Thursday Morning Vacation

Last night as I was leaving work for my grad class I took two steps out of my office and slipped. I don't know if it was on the hem of my pants which still haven't been taken in, or the fact that the shiny linoleum is also slippery, but I busted the hell out of my $4 gray thrift shop heels. I limped brokenly down to the bus and called my mom. I call her whenever I want to whine and bitch and my friends don't want to hear it. Like when I get a paper cut on my way to give an oral presentation that I'm not prepared for, or when I tear my heels, both of which happened in about five minutes last night. She commiserated and asked if I wanted her to bring me a new pair. Ah, the perks of living at home!

But of course, since I was worrying about my oral presentation this gesture of kindness only served to annoy me when it was carried out. She texted me three times to ask what black heels I meant. I only have one pair. She brought three of my black shoes with her, two pairs of boots (neither of which have heels) and the one I'd asked for. When she got to the metro, and just as I was walking up to the car she pulled away, like she was playing some cruel joke. She said she didn't see me and was just moving out of the way for the other car, but I had my suspicions. Then she accused me of smoking, which was doubly unfair because for once I hadn't and had just walked past a man who was, so the smell lingered on me. At least accuse me of it when I actually have been! And when we stopped for dinner in the middle of rush hour and didn't go to a drive thru. I was convinced I'd be screwed, and by my own mother!

But once I got to class my mood improved. I didn't have to go first after all, as I had feared. And my kind professor had brought goodies for us all, including a bottle of wine. Why hasn't someone included wine in oral presentations before? Maybe because after I had only about an inch of wine I could feel it in my face, and started worrying that I'd be slurring my way through my speech. Fortunately, the tipsy feeling passed and I got up and speed talked my way through my ten minute presentation, coming in at 9:30, just as I'd timed it. I think it went well.

I gave myself the day off today--I'm still at work, but not worrying about anything. I'm going to do the crossword, read blogs, maybe watch some tv. I don't have too much actual work today so I'll be taking it easy. (Incidently, I'm really started to get annoyed by the TV companies who won't give in to the writers. Enough already! I want my Tina Fey back!!! The Broadway producers gave in, why can't you??)

Moral Majority & Me

My boss has just been sitting here talking about his children and their many successes in life. I like my boss, he's a nice guy and I'm sure his children are nice too, but I don't want to hear about how all five of them are doing well in life, and are all married, even the ones around my age. The thirty year old is making 6 figures, the next one younger is a very successful horticulturalist and architect or something, married to a woman who just got her PhD. in Molecular Biology. When they moved to Chicago so she could continue school he had jobs lining up to hire him. The youngest was a government employee by the time he was in college. Because he was so good at being a receptionist(!?), they offered him a job.

I sat and listened and thought about my family, my friends, my life. My thirty year old friends don't know what they want out of life, and they certainly aren't married. My family is a mess. My resume does not reflect any brilliant flashes of cubicle cohesion. My GPA is only a smidgen above average. If I ever even saw an out of town job offer I'd be so confused I'd probably throw rocks at it. My boss' family reads like the Christmas newsletter families I barely know send my mother to make us feel bad. I wondered where the black sheep of the family is; was there a sixth child who was disowned because she was single and working as a waitress? Did the youngest drink once too much in that GMU frat house? Did any of them ever try drugs? This family sounds nice, orderly, conventional and boring.

Boring is one word that does not describe my family. In fact, in polite society we are normally referred to as that Byrd Family. It used to bother me when I was younger that we were always the odd ones out. We never had matching fluffy towels and didn't live in a McMansion with beige carpets which my prepubescent self thought was so important to decency and moral order. We had an old manse house where the pipes froze one winter, forcing us to place jugs of water by the toilet for flushing purposes, and go over to neighbors for showers. We had a minivan whose upholstered roof began to unstick itself and hang like a curtain, brushing our heads. Eventually we removed the upholstered part altogether and rode around with the metal frame of the roof as our only barrier. We were the ones who didn't have a television until I was ten, so we created epic storylines with our Barbies, constructing tent houses for them out of those mismatched towels, and imagined dust angels swirling around our ankles when we stepped into the silty creek bottoms and knew every child safe movie made up through the Seventies, because that's what we were allowed to watch. We were the ones who lived in an old house behind the McMansions, with a chair lift for my grandmother that all of us kids would ride simultaneously for the fun of it.

Boring is not a word that describes my friends, either. Pouring dishsoap into fountains to see what happens, having spontaneous Chinese dinners, serving microwave s'mores at 2 am, sewing clothes while sitting around in her underwear, moving to Europe for the experience, moving to another country for love, getting yelled at by Belgian conductors, taking road trips up to New York for the hell of it, or to the mountains to capture the perfect summer day, these are not the things of normal people. These are not the things my boss would be bragging about if it were his children, but these are the things that will save us from the life he does brag about.

All of my favorite people are a little unusual, they do things a little oddly and laugh a little too loudly. They plan poorly but execute splendidly. Anyone who gets anywhere does it by not being conventional. Think about it. What actor, writer, inventor or artist gets where they are by being a conventional person? Since I don't plan on living a life of convention why would I care to compare myself to the people who do? Nothing wrong with those people, but I don't want to be one. Now that I've been unconventional for so long I've gotten used to it and I think I'd like to continue. It's more fun here, on the fringe, where you're allowed to dream about being an artist and make up your own games. I want us to keep being the strange ones, the ones without a plan, but having a lot of fun. Let's burn burn burn and never settle down. We'll be Jack Kerouac, Dorothy Parker, Oscar Wilde and Pablo Picasso all rolled into one.

What A Girl Wants

Ha. Ahem, Hmm. Just when I think I'm growing up and getting better at the man game I get thrown for a loop. A Fruit Loop. My new gay best friend, Jason? Turns out we're best friends for a different reason--because he's bi and has a crush on me. I mean, this guy seems so gay he's got pink flames shooting out his fingertips and he has a crush on me? First off I'm flattered. When I think of men, or women that would be attractive enough to make a person go in a certain direction that maybe they don't always go in, I am not on the top of that list. Secondly, I'm curious, partially for the reasons stated above, why am I of interest? And also because he's 35. I kinda feel cool. Thirdly, though, I'm worried that he'll make a move that I can't reciprocate and I will lose a new friend.
I know generally women bemoan the fact that a cute, cool guy is gay, but today I'm bemoaning the fact that he's not gay enough. Because then I wouldn't have to worry that I was going to hurt his pride, feelings or anything else. I don't really have a problem dating a bi guy (umm, I've done it before, without great results but that's not my fault, I don't think.) but I'm not interested in Jason in that way, and I feel like I've just been stuck with an adorable puppy, one who brings me my slippers and waits for me to get home, but I'm just too much of a cat person to appreciate it.

I'm wondering if we can just keep this a friendship. Of course, I was also wondering that last night, when I was picking out what to wear tonight when we go out for sushi. I was trying to tell myself that it's just because I don't want to look schlumpy in the city after a day at work and around a new friend, who since he's a little gay, has a good style. But part of it feels like this is a date, and even if it's a date with a gay man it's the first date I've been on in so long that dressing up for it is fun.

