themoodmood

Why Yoga is Essential.

2009-09-21T13:49:00.002-05:00

For a couple of months last spring my yoga practice was feeling terrible. Like unpeeling a layer of an onion that was rotten and worn out, my breaking point was when I went to a hot yoga class in Charlotte and could barely do the postures. Knowing that if I stayed in the room, stayed present to what was happening in my body, that these feelings of letting go would all melt into the floor, was all that kept me going. Now I know I was simply avoiding…

This weekend I am taking a yin and yang workshop with Heather Tiddens. In the yin postures we hold them for over five minutes at a time, working deep into the body. Like most challenging postures, I go into the habit of breathing into them, trying to pull out some piece of comfort from the pose. But Heather is asking us to simply feel where we are. To not avoid those feelings or transfer the stress of the posture where we usually do (the shoulders and neck).

Ever since mid-August I feel like everything has been on autopilot. I drive around town from yoga to teaching to career counseling without blinking, maybe stopping for a smoothie for lunch on the way. The only real escape is my music and the mountains, as usual. And it’s not even about there being something wrong with how I am balancing my busy schedule, but there’s a sense that I am not being true to the integrity of the moment. Even now I feel like I’m not getting this written down the way I want it to be. But that’s the struggle.

After that class I got into my car to drive back to my then boyfriend’s house. And for some reason I couldn’t stop crying. I couldn’t stop thinking about how tired I was of feeling terrible and working through my yoga practice in this way. I wanted to give up. The muscles remember pain and pleasure; they remember car accidents and frightening experiences we had as children. Who knows what I was working through that evening, but I knew right then I was letting go.

I was house sitting this week for some friends who were in San Francisco. On my drive into work I took my eyes off of the winding road and stared up at the trees. It was one of the only breaks in rain we had had in the past week and it was amazing. The way the leaves spread open across the sky and then broke; I was shoved into the present moment.

When I was out in Las Vegas in June visiting my friends, we went on a moonlight hike in the desert. We spent the night in the Valley of Fire, sleeping on red rocks that used to be under the ocean. There are certain ideas associated with expanding or exploring your mind, and in my opinion, it’s avoidance of truly dealing with your authentic self. Bull shit, crap, selfishness, grace, determination and all. All of it.

I don’t know where the balance between dealing with and working with the past truly helps us to be in the present moment, but I do believe that without it, we simply avoid things. Instead of dealing with a nagging injury at the beginning of its pain, we push until it breaks. Without stepping back and healing, scar tissue continues to build and build until we have nothing to work with.

I find myself during this break in the workshop writing in my blog, even now clinging to the idea of my dear friend from Las Vegas being here to practice beside me. To talk to about all this yoga bull shit. But the clinging to the idea is not the problem, because really sitting with those thoughts can assist in discovering why those thoughts come up in the first place. For me, I just miss my friend.

I knew then like I’d known when we first starting dating. I stood there in his kitchen, crying uncontrollably; thinking about how to explain it to him. And I knew he knew, too. But we both wouldn’t pay attention to that nagging and then it broke, again. When you keep retracing an injury it takes time away from it in order to heal. But there’s no point in avoiding the scar tissue created over time. We’ll both have to work through that on our own.

I watch the videos on the DC Tea Party with signs about Burying Obamacare with Kennedy and pictures of Obama with a Hitler mustache (ironically next to a sign about Socialism), and then I hear the commentary about how FoxNews has planted the idea in these folks that we all need to “wake up.” That somehow politics have suddenly all gone wrong. Rarely does a country truly step back and reevaluate the mistakes it’s made, especially when it relies on its ego to control the world. I find myself feeling so angry and ashamed at the country I live in today. We are beyond repair in some ways, but mostly we need healing. And yes, FoxNews, we all have a moral obligation to “wake up,” indeed.

Not to say I live a perfect life. Not to say that I am completely authentic in my everyday actions. I sit here now, finishing up this blog I wrote on Saturday, at work, sick, and feeling the need to stay and complete a responsibility rather than go home and heal. Sitting here, to me, is less of a hassle than telling my boss that I am overwhelmed and overloaded with to dos in my life right now. But instead of feeling bad about it, I’m going to explore it and see what comes up.

It will take a lifetime to explore it all.

I and You and Love

2009-09-10T10:47:00.002-05:00

Whenever I’m not counseling students at my part-time office job, I’m diligently trying not to play facebook scrabble, gchat my best friend in LA about every detail of my life, or flirt with friends online. Yes, it has come to this. Avoiding the unavoidable which I should be able to avoid but don’t. A series of habits upon habits.

My friend sent me a link to a new Avett Brother’s song. I and love and you. I stare at it in my inbox, thinking back to that romantic love I’d feel swimming in my heart when any of my past boyfriends sent me something. That openness.

It’s a fall kind of song because we are getting to that time of year when my alarm goes off on my cell phone and I feel like it’s really a lot earlier than it seems to be. Some mornings are different than others, but I know that that consistency and time is part of the process. Just getting up and moving on.

There are some relationships that keep evolving long after they seem finished. During a break up you generally don’t hear about what’s going on with the person who used to know everything about you. And for right now I’m keeping it that way. And, unfortunately, it won’t be able to stay that way forever.

Sometimes love is misplaced or misguided, sometimes it was never really there, and sometimes you leave it in little spaces among the wreckage. Rarely does it make any sense to pick those pieces back up again.

I guess there’s a current to it all. I’ve been wading, watching, moving in my day today with ease and humor. But when I woke up this morning I felt part of that wreckage move with me, refusing to let go. Each day a new layer unfolds and I see how well things have fallen into place here in Asheville. Build, build, build, break…build again.

And then it all falls away and there’s a stillness to it. A sense of peace that I haven’t felt in a long time. It’s always been there it was just muddled...

New!! YES!! New Post!!

2009-09-04T15:30:00.000-05:00

It’s already getting to be fall in Asheville (although people keep swearing to me it’s going to get hot again-so don’t get too excited, Alex) and more and more I feel like change is still an amazing thing.

I find myself driving through downtown Asheville excited at the gap in terrible tourist drivers, cutting through the beer trucks and food delivery vans to get from teaching grammar to yoga to counseling. There’s a beat and a thought to it all.

Finding myself wrapped up in the buildings, in the mountains that surround the buildings, in the idea of Asheville and its constant reinvention. I almost forget about this pulse until I cut through downtown and remember why I live here. Why I’ve stayed here even when the city seems to shrink with acquaintances and the inevitable conversation at GreenLife.

One of my favorite parts about Asheville is there are no real shortcuts. Growing up my family always sought out the most efficient way of doing things. It was celebrated, in fact. The building of the Toll Road to replace the Leesburg Pike was a welcomed change to my dad’s daily commute into D.C. Up there, efficiency was drawn out into perfect turns onto back roads, new shortcuts around the ever-growing town, and an urgency of getting exactly where you needed to be when you needed to be there.

For a long time, even while I was regularly practicing yoga, I would reflect on the past as if it was the meaning of the present. As if it represented how I should be feeling in the moment.

I teach yoga three times a week at a local gym. While training many people warned me that there were NO teaching gigs left in Asheville and that teaching at a gym wasn’t nearly as “yogic” as teaching at a studio. This was of course contradicted by my fellow yoga instructor trainees and the director at the studio. Because if you put anything out into the universe it will, in some form, return back to you. But at some point you’ve even got to let go of that philosophy.

Any philosophy is a trap, really. Just the idea of living a certain way because of past experience is limiting. I often talk about suspending any ideas of what happened on their yoga mat the day or hour or even minute before. Because once we assign all these ideas we are forced to live by them.

There are layers gone just in time for the fall. Just in time for leaves and cool nights and mosquitoes disappearing.

That's What Real Friends Are For...

2009-04-21T13:55:00.001-05:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/21/health/21well.html?_r=1&em

Slacker!

2009-04-21T12:19:00.002-05:00

Yeah, Yeah.

Nothing new here...

2 years of a blog and each day I slack more and more...

I'm working on my artist flare. Everyone can be an artist as long as they have a blog, right? I mean, as long as I randomly update it, right?

Elk River Falls

2009-03-06T16:59:00.000-05:00

There’s a falls right outside of Banner Elk and it was one summer, sunny afternoon up in Boone and a couple of us decided to head out to the falls to jump off into the water below. I had no real idea what it was going to look like, or that my friends would freely jump into the water over and over again while I stood at the top, feeling I needed to prove that girls can do it too, my shorts shaking over my bare legs. I’d heard that people have died or been paralyzed by the fall. Something about rocks and cars being at the bottom.

There’s something in the idea of jumping out into nothing for no real good reason. Even when there are talks of how bad things are or how much money there isn’t or what needs to be cut where. And frankly, I’m sick of hearing about it. Now’s the time to be creative. To innovate. To jump.

At least, that’s what I try to tell myself. I keep picturing this sunny, lazy summer here in Asheville, working at some coffee shop or teaching yoga here and there. And it all seems to make sense. Because sometimes you just push and push and push until there isn’t anything to push up against. Until it all dissolves.

And as much as I love Obama and the idea of things getting better, there’s always something to learn from a “severe” recession. Because really, it’s a recess from money. Because really, security is an illusion. So says the girl who is searching for something to bridge the gap between jobs. Who is a constant in ideas of what could happen…because right now is the perfect time to be thinking of the next great idea.

My coworkers got me a book on writing and yoga and I’m teaching a workshop for yoga and intention during one of our career exploration programs. It’s all about setting an intention for your life and goals and acceptance of what is. Because I feel like I’m really struggling with accepting things the way they are right now. I think we all are.

It got to the point where the crowd (yes, there was a crowd of people hanging out and watching us) was counting down for me to jump into the falls below. And I stood, one foot back ready to launch myself into the falls below, the cheers and claps of the crowd muffled by the water. And then I would have done something that cool summer afternoon.

After I didn’t jump, after hours of waiting for a real reason to jump, one of the women from below came up the rocks to tell me: you’ll do it by the end of summer. I just know it. It’ll happen. It didn’t.

I'll Text Ya an Update at 12:15am

2009-02-12T16:22:00.000-05:00

There was a time when I swore I would never, ever, ever in a million years get a cell phone, that I would never be the person in the grocery line talking to a friend while checking out, that I would never, ever, ever be that person who checks her cell phone for texts from friends on a constant basis.

Never, ever, ever.

The gobbly gook I sent out last night was a half awake, then promptly falling asleep with my phone open, then an end of a message that read: Imp psuddenly hak?,?. Yes, it has come to this. I sent a text message in my sleep.

Granted, it didn’t make sense. At least the second half. And I sleep with my phone next to me because it doubles as an alarm clock. So really, I was simply finishing the thought I had hours beforehand.

I’m thinking that what I was attempting to text in my sleep was: I’m suddenly half asleep. Really, I could take this statement to mean many things in my life right now. I do, actually, suddenly fall asleep at around 9-9:30pm every night. I set myself up in bed to read or knit and within minutes, I am out.

So this morning when I woke up with my sticky-slept-in-my-mother-fucking-contacts-again eyes, I grabbed the phone thinking I had texted some big secret to my friends. Like some sort of mass text about something crazy going on in my life. Or that there’s absolutely nothing crazy going on in my life so what the hell are you even talking about and why are you texting me at 12:20 in the morning you crazy friend. But to my west coast friends it would only be 9:20. Just about the time I would be falling asleep in the desert in Las Vegas, if I was still there.

My classes got dropped at the community college and my job here ends at the end of May. Budget cuts for education when really we should all be focusing on what matters. Quite an interesting little society we have here.

I’ve explored a couple of options already. Yogaville for the month of June then some summer job here in Asheville. Maybe I’ll save up some money so I can work part time until I start teaching again in the fall. Maybe I’ll actually commit myself to writing more than just in a journal or on a blog. For so long I asked for things to be more flexible in my life, and now it’s here. I wanted to have more time for yoga teacher training and my classes got dropped. It’s a blessing in disguise. Things like that always are.

Two Months of Separation!

2009-02-02T10:15:00.001-05:00

I think I finally get it. Not it, it. But it. You know. IT.

I was sitting in yoga teacher training yesterday, finishing up a weekend of yoga and potential teachers and training, my hips in gomukasana, feeling some kind of anger for those tight muscles, patiently waiting for them to peel away the layers and layers I build on them everyday. We hide our emotions in our hips. It’s those sneaky corners that sway side-to-side, crease when we sit, and of course the hips are useful for many, many additional adventures.

After having a month off from both of my jobs and traveling home and to Charlottesville over the holidays, I had a lot of time to sit and think. A lot of time to explore Asheville, welcome my good friends to the area, and of course, yoga.

There really is a constant transformation of things. Everyday really is a new day. Something new to support or listen to, something new to explore and take in. Everyday. Even though things are quite hectic right now, I know that I’m in the best place possible.

There’s something very real and true about feeling who you truly are. About feeling your essence, somewhere buried deep down inside. Because we bury it, thinking that at some point we will all dig it up, scoop it out, and sift through the pieces. Like we will have these huge globs of ourselves sitting out on a coffee table. Sometimes it takes a nervous breakdown when people turn fifty; sometimes it takes a lifetime of yoga to really and truly believe in something inside of you.

I do know it doesn’t take a job or an apartment of your own, or close relationships to truly bring these things to the surface. I’m finally really looking forward to becoming a yoga instructor in May. For a while I was just going through the motions, doing my practice and meditation. Not even really serious about meditation. And then it hit me: this is it.

It’s kind of like the tough guy who writes about tough things his whole life, and then all of a sudden he gets his girlfriend or wife pregnant, reacts really scared and weird but excited about it, then ten months later he’s writing sappy, sentimental poetry about his baby’s eyes or the way it’s belly rises and falls as it sleeps. It’s like that. Before I went through this experience I promised myself I wasn’t going to really dive into yoga on my blog, that I didn’t want to become one of those people who talk about peace and inner harmony and appreciating the moment. I pre-judged myself and judged others for attempting to create a culture of happiness and contentment based on something other than material goods. On what’s under the surface of each surface.

In one of the books we read for training, she explains that we come into this world on an inhale and leave on an exhale. If you watch a baby sleeping on its back, its belly pleasantly moves up and down. For adults, we choke our breath into our throats and the top of our lungs, continuing to short ourselves.

I have my students write out their goals for the next couple of years and it’s an exciting time for me to be revising mine. Added are yoga retreats and writing more, because at some point I really do want to write a book. And in the middle of all this energy, knowing that both my contracts for work are up at the end of May, I know that there’s an opportunity in all of this. That Asheville in the summer teaching yoga is going to be amazing. I want to take a trip back out to the desert to see all of my friends and to teach a class at my friend’s house.

And of course it’s all about what you enjoy. For some people it’s watching a football game on a cold Sunday afternoon, or waking up to your son saying “hello” and “echo” to your high ceilings in your new home, or going to the farmer’s market in your new section of your city on a Sunday morning. For me, it’s that discovery.

Don't Quit Your Day Job

2008-12-03T19:42:00.003-05:00

It seems like everyday I wake up wondering what's going to be important for that particular day. And for awhile, I hestitated about writing about the newly elected Barack Obama, because most of me didn't even know what to say.

A couple of days after the election my aunt e-mailed some writings about her husband's death over three years ago. She wrote a hello and horay! for Obama and also attached some writings she thought I would enjoy. In her e-mail was the mention of a New York Times article on Albany, Georgia's celebration of Obama's victory.

I remember hearing about Barack Obama years ago from my dear friends who live in Chicago, how political consultants had told him to change at least part of his name in order to be remembered by the United States public. How inspired they had been by all he had done in Chicago. And how far I felt we needed to go in order have him actually elected as president. Actually, elected.

I think I was about twelve when my uncle confessed he had been arrested. In Albany, Georgia, he said. Like my young mind knew much about the civil rights movement and protesting and standing up for what is right. But over time I've learned the impact it's all had on everything. My aunt mentioned how much she wished my uncle had lived to see November 4th.

A couple of weeks ago I printed off my aunt's writings to read and placed them in my bag where I keep all my students papers and yoga books. And tonight, when I was all ready to play around on the internet for hours, I pulled out her writings and began to read. And it was so nice. She was finally sharing how she felt with me. Her writings are honest and refreshing.

I don't know if I'll ever really understand where my immediate family is coming from. I do know that all of these bits and pieces that I am collecting will someday come together to make sense. They have to.

Dear Barack Obama,

2008-11-28T18:09:00.003-05:00

I love the feeling of you being President. You are the same skin color black & white. Guess what else? We were both raised by our mom and didn't get to see our dad. We also have grandparent's who have passed on now. I am still young I am ten years old I'm sorry for not introducing myself. You being president elect makes me feel like I can be president someday. Because I am not going to be able to vote for you if you run again but I can vote in two elections. Then when I am 35 I will run. You are going to be great I know. I believe in you. You can do it.

Signed, one of my friend's 5th grade students, Covington, Kentucky, 11/06/08.

GO GO GO!

2008-10-24T09:29:00.001-05:00

It’s one of those rainy-cold days in Asheville, those days I used to daydream of when it hadn’t rained in months in Las Vegas. It’s all dark and gloomy outside and my office is cave-like today, keeping itself rounded against the rain.

I’m a student again, now. Yoga teacher training started last weekend and really it’s the beginning of something that will never end. And I really like it that way. We all lined up our sticky mats and blankets and learned about anatomy and yoga politics and downdog. At the end of the weekend I didn’t feel like a new person, but at the start of a new journey. Because it’s all one journey after another. Because this is why I moved to Asheville.

