meg smitherman

I’ve been posting about it on twitter and insta for weeks, mainly to vent and just get the thoughts out, so what better way to do so than blogging. I’ve been dealing with some pretty debilitating neck pain, migraines, and resulting nausea for the last couple of weeks. On Monday I finally went into my chiropractor for a full work-up and x-ray, and it turns out my neck is severely out of whack. My neck has basically become a straight angled line instead of a healthy curve, and as a result, some of the vertebrae are too close to each other and impinging on arteries/nerves and causing stomach issues and migraines. Fun!

It was a relief to find out that I’m not dying of a mysterious neurological disease, but along with learning the problem comes a whole lot of treatment. I’m going to be getting chiropractic care for the rest of the year (multiple times a week), plus weekly physical therapy, plus the daily use of a cervical traction device at home. No idea what that is? Me neither until yesterday! It’s like waist training but for your neck, gradually stretching it every day until it curves correctly. Fucking bizarre.

Other than the exorbitant cost (thank you, shitty work insurance for covering basically none of my treatment), I’m feeling really overwhelmed by the whole thing. Not only am I still having a hard time functioning because of my neck, I’m now gearing up for a 2021 full of medical treatment.

It sucks, it really sucks and I’m mad about it!

Today I was feeling a lot better in the morning, but as the day wears on I’m getting more and more uncomfortable with holding up my head. And I know it will be a long worthwhile process, but the idea of being only partly functional for another few weeks is getting to me. I had a long desperate cry yesterday because I’ve just not been able to live my life at all lately, and I hate that Adam has to take care of me, and I hate that I’ve not been as present for him as I should be due to the pain.

And on top of everything I have to work, which is literally the reason my neck pain was so exacerbated in the first place. I’m having a hard time not feeling deeply resentful, wishing I could just quit and write books and not sit at a stupid computer all day, straining my neck.

“But Meg if you wrote books all day you’d also be at a computer.” I mean yeah, but I wouldn’t be tied to it, and I could lie on the couch if I needed to. I could take it at my own pace and not feel beholden to anyone. But obviously that’s what we all want, and it’s silly to wish for things I’ll never have.

I’m just feeling pretty defeated lately, despite the fact that there’s a treatment plan in place and positive results already. Once I start feeling better I’m sure I’ll perk up, but in the meantime it’s 3:05 pm and I feel ready to lie down with a heating pad and cry.

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I’ve been “experimenting” with press-on nails, if you can call it that. I used to be a gel mani addict through and through, but panini put a wrench in that. So I got creative with my nails, and like why not? For $14 you can get a set of reusable nails and I say that’s a bargain!

Plus, I really like the long nail aesthetic — it feels luxurious to me. Oh, you want me to perform manual labor? You want me to use my hands? Sorry, can’t. My delicate digits must remain coddled at this time.

The thing I didn’t quite prepare for was the complete inability to type. I’m writing this now on my phone because the keyboard is almost inaccessible to me with these claws.

Adam says it’ll be like acquiring a new skill, typing with the flats of my fingers. Flapping my fingers against the keyboard like duck feet, hoping I hit the right series of letters. Anyone who has mastered this skill is an olympian of the hands. Physical prowess beyond measure. God-like achievement in a mortal form.

It’s worth the struggle, though. Cuz I feel like a bad bitch and we all deserve to feel like a bad bitch.

I know we all say it constantly on Twitter, but can something be done about capitalism? Man. It’s wild to me that we as a society are expected to have emotional investment in our jobs beyond “I feel good that I will receive a paycheck from this.”

Who said we’re supposed to love our jobs? Who decided a dream job was a thing? None of us would be at our jobs if it wasn’t necessary in order to live. We’d be vibing. Or we’d be doing something worthwhile, like exploring the galaxy and eating calorie-free chocolate sundaes on the Enterprise.

When someone mistakenly assumes that I care about and have deep opinions about my work? Or even ideas about how to improve the work itself? Who do you think you’re speaking to? As if I spend my time at work thinking anything other than “here’s what I have to do, and now I will do it, and then I will sign off and forget this place exists.”

Disclaimer, my job right now is fine (despite the fact that it gave me a literal nervous breakdown last September lol). I’ve had worse jobs, my coworkers are great, and it’s fine. What gets my goat is the culture of work in general, the people who ruin it for the rest of us. Some people love working and think about work on weekends and like, actually really care about it. Please do not confuse me with them. I resent that I must live in a world where those people exist. I’m literally just trying to live my life and be happy, and my job is a footnote in a very small font size.