He came over after Thanksgiving, when all my friends had stopped by to escape from their families, and hang out with friends. He brought his Wii, which made the party, and extra alcohol, which helped. Then he stayed late to clean up with me, take out the trash and put away leftovers. Aja, who was still there when he took out the trash just looked at me with a smirk. I knew what she was thinking but I didn't want to believe it. Now, after discussing the possibility with The Pea as well, I think I have to face facts. My new gay best friend is in love with me. Sigh. Maybe we could get a spot on Sally Jessy Rapheal.

You've Come A Long Way, Baby

I just watched this Grey's Anatomy episode online, since I have no work to do. It was all about how we never really get over high school, even as we grow up and move on as adults, a part of us is still stuck in the mold high school shoved us into. I guess that is partially true. Whenever I get together with people I knew then, gossip about high school and what's happened since reigns. It's like nothing else will be as big as high school, until maybe we all start having kids. I don't know if it's just an American construction, or if it's because high school involves a bunch of different kids living through their formative years together, like a huge petri dish, but it does stay with you.

I hated high school. Hated it. I thought it was a major waste of my time, not because I didn't think I needed an education, but because I didn't think I was getting one. I was mostly getting busywork. I would never want to repeat it, even if I could go back in time with my current knowledge. I'd still feel like a mouse. I spent so much time and energy re-inventing who I wanted to be that I'm sure people thought I was strange. I was seeking that magic combination, the one where I instantly transform into someone who doesn't care what others think, and is also admired by everyone. I think that was important for me, I discovered who I wanted to be, who I was, and who I could never be. That is something I still have, a knowledge of who I am and who I could never be.

At the same time, I don't think I'm trapped by it. I think some people can be so traumatized by how they were treated in high school that they can't see what they've become. They can't see what everyone who has met them since sees. I guess that's why realizing that my friends are not only cool looking but also cool people made me so happy the other night. Sometimes I stop and observe and without realizing it, compare them to high school. That's when I notice how far I've come. In high school I would have never dreamed I could have such friends. I would have felt inadequate and shy. And because they're older I would have felt that difference much more than I do now. But I also think that the really cool people, the coolest ones out there today, were not the ones you thought of as popular or hip in high school. So maybe my friends that I think of as cool and stylish and smart and funny would have been just as awkward as I was then. We've grown into ourselves and the changes are nice. It makes us better people.

Now I can make friends and feel like they want to be my friend for a reason. In high school I never thought that. Or at least, I was always a little suspicious. And friends that I've made since then, that I knew in high school, but never spoke to, have revealed themselves to be different than what I expected. I don't think I live in a clique, like Grey's made it out to be. I think that I do have a circle of friends and there are some people that aren't part of that circle, but because we don't have that friendship chemistry. We're not of the same tribe. They have their own circle. I don't think anyone looks at me and thinks, I wish she'd be my friend, but she's a popular snob. If you fit with me I'll be your friend. I spent too much time in high school worrying about being "cool" and missing out on great friends around me by not talking to them.

High school remains an important part of our lives, sometimes it is to our detriment, sometimes it is for our betterment. But I don't think that Grey's has it exactly right. I think we do get past it, we do move on. Even if we keep the friends we had then we can add new ones, ones we wouldn't have had before. And we grow into people who are fascinating because of the differences that high school points out so clearly.

Wrap Up

Ahh. Ohh. Ugh. I am totally wrecked after this weekend. I planned on it being a calm, sleepy sort of time. Nothing too much to do, no big plans like Boston or New York. Just hanging out. Most likely in Reston. That didn't exactly happen. I hung out at Matt and Mark's on Friday, with a group of their friends, mostly from high school. Aja and I ended up on the couch giggling over boys and their ridiculousness, after the old high school friends left and it was just the normal group still there. Paul brought over s'mores to make in the microwave, and then treated us with ginger snap cookies he'd also made. Jackson, Matt's new friend who fits right in with the group, and his ex girlfriend from West Virginia, Scarlett came over and made a nice addition to the group.


Saturday I've already mentioned. Sunday I went to dinner with Spencer, my friend from high school. We went to Thai and talked faster than our brains could keep up. I don't remember it all, but it was philosophical and deep.


Monday I was tired and scratchy at work. My voice is almost gone and I didn't get nearly as much sleep as I planned this weekend.

Tuesday I stayed home sick. I got as far as the Park & Ride on Whiele and got off, called my boss and went home to bed. As soon as I'd be happily drifting off something would wake me up. First it was Sadie coming to join me, then it was Jason calling to chat. Finally I gave up and got up.

I spent the day relaxing and cooking. I've invented a new recipe, pumpkin pie baklava. I brought over the remainer of my test batch to Matt and Mark's where Scarlett put us all to work making Chinese and Vietnamese dinner. Paul came over and then Alan, their friend from high school came by. He'd just gotten home from L.A.

Today we get to leave work at 2, so I'm wrapping things up and excited to go home. I still feel sick and I need some more sleep.

Make New Friends, But Keep the Old.

Last night I went out with The Designer, Matt, Mark, Jackson, Scarlett and Paul to Be Bar in DC. I didn't plan on going out, I went into DC to get my hair cut at Urban Style Lab where my friend Jackie works and then I hung out with Chris Nixon for the rest of the afternoon, going out to eat, hanging at the place where he's dogsitting. Then, I went to meet up with everyone in DC. I didn't plan on going out, but I always plan on looking good, so it wasn't too much of a problem, except that I was wearing my beautiful wedge heeled boots. Beautiful, but not practical for all night dancing. I also forgot my ID and wore the stylish XXX for the evening.

Be Bar is fun and pretty, and filled with pretty people, but not too pretentious, just a little pretentious. And, about 95% gay, as I was sad to discover. It was mostly gay guys and fruit flies. But the dancing was good, and the DJ one of the best. I had a great time despite my underage status.

After the bar closed the party continued. We made our way to Annie's Steakhouse, where we were greeted by the rest of the underground late night partiers in DC. When I went to the bathroom a coiffed drag queen in ruffled teal blue stepped out with a sneer, leaving me facing the toilet seat in its upright and locked position. "Thanks, lady." I muttered.

Jason, my new friend that I met at Be Bar, and I sat at the bar while everyone else, and some extras crowded around various tables. We exchanged life stories and made friends with the flaming bartender, Julio, who livened up the early morning crowd with his extravagant personality, and sang for us along with the stereotypical gay disco music playing over the speakers.

I love going out when I don't expect it, and making good friends in the course of a night. I love feeling like I fit into the decor of a pretty place, and I love looking at my friends and realizing that they are hot shit. It's vain, I know, but it's an ego boost that I used to never imagine possible. It's part of the fun of being an adult without yet acquiring most of the responsibilities. I love crawling into bed as the sky lightens, after dancing until my feet ache.

The Thinker

So apparently my friend The Designer has nicknamed me "The Thinker" and our other friend The Pea. Well, as my brother always says, that's better than "The Stinker."

Tomorrow: My trip to Boston and New York. For reals y'all.