Carving out time to practice and meditate daily and read all the yoga books that are out there can be challenging. Sometimes it feels like everything is a means to an end rather than what’s in the moment. I find myself wishing the day away and then not being able to be present on my yoga mat. And that’s what it’s all about, right? Being present in the moment and creating that peace within…

Everyday we dedicate our practice to something. Whether it be to ourselves for healing or some higher power. Because in yoga, god is everything and everywhere. It’s whoever and whatever you want it to be. It transfers through languages and cultures. It recreates the idea of your world. When I was in Las Vegas healing a broken heart, I dedicated my practice to him everyday. And even though we weren’t talking at that point, and things seemed worse than they had ever been, I was finding peace within myself and sending it across the country to him. Because ever since I realized I loved him I couldn’t go back. That love radiated and for awhile, neither of us knew how to handle it. And when you finally do, it is amazing.

Obama spoke in Leesburg a few days ago and my mom e-mailed me that she was thinking about going. I wrote back GO GO GO! Now is the time to GO! When I asked her how it was she e-mailed me that they got there kind of late so he was already speaking but that it went well. Then she mentioned that she and my dad signed up for a yoga class together at the local recreation center. That they were trying to get some friends of theirs to join them.

There are many ways to heal the heart. People travel or meditate and do yoga. Sometimes it takes an amazing conversation over coffee or screaming in your car while driving home from a long day at work. Some people drink themselves silly or write everything out until their hands are sore. For me, it was getting that e-mail.

I Mean Silly Awesome Great and Gay

2008-10-13T10:27:00.000-05:00

If I were sixteen, I would be jumping up and down with them. My feet would be sinking deep into the floor as it stretched below me. And the smile on my face wouldn’t be so hidden by adulthood and awkwardness. Because when you see Of Montreal in concert, there’s a little kid in you that can’t help but dance.

And today I’m tired. But I can’t help but think about how hilarious it is that my best friend woke up to a Jesus fish carved into the side of her green jeep. And that she noticed it on the way to the vet to make sure her cat Delicious was okay. And that now the cat has a cone on her head and keeps running into the wall at her apartment.

After the lead singer of Of Montreal (they are from Athens, GA) dressed in nothing but tight, gold shorts, was painted all red, and then came out in a box covered in foam, he called out: thank you for letting us be ourselves. And it sounds so fucking corny but I really loved it.

I hadn’t been in one place where so many people were so happy and full of energy in a long time. I’m getting a little too used to my day-to-day work and yoga mode where I find myself hidden in lunch breaks in my office and singing in the car on the way from one school to the next. And on top of it all I am starting to freelance career counsel here in Asheville. Because the idea of creating my own career has always appealed to me I’ve just never had the guts to do it.

And even when things aren’t beginning to slow down and I start my yoga teacher training a week from tomorrow, I know that it’s all meant to be chaos. Folded on top of each other and around and never knowing when anything is going to end. And every time I try to stop this motion it cuts me short like a revolving door. Like I should just step in and go, instead of fearfully sticking my fingers out only to get slammed back into me.

And all I can picture is my best friend’s cat in her tiny apartment in LA running around that hardwood floor and sliding into the walls. And then just bouncing right off and back up onto her feet. And it’s hilarious.

Thank you, Delicious, for being yourself.

Out of Gas

2008-09-24T15:47:00.006-05:00

I like myself. I like myself. I like myself. I like myself. I was talking with a friend from Las Vegas last week about how recently I’ve felt really negative. That when I go to yoga I’m only scratching the surface rather than digging in deep. I told him that I was missing Las Vegas and yoga and that hot desert heat.

My classes are cancelled at the local community college here and I’m walking to work at my second job for the rest of the week. It’ll be about a 45 minute walk and I plan on doing a lot of thinking. I’m looking forward to it. Because even though my gas gauge is at about a quarter of a tank and the gas shortage in this area is supposed to clear up by early next week, I figured I would take advantage of a crisis.

In Boston, I used to take the T and walk 20 minutes to work. I’d put my IPod on and listen to music and think about my day. It was nice and refreshing. And now in Asheville it’s officially fall and even the trees are starting to change. And I like being back in that place.

My friend from Las Vegas sent me some motivational CD’s that we listened to as part of training at lululemon. He’s recently re-listened to them and talking to him made me realize what a slump I’ve been in lately. How I need to move and stretch my way out of it. I feel terrific. I feel terrific. I feel terrific.

The truth is, with yoga teacher training in three weeks, and my classes going really well and my career counseling picking back up again, I feel like the world is in a great place. And every time I think about what’s going on outside my mountain bubble, I want to pass what I’m thinking on to them. At least, that’s how I want to believe things are going. And as a result, that’s the truth of how they are going.

Seeing Obama speak in Charlotte this past weekend while visiting him gave me hope again. Even though all weekend I wrestled the idea of another long distance relationship, of driving down the mountain to see him and knowing things are amazing and that we’ve worked our differences out (even though I love a good fight), my habits take shape underneath it all and I can’t help but feel anxious about things. And maybe it’s because my parents haven’t e-mailed me or called since I’ve told them the news, or maybe it’s just an old habit that I tell myself. Because even when you know you deserve love, it doesn’t always feel great when you have to constantly explain yourself to your family. To realize that they’ve never really trusted you to make your own decisions. It’s isolating.

Everyday is new. And what I moved here for, what I’ve been looking forward to, is finally coming up in three weeks. In my yoga classes I keep concentrating on my hips (where emotions are stored), thinking that if I let it out in class that I won’t have to deal with it later. That as soon as I work on my tight hips I’ll be able to have a better relationship with my family. That working on changing that attitude will change things. It’ll open things up…

2008-09-08T11:33:00.005-05:00

go to wordle.net

Time, time, time...

2008-09-05T13:06:00.001-05:00

Part of me almost wants to congratulate all those that said the economy was going to shit. Say: “you were right!” with a big applause. Tell them that they knew things were unstable and on a shaky ground and thank you for being practical and warning us all about the end of our economy as we know it.

Then I think about the rash of friends who have recently been laid off. And there really has been a rash of them. For one reason or another, whether it be budget cuts or new hiring, as well as the company closing down altogether. And part of me wants to feel more appreciative of the opportunities created here in Asheville, and another part of me wants to rework the whole system. No jobs, no forty hour a work week, no idea of a career, but just living and being. I moved here knowing Asheville could provide that feeling for me. That that lifestyle existed here. There are still many realities in the world that you envision. And not all of these realities are negative.

I always wonder if the person moving and talking out in my world is the same one that I see inside, from behind it all. Like when he tells me I don’t communicate how I feel to him or that I have a hard time demonstrating my appreciation, I immediately think of my family and how often I feel that glare. There’s so much of that mixed in with the misunderstandings between my mom and me. Because for me, there’s that extra pause of anxiety before telling someone I love them.

Right now I’m teaching at a local community college. My three classes are all very different, and my goals in teaching them are to help them realize their potential. Sounds corny and lame, and for some of them it takes a lot of effort to sit still and not fall asleep at eight in the morning. And for a little while, I was getting frustrated at some of the lack of response in my classroom. And then I realized, it wasn’t them, it was me. I was searching for validation from the wrong source. We all have to know we are doing a good job at whatever we are doing, and that we are all contributing to something greater than ourselves. And that idea doesn’t have to be thought about everyday, but can easily be tucked away under thoughts of the day.

There’s this constant struggle with myself as a writer. Some of my friends from college have given up on writing. They say it’s the best thing they’ve ever done. And when I think about what I really want to do and what I’m doing now, there’s constant thoughts of what could happen. It’s like I’m still working towards feeling satisfied and balanced in my life. I do it everyday.

Pour a little salt we were never here...

2008-08-02T17:06:00.002-05:00

I can still remember the smell of the hardwood floors underneath my sister's bed. The dust that hadn't moved in weeks. The feeling of hiding there in hopes of being gone forever. Of just disappearing for awhile.

I'm in Philadelphia with my family celebrating my sister's 30th birthday. Things are patched up for now, hidden under what my parents really want me to do and how I envision my life. We don't talk about yoga teacher training, but details are asked about my new jobs in my field. And I do feel good about it, but not for any of the reasons they do.

When the topic of parking in the Charlotte airport is discussed, I mention that I got a ride and the conversation stops. It's how I've always felt-frustrated and on the verge of telling the truth. But sometimes it's easier to be casual. And easy seems like the better choice.

Growing up I always knew I would leave the D.C. area and driving in last night to go to Bon Iver show, I realized even more why I left that area of the world. I felt stuck. And being alone at a show makes you take in the noise even more. Makes you hear the chatter below his soft, high voice. Wondering too where he's going to go from here. Whether heartbreak in the woods of Wisconsin should become popular. Whether things like his music should be felt in a room full of people asking for skinny love or another beer. And the whole time I wondered how he felt about that.

Eventually everyone is found. My mom stepped next to me under my sister's bed, angry at me for snapping the leg off of one of her old dolls. Talking about not knowing if there was a place to fix it in town. Then hearing how much it hurt her to have me break this doll from her childhood. And then watching it sit on the shelf in her closet for years, wondering when she was going to get around to fixing it.

There's the building and the breaking and the building...

2008-07-10T18:23:00.002-05:00

There's a certain sense that when you are driving up to the mountains, to where you've done days and days of driving and moving to get to, that there's no way that this small city is really it. That if I somehow keep driving I'll find somewhere hidden and new. That the journey just keeps continuing.

I talked to one of my good friends today who is moving down here from Chicago at the end of the year. We talked about writing and careers and feeling like what you are doing is making sense in being a part of this world. I felt like she was right next door already, and that things and time had just passed. That I was going over to her place to have dinner with her husband and baby boy. That now both my friends from Chicago were back to go on hikes and start a garden in their backyard. It's so weird how things feel that way sometimes.

There was the beautiful Colorado River while in Arizona, green against red, and the poverty across the whole country and into Yukon, Oklahoma, birthplace of Garth Brooks. And a mule ride on the north ridge of the Grand Canyon. And moving away from this strange place that I called home for a year, and into a new place that I'd always seen as my home. I want to shout to everyone I see, including the CVS girl who tells me she's had too much candy at the checkout counter, or the snobby checkout girl at the overpriced downtown green grocery store: "I'm here to do something amazing!" I promise. "I'm getting started tomorrow!" And that's here now.

Getting used to things, even final things, is an adjustment. After being with friends driving across the country and then in Boone and Charlotte I just can't seem to quite adjust. I don't know the yoga instructors and everything is so new again. So I wonder why I'm doing this, again. Why it matters so much to me to be here.

And it's that question of what you do when you get to the end of a journey. I guess you just start a new one.

This Fucking Yogini is Eastbound...

2008-06-20T21:36:00.002-05:00

Tomorrow night my friend from Kentucky is flying into Las Vegas and my other friend is driving in from L.A. We are going to one last celebration and one last yoga class before my Kentucky friend and I drive back east. I haven't written on this blog in over a month and I really don't know why. I guess real things just caught up to me. And now I'm leaving Las Vegas on Monday, headed for those North Carolina mountains.

I signed up for yoga teacher training which starts in October in Asheville, NC. I've always talked about it and now I'm finally going. It's a whole new chapter and experience. Beginning with a mule ride across the north ridge of the Grand Canyon and ending with the 4th of July in Boone. I will be spending time with friends in the mountains. Because the more I think about it, the more I realize that the lifestyle that was laid out for me at birth is not the lifestyle that I am going to live.

I spent one of my last nights in Vegas on a moonlight hike in Red Rock Canyon. We stayed up all night on those rocks and watched the sun come up over that red-orange sky. I feel like I've spent my time here well. And I know I will miss the friends I have made here. I always do. There are amazing people everywhere, it's just a matter of finding the ones you love and staying with that.

There's a million reasons not to go. I just moved out here, the economy is not doing as well as usual, gas prices are high, I don't have a job yet, my health insurance will run out at the end of the month, etc. So maybe just a couple of reasons.

Growing up, I always thought my relationship with my parents would get easier the older I got. But it just hasn't. They were so angry at me for creating my life out here in Las Vegas, and now they don't understand my decision to move back east. In my mom's eyes, I am being irresponsible. She told me over the phone that I can't always follow my dreams. I can't imagine ever giving that up, especially at 26. Explaining that each new experience leads to the next, that compassion and acceptance are easier than judgement and opposition, is lost when it comes to parent-child relationships in my family. We have never seen eye to eye. And it has cost us our relationship. And at this point I don't know what to do about it. I don't expect my mom to change, but I do know who one of my very first students will be.

I'm under the belief that yoga is the key to challenging everything you've ever thought about in your life. It's the key to happiness and love and all that corny bullshit that we constantly shy away from in life. To peace and change. I believe opposition to yoga is the idea that life is harder than we think and that faith cannot carry us to a happy place. I believe that following one's dreams is always the path and daily yoga and meditation are key to figuring out the lifestyle that you want to lead.

I'm hoping to find peace with my parents. To continue to forgive and remember the things that amaze me about them. My mom's unending worry and love for her family. Her belief in my talents to do something amazing in this world. My dad's ability to pass no judgement. His talent for knowing and learning. When I picture my parents, who they really are, my mom is walking our dog Liza on the side street in the morning. My dad is out in the garden in a torn old t-shirt taking care of each and every plant. One is in the morning, just after the sun breaks, and there's that fog falling all over the road. The other is in the late afternoon on a Saturday, the sun starting to set slowly over the trees I used to hide behind when I was a child.

Knee Poem

2008-05-21T18:29:00.001-05:00

It is almost like
I am perching
or like a kickstand
but it doesn't hold me up
just separates.

Ever since I can remember
it's been one knee out
like tree pose
only laying down
just to make space.

It's a habit I only broke once
for a couple of months
while we slept
knees into knees
just for a little while.

That first night you were gone
I lifted my knee up
like a warrior
defending myself
just because.

I had extra space
the length of my thigh
is what I gave you
muscles, blood, skin
just for you.

I Love Beards! Yes, Beards!

2008-04-21T15:04:00.003-05:00

To all of the places that I have known. To all of the places that I have known. To all of the places that I have known. To all of the places that I have known!

I have this visualization of my best friend sitting in first chair next to her rival saxophone player, the heavy brass instrument hanging beside her. He only got to be first chair about twice during middle school, because everyday after school she was forced to practice for two hours to keep that chair. To keep that passion of music. And then when high school came she divided her time between drama after school and marching band before. After graduating from college she moved to New York City and then L.A. to pursue a career in acting. She left that saxophone in her parents house in Virginia.

About a month or two ago when she finally gave up her dreams of being an actress, she started a music blog (it's linked underneath my faded beach picture, selectbypush) and started writing music reviews for popmatters.com. She also got an internship at a record label to really start getting into the business. Her blog is all about the bands that are going to be at Coachella, where we are meeting in a couple of days.

I don't feel like she's really giving anything up, actually. And for her, music never really went away. She's just rediscovering her passion for it. She's brought out that old saxophone and she's finally starting to play it in front of people.

It is called Bunkerhill Saloon and it's on the outskirts of downtown old Vegas. It's basically on a street of apartment complexes and I think as we pull up that we could discover another side of Vegas tonight. When we walk in the opening band is still playing and a couple people are dancing at this old bar and I see beards and flannel shirts and I think: this really could be something. I'm immediately in North Carolina, but this lasts about twenty minutes.

By the time Akron/Family sets up their equipment themselves, half the crowd is drunk or has left. There's about ten of us who are really interested in what's going on and as they begin to play some ass hole by the bar yells: "you suck!" The bass player gladly dedicates their set to him before the second song. It's just three of them, and they are loud, folk, electric, and amazing. I think I'll leave the music writing to my best friend and my roommate, but it truly was one of the best shows I've ever been to. It was seven bucks, a couple of PBR's, and a reminder of how important music is to me in my life.

After the show we tell them what a great job they did, my roommate buys a t-shirt and we say we'll see them at Coachella this weekend. Thursday night we are heading out to the campground after my roommate gets off of work. I was going to go into work an hour early today to get the schedule ready for when our manager gets back into town. We've had a couple of people quit recently, so I've already got to adjust the schedule accordingly. I'll never really know what makes people tick or how people find what they are passionate about, but I feel like something is tilting in my life, spilling over.

I'm already late sitting here writing this blog. I think I'll stay and keep listening to music with my patio door open. I think I'll go into work when I'm supposed to and know that I can get it done later. For right now, I just want to hang out and enjoy some music and think about this weekend...

Blogaversary.

2008-04-16T11:34:00.002-05:00

One year ago I started this crazy thing. So I officially know exactly what I was doing a year ago today. Whole Foods, gas prices (75 cents cheaper), Virginia Tech shootings, going to work, the way the weather felt that day, listening to Wilco, going to coffee.

Honestly, I'm just having a weird day. But I wanted to write because it's been one year and it's weird. Just having a blog and writing about myself is weird.

While Hiking at Red Rock...

2008-04-13T18:13:00.005-05:00

rocks hardwired to other rocks slipping underneath your gray newbalance shoes luon sticking to a cactus picked out over raw hummus and smoothies and sun gazing over a fake lake paddle boats old school style any style two men smoking cigarettes and one has risked his life for the other you can just tell by the way they swagger around each other and you sit and enjoy some fake grass after trying to catch up on the way up the desert mountain and on the way down you were like a cat, impressive and red cheeks and nose dry in that desert and the strip was tiny, you crushed the stratosphere with your index and thumb all those people making bad decisions below you and earth and breeze and some cashews and dates pictures being taken and remembered one after another with sweat frozen with dust to your forehead and it's so nice to have a day off and see the red rocks in the distance one after another laying on each other so soft and curled up and sitting, one leg on top of the other, you talk about things that have been, travels to what you considered the edge of the earth and to you it's impossible to only have been as far east as Chicago but then again the last time you were in Portland you were four and things scramble on the way down you turn and scale a mountain and miss a yoga class and things don't seem to bother you as much as they used to even as he moves way out ahead of you and even when on the way up you pointed out your family dynamic in a group of friends your mom in the car your dad way up ahead and sister mediating in the middle brother off missing somewhere and you taking a break near the bottom and when you see them at the top the you has wondered off and made it up first and you take a picture of yourself and he then takes a picture of you in a bridge pose and yoga makes you heal and wonder about these kinds of things wandering around the mountain and you both can even see Utah from here and then driving to go get those smoothies and sit by the lake you stop by a neighborhood with hills of fake grass and both see your teenage years in a flash of smoke and you put your broken sunglasses on, crooked on your sunburned nose and you move slowly to something tired, something rested, something unheard of before now...

