2020: The Year of Silver Lining — Looking Back at the Years

It’s been almost a year since the last time I’ve posted, hasn’t it? The last thing that’s showing at the moment was when I was at Sakura-Con in 2018. I had originally posted about my first time traveling to Japan, however I was embarrassed with its quality and took it down. So I’ll go ahead and start from there.

Mid 2018, I traveled to Japan for the first time! In a weird stroke of coincidental luck, I also managed to meet up with friends who happened to be visiting Japan at the same time I was! Although the trip only lasted two weeks, I think it was the perfect amount of time to really enjoy the country.

In 2019, I was still working at the convenience store; however, I decided to make a serious effort to start searching for a job in the IT field. To do so, I did what I could to make myself desirable and researched as much as possible. After I had gotten A+ certified through CompTIA in June, I started applying to every possible IT-related job I could find while trying to find other resources to help me get a better chance of employment.

Later that year in November, I joined Nightmaren to visit Japan again! Not only was it us, but some mutual friends of ours, Ygritte and Yuuiki, were able to join us as well! It was a nice contrast to the year prior considering I was able to experience Japan during the Autumn season whereas my prior trip was during Summer time. It was really nice spending time in Japan with prior experience as it helped me decide how I wanted to spend the days there.

After coming back from Japan, It was also right around the time when I began to actively help out with a side project that would last about a year.

Then alas, 2020 came. While I was going through some chat logs, I came across a message Nightmaren had sent. Although there was no way I could have known, I never would have guessed would set the tone for the year to come.

“I don’t know what to make of 2020. I foresee a lot of big changes. It makes me a little wary… mixed feelings about impending 2020 so far.”

There was nothing much to make note of from January, but things started to pick up right around the beginning of February because that is when I got hired at Airship! However it was not in their IT department. Instead, I was hired as a QA Technician. They actually listed the job as as IT position because they were hoping to find someone with skills found within IT candidates so they would have an easier time finding qualified candidates. Thankfully I was one of them!

To say working at Airship was like stepping into a new world wouldn’t be much of an exaggeration. Prior to Airship, I had always worked retail-based jobs. I had an hourly wage, my hours were always inconsistent, and had to deal with customers. Even though I would eventually become a business owner of a convenience store, the work itself wasn’t much to be proud of and I still had to interact with people I could not respect.

Working at Airship, however, was completely different than what I was used to. I had my own workstation, I had to use my head to solve problems every single day, I had a TEAM I could rely on, I was paid with a salary, I had benefits (free medical insurance, paid vacation, and a 401k), and best of all, I was proud of the work I was doing! It also REALLY helped that Airship was a dog friendly place and allowed employees to bring their dogs into the office.

It may not be what I had originally signed up for, however, I found myself really enjoying working at Airship. The more I worked there, the more I enjoyed it! I also found myself feeling more and more encouraged to learn coding so that I could better understand the software! With each passing day, I became more and more excited with the opportunities that were finally starting to open for me working at the company!

Then that’s when things started taking a turn for the worse this year.

A good friend of mine, Arujei, had been struggling with medical issues for a very long time. He would be doing fine, and then the next day, he’d find himself in the hospital. This would continue for several years however unfortunately, his last hospital visit resulted in him passing away.

Arujei was essentially the “big brother” in my group of friends and I thought of him as such too. We didn’t actually talk too much, but he was still like family and would act very lively when we would actually talk.

When I heard news of Arujei passing away, I was hit much harder than I thought. I would try to work in the office but I had a hard time focusing. I even had to ask to work from home as I just didn’t want to be in the office while my head was effectively still going through noise.

I’m better now but I still think about Arujei every now and then. Even though I never really talked to him much, I miss him. He was still family, after all.

Arujei, you were really a good man and I hope your soul will rest well. May your family also find peace and solace.

As if to add more to the grief, the world found itself in a situation it could never have predicted to happen: the COVID-19 pandemic.

When there were reports of the Corona Virus reaching WA state, Airship tried its best to take caution with how we would work in the office. However, after one employee reported they may have had contact with someone who was infected, the founder of the company made the decision to have everyone return immediately and start working from home.

Thankfully because I had already configured my personal computer at home to be able to do work for Airship, I was able to transition fairly easily. Because I was always more of a homebody and slightly more on the introverted side of the spectrum, I thought I could handle staying at home every day.

For a while, I was able to handle it. I was able to do a decent amount of work at home and just relax afterwards. However as more and more time passed by, I began to realize I was getting really stressed from not being able to go out or see my friends in person. Just the thought of going outside and doing anything was slightly terrifying.

During this time, also, there was a bit of a fallout within my immediate family. There was always some tension that had developed between my mother and the rest of us and at a certain point, she had reached her breaking point and she decided she would move out and live on her own. This was concerning as there had been several times when my mother had felt incredibly sick and neither of us could do anything about it as she refused to disclose where she was living. My father and I eventually got my mother to finally move back into the house after several months of convincing her to come back. Although this would ultimately ease my father’s anxiety since now he can care for my mother if anything were to happen, mine would continue to grow.