The Sun Shines Through

I had a feeling of doom laying low in my stomach for much of yesterday. It rested there and wasn't bothered by the bouncing of the bus as I made my way to Mason for my conference with Professor Jann. It was bothered slightly by rambunctious children in their costumes, riding the bus with me, but not enough to go away and leave me. I was early for my meeting and so I killed some time in the Fenwick library, the library on campus that makes me happy and comfortable in its dusty world of knowledge and mediocre mid-Sixties design.

I made my way up to the English department on the 4th floor of Robinson A. As I clomped up the stairs I was reminded of something one of my professors said while struggling up to the top floor, where they'd ensconced the literary nuts like him. It made me smile. Standing outside my professor's door, eavesdropping on her conference with a classmate and reading the fliers, comics and political statements of my previous professors, made my heart stop racing.
In Professor Jann's office her commonsense and cheery disposition frightened the feeling of doom away. Listening to her comments on my paper, which were pretty good for a rough draft to receive, made me feel capable again, and her ideas and way of listening to mine made me feel intelligent and almost like a peer. She laughed at my description of my Halloween costume and when I told her a friend couldn't believe I had a conference on tonight of all nights.

Leaving her office full of determination and focus I marveled at how hearing someone's experienced opinions could calm me. When I'm all alone with my fears and inadequacies I tend to burrow into them, letting them cover and suffocate me without fighting back. Professor Jann and other professors I've had, are like a bright light shining through. She's like my Gandalf, if you will, shouting down the Balroq (Oh man, that's so geeky). And now I have an amusing vision of this thin, fairly plain, older professor with twinkling blue eyes (very much like Gandalf's!) in a robe and carrying a staff.

Here's some quotes about failure to cement my position as today's resident literary geek:

Don't be discouraged by a failure. It can be a positive experience. Failure is, in a sense, the highway to success, inasmuch as every discovery of what is false leads us to seek earnestly after what is true, and every fresh experience points out some form of error which we shall afterwards carefully avoid." -John Keats

The men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better than those who try to do nothing and succeed. ~Lloyd Jones

Panic at the thought of doing a thing is a challenge to do it. ~Henry S. Haskins

I would sort out all the arguments and see which belonged to fear and which to creativeness. Other things being equal, I would make the decision which had the larger number of creative reasons on its side. ~Katharine Butler Hathaway

The one permanent emotion of the inferior man is fear - fear of the unknown, the complex, the inexplicable. What he wants above everything else is safety. ~Henry Louis Mencken

There is a time to take counsel of your fears, and there is a time to never listen to any fear. ~George S. Patton

Many of our fears are tissue-paper-thin, and a single courageous step would carry us clear through them. ~Brendan Francis

There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them. ~Andre Gide

I woke up this morning thinking 'Ack, Ack.'

I went up to Boston this past weekend to visit my good friends Corey and Chris. (You'll hear all about my trip when I download pictures to accompany it. And once I write it.) Corey and I walked around Harvard a little, and talked about grad school a lot. He and I are both preparing to go next fall, but I feel like he's a teensy bit better prepared than I.

During my trip up to Boston I read scholarship guides on the bus. Corey and I compared notes on the GRE Lit. test, which I took a few weeks ago, and he's studying for right this minute. We discussed potential references and talked about where we were applying. I'm going for University of Oregon, University of Texas at Austin, and three in London. He's a little more ambitious, applying for Ivy League schools for his M.A. and tons for his Master of Fine Arts (as he explained, so few accept MFAs that you have to cast a wider net).

Back home I scheduled my application deadlines into my Microsoft Outlook calendar, read over the requirements for entry once more.

And then, right on schedule, I had a panic attack.

I'm terrified that I won't get into these universities; that they will take one look at my sub par resume, my unconvincing recommendations, and my academic writing sample and they will laugh, wondering why I would ever consider graduate school.

Part of me wants to blame my lackluster GPA and academic performance (coming in at a paltry 3.2) on the fact that I never considered wanting to go to graduate school until I was in the real world and realized that my education was not complete. I missed the classroom, and not just because it was safer, but because I missed feeling alive and curious and studying literature. And now that I am volunteering with Higher Achievement I know that teaching is something I want to do, that I love doing. So, now I'm trying to salvage what I can of my undergraduate performance, shine it up and pass it off as Acceptable at the very least. But I don't feel Acceptable. I don't feel like I've worked hard enough or been dedicated enough to my studies. I compare myself to other students who seem to do it so easily, who never procrastinate, or always get the professor to like them. To all those students who understood math and took the SAT prep class. I feel like a fake and it makes me nervous.

Writing this I can see that it doesn't seem so huge, but the universities make me feel like it is. They're like these scary dragons who are waiting to judge me on every little flaw, rather than humans who make mistakes and take wrong turns too. They don't seem like sympathetic professors excited to pass on their love of learning to me.
I've been staring out my office window, contemplating the blueness of the Potomac and the silvery shine of the Air Force memorial by my building. The white marble of the city spread out before me and the grim reminder of the Arlington Cemetery in its neat white rows. It doesn't seem so big in the face of that landscape. I just need to take a deep breath and breathe. I've found meditation actually works in the face of my panic attacks, which seem to be growing as the deadlines approach. But today it's not working. I called my mom and she made me drop everything and go for a walk. I stood in the parking lot breathing deeply and wondering at how my body reacts to this sort of thing, and what will happen when I'm faced with other huge decisions. And I wondered if I should get medication. I think I am going to call my doctor about it because winter is just starting and I only forsee this getting worse. Maybe it will help to take Prozac or some other calming drug.

Things I hoped they might be thinking about me when I was...

9 - What a charming little girl! She's like a fairy princess and so sweet!

11- She must be walking around in that old timey white dress and talking to herself because she has such a lively imagination! Maybe she's talking to fairies. She's probably the time of little girl who will write a book at 12.

13- She is so pretty and cool. I wonder why she isn't an actress in some teen drama. Maybe she'll be discovered someday.

15- It's so cool how she eschews fashion trends and wears those men's pants. And her men's red Doc Martens are so anti-establishment!

16- She must be reading 'The Bell Jar' because she has such a deep and sensitive understanding of our facades as a society. And Sarte's 'No Exit'? She's so intelligent I bet she even knows how to pronounce his last name. I'd go over and discuss his existential crisis if even I knew anything about existentialism.

18- The way she nods her head in time to the rythym of the song she's listening to on her CD player obviously shows that she's got a real understanding of whatever it is she's listening to. She's probably a musician herself. A girl musician, that's so cool.

20- The pictures she's proabably taken with that camera! She's such an artistic soul! I bet she always captures the very essence of the issues. We should invite her to our party, or rock show.

22- It's so cool how she never seems to be concerned about boys. It obviously shows she's self confident enough not to need a man in her life. I wish I were like that!

24- Hmm, the clothes she's wearing say 'young woman going to the office', but she's also reading 'Howl'. She must be one of those hip, young writers or poets paying the bills at the office but is also writing the Next Great American novel. I should go talk to her about Ginsburg. I hope she doesn't mistake my Salvatore Ferragamo suit for being a sign of 'The Man', and let me take her out for a drink.

Charlie Brown as a "Symbol of My Soul"

"This is my depressed stance. When you're depressed, it makes a lot of
difference how you stand. The worst thing you can do is straighten up and hold
your head high because then you'll start to feel better. If you're going to get
any joy out of being depressed, you've got to stand like this."

"Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, 'Where have I gone wrong?' Then a voice says to me, 'This is going to take more than one night.'. "-Charlie Brown

Sometimes I get the 'death moans' and everything seems black. My failures seem great and my goals look more like a wall. With some barbed wire around it. And maybe a spot light. And it's really, really tall. This morning was one of those days. I woke up and sat on the edge of my bed like an old woman taking a moment to conserve her strength before she can stand. My pants looked too short in the mirror and I had stayed up worrying about what my statement of purpose was. Not in a philosophical sort of way, but for my grad school applications. I don't know what I want to study but I'd better come up with something fast. And not too tired.

It could have just been the early hour, or the fact that I hadn't heard back from this boy I asked out, or the fact that I was thinking about grad school while my sister had her boyfriend over, but I could feel the blues sneaking up, undetered by the speediness of the bus, or the oblivious morning commuters trying to impose their comforting humanity on me. I got to work and just felt like today was one of the days I should have called in sick. I should have stayed home and drank tea, watched shiny movies on AMC and felt miserable for myself for no apparent reason.

But life doesn't work that way. Somehow, despite all my resistance I'd be forced out of bed and taken on a cupcake adventure, or a discovery of mountains or to the bookstore to read celebrity magazines (because even though reading them makes me feel like I've eaten too much candy, I always feel better that at least I'm not being photographed at every corner.)

I decided to combat this in the only way I know how, reading. With my blue scarf wrapped around my neck like Linus' security blanket, (how wise I was to put this on, I thought I'd only need it for the physical cold today!) I looked up some quotes about depression and discovered the ones you see above you. And then I got on here to share them, but before I could get to my blog my eye caught this: the "blog" of "unnecessary" quotation marks and I found myself laughing at the witty snarkiness of people who can't stand bad grammar but love irony. And that led me to this one: Crummy Church Signs and I also checked out this one: Mustaches of the Nineteenth Century for my friends Corey and Megan.

After following the advice of Benjamin Gladstone who said, "If you are cold, tea will warm you; If you are too heated, it will cool you; If you are depressed, it will cheer you; If you are excited, it will calm you.", I made myself some tea, and thought about how one good cure for feeling sorry for yourself is doing something nice for someone else, and how I'm going to volunteer tonight and teach girls about literature, and without so much as a warning my early morning blues dribbled away.

Because the Charlie Brown quote reminded me of one of my favorite authors, Anne Lamott, and because I love quotes just a little too much I'll leave you with this one:

"Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don't give up."

Oops!

I forgot all about the fact that it was Blog Action two days ago and now I'm feeling guilty. But, as my mom has taught me, better late than never. (I'm proving that point extra well today, I overslept and got to work late.) So, in honor of being slow, I present the Slow Food Movement portion of Blog Action Day. What is Slow Food? Is it extra dumb cattle? Or a dim cucumber? According to Slow Food USA we are participating in the Slow Food Movement when we shorten the distance that our food travels to get to us. It's good, clean and fair food. By being informed about how our food is produced we are taking responsibility, not only for how our planet is used, but also for what goes into our bodies. We become a part of the production process, instead of mindlessly consuming our food. It's not just about the environment, but also about what we eat, for our own health, but maybe more importantly, for our own enjoyment.
Ever wonder how we have strawberries in December? Or vine ripened tomatoes when everything else is brown? That's because we rely on our modern methods of transportation to get ripe food here fast, but somethings aren't meant to be enjoyed in winter, they aren't meant to be served fast. Strawberries, for example, have become less flavorful because they must now be produced in a way that makes them heartier, and able to withstand the long distance that they must travel to get to our grocery stores.
Most fresh market tomatoes are grown hydroponically, which enables greenhouse growers to have a longer growing season and produce an average of 15 times more per acre with a greater percentage of marketable fruit (because who's going to buy a tomato that doesn't look bright and red, despite its flavor?) but the taste of these tomatoes are mealy and bland. Think of the tomato you get in your QuarterPunder. You'd hardly know you were eating one. Why are things like this? Two reasons; we want cheap food and farms want cheap labor. Another blogger, at Gristmill says this about why it's so easy for us to ignore the probelm:

"We need our food supply as cheap as possible to feed low-wage people; we need
lots of low-wage people -- farm worker,s slaughterhouse workers, clerks at our
number-one grocer, Wal-Mart, and so on -- to sustain our cheap-food system.
Whatever else it does --and it works pretty well, if you're a major shareholder
in transnational corporations --this cycle consumes enormous resources and, yes,
severely damages the environment."

AND

"Last year the federal government cut checks to commodity-agriculture producers
amounting to $23 billion -- roughly equivalent to Bolivia's GDP. In those terms
alone -- never mind steep environmental and social costs -- cheap food is
actually a pretty pricey proposition. "

He goes on about some more stuff too and I know that's a lot to read, especially if you're not an
amateur chef like me, who cares about the flavor, but even if you just care about the environment, or the people who labor to bring you the cheapest foods possible. If you don't really care about all that above you should still check out The Sustainable Table for ideas about how you can make changes in small ways, like learning how to 'eat seasonal'. When we 'eat seasonal' we're not only cutting down on the damage done by shipping this food all over the country, we're also supporting our local farmers, people who in turn invest in other aspects of our communities. Most of those food subsidies that Gristmill talks about above aren't going to the organic farmer hippies you see at the farmer's market, they're going to major agri-business farmers, like the ones who had the E. Coli epidemic last summer.

I'm guilty of this stuff too, sometimes it's hard to remember the larger costs when faces with the grocery store budget, but in the end the cost is going to be much greater. I just have to keep telling myself that. We're not going to solve this environmental crisis tomorrow, it's going to take little steps from millons of people. We should probably start right now.

contemplating my madeleine

I'm reading a book right now about how to write good college essays as I prepare to apply to grad schools. It has a list to help you prepare to write a personal statement essay and some of the topics to get you thinking are "Describe 3 Significant Lessons You Have Learned," "Describe 3 Memorable Experiences You've Had," "Discuss a Failure That Taught You Something." As I'm reading over these starter topics I peruse my memory for relevant events and then start to wonder, should I use my move to New York as having to do with a Significant Lesson, or a Failure that Taught Me Something. Do I discuss the experience of traveling to Cuba and Kenya? My Internship at Tribeca as an Experience, and my film career as a Failure? Then, after thinking of these past experiences for a moment I get a little sad. Sad because some of this stuff was exciting, challenging things that I have moved past but feel sad that I didn't stick with. While working as a PA and interning at Tribeca I started to realize that film might not be the career I want to stay in. I started to miss the academic environment, where my ideas were welcomed and my assumptions challenged. I missed feeling like I had something to offer, and that I was learning something that made me grow as a creative person. I realized I didn't want to stop learning about and discussing literature yet. And that the world of film, although I love the cinema, and love the stories it tells, might not be the best place for a dreamer like me. I wanted to inspire others to love literature, and I wanted to write stories that had a chance of being read somewhere, not just by an intern in a production house that will write a snarky film student critique and stop my film from being made. Usually I don't regret walking away from the endless amount of work I forsaw. I wanted to be a creative, and I wanted to stay fresh. I didn't want to stagnant. I don't want to stagnant. For a while I oscillated between wanting to be in that world and being a normal person in education somewhere. Finally the desire to teach and continue learning won out. I don't really regret it. But I do sort of wonder what could have happened if I had pushed forth. And if I had stayed in New York. In the back of my head, as I sit in an office editing military briefs that I don't care less about and worry about the money slowing being deposited in my account, and fret about my grad class and the chances of getting into grad school I wonder if I've given up excitement. Or at least for now. It seems harder to come by when you're living in your mother's house in Reston, commuting down to Arlington and not doing much else. I don't think I've given it up in exchange for a paycheck and the chance to sit at a desk. But sometimes I'm afraid I have and that I'm too meek to find my own life, find my own adventures and that they have, or will pass me by before I realize it.