I think I'll spend my whole life deciding if this is true or not.

2008-04-02T12:22:00.003-05:00

I woke up on Sunday morning in an awful mood that I just couldn't shake. Even though I had plenty of sleep the night before and I was getting ready to go to a Steve Ross workshop across town. He was the first person I ever did yoga with, on the Oxygen network, in my living room in Virginia. In the house I grew up in my kitchen is attached to the living room, so my family was hanging around as I tried to concentrate on postures. "Does that really do anything?" my brother asked me mid-pose. "Can't you see I'm sweating?"

My dad firmly believes (he only firmly believes in anything, it's never a half-assed thing for him) that people are born with certain dispositions. Who they are is who they are, and there is no changing that. There are certain things one can do throughout life to adapt to situations, but generally people are set in their ways from very early on.

My new roommate and I went together to the yoga class; he went to a coffee shop to write while I went to my yoga class. In the car and earlier that morning I was just being an ass hole the whole time. I couldn't shake this bad mood and I was taking it all out on him. Telling him I needed space and that I was one of those abnormal people in that I needed time to myself for about two hours a day or I get really impatient with people around me. It was a similar conversation to the ones we used to have when we were dating. I just went right back to that formula.

It's all really silly, anyway. Even as I got to the yoga class, one I'd been looking forward to all month; I couldn't really process how I was feeling. The kind of yoga that Steve Ross teaches is relaxed but intense; basically he wants you to eventually come into your own true self. At least, that's how I see it. He plays hip hop music and expects you to not take yourself so seriously. Toward the end of the class he leaned down to me while I was stretching in a hip-opening pose and said: You're quiet today. Is it working for you? I stubbornly answered : YES!

Tomorrow, of all days...

2008-03-21T15:05:00.005-05:00

Stack his journals, pictures, clothes, and razor on the chair in the living room. Go through the box of pictures, pick out the best ones with him and his brother, the best ones from your wedding, one with your son playing his violin, and one of your daughter sitting on the front steps. Wash the clothes, throw away the razor, and start to read through his journal for good poems about his life, about nature, about Buddhism. Stop at the poem about your son, about the day the three of you trekked through a snow storm to get him to his violin lessons, about how you were the only ones who showed up that day and proudly announced that you were from New England. About time, and change, and how later when your son came home one weekend from college he was different. He had grown a beard. And the poem compared him to a snow angel, and how his arms grew wings and carried him away. He wrote about how he missed his son now that he was no longer living at home. How he didn’t feel like he knew him anymore.

Don’t play any Johnny Cash, it’ll make you cry. Wash the sheets so they don’t smell like him anymore. In fact: vacuum, clean the counters, take out the recycling, sweep the front porch, move each vase of flowers from the living room to the dining room and then back. Smell the flowers and know that in two weeks, they, too, will be gone. Get out all the necessary paperwork. Find it in his desk drawers and in the safe in the attic. Look at the paperwork; thumb through it like it makes sense, like you can concentrate on it, then put it away until tomorrow. Until your brother is there because he is good at handling all of the necessaries. Take Zeke on his walk, and remember his Frisbee. Wait.

Touch the New York Times Magazine that has sat on your couch since the day they called you out of class. Since the day your students wondered when you'd be back to teach English, and since they started sending cards saying: “We’re sorry for your loss.” Look again at the magazine and remember how you took it with you to the Emergency Room that day, thinking you would have to wait a couple hours before he was out of the hospital. Remember the nurses’ face as you asked to see him.

Fluff the couch cushions and put a kettle on the stove. Line all of the different teas on the clean counter. Get out the milk and sugar. Remind yourself to go to the store to get more milk. You’ll do that in a couple of days. When things have settled down and no one is leaving dinner or flowers on your doorstep. Wait.

Give long, intense hugs and watch your son and daughter pull their luggage across the room. Watch them hang up their coats, as they tell you that people will be there soon and that everything is ready and the food is on the way and that everything is going to be okay.

Show your daughter the flowers that a family of one of his students sent, and watch her scoff at the thought of it. Because to her, flowers don’t represent comfort, but anger and rage, and the replacement that smells up a corner of the room. Watch her walk into the kitchen and immediately begin to cry when she sees the calendar hanging on the wall, marked with School Staff Meetings at 7 p.m., a trip to Irvine, California, and then, on March 22nd, Ralph dies. Look at her touch the calendar, and then walk outside to the back porch and pick up the phone to call her friends in California.

Listen to each story about how he shaved his beard just above the lip so that a deaf student could read his lips. About how he wanted each student to feel comfortable in his classroom. Listen to how he took a deer off the highway and brought it to a butcher because it was such a waste not to. About how he drove past it on the highway twice and then decided to pull over, wrap it in his coat, and place it in the trunk. How you told him to take care of it, because a hanging deer in the middle of a Philadelphia suburb wasn’t exactly normal. But neither was he.

Watch as your two brothers and their families read about how he found God in nature, and how he hiked as much of the Appalachian Trail as possible. Until his sixty year-old body couldn’t take it anymore. Until he hit Pennsylvania and the green and mountains had become too much for his knees. Listen to your neighbors tell people how he darted across the street the first day they moved in to carry a coffee table and welcome them to Philadelphia. Watch your brother hand you a picture of him dancing a few months ago at your nephew’s wedding. Remember how he slid his thin legs across the marble floor, suspenders held tight against his chest, eyes closed in harmony with his own tune.

Listen to his patience, whispering in your ear that it will all be over soon, that things will settle down. That he will call any minute and tell you why he decided to ride his bike to the hospital the day he felt his shortness of breath, how a young girl was in the elevator when he hit his head on the rail, and fell over from a sudden heart attack. How lucky he was to be in the hospital, but how unlucky he was to have a small piece of plaque in an artery of his heart. How he loved the metal of that bike, and how much he appreciated the hospital returning it when he couldn’t. When he was returned in ashes and air and flowers and food and family you haven’t seen in many months, even years.

Wonder how you will survive the ceremony the next day. Wonder why his death is the only time his whole family could be in one room. Slowly watch people leave your house. Feel them hug you. Feel the cool air that brushes over you just after a hug, and then feel nothing.

***

Three years ago tomorrow I was living in Boston, across town from where my uncle grew up. I was in this writing group that met out at bars once a week and that week we decided to do a list writing exercise. I had just gotten back from my uncle's funeral when I wrote this, sitting at my kitchen table. I don't begin to know how my aunt was feeling, but I do know that when I wrote this, things began to heal for me. Even some of the truths I knew at the time, or some of the truths I've heard later, after I wrote this, don't matter in this writing exercise. In my small family, we don't always talk about things in the most candid way, but my aunt contains something very true and real about her. Especially after her husband died, it seems. Maybe nows the time to start writing a letter or email. I want to hear stories about her and my dad and their brother. And I don't even want to bother with the truth.

Bring on the Belated Birthday Wishes...

2008-03-07T18:29:00.002-05:00

Amazingly enough I don't even mind the traffic in Los Angeles. Maybe it's just because I don't live here or maybe it's because every time I visit my best friend I want to pack up my stuff and move out here. Work for lululemon and do yoga and hang out on the beach in California. Surround myself in that creative air. Because that's really how I see LA, anyway.

Then come the excuses. It's too expensive. It's too superficial. It's too ridiculous. The biggest thing I've learned from living in Las Vegas: it's what you make of it.

A year ago yesterday I was hanging out with my two best friends in LA as well. It was the week I decided to move out here and quit my career counseling job. It was the week I starting realizing and feeling more like myself. I remember getting calls from east coast friends early in the morning last year, so I put my phone in the other room. This year, all my early morning calls came from west coast friends.

The silliest part about birthdays is it forces you to look back to what you were doing the year before. And each year, I'm amazed at how different my life is. How many changes I've gone through in that one year. Quitting my first real job. Moving across the country. Two break-ups. Starting a new job. Financial struggles. And I know that in a year, things will be completely different again. Maybe I won't be just visiting LA.

We took a yoga class yesterday where the instructor focused on duality. Meaning: bringing how you feel onto the mat and off of the mat. At one point he had us in a pose breathe out something that was bothering us or causing us pain. And instead of layers upon layers of things pouring into my head, some slow, subtle thoughts came to mind about what I can change in my life. What I know I can just breathe out and let go. And for the first time, I think I truly understood that.

There's a Lobster Behind the Fridge.

2008-02-26T23:49:00.001-05:00

I wrote this blog in my head while driving to yoga this morning and I have a feeling that it's not going to come out quite right. I mean, I sometimes try really hard not to write about things that are really personal to me (hence the recycling rant below) but at some point I just have to do it.

I was wearing our orientation green t-shirt and we were sharing a bed in Venice, Italy. I had known something was wrong for awhile, but admitting it at this point was impossible. I remember wishing I could go back in time to when things were good and clear. I think I've written about the break up with my college boyfriend and me before.

Months later, on a fall it's-getting-really-cold-soon night in Boston we were on my front porch at five in the morning arguing about being in each other's lives. He was too polite to tell me to just let go, but that's exactly what I needed to do.

I have this weird reoccurring daydream where I'm talking to my son or daughter (it changes, depending on the day) and we are up in my attic (it's the scary wooden one in Leesburg where I used to creep around trying to find old toys I had grown out of or Christmas gifts my mom had hidden from us) and we are going through a box of old pictures and we stumble onto this picture of me and another man and my son or daughter asks: Mommy, who's that? It's seriously that corny and unassuming. And I go on to explain who it was, that I loved him at some point in my life but that I love their dad now. And that's it.

I will be the first to admit I'm not the best at letting go of people in my life. After that argument on the porch we decided to not talk for a couple of months. Let things heal a little. It took our best friends wedding in North Carolina to bring us back together as friends.

And after that I dated my boyfriend from Boston for a year longer than I should have, to be honest. I didn't love and respect him the way he deserved and we both struggled with letting go in the end. And now he's got a job in Las Vegas and he's driving across the country on his way to take over the lease of my apartment. Even though I'm staying around Vegas for a little while longer, I'm excited to have another friend in this city. We can start over new.

I just got back into town last night from New Mexico. My mom and dad and sister were there, and we stayed in this little, Southwestern-style apartment. I knew my parents could hear the argument in their room, but I didn't care. I was back on that porch in Boston, but it was New Mexico vs. North Carolina in this one. Deciding to hurt each other. Because honestly, it was time to let go and I hadn't recognized that.

I woke up the next morning with most of all a sense of relief. My current daydream consists of an awkward Annie Hall moment in a bar in North Carolina months or even years from now. And I've had this one before. We are both exactly where we want to be in life, and after a great conversation over beers we finally relax, settle in, and then one of us has to go, so we stand up together, awkwardly sway in front of one another in an attempt to pick sides in a hug, and then turn and say good-bye. And this is at the very least.

It's a Wasteland.

2008-02-19T01:56:00.002-05:00

On days when I'm feeling particularly selfish, I try to think of ways I can impact the world in a positive way. Why can't I find some way to make all of my ideas, and my ideals, a reality. That's basically at the core of everything.

When you recycle in Las Vegas, they take your bottles and cans and throw it all together into one big pile, supposedly to be separated at the landfill. At least, that's what they tell people. When you go on the recycling section of the city page it just loops you around in a circle. Six bags of recycling sit in my dining room, waiting to be taken out somewhere. But I'm convinced now that Las Vegas just doesn't recycle.

A couple of my friends and I were talking after work about making a documentary about the problem of no recycling in Vegas. The issues of no community or attachment to anything tangible, even if you try really hard. In thinking that the community here is one that is temporary, a wasteland that people come to to make money and leave. I came here for peace and discovered so much more, and now I'm ready to leave. I got what I wanted from Vegas, and can't imagine investing anymore than that.

This is where I fit into the problem. Of making things temporary. Of creating an idea about a documentary that really should be made, but probably won't in the end. When I was talking to my friend about energy and solar power in Vegas, and how we don't utilize the sun in this crazy city, he simply said, "if you think about it, Vegas shouldn't even really exist." He's right.

My friends and I drove up to Red Rock this past weekend and decided not to drive around the park area because there were too many cars. It felt all crowded and overused. "Vegas isn't that bad," they remarked. In the end, explaining what I've learned and grown from personally by making this move seems trivial. In the end, I feel guilty for living in such a self-indulgent city. When I see all the tourists walking around, gambling and spending, they seem to just want to take from the city this idea that something greater exists. That the world comes to Vegas in all its glory. In order for Vegas to exist, other parts of the world must suffer and go without. And at some point, some point soon, I can't be a part of that.

It's Valentine's Day.

2008-02-14T23:38:00.003-05:00

Normally, I'd be happy about Valentine's Day. In fact, we had all these events in the store today and all in all I had a pretty good day. My friend from Kentucky texted me from the airport in Cincinnati that she was on her way and I told her I'd pick her up from the Vegas airport around midnight. That we might be going out with some of my friends to a battle of the sexes poetry slam in Caesar's Forum Shops. That doing that was enough of a welcome to Vegas.

Instead of that I get a text after yoga class that her flight got delayed and she'll be missing her connecting flight so she probably won't be able to make it out to Vegas this weekend. I cry right there in the yoga studio with my two friends who I met up with...because I really needed her to visit this weekend and I'd been looking forward to it for months.

So instead of going out I just took a bath and now I'm sitting here, stewing about how much I miss my friends and the east coast. Instead of investing in the amazing friends I have here I'm deciding on feeling sorry for myself tonight. Because that's just what I want to do.

Even though he's moved back across the country we still talk every so often. We sent each other Valentine's Day gifts but haven't been able to get a hold of one another all day. I find myself not wanting to talk about it to anyone because after not seeing him for a month and a half I can't even remember what he smells like, much less how I've been feeling about things lately. At some point I just decided to let things happen and see where it takes me. Loving someone is just something I've never been able to control. And I wouldn't want to, either.

Part of me wants to get out of bed and change into clothes, drive to the strip and hang out with friends. The friends I have here and now. Because I realized today that I have more friends in Vegas than I did in Boone even. And these are great people who I get to see almost every single day. But at some point you can't replace my friend from Kentucky or that feeling I get when I'm around him. But she's not on a plane on her way here and I'm still sitting here, waiting to see if my legs will move me to some kind of decision.

May it Always Be

2008-02-08T01:02:00.000-05:00

We spend so much time (at least, I do) trying to live in the present. Going to yoga, relaxing, sitting and thinking, painting, waiting in traffic. It's all right here. All in all, things are pretty boring right now. And I kind of like it that way.

I've really started to like Las Vegas for it's energy, even though it's pretty quiet right now and even though on my way to and from work I see at least one accident each way. I passed by one today at the exact point where I got into mine a month ago. And it really didn't seem that long ago, especially from the feeling I get when the car in front of me slams on their brakes.

I tried for a very long time not to make decisions based on money, and last week they caught up to me. Because I quit my job last year I basically get nothing back from taxes even though I paid a ton (where do they go again?) and with the taxes on my new car plates I can bearly make rent. I have a friend who is moving here who might take over my lease, so I'd be free to leave whenever I want. Or at least find a temporary place while I'm still in Vegas. But I'm at the point where I don't want things to be temporary again.

I really have nothing to write about. Things are just keepin' on.

Out with the old...

2008-01-15T20:49:00.000-05:00

For awhile I seriously thought the worst thing in the world that could happen to me would be to get into a car accident. Thinking: I have no friends out here in Vegas, the people are mean, and my health insurance is still in paperwork form. And I figured I had at least three or four more months with the Honda.

I have to admit I freaked out a little bit. While trying to get from the middle exit lane to the side of the road on a busy highway I wondered where my phone was. That I needed to call my dad and get him out here immediately to help me. That I'd just smacked into someone who hit another car and the honda was smoking on the side of the road. I called one of my friends from work who came right over to help me. Without question, she was there for me.

Maybe things happen to test you to find out a different perspective on a place. I've heard horror stories about car accidents in Vegas. But everyone was nice and supportive, including my dad. When I called crying, yelling that I hated Vegas and just wanted to come home, that I'd had enough of this place, he reminded me of my goals and how self-destructive it can be to not be completely present while living in a place. That North Carolina will always be there.

My parents helped me buy a new car. I explained to the dealer that I was going to pay them back each cent and that I wasn't that kind of daughter and that I really, really wished I had the money to do this on my own but that I've got this new job that I love but it's not the best pay but I'm really good at budgeting and just happy to have parents who will help me negociate for a new car after I've wrecked the old one. When I was fifteen I backed that exact car into a tree in the driveway. My dad calmly understood that it was a mistake but my mom was really upset with me. This time, she just reminded me why she wanted me to get my health insurance at work all taken care of. I think I just assume my parents will never change despite everything that happens in a day. Despite it all.

2008-01-07T00:59:00.000-05:00

The heart pumps blood to itself before it reaches any other organ in the body.

2008-01-06T16:34:00.000-05:00

When I was younger and would get in trouble my dad used to make me sit on the steps and think about what I'd done. He would always tell me to quit feeling sorry for myself whenever I told him that I hated him and wished I had different parents. When you have opposing values from your parents, it's really hard to ever see eye to eye. There's always something there pulling at both of you, and sometimes things just snap.

I've spent the last three weeks feeling sorry for myself. Wanting to run away from this place that's so awful. Wanting things to work out when I haven't even realized how much we both created stories about each other. I created a story that he was going to leave, and so he did. But things are never really that simple. And if they were, they would never really be worth it.

We have a January challenge at work to see who can go to the most fitness classes for the whole month. I did yoga in the middle of the Fashion Show mall on the strip in Las Vegas, Nevada today. I write it all dramatically because in the middle of class I realized exactly where I was. And it was incredible.

