The Happy Jar of 2019

Run-down. I have been completely open about how much I've struggled this year, and I can see it clearly in the small handful of posts I've written these past few months, especially in the posts labeled as "Musings." I talk about how tired I am, how things have been rough, how shitty I've been at writing and posting lately. Apparently, though, I've also gotten really good at lying to myself. Everything's fine, it's all good, put a smile on my face and power through. I'd gotten so good at lying to myself, and others when they'd ask how I'm doing, that it took me far too long to realize my smiles are fake, that all I am doing is sleeping, that I'm not joking when I say I don't have the energy to feed myself. I'm not entirely sure when I stopped caring about the things that make me happy; it's been at least since spring this year, though maybe even further back. Again, lying to myself. I have next to no motivation to travel, to write, and even thinking about picking up a chapter book to curl up and read for a while makes me exhausted. I still love and care for my animals, and am excited when I get to bring home something new, but my motivations for loving and caring for them have changed from doing it because I love it to doing it because they need it. And it is exhausting.

I think I first realized something was wrong as I was writing my Thanksgiving post, when I seriously sat for an hour and struggled to think of more than one thing I was thankful for in the last year. But again, I lied to myself and brushed it off as being tired. It wasn't until the following weekend when Jared, who had read my post, asked me if I was happy. My answer was an automatic "of course I am" though almost immediately I realized I was lying. But I didn't say anything. It wasn't until later that week, when Jared found me in bed after getting home from work early, sleeping right through dinner and evening animal chores and everything else that comes in the hours after work, that I verbally acknowledged that I am not okay. The next day, after sleeping for nearly 14 hours, I began looking for a therapist.

I've recently begun treatment for the depression I've desperately been trying to hide from myself and everyone else, and though I'm not okay yet, I am at least hopeful that I will be. The problem is, it's not all the time. I can be cheerful and excited and look forward to things in one moment, then eventually those emotions drain away to leave me feeling like I'm wading through a fog of exhaustion and apathy. I can easily hide my melancholy while chatting on the phone, and it's even easier over text and social media, where tone is never conveyed and I get to pick and choose what I share. But now that I've acknowledged there's something wrong, and have taken steps to get help with pulling myself out of whatever hole I've fallen into, I can work on being better. One of the exercises my therapist has me do daily is to physically write down three things I'm thankful for; the first time she asked me to tell her what I'm thankful for I struggled in silence that seemed to stretch on for hours until I finally came up with being thankful I got off work early. Another pause, then said I was thankful for my run at lunchtime. But I just could not come up with a third thing. I couldn't do it. We sat there in silence until I finally remembered it was sunny out, and blurted I was thankful for the sunshine. And I think that was the point of the exercise: to be thankful for the little things in life, to make note of even the smallest things that make you smile.

That exercise, on a bigger scale, is what I've been doing for years with my Happy Jar. I take the moments in life, big and small, anything that makes me happy, and write it down on bright slips of paper. I review those slips any time I need a reminder of happiness, and I can finally admit to myself that I've looked at that jar more this year than any other. I know that this is not going to be a quick-fix, that I've got a lot of shit in my own head to sort out, but at least now I have acknowledged there's a problem and have someone with training to help me figure it out. While I've got a long ways to go to just be okay again, here are a few things that have brought even a small dose of happiness into my life, which I'll keep in mind for however long it takes:

Please excuse me while I wax poetic about how amazing my husband is. Jared has been nothing but supportive this year, and I really wouldn't know what to do without him. He does this thing where he intentionally makes goofy faces, or pulls off ridiculous actions, just to make me laugh. And he licks my face. While it's gross, it obviously makes me giggle, and I'm pretty sure it's one of his favorite ways to get a laugh out of me.

I finally had a real garden this year! I didn't get to spend nearly enough time in it due to a broken wrist this summer, but I am pleased with how it turned out. I can't wait for planting season (which, ya know, is in a few short weeks down here!)

A constant source of joy in my life this year has been Bug, the ring-tailed lemur baby my husband and I raised from the day he was born. Those first few weeks were rough, with hourly feedings which gradually became less frequent, and constant worry that something would go wrong, but he's now nine (!!!) months old and living his best life with us. The picture of him below was taken when he was right at 24 hours old.

This year was the busiest by far for rehabbing, and I wouldn't have it any other way! I am fortunate that I had help from both Jared and coworkers in caring for the spring babies, and the coworkers mostly cared for the fall babies, which allowed us to help even more animals than if I were trying to do so alone. It always feels so good to see hard work rewarded when releasing wild babies back where they belong.

This one is super important to Jared and I, because for the last several years Marley was plagued by seizures every 5-6 weeks. We finally found a dose of medications that worked well for him and moved into a permanent home (we were renting before and didn't much like where we lived), and now he's seizure-free!