Volunteering

Today I start volunteer teaching at Higher Achievement!!! I'm going to be working with 8th graders, teaching them about Literature. I'm so excited I'm bouncing in my seat. Wish me luck cause I'm also a little scared that I'll be horrible.

This October 15th is Blog Action Day.

A How-To For Investors, From Someone Who's Still Clueless

Last December I did something I never thought I'd do. I sat down and opened a Roth IRA. What is a Roth IRA you ask? I didn't know either, but having finally cracked the book a family friend gave me when I graduated high school I learned a thing or two.

So, in light of recent posts about finances and growing up I thought I'd share what I learned about the big, bad world of stocks and bonds. Please bear in mind that I know nothing about how this all works, don't give any advice about which stocks to buy and when to sell them, I'm just giving you my perspective, as a real, live, young person starting out on this path.

First of all, I decided on a Roth IRA because I was working as a freelance PA in television. As a freelancer, small business owner or anything else where your job doesn't offer a 401K or its own IRA this is a good alternative. With this you don't pay taxes until it's time to withdraw your money, and you can keep it for a long amount of time. I invested $200 dollars into it, with the idea that I would continue to invest that amount of money with every paycheck I get (if I could afford it, of course)

And then, the next thing to do of course, is invest it. You can keep your $200 and save it up, or you can be brave and foolish and use your money to make money for you. What a strange and unusual idea! Who would have thought that you can make money without working 8 hour days for it! Now, I have no clue about how exactly the stock market works. All I think of when I hear "stock market" is guys rushing around on the stock market floor waving fingers and trading little white slips of paper, like in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, or guys in big glass office buildings accumulating loads of money, like Patrick in American Psycho. I get that you invest your money in companies, giving them money that they can use to grow and get better, but what shares mean, why they rise and sink, and how that increases my bottom line I don't know. In addition to the book above I used http://www.thebeehive.org/ to help me figure some of this stuff out.

Before I began all of this I happened to hear a radio report on NPR about socially responsible investing and decided that when I was more adult, and more able to comprehend what exactly a 'stock market' is, I would do that. One more way to save the world without actually having to do much.

Once I started considering stocks to buy I remembered this promise to myself. If you are a person who cares about the environment, gets angry at the way pharmecutical and oil companies run amuck and recycles religiously then why not decide where your money makes a difference by where you invest? And I'm secretly hoping I stumble on the next Microsoft because everyone is so concerned about the environment and energy saving innovation one of these companies has got to be onto something. Here's some websites where they give some good advice about socially conscious investing:

1. The Sensible Investor
2. Rethinking Socially Conscious Investing
3. Social Funds
4. New American Dream isn't exactly about investing but it has really good advice about living green.

So, there you go. I started investing money in Green Mountain Coffee Traders (GMCR), Hybrid Technologies (HYBT), SunTech Power (STP) and Evergreen Solar (ESLR). Green Mountain Coffee Traders is doing the best so far but the others are in the green these days too, literally and in my account (they use green instead of black to show the increases).

I'm getting kind of into it. I love seeing the numbers go up and down, even if I have no idea what exactly they mean. And I can even talk about this stuff and sound knowledgable, at least around my friends who are just as clueless about this as I am. It's funny to see myself doing something so adult like when I feel so much like a kid most of the time. I even got my grandmother's old account for me from my dad and started investing that too.

I've mentioned before how un-adult-like I feel, and how I don't know all of this stuff, but with this I can control it and make these decisions on my own, and it will benefit me later in life. It's one of those things that I am doing to prepare for myself the life I'd like to have one day. I think this whole growing up thing should really just be done in tiny steps. Like a toddler who repeats things over and over to learn how things work.

Spontani -Tea

Yesterday, after we finished up a big project at work we got to go home. I got home at 1:30 on a beautiful fall, I mean summer, afternoon. As soon as I pulled into my neighborhood Aja pulled in behind me. She had recognized my car on the road. After changing my work clothes for playclothes I got an everything bagel with lox at Einstein Bagels with her and Ayana. I also got their green tea, Spontani-Tea, which would explain the spontaneity of the day. We went back to her house to eat our bagels and killed an hour reading magazines on her back porch. She started walking me home when we decided to stop by and see what Mark was up to, and bum a light for a shared cigarette from him.

Mark was playing Halo 3 when we knocked on his door and entreated Subi the dog to let us in. Sitting at the table he mentioned it was Paul's 31st birthday and he was sick. We decided we should do something nice for him. I think it was me who mentioned making cupcakes because I'd been thinking about them all day. So we found the recipe for Magnolia Bakery's cupcakes, made up a list and went to the grocery store.

Our cupcakes turned out delicious, and we iced them in Dusky Rose and Sky Blue. The icing melted onto them and they took on a strange, drippy glazed look. Once we added the black and white striped candles we bought we had cupcakes straight out of Tim Burton's Edward Sicssorhands.

Matt came home from work while we were taking turns cracking the eggs and beating the batter. Once we'd all gone home to eat something other than sugar we returned to take them over to Paul's.

The four of us show up at Paul's front door holding the lit cupcakes and knocking furiously. He didn't hear anything at first and he came down glowering, about to yell at us, when he realized the flames were birthday cupcakes. We came in and ate a few and got sick to our stomachs from so much sugar, but had fun. Paul was pretty happy because he'd been miserable and alone and sick all day. It was a nice way to end a spontaneous kind of day.

Let ME Do It!!

When I was a toddler, my parents like to remind me, I used to assert my independence by saying to them "Let ME do it!" when they tried to help me brush my teeth or wipe or anything else that I knew I could do alone. And that's sort of been my life's philosophy. I'm really independent. I've travelled the world by myself and figured out all sorts of my own problems by myself, sometimes they're problems that I created for myself but I still solved them. But as I get older I realize how much I've been leaning on my parents for help. And that's not a bad thing, but at 24 I think I should be handling somethings on my own. It's hard to let go though. I used to let my dad handle all the red tape that I didn't understand, or want to worry about. But now I feel like if I don't do it I won't know what's going on and how to deal with these things that being an adult involves. The stuff they never warn you about...

I need a primer course in all the red tape involved in being an adult. I tried to fill out my credit report information online because I don't know what my credit score is. They couldn't verify my identity when I tried to re log in so I had to call the number they gave me to verbally verify my information. She asked if I had any student loans and I said I did but I don't know the name of the company because my dad takes care of it. So she said to call back when I had that information. It was a little hard to hear her so before she hung up I asked "So all I need to get to verify my identity is the name of the company I have my student loans through?" And she replied, "Unfortunately we can't give out the information you need because it can lead to identity theft." And I was like, but you just told me, and I'm trying to make sure I get the right information, and when I come back and call you back with it, that I have all the information you need so I don't have to keep calling my father for this information.

