vivian gietz

Happy New Year!

Real quick: If you like what I do and say, and you want to support a starving writer living in one of the most expensive cities in North America in a tangible way, you can buy me a coffee for just $3. Thanks! (Not all “coffee” funds are spent on actual coffee. Most are spent on groceries. I am very broke.)

December was indeed a month of goodness and strangeness in many ways. I hope yours was too. I hope for the new year, you’ve resolved to eat more of the foods you love, hug more of the people you love, and do more of the things you love.

For me, that includes trying to write more, and put forward more actual writing projects. I’ve done a lot less writing since graduating university, when I had to write every week, between all the creative writing assignments, essays, and other school work. Starting this blog has helped, but I only update it about once a month. (Yes, this does mean I resolve to try and update this blog more in the new year. Hold me to it!)

This year is off to a great start in a lot of ways. I’ve started a family, and by that I mean I finally have my cat here with me in Vancouver. Although she’s still reluctantly adjusting to the new space, she’s very happy to be with me. She’s extremely purry, needy, and cuddly. She’s also way too cute to stay mad at when she breaks, chews on, or pees on things in my home. (All of which have happened.) I’m sleeping better than I was in the fall, despite being woken up by my cat every night. I feel a lot happier, brighter, and more hopeful than I was even a couple months ago.

A lot of that is probably because I also have slightly more financial stability than I did before. I had this job mostly set up before Christmas, but it’s confirmed today: I’m going to be doing a sales person job with commission incentive, selling products in Costcos and Canadian Tires. I start training on Tuesday morning. I’ve never been a sales person before, but I had to go through three interviews and they liked me every time, so they must think I’ll be good at it. It’s definitely not my dream job, but it’ll keep me going, and that’s what I need.

This job means working evenings and weekends too, and will start off at part-time, and move into full-time once I finish training in a few weeks. Which means I’ll still have to be careful, and will continue picking up a few hours at the bakery to make ends meet as long as I need to and can. But the ends will meet, even if I have to force them together.

As previously mentioned, I’m also going to be using that spare time to do more writing. I’ll also be developing my platform as a freelance writer, working on my personal writing projects such as a second chapbook, and maybe even trying to tackle at least one of the many novel ideas I have sitting around in various MS Word folders. I will also be focusing my long-term job attention on potential positions which more directly align with my interest in writing for social justice, feminism, and LGBTQ+ Christian activism.

Because, yes, while an office job doing social media marketing for just about any random company that I’ve been interviewing for these past few months would be nice, and great for the pay and experience, it only makes sense for me to fine tune my search to my long-term interests now that I should be able to (mostly) afford to pay the bills. These days, so few people have a 9-5 office job anyway. I am more and more okay with not having one, with crafting my own definition of a successful life, a self-driven personal career, the more likely it becomes that I can survive, and even thrive without one.

After all, it’s been three full months since I arrived in Vancouver with the intention of staying permanently, and I’ve made it this far. I’ve been thinking, loving, and living creatively and authentically, in ways I never could have imagined or been able to achieve if I had stayed in Brooks. I know myself and my needs much better than I did this time last year.

And if I absolutely hate the sales job, I’ll continue being less picky with the office job search. I’ll wing it and hope for the best, like I’ve been doing this whole time. If my new year’s ambition wears off in a few weeks, don’t blame me. Let’s be real. You know your’s will too.

But that doesn’t mean we aren’t gonna try.

Baby (the cat) sends her love,

Vivian