For a long time now, my mother and I have always argued. I think most of the issues we had stemmed from the fact she still maintains her authoritative figure as both my mother and my elder — my mother easily gets upset if I make any sort of criticism with what she’s said. With this mindset and her stubborn personality, it becomes really difficult to talk to her about anything. If I point out what she’s saying is wrong, I’m the bad guy. If I say something that my mother decides is wrong, I have to apologize. If I don’t, I’m the bad guy again.

My mother also made it difficult for my sister for all the same reasons. My mother has very little to no tact whatsoever and is very abrasive when giving her opinion on anything. It also doesn’t help the advice my mother would give sometimes just be literally wrong.

Nonetheless, despite all of this, both my sister and I can’t help but love her as our mother. Because of that, despite having wanting very little to do with our mother, I convinced Jasmine to come down and visit the house to make amends.

It didn’t go very well.

The end result had my mother yelling at Jasmine saying she never wanted to see her again and then redirected the rest of her anger by telling me I was to move out immediately.

I was done living in a toxic environment where my mother expects to get away with saying anything and my father desperately trying to get us to forgive her. It was right then when I made plans with my sister to move to an apartment together.

The search was difficult as I had to find some place that would let me bring three of my dogs with me (most apartments would only allow 2 pets maximum). My mother didn’t want to take care of the three dogs and had even mentioned that if I left them with her, she would give them away to a shelter. My sister and I wanted to move within the Seattle area as that would help cut down commuting; however, that would mean higher costs of living. Still, we were determined to make it work out.

Eventually we found an apartment complex that was willing to be flexible about their pet limit and allowed us to live there with all three of our dogs. Getting the apartment was a pain due to the fact the leasing office were some of the most incompetent people I have ever met. The only consolation I had was knowing I wouldn’t have to deal with them anymore once the process was all done and over with.

We moved in right around the middle of June and because both of us didn’t have too many things we needed transported, we were able to get everything moved and set up in the apartment within a day.

This was the first time I had actually lived away from my parents and on my own(ish). Although I knew this would be the case, it really hit home just how much money I was saving and the things I was taking for granted. Since the six months I’ve been living here in the apartment, I’ve struggled to keep up with bills and groceries. Nevertheless, I am still happy to finally be on my own without having to worry about my mother.

Since then, the only things that were notable was having finishing many of the tasks that was asked of me for the side project I was helping with. The holidays weren’t all that significant simply due to COVID-19 reasons.

Which brings everything back to where we are now, right at the end of 2020 and transitioning into the new year! Although 2020 was generally a really cruddy year, I think it’s important to look at the positives and that’s exactly what I’m going to do.

This year alone, I definitely have grown a significant amount. I not only was able to achieve a career that I can truly be proud of, I learned much more of myself. I learned what my limits are, what I am capable of, what I need to improve on, and what are the things I cherish.

Reflecting on all of these positives, I think the best way to show our appreciation for the oncoming year is not only to make new years resolutions, but plans on exactly how to do so.

For 2021, I want to get back into writing more frequently. There are several reasons and one of them is so that I can actually make use of this blog. Not only that, I think doing so will also help me process my thoughts much better and maintain better memory of events that have occurred.

I also want to start taking more pictures. I haven’t taken as many pictures as I would have liked to this year and I am really starting to feel rusty as a result.

The way I will accomplish these two things is to do something similar to the 365 challenge I did several years ago, but changing it ever so slightly.

Instead of making a post every single day, I will write a post once a week describing what has happened along with a couple pictures that were of significance to me that week. All of this will help me actively look for something to take a picture of, try to remember what I’ve done throughout the week, and start learning how to write better.

I also want to get back to doing some sort of exercise every week. Before, I used to go to the gym every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. That was with a friend, however, and when he wasn’t there to hold me accountable anymore after moving out of state, I stopped going as much.

Although going to the gym now is pretty much out of the question, there are still several different ways I can do some sort of exercise at home.

The way I’ll tackle that will be similar to how I was getting myself to go the gym in the mornings – being held accountable.

Thankfully, I have a group of friends that want to do a “30 day challenge” to start off the New Year with. Having a lot of friends participate in something like that will definitely be a great way to get the ball rolling and gain enough of a momentum to have exercise become a habit again.

Furthermore, I decided to rope some friends into using Habitica with me again to help cement these habits even further. Not only with exercise, but also with the aforementioned writing as well as any other habit I think is worth developing (such as meditating).

2020 was objectively a really cruddy year. It was, however, also a year I think many people were able to grow from. The only way we can continue that growth is to look forward and try our best to make 2021 a better year!

Happy New Years, everyone, and thank you for continuing to be part of my life’s journey.