Living Alone, Renting in Chile, Stress and the Sun (Blog #2)

Hey there! It's currently 11:40am of the 18th of July, I've been alone at my apartment the last few days as all my roommates went back home to their families to spend the second batch of total quarantine together, and I LOVE having all this space to myself, I'm spending less time closed up in my room, a lot more time out in the balcony and haven't used headphones in days!

I've been thinking a lot about having my own place in the future, I'm in no position to do a jump like that, but It's been nice thinking about peace, the quiet, and being able to go from my room to the balcony in my undies to take in the sun! Hahaha! But renting in Chile, as far as I've been seeing, is not as different as renting in the U.S., here it's super normal to see people asking for 3x times the rent in pay or have at least a year of savings (most of the time they won't even accept savings!), so I'm trapped in a place where either my father has to help me out (which I know won't happen) or I live with a roommate who can help me out with that...

I've been eyeing smaller cities in Chile that have a lot more understandable fares for rent and I've been kinda dreaming about it, I've spent most of my life in the north of Chile, next to the most arid desert there is in the world and I would LOVE to live in a place with more green, more plants, where rain is expected and won't destroy the city. My mom doesn't really like the idea, saying I should be looking at bigger cities to go, but not only is that super expensive (Antofagasta and Santiago have absurd rent fares in general, with my current rent I could actually afford a place for my own in smaller cities, or with a bit more, even renting a house, lol), but in my situation, where I rarely go out anyways, a small city with tons of plants and small communities just sounds dreamy! I mostly need access to my current college (which has campuses in almost all of Chile so transferring is easy), knowing how the city is regarding LGBTQ+ (because it's not like I'm cis-passing, so I need to feel safe knowing that people WILL NOTICE that I am trans for a good while, and also I need to be able to start HRT there) and a decent internet connection so I can work from home (fiber would be so gooooood, I really miss fiber internet ; - ;).

But, for now, I'm just appreciating the time I have for my own here, laying in the balcony, taking in the sun, talking with the plants, hearing the Hibike!Euphonium OST and just relaxing. But I have to be honest, this is the first day I get to really relax, between commission work and so many tests that I got assigned for this week has been stressing me out a lot, yesterday was an awful day, my teeth ached, my head as well, I didn't feel good in any way, but I did finish two tests and sent some corrections to a commissioner, so at least that helped me take the morning off today. (I have one more test to finish this afternoon, and I'm hoping it wont be stressful, but maybe just time consuming, hopefully!)

Yesterday I caught myself wishing that today would be a sunny day, it was really cold and cloudy, and that caught me off guard! I've been a "cloudy cold days are the BEST" kind of girl my whole life, but I've also been depressed for most of my life, so maybe I shouldn't try to stick with stuff like that? lol Taking time to take in sun and wind has been keeping me grounded, I felt really bad the past weeks and since forcing myself to take in at least 20 mins of sun every day I've been feeling a lot happier and a lot more productive, I just need to balance those out so I don't burn out like I've been lately. But yeah, the sun is GREAT, maybe it's just me living in the desert that made me hate it, right now we're in the middle of winter and I'm outside in a shirt and shorts and it still feels kinda hot, so, imagine how the summers are. 😥

I think that's it for todays' blog, I've been really busy and today's the first day I've taken time to relax and be present, being why I chose to write for the blog!

How's the climate been lately where you live? Have you got any tips on self-care I could maybe use? What have ya'll been eating? I got lots of frozen chicken and I'm actually getting tired of it, hahaha! If you've got decent chicken recipes I'd love to hear them out!