This year might as well be known as the Year of Star Wars for me. Because yeah, I AM a nerd (like my father before me)!

It's pretty well known that Jared doesn't really travel with me, and that we generally prefer it that way. Occasionally, though, we do go places together, and I love it even more. While at the beach for a friend's wedding I somehow got Jared to go into the water with me for a bit of swimming, which mostly consisted of him carrying me because I didn't want to step on a crab. The things you do for love!

I am rather proud of both myself and my dog for this one. I've never really run before this summer, and now I'm signed up for a few races in the coming months. Ghost, who failed as an adventure pup due to his fear of heights and water, has been with me on every training run possible, and he's taken to running better than I could have hoped. Plus his post-run faces are the best!

Again, Star. Wars. Nerd. Jared and I enjoy going to the movies and we saw several this year that made it into my Happy Jar (Avengers: Endgame and How To Train Your Dragon 3 to name a couple), not only because I loved the movie but also because it was a date with Jared.

2020 is going to be quite the year as I relearn how to navigate my own life and work on being better. I already know next year's Happy Jar is going to be central to helping me be positive, and I'll continue doing my daily exercises at the direction of my therapist to facilitate that. As it is, I'm happy to wave goodbye to 2019 and am looking forward to what the new year will bring.

The Happy Jar of 2018

Upbeat. It's already January 1, 2019, I have my travel Wrap-Up posted (read it here), so I guess that means it's time for my Happy Jar summary! All year long I write down what makes me happy and slip the little colored papers into a glass jar on my dresser so that I see it every day. Usually just seeing the jar and the tiny pieces of happiness it contains is enough to get me out of a bad mood, but in the case of extreme melancholy I'll take out those slips and read each one of them, reminding myself that I have a lot to be happy about. This year's Happy Jar contained a whole lot of animal-related joy, as well as a bunch of excitement and accomplishment regarding our house. In case you missed it, Jared and I bought our first house in December 2017, and we moved in during January 2018. The house has kept us (mostly me, because I'm a busy-body) occupied with minor improvement projects, including gardening. Gardening, surprisingly, also featured heavily in my Happy Jar this year, as did travelling (duh). Check out a few examples of my happiness below, and feel free to share bits of what made 2018 great for you!

Last year Alisha and I scored permits to hike the Grand Canyon, this year we got permits to backpack the Tetons! Backpacking permits for major national parks are notoriously difficult to come by, and you usually have to book your trip on the first day it becomes available to reserve. The first Wednesday in January saw me glued to the NPS website, waiting as the site crashed for a nerve wracking two hours until I could be sure our reservations were accepted for our desired hike and dates. We got them!

2018 was filled with babies! Not mine (don't get excited) but there were a whole lot of the furry kind of babies that filled a vast majority of the year. The first was Leonard, an infant ring-tailed lemur who I took in turns with a couple coworkers to care for. Leonard was tiny when we first got her, about the size of my palm, and her favorite place to be was clinging to my neck. She still prefers sitting on shoulders, and it was our pleasure to have her home with us for a few days over Christmas.

I did say our house has been the source of a lot of my happiness, and I meant that. Including buying "adult" things, like a new couch! Of course, we had to make sure it was big enough to fit Jared, myself, Marley, Callie, Ghost, and all of the cats. It is!

I have wanted chickens for years, ever since some friends of ours had a flock back when we were kids. One of my requirements for buying a house was it had to be able to accommodate chickens! Just over a month after officially moving in, we got chicks!

Gardening has always been enjoyable to me, and I've kept at least a few potted plants throughout the years and several moves. Now that we have a house of our own, I can put plants into the ground! I started working on garden plots within a few months of moving (winter in Texas is a great time to do so!) so when spring came and I had the time, I planted my front and back gardens. I still have a lot more I want to do, including gardens along the sides of my house as well as a vegetable garden, but that's what this year is for.

Never underestimate the amount of joy I get from having visitors. Jared and I really aren't the most sociable of people, but when we have the time and energy to entertain, we love having people over. My sister in particular seems to practically live at my house for as often as she shows up here, but Jared's parents, my brother, and my mom and aunt have all come to visit in the last year, and we're always open to hosting more!

An absolutely enormous part of the last half of 2018 was the addition of Luna to the Tiger Creek family. Luna was a six week old little white ball of lioness fluff when we got her at the beginning of July, and to everyone's utter delight most of the staff at Tiger Creek were allowed to help raise her. As in, we got to take her home on a rotating schedule and care for her. Yes, we had a lion in our house. Frequently. And holy cow did she cuddle hard! It was awesome.

You guys, I finally got my orange kitten! This is not news to anyone who's been following along since August, but Jared surprised me with a couple of kittens at the end of July, one of whom happened to be a fluffy little orange tabby. Hoodoo and his sister, Rey, have settled in wonderfully with our already extensive personal zoo, and Hoodoo regularly accompanies me on my trips, including hiking six 14,000 foot mountains in five days (read it here)!

