I am NOT moving back to Ohio...

... But I didn't go back to California.

At moments like this I wish I had never started this stupid blog. Honestly sharing my current feelings and happenings quite frankly sucks. A few years ago when I was keeping up appearances on a less candid blog, I probably would have written this:

Luckily some bonus funds are covering the final few months of my current lease in California which gives me the opportunity to stay in Ohio a little while longer, guilt free! Since the New Year we've had a few prospective buyers come through our house, as opposed to the pathetic one in the six weeks prior. It just makes sense for me to be here now to help with showings. I was very unhappy by myself, so I'm excited to be actively helping to do what it takes to get my partner to LA with me! My return to California is indefinite, but always just a cheap one way ticket away.

In other exciting news, I received submission guidelines for sending an audition video to QVC! I need to record myself selling two different items, three minutes each! I've been watching QVC and trying to decide what to faux sell.

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Okay, so that is what's going on, but not at all an honest assessment. I do have a good reason to still be here, but had I wanted to go back to LA, I would have. I feel like such a loser; even though I was incredibly depressed in Cali by myself, I feel like I should be persevering anyway. Oh, and as for "guilt free," that's total bullshit. Even if the apartment is being covered by "bonus money," I still feel like I'm wasteful for not being there.

I have some great friends who have been incredibly supportive; I only wish I could be as nonjudgmental of myself. Deciding whether or not to depart on the 20th was agonizing.; the pros and cons of staying a bit longer or going back were uselessly even. My biggest fear is that people will think I've given up already. A week has gone by and I'm still conflicted, but I am sure I will be going back to LA in the near future. After all, my car, almost all my clothes and other things are still there. As for my jobs, I'm a seasonal employee at Universal, so I haven't been on the schedule since Christmas, making this is a good time to not be there. My paperwork isn't complete for the Observatory; hopefully they'll still be interested in finalizing it when I do return.

So there it is...

I'll try to blog more, but it's hard to do when I'm feeling like shit about myself and don't have much to write about.

Paralyzed

As I sit here on my sofa, I feel like the gravity of the universe is pushing me down; a laundry list of things to do is swirling around my head, but I can't move: box up your college binders, go fill the bird feeders, grab one last coffee with so-and-so, make supper and take it to your guy who's at work till 9 p.m., clean out the loaner car and worst of all... go pack your suitcase.

My original departure date was the 6th; as soon as New Years hit I became very aware of it and extremely emotional. We moved it to the 20th, tomorrow, and thankfully I've been able to enjoy the past two weeks. "The 20th" did not loom ominously like the 6th had, but now that it's here I literally feel like I'm going to vomit. The idea of getting on a plane tomorrow afternoon seems bizarre and absurd, as if the life I'd led from last April to November was just a dream.

In the interest of thinking positive, the submission site I belong to has been sending me several emails a day with projects that match my profile, so it looks like there will be a lot of things to submit for, from which I'll hopefully be busy with auditions. I've also promised myself I'm going to be less of a hermit. I know three fellow Ohio women out there that I never met with in my first seven months, not to mention some other distant family, old acquaintances and new friends that I hadn't made the effort to reach out to like I should have.

On the other hand, my presence here would be more helpful now, in terms of selling the house. There was only one house showing in December, but already three in the past two weeks. I know my partner can keep the house neat and clean, since he's never here to mess it up, but removing the animals is a huge pain in the ass for him. The uncertainty of this coming year causes me a headache at its very mention; there's no way to know when the house will sell or what kind of project I'll land.

In the industry I've chosen I can never think anything is stable, nor can I write anything off - two days ago I got the same message from QVC, again asking where I was located. I don't know if they misfiled or simply never received my first reply, but I again sited dual residency and expressed my interest.

So, that's the latest. I suppose once I'm back in LA I'll have more to blog about here again and I'll try not to be such a downer all the time.

At least the dog enjoyed the hour in the car...

Instead of looking out my window, it seems as though I'm looking into a snow globe today; the flurries are absolutely beautiful! There's at least five inches of snow lining the top of the split-rail fence around my back yard, the thick tree branches and atop my bird feeders. It looks like icing piped on a ginger bread land. Though we're in a subdivision with neighbors on each side, there is a nature conservatory right behind us, which means a thinly wooded area that is green in the summer and sparkles with snow and ice in the winter.

Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? You'd want to buy it, right? Yeah, well, the process of selling has me livid right now!

I cleaned for a considerable amount of time yesterday for a showing this afternoon. I awoke to do some finishing touches, which instead turns into a mad frenzy, as I race against the clock. I loaded our Great Dane and cat into my loaner car and parked on the street a few houses down. The roads are bad so I didn't want to drive anywhere, not that there are many places to go in the winter with two animals... Plus I think it's fun to get a glimpse of the prospective buyers and also be able to go right back home as soon as they leave.