As part of my job we write our one, five, and ten year personal, business, and fitness goals. It can seem intimidating at first considering my goals and perspective change every week but there are always certain things that stay the same.

Five Year (November 2012-30 years old)
I am being: To make this happen I am being ambitious, creative, peaceful, and organized.
• I live in Asheville, North Carolina, having successfully opened a lululemon athletica as store manager or community coordinator.
• I lead a GREAT staff of people, motivating them to achieve their goals.
• I am going through yoga teacher training.
• I am a published author in small magazines and am working on a book to be published.

Five Year (November 2012-30 years old)
I am being: To make this happen I am being environmental, stable, and content.
• I drive a Prius car.
• I own a house that I will completely redo to be environmentally friendly, as well as remodeling my house by going to garage sales and making new furniture.
• I contribute to the Asheville community through lululemon, yoga, and volunteering.
• I am in a passionate, amazing relationship (possibly married).

I feel silly sharing these now knowing how much will change. For now what I'm working on is being able to do a freakin' headstand alone, not up against a wall, during yoga. And to be able to breathe calmly for fifteen seconds while doing it.

East Coast Time

2007-12-28T13:55:00.000-05:00

I don't even think I was home for more than 30 hours. But I got to see my family on Christmas morning and hang out with some friends from high school that night. We went out to a bar expecting to see lots of people but my friend let me know that Christmas Eve is the new night to go out in Leesburg. Oh how things have changed.

Now that I'm back in Las Vegas for a couple of days before heading to Charlotte to spend New Year's with my college friends, I'm really wondering what's keeping me here. I can work back in Virginia or North Carolina for the same company I work for now, only in a community that I care about. I keep trying to remind myself of the idea that a place is only what you make it, but Vegas made itself up a long time ago and no one stays here long because of it. And I'm just one of those people waiting to leave at this point.

I'm hoping that when I get back to North Carolina I'll actually stay still for a little while. I'll figure out how to be in the present and know what I'm looking for. On the vision board at work I've got mountains in the backround and my goals are to open a store in Asheville and settle in there. To eventually become a yoga instructor and own my own studio. It's a peaceful life where I'm walking down the street with my children to get breakfast on a cold Saturday morning. And then I look at what I want to do before all that and think: I'm right where I need to be.

Virginia Bound

2007-12-24T16:11:00.001-05:00

I'm having one of those mornings where I have too much time to think. I've packed my bags to go home for Christmas for two days...I am closing the store tonight, parking my car at the Las Vegas airport and arriving in Virginia to surprise my parents on Christmas morning. My sister's helping me as her gift to me...the flight prices kept going up and down and I was happy to see it finally went down enough to make it worth it. At this point, I was ready to pay anything for 36 hours at home.

It's interesting how we figure out what we value and need. I love the idea of being free and open...I'm listening to the Jackson Browne record he left me hiding behind our old dresser for Christmas. It's bringing up those feelings of why I moved out here in the first place. Of why I hate being stuck out here now.

I love my new job. I lost my keys the other night and I just stayed over at my manager's house. Her family was in town and they kept trying to cheer me up. When I found them in the back room under the fridge the next day I felt such a relief. All I could think about when I lost my keys was how alone I feel in this city. But that got me nowhere. It just made me feel bad about myself.

I think the process of letting go is a long one. Especially when you can't explain why you are drawn to certain people in your life. Even when they don't make sense to you, it's just this feeling of being open and calm and excited.

I'm going home tonight. And my apartment will stay here and when I get back I'll clean up the dishes in the sink and finally start to dust off the banjo that's been sitting in the corner of my bedroom for months.

My New Home

2007-12-14T21:31:00.001-05:00

A New Routine...

2007-12-14T21:04:00.000-05:00

My apartment is naturally colder without him. I'm watching the Appalachian State football game alone in my apartment on a Friday night, after working all day. And that's the mistake people make. They think they need lots of alone time and decide to throw themselves into working all the time.

He's on east coast time now in Charlotte, NC where many of our friends live. I'm picturing him at a bar right now, happily settling in to his new home. Or at a car dealership negociating for a new car to drive around in his new city. It's hard when you wonder about something and build things up to be something great, only to have them not work out. What I didn't expect was how hard it was going to be to say good-bye to him.

So many things remind me of him. I live right near the movie theatre we used to go to all the time and there's an empty whiskey bottle on the kitchen counter. He told me I was playing sad music and making things harder than they have to be. I guess I was finally figuring out how much I cared about him. I never really realized that before then, which is normally how it works anyway.

I realize that this is just a stage and that feeling sorry for myself and jealous that he's around great people in NC will pass. I'll figure out how to go to the movies by myself and know that I moved to Vegas for myself, not for him. At least that's what I'm telling myself for now. Part of me half expects him to walk through the doors with groceries in his hand, and things would be different. Then again, I half expected everything with him and all it caused was problems. I have no idea why I've held on to this idea of him for so long, or if I'll ever let it go, but I know it's much better as an idea and not a reality. He made no sense in reality.

It's hard to feel so disconnected and alone. It's hard to think of how my life will be without him. But I know that there were unfixable problems with us and that being without him is better now. And in a couple of weeks I'll look back on this blog and think how ridiculous I am for posting this crap. But I just don't care about it at this point.

How We Remember

2007-11-25T15:26:00.000-05:00

It's funny how we remember or how we want to remember people. There's this idea that we make stories about the people in our lives and from that, we react the way we expert things to happen. I've been trying to be more positive lately, shoving aside my usual self. And I think it's working.

I started the master cleanse yesterday as a way to transition into eating healthier and having more energy. I'm trying not to have negative expectations but not eating for ten days to clear out my system seems a little daunting. I'm trying hard to imagine the positive effects it's going to have on my life.

And in the end, it's all in the way you remember it. My sister, hiding her fruit rollup on the roof of her mouth so that I thought I took longer to eat mine because I wanted to have something that was mine. Or the note my brother left me when I cried all night and slept on my parents floor when he left for college early the next morning. Or my friend, sitting in the office in Boston during her first day, tea being wrapped around by bright colored gloves. Or in trading shoes over a first, exciting conversation in a black button-up shirt. My cousin, showing us how to do yoga in the living room that we never lived in (except on Christmas morning). My grandma and her hands, showing us how to make paper dolls before she forgot how to do it altogether.

And my mom, in her bathrobe on Christmas morning making coffee, my dad still asleep (it's the only day of the year he sleeps in). Conversations at the top of the hill in the hot summer Virginia nights, fall coming in on us. Or you and her sitting at the lunch table, clear and empty of what used to be your friends when you decided being popular was overrated and she agreed. A drunken dive into an overhead light when the Boss comes on and the rest of it on the porch surrounded by mountains and cigarette smoke. My grandma, hanging out in her white underwear when we came to visit, reminding us that she didn't give a shit what people thought about her. Those hot summer nights in D.C. where you were displaced and going to the movies and having a couple of drinks was enough to electrify the air between us.

It's all about the context. Whether you are surrounded by beautiful mountains, green and lush, or out in the desert of Las Vegas, some kind of peace can be found. That's the way I like to remember it.

I'm Officially Worried...

2007-11-02T19:34:00.000-05:00

Politics weren't really discussed in my house growing up. With a Democratic mother who wanted everything to be equal for everyone (this included the love she shared equally for my brother, sister, and me), and a self-proclaimed Libertarian (glorified Republican) for a dad, nothing ruined Easter late lunches better than a good ol' discussion about who was doing what in the office just one hour away from our home in the suburbs of Virginia.

It wasn't any surprise that my brother grew up to be a lawyer and my sister works in marketing. It wasn't any surprise to me that I would feel uneasy or discontented the second something felt wrong to me. A lot of people in my life have called me difficult for questioning things, and I know if I weren't constantly doing so I'd still be working in the same office in Charlottesville just hoping things would change on their own. What are we all searching for anyway?

Ever since Bush, Jr. was elected I haven't felt easy living in this country. Mark my word: if Rudy, Jr. gets elected in 2008, I am leaving this country. It's not that I don't feel safe or that the price of gas is outrageous in Las Vegas (although, it is pretty darn high), it's that things haven't felt right for a very long time and everyone knows it, but no one is doing anything about it.

Last night we went to see bell hooks read at UNLV. She spoke about community and feeling connected, the way that people speak about something they are really passionate about, in a joking, down-to-earth kind of way so that people would warm up to her and actually listen. I kept thinking about ways I could be connected to the ever-changing community in Las Vegas, or how I hope to one day feel connected to somewhere. She also spoke about the idea of local politics and action on a local level, since that's where things begin. When we were walking back to the car, I turned to him and said, "I don't think it's enough to be a good person anymore." I think I finally believe that.

I was hoping that this job would help me spread yoga and peace in what seems to be a corrupt country and world. I was hoping that it would help people feel good about themselves so that when the little things happened they felt comfortable in being a good person. Not that I'm a saint or anything, but I do fully believe in the idea of spreading goodness. Seriously.

Today has been one of those days where everything seems to be too much. Where my own selfishness has gotten in the way of any kind of real change. In her talk, bell hooks also spoke of the idea of going back to where you were born, back to your roots to help contribute to that community. Even if it's one that doesn't agree with you. Even though my dad is from Vermont and my mom is from Missouri, my brother, sister, and I were all three born in Washington, D.C. It's where I lived until I was four.

When I was a child I had this bathing suit with a goldfish on it, and in one picture I'm eating a goldfish cracker as I wear this bathing suit in my backyard. Of the memories I have of that place, one that sticks out in my mind is me, holding a goldfish, in the back of our van as we drive to the suburbs of Virginia. I don't even know if this actually happened, but for some reason I'm four and I'm hoping no water spills out. I'm hoping that this goldfish makes it through the car ride with enough water to live to move into our nice, new house.

Halloween at the DMV

2007-11-01T00:57:00.000-05:00

So my plates officially say Nevada. I waited at the DMV between a meeting for work and yoga class with other staff. I took a nap in between, right before yoga, on the floor of my apartment. I woke up all groggy, reminded of my allergies in Charlottesville and how I felt in that valley, trapped. I kept one of my Virginia plates and it now sits on the floor in the front seat of my car. I am still not used to it.

With the traffic being so unpredictable I was late to yoga, almost too late to go in and join the rest of the group. At the end of class while relaxing into my breath, that familiar comfort feeling washed from the tip of my heart to the edge of my hands and feet. It filled me, that warm blood rushing around inside.

When I got home I made my mom's halloween cupcakes. He had to remake the icing because we used butter instead of margarine and it came out all light brown and soupy. The icing is supposed to be bright white and thick so that it can stick to the cupcakes and hold the candy pumpkin that goes on top. But after forgetting sugar, then the margarine, another trip to the grocery store to get the candy pumpkins would be a little too much. It's getting late and I'm going to a yoga class at 8 am tomorrow morning followed by a day of work, and then we are going to see Bell Hooks read at UNLV.

Tomorrow seems to be my first real full day since moving to Las Vegas. And I even have to start writing a novel tomorrow because my best friend in LA and I are participating in the write a novel in november club. I guess it's a club, since it's an organization of people who expect you to keep writing, just get it out, no matter how good or bad it is. I am hoping that I actually do this and that it's not just an idea. We shall see. I am going to LA for Thanksgiving so between the writing and eating I am hoping that I don't miss Virginia too much.

After remaking the icing it still doesn't look right. It's not that bright, white color I remember so well from when my mom made them. But it tastes the same as I remember, which I guess is all that matters. But I know that no matter how many years I make these cupcakes, they will never compare to the way she makes them.

Cooking Pumpkin Seeds

Salt clinging to the
bottom of the pan
crispy-crewy, hands sticky

Kitchen smells move in and out
nails turned soft from the sweet mess
tangled strings orange and discolored

I wipe a grain of salt
from the corner
of your mouth

that moisture-filled sculpture
with its small eyes
an unseen voyeur

Heat from the oven against my back
that thick smell wearing us
following us all the way upstairs.

Halloween, 2003

Between Past and Present Tense

2007-10-09T11:44:00.000-05:00

About a week ago we drove to LA for the night to see The Weakerthans. They played in this really small club in Hollywood and we ate and hung out at my best friend's restaurant for a couple of hours before the show. Once we got there we kept pointing out people in the crowd who are our versions of our own friends. I tried to find one of my best friends who introduced me to The Weakerthans in college. Because they always remind me of him and getting take-out and eating it on a hill with three crosses. And just driving around Boone where everything was right there.

We got up early the next morning so I could be back in Las Vegas to help conduct a group interview for my new job. I was tired, and attended my last Bikram yoga class for awhile. I've decided to explore other types of yoga because of this new job. Because doing that is actually part of my new job.

I can see why, aside from the many excuses that I seem to come up with, people don't want to go to yoga. It's basically like striping you naked and saying, "see? this is how you've been treating yourself". With all these changes I would have thought I made some healthy ones, especially with this new job, but that hasn't been the case. A lot of my energy has gone towards adjusting. Getting used to everything being a 20 minute drive away. Getting used to football on Sunday and Monday nights. And just two chairs that will eventually go out on the porch once we get a couch.

We found a local bar in a strip mall (Vegas is the land of strip malls) with $1.50 beers and 50 cent pool tables. And it's in walking distance. It's open 24 hours (like everything in Vegas) and seems like somewhere we could frequent for cheap pool and the baseball playoffs.

It's incredible what we get used to. I've used up almost all of my savings to move out here, and these next few months should be interesting. He says we can eat really cheaply and just wait to get more furniture. I still want to take trips to Whole Foods and shop around so that we can be more comfortable. Our books are lined up against the walls, waiting for him to make bookshelves. There's something so nice about living like this, but I can't contain it in any sort of way. It's like even when it comes to giving myself time for all of this, I've set some kind of expectation. My life in Charlottesville wasn't what I wanted, but there are things about it that I guess I'm not ready to let go of. Because there was something simple about it, too. Going to yoga after work and just being by myself, thinking about the next day and sometimes how to survive it without yelling at someone awful I worked with. Because some days were just awful at my old job.

At my new job there's a manifesto that lives and breathes the company culture. Do one thing a day that scares you. Friends are more important than money. And the people who work here live by this manifesto. They take it to heart, and in what would seemingly be a set of opinions that just influenced or had no affect on people's lives, does. It's authentic.

Cha-cha-CHANGES!

2007-09-25T13:27:00.000-05:00

I'm moving into my new place on Friday or Saturday. It's got an open kitchen and garden tub. I'll finally have my own space here in Las Vegas. I start my new job on Monday and part of the training includes going to yoga classes together. Finally, things won't be organized in boxes on the floor but scattered around until I get furniture and places to put things.

He's staying here for a little while so we can try and work things out. After you break things down all there is left to do is build it back up. And that's what we are doing. We ate at the Sizziler for his birthday. I got the fillet mignon and he got steak and endless shrimp. We drank beer and talked about how much we missed each other. How things had been different since I flew out to Vegas. How much pressure we had both been under to see if things were going to work. Now, without pressure, we were back to having fun with each other. That energy was back but out here, on a playground across from the apartment complex we've been living in for the past two months. It was on the yellow tube slide and the sprinklers we ran around in.

The problem with telling people about your struggles is they get protective, and don't always understand the choices you make. The difference now is I know I can pick myself up after a fall this time. I made the choice to stay in Vegas thinking he was going back to North Carolina. I can make those hard decisions now. And with everything settling down, I won't feel like I'm relying on my friends so much for support. I've felt like I haven't been a good friend these past couple of months, and I can finally start to really be there for the people who have helped me recently.

I'm glad he's staying. We can explore this crazy city together.

It Rained Last Night in Las Vegas, Nevada

2007-09-21T18:19:00.000-05:00

My friend from Charlottesville sent me an email today talking about how things aren't as haphazard as they seem, that something stronger is keeping me here in Vegas instead of having me move on to LA or Portland or Chicago. I'm looking at an apartment later tonight to see how far away it is from the Strip, which is where I'll be working soon. I accepted a job with the yoga clothing company, and even though I'm excited about the job, the idea of living out here alone scares the crap out of me.

Once things settle down, you realize people are just people. There's no way around it. And there's no way to explain why we treat each other like we are expendable or that there's something better on the way. But when timing isn't right, there's nothing that can be done about that. There's a chance he'll stay here for a little while. He's looking at cars in both Vegas and the coast of North Carolina. Either way, I'm looking at the whole transition alone. Which is why I started all of these life changes in the first place.

Some days I feel excited and others I feel suffocated by the heat. I really don't know what I want out of this, but I do know that I couldn't move to Portland or Chicago just yet. Because doing the comfortable thing would make things easy at this point. At least that's what I'm telling myself.

Set Out Running...

2007-09-15T12:42:00.000-05:00

Before I moved out here to Las Vegas I would listen to this Neko Case song Set Out Running because it reminded me of him. Of driving around D.C. and going on movie dates. How the air seemed electrified with energy between us and I couldn't help but think that this was something real and good. Neko Case sings: if I knew heartbreak was coming, I would have set out running... Her voice is thick with those lyrics.

Sometimes you push and push and push up against something until it breaks. And when you live in an apartment complex surrounded by boxes and looking at the parking spot where his car used to be before it was stolen, unemployed and trying to find a new place together, you think: this is the hard part. Because one minute you are cooking dinner and watching Deadwood, and the next you are threatening to pack up and move to Portland, and that you can't take it anymore. And he calls your bluff.

Part of me wishes I hadn't come out here at all. That I had kept him in this place, in late nights in D.C. and playing pool in Boone. But without exploring things you are just stuck. You can't figure anything out that way.

I slept on an air mattress at my sister's friends place last night. He had towels and clean sheets ready for me. He just took me in and helped me realize that this was the worst of it and it will soon be over. Things had gotten too hard, and after crying all day and trying to explain how alone I felt and how much this hurt, he just looked me in the eye and couldn't give me anything. We are dealing with things differently, he says, whatever I knew of him gone from his voice. It is cold and distant, because he says he has shut down and will deal with things later. And every time I saw him yesterday I would try to act the same way, but in a minute I'd be crying, because suddenly everything was misplaced.

