I never thought that I would be able to "afford" a house. Heck, in my mid 20s I still had dreams of moving back to Washington state (where I was born and spent my childhood) and getting a tech job out there and so I was pretty opposed to the idea of buying property here in Kansas City. But as time went on I became a very jaded software developer and I am convinced that I probably wouldn't be able to find a job as a software developer that doesn't make me incredibly depressed. I think I may low-key have some PTSD relating to working in the tech industry, considering the panic attacks I've had when trying to get myself to search for programmer jobs.

But I teach Computer Science now, and I love teaching about computers and programming and math. I began teaching at my college in 2016 as an adjunct and as of this past fall semester I am officially a full time permanent instructor, even though I don't have a master's degree (four time drop out! woo!).

Anyway, that is to say, we "have" a house now. Though it feels really silly to say that it's ours or that we own it because the reality is we paid 10% down on it so we own a tenth of the house. We are still beholden to the lender and a 30-year mortgage and if we ever weren't able to make payments we would still be kicked out. As a millennial, it just doesn't feel right to say that I am a homeowner; especially when my career started in 2009.

I'm just really going off topic now. It's 4 am and I can't sleep. I'm on semester break, we've been packing and moving stuff carload by carload (I've never hired movers before). I also need to get class prep done during this semester break to ease the amount of work I need to get done during the semester, which piles up quick. Also, it's the new year.

I find it somewhat distasteful when people talk about 2020 as a "thing", as if 2021 is going to be any different, like a light switch flipping. Maybe we'll get access to a vaccine - maybe not. Maybe this government will continue screwing over the people living in this country; I don't expect them to magically start treating us all any different. There's always more work to be done to push those in power to actually do the right thing. A new president isn't going to make things magically better.

Bleh. Anyway, I like making new years resolutions. I like taking time to assess what is important to me and something to work towards, and even though Jan 1 2021 is just another day like the day before it, our arbitrary partitioning of time does make it feel somewhat special, in a way. A new year.

In 2020 I was fortunate enough to get a full time job, and it's a job that I can work remote. I wasn't sure if I'd ever be able to find a full time job outside of software development. So many people have helped me along the way and I am so grateful for that. We also somehow "bought" a house. We looked on the Kansas side first but were always getting outbid, so we are moving to the Missouri side. I've basically spent one decade of my life in Washington (childhood), one decade in Missouri (teen years) and one decade in Kansas (20s) and now I'm returning closer to where I spent so much time as a teenager. I just still can't believe we "have" a house.

Thinking of what I want to achieve this year, my resolutions for 2021 are pretty simple, and mostly revolve around reducing anxiety and stress:

• Get a majority of my classes pre-prepared so I have a minimal amount of weekly content to prepare each week (and so I can focus on grading + feedback instead of trying to stay on schedule.) Also continue making my class resources free and publicly available.
• Keep our house clean and organized! Why keep stuff in storage long-term if it never gets used? Trash, recycle, donate, or give things we just don't use. Minimize storage for storage sake. Everything should ideally have a place.
• Study Hindi regularly! A lot of my family in India (calling them in-laws sounds too cold? Maybe that's just an American thing; there's that whole trope of hating ones' in-laws) and much of that family does not speak any English - including my husband's mother and father. I'm so bad at keeping up with studying regularly (ADHD?) but it's something I must do.
• Program something - ideally, my language learning game, so I can make a cool program and also use it to help me study Hindi. ;) I miss coding games, but it is often hard to find inspiration or an idea that I love enough to stick with.

That's really all there is for now. I'm still not tired and I feel like being creative, but I've also already moved my sketchbooks to the new house. I could think about game development or write a blog post about what prevents me from sticking with projects. Just thinking about this and class prep and moving is making me kind of overwhelmed, blaaaahhh!!