From Joy to Misery, then Darkness to Light

It was April 25th. Right after I became a US citizen that morning, I rushed to the passport office, as it was the last day when you could just walk in without an appointment. No appointments were available before May 15 and I wanted to travel on May 25th. They allowed me to walk in without an appointment and turn in my application. I couldn't've gotten there any earlier if I wanted to, but I was admitted almost 30 minutes past the time that we were allowed to walk in without an appointment. I was among the last ones admitted without an appointment. After paying for my rushed passport and overnight shipping fees, I received my passport, my passport card, and documents over the mail in different deliveries within the next 2-3 weeks.

One month later, I was leaving early to San Diego. There was a lot to be thankful for, as this had been my most successful academic year as a teacher and after almost 12 years, made the US my new permanent home. A new "glitch" had just started the last week of school. I started snoring before falling asleep. Because of this, it took me longer to fall asleep. I had no idea that this was even possible. Maybe I needed to relax, maybe this trip would be a well-deserved time off. While these snoring "glitches" got worse over the next few days, I still caught some sleep. San Diego was my least favorite place to visit, but at least I can say that I've perhaps seen the best that the city has to offer:

As there was some rail construction going on, it took two trains and one bus to make it to Anaheim that morning. Visiting the Disney parks was not a priority, but most museums are closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. After visiting this beautiful church, I visited both Disney parks, followed by Universal Studios in Los Angeles the next day (Tuesday):

The Getty Center was one of the few museums that were open on Tuesday. One day at Universal Studios was way too much for me:

Over the next two days, Wednesday, and Thursday I visited some known and previously unknown hidden and not-so-hidden jewels (AKA historic buildings, museums, and churches) in southern Los Angeles County:

Santa Barbara might've been a close tie to San Diego as my least favorite part of the trip, but at least I won't have to go back:

I was a little nervous about renting a car and drive from Santa Barbara to Hearst Castle. My Texas driver's license will expire in a few months, but the place where I was putting it in my wallet made some cracks. I now keep it in a mini plastic Tupperware. Also, elbow problems and new snoring problems were making it hard to sleep. Luckily, they accepted my driver's license and I did not fall asleep on that five-hour roundtrip drive to Hearst Castle:

I had already visited the Grand Rooms Tour a few years ago. This time I took the Upper Rooms and the Cottages and Kitchen Tours. I took a Bus to San Jose the next day, on Sunday, June 1st. I visited a few museums in the southern Bay Area. This area looks really nice. It might even be a nice place to live and work, if you can afford the high cost of living and high taxes:

Uber or Lyft are not cheap ways to move around, but they're certainly convenient. I took an Uber to San Francisco to spend a night there before flying to SEATAC airport the following morning:

Olympia has a nice capitol on the outside and nice green neighborhoods under coastal Douglas firs, but it's only worth visiting once in your life:

Tacoma has two art museums. Both of them have glass sculptures, but not just from Chihully. 

I met my family in Seattle. Warned about my new snoring problem, we miraculously spent the next ten nights or so without too much sleeping disruption. We started that night visiting the Chihully Glass Museum and the Space Needle:

We spent next day in Seattle:

We rented a car for the next two days. We visited Leavenworth and then Mount Rainier:

My parents and one of my sisters who was traveling with us decided to fly to Vancouver the next day. I took an Amtrak bus to save some money. We spent a day in Vancouver followed by a short road trip to Whistler:

We then took a bus and ferry to Victoria. A bus drove inside a ferry, then drove out of it once we got to Victoria. We spent two nights there. This is part of what we saw:

On our last day before returning we flew back to Seattle for one night. Not much left to do, but we did visit this Japanese garden:

I flew back to Dallas as my family flew back to Mexico. I spent a night in Dallas, washed some clothes and collected my belongings before meeting my family in Mexico a day later. Before knowing what was coming, I booked a cheap same day round ticket flight from Monterrey to Chihuahua. Little did I know that I would not be looking forward to future trips for a while: 

It was now time to check my snoring and possibly have elbow surgery. I was advised that I need a CPAP to protect me from possible health risks and get more energy during the day. I decided to finish this study after my surgery, as there could've been other options, according to this sleep doctor. It appears that surgery went well on June 30th, but I was not expecting a long and depressing recovery.

The pain got worse during the month of July. Therapy that started a week later was helping me recover from the surgery itself, but the pain that I had felt before my surgery had gotten worse. I spent many sleepless nights, and many nights with a few hours of sleep. There were times when I was able to sleep only during the day. "How am I going to get back to work like this?" I thought. 

As beautiful as my hometown was when skies were clean, little did it do to cheer me up. I visited friends twice, but I would've rather stayed home during those six weeks or so. I would've given up all future trips for easing my elbow pain if I had to choose either one or the other.

I flew back to Dallas on July 26 and reported back to work on July 28, the day that my first niece was born. It was tough going to work usually feeling tired and lethargic. Due to this lack of sleep, I was about to take an Uber to go to work, but on August 7 things changed. 

While I cannot make these details public, all I can say is that through a friend I found a special praying group, and I am now recovering. I can now extend my elbow on top of a pillow. While recovery did not happen immediately, I started feeling peace right away. I pray to God that I can repay their favor. I will continue to do my best for my students. I'm even looking forward to more trips in the not-so-distant future. As for my snoring, I visited two more sleep doctors. One of them made me a pair of retainers to reduce snoring. I was also told that if I lose weight, I might stop snoring. I did not like wearing retainers, so I've been doing some mouth and tongue exercises to help strengthen the muscles that block the airways and cause snoring. I also started losing some weight. We'll see if this helps. As of now, snoring while still awake has no longer been an issue.