KSena's Journal

Sometimes... sometimes you need to take a bit of a step back, right? I did that the other day on social media. On LJ and DW I've done several clean ups, so it wasn't needed here. But on Twitter and Instagram, it was getting a bit ridiculous. I was following way to many accounts/people, so I had to do a serious clean up.

I mean, online stuff and social media should be for fun, right? Well, combined with the stress of work and everything else, it just added to the stress. So hence the clean up.

Work is really stressful at the end of the school term. Last day of school is on the 15th of June next week. And this whole month or a bit more actually, has been SO hectic with everything that I need to do with the kids and teens at the school. Classes I need to hold and information I need to spread. I have made it, if just, but I did. I am getting WAY way better at planning than I was when I started this work. And I feel more confidant in my role as a school librarian to, which I think has a thing to do with it to. I dare more to demand things and push more for activities I need to do. You know?

It helps, of course, that I've been allowed to go to TWO educations on the University here that my employment payed for. And it was during working hours (sort of), so that was cool!

At home it's been a bit much to, so this term I have gone down to work 7 hours a day instead of 8. It has done WONDERS for both me and Alexandra to be honest. It's just one hour a day, so it doesn't effect my paycheck that much, but it does make sure I feel less stressed and less guilty each day. :-) Win-win!

Also, it's that time of year to. The dreaded Midsummer time.

For those that have been around a while, I dread Midsummer each year. Last time I was so down I am sure I showed quite a few signs of depression.

My beloved Mr P, or Peting, has a friend who USED TO BE his best friend that he goes to visit during Midsummer each year. To him and his friend Midsummer is no big deal. It's just a few days extra off work and a reason to have a small party. So that's what they've been doing ever since I got to know them. Even after he got married and moved 8 hours away from here.

His wife was... special to say the least. I don't use the word lightly, but hysteric is a word that would actually fit her. I've visited there a few times. Last time was when Alexandra was a year. I was not doing good during that visit, let me tell you. Even worse than last year. After that, Mr P went all by himself.

But that meant, he wasn't with us. No big deal, to him. But big deal to me. Because when I grew up Midsummer was a family thing. My aunt has always and still do have this HUGE Midsummer Party the day before Midsummer Eve. Where ALL of my huge crazy extended family go to. These days were about 25-30 people there. (Including spouses and kids.) And when I grew up on Midsummer Eve, we had a smaller gathering at home. And on Midsummer Day the family went to a traditional feast area to dance and hang out.

All family things. Mr P didn't do anything like that, and I guess is not used to it. But him not being with us has effected Midsummer badly for me.

This year though, his friend, who really hasn't acted like a friend ever since he got married to that woman all those years ago, hasn't talked to him all this year. Last year I think he called twice. On his own birthday and then once more to invite Mr P to come for Midsummer. This year he did neither. Probably since he's gotten divorced and has no area to be at for any Midsummer party.

I'm sad for Mr P, he has last what he thought was his best friend. I can't help but feel happy though, because that means he'll be spending time with us. And I need that, I think. I need that very much.

We've been together since 2003 now. And sure, we've had our ups and downs. None of us are perfect. But dammit, he is mine and I am his. And want to be with him and kiddo when there's holidays and shit.

*sigh*

I guess some of the Midsummer blues has set in. :-P Even if I do look forward to it to. I'll get to visit mom, spend some really good time with her, and I do svery much look forward to that. She has retired now, 65 years old, and has taken on the project of clearing out stuff from her house. I'm actually curious to so what she's done!

Anyhow. Over and out! We'll see when I poke my head in here again. :-) Hopefully it won't take quite as long until next time. I do feel better after writing this!

This entry is cross posted between LJ and DW. Comment where you are comfortable.

I am home sick today. Ugh. Every time I get sick, in having a cold, it effects my throat. Everytime. I sound like shit (if you follow me on Instagram/Snapchat you've heard my horrible voice.) It started on Sunday when we were at my cousin and mom. And then it just got worse and worse... :-P Monday and yesterday was really really bad. I was really short of breath and it... "whistled"... when I was breathing? And it was hard to breath. Not to the point I felt a need to go to the ER, but it was still not very fun. And I was coughing. SO MUCH! So now my ribs ache. :-P And I had a fever. Because why not. It's a good thing the kids/teens are off school this week what with Easter, or I would have felt horribly guilty as well. Bah. But as it is, no school this week so I can be at home and get well in peace.

Yesterday though I'd taken a day off and had planned to go shopping with Alexandra. And we did! But man, my breathing was so bad when we came home I had to sit down and focus on my breathing for a moment when we came home. After that though, I've just taken it easy. Taking care of me. I know I'm bad at that. But I get when I'm beaten by germ. *raises fist at fucking germs*

Anyway, since I'm home anyway, I'll just finish off this challenge that I started. I'm late as all hell, but I WILL FINISH IT DAMMIT!!!



