One thing I'm enjoying lately is my oc's or sonas. I will be making pages dedicated to them, but for now, I will introduce them: Seren on the left, Caelestis on the right.

 
(art by akirakkie @ toyhouse)

Seren is a complete sparkledog, and Caelestis is sparkledog adjacent. While I adore marine animals and the ocean in general, I identify heavily with canids and feel a strong connection to them, so I wanted my sona(s) to be dog- and wolf-like. I really love them both. I practically was just staying on social media at all recently to use them as my layouts, but now I'm hoping that making pages on here dedicated to them can fill that void and help me enjoy them. I need to write up blurbs about their personalities, etc.

Something I've been exploring or dealing with lately has been my relationship with masculinity, and my identity in general. I could probably write a whole post about that in and of itself. I say it here because Seren and Caelestis have been kind of tools for me working through it. They're both masc, which I've realized is how I'm most comfortable presenting. As I write this, I'm wearing a dress, but that's pretty much just left over from when I was trying to be femme and I don't have a lot of other clothes that fit and are summer-appropriate right now. When the fall comes and I can justify buying new clothes again, I'll hopefully be living the butch fantasy, or something adjacent to it. For now, I'm just enjoying my he/it sparkledogs.

Anyway, that's pretty much all I've got. There's not a lot going on. In August my mom is getting her knees replaced and so I'll be going to NYC to help her out for about a week or so while she heals, so she doesn't have to go up and down the stairs of her apartment building or do too much in general. That's pretty much going to be the biggest thing I do this summer, if not this year (unless something else crazy comes up). I live a pretty boring life and I never claimed otherwise, haha.