Still nothing...

... from the Edison National Historical Park folks on volunteering.

And nothing yet from the specialist on my breast issue. Called to discover that my primary's office hadn't faxed the report over, so I had to get that corrected. And I picked up my films and the doctor's report yesterday.

While I've been pitifully inert this week (besides a blog entry on another site... and web searches on Fort Hancock... and five loads of laundry after switching my drawers over to fall/winter), I realized that I may be back to normal. That sounds weird. Let me explain:

I don't think I ever felt like my regular self at my last job. Whether the need was real or perceived, I always sensed that I had to be someone other than who I really am. Maybe it was because I worked with people who mostly acted like they were curing cancer (they weren't) and assumed I agreed with them (I didn't; I was just trying to get by.). And a lot of the time, I felt judged, and deemed inadequate. As I got more and more exhausted by the job, I think the weight and impact of the pretense bled into my personal life. I withdrew. I didn't initiate a lot of contact, and I certainly wasn't as friendly as I once had been. I got so out of practice on being the unvarnished me, that I was having a hard time relating to the dwindling number of people I really wanted to get to know. Label it cautiousness, or shyness, or anything else; the result was a very solitary existence.

I was really starting to wonder if I'd have the skill or desire to connect with anyone again.

Not to worry, as it turns out. Free of the spectre of judgment, I think I've probably chatted up more people in the past two months than I took a chance on in the past two years. It hasn't been incredibly conscious, either, just finding some presumed common ground and striking up a conversation. And, in some cases, going on a flyer and asking for a second helping when the chat seemed promising. It's coming a lot easier, maybe even easier than it ever has.

There's still a lot of ground yet to cover (and a lot of pushing on my recent inertia -- better to do than to mull over and write about), but it seems that I'm moving in the right direction on that part of my reboot. When you feel more like yourself, you can claim more of your own power and everything else that makes you wonderful. And that's a good thing.