I should be thinking I have all the options in the world. I could go to Portland for real this time or Chicago to be near good friends. LA seems to be out of the question now that I am running out of money. Once I hear back from the job here in Vegas I think I will really know how I feel. Right now I feel alone here, but that's because I have nothing connecting me to this place. When we were talking yesterday he mentioned going back to North Carolina to stay on a friends couch. And I thought: you'd give up? Just like that? But I would be doing the same thing in Chicago or Portland or LA. It seems I can't make a decision for myself, either.

I really don't want to do anything today. I feel like leaving to go to yoga is even going to be a struggle. My sister has told me to not make any decisions yet, but I feel like I've become transient in Las Vegas and I'm itching to get out of here. Would it just be stubborn to stay? Like all big changes, I made this move for myself. And now all I have to worry about is me. It is the first time in a long time that I've had that option. It's like I don't know what to do with it.

I wish I had that Neko Case song on my computer. The CD itself is in a bag at the apartment, waiting for me to come pick it up. I want to go pick it up and replace the stereo in my car and blast it as I drive around Las Vegas. Because I think that now is the time to be dramatic. To just swim in it. To really think about things in the moment, now, so that in time, I will be able to completely move on. Because that's what I'm going to do.

One Word

2007-09-10T22:13:00.000-05:00

I'm reading a book right now that my sister-in-law handed to me before I left for the West. It's about a writer who travels for one year after a painful divorce to discover those parts of her that were missing in her seemingly perfect marriage and career suburban life. It couldn't have been a better gift at a better time.

There are days that all I have done while here has been to hide out in an internet cafe and obsessively look for the right job that's out there for me. Even though I have more time I haven't been writing as much as I could, and there are some days where time just slips away and I find myself missing my yoga studio in Charlottesville rather than going to the new one here.

I haven't really made any friends while in Las Vegas, but stayed contented with relationships over the phone and internet while discovering this new, changing intimacy with my new boyfriend. There are mountains that stick up into the hot, beautiful, puffy-white, blue sky. It serves as a backdrop to my Honda, Virginia plates, a new, vibrating muffler barely attached by a wire to the back of the car that I can clearly hear over the empty box that used to be my car stereo. Two boxes sit in my trunk over a pile of clothes and the quilt that my grandmother made for me. There's no room in the bedroom my boyfriend (yikes!) and I share with the two still-strangers we call roommates.

I had a second round job interview this morning with a yoga clothing store opening up in the mall on the strip here in Las Vegas. It was more of a conversation than an interview, and to my amazement an organization that values, trusts, and expects from its employees actually exists. When I walked into the interview from the mall, Hootie and the Blowfish playing in the background, I began to imagine the mall during the holidays, a Hootie Holiday Special CD playing, people everywhere buying gifts, and thought to myself: what am I doing here? But when I met with the woman who is going to be my new manager if I get the job, all of those concerns disappeared. I knew this organization was different and that it lived by the principles that governed it. We even discussed a goal of mine: to open up a store in Asheville. I felt this goal come alive as we talked.

I'm not sure I can call Las Vegas a home or that this is the city I will discover myself in. But I do know that I've found something big and life-changing. For the first time in awhile, I'm starting to feel like this risk paid off.

So I'm going back to LA to wait and hear the news about this job. I'm going to relax by the beach and celebrate a friend's birthday. What I didn't realize about quitting my job and moving is the time I would be given for my thoughts. This can be both a blessing and a curse. I've used my time to find job opportunities and even though it has paid off I plan on relaxing, writing, and traveling during these next few weeks.

In the book that I'm reading she writes about a conversation she had in Italy about cities. And that there is one word that can describe each city. I tried to apply this to the cities I know, then to myself, as she begins to in the book. My word for Las Vegas: TRANSIENT. (I thought about HOT and GREEDY but decided to go with a friendlier word.) My word for Washington, D.C.: STIFF. My word for Charlottesville: PASSAGE. (This is for two reasons: there are many back ways of getting around traffic in Cville and it takes a little while to find these passages and Cville is a liberal city right in the middle of rural Virginia which I see as a passageway to other towns and cities as well as a haven from abstinence-only sex education programs and Virgil Goode (yes, that is his name).

Like the book, I haven't thought of the word I think describes me. Some that immediately come to mind are DIFFICULT, RESTLESS, and FELINE (my best friend always says I'm like a cat: I like to be touched when I want to be touched and left alone when I want to be left alone). I once asked my mom to describe how I was as a child; walking around in the handmade Easter outfits my grandmother would make for us. Without hesitation she answered: determined. You've always been so determined.

Football! Yes, I said football.

2007-09-02T13:39:00.000-05:00

My junior year of college I did a report in my Business Writing class on how the current students and alumni at Appalachian State would benefit from a fifty million dollar football proposal. The chancellor said that intramural sports would benefit, which in turn benefits most of the student population. Turns out, all that money was just going to one thing: football. Walking to my English classes in Sanford Hall, where budgets were being cut and money was tight; I couldn't help but feel resentful. Does anyone even give a shit about football around here? I had gone to two football games in Kidd Brewer Stadium while at App State.

When I woke up late yesterday morning and heard one of my friends from App State who is in town say that we were leading against Michigan in the third quarter, we decided to go out and find a bar. The night before we had been out in old Vegas playing the penny slot machines and black jack. Nearby were the huge sporting screens where people can bet on upcoming games. I think we were all wishing we had put at least five bucks on Appalachian to win that football game. But then again, who knew what was going to happen.

It was humid and hot in Vegas when we all three got into the car in search of a bar that was playing the game. He remembered seeing a sign about playing all Michigan football games, and on the way to finding another sports bar we saw the sign. The Inn Zone: a smoke-friendly dive bar in a commercial space. We walked in to a dark, smoky bar full of Michigan fans, nervously watching a football game that they were about to take over at the beginning of the fourth quarter. We sat in the front row with no real identifying colors, but when App State intercepted a pass in the fourth quarter, we all sat up and clapped in excitement. We just couldn't help ourselves.

Here we were, in Las Vegas, walking into a dive bar during the middle of the third quarter, surrounded by Michigan fans who don't even know where Appalachian is, much less expecting alumni to show up to watch the game so far away from North Carolina, and we were sitting in the front row cheering during their disappointment. Then tension at the end of the game was so cold it was almost laughable. We stayed as Michigan fans quickly and quietly filed out of the bar. We stayed to watch the coach talk about the player's hard work and dedication. We stayed long enough to see the bartender turn off the recap of the game from the big screen.

When I tell people where I went to college they do a couple of things. First mispronounce it, then they ask where it is (Boone? , they say) then ask if it's a private school (to which I reply Appalachian State University), then they ask how big it is and are always surprised that 15,000 students attend the school. Even though the state wants it to grow, those mountains keep it enclosed and protected.

I don't generally watch football. In fact, aside from tennis, it is my favorite sport to fall asleep to on the couch. But yesterday was great. It was a little piece of them mountains in a smoky dive bar in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Hallelujah's Are Optional

2007-08-28T16:30:00.000-05:00

The road between Las Vegas and Los Angeles is long and open. You can see the few casino stops in between from miles away and there aren't any gas stations with the exception of a few. Last Thursday night before we went to LA to celebrate my best friend's twenty fifth birthday, my car was broken into. Instead of my radio was a hole with wires hanging out, and instead of four hours of music and dancing around in the car, we are settled into conversation.

When we get to Hollywood, California, we are of course greeted by traffic, then my best friend outside her small apartment. We eat at a cafe nearby, and he orders the best friend chicken I've ever begged for bites of in my entire life. Things are defined in palm trees and red, marble stars. We have some drinks and prepare for a day on the beach in Santa Monica, California.

We are visiting the LA area for my cousin's wedding as well, which is in Riverside on Saturday night. I start thinking about seeing my parents, who aren't too happy about my recent move out west. At first I didn't tell them about my plans to stay in Las Vegas for a little while and the last time we talked things were pretty tense. Moving across the country at the risk of your heart doesn't make any sense when having a job and making things practical are all that seem to matter. Decisions aren't supposed to be made like this and things are supposed to be back in an apartment in Charlottesville, getting ready for my job to pick back up again. But I'm not there.

The water in Santa Monica is a perfect chilly-cold, like swimming in a lake up in the mountains. I look over at him while we are all swimming, thinking back to those mountains where we first met and became friends. And how we barely knew each other before I moved up to Boston, but how over the next couple of years we would see each other over holidays and graduations and vacations. And now, from those mountains, we are diving into the waves in the Pacific Ocean. We go out that night to celebrate, and the back of my legs are on fire from the sun. I can't sit anywhere without feeling their sting, but after a couple of drinks I don't feel them anymore.

Riverside, California is a small college-town-city sixty miles east of LA. When we get to the hotel my parents and sister are staying in, things seem hot and out of place. Too much time in the car without a radio to listen to and I'm not even looking forward to going to my cousin's wedding anymore.

But when we get there my mind changes. I talk with some of my family, and there's talk of what I'm planning on doing while out west. Most still think I'm going out to LA and for the first time I really don't know. I don't have an answer to what's going on and it feels great. The ceremony is warm and full: my cousin and her new husband standing across from each other and her belly six months swollen. People read poems, someone plays the accordion, someone sings and plays the guitar, and we all sing a song together.

During the dancing and music, we sneak off upstairs in the open art gallery and make out. I taste like white wine and my dress is starting to stick to me from the sweat of dancing. I know my parents are looking for me and getting ready to go, and I know that I've already upset them enough lately, so we walk back down and continue dancing until we leave. My cousin looks happy as she dances with her new husband, and I feel good knowing we will be close.

On the drive home there's a thunderstorm up ahead, and unlike in Virginia where they creep up on you and come over the mountains, we can see the gray clouds and lightening from miles away. It moves along with us almost, and the rain begins and ends over a stretch of desert. There are cars lining back from Las Vegas to California, and once it starts to rain everyone slams on their breaks. Since it never rains here, people go from confidently speeding along to hesitant and awkward. I'm just hoping the rain cools things off a bit. At least, for a little while.

Filling Station
by Elizabeth Bishop

Oh, but it is dirty!
--this little filling station,
oil-soaked, oil-permeated
to a disturbing, over-all
black translucency.
Be careful with that match!

Father wears a dirty,
oil-soaked monkey suit
that cuts him under the arms,
and several quick and saucy
and greasy sons assist him
(it's a family filling station),
all quite thoroughly dirty.

Do they live in the station?
It has a cement porch
behind the pumps, and on it
a set of crushed and grease-
impregnated wickerwork;
on the wicker sofa
a dirty dog, quite comfy.

Some comic books provide
the only note of color--
of certain color. They lie
upon a big dim doily
draping a taboret
(part of the set), beside
a big hirsute begonia.

Why the extraneous plant?
Why the taboret?
Why, oh why, the doily?
(Embroidered in daisy stitch
with marguerites, I think,
and heavy with gray crochet.)

Somebody embroidered the doily.
Somebody waters the plant,
or oils it, maybe. Somebody
arranges the rows of cans
so that they softly say:
ESSO--SO--SO--SO

to high-strung automobiles.
Somebody loves us all.

Las Vegas, Nevada

2007-08-22T12:12:00.000-05:00

When you are unemployed and in Las Vegas, Nevada, you could assume that days would be filled with penny slots and poker. You could assume that while getting quarters for laundry at a gas station, an Elvis in a t-shirt would drive by in the nearby Wendy's parking lot. You could assume that it's hot here, even at night and early in the morning. But early mornings aren't really awake in my day-to-day tasks of sitting at Panera for the free wireless internet, going to yoga, and hanging out with the one person I know in this city.

You could assume that there are big businesses and gated apartment complexes past the strip. And that people are born here and stay. And while filling out your application for a VONS grocery discount card, one of the baggers tells you not to write your address or the cashier will bring a pie right to your door. "Cherry rhubarb!" your friend yells as you walk out to the car.

I don't know if I'm stopping by Vegas on the way to L.A. or if I'll eventually make my way up to Portland, Oregon. My health insurance runs out in a couple of days and my money won't last too much longer, and aside from the occasional freak out in crowded Panera, things just seem to be moving along.

I came out to Las Vegas to hang out with my friend from college who just moved from Washington, D.C. for graduate school at UNLV. Things, it seems, always happen when you least expect it. I wake up next to him knowing that this week I'm here, and I may be here for awhile, but next week could be completely different. I wake up thinking that no matter how much you try to make things less complicated, everything eventually catches up, whether it's in a heated conversation or a half-filled out lease application. When all I want to think about is filling time with goofing off at the grocery store and watching movies on his laptop in bed, the heat of Las Vegas creeps into my thoughts and I realize I'm across the country from what I used to know and nothing is familiar except for him. I think about how cool it is in Portland, and that now that my car is here, I can just drive away at any time.

We are driving over to Los Angeles this weekend for my best friend's birthday and my cousin's wedding. There will be relaxing on the beach and dancing like ass holes in the Riverside Art Museum. And I'll think about how, this is it; this is what we are meant to do. This is where I am meant to be.

The Big Move...

2007-07-31T14:53:00.001-05:00

Indications that you are going through a quarter-life crisis (in no particular order):

1. You quit your job.
2. You quit your job without finding another one first.
3. You break up with your boyfriend of two years.
4. You plan to move to Los Angeles, California to live with your best friend since first grade.
5. You pay to ship your 1994 Honda for the price of the car.
6. You plan a trip to Vegas to make twenty dollars into five hundred.
7. Nothing seemed to make sense anymore, so you decided to move somewhere where nothing will continue to make sense.
8. You trade in Route 29 traffic for smog and real traffic.
9. You hope the west suites you.
10. You finally feel like you are getting somewhere.

My apartment is half-packed, ready to get up and leave Charlottesville and move out to Los Angeles. There's a debate on what to take: my favorite red bookshelf doesn't fit in my car or but the banjo will fit just fine in the backseat. I'm realizing how much stuff I actually have. How many clothes I don't wear. And what I've worked for in the last year seems to grow blurry. Because even though LA may not have the answers I'm looking for, just continuing to seek them out makes me feel good about things again. There's only so much complaining and feeling stuck that I can deal with before I decide for a change again.

In less than two weeks, things will be different. I'm flying out to the west, and trying not to think of all the practical things but of the experience. Things will fall into place and I'm hoping for an adventure. I go through different stages of anxiety where I think that I am crazy for doing this, and that I'm not actually moving out to LA but just talking about it. Then I know I will get on a plane and just be there.

Off to the Windy City

2007-07-18T13:39:00.000-05:00

I'm off to Chicago tonight for friends and relaxing...

And new destinations await as soon as I figure something out...

Sometimes, you have to make things happen yourself and get out of situations that are just not right or good for you in the end. Even if it's not practical. With risk comes reward...

In Limbo

2007-07-12T09:30:00.000-05:00

So I generally don't enjoy touristy things. Hip-packs and maps are not my thing. If I am lost in a city that I am visiting I will stubbornly wander around before getting out a map just so that I don't look like a tourist. And if I do break down and get a map I try to act like I just moved to the city or town. When I first moved to Boston and gave someone directions, it made my day. It made me a part of that city.

When my friend and I were in Nashville we went out on Broadway Street, which is one of the touristy areas. The bars were full of musicians doing covers of real country music. We tapped our cowboy boots and drank beer all night long. The band's we saw kept asking everyone where they were from. My friend would shout out "Louisville!" to which I gladly complied. Even though we were in one of the touristy areas, things still felt genuine.

Like any vacation, it left me feeling restless. Should I invest more of myself in Charlottesville? Is this somewhere I really want to spend my mid-twenties in? Should I move closer to friends who have their own lives elsewhere or move to somewhere completely new while I still can?

I spent the week of the fourth hanging out with different friends up in Boone and Beech Mountain. The view from my friends house is amazing and we watched all the fireworks; tiny up against the broad mountains. Each morning was coffee and hanging out on the porch...

When I was in middle school my two best friends and I used to walk down to the candy store and buy jelly beans. We used to take the flavors we hated, throw them into the street and say, "if a red car hits my jelly bean then I will get a boyfriend in the next two weeks." Every so often a red car would run over my butter popcorn jelly bean and I would think for a couple of minutes that my wish would actually come true. As if my fate was held in these jelly beans and the color of each car that passed over it. Because we wanted those things to determine what happened in our lives instead of actually making it happen. It was easier that way.

I am beginning to think that everything in life is about timing. And that we are all just shuffling around and waiting for things to begin to settle down. At least, that's how I feel. And when I was leaving yoga class yesterday and a woman asked me for directions, I initially didn't know the street she was asking for. But when she described it to me, I knew exactly where she should go. I even knew a short cut.

In a Backyard Somewhere in Charlottesville, Virginia

2007-07-10T06:23:00.000-05:00

The fresh breeze detergent at your apartment doesn’t
even smell like a fresh breeze
I know because my friend once tried to put up
a clothes line in her backyard
One of those circular ones that spin in the wind
but she didn’t dig the hole deep enough
and it just collapsed under the weight
of her wet clothes
And they fell all over the ground
scattered like popped balloons
deflated and flat,
those little helicopter things stuck in the sleeves
Disappointed that even now the real thing
can’t exist
or never really existed to begin with.

I have a friend who when he travels makes lists of what he sees to remember for later...

2007-07-03T11:47:00.000-05:00

Staying where you grow up. Kentucky vs. Virginia. Nashville trip. Ew Mf. NASHVILLE! Buying cowboy boots buy one get two free. Touristy yet welcoming. Where are you from? Upright base player and stomping our boots at two in the morning. Churchill Downs and betting on two horses. Missing routine. Reading. Too late at night phone conversations. Drive to Boone through Knoxville and Johnson City, Tennessee. Missing at the airport. Green and trees. No real traffic. Counting state license plates. Alaska and California and Iowa. Feeling more like myself. Florida tourist drivers. Friends in a cabin off of 194. No open pool tables at Murphy's on a Monday afternoon. Neko Case and Dwight Yoakam. Black Cat burritos and PBR pitchers. Hanging out with my old college roommate and her husband. Cafe Portofino. More traffic. Feeling disconnected. Sleeping on a couch in Villas. Cool breeze through the window at night with trucks passing by. Waking up to a rescued kitten crying. Mel's Diner. A move to Charlotte. Upcoming plans. July 4th on Beech Mountain. Espresso News surrounded by the internet surrounded by mountains.