What kills me about all of this is that I understand it's "For my protection" and I'd rather not have someone steal my identity, but at the same time I hate anyone having this huge information about me and me having no way to access it. They can easily destroy my life with this stuff and I can't even do anything about it. I hate that someone gathers this information and uses it to judge me, to decide what I can and can't do with my life. I want to be the only one who decides what information is relevant to me. I want to be in control of my life and my history. It makes me feel like this is a sci-fi thriller where someone has a file on everything I've done and it scares me. I don't want to live in that sort of adult world.

Recently I read this interesting article about Harry Potter and the transformations that J.K. Rowling uses in the books. Like how Harry transitions from a black and white world view where the people to be trusted are very obvious, into one where he's not sure who to trust and he understands the motivations of people in new ways. He grows up and into this world where tough decisions, ones that will affect his life must be made, and he can't trust the adults to do the job because they're human too, and have their own fears and hopes and agendas. That's sort of what I feel like right now, like I'm slowly becoming aware that if things regarding my life are to be done they must be done by me. And that's sort of terrifying. Because I don't always have a safety net to fall back on and I'm never quite sure what information I'm going to need or where to find it. For so long I've been running back to my dad who has all the answers, knows my SAT scores and my bank balance, knows what my credit history is like and how to apply for the FAFSA or the car loans I need. Now, I'm starting to do it on my own and even though he is still available I need to do this on my own.I'm also trying to track down my W-2s and my 10-99s so that I can do my taxes for myself. It's hard though to figure out what's necessary, and what's a fair deal when I'm trying to do it by my self for the first time. A lot of it I just try to fudge and hope it's correct.

The Curse of the Empire Waist

This morning, as I was standing on a crowded metro train, just around Virginia Square a man sitting in a seat to my right tapped me on the arm and asked if I'd like to have the seat. Thinking he was getting up at this stop and offering me his seat first I smiled and said 'No that's okay, I'm getting off soon.' Then he remained seated when the train stopped, not getting off, and I looked back down at my paper and realized that maybe an empire waist on a shirt that is slightly fitted is not a good fashion choice.

That's right dear readers, he thought I was pregnant. Not hugely pregnant, or the type where you're not sure if it's body fat or a baby bump hiding under there, but just early stages, starting to show, sort of pregnant. In an ironic turn of events I had already been experiencing morning sickness and thrown up all of my breakfast, but that's because the dog threw up on the kitchen floor and I had to clean it up. Puke makes me puke, especially when it smells like dog poop, which is probably what she'd been eating.

What could I do? I had already responded politely to the man and it was a crowded train, not much room to move, people had obviously heard him ask and me respond. What else to do but push out my belly a little more and pretend I was in my fourth month, or something. My secret smile had less to do with the "life growing inside me" and more to do with my amusement at the situation.

I thought it was funny, I obviously wasn't huge and so couldn't regard it as strictly an insult (even though I'm not walking around with washboard abs here) and I'd rather him offer his seat to a (truly) pregnant lady instead of being afraid to insult her. Besides, it's strange to realize that I am at an age where that possibility isn't out of the question. I think it's funny that I could actually be pregnant and people would only smile and think, 'She glows!" ( I hope.) But at the same time I don't want people to think I'm pregnant when I'm not, so the empire waist has got to go.

I Hate That Stupid Freud

I've been sort of pining away for some one. I hate that phrase too, by the way. I feel like a corsetted, soppy Victorian miss when it is used. I haven't been pining way. I've been moving on and enjoying everything a lot lately, but sometimes in a sneaky voice I hear, 'It'd be nice if we were still friends. If you could talk to him about his thoughts on Kerouac and your paper.' or something else equally undermining.
Even with the confusion of not knowing exactly why he forgot about my existence (I chalk it up to the fact that he wasn't ready to date after his last relationship, despite his objections to the contrary.) I don't really care anymore, not much anyway, and I think I've forgiven him, in my mind. And hanging out with some old high school friends, gossiping about things we've learned about our former classmates in the intervening years, helped too. I learned some stuff that I had sort of known already but not really acknowledged about him. I'd ignored it because it didn't fit into my picture of things. But now I was faced with it and decided that now I really didn't care about him. (just for the record, it's not something that hurt me, so Aja you don't have to plan any revenges.)

And of course, after deciding that, I go home, go to bed and have a lovely make up dream about him. The kind that makes you wake up and think for half a second before remembering it was just a dream, 'Wow. He likes me again!' Not the sex dream kind, but the sweet dream kind. Those are so much more devious.
That damn subconscious. It always knows where you're most vulnerable, even when you don't. And because you don't know it's there, silently biding its time, how are you supposed to supress the thoughts it can take advantage of? You can't know what it will and won't use.
Stupid Freud and other psychiatrists figuring these things out. Thanks a lot, subconscious!

All Dressed Up

Ubiquitous Starbucks coffee cup in hand, I stood staring at row after row, aisle after aisle of shoes, wondering which ones defined me. Which one would I buy so that another facet of my personality would be revealed to the world? Which shoe would tell everyone I met that I am elegant, but fun, sophisticated but still young? Something classic, but unique. I was looking for black heels for work and a slip on shoe for everyday wear. Who knew there were so many choices when it came to black heels, but so many of them inappropriate for work? All I wanted was a black heel with a certain amount of height, but not too much. I do need to be able to walk, and I don't need to pole dance. One shoe was patent leather, yuck. One had too pointy a toe, making my feet look like long, black weapons. Another was too rounded. Finally I found the perfect pair-- Micheal Michael Kors, the Charlize pump. Elegant and simple. But they didn't have my size. And it was $89.95, more than I had decided I wanted to pay. (It would have used up all my babysitting money!) So I didn't get it.

Then it was on to finding everyday shoes, this task proved to be harder than the black heels. Even more than what heels defined me for work was the conundrum of what casual shoes defined me the best. And whether they would stand up to repeated use. I really wanted a pair of white loafers. Not off white but white. My mom has a pair that are surprisingly cool. I feel like a hip mod when I wear them, or a preppy yachter. But there were no women's loafers to be found, much less white ones. There were some great men's loafers, but again none in my size. So I ended up without shoes.

For years I have been using clothing, music, books and my other tastes to define me. Ever since I began school at Lake Anne in the middle of the sixth grade and insisted on a perm, (looking back, a very bad idea, I'm not cut out for curls) and wore a sweater over my very cool-at-the-time black stirrups. I began a life long quest to define who I was, and how people thought of me based on my clothing. For a long time I didn't want to be defined exclusively through my clothing, and so wore men's trousers and a variety of shirts and sweaters, all trying to achieve a certain rebellion against fashion by devising my own version of the beat look. Obviously what was more important than my clothes was what I read and thought and did. This in itself was a form of dictating how people thought of me in terms of what I wore, as in "Don't relegate me to that group of girls--I'm independent of that, can't you tell by my thrift shop digs?' And of course I still believe that, but I also recognize that the way we look is important to how people percieve us, as unfair as it might seem, it's true. And we can use that to define ourselves, and better understand who we are. So even though I still dress to stand out from the normal suburban crowd at the mall I try to do it in a way that expresses who I am, and what I like.

