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A Flight Plan for Future Days: 2016

12/31/2015

It wouldn’t be end-of-year blogging without some goal-setting. My Year 2015 Post was about looking behind at the year that was. This post is about looking forward to events as yet unfolded, and trying to orchestrate some good out of what may come.

Last years goals were a mixture of health and success (academic, financial, and writing) related objectives. I began walking more. Even though I haven’t seen the results of all that walking in much weight loss, I will continue to try hard with my exercise. I also graduated Summa Cum Laude with my Bachelors Degree from the University of South Florida St. Petersburg, and that was an unexpected plus for the year.

So where do we go from here? Well…here is everything I hope to accomplish in the coming year.

Get some more hours at either job whenever I can. I need the money for taking the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) and applying to graduate programs.
Pass the GRE (get brushed up on the maths and nail this thing in one go!)
Apply to the 5-6 graduate programs I’m interested in.
Blog more. It’s not that I didn’t blog much in 2015. I did a helluva lot of blogging last semester for my Senior Portfolio class. So I have some posts to steal from there to make up for lost time. But I also need to blog fresh good stuff on here.
Read more. I read 126 books in 2015. My goal was 75. I would like to set a goal higher than 126 for 2016 and blow that one sky high as well.
Get the few completed short stories I have sitting around edited and in decent shape for submitting to magazines.
GET PUBLISHED BIG TIME IN 2016! That means a decently paying market.
Write more. Now that I’m not writing for academia anymore, I would like to start making sweet words with my muse again. We have missed one another.
Keep walking. Try to finally invest in a stationery bike or look at getting a membership at the City Gym I pass by every day. I need to get really in shape if I expect to be cruising big-ass campuses like Florida State or Iowa or USF Tampa.
Keep breathing. That's very important.

That’s it, really. I’m sure there are other things I need to do, but I’ll deal with all that stuff as we roll along.

As for you all, I hope you manage to slay your 2016 Resolutions List like the bosses you are.

Peace and Joy and Love.

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The hard but rewarding year 2015...

12/31/2015

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Yes, I know that I have not blogged anything for nine months. If you are one of my faithful readers, I am sorry. Most of you know the reasons, however, I think it is time I start blogging again on this site and I shall begin with telling you all about the past year and how it ended for me.

The best way I can describe 2015 is to say it started with a painful whimper, but ended with a triumphant Whoohoo! (at least academically).

Finances were the core issue for me in 2015, and the cause of whimpers both in my personal and academic lives. I lived through the roughest months I’d experienced since my mom and hubby passed away, back to back, fifteen years ago. Due to a technical glitch, I was awarded a scholarship that wasn’t due me because I was no longer a member of the Honors College at school. I was facing not being able to register for the Fall semester unless I could clear it up. And I had no money.

I was burned out and just not mentally up to my usual good work in class. I am lucky I got through the semester with two A’s and two B+ grades. Everything fell to ruin those first few months of 2015. I was only working 5 hours a week and behind in all my bills. I searched and applied relentlessly for a second job, interviewed for many positions, but there was no joy. I got a little depressed, to say the least.

Then, some miraculous and strange things occurred. It was as if Mistress Fate had twisted her magic wand in my direction.

First, a friend told me I should check out a crowdsource funding site, like Go Fund Me, to see if friends or acquaintances in the social media world would help me to pay off my school debt so I could register for the Fall semester, the only term left to complete my bachelor’s degree. I worried that it would come to nothing. And my pride is such that I have a hard time asking for help from even my closest friends. I didn’t think that my online friends would themselves be in any position to just give me money to help me. I was wrong. I swallowed my pride and made a Go Fund Me account and my online writer friends jumped to help. They donated and shared the link. They shared the link when they could not donate. They not only helped me meet the $500 debt I owed to the university, but the donations exceeded it to the point I was able to put the remainder toward getting the tablet I needed to be my light note-taking and writing device for two of my three final classes.

As for the second job, a non-profit company that I had a great interview with in March and never called me back right away…did call me back at the end of June to offer me another position, that of overall traffic coordinator for PBS and NPR throughout the state of Florida. I accepted it and this position has been both an incredible challenge and a dream job for me.

I started the year depressed, depleted, and anxious over money and school. I ended it with a great job and a diploma.

See that picture below. That’s me on the left end, smiling with my friends.

2015. Hard, but worth every minute of it.

I want to say a great big Thank You to all my friends, writer nakama, USFSP professors, and other kind people who helped me during the hard first half of the year with money or with words of encouragement. You all know who you are and I would not be where I am today without you.

Thank you, too, Mistress Fate.

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M. X. Kelly

A Flight Plan for Future Days: 2016

The hard but rewarding year 2015...

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