I Love Skunks.

2007-06-28T14:19:00.000-05:00

There's nothing I like more than trucks on Route 81 South through rural Virginia. Especially when, as you are trying to pass a truck going 70 in the left-hand lane, you hear a big pop in the back of your car. At first I thought it was my tire, which went flat about a year ago on my way up to Boone. But right outside of Staunton, Virginia, I'm not too excited to think of changing a tire while trucks blow past me. I pulled over, called my mom, insisting that I had a flat tire and that I would need to call AAA. I climb out the passenger side seat, get out and realize that my tire is fine. But next to my car is a large ball of hair. And as I bend over to see the damage, I notice an even larger ball of hair extending out of my exploded muffler. Exciting.

I do what any self-respecting feminist does. I call my dad. I pull over at the next exit. I find a mechanic shop and they replace my muffler in an hour. The clerk at the front tells me that the skunk felt no pain. I watch the soap opera Passions while I wait. Hours later I arrive at my friend's apartment in Louisville, Kentucky.

We go to bed early. The next day we hang out, watch some Felicity, make plans to go to Nashville, go get coffee and tea, and go out to Waterfront Wednesdays on the Ohio River. We can see Indiana in front of us. Like Charlottesville, Louisville is a pocket of liberal-minded folks surrounded by a red state. Kentucky's also trees and hills and green surrounded by buildings and roads. There are local businesses as well as Target's and Wal-Mart's.

My friend is about to move back up to Northern Kentucky to become a 5th grade math teacher. In Boston, we both worked for non-profit education organizations, helping students have equal access to resources. The Supreme Court decided today that the Jefferson County schools can't assign students to certain schools according to race. There's the idea that every student deserves the same education. There's the idea that a woman who wants the best for her child, no matter how it affects society, should be entitled to do so. It's reassuring to know that my friend is going to be a teacher and really stand up for the kind of education that every child deserves. At the end of the day, at least there's that.

There's a point where you realize that some friendships make you understand why you don't allow crappy people in your life. When you realize that all friendships should be as meaningful and supportive as those that make you feel completely comfortable and relaxed. Where all the bull shit things that happen in life tend to fade.

Tonight we are going to one dollar beers and minor league baseball. We head up into the mountains next week to celebrate our nation's independence. I'm hoping to miss the fireworks for the fourth year in a row. But there will be sparklers involved.

Our Nation's Capital

2007-06-25T09:06:00.000-05:00

Like Boston, trips to D.C. now have to include specific things: baseball, hanging out, relaxing, beer, good food and greasy, cheap food. I feel like whenever vacation hits, some people want lots of plans, things to do, etc. I find myself wasting away mornings while my friends are at work, taking long showers, and thinking a lot. There's no real purpose to my days, and each would blend together if I didn't have my friends schedules to dictate time. Today I plan on taking the metro in and wandering around D.C. Maybe I will go by the townhouse I grew up in until I was four on E Street.

On Friday, my friend and I walked around and ate lunch on a park bench. We saw a movie that's a bunch of different little movies about Paris. We ate at a small restaurant on U Street and went out for drinks at a bar where we felt less than hip. We talked about the Wilco show the night before. Jeff Tweedy's hands in the air as he had the audience sing and clap along. And how weird it all was. We made fun of the people next to us and decided that we are both cursed with having crappy people sit next to us in public. Then again, we could have easily just ignored them.

We didn't talk about his upcoming move to Las Vegas, or how it only rains 4 inches per year. We didn't talk about how hard it can be to find people we connect with without some kind of investment or how the city you live in can change overnight the second you meet someone you can really relate to. We didn't talk about our jobs or how hot the weather is in D.C. I didn't talk about how much I'm going to miss him.

I feel like I've either got to stop believing I have this rare connection with a few people in my life or start trying to let more people in. I tend to hang on to those who I find very dear to my heart without giving others a chance to know what I really think. It's a lonely way of doing things and it often seems to disappoint me. Then again, I feel fully invested in those relationships that I've slowly built over a couple of years or those that happen instantly. There are just some people who make you feel completely content with who you are, yet completely wake you up. And I have a really hard time finding that in everyday life.

I head out to Louisville early tomorrow morning to visit my friends from Boston. I'm hoping it includes watching Felicity, a water park, a trip to Nashville, and great, long conversations over coffee and tea.

Beware of the Red Jellyfish

2007-06-21T08:18:00.000-05:00

Growing up, my family and I used to take yearly trips down to the beach in North Carolina. We would all pack into the car, boogie boards strapped to the top, and make the six or seven hour drive down to the shore. One year, there was a huge storm the week before we got there and all these jellyfish had been washed to edge of the ocean. The waves were literally speckled with white. But my sister and I were determined to go swimming since we had traveled all this way. So we blew up two rafts and set out into the jellyfish-infested waters. At first it seemed like a good idea. We both kept our feet in the water and our rafts tied firmly together. Then we started drifting out. A huge, red jellyfish swam up to our rafts. My sister abruptly told me she was leaving, untied our rafts, and quickly stepped out of the waters. I remember drifting there, thinking: I can't follow her. I've got to stay out here on my own. But I was terrified and had lost sight of the red jellyfish. Not even a minute later I grabbed my raft and ran back to the shore to join her.

This past weekend, I traveled up to Philadelphia with my mom and dad to see my sister and my brother and his family. We spent the weekend hanging out with my new nephew while my dad replaced a floorboard in my brother's house and helped my sister in remodeling her back patio and kitchen. He got right to work when we got there and was up early on Sunday morning to start fixing things before we had a casual Father's Day brunch. After my parents left on Sunday my sister thoughtfully went to a Bikram Yoga class with me for the first time to see what I liked so much about that hot room. In the downtown Philadelphia studio there are hardwood floors and a huge painted brick wall at the back.

My sister took off of work on Monday and we drove out to the Jersey Shore to hang out on the beach. On the way out we talked about my recent break-up and how hard it can be. How you never really know why something fits and something else doesn't, but that if you don't listen to your instincts you could end up in the wrong situation. My sister and I are very different people, and growing up we both struggled to get to know one another. As adults we can talk about almost anything and I know that whatever decision I make she will support it. We talked about how even though I know my mom meant well, when she asked if I would ever get back together with him it really hurt. I abruptly told her: no.

We got some food at the local Wawa and set off for the beach mid-morning. My sister had to go find our permit tags so that we could stay on the beach while I sat and watched our stuff. Really, it was her taking care of me. It was one of those cool days where if you sit in the shade you almost feel like it might be fall. The water was too cold to swim in, but we just relaxed and read and napped on the beach. It was exactly what I needed...

I took the bus from Philadelphia to D.C. It was crowded for a noon on Wednesday bus ride and even though I selfishly tried hard to sit alone, someone sat next to me at the last minute. There was a baby crying the whole time and I was reminded of why I hate to be around lots of people. Things felt congested and closing in on me. All I wanted was to get off of that bus and out into the hot streets of D.C.

I'm here in D.C. until early Tuesday morning when I head off to Louisville, Kentucky to visit my friends from Boston. Hopefully we'll make a trip to Nashville and then it's off to the mountains of North Carolina to visit my college roommate and her husband. I hope it includes burritos at Black Cat and pool at Murphy's. I hope it rains and then clears up into a cool, open night where the mountains open up and wrap their arms around you. I hope that it feels the same way it did when I lived there: like home.

There's a Jesus Billboard off of I-81 Going South

2007-06-14T09:01:00.000-05:00

There's a system for everything. And the process for this system works the same in any context. When dealing with people you care about, the process can be sticky. It can take time. And sometimes all you need is timing.

We had been planning this road trip for a year. Now it's just me, 3 weeks off of work, and some visits to friends and family that I haven't seen in awhile. Maybe it'll still include a trip to Nashville or up to the mountains. It'll definitely include a trip to Louisville and Chicago. There are plans to go up to Philadelphia and I'd like to see the ocean at some point. Now all I have is time.

My drive from Leesburg to Boone during college was six hours. Sometimes I would dread the traffic and trucks along 81. And the more southwest Virginia I would get, the more churches and hell and damnation warnings I would see. Funny that I thought I was heading in the exact opposite direction: from a supposed hell to what I saw as heaven. Then one fall break my roommate came home with me. She talked about how beautiful the drive was up through the Tennessee mountains and then onto the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. I was so busy complaining that I hadn't really stopped to realize how much I loved that drive. How much thinking can be done while alone in the car. I'm looking forward to it.

Buried Lists

2007-06-12T08:50:00.000-05:00

bottled water
granola bars
string cheese
shampoo
razors
wheat pasta
trash bags

When I was growing up there would always be a weekly grocery list sitting on our white tile kitchen counter. These lists normally consisted of things my mom would be buying at Giant, and in the corner there would be a smaller list: pick up dry-cleaning, make dinner reservations, soccer game. I imagined keeping all of these lists in a scrapbook to keep track of time and day-to-day tasks. But my mom always made sure to throw them away once the tasks were completed.

At the same time there were always flat soda liter bottles in the pantry. Whenever I searched the kitchen cabinets for an afternoon snack I was disappointed when there weren't any fruit snacks or she had gotten the Giant brand granola bars this week. It's only 20 or 30 cents more. I used to think. She knows I hate that kind. Talking to my parents now, I sometimes feel the same way. I'm thinking about becoming a yoga instructor, I say. Can you make a living doing that? They say. What about health insurance?

Growing up, I assumed my relationship with my parents would get better. That we would begin to understand each other and the different choices we make. And every so often I'm reminded of how differently we value things, and how easy it is to feel bitter about all the negative things. Then I remember how much my friends hated the flat soda I had to offer them when they came over, and how I had gotten used to it. Sometimes all I wanted was a lukewarm, flat glass of Dr. Pepper.

e-mail for addresses
clean apartment
pack
yoga
try not to fall asleep to Munich
prepare

Yoga class yesterday was one of those packed, great classes. Where everyone felt like they needed to be there to sweat something out. The humidity clouded the room, and each time I felt like I couldn't get my breath I remembered that this room was my sanctuary. It is where I go to think and relax. And when I talked to one of the instructors after class about becoming a teacher, thoughts and hesitation filled my mind. It's easy when you can think of ten negative reasons not to do something. Sometimes those thoughts can be hard to ignore, especially when practical matters are all that seem to matter.

Getting ready for the cross-country road trip has felt the same way. I've made lists. To pack: tent, maps, bathing suit, coolers, food, water. All things needed for survival. We start out on the road on Friday heading from Charlottesville to Nashville. Straight across the country and up California One, then back around. Part of me wants to get lost in it all and end up in a small farming town in Montana. I never throw away my lists like my mom did; instead I find them months later in my purse or tucked into a book. It always reminds me what I forgot.

Reasons Why I Should Quit My Job and Become a Banjo Street Player

2007-06-06T09:29:00.000-05:00

1. I hear Sufjan is in need of a back-up banjo player and this is my ticket to fame.

2. All those crazy-Charlottesville-is-not-really-part-of-the-South-Bluegrass-lovin' hippies will gladly share a beat with me.

3. I hope to stand close to the five-year-old violin player to catch some sympathy dollars.

4. I will never have to read a four page e-mail about parking stamps or cleaning out the office refrigerator.

5. Yankie-Freakin-Doodle-Dandy.

6. Hanging out on the streets with the dregs of the Charlottesville community will, in the end, make me a better person.

7. Sad stories of "failure" are so much more motivating than success.

8. The TV show The Office will seem foreign and weird, not creepily familiar.

9. I can feel confident that after playing on the streets for a couple of weeks, I can get to a level above sucking.

10. Moonlighting as a hooker has always been my dream.

11. I won't feel my soul slowly sucking out of my body every time I sit at a desk.

12. I plan on taking Kentucky's bluegrass title one string at a time.

13. I hear there's a new market for street banjo players, and they are finally edging on street steel drum performers.

14. Money tips are way better than life tips. Especially when given by random, self-righteous strangers.

15. I’ve always wanted to be someone’s project.

Two Poems

2007-06-03T11:20:00.000-05:00

What Love Is

Nah nah nah nah nah
I don't know how to spell that out
like a little kid with his hands behind his ears and his tongue out
I’ve got you
tickled and thinking
backing you into the corner of the playground
where all the teenagers smoke their cigarettes during gym class
so the teacher’s can’t see them
or at least they used to
before gym class was cancelled altogether and sitting became learning
then there’s you
and I tagged you but you just stand there
looking at a dead bird on the ground
he must have flown into the window
you tell me
eyes wide open, jaw slightly cracked
there’s nothing to bury him with
you say, arms at your side,
belly lose and charging out of your OshKosh overall jeans
you give me your lunch money
$2.50 to keep the other boys away
to keep them from noticing your blushed face
I charge away from you
keeping my secret crumbled in two one dollar bills
dropping the change as I walk.

What Love Is

We could have been on a dance floor together,
those ones that light up from below
in Tennessee we would have
drank whiskey and talked about how long the state was.
We would have played pool in a darkly
lit corner, with random sweaty stink and smoke.
We could have been in the back of your Chevrolet
if it wasn’t a big truck with only
two front seats and the smell of wet dog.
No Jesus air freshener hanging from the rear view mirror.
Then there was the coffee shop
you turned into a pancake house
at three in the morning.
And I think: this is it.
This is when we ride off into the sunset
your mullet catching the wind
my hands clinging tightly to your chest
summer sweat underneath our helmets.
Do we even need helmets where we are going?
But you just pay the waitress after shoveling down
three pancakes with strawberry syrup
and I never get to see how you bend a girl over.
I bet you ask if she likes it rough.
Do you even take her shirt off?
Let her nipples hang underneath you?
We could have been a post-prom fantasy,
the kinds that don’t require flowers or a fancy limo
or a tissue to clean things up.

Only in Europe

2007-05-28T20:44:00.000-05:00

I got the day off for Memorial Day, so I did what every self-respecting American does on this day: I hung out by my apartment complex's pool and read a book on presidential assassinations. It’s called Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell and it’s excellent. She starts out explaining how she relates her world to all the presidential assassinations, out of habit or intrigue. There were a lot of get-togethers with friends where I didn’t hear half of what was being said because I was sitting there, silently chiding myself, Don’t bring up McKinley. Don’t bring up McKinley. I thought about what I relate to my day-to-day experiences on a constant basis.

This weekend, three day weekends sometimes do this, has felt like a month. Maybe it’s because of the upcoming changes that could take place in my life, or the actual time I’ve had to sit and relax and read. My dad just called to arrange travel to LA in August. I feel like I can’t say anything because I don’t know anything yet.

A month after I graduated from college, I met my college friend and boyfriend to go backpacking through Europe for two weeks. They had both been studying abroad for the semester in England, so we met in London and headed to Paris right away. Looking back I had known all along, like most people know when things are too good to be true.

My boyfriend and I broke up in Venice. After the semester abroad things had changed. We still had a majority of the trip left so it was almost impossible to recover immediately. In fact, it would take months of not talking to each other in Boston, then our two best friends from college (one was on this trip) wedding, before we really found a place in each other’s lives again.

After a couple of tense days in Italy, finding some quiet in a couple playing the violin and cello on the streets of Florence, we headed towards Marseille on our way to Barcelona. We arrived in Marseille at the beginning of dusk, and using my newly ex-boyfriends broken French, made it to the right bus on our way to the hotel. We had made this our only hotel reservation, thinking it would be a nice break from all the people and hostels. He asked the bus driver where exactly the hotel was located and the driver kept pointing and speaking in French.

When we got off the bus he revealed that he didn’t really understand the bus driver but that maybe we should just start walking. In the tired, dusk heat we lugged our packs up the countryside hill for about an hour, back and forth. When we walked too far we doubted ourselves and turned onto another street. We hadn’t eaten anything in hours. Cars passed by us; the sun was setting and we were lost in the outskirts of the unfriendly city of Marseille. Then we finally found it.

When we got to the front steps a middle-aged Frenchman greeted us with a warm smile. He helped us into the hotel (which turned out to be more like a bed and breakfast. There were only about five rooms). He offered to drive my ex-boyfriend to a local pizza place, and they had to hurry because it was about to close. I showered while we waited, in what felt like a shower that was created just for me to use at this exact moment. It felt good to finally wash the day off.

We sat in their kitchen eating warm pizza with olives in the middle. The Frenchman’s partner, an American, was watching an Italian movie with French subtitles. He laughed and said: only in Europe. We told him about our upcoming moves to Boston and Chicago, and he told us a story about freezing on the T in mid-March. His partner cooked dinner while we talked. It was around 10 p.m. by the time we excused ourselves so they could eat their dinner alone.

Even then I knew. I knew there would be years to come before I found the peace they had found in the mountains of southern France. Before I could even begin to recapture what I felt in the mountains in Boone. What I hadn’t thought about before then was how much it would be worth it to go through everything to get there.

In the morning we swam in the pool and relaxed before our train ride down the coast of France. The Frenchman checked us out of the hotel, saying good-bye for his partner as well; he had been up late writing and was still asleep when we left. He wished us luck on our journeys, and we left: walked up the path to the road to catch the bus back into Marseille.

some sort of noise

2007-05-26T14:07:00.000-05:00

Sometimes, before you even know it, things just change. And you sit wondering how you got somewhere; how if years before now someone had told you this is the life you would be leading you would have laughed in their face. You still wonder.

