Friday, June 20, 2014

No Light at the End of the Tunnel


I re-homed Rob. 

Well, his foster did. 

It's for the best. 

Ali seems cool and calm again, Al and Luke seem to have become best buddies, and Cass seems sociable, playful and sweet again. D no longer had to break up fights in the middle of his conference calls, and is now able to allocate some time in the evening to play with Ali (D is Ali's favorite human).

But I am heartbroken. 

Rob has always been more like a puppy than a cat, following me around the house, talked and argued with me, and invited me to play just about any game he could think of all the time. He always ate whatever I gave him with much enthusiasm, which heartens me because it takes so much time and effort to plan and prepare their meals. 

Unfortunately, Rob is also a daredevil and headstrong kitten, whose energy level and playfulness overwhelmed my low-energy and no-nonsense girls, who accept an equally playful Luke only because he respects their boundaries. 

I still smell Rob in every corner of the house everyday, and think about how he is settling in his new home. It doesn't help that his new guardian works full-time away from home and has been unable to properly observe his interaction with her other cats to give me any useful information. 

Rob's foster has asked for my patience, and that we allow Rob a little more time to adapt to his new environment. 

It doesn't sound good to me.  

But I am starting to feel a little numb about losing cats. I used to be really afraid of losing Alberto, and wondered how I would live without him. And then all of a sudden, Alberto was gone. And life went on.  It had to; I couldn't afford time for grief. 

The period spanning 2012 and 2014 has seen me losing more than cats; I lost my entire family, immediate and extended, something I saw coming for allowing myself to fail catastrophically as an eldest sister, a daughter, a niece and a mother. 

D has been patient throughout, although I have spared no effort in pushing him away as well. I have always found it humiliating to keep those who don't love me in my life. I never thought I would say this, but I realize that no one loves me, and I love no one.

These days, only the twins, my dark and puckish but terribly adorable and loving nieces write/ text bomb me every few days, and visit from time to time. They turn 11 this year, and are still amused they have a cousin who is a Canadian residing in Hong Kong, and who has graduated from university while their friends have cousins who are little kids in elementary school. They met Celeste for the first time last year, or maybe the year before, and they got to meet Celeste's fiance during that trip. They have not asked me a single question about Celeste after they came home. Their diplomacy impressed me. These were the same kids who, out of curiosity about what people do with their pets after they passed on, asked me if I simply threw Alberto down the rubbish chute, and insisted on peeking into Alberto's urn.

I am still sitting on my 6A short. I had a chance to bail during contract rollover, but I didn't. Sitting has become a comfortable thing to do. 




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2 comments:

Sean said...

Jules, you broke my heart...

Trading's a'lot harder than I ever imagined.

I've been following your stories since your old site in '08 or '09... I had a sense that you were "for real" -- back when I was only getting into trading. Now, with some experience, some success and a little more failure, I'm even more jealous of your trading success.

I went back into the html copy I made of your site (seriously! in mid 2010), searching for your trading coach's name... (Michael Woo!)... convinced I'd just go all-in and take a vacation to Singapore for one of this dude's classes... but, alas, he seems to have vanished. Oh, well, I doubt "systems" are responsible for success... I'm convinced it's mostly intuition, an emotional gauge of intraday moves.

I "retired" early from the oil service industry a year ago -- coinciding, roughly, with a divorce... tried trading "full time"... got bored, and tired of making and then losing all profits, perpetually. Now I'm back with another top-5 oil service company, and hating every second of it... Tempted to try again...(i.e. "retire" again -- at age 33) with more trading experience this time. Seems like swing trading is far more like gambling than day trading--I've just been getting chopped up while trying to trade part-time while having no control over my trades during the day.

Any words of wisdom for a 33-year-old mechanical engineer who wishes he was as trading-smart as Juliana Tse?

--Ignore news?
--Base judgment on certain candle patterns? (I gave up on candles years ago... OHLC bars seem prettier...)
--Watching several symbols, and waiting patiently for a good setup in one, rather than just focusing on one thing every day?
--Go to Singapore, and search for Mr. Woo?! :D

Thanks,
Sean

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure what the title has to do with cats, self-loathing and trading....

Did you find religion? :)

Where you been gurl?!