So we waited, and waited, and waited, then drove around the block a few times to get out of the way of the snow plow, then waited some more. You know where I'm going with this... NOWHERE! No one came. Again, the roads aren't great, but the fucking phone lines are still working! At least the dog enjoyed the hour in the car...

I'm left wondering how people can be so inconsiderate. There's a high likelihood that buyers for this house are already homeowners, therefore I would think they have sold or are trying to sell their own home and would understand how difficult and frustrating it is.

With the hassle of getting the house ready for each showing, I also feel like maybe we're not tidy enough on a daily basis... We are neat and clean people and the house has been "decluttered," as they would say on an HGTV show, but there are still a million things to do each time. My beau reassured me, when it comes to showing a house, "it's different." You simply must vacuum every room right before. I'm sure some of you germ-a-phobs sweep daily, but every room? Every personal item from every surface must be cleared away. Dog pillows from three rooms have to be tucked away and kitty liter boxes have to be removed completely. I try to have the dishwasher emptied and toss the current dish towel into the empty washing machine; I hide the hand soap from the kitchen sink, as to not reveal that the built in pump doesn't work. The plastic container of mixed nuts that my guy keeps on his nightstand as a midnight snack gets demoted to his sock drawer and the rug in our bedroom has to be rolled up and put in the corner of a closet so its frayed corners from a teething puppy aren't a distraction. The open music books on the piano have to go and the guitar cases and kareoke machine have been packed up. The tray by the backdoor for keys, change and other miscellaneous items found in ones pockets at the end of a day is jammed in a cupboard as well as the mail basket and every trash can must be emptied.

I know it sounds like stupid, easy, tedious stuff, but everywhere I look there's something on that level and it takes forever! Loading the animals and animal stuff into the car takes three trips; I was in a hurry and my snowy shoes accidentally tracked muddy water onto the freshly cleaned floors. The clock was ticking, I was sweating like a pig from scurrying around and I wanted to scream!

Even after all that, I'll readily admit we have come to like the streamlined look of our home, but it's not realistic. Again I'll say, I have no idea how people with kids do it! My parents visited right after a showing last week and I proudly asked, "isn't this the best our house has ever looked?!" My mom quickly responded, "No! It has no personality... It looks so empty. Where are all your pictures?"

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My guy just called - apparently their agent left a message at our agents office, which was closed. They didn't have his cell number? Really? It's been rescheduled for Tuesday; until then, I'm not touching anything!

New Year - Same Stress

Sorry folks, I've been spending my time on my other subject-specific blog, as opposed to this one where I usually have to tackle plans and feelings and difficult things. We all know it just easier to bottle it up, but it all comes out eventually.

Even before the champagne was popped open on New Years Eve, my emotions were bubbling over. But I really don't feel like getting into it, so here are the cliff notes...

The holidays were great. I survived hosting my guy's family and always enjoy being around my own. After my rant about Universal, they did schedule to the bottom of the list last week and I missed two shifts, which is not too awful in terms of attendance points.

One of the benefits of being home was supposed to be that I could easily remove our animals when the house was being shown. If only our shitty agent would actually get us some showings!!! We finally got one this past Friday and then the couple brought their parents to see the house Sunday. The agent said they looked at six houses Sunday and we're now in their top three, even though the parents "totally picked the place apart." I'm excited about the possibility, but my guy is really sick of the process. Our house has been in the top three before and he's not getting excited about anything until there's actually an offer.

I can't begin to share how difficult and frustrating it is to prepare and maintain a large house for showing, I don't know how people with kids do it! It's also nauseating that our home has actually depreciated despite our good neighborhood and upgrades. I get so angry when I watch shows on HGTV that feature nothing but appreciation - not here! Worst of all, if it doesn't sell soon, I fear I'll still be alone in LA when my lease is up at the end of April and I won't know what living situation to get into next.

On a lighter note, yes that was me on national TV this weekend. "Gameshow in my Head," a new show I was a paid audience member for several months ago finally aired. I DVRed two episodes, even though I didn't recognize their summaries. Indeed, when I went back and watched them they were not the episodes I was there for, however I was featured in reaction shots. Ah the magic of editing! It'll be interesting to see if I'm in the episodes that I actually was there for! I specifically remember one of the contestants was a college basketball player from Ohio and the other was a middle-aged woman who had to pretend to be a psych ward escapee.

As for my whereabouts, I'm still in Ohio and frankly don't want to go back to LA. It's not that I don't want to continue pursuing my career, it's that after being in my home with my family and friends, I don't want to go back to the pathetic excuse of a life that I have in LA. I don't know if this makes sense outside my head, but I feel like I've done as much as I can do until I'm truely settled in California with my guy. Happiness directly impacts our health and success; I know life will always have its challenges but being apart is too stressful and lonily for either of us to be at our best.

So yes, I am going back to LA but the flight that was originally scheduled for tomorrow has been pushed back a little bit.