♥ Day 1 ♥ Day 2 ♥ Day 3 ♥ Day 4 ♥ Day 5 ♥ Day 6 ♥ Day 7 ♥ Day 8 ♥ Day 9 ♥ Day 10♥ Day 11 ♥ Day 12 ♥ Day 13 ♥ Day 14 ♥ Day 15 ♥

Day 11

Share a book/song/movie/tv show/fanwork/etc that changed your life

Oh dear... This is a hard one to answer, since I've been around for quite a lot of years. *LOL* Old farts unite! I'm allowed to call myself that when I'm 40, right? ;-)

Anyway, well... If I go to books I've reread the most, I'd say there's a few series that kind of changed my mind. That I can say opened my mind and set my imagination on fire when I was young.

First off there's CS Lews Narnia series. It was the first fantasy-series I read, and it was very much an AHA-moment for me when I read them. I was... 11-12 when I read them the first time, I think. And when I reread them today, I still enjoy them (although I see the issues today to... Because there are quite a few.)

Then there's The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien. NOT The Ring Trilogy, actually. To be quite honest, I think they're boring. But The Hobbit I love! Same thing there, it just again showed the width of the imagination for me.

And then there's all the comics I've read through the years.

Donald Duck and C/O is the first comic I ever got a subscription on when I was 6 years old. I'm still subscribed to it. Get a comic in the mail once a week. I can't imagine a Friday without it, to be honest. :-)

And then there's Elfquest. I found the first two issues in a corner in the public library, broken and worn, but they spoke to me and I could NOT get enough of them! They stopped publishing them in swedish, but I now have nearly everything published in english. I don't know what it is with that comic, but I can not get enough of it. When I was young I saw one thing when reading it and as an adult another. Pretty incredible.

When it comes to movies and TV-show, the first one that really knocked me out was... Xena The WarriorPrincess. I do remember that there was two things with Xena. One: There's a woman that's far tougher than any man! And Two: She was the bad guy first!

Then there's Buffy, and it's the same thing there. A bad ass WOMAN in the lead. And vampires. Which I've always had a thing for. Just like with the others it was one of those AHA-moments.

I think all off these gave me AHA-moments. I could go on, I suppose, but these are the main ones. :-)

Day 12

In your own space, create a fanwork. Make a podfic, an icon, a sketch, a meta, or a rec list. Arts and crafts. Cross stitch. Draft an essay about a particular medium. Put together a picspam or a fanmix. Write a review of book you love, a ship manifesto, a you-should-be-listening-to-this-band essay. Create something.

I'm not a contributer to fandoms, so I don't have anything in particular. I just read, watch and listen. :-P But I do try to comment all the things that I do enjoy. Especially fanfic, for some reason. And fanart. Because that's people that write/draw something they are passionate about, and they should know there are more people that are passionate about the same thing.

I did create a list about my favorite YouTube channels once, I guess that's as close to something I've done. :-P

Day 13

In your own space, set some goals for the coming year. They can be fannish or not, public or private.

My goal is to just do what makes me happy. If you're in a fandom, or a fan of something/someone that does not make you happy, then why do you do it? So yeah. I'm not going to force it. I'm always so tired after work anyway, so I don't even have energy to talk to friends. So why should I do/read/watch anything that just makes me sad or upset me? I mean, really? My time is worth more than that.

Day 14

In your own space, create your own challenge. Whatever your challenge is, and have fun with it!

My challenge to any writer and/or artist is to write/draw a character that is the least popular in your fandom. Try it. Maybe you end up like it.

Challenge for me is to be more social. To dare to be online and talk to people again. And not be ashamed if I end up zoning out. It's fine to do that, even if whoever I talk to have to remind me of their existence. I'm a 40 year old mom working full time. I'm allowed to zone out in the evenings.

Day 15

In your own space, write a love letter to Fandom in general, to a particular fandom, to a trope, a relationship, a character, or to your flist/circle/followers. Share your love and squee as loud as you want to.

Dear fandom,

Without you I would not have discovered so many things about myself. Without you I would have been so lonely. Without you I would not be who I am today. Without you I would not have so many friends for life. And for all that and more, I will be eternally grateful.

Yours truly
// KSena

This entry is cross posted between LJ and DW. Comment where you are comfortable.

A month later and here I am again. Guess I can't stay away. :-) End of 2017. I guess a little reflection of the year is in order.

Don't know really where to start. :-) It's been a pretty good year, most of it. Apart from the autumn this year. Less good that one.

Early 2017 was good. The winter-part and the spring-part. I do work a lot, and I do enjoy it.

I feel like I started to grow into my professional role a lot this year over all. And it started this year, pretty much. I feel more confident. And I know what to do, how to do it.

