A quick check-in

You haven’t heard much from me lately for a few reasons. The first is, I have been struggling with migraines and some depression for about a month or maybe since the beginning of January. I don’t know why, other than, yeah, it’s winter, but it’s also Tucson, right?

We’ve actually been getting quite a lot of wind and rain, plus snow on the mountains.

Secondly, I’ve been taking a Master’s Naturalist class that is quite intensive. It meets 1-2 times a week for 2-3 hours each meeting, and if I read all the supplementary materials and watch all the presentations (in addition to class time), and do all the homework, it takes about as much time as a college graduate course. Why am I doing this? I actually am really enjoying it, but I will also be glad when it’s over at the end of the semester in May.

The class is all about the Sonoran Desert – the flora, the fauna, and some about the cultural history in this region too. We’re also learning about all the different local environmental non-profits and all their different projects and programs.

And there’s lots of options for volunteering! There are outdoor projects like pulling out invasive buffelgrass. And there are projects that volunteers can do at home with their computers, like carefully looking through thousands of wildlife camera photos from around the Pima County, and logging what they are seeing for the scientists.

Because of the class and all I’m learning, my photos have recently been full of pictures that look like these.

I will hopefully write another post soon about the amazing plant and bird ID apps I’ve been using. They are tons of fun! But that’s for another post.

The class, plus the sudden and unexpected return of my migraines, is not leaving me with a lot of time or energy to blog. And because of my (seasonal?) depression, when I do have free time and feel well enough, I’m trying to get myself outside to exercise in the sunlight. This always is helpful when I can do it.

The third reason why you haven’t heard much from me, is I did actually try to post something a couple of times recently and the emails didn’t go out, so none of you knew it had posted. I don’t know why the emails didn’t go out. I took those posts back down and will try again later. I’ve contacted my friend, Amy, who helps me with my website issues (for whom I am very grateful).

I’m actually not sure if the email for this blog is going to go out or not. If you get this in your email, then yay! Otherwise, I will probably take this post back down again in order to continue to work on the problem before reposting.

Happy middle of February. Spring, we are waiting for you!

To send me a comment, email turning51bykristina@gmail.com.

Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals