A Little Bit About Me: My Life Update

First of all, I will like to tell you all that I am very sorry I haven't posted as much as I used to. Life has kept me very busy. Now that doesn't mean that I haven't read books, because of course I have. I don't think I can ever stop but I haven't been posting as many reviews as I would like. For that I am sorry. So I would like to share with you my crazy journey these past few months. I will divide it into sections. By the way this is Tanya. Just so you know.

College Life

I thought this was the easiest section to dive into so I am going to cover it first. I am sure many of you can agree that school is crazy! This semester was one of the hardest I have faced yet but I loved it. It showed me that I love stress! Yeah I know that is crazy but it is good for me. It helps me push myself and work harder. Right now I am not under so much stress and I miss it because I feel like I don't have much to do. I need to get used to a stress filled life because I am going to be a journalist so stress come at me, I am ready for you.

Some of the classes I took this semester were quite interesting. Lets see, I took Chicano Studies: Societal Issues, African American Studies: From Hip Hop to Rap, an online magazine class for journalism, Women Studies: Women Who Work in the Sex Industry, and Communication Theory. This was one of the best semesters because I learned so much. My favorite class was the Women studies class. I learned so much and the class was so much fun. It was a lot of reading but these readings were so good and eye-opening. I also loved my online magazine class because I was able to report on many stories and it was fun and it reinforced my love of journalism.

So after this semester I decided to take a Broadcast Journalism course in a Mini-mester. It was just 2 weeks! Yeah, it was crazy. It started right away so I only got a weekend to rest before it began. Now this class was one of the best. I finally was able to learn about broadcasting and how crazy it was. We had a guest speaker from different news stations almost every day. It is one of the best classes I have taken. Ok so I think thats the wrap-up of my college experience.

Blogging

So now that you learned a little bit about my crazy semester you can understand why I didn't have much time for blogging. I had so much work that I would be studying and doing homework until Midnight or later. That left little time for blogging which made me sad. I did continue reading here and there when I had time. I didn't do as much blogging as I would have liked but I did do some. It was just the last month (May) that really killed me. So now that I am on break I am hoping to do more blogging but then in July I am taking a summer class so I don't know how that is going to work out yet.

Currently I am addicted to the Addicted Series and the companion novels by Krista and Becca Ritchie. I am loving these books and I can't stop reading them. I have gone through four of the books already and I just started the 5th one. I am excited about it because it is back to the original characters that the series started with. I am trying to stop and write a review for them but the books keep pulling me in but I promise that I will get to the reviews soon. I am thinking of doing a Week of Addicted for the books. They deserve a whole week to be recognized.

One last thing before I move on to a different section. I am now realizing that I am horrible at keeping track of the books I have read this year. I decided to take part of the Goodreads Reading Challenge and I forget to update it. I have read but I never add the books so just right now I tried to update it and I had like 20 books to add. I think there are more but I just can't remember! That is not good. I hope to be better at it! I hope to write reviews for most of those books so be ready for that!

Oh and shout-out to Jae and Juliana! Thank you girls for everything. Jae thank you so much for being a great book friend to me. She introduced me to the Addicted Series and she doesn't get annoyed with my constant tweets to her with updates and thoughts that I send to her while I'm reading the series. You are awesome and I am glad to havee met you! Now Juliana be patient with me. I loved your book and I am working on the review! I am so happy to have met you. I am glad that you answered my messages as I gave you updates as I read your book. I hope that we keep in touch. Be sure to check out Jae at The Fluttering Book Nest and check out Juliana's book The Way He Looks at Me!

Life in General

So this year has been a tough one because my family had to endure some bad news. My 84 year old grandma, the love of my life, has cancer. This is one of the hardest things I have ever had to endure in my life. This news broke my heart. My grandma has always been healthy. She has never had anything wrong with her. She had no blood pressure, no diabetes, no nothing so this news was completely shocking to us. We just couldn't believe it. I still can't. It is hard for me. I have always seen her healthy and so active and now she isn't the same.

There is no cure for her. No treatment. No nothing. It is too risky to do anything. She is slowly dying and I hate to see it. It is hard for me to even finish writing this without bursting into tears but I can't because she is here with me. That is the hardest part. I feel like I am holding in my emotions. I am almost always with her and I look at her and I become filled with grief and sadness. I don't cry in front of her and I won't. She has always been there for me, cooking me a buffet of food all the time when we (me and my brother, sister, and cousins) visited her as kids. She would take care of us and make us laugh. It is now my turn to be here with her and take care of her. It is hard but I have never been happier in my life to get each day with her.

I am incredibly thankful to Jay McLean because it was like a miracle happened in my life. Just when we heard the news about my grandma I had just finished her book. It helped me so much and I couldn't be more thankful to her. That book was just what I needed. It showed me the value of life and the importance of it. Where The Road Takes Me (WtRTM) has changed my outlook but it also helped me process my life at the exact moment I needed something to help me. I am just so happy to be living each red letter day with my grandma and I look forward to each day and each hour that I have with her. Hence why I wrote this section in red. If you want to understand why you will have to read WtRTM because I will not share the significant meaning of the color.

I have accepted what is to come and I enjoy every time her eyes light up with her laugh. She is a feisty lady and I love it. She reminds me a lot of Aunt Ada from Blindsided by Emma Hart. I love her so much and even though some days are hard I am so overjoyed with each day that is good. So this is what has happened in my life but I am so glad that I have books in my life. They help me escape a little and feel the pain. I need a book that will let me express all the sadness so if anyone knows a book that will make me ugly cry please let me know!

Oh and just as I was wrapping up I hear the door slam. A short story of my grandma goes like this: The door slams. I hear it and I start to rush out the door. It can only be one person. Granny. She can walk on her own. Sometimes she holds our hand but she is still capable of walking without assistance. One day she got a walker. It has been there collecting dust for a few weeks. Today she decides to try it out. So back to the door slam. I rush out the door and there she is walking around using the walker. This makes me laugh because she really doesn't need it but there she is. She decided that it would be fun to use it so she did. She goes back and forth with the walker on our front porch. Funny sight. Just made my day. She does little things like that that make me smile.