This isn’t even taking into account the panorama.

I’m struggling to get through each day alive and someone thinks my brain is active? There are two cells in there. Two cells, bonking against each other and pinging off the sides of my skull in an otherwise empty vastness. I have no input. I have no notes. I would not like to speak up in the meeting. I’m on the max dose of SSRIs, Brenda. I haven’t known rest since 2019. I had three headache-free days in 2020. I don’t know the answer to your question.

You know?

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Y’all ever play with instagram filters in a fit of boredom and then realize you look hotter in the filters and have a massive existential crisis?

Yeah me too.

Yesterday I became obsessed with and then immediately full of hatred toward a “little demon” instagram filter that not only gave me adorable demon horns, but it enhanced my lips, gave me blush and freckles, and eliminated all my old lady (I’m 34 I’m not old) lines. I had a minor breakdown, which for me is quite normal during PMS, and decided I needed to replicate the look with makeup since I couldn’t be a perfectly enhanced little demon in real life.

Imagine growing up as a teen right now in like, the age of social media (or whatever crotchety millennials and elders want to call it). In my mind there are two sides of the coin: one side, you are constantly comparing yourself to the people you see on social media, the instagram filters, the influencers, your classmates and friends, all presenting only their hottest and most perfect selves online. But on the other side, you have access to beauty tutorials, a growing body positivity movement, and way more progressive ideas online than I was ever exposed to as a teen.

When I was in high school, I didn’t think once about hating my body or wanting to wear makeup. But I also looked like complete shit. So it’s really, to keep the coin metaphor going, a toss-up.

All this to say, I don’t know how we’re supposed to feel good about ourselves on a daily basis (or even weekly basis?) with the internet the way it is. But at least, thank god, we have TikTok makeup tutorials.

My attempt at self care today has been to try a new look with my makeup, and amazingly enough, it actually made me feel prettier. Maybe not little demon pretty, but pretty enough that I like what I see when I look in the mirror. That in itself is a huge accomplishment these days.

Makeup-wise, I just ramped up my blush a little, put some on my nose (it’s the trend and I love it), and tried a new highlighter. I don’t usually use highlighter so this is definitely going to become a habit. I also used my setting spray for the first time in a year, and honestly why the hell wasn’t I using it throughout 2020? It’s a NYX dewy finish spray and it’s a game changer honestly. I look like a living human being and not a faded wrinkled photograph from the 70s.

On this, the day of my first vaccine dose, I’m feeling a lot of things. Mostly gratitude, but also awe. I’m so incredibly impressed by the unending labor that went into making these vaccines. And in under a year! Science is basically magic to me.

I was thinking about this TikTok I watched last night where a guy explained how the vaccine works, acting out each of the players: mRNA, immune system, antibodies, etc. It was goofy and entertaining, but it also made me unexpectedly emotional. It was definitely partly due to the background music of “Sunshine (Adagio in D Minor),” which will move anyone to tears on its own, but it was more than that. I mean, the things our bodies can do? Unbelievable. Surprisingly enough, I’ve never sat down and deeply contemplated how vaccines work, but it turns out they’re really fucking amazing (I know, I’m late to the party). Not only can our bodies learn to defend themselves from specific attackers, but human scientists actually figure out how to trigger that learning process in our immune systems. What?? How did anyone come up with this? How do they even make it happen once they know what they’re doing? Blows my mind.

My own mother is a career scientist, one of the smartest people I know, and also one of the most compassionate and awesome humans on the planet. Whenever she tries to explain her job to me, my eyes glaze over and my brain smooths to pudding consistency. The fact that she understands this stuff is beyond impressive to me. And something I really admire about my mom is that science is spiritual for her, in a way. I remember she once told me that the more she learned about how the human body works, down to each individual cell, these microscopic yet deeply complex systems that labor ceaselessly to keep us alive, the more she believed in God.

I think most scientific-minded people would turn up their noses at that, or argue that believing in science and believing in God are unreconcilable. I don’t believe in God in the Christian sense. But I do believe there’s more to the world than we see. And I understand what my mom means — there are so many perfect systems in nature, so many incredible, beautiful things that happen without any outside influence. Am I saying I don’t believe in evolution etc.? No, obviously. But when I think about our planet in the context of the infinite universe, all the life teeming here. Sunsets. Whales and shit. Human love. I have to believe in magic, just a little bit.

