Where I am right now

I guess it would be a good idea to talk about where and how I am right now.  It's been around ten years since I wrote the material that were originally published on positivelite.com.  Since then, I was hired in a really reputable company in Jul of 2014 to apply customer payments to their accounts.  In the accounting world, those folks are called Cash Applicators.  I believe my starting salary was $39k.  I remember how excited I was, posting on social media that it'll change everything for me.  And it did.  It was the most money I've ever made at that point.  A year later, I bought a house with my parents and sister in the North York neighbourhood of Toronto.  I was so excited that I slept at the house on the night that we closed the deal and I got the keys from the realtor.  I slept on the floor of the living room, haha.

A year later was when I wrote my third contribution to positvelite.com, about my thoughts on the 2016 Pride parade.  I befriended a really nice person at my job, who was responsible for the general accounting of the firm.  She inspired me to restart pursuing my accounting designation dream.  I applied, and got accepted at the B.Com program at Laurentian University, hoping to fulfill the undergraduate requirement of the CGA program.  It was around that time that the three main accounting designations in Canada amalgamated together to form the CPA professional designation program.  This meant that I had to transition from a CGA student to a CPA candidate.  The transition was mostly painless.

In retrospect, I would say that the 2016 Pride parade definitely radicalized me.  I immediately started following and getting connected with social justice activists all over the world.  It was through them that I learned about the NoDAPL movement in North Dakota.  When I learned that there was going to be a rally being organized around Nov of 2016 in Toronto, I messaged one of the organizers to ask if I can help.  They invited me to attend an organizing meeting being held at the Aboriginal Legal Services on Yonge Street.  That's where I met P and P, two Aboriginal women who, that night, asked me if I could help organize the donations and volunteers for the rally.  There were thousands of people who attended the rally (see a video here).

After the rally, P and P kept in touch with me, and they both eventually invited me on Jan 2017 to come on board and join them on their project to bring the first Healing Lodge for Indigenous women in Ontario who come into contact with the colonial justice system.  I worked with them as a volunteer board director, where I managed their donations and assisted them in getting their charitable status.  I was with them for about a year before I met M, my now husband, through Scruff.  My love for M is a subject of more blogs to come, but let me just say that I love this person very much.  I didn't know it was possible, but my affection for him has only grown as the years go by.  He and I have had challenges, and we've definitely both needed to work on our communication skills.  But, thankfully, after a lot of hard work, he and I are in a good place right now.

I eventually left my work with the Healing Lodge, but only to pursue volunteering for organizations that's closer to home: filipino-centred non-profits and charities based in the GTA.  I also left my employment with the firm that hired me back in 2014, and eventually found gainful employment with a Canadian firm that's been in existence for around 130 years, working as their corporate accountant, with a focus on organizational cash, taxes, and capital asset management.  I eventually graduated from my B.Com program, which I then traded for an MBA at the same institution.  I'm in the final stages of my CPA designation, but I'm facing some challenges clearing the final hurdle: passing the Common Final Exam (CFE).

I am now on a really good HIV med called Biktarvy.  I'm also still taking Risperidone to manage my over-active mind, and also taking Trazadone to help me sleep.  I go to the gym quite regularly, and also have sex quite regularly, both with M and with my other buddies.  It's always fun to wfh because M and I would do the deed at around lunchtime, haha.  And I wfh two days a week.  We'll be heading to Singapore together next year to visit his family there.  It'll be nice to be back and spend some quality time with them.  My goal right now is to take Mandarin classes, so that I can better communicate with his family, especially with Mummy and Papa.

My recovery journey is a subject for future blogs.  What I can say is that it's interesting how years and years of experience adds wisdom to the person who's going through it.  And, sometimes, that wisdom is put into good use, and, sometimes, it's deliberately dismissed by none other than yours truly.  That's not to say that there's no more for me to learn.  Because, I think I haven't even scratched the surface of what I can learn, not just about my recovery journey, but life, in general.  My relationship with crystal has definitely changed over the years, and I'm hoping that I can explore that relationship in a deeper manner through this blog.

All this to say that, having just turned 43 years old this past Oct 15th, I'm just getting started.  But, before I go further, it's important for me to look back.  To this end, I will be posting a series of vlogs that I made between 2013 and 2015.  I had kept them private and never showed to anyone, except M.  He watched them very early on in our relationship.  I will have to figure out how to edit the videos to cut out names that I mention.

Thank you for reading this far.  This blog may well be chaotic and messy, but I hope that it can help me make sense of the world around me.  I will approach this blog with lots of curiosity and openness.