It’s become that sticky-hot summer weather here in Charlottesville. It’s the kind of weather where you can feel the pollen crowding into your nose and face; the kind where things seem out of focus by mid-afternoon. It’s where you sometimes feel exhausted, like you are constantly moving and walking underwater. Like your body is holding its breath and all you can do is think about the moment you will come to the surface and breathe. It’s haze and soft breezes blowing through my long, white blinds. They clap together.

The fan above my bed is creepily quiet. Almost like it isn’t moving at all, just hanging in the air and pushing it so that it absorbs into the walls. I want to hear it, sputtering around above me doing its job to cool me off, but it continues its silence. Maybe I just want some sort of noise to cover up my thoughts.

I hope to never have regrets for the choices I make, but when they hurt people I care dearly about, I can feel it. Though to say we got much hope, if I am lost it's only for a little while. It’s harder when you are thinking that it’s just the beginning of the end. That you have to give back the record player you just got him for his birthday, and that even when you think caring about someone is enough, it’s a hard truth to find out it’s not. People live like this for longer, accepting graciously what has been given to them, without question. I was not born with this ability. Only with the ability to try and change, which I have been unsuccessful at doing.

I don’t understand how these things work. I only know that when my fan isn’t loud enough I will put on the record player, for the time that it is mine, stare at the empty shelves that will never carry his books, and think about what might have been, but more importantly, what is to come.

A Graveyard on a Hill in Vermont

2007-05-23T11:26:00.000-05:00

As a child, I made a list of all the names I knew
and had ever known.

Lois and John and Howard, Gage and Maude
There were two Margaret’s and one Mildred.

After each name I paused, guilting the ink from
my half-melted black pen, hand clammy-wet,

then shaking it hard onto the bright, white page,
ink splattering like leaves, dropping slowly,

all old and brown, from having stayed on the
tree for far too long.

And then I remember Vermont, on a hill, black
metal fence caging us in the day we scrubbed

Names from charcoal and thin, chewy paper
rain falling whenever we pressed and later

hot summer sun rising and breaking through
thick clouds whenever we stopped to break.

Wondering if they wanted to be remembered
or simply left alone.

Re-freakin-union 2007

2007-05-20T22:38:00.000-05:00

There’s something about being up at 5 am on a Saturday night, drinking High Life and listening to birds waking up behind Tom Waits’ Closing Time. There’s something about hanging out with a group of college friends until the sky begins to get that black-blue-gray shade. There’s something about knowing that staying up and hanging out will make you tired the whole week but you stay up anyway, waiting for a real reason to go to sleep. Waiting for something to give.

When I feel like I’ve explored a place for long enough, I know immediately that it’s time to move on. And I’ll do anything to make that possible, because change is inevitable, so why not make things happen. What I’ve realized is that the older one gets, the harder it is to make these sudden changes. You can’t just move to Prague and start a whole new life because in this scenario Prague doesn’t even exist. Things become planted where you are and roots begin to grow without you even noticing. It takes something, like a weekend with good friends, to realize how firmly these roots are planted in. And if you even put them there.

On Saturday it was one of those crisp sunny days you would expect in September. We went to the bating cages and then the four of us hit some baseballs on a field out in Maryland. The last time I played baseball was with these guys and I couldn’t think of a better way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

One of my friends is moving to Las Vegas at the beginning of August, another to Nashville maybe, and another is still deciding. Plans change every week and don’t even require solid plans in the end. There’s something about following your instincts that is inevitable in these situations, but sometimes it seems impossible. Because it costs too much money or there isn’t a job set up. Sometimes I wonder how anyone makes any decisions at all because we create so many barriers.

Is it something about me? Or is it everything? Would you change a few pieces? Or forget the whole thing? ‘Cause there’s something about you, keeps me coming back. I know things will be fine. Fall into line. You’ll still be mine. -Caitlin Cary & Thad Cockrell

I always feel like no matter where you go, you keep circling back. That things never really change, only recycle. But something was different about this weekend in a way that I can’t explain. There was an uncomfortable change that had occurred, while we were all living in our separate cities. I only really felt it as I got ready to leave to drive back to Charlottesville. Where you are sitting around wanting to talk about something important, but you are too tired to really start that conversation. And time just passes by until it’s getting to be dusk. The sun was a huge, orange circle that settled over the Virginia mountains as I drove out of D.C. I was not really feeling like I’d left anything behind. My toothbrush and face lotion were packed in a bag in the trunk of my car. I just listened to Caitlin Cary and Thad Cockrell as I drove back to Charlottesville, my mind filled with disappointment and exhaustion.

Sick Day

2007-05-17T14:37:00.001-05:00

The day before my ninth birthday I had my appendix taken out. I don’t really remember the pain or the flowers, just little things like my best friend visiting and sitting on my hospital bed and lifting it up way off the ground and then back down. And my brother walking our dog below my high-up window, me waiving down to it as she just jumped and looked around at the ground for a treat. And my mom, staying by my side and sleeping uncomfortably next to me so that I wouldn’t get scared. As a sick child, you don’t really remember the urgency of those around you, just the thoughts of wishing things would get better and knowing that at some point you will be able to go home.

There were many occasions when I tried to fake a sickness so that I didn’t have to go to school that day. When really all I needed was a break from it all, my mom saw it as one more day that I would be behind in school. That I had to keep up with things in order to be successful later on in life. So each time I take a sick day I always feel this pang of guilt that I really could go in to work and get something done. That life doesn’t stop moving even if your body forces you to.

Whenever I get sick I always try to deny it, then I get really angry like something is getting in the way of me. And I assume that things will settle down and if I drink enough water it will go away. After being sick for a week I finally gave in and went to the doctor for help. I had a cold which turned into a sinus infection. I stayed at home and watched movies and slept all day. Just like any other sick day it forced me to really sit back and take a look at my life. I was unable to relax and try to get better because growing up I never really thought that was necessary. Because if you wait long enough, anything will fix itself.

One summer, two of my best friends and I were shopping in a consignment store in downtown Leesburg. Everything was going fine; we were typical middle schoolers trying to waste away the summer time in a growing but small town. I remember feeling this surge of energy, and instead of turning to my friends to talk about it, I just left. Without telling them anything. And I walked back to my house. I really don’t know why I didn’t want to be standing there anymore, in that thrift store, with my two best friends. I just couldn’t shake this feeling that nothing made sense anymore. That without school and other obligations that tied me down I would just drift away.

Recently, my dad also had his appendix out. He called me the day after his surgery to apologize for not being more empathetic of my pain when I was sick in third grade. How he wished he had been more understanding and that he loved me. The funny part is I don’t really remember not feeling supported during my trip to the hospital. I just remember how he carried me into the emergency room after fainting in the bathroom.

All day I’ve been looking up cities like Asheville and Missoula thinking I could just pack my bags and leave Charlottesville. That there are more exciting and peaceful places in the world that I’m missing out on by staying in a commitment. That there’s no use in dreaming anymore because people never really make decisions based on what they really want. They just wait things out until the next thing comes up, hoping to find some sort of peace with where they are at the present moment. This has never been good enough for me and it eats at me each day. I feel like I’m waiting for the moment when I will get up and walk out, without telling anyone.

For Mother's Day

2007-05-13T22:45:00.000-05:00

We are on our way back from a weekend in Leesburg, babysitting my mostly new nephew and celebrating Mother’s Day, when we stop at a drive-thru Starbucks outside of Culpepper. A drive-thru Starbucks. I get a Mocha Light Frappaccino (no whip cream) and he gets an iced Mocha. We talk about how family dynamics never really change and how when you are younger, you make the assumption that things will get better the older you get. That at some point, your family will realize you are an adult and that you exist without them. But this never really happens.

My mom and dad admit that my sister is the only one of the three of us that was planned. My brother and I were surprises, as they liked to call us, because when my parents first eloped in Korea they didn’t want to have kids. Four years later my brother was born, and there are only baby pictures to prove it. There exists only one picture of my mom while pregnant, and she’s hiding her round belly under a large overcoat. You can’t even tell she’s really pregnant unless you look really closely.

Last night was prom night outside of Culpepper, Virginia. I know this because the drive-thru barista at Starbucks sleepily tells us this as he hands us our drinks. He apologizes for not being ridiculously customer-friendly, blaming it on prom. I drive away and turn to my boyfriend: we should’ve asked if he lost his virginity. A little down the road we pass a truck and he points out a bumper sticker that says: Pro No Sex with Pro-Lifers. We both agree that that’s a good plan.

Mother’s Day is the biggest holiday of the year for flowers and cards. It’s marketed for weeks, months even, before the day arrives. For Mother’s Day, give an engraved iPod. I think I’ll give an engraved card. One year, I remember getting up really early to make my mom pancakes. The smell filled the entire house, and hoping to get her while she was still in bed, by the time I got them upstairs she was already out of the shower and drying her hair in the bathroom. She yelled from beneath the hairdryer: you know I don’t really eat breakfast, but thank you. I put the pancakes on the ironing board and left to get ready for church.

Once I made a mini-scrapbook out of a magazine about mothers and daughters with Gwyneth Paltrow and Blythe Danner on the cover. I pasted pictures of my mom and me, and then wrote notes about how much I appreciated having her as a mom. She told me that she told her best friend that it was one of the nicest Mother’s Day gifts she’d ever gotten.

I’ve only ever really seen my mom get angry twice. Once, I was directly responsible for that anger, when I accidentally backed my dad’s car into a tree in our driveway while learning how to drive stick shift. Do you know how much this is going to cost? I can’t believe you let this happen! The other I was only present for through the ceilings, when I could hear my mom yelling at my dad in the attic. She was crying, and her voice shook and creaked. My mom emerged from the attic, a shoebox in hand. The air conditioning installers had thrown a nativity scene I had made inside a shoebox while in preschool, across the attic thinking it was just a box. She had managed to find all the pieces except for the baby Jesus. The Virgin Mary was decapitated, and nothing seemed to fit inside that shoebox anymore. Now you know what those things mean to me, she said.

Chinese-Japanese Food in Boston’s Chinatown

2007-05-08T22:32:00.000-05:00

You are a spicy tuna roll and I am your chopsticks.
We are downtown, in the surrounds of snow and
extra wasabi. You are rolled in sticky white rice-
all soft and raw and pink in the middle. We are
the dog and rat bleeding onto the hard, brown
table. Two sugar packets shoved under one leg.
My arms and hands are large, clunky boots, still
wet dripping cold. There’s soy sauce up to our
ankles now-we are being dipped in it: salty, warm.
Hot water tilts and becomes soft. You are breath-
white on the glass and invisible to the outside…
and it stretches-engulfs you-all dark and damp.
We order bubble tea-leave too good of a tip and
walk out onto the chilly, concrete, narrow streets.

Betting on a Storm in May: Cinco de Derby

2007-05-07T22:52:00.000-05:00

I wanted him to write: Y'all have a good marriage, now. And then sign our names. I said it loudly-almost demanded it. But he only wrote the y'all part with something about from below the M-D and best wishes. Up until late Saturday night I had returned to Boston for the weekend feeling at home. Having lived there for a year working with after-school programs and traveling all over the city to parts where the T does not go, knowing I had a grandmother from Arlington, Mass., and an uncle from Melrose, Mass., and after spending Friday night with two friends from Tennessee, I didn't feel the sting of being an outsider until right then: watching him sign his friend's wedding picture boarder at the South Shore Country Club in Hingham, Massachusetts.

Growing up in Leesburg, VA wasn't too different from growing up in Weymouth, MA. One just had a stronger accent than the other. Both served sugar packets on restaurant tables to put into iced tea rather than serving sweet tea and both were the suburbs outside of major cities. I had Waxie Maxie's (which eventually became Coconuts Music) and he had Newberry Comics. Both of our friends from high school and college have begun to get married in distinct rows and seasons. While staying at his parents’ house the whole weekend he made me egg sandwiches and coffee in the morning-mine over-hard while his were over-easy. We talked about how as children the only way we would possibly eat eggs was if they were scrambled, their colors of white and yellow blending into pepper.

The wedding was full of loud south shore Boston accents, a DJ who couldn't even maintain drunken middle-aged dancers on the makeshift wooden floor, and crazy, male-on-male dancing. Which is what happens when a bunch of friends from the same town get together to celebrate the beginning of something and the end of what is known to be true. There was a camera awkwardly recording the whole thing, a bright headlight shining down on everyone, reminding us that the bride and groom will actually be present during the viewing of this recording, alone and on a couch in their new life as husband and wife.

I called my Americorps friend who returned to Kentucky after her year in Boston. I told her that Boston wasn't the same without her, and that she needed to blow off the Kentucky Derby and come hang out with me. Even though I knew this wasn't possible, I still hoped she would call me and say she was waiting at the T stop for me to come pick her up. But she stayed at the Derby and instead, I bet on a horse. Storm in May. It lost. I lost two whole dollars.

All trips up to Boston must include seeing my friend from college who I used to date. Seeing him and thinking of peanut butter and jelly and potato chip sandwiches, The Shins and Ben Folds Five in his dorm room, and sitting in those mountains at the top of the hill with three crosses. It must include drinking in Cambridge or Brookline, then heading back out to Weymouth. Never the same way since there is always construction and will always be construction in the city of Boston. It is its constant. It must include visiting my old boss who now has two children with her partner. Looking at the two new bedrooms with butterflies and airplanes hanging from each ceiling and thinking about how we used to do work at a desk in one of those rooms and how now it is filled with imagination and clouds. It involves realizing how much has changed since I lived there.

Now when I talk to his family and friends I say I'm from the D.C. area. Then I don't have to deal with why I don't have any real accent, and I don't have to explain that my dad is originally from Vermont and my mom from Missouri. I don't have to explain that the one thing Leesburg is now known for is an outlet mall, and how if I had to pick a place to call home it wouldn't even be those mountains in North Carolina anymore. I want to ask them why they stay in the Boston area. Why no one really seems to leave. Why they want him to move back and how I can become a part of things even though I say my o's much differently. But the small talk always ends too soon, and we are onto the next subject, without hesitation.

An Atypical Anti-Feminist Feminist

2007-05-02T08:59:00.000-05:00

I am beginning the month of May with Feist, a mixed CD made by a friend called More Than Boobies, and Marie Howe. I plan on continuing through the month with Cat Power, Mates of State, Yo La Tengo, Sleater-Kinney, Smoosh, Tori Amos, Billie Holiday, and poetry by Kim Addonizio and Jesusland by Julia Scheeres. I’ll have to wait to listen to the new Bright Eyes and I can’t start reading Lolita like I’ve been planning to for years.

There’s a place for everything. When I was growing up, I kept all of my Barbie dolls in a pile on the floor, sometimes they were shuffled under my bed or kept in the closet. I only had two Ken dolls, both of which were hideously ugly and misshapen, so when my friends and I coupled off the dolls we had two women together most of the time. Even with their weirdly small waists and pointy feet, they just looked better together. The Ken dolls just threw everything off and most of the time we didn’t even bother to get them out to play with. Things just seemed better that way.

Yesterday after I bought the new Feist CD, my friend and I went to lunch together. It was one of those cool-in-the-shade types of days, and we sat outside, eating rare tuna and French fries. The fact that I had to be somewhere at a certain time drove me crazy. And that’s when I told her this idea, an idea I’ve had for years, was finally coming to fruition. I was going to only listen to or read or watch TV or movies with women as main characters or authors or the driving creative force behind the material. Last time I told her this she asked me why I didn’t just incorporate more women into my life. Why make a deal out of it. She admitted to being an atypical anti-feminist feminist.

After I graduated from college I moved to Boston for a boy. In the locker room at yoga I have to kick myself every time I say I’m sorry when I need to get by someone or I feel like I’m in the way. On the back of the bus in first grade I told a boy that I had a crush on that my best friend (who also had a crush on him) liked him. I’ve allowed a friend to be in an abusive relationship because I thought she was strong enough to take care of herself and it turned out she was strong enough not to ask for help. I resented my mom when she went back to work after our first couple of years in Virginia because it meant I had to stay at the babysitter’s house who only gave me one cookie as a snack. When people told me that I reminded them of my grandma Lois I resented it, thinking that she was difficult and self-absorbed. I slowly allowed my back to peel over, not wearing a bra even after I really needed to. After spending hours and hours in the library of plays in high school, I realized that the world shared my limited view that women had no real voice when I couldn’t find any monologues for class. So instead I wrote my own.

I always say the day I became a true feminist was at the beginning of middle school when I threw all my old Barbie dolls on the roof over and over again until they became scratched and worn; their eyes no longer recognizable and their tan thighs became torn and ugly. Then I left those dolls in the attic to melt in the hot, summer sun. I had the idea that I couldn’t just be a woman, because just women are weak. Feminists are strong.

Maybe it’s the thinking that when you are with a group of women there’s a high chance that at least two or three of them have been sexually assaulted or abused. Maybe it’s the vulnerability I feel when walking even in the safest places alone, or the way my heart beats when a man accidentally walks too close behind me and I gladly let them pass. Maybe it’s the condescension in older male voices when they offer to help you carry something heavy or the naïve tone in my dad’s voice as he tries to tell me that I wasn’t built to carry a window air conditioner down the attic stairs. I don’t plan on changing the world or making myself feel safer by holding my keys between my knuckles, and I don’t plan on carrying a window air conditioner up and down stairs so that I can be strong enough to help my dad. After all, we got central AC a couple of years ago, so those clunky, awkward window units can sit in the attic and collect dust, waiting for someone to come and take them to Goodwill or throw them out.

ridiculous seersucker preppy outfits

2007-04-29T18:21:00.000-05:00

I rarely have the courage to do things alone. As much as I love being alone in my apartment, I always get so anxious when I have to do something outside in the world by myself. I always admired people who can go to the movies by themselves (although I think this is more of a city thing) and feel completely comfortable. Not only are these people comfortable but also they really enjoy it. I mean, unless you are one of those people who talks throughout movies, then going alone is probably a great experience. I really hope to do this someday. For now, I'm going to settle with walking downtown to get dumplings and sweet and sour cold noodles.