What does all of this have to do with vaccines? Not a lot. I’m just very moved by the progress scientists have made in the past year, to almost a reverent degree. The hard work, endless days, the burn-out they must have experienced and are still experiencing. And the work we’ve all done, both emotionally and physically, to keep our heads above water in the past year. Those of us who are still here, we’re so, so lucky.

We’ll be feeling the effects of this year for the rest of our lives. And maybe it’s weird and new age-y to think like this, but everyone who makes it through this pandemic will be connected by a shared trauma. Not remotely a romantic thought, but it’s meaningful to me: The idea of being connected with people I’ve never met, having gone through something unimaginable with everyone else on the planet. It gives me a strange sense of comfort.

I have a bullet journal that I no longer use.

I used to use it religiously. Every Sunday I’d sit down and make my calendar for the week, jotting down goals and daily tasks and appointments. It was soothing, organizing the minutiae of my life, page by tangible page. I could look back through the weeks and see what I’d accomplished, what I still wanted to do. I felt control over things that had felt overwhelming before. At the time, it was good for me.

Recently, I showed it to Adam and explained how it worked, how it had eased my anxiety and organized my life. I showed him the hockey games I’d attended, the writing goals I’d set and met, the online Diablo dates and flights to Missoula. I showed him where it began to taper off, the to do lists growing intermittent, black pen replacing the carefully placed washi tape and perfectly spaced lettering to mark each new day on the page.

And then I stopped altogether, not halfway through the journal.

“I guess I just got lazy,” I said, feeling self-consciously like my abandonment of the bullet journal might reflect negatively on me, like I’d been irresponsible. Like I’d shirked my duties as a good, professional, organized thirty-something.

“Maybe it means you didn’t need it anymore,” said Adam, overturning my self-critical perception in a few easy words (as per usual). Maybe, he continued, I stopped using the journal because I didn’t need that control anymore. Maybe I stopped because I was too busy living.

He was, of course, right. There are probably many reasons why I stopped using the bullet journal, and maybe one of them is laziness. But before, I’d felt I needed the bujo. That my life would spiral out of control without it, that I’d never stay on top of anything if it wasn’t written down in neat little bullets every day. And then I wrote a book, and fell back in love with my city, and practiced positive self-talk, and began journaling — truly journaling, writing down the little things in life that made me happy and the things I was proud of and the things I liked to do — and I forgot about the bullet journal.

In the many months since the bujo’s abandonment, I’ve been happier than any other time in my adult life. I’m not writing as much since I finished my book, and I’m not reading as much, but I’m going outside more. I’m experiencing the city. And I’m excited to do things! It used to be so hard to get me to leave the house, but I love planning activities for the weekend now. I feel like I’m living my life in a different way than I have in a long time. I’m kinder to myself and others, I’m open to more things, and I’m taking things day by day as much as I can. I fucking love it.

It also helps that I’m in love. But that’s a subject for another post.

I’m sure you’ve noticed that I don’t write here anymore. I think this blog may have gone the way of the bujo — I don’t need it as much as I did. I don’t need to work out these conflicting thoughts on the page. I don’t need to vent my troubles here anymore, because I’m not alone with them anymore.

So farewell to the bujo. It served me well when I needed it. And now, instead of embarrassment at neglecting my organizational tool, I feel grateful. It was right for me at the time, and now I’m living the way that’s right for me now.

Earlier this year, I wrote about the things I wanted to accomplish in 2018, and the person I wanted to become. The latter was most important to me, but tangible goals are great too!

In 2018, I wanted to: 1. Write a book, and 2. Get a hot boyfriend. I succeeded in both of these pursuits, despite some serious doubts on my end. It would be too expected and cliche to say I’m happier than I’ve been in a long long time, but… I’m happier than I’ve been in a long, long time.

First off, what the fuck, I wrote a book! I wrote a whole novel, start to finish, edited and sent out to publishers, in 2018. That in itself is still almost beyond comprehension to me, and I’m the one who sat down every night after work and weekends and during lunch breaks and wrote the damn thing. And I’m so proud of what I wrote. It was a story I’d been thinking about putting to paper for years, so to finally bring it to life was… not a dream come true, but a difficult goal accomplished. I’m so proud, no matter what comes of it.