One thing I do know though, and I am working on it, is that I want to do to much. I have a lot of ideas. Things I want to do at work. But there's never enough time, you know? I did get more time this year. Before I worked only 30 hours a week at the school and 10 hours at a neighboring library. This year I got 40 hours to work only in the school, so that's good. More time. But there's never enough time when you are the sole responsible for EVERYTHING at a workplace, is it? :-)

So this autumn it just got a bit to much with work, family and everything. Usually the autumn blues does not effect me. I've never suffered from it. But this year... This year it hit. Hard. Hard as fuck. Depressed friends told me I showed signs of depression, and that might be true. I had no energy for anything. And I pulled back from socializing with anyone at all, even my best friend. And I stopped logging into my chat programs. Which I used to do a lot before. I just didn't have the energy. I didn't have any energy left at all when I came home from work, and I constantly felt like I lacked there to, despite my boss and colleagues telling me otherwise. The teachers and other staff at school think I do a great job to, but at that time I couldn't take that in. So that was not a fun part of 2017.

And lets not start on the political climate in the world these days. That's a depressing state for sure. Fuck Trump. And that's all I'll say on that, or this post will be even more of a downer.

The Swedish political climate isn't to much fun either, since Sverige Demokraterna, which is the alt-right here in Sweden has far to much power. And is gaining it. And there's far to many areas in Sweden where crime is running rampant (and the school I'm working in is in one of them areas...), but trying to beat it with racism is not the answer. Racism and hate never is.

*sigh* So that was the less than good part about this post, but it's reality, so that's that.

But despite how I've felt about my job, I do like it! Even though I struggle with my hooligans, when I'm alone with them, they're so nice to talk to! It's when they come in a group, things get crazy. And the other kids/teens at the school are WONDERFUL! There's about 700 kids/teens at the school now, and the hooligans are around... 10-15 kids/teens. Soooo many refugee kids though, or children of refugees. Hence why I work my ass off to make sure they get the best possible help to make it here in Sweden. To do that, you need to know how to read...

As you can see much of my life is... work...

Then there's Alexandra, of course. The best thing in my life. :-) She grows SO FAST! It's crazy! And she's growing up to be a really good kid. :-) Spoiled, yes. Both grandma's really do love to spoil her rotten. *lol* No wonder my MIL wants to, since Alexandra is her only grandkid. :-)

She cares a lot of her friends and her cousins. She really loves them. So I hope when she starts school she'll have her friends in the same class. Fingers crossed. Her big cousin Tilda, who is 10 years old, is Alexandras big idol. She follows her like a little puppy when we're at the same spot, and she learns a lot from her.

One thing she's really gotten from Tilda is the love off horses. Alexandra started riding this year, and she has really taken to it! She's always been very shy, but not when she's at the stable. She's really outgoing there, and not afraid of the horses at all. :-D At this riding school you don't only learn how to ride on the horse, but also how to take care of the horse. The whole thing. And she's not afraid to get her hands dirty. Not at all. So that's really impressive! And she's getting really good at riding to, for her age. :-D So I'm totally happy with driving her to the stable once a week. Eventually there'll be more than once a week, I know. But I'm fine with it, since it seems to be good for her, not only physically but mentally to! And she loves it! Win-win!

Her teachers/caregivers at daycare says she is doing really well at daycare to, she's popular with the other kids. She likes to learn new things. To try new things and to explore. And to help her friends when needed. Only time she ends up cranky is when she can't run the games she does with her friends. I think that comes from her being an only child and always deciding the games herself at home.

Another bad thing is that she's inherited two bad qualities from me and Peting... My tendency to 'disappear' in my fantasies, to the point I dream while being awake and not hear or see what's going on around me. So people have to touch me or call out for me to snap me out of it. Alexandra does this to, especially when tired, morning or evening.

Another thing, that she got from Peting, is her absolutely HORRID morning-temper! Now, I don't expect anyone to be cheerful at 6am in the morning which is the time I wake her up, but my GAWD! There's some serious fights quite often when she just refuses to do anything at all, and fights and hits me to get out of it. I've been brought to tears some mornings because I've been so frustrated and this autumn and winter I've been late for work nearly every morning. :-/ Peting is like that to. Well, he is not fighting, but I do avoid going into the kitchen until he's taken a seat and started on his breakfast. Just saying.

Right, so... This last month or two, I've started doing a lot better. I even start feeling an urge to go back to the vampire-LARP, which we stopped doing as well this year. We took a break, but now I'm started to feel energy and urge to go back to that to. They've done a restart this year, so instead of vampires in the modern age, the LARP is now set in the medieval times. Medieval vampires... We'll see if I can figure something out for it. I've noticed that many of the LARPers that moved away from this city for work and education has started to move back again. It would be fun to play against them again. :-)

So as you can see, even though this year has been tougher than previous years, I'm still going out on top. At least that's how it feels like to me. :-) I do have hopes for 2018. Alexandra is starting school! So that's going to be interesting! Onward to 2018!

Books, movies, tv-shows... I'll just have to make a separate post for that! Kudos if anyone had the energy to read through all that!

I made a deal with hexenhasel today to be better at posting, and I'll try to do that. I'm not sure I can jump back so far to catch up, so if there's any post you want me to read specificlly, link to it in a comment or just tell me whatever you want me to know. :-) I'll jump back until December 1'st, and then keep up from that.

This entry is cross posted between LJ and DW. Comment where you are comfortable.