But as we grow older who we are and what we like, and who we have to become, in the workplace, with friends, everywhere else we might go in life, grows more complicated. For instance, right now I am an employee in a corporation. I have spent years rebelling against the idea of 'business clothes' and 'business casual' because even though the models look so pretty in their Banana Republic clothes it didn't feel comfortable to me. I didn't want to be beholden to a code that dictated what I could and couldn't wear. As long as I thought it was appropriate and clean and neat then who else cared? It felt like a violation of my First Ammendment. Now that I do have a 'real job' I try to balance my love for costume jewlry and unusual clothes with a sense of business casual that my boss can understand. I can't dress in what I feel to be the typical boring work clothes, I wouldn't feel right. But neither would I wear torn jeans, so what is so wrong with wearing what I want?

Women are so often told what we can and can't wear in this world, and we soak it up, we're always so certain that we must be doing something wrong, our hair out of style, the wrong dress, why else wouldn't we have the life we're shown in the advertisments? We let these depictions of life define our roles for us, telling us we should be sexy and also virginal, and smart and also a great mother and stylish and put together, but also free to be ourselves that it's no wonder some people drop out of the race altogether, or some like Britney Spears, go insane.

I can only foresee this continuing, my struggle to define myself as I change throughout life. Who will I become when I get married? How will I dress when I have kids, to show I am cool but still a good mom, but also independent of the stereotypical soccer mom? And where are my role models for aging elegantly? We seem to only have a few versions of old women that we allow slip through the mainstream. Right now it's great to be young and feel free enough to chop my hair into bangs and a short bob like I did on Friday, or wear ridiculously high wedges with my silk trousers. I don't want that to change, but things inevitably do. Growing up allows us to dress in a way we couldn't when we were younger, either because of our parents' censure, our lack of money to afford the clothes we wanted, or our own inhibitions about our bodies. But just when we can wear whatever we want we also start to censure ourselves, either because of work, or the roles we play that seem to dictate a dress code. I don't want to ever forget, as I define who I am as a woman today, and navigate this world as an adult, the sense of freedom and self that my clothes allow me.

Blah blog blag.

Is my dad and Aja the only ones who read or comment on my blog? God that's pathetic. Also, I almost wrote blag. Freudian.

Guilt Pangs

Argh, my grad class professor makes me want to throw up. And I don't mean that she's a scary, horrible person. I just mean that she scares me because I want to do so well, and I want to leave a good impression but I don't think I do. Especially not in the email exchanges we've had so far. When I get an email back from her my stomach tightens and my throat closes up. I feel like a 6th grader again, not knowing my homework assignment, and I'm in grad school. This is the time when I'm supposed to be responsible and adult like, and I'm failing miserably at it. I know I want to go to grad school and I know I can do all this, so why am I doing so badly? Partially I think it is the timing, just having started this new job and also this class might not have been the wisest idea. I thought I was prepared for both the courseload and my work schedule, and they do seem to match pretty well, but I just haven't been able to knuckle down and do the work when I'm supposed to, or I always forget something is due or I think I'll have time for it and don't. It's depressing because I know it's all my fault, but I still can't seem to get it together. I don't want her questioning my abilities or my dedication. I hate that sort of thing. But I'm still scared of her emails, expecting one of them to say, "Meredyth, if you can't do the work required for this class then maybe you shouldn't be in it." Oh god. And I know the other students are probably doing the exact same things I am and that she doesn't hate or think less of any of us, it's just how it sounds in the emails. Last class I did great, she loved me, and the other students seemed just as much in the gray areas I did, but I can't get the feeling out of my head that she's going to think I'm a terrible student who expects her to drop everything and help me out of a quagmire. I feel like a whipped puppy but I'm doing all to myself.

C.R.E.A.M

This blog is supposed to be about work ostensibly, or my every day life. I'd like to do some creative writing, that's the sort of thing I really want to do, not just blog about my day. But I am very busy working out how to be a grown up, and so I haven't had time for daydreaming stories. Siigh. Being a grown up is very complicated, what with the bills, and the automatic bill payments, and the interest, and the APRs, and the loans you can, and can't, qualify for, and the things that keep costing money without me knowing how, or why, exactly. I've spent the day trying to wrap my head around how a budget works, and if I could stay within one. My mom is a very bad money manager, and my father too. I don't like how they manage things but I find myself falling into the same traps, which then become a rabbit hole. I don't want to take that pill, thank you. I just want to dig myself out. I've been thinking about the need for a car and the need for a car loan and insurance for that car. I think I can afford one, but I also need to pay my mom back for things, and also pay off my credit card debit, and also my grad class. Hm. How can I do this all and stop worrying about money, and whether or not I'll have some at the end of the month? It always seems to go this way. As soon as I found the Job and they told me how much I'd be making in a year my heart did a dance. I'd be free from the worry! It was more than I was ever used to making in a month. I could buy things! But then the reality of due dates and collectors set in. And taxes, let's not forget about taxes. Ohhh. Brrr. That's a cold shower. It's very unpleasant to come down off the cloud of cash and to find out things aren't as simple as it seems from so far up. I think I'll be okay, not like the other post about this I had, but more optimistic. I'm not as broke as I thought and my debts really are manageable, but just having to do these things as opposed to the things I'd like to be doing, and along with all the other non-financial things I need to do and usually forget about, is annoying. Even though getting them accomplished makes me feel super productive, it's still not fun.

'Round and 'round it goes...

I'm at work, and using the computer. It's a pretty big deal. It almost makes me as happy as when I got my ID card and didn't have to be escorted through the building everyday. Finally I have internet access again! A million possibilities have opened up! And of course I only go to the same old websites I always have. Siigh. I really should discover some new ones. But I have all the time in the world now, because it's pretty slow around here. I don't mind it though, it's exactly the kind of easy, but still carrying some responsibility, job I was looking for, that would allow me time to do my own thing when I wanted. I like it alright.

There is a long hallway by the windows, on the way to the bathroom. There's no offices or anything nearby it and I strut the hell out of that hallway, striding like I'm Tyra's next little top model. Or Christy Turlington, who already is a Top Model, and ridiculously smart and good looking, two very admirable things.

I get time to study for my GREs, which is a good thing, because they're coming up fast and I wouldn't have studied at all if I didn't have this free time. I take the Literature GRE on Oct. 6th. I'm a little nervous about them because there are a lot of books I have read, but also a lot I haven't, and it makes no sense to try and read all of them on the off chance you'll come across them, but it's also pretty hard to know, from the passages they give you, what book it is. I've been reading the classics lately and I think that should help. Then, on Oct. 27th I get to test my math skills, something I haven't attempted since junior year of high school. The book I'm using makes it so much easier than I remember from school, but at the same time cramming all this stuff in is hard!