While we’re talking about dreams coming true, let me direct you to this quote from my 2018 resolutions post:

“I’m going to rely on the love of my friends and family, and I’m gonna do my best to be the truest version of myself for that hot hot boyfriend when he finally bursts through the door of my life, Kramer-style.”

Reader, I did that. Over the course of the last twelve months, I’ve worked consciously and deliberately to shed all of the armor I’d built up over my heart in the years prior. I’ve meditated, read tarot, journaled regularly, and altered my thoughts and behaviors in ways that are kinder and more loving — to myself and others. I’ve worked hard to form a healthier mental relationship with my own writing and creative endeavors. I’ve done everything I can to become the best possible version of Meg. And while there’s always room for growth and work to be done (and there will be every year for the rest of my life), I am so proud of how far I’ve come in 2018.

So when that hot boyfriend burst unexpectedly into my life, I was in a place where I could let my heart be vulnerable. I can’t tell you how happy I am. It’s still very new, and so exciting, but I honestly didn’t know a person could be this happy in a relationship.

I’ve written about my “perfect man” before, briefly in this blog, and at length in my personal journal. But he was always a dream, an unreachable ideal, a lofty goal to hope for but never truly believe in. Not to say that my boyfriend is perfect (no one is, even though I couldn’t come up with any specific flaws about him if you asked), but I truly didn’t think there was someone out there in the world who could fit so easily into my life.

I didn’t think I’d ever find the “funny, cute, shares my interests, gainfully employed, feminist” man I told my dad I was looking for.

But like… I did.

You never know how, or if, things will work out. There’s no possible way to predict what will happen in 2019 and beyond. But I do know that right now, I’m stupidly happy. I’m loving every second of a new relationship, I’m writing, and I like who I am. A lot. 2018 has been a hell of a good year, and I’m ready to dive into the next one with gusto.

Content warning: weight, body image, food, and so on.

(Also, please note that I’m writing purely about my own experiences, and this isn’t meant to reflect anything but my inner thoughts. I’m not trying to get any point across. I just want to unload, as it were.)

I’ve struggled with my body since I was in my early 20s. I know, I was kind of old. When I read articles about girls and body image, it always says that girls begin worrying about weight when they’re young, too young. But I was in my early 20s, a few years into college, and it happened when I gained 40 lbs.

This happened for a few reasons. First, I started taking anti-anxiety medication, which meant that for the first time in my life, I wasn’t sick to my stomach from worry all the time. I actually had an appetite! I was able to eat whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, and no one — not even my anxiety — could stop me. Second, I was happy. I was in a serious, emotionally fulfilling, and comfortable relationship. And we ate together. A lot. I ate the same massive portions as my boyfriend, a 6’3″ 24-year-old with a lightning-fast metabolism. And third, I didn’t know anything about nutrition. My idea of eating “healthy” was like… a bagel and cream cheese. I had no idea what calories or fiber or fat or any of that meant. I just ate what tasted good.

So, unsurprisingly, I gained 40 lbs in the space of probably a year. At one point, I had lost so much weight due to anxiety that I only weighed 90 lbs. Less than two years after that, I weighed 140 lbs. I’m 5’1″, so it was a very significant and very noticeable change. My body didn’t handle it well — I had burst blood vessels all over my thighs, where my weight gain was most substantial, and stretch marks due to the rapid expansion of my skin. My digestion was fucked up, and I no longer knew how to dress my new body.

It was a confusing time for me! Obviously, as I said, I was so happy in my relationship and school and, after I graduated, my job. But I didn’t like how I looked, and I didn’t understand how this change had happened so suddenly.

Finally, at the advice of my mom, I started Weight Watchers. When I set goals I keep them, so I stuck with it, and by the time I went to grad school in London a couple years later, I had lost almost all the weight I’d gained. I liked the way I looked in my clothes again, and I had learned to understand how my body responded to food.

But unlike my body, my mentality never went back to baseline. Up until the time I started gaining weight, I rarely, if ever, looked at my body and disliked what I saw. I just didn’t think about it. It helped that I weighed 100 lbs and had other pressing concerns, like my bad hair or braces or acne or general air of awkward and unapproachable loser. But even after I lost weight, I had become aware of one terrifying fact: I could gain weight. I wasn’t immune. At any moment, I felt, my body could betray me and go back to the way it had been: unfamiliar, uncomfortable, difficult to dress, and — I feel awful just typing this — repulsive, from my warped point of view.