Last night during this walk I was listening to the new Andrew Bird on my iPod, and it was one of those perfect spring-summer nights where it's cool enough to wear a jacket or just a t-shirt. And like usual, the downtown mall was full of people hanging out and eating outside. Some of the restaurants open up European-style in the warmer seasons, and everything seemed so round. I didn't get annoyed at the couple in front of me walking with their arms around each other and I even smiled when they stopped for a long, romantic kiss.

On Friday night I had been convinced to go to Foxfields by an old high school friend who was in town, but only if our other high school friend who also lives in Charlottesville went as well. Foxfields is basically a huge field party in the middle of horse races. Everyone dresses up in ridiculous seersucker preppy outfits and sundresses and gets wasted in the middle of the day. Not exactly my idea of fun, but the fact that I was hanging out with these two friends really made the difference. That always makes the difference.

I struggled to get up early on Saturday morning since we spent all Friday night drinking and catching up, explaining how much our lives had changed without really talking about it, and drinking cold, white wine. My friend's boyfriend drove us to Foxfields, with me sitting in the back, sunglasses and emergen-C on hand. I had thrown on a cotton dress and flip-flops, my make-up from the night before still sagging on my face. About an hour into the five-mile-an-hour/standstill traffic, my friend and I got out of the car and started to walk. On any other day I would have been complaining, but at this point I was invested in finding our other friend, enjoying the overcast cool breeze day, and just plain being in the company of these two people.

The road to Foxfields is full and green, right outside of Charlottesville and into the country. There are large houses that line the road, and when we finally got to the ridiculousness that is Foxfields, I was almost disappointed that the walk was over. We finally found our friend, and he was at a plot near the horse tracks. At one point we began to talk about figuring stuff out, and it made me think of how we all three used to hang out in high school, how they lingered around together after I had gone home.

I have never really understood the reason why people are drawn to certain people, they just are. Whether it’s on the wooden bleachers in a worn-down gym or in the middle of a field in central Virginia, there’s no real way of knowing why each group connects together and then, broken apart, swarms around each other.

My friend and I left early and took a cab home because she had to work, and we shared it with a couple. I felt like I lived in an actual city again. The girl sat in the back with us and her boyfriend sat in the front, drunkenly putting his hand up in the air for her to hold it. They were making plans to go get some pizza and then take a nap. In the middle of the silence of the cab ride he blurted out "love you" as if that was the one thought that made it through his foggy mind. It sounded like it came from somewhere deep in his thoughts, like he had dwelled on it and then couldn’t help but let it surface. She laughed and told him she loved him, too.

Bright Red Stick Shift Aerostar Minivan

2007-04-25T20:47:00.000-05:00

There are things that only slightly upset me, like BMW's and Dancing with the Stars. Then, there are things that really upset me: tweed, crowded grocery stores with old women who tell you you have too many items in your basket and that you should get a cart, that psychic guy John Edward who preys on families who have lost loved ones and tells them that they are "in a better place," and hot, humid, middle-of-July type of weather. There's also a long list of things that creep me out as well.

I've decided that minivans creep me out. Not in a soccer mom entitlement kind of way, but in an intense, I just watched an actual scary movie kind of way. Today I was behind this silver minivan, New Jersey plates, a black turtle compartment on the top, visible passengers throughout the van which I had to strain to see through the tinted windows. I'm guessing it was in case they wanted to watch a DVD while on their five minute trip downtown. I know this because I drove behind them all the way from my apartment complex to the parking garage. The driver was doing the type of driving where he was either talking on his cell phone or having some sort of important can't pay attention to the fact that I'm driving kind of conversation. And something about the whole thing creeped me out.

Growing up, my family had a bright red stick shift Aerostar minivan. My brother eventually took it with him to college, and we promptly replaced it with a black stick shift Explorer. We are a stick shift only family. I eventually learned how to drive a stick shift car in the parking lot of my old elementary school with my dad yelling, "Clutch! Clutch! Now gas! Gas! Goddamnit!" It is one of my most pleasant memories of growing up. By then I was used to my dad yelling things like goddamnit, but usually it was from the backyard while he was working in his garden or from upstairs when he was installing the window air conditioners in mid-June. The best part of that whole experience was our neighbors letting us know how great it was to hear him yell goddamnit son of a bitch every Saturday afternoon when the lawnmower broke or the rabbits ate all of the lettuce. He once killed a possum with a pitchfork. We didn't hear any cussing when that happened and I didn't learn about this story until I was a teenager. At the time I was embarrassed by all of this, thinking that everyone thought my dad was hard to deal with or a disturbance, but it was something that I learned to love and appreciate about my dad. Most of the time he would trap the animals that disturbed his precious garden in a silver cage and take them out to the woods and set them free to disturb somewhere else.

Other things that creep me out: that weird guy with the round-faced body, unibrow and that weird girl he's with in the yellow dress on that e-harmony commercial. They stand together and talk about communication and how hard it is to talk about themselves to each other and how e-harmony helped them find each other. And I think to myself, that's exactly what happened you sad fucks. They are very, very creepy both alone and together. I'm actually glad they found each other because all I can think about is his round unibrow face sitting at a bar asking the bartender what time she gets off work after she's watched him unsuccessfully present himself to a variety of unattractive, lonely women all night. And when she promptly says no as well, he decides that e-harmony is his online lonely bar ticket to love.

While I was doing my year as an Americorps*VISTA working in Boston, I had a friend who lived out in Holyoke, Mass. (FYI: It's the birthplace of volleyball, right next to Springfield, the birthplace of basketball). We used to drive up to the "mountains" (after living in Boone, North Carolina for four years, nothing's ever really mountains anymore), and then over to Northampton, Mass. He had this tape of Jeff Mangum playing live at Jitter Joe's and throughout the whole thing there is a baby talking and crying in the background. And it always creeped me out because on top of his music and his voice there's this baby crying and then the sounds of clanking of plates in the restaurant. Part of me doesn’t want to listen, but part of me wishes I had been there at Jitter Joe’s.

For some reason when I was behind that minivan today I really wanted to see what it was like inside. Get a closer look at this family that who stored extra DVD's of A Night at the Museum and Shrek II in their black storage turtle. Because while I was growing up we sat in the back of that bright red Aerostar, air conditioning never really reaching us, half cracked windows that slid to the side, and gray, soggy seats. And from the outside, without tinted windows, everyone could look in and see us.

Sleeping in a Wal-Mart Parking Lot

2007-04-23T18:21:00.000-05:00

My friend's sister once went on a diet that consisted of eating beets only. I remember this well, because we were standing in their kitchen one afternoon, my friend and I eating hamburger buns or leftover pizza from the night before, and she was standing by the sink eating bloody, red beets out of the can. And she was doing it proudly, announcing that this was the third day and she had already lost eight pounds. And that this was the beginning of the new her. That she would no longer have to worry about being overweight, that this red vegetable was the answer to all of her questions. Her diet lasted less than a week.

I woke up this morning feeling tired, like I always do after the weekend. There was again, one toothbrush next to my sink and two pairs of boxer shorts and some socks on the floor in my bedroom. I couldn't hear the red sox/yankees game playing next door in my living room, and the only warmth that came into my apartment was the beginnings of a new, hot spring day. I could feel the Charlottesville humidity rising outside my window, creeping in as the sun came up. But I kept my windows open to bring the sounds of cars and trains passing next to my ears.

We spent Sunday in bed all day planning our three week road trip across the country. We made sure we planned to stop in places like Missoula, Montana, and Madison, Wisconsin. We mapped out what cities we have friends in, where we want to stay in hotels or hostels, where we want to camp out, trying to avoid a night in a Wal-Mart parking lot. Parts of us want to just hit the open road and feel all romantic and energized and spontaneous, but parts of us know that at the end of a 12 hour day of driving, knowing that cold sheets in a two star hotel await us will feel amazing.

When I was four years old my family took a train trip across the country. There are pictures of the experience and a whole album devoted to it on a shelf in my parents house with little captions next to the pictures like, "Woah, that's a long way down" from the Empire State Building and "Snow? In the summertime? Unbelievable." One caption reads "Thank you, to the man who made this all possible." My dad traveled a lot for work while I was growing up, so we could make trips like that, so that once a year we could travel up to Vermont or Colorado to go skiing. Whenever I think about these trips, I also think of my brother, sister, mom and I sitting around eating BLT's or pizza whenever my dad was out of town on business. And how much I loved knowing that we could have BLT's whenever my dad was out of town because he was trying not to eat red meat and we could never eat anything like that when he was at home for dinner. Somehow, I always concentrated on the perks of dinnertime without him, so that I wouldn't feel like I was missing something.

The only part I can remember about the cross country train trip is the It's a Small World After All ride in Disneyland in California. I just remember being surrounded by all these dolls singing and the dirty, dyed green-blue water as we floated behind families who had traveled to have some sort of vacation, some kind of break from it all, only to be lined up in the hot sun. And when I was growing up and someone asked me if I'd ever been to a certain city or state I always had to ask my mom, "have I been to Seattle?" Yes, I've been to Seattle.

For the upcoming road trip, we made a list of things to pack making sure that a cooler and plenty of food and water was at the top. Knowing what is available at the gas stations and truck stops along the way, we wanted to make sure that we actually took care of ourselves on this three-week excursion. In my mind all I picture is the Pacific Ocean lining California One as we eat granola bars and drink five day old bottled water, no shower for days and the smell of salt spacing through the open windows. Whenever anyone asks how long we've been together, and if we have ever driven for a long time with each other we both avoid the question. "Three weeks, huh?" Part of me wants to defend us, saying we've driven from Virginia to Boston plenty, but the other part just thinks of that Pacific Ocean. And him right next to me.

Then I think about what happens whenever we put ourselves out of our own contexts. I picture the lives of all the people we will pass on the road, and how unexplainable the whole experience will be. It makes me want to think about what I can already change in my life right now, feeling sometimes like I'm living off of beets and not really tasting or experiencing anything.

MTV, You're My Hero

2007-04-19T19:28:00.000-05:00

I've gotten into a really bad habit of watching MTV music videos in the mornings while eating heart-to-heart cereal before I go to work. It's even gotten to the point where I am late every morning because Daughtry's singing to his new audience or Gwen Stefani's pulling two Asian chicks up a building with her hair. It's really an awful way to start the day, and it's a habit that at this point I'm not willing to give up. Sometimes at 8 a.m. some dating reality show will come on and they will kick off the music videos early. This always makes me angry for some reason, like one is actually better than the other.

And sometimes the moment I get to work I close my door, separating myself from the rest of the world by a sheet of glass and some wooden panels. I always find myself thinking that there's no real reason to feel this way, that everyone has good intentions and are just trying to move through life without running into too many sharp edges. But it feels empty to me.

When I was younger my best friend and I used to love watching music videos (never at my house because it smelled and acted old). If we weren't watching TV we'd hang out in her basement playing on her small trampoline against the cold, hard concrete. But if her mom or housekeeper came to do laundry we'd have to relocate again. We were in constant search of somewhere to go without being found.

In the summer we would go out to her bay house in Chesapeake, Maryland and kill jellyfish and go out on her dad's boat. I remember her mom staying in and reading while we went outside into the sun. We'd swim in the pool next to the bay when it got too hot and smelly to go in the real water. We'd hide in the woods around her open, glass house and pretend that nothing else existed. I remember the huge, thick trees and how the bark would shed off onto our hot, salty hands. And we could never figure out how to shake it off.

Now we are on opposite sides of the country and that voice is heard from an e-mail about how the weather in L.A. is sunny or how she's gotten new furniture which means she's staying out there. And I close my office door and write her an e-mail explaining how there's noise outside and I can't concentrate on writing a good one. Then I delete it, remembering that she is in Japan enjoying the cherry blossoms with no real internet. And I remind myself that this is how it's supposed to happen. We all move away and live with real furniture in real cities. Mainly, I just miss her.

And we make choices as to who gets to stay close to us. He's coming to visit this weekend and again it's time sucked into 48 hours, coffee shops, maybe the movies, and the planning for our upcoming summer road trip together. It's my apartment, warm from his laundry and cooking, his feet under a blanket next to mine. Those same feet that I traded shoes with at a party in Boston the first night we met. The night I rushed back from Philadelphia after my uncle's funeral and rain that delayed my plane for almost 4 hours. It's feeling that independence and separation I've worked so hard to have slip away into something new. And it's discussing plans of him turning down a job in Greensboro to move here to be with me. We've decided that staying close is better than keeping that drive down route 29 across state lines between us. Because at some point all the phone calls and e-mails aren't enough.

Temporary Tattoo

2007-04-17T20:00:00.000-05:00

I can see its little head creeping out from under my sleeve all day. It's a smeared blue and I can smell the lotion I used to put in on my forearm. It's a fruit-purple odor and each time I move my sleeve to cover up the temporary zebra tattoo I can smell it. I can even taste the fruit stripe gum whenever I see that tattoo, long after it's been removed from my sore jaw. And it's a fucking blue and orange zebra on a bike and it’s fruit stripe and elementary school all over again. It's sitting at the lunch table waiting to finish my sandwich so that I can taste the pink and white sugar-gum.

The numbness from the early morning dentist visit has worn off and I keep moving my jaw to check in and see if it's awake. I'm still getting used to the way my teeth collapse on top of each other, awkwardly adjusting to the new fillings. I keep thinking that something's stuck in my teeth, and if I clench down hard enough things will go back to normal. I've only had two cavities in my life, so three in one day seems pretty intense but I promised myself that I would relax and keep my shoulders down off my ears. Because eventually that turns into a headache. And with the wind and the train near my apartment the night before each hour seemed to wake me up and my eyes feel swollen with metal wheels clicking on a track.

The sun’s finally back out over the mountains and I can see it pouring into the hallways outside my office. And it's quiet and reaches out onto the blue carpet. I want to say that it seems sunny outside but I feel like each time I move my whole office can hear me. And it stays like that on through the afternoon.

When I get home the Henrico County news is forgetting who Nikki Giovanni is, and I half-watch while I get my stuff ready for yoga. I pack my duck towel I've had since I was four, in the past saving it for the yearly beach trip down to the outer banks with my family. And when we could no longer survive the hot six hour car ride (no bathroom breaks unless we were on empty, which was much worse for my older sister), the towel got stored away on a shelf in my closet. Now it's becoming all scratchy and worn after months of sweating and washing it out. It feels stiff under my fingers and I squeeze it tightly as it crunches into my bag. I switch between three towels. One has a picture of a monster holding a pencil with "No More Mr. Nice Guy" written on it and the other is a man, woman, and poodle surfing with a "Come On Aboard!" written in big, red letters.

When the class isn't that crowded at first I feel relief, then the heat, then the comfort of it as it begins to try to warm my body. Something feels so off about tonight and I turn my duck towel onto the white side to keep the bright colors from distracting me. But eventually my sweat bleeds through it, and I can see the ducks all crowded around a beach ball. It feels like they are just looking at me as I try to balance and breathe and concentrate. But I know after all those years of being stuck in my closet that they are resentful. Each time I bring them into the hot yoga room I know they listen for the sound of the ocean but it's not there and my sweat isn't salty enough. And there's blue streaks coming down my arm as the temporary zebra tattoo washes away. I try to let it all wash away.

From the beginning...

2007-04-16T20:09:00.000-05:00

So from the time my cell phone-alarm clock goes off at 6:30 a.m. I know today is going to be one of those days. I can just feel it in my eyes, the back of my head, and mostly in my body which is tired from the 3 hours of yoga I did the day before. It's the hot kind, where you smash yourself in a room with dozens of bodies in 115 degree heat and even more humidity. It's the kind where you drink lots and lots of water and plan ahead all day just to do something amazing for your body. And it's only supposed to be 90 minutes, but I hear about people doing doubles, so I tried it out. But my body feels worn, not more flexible or healthy. And I can feel it as I get up to go to work.

I don't straighten my hair or do my eye make-up. I wear my glasses and throw on some clothes suitable enough for a business casual office. It all reminds me that I work at a business casual type office, and feeling that 8-5 pulling me closer, keeping me in for years and years to come because of the surviving salary and benefits. Because of the comfort. And it's the first time in my life that I can feel that choice...that definite comfort. And it picks at me.

The day goes by as any usual day, any day that rushes into decision making and the weeding out of information. My only reprieve seems to come with a few friends sarcastic e-mailing, a coffee break, The Weakerthans on my lunch break, and knowing that at some core I'm doing something right. It's a day that just begins and ends on the clock. And just when I'm getting used to Charlottesville, just when I think it's safe to believe in a place that I've struggled with for the past year and a half, I get the lights cut off on me during my every so often trip to Whole Foods.

From the emergency lights above I can't see the hippies, healthies, and old people who were just standing around me...but I can hear the employees hoping they get off work early, and then the silence, the type of silence that makes everyone uncomfortable. The girl next to me immediately gets out her cell phone and calls someone. Others get out their cell phones and start to shop by the light of it. I just stand there, waiting. I think of that hot, hot yoga room. I think of how stale things seem to get without electricity and eventually I make my way up to the front of the store.

Maybe it's the day or the dust that's brought this. Maybe it's the wind. Because it's turning into one of those nights where the clouds roll over each other and everything's a dark blue with that gray tone. Maybe it's because people don't feel very comfortable being in an uncertainty on a day where tragedy is defined by 33 and who could have done what in 2 hours. The manager has instructed people to check out using a calculator, and they are just underestimating those items that they don't know the exact price of. Just as I start to wait in line, power hums back on and you can feel the relief in the room. Everyone can hear the noise again.

And I don't begin to understand why I'm paying $2.75 for gas on the way home, or why there were hardly any cars on the usually busy route 29, or why I've decided that taking a different way home that is the same amount of time as any other way home (all short cuts and long cuts are the same in Charlottesville) feels somehow like I'm still trying to figure things out, but it does. I've switched from The Weakerthans to Wilco, because at this point it's gotten darker outside, and everything still hangs between rain and nighttime.