mood:
listening: yiruma - river flows in you
weather: clear, cool
time: 13:24

it finally happened the horoscope girlies were right. i kept seeing those dumb tiktoks where they shuffle the cards or whatever or sit there like "listen up if youre a libra or a scorpio or a virgo then this month-" where they kept mentioning that for virgo things that had been at a complete standstill were going to start moving forward in a positive direction. though im a really spiritual person i don't put a lot of stake in horoscope stuff simply because well a lot of it is super westernized metaphysics stuff that tell you what you want to hear and i esp try not to pay attention too much to what tiktok "psychics" have to say.

and sure enough.. i finally got a call concerning my VA ratings and it was a really good answer! talked with some more people concerning seeing about speeding things along so i can attend school next spring and the lady who's handling my case said she doesn't see why it wouldn't happen. of course - i am being cautious in getting my hopes up because if there's one thing the military loves to do is take its sweet time, especially towards the last few months of the year. so while im keeping my hopes reserved to an extent im also going YIPEPEEEEE YAHOOIEEE!! A litle because well you gots to celebrate your wins sometimes! i also think its important to be thankful and express thankfulness especially when you reached out and asked for something. in the past i have made prayers to a particular god and shortly afterwards harvested probably the biggest mushroom crop i had ever grown. thought it was important to thank him by sharing as many as i could with my friends and did just that. so i think its important for me to express thankfulness for this as well even though i didn't ask anyone in particular for help this time- i just reached out and put something out there for the natural world itself. so i think ill be thankful by going outside later and enjoying the really beautiful weather and the woods that i'm so lucky to live near.

lately ive been kind of beating myself up for not working on my webcomic - ive done some sporadic work here and there mainly concerning re-scripting a massive portion of the comic and fixing technical aspects of it and starting on preliminary thumbnails/sketches. but for the most part i feel like there's more work that could be getting put into things right now. it's hard because ill have weeks where i am doing pretty much literally nothing and then something will happen and i have a huge load of work or something regarding my move that comes up. there's a lot of stuff that goes into leaving the military that people don't really understand, even people who are currently enlisted don't understand. and then there's also the stress that comes with it, where am i gonna live, whats my pay going to be like, where am i going to work, what's going to happen to me, when do i get out, etc. i think some of these answers are clearer for people who are "organically" leaving ie they're at the end of their contract and are leaving. since i'm being medically separated it's more complicated because i technically still have about a year and a half left in the military as per my contract but in reality i'll be leaving sometime in the next 6 months. as to when that is, i'm still waiting to find out.

im a guy that loves to make plans i don't like winging it (at least when it comes to big life things) i like to make sure i'm secure and since slater will be moving in with me i'm also invested in making sure that it's taken care of as well even though it's going to be working and is more than capable of taking care of itself lol.. im domestic i guess and i really want it to feel secure especially since it's such a big move for it. so while i've been looking at rental properties non stop the last year or so now it's been stressful because i'm not able to actually confirm a place for us yet. best case scenario would be an actual house for us to rent but prices are pretty high and with the projected income plan right now i think the best choice is to find an apartment complex to live in for maybe our first year or so in the new area while we both get established and go from there.

the relief that comes with leaving the military is huge but it's also been kind of a surprisingly sad process... it feels like it was just yesterday i was leaving texas for basic training and i really had 0 idea what i was getting myself into. i had initially planned on going into another branch. but things were taking too long and after it was looking like i wasn't going to have a place to live much longer i sort of just went for it and talked to the army recruiter. i was gone within the next few months. tbh i didnt do a lot of research onto what the army would be like because id sort of exhausted myself looking into information about the other branch i was considering. just knew that it was a little more difficult PT standard wise and that the basic training was harder. you can imagine my surprise the first time they threw a 45 lb ruck onto my 87 lb self and told me to giddy yup for 10 miles.

let me just say that no, i dont actively encourage anyone to go out and enlist. im pretty vocal about people doing their own research and deciding things for themselves and i don't want to say my Exact thoughts just yet(staytuned). but i also think people in the online sphere are immensely sheltered and don't understand why people choose to join. ppl often joke about how they'll work at mcdonalds or be homeless before going to enlist and that's right there what tells me that the person has never worked a food job or ever had to worry about homelessness in their entire lives. i think ill have to wait a little to write more on this topic. my point is that ppl see people who enlist in the military as conservative imperialists or white supremacists and yeah of course there are ppl like that in there. there's ppl like that tht work at your local walmart too. the vast majority of the people that i met in the military were people who came from hard times and just want to provide for their family. i had friendships compromised over my choice to enlist despite them KNOWING the reason why i enlisted was to get out of my terrible home life. i come from a christian fundamentalist homeschooling family there wasn't much choice in where i coudd go so i really had to just kind of take it by the horns and make my own choice. but its not up to me to make other ppl understand its on other people to learn shit like basic empathy and 3-dimensional thinking.

WTF is going on in the south!! i'm shocked by this weather. but not in a bad way at all its been so peaceful and calm in the evenings everyone has their AC units shut off and you can hear the wind again. its amazing i haven't had mine on in weeks now and my electric bill is gonna be next to nothing this month. recently on my walks ill take little detours to go off the path and sit in the woods and look at the lichen and moss and really just soak it in. i heavily believe that while every bit of nature is magic in its own way there are just some areas on earth that hold some type of greater significance or power almost- im not really sure what it is but you can definitely feel it and this area where i live is one of those places. theres just something about it and i think that's what makes the sudden development here so much sadder. i try to get out and enjoy it as much as i can while i still live here because eventually i'm going to take my last walk down my regular route... its kind of sad when i think of it that way but its just how life goes and this is how its supposed 2 be. it would be more sad to stay here forever.

moving to the mountains will be super exciting i grew up in the Swamp and the only time i'd ever see mountains is going to the cabin my grandpa built up in tennessee. id only been there a few times but i do still remember what it looked like and the surrounding areas. it was built right on a little ledge overlooking quite a few acres of woodland and there was a swimming hole not far from there. all types of deer and turkey and other animals would come up and my brother and dad would go shooting right out on the porch, which as a little autistic kid who was scared of loud noises stressed me tf out haha i remember id go lay under a blanket and cover my ears. my grandpa sold it years and years ago (2010 i think) to buy a "beach house" instead, a 2 or 3 bedroom house that was right up against a waterway that was more of a ditch than anything else. i dont think he wanted to sell the cabin, i think it was my grandma that influenced him to do it. no clue what happened to the nasty old "beach house" but i think they sold it long ago too.

i'll be in the blue ridge instead of the smokies, but it's still in the same-ish area of the world that the little cabin was in. tbh i don't think it'll ever get old =] when i went to tour the school i'll be (hopefully) attending i was so amazed by the views!! the girl who was taking me around was telling me about how the clouds will come through and how pretty it is, i cant wait to see it. there was a few months where i was really feeling stressed about everything and like i was somehow doomed and going to end up broke and homeless but doing some thinking and Reasoning with myself i realize that it's gonna be okay and me and my BF are gonna be safe and secure... the cats too.. thats the most important part. i'm legit so pumped to decorate and do some domestic shit with it yall idk i'm a little timid to say it in case i jinx myself but i think....... things r looking up maybe....

ok well i guess that's all i got for now. nothing interesting really happened this week aside from getting good news and chipping away at all the stuff that needs to get done. Peace out bros