I’ve lost more weight since then. I gain weight easily, because I’m super short with the most sedentary lifestyle possible, so it tends to go up and down. But the most upsetting thing, and the thing that I knew would be true but never really understood, is that no matter how small I get, no matter the fact that the GAP petite size 00 is now too big for me, a day never goes by that I don’t think a negative — if not truly hateful — thought about my body.

I know I am not alone. I know this is something all people experience, especially women. And I feel weird writing about it because I am very small, I’m white, I fit pretty well within traditional Western beauty standards. I know this, and remind myself of this as much as I can. But even knowing all that, it is so incredibly hard to reach a healthy place with my body image.

In the past two years I’ve stopped weighing myself, deleted MyFitnessPal, and stopped counting my calories obsessively. For the most part, I eat when I’m hungry, and only what will sate my hunger — I don’t overeat (unless I go out with the express purpose of doing so, which, let’s face it, is still one of life’s biggest pleasures).

Another important step I’ve made is that, instead of relying on my boyfriend to verify my “hotness,” which I was very guilty of doing when I had one, now I’m doing my best to tell myself I’m hot. Whenever I catch myself starting to spiral into a dark place of self-loathing, I consciously have to decide to make positive statements about myself instead. I remind myself that there’s no point to hating the way I look. Literally none whatsoever. If I want to watch what I eat, fine, but beating myself up will only result in misery. So I do my best to say kind things to myself, focus on the parts of myself that I love — both physical and otherwise — and move on with my day.

For the most part, teaching myself to be kind and loving to myself is getting easier. I’m starting to believe myself more and more when I say loving things, and to catch myself when I say hateful things. I refuse to say things to myself that I would never say to a loved one. If there’s one person in life who I should love and care for above all others, it’s me. So why say cruel words when I could say kind ones?

It’s been a long and difficult journey. And I’m writing about it now because I just put on a pair of shorts that fit me last year, and which I’ve now discovered just barely fit over my ass. I started to have a breakdown, thinking I was hideous, that I had to throw away all my clothes, that I was a deformed freak. Like, what the fuck? Just insane, irrational, ridiculous thoughts. But before I could truly spiral out of control, I paused and thought: why have I gained weight? What contributed to my thighs getting just a little doughier, my stomach having slightly deeper folds when I sit down?

Here’s what happened in the past year. I got my wisdom teeth removed, which caused me to have a massive outbreak of hives due to the anesthesia and narcotic medications I was taking. The steroids I took to treat the hives caused a bit of weight gain; that’s just the way they work. After the hives cleared up and I could eat solid foods again, and I was overcome with this renewed appreciation for the world after spending almost three weeks bedridden and in so much pain I could barely function. So I went out to eat a lot, I enjoyed food a lot, and it made me happy. I didn’t limit myself, because I wanted to enjoy life. And then I got a promotion at work, I have a little more money, and I like to spend money on eating out at foodie restaurants with my bestie; it’s one of my favorite things to do in life. So yeah, after all that, I gained some weight. But all of those things were either unavoidable, or truly positive.

Would I take back any of the incredible, delicious meals I’ve eaten this year? Absolutely not. Would I take back even the traumatic experience with the hives? No, I don’t think I would. It was an experience that I think directly led me to write an entire novel in two months in the direct aftermath. That experience gave me what felt, at the time, like a new lease on life. So no, I wouldn’t change any of these things.

So why should I hate the changes in my body that reflect these important experiences? Why should I hate that my thighs won’t fit in these stupid shorts? The reason they won’t fit is because I’ve eaten good food, spent time with good friends, and gone through some shit that I wouldn’t take back, even if I could.

Do I have a totally healthy body image? No. Does anyone? Probably not. I don’t think I’ll ever 100% love my body, or go a full day without a critical thought about my body flitting through my head. But I realized today that it’s a long journey, one which I may never reach the end of, and I’ve already come such a long way. I’m really proud of that. All I can do is keep at it.

And here’s a reminder to myself, to you, to anyone: be nice to yourself. As much as you can. Even if it’s just once a day, for 30 seconds. Say kind things to yourself. It’s wild how much of a difference it makes.

I’ve been thinking a lot about what book I want to write next. If this were a world where I wasn’t averse to throwing caution to the wind and writing whatever the hell I wanted with no regard for my future career as a novelist, I’d write a sequel to the book I wrote earlier this year. I’m not ready to say goodbye to these characters, and there are so many stories I could tell in the world I made for them.