My last visit to Nebraska was not only a surprise to my sister (who graduated with her Masters Degree, woohoo!) but also a bonding moment for myself and Torrey. We've known each other since we were in grade school and have travelled together to Pikes Peak every year since 2014. This year, we decided to commemorate our annual vacation with a tattoo! That's right, we got a matching tattoo of Pikes Peak, where our artist took one of my photos and drew our tattoo from it. Torrey had the vision to color the mountain in shades of purple, and I think it turned out amazing. So much love!

I have always had a thing for photographs, going so far as to take as many photography classes in school as possible and even considering going to an arts college in Denver to pursue my passion with an acutal degree. I didn't follow that path, but my love of taking pictures has trailed me through the years. Now that I actually have a house where I can knock holes into the walls as I see fit, I knew I wanted to start hanging up my photos. The only problem was, I didn't know where to start. It was a conversation with my sister that inspired me to turn my hallway into a photo gallery, with various canvas prints of my favorite photos lining the walls. I finally began to turn my dream into reality (canvases are expensive, if you didn't know!) and have slowly started hanging my pictures. I love seeing my art on the walls of my home, and can't wait to take and print even more photos as the years and my travels progress.

So there you have it, a few examples of my pride, happiness, and accomplishments throughout 2018. There is absolutley nothing wrong with reflecting over each year and picking out the best parts of it, remembering the year based on the things that made you happy. I already have several things I know will make me thrilled during 2019, but I also keep in mind that I can find joy in little things. Unexpected happiness could be waiting in the future too, but I won't know it until it happens. So here's to saying goodbye to 2018 while ringing in 2019 with a bright and hopeful smile.

The Happy Jar of 2017

Chipper. For the fourth year in a row, I've dedicated myself to filling up my "happy jar" - a glass jar where I put little slips of colored paper containing a reason why I'm happy. It can be something as small as a bubble bath, or as big as getting married to my best friend. 2017 has been a good year for me, and my jar is more full this year than it ever has been, filled with every day occurrences and major life changes that have brought me joy. Take a few moments to browse through my reasons for being happy and see if you have reasons to be happy like my own.

First and most important, Jared became stuck with me forever. We were originally suppposed to get married on June 23, 2018 but decided we couldn't wait any longer and held an impromptu wedding surrounded by our families on July 2nd this year. It was an absolutely perfect day that you can read about here, if you feel like getting into a sloppy love story.

This personal accomplishment of overcoming physical and mental limits is one that I can't wait to do again. My sister and I hiked the Grand Canyon in May, and although it tried to kick both our butts we came out of it all the better. Read the first part of our adventures here.

Another huge part of my year is this big win for Jared and I: We bought a house! We are set to move into it in January, and so the packing begins!

You all know how much I love animals, and how attached I am to squirrels in particular. Well, this year two little baby grey squirrels fell into our laps and Jared couldn't say "no" to me... Sebastian and Kachina are now almost 9 months old and I adore them!

Quite a bit of my happiness this year stems from someone other than myself. For example, I am so incredibly happy for and proud of my sister for making her dream of being a teacher a reality. Way to go little sis!

This year Jared and I saw a lot of new movies, but by far my favorite was the newest Star Wars, The Last Jedi. I absolutely loved it, and saw it four times in theaters between the day it came out and the 31st of December, though there is nothing quite like seeing it for the first time. Jared and I squeezed each other's hands during the entire showing so hard we had to check that we hadn't left bruises on the other's fingers. No shame.

I've touched on this homecoming feeling before, but it really struck me again hard this year. I've traveled more than ever (stay tuned for my 2017 Wrap-Up post), and while it is never easy being away from my furry and scaley kids, their greetings when I get home melt me. Seriously, I usually end up on my knees in the doorway hugging my pets hard enough to choke them. And end up with a paw in the face because of it. Which is perfectly fine with me!

I've never felt such a giddy sense of relief and excitement than when I found out my sister and I had received a lottery permit for hiking the Grand Canyon. Those things are so incredibly hard to come by, and we got our desired route and time on the first try!

We adopted a puppy!!!

And a new cat!!!

Now, I admit that most people wouldn't exactly be thrilled if they encountered a bear in their campsite, but I'm not most people. I hope we see a grizzly next year!

2017 was a good year for me, and I can't wait to see what 2018 has in store. I can forsee quite a few things in the upcoming year to make me happier than ever, including moving in to our new house, grand adventures with friends and family, movie dates with my husband (husband!!! it still feels so weird to call Jared that!) and lots of time with my pets. What is the happiest memory you have from 2017? What are you looking forward to in 2018? Let me know so I can be happy for you too!

Goodbye 2017, Hello 2018!