Buuut if my book doesn’t sell, I want to have the next project in the works already. Something to live for, if I’m being dramatic about it, which I always am. A sequel, if I start writing one, will die on the vine if book one isn’t a success. So I’m keeping those stories in the back of my mind, percolating, until they’re needed.

In the meantime, I’ve written bits of other things. I outlined a complete YA fantasy rom com and wrote 11k words of it before… well, I got bored with it. I was going to say it wasn’t “speaking to me” or that it wasn’t the genre I wanted to write at this point in my life, in an effort to make myself sound less wishy-washy, but I honestly just got bored. I figure that’s a luxury I have now, while I’m unpublished and free to dick around with book ideas until one sticks, so I’m allowing myself to drop projects after 11k words and move on. No deadlines and no expectations? A good thing!

The thing is, I have a lot of ideas but nothing is grabbing me, needing to be written. I think the most promising option right now is to write something in the world of my book, but with different characters and planets and conflicts. A spinoff, a distant prequel, something?? But I just don’t know. There are things I love to read and things I’m good at writing, and I’m learning that those things don’t necessarily intersect. Nor should they, I guess. I love writing light-hearted action-packed romantic comedies in space, so… I’m thinking maybe that’s what I should keep writing.

Part of me thinks I should branch out or change it up, just to keep from getting stuck in a rut, but… why? As I said before, it’s not like I have deadlines. Nobody expects anything from me, not yet.

Then why do I feel so stuck? How have I not come up with the plot of my next book yet?

Oh my god how do people come up with ideas!!??? !!1??

Hhhhhhow.

Guys, how!!

Anyway I’ve started having an existential crisis, so I guess it’s time to go to bed. This was a pointless post. Bye.

Lately I’ve been feeling really sad about the fact that I can’t afford to rent my own place in LA and still be reasonably close to work. It got to the point where I’d get home from work every night and spend hours on Craigslist, getting more and more depressed as I scrolled through the apartments I couldn’t afford, or the shit-holes I could maybe afford, but only if I stretched my budget. I had dug myself pretty deep into a self-pity pit, doing nothing but complain about how much I hated my living situation, how depressed I was that I couldn’t afford to live alone.

On the full moon, I did a tarot reading that essentially told me I needed to shut the fuck up, stop feeling sorry for myself, and actually make an effort. Go out there and do shit! And since I’m stubborn but not that stubborn, I did just that.

With this newfound optimism and gung-ho attitude, it occurred to me that I really don’t have it that bad. My rent is reasonable for my area. I have my own bathroom, utilities are included in rent (I can run my AC all day and don’t have to pay extra?? Honestly a sick deal), we have a washer/dryer, I very rarely even see my roommates, and my drive to and from work is never longer than 30 minutes. For this city, that’s a lot of pros to check off on the ol’ pro/con list. Yeah, I wish I wasn’t 32 and living with roommates, but I could be a lot worse off.

And the thing is, my room is massive. It’s the master suite, and I swear it’s like the size of a 2 bedroom in Manhattan. But I wasn’t using any of it. I was just spending all my time sitting on the bed, or in the bed. I’d eat my dinner in bed, write in bed, watch TV in bed, play video games, everything in bed. There was a desk in the room, but I didn’t ever use it. Most of my room was just empty floor space.

So when I was veering toward “woe is me” about my living situation one night, I realized… I could do something with this! I have so much room at my command. I could probably even fit a couch in here. I could have a little sitting/TV area, and a separate bed area. And if I put in a slight modicum of effort, I could actually get another bookshelf and not just pile books on the floor like a feral beast. I could turn my big stupid useless depressing room into… a makeshift studio apartment!

So I took full advantage of Target’s Labor Day sale and got to work. I spent an entire morning and most of the afternoon rearranging, cleaning, assembling furniture, and shelving books… and I can’t even express how happy I am with the results.

This is mostly stuff I already owned — I only just bought the couch and a bookshelf — but I’ll be getting some side tables and an ottoman for the couch soon!

All of a sudden, my bedroom is a tiny studio! It feels like a real home. All I had to do was move some shit around and shove a couch in here, and voila! The coziest it’s ever been. I can’t get over how happy I am about this. I was so low about my living situation, and now I feel a million times better. I’m renewed and refreshed.

Let this be a lesson to me: stop feeling sorry for yourself, Meg, and make the best of what you have. There are often solutions I don’t see at first because they seem too simple, but in this case, a compromise was exactly what I needed.