My days are so full lately, it doesn't help that my commute is about three hours roundtrip. I'm exhausted by the time I get home. I don't mind taking public transportation at all, that's not the problem. The problem is that I take a lot of public transportation and it takes up a lot of time. I'm thinking about buying a car, not to drive everyday, but to drive some days, like, to my evening class at Mason (I'll save those complaints for another post, I'm already getting annoyed with myself.) And that's a big responsibility, one I've never really attempted before. But I'm anxious to prove to myself I'm an adult who can handle the responsibility. And maybe move out too, that way I'd be closer to work and not killing myself trying to get here, but that leaves a lot of other issues that I'm not sure I'm capable of tackling right now. Here comes another big sigh.

Dear Skulkers,

Sorry I haven't been around much. I started a new job and it takes a while to be allowed to use the computer. I have to have a special card and I should have that by Monday or Tuesday so I'll update lots then, because I have a lot of free time. Besides that everything is fine. Lots of love, and see you soon. -Meredyth

Poor Little Rich Girl

Hello, I hope you had a wonderful Labor Day weekend. I'm still pretty sleepy. Not that I did anything, I just hate waking up to go back to work. Although, I was told that I passed the initial clearance and can move on to my real job soon. Thankfully. It's been pretty boring here, not doing anything. I've been falling asleep while trying to read for class. We haven't really been doing much at my house all week because we're all just waiting for our paychecks to come in. We're holding on and holding out, but it's going to be a close one. Somehow it reminds me of the W.B. Yeats poem, The Second Coming and the line, "Things fall apart; the center cannot hold." As though we were spinning planets in orbit around the house, but the center of gravity, what holds our lives to each other is slowly separating. It has been happening for awhile, just like a dying star, the falling apart of a family takes awhile. You can watch it implode, slowly, a ripple and shudder as the earth moves beneath your feet. And then, you start to notice that things aren't in their right place anymore, something familiar is alien, a feeling you never noticed before, a sense of panic, is there, just under the surface of things. You can feel it when you breathe in.
We've never been broke before, not like this. I've been broke, my sister's been broke, my mom's been worrying about money and it always seems to be slipping through her fingers; but we've never been broke collectively. The kind of broke where we don't go grocery shopping until Wednesday, where I squeeze $25 to make it last all weekend and come up with unusual ways to use what's in the refridgerator, how to get by without eggs. Julia borrows a textbook from a friend.

It's not so bad today, and I know it's not as bad as over half the population. One of the reasons why we're broke is because Mom and Dad paid for my grad class until I get paid, not everyone has that luxury. But, even when I was a kid and we couldn't do something we'd been promised because we couldn't afford it, or when Mom's credit card didn't work at the mall, it never felt quite like this. Not only is half of our family gone now, but so is whatever comfortable life we had. It's not the same anymore, things fall apart.

I just found the most luxurious site. Ohhhh. It makes me hungry. It's about lunchtime anyway. I'm going to go find something to satisfy me. I wish it were the food in these photos though. They make me want to go home and start cooking immediately.

Enjoy the pictures and I hope they inspire you too, or at least just make your mouth water uncontrollably.

One way to kick start that fish, Deim

I have found one good thing about the job so far. SO FAR. I'm trying not to complain or be pessimistic. And this thing is pretty optimistic. Sort of. Coming home from a long, mind numbing day of work really puts me in the mood to live life to the fullest. I want to do everything, see everyone, eat everything and do anything that might be construed as fun or relaxing. Maybe this can be the way I can fulfill the quote I like, "the future unimagined for the sake of the glorious, difficult present." Mmmmm. I want gallons of ice cream, glasses of wine, cigarettes and dancing. I'm so happy to be home that you could convince me of doing any outrageous act. Ahh, to be young and home from work.

Two Days for the Price of One Post

Another day of skulking around the maze of cubicles hoping someone doesn't ask me what I'm supposed to be doing. I played a super fun game on addictinggames.com for a while. And then, trouble. Apparently they can't find my security clearance from my old job to reestablish it. Embarassing questions got asked, questioning my competency and reliability and job status.

Well, not really, but it felt that way. I felt like even more of a fraud; like I had lied my way into this boring place just to steal state secrets. So I had to fill out bunches of paper work accounting for my past 7 years.

Resumed 8/29/07
It is in these moments, when I am filling out resumes or school applications that I am made aware of just how sporatic and unregimented my life is. I tend to think of myself as organized and liking schedules, knowing where the plan leads to. But when I look back and see 3 different colleges, 15 jobs, 2 cities and countless missing phone numbers, addresses or supervisors' names trailing after me that I realize just how impulsive this life of mine is. I always make decisions impulsively. I tend to want to gather the data but then end up just throwing it into a corner and running at the situation with my head down. I think it yields interesting results and stories but might look a little too colorful for this cubicle. It's a bit outside their color scheme. I'm afraid I'll be a bit too outside this color scheme too. Yesterday when I left here I felt physically ill. I think I'm just not used to this sort of schedule, but it's also my fears creeping out and affecting me. I need to remember more often that I have done quite a lot, and know quite a lot more than people give me credit for. I went to Kenya by myself, I visited London all alone. I got an internship working in Robert DeNiro's production company, and moved to New York all alone. I can do anything I want (and I don't just mean that in a girl power sort of way. I'm pretty self suficient.) Just because these people don't know what I'm capable of doesn't mean I have to feel intimidated by beige walls and button down shirts.

In response to Smith Mag's six word memoirs I came up with this minute autobiography: Exuberant families breed stories from messes. That, in turn, led to this poem (which is still a work in progress):


Exhuberance oozes out of them

like oil; rich, smelling of sun, necessary.

From this force of relatives and friends

Messes are beget on the kitchen counters,

in the living room, and bathroom sinks.

They trickle onto the sidewalks

where neighbors gather gossip,

leak out through phone lines,

and on voices carried past the pines.

Slowly, after tears and roars- of laughter fade,

the messes emerge from chrysalis as stories.

And the stories creep back in to fill up the house.

Breeding among the late night dishes in the sink

and bottles left on the back porch,

events catalogued like colorful beads,

from conversations continued long into the night;

they take up their place alongside the silent spiders

and remain; the friendly ghosts of the family.

New Kid on the Block

I started my first day of work this morning. I had an hour long orientation and then a quick tour around the office maze, and now I'm sitting here in an abandoned cubicle feeling like a little kid on her first day at a new school. The girl that I'll be working with for the next couple of weeks showed me around and then dropped me off at this cubicle and left. I read through the packet of new employee information I'm supposed to understand and fill out and now I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I feel a little like someone pulled a Freaky Friday on me and my dad and I've stepped into his world of business casual and gray fabric cubicles. I slink around the makeshift halls hoping no one looks up from their computer and recognizes me as a fraud, or will ask me a question and expect a smart, professional response. I don't know what I'm doing here. Literally or metaphorically. I don't know what my job will consist of and I don't know why I suddenly have an office job. It sort of scares me. Maybe it's the thought that this means I'm one step closer to really growing up. I know I'm supposed to have a real job and yet all I'm doing is sitting in this office, hidden away from everyone and wondering why I wanted to enter the real world of employment anyway.

It's sort of everything I imagined a real job to be-lonely, boring and confusing but not what I actually thought I'd have. Thank god I don't plan to be here forever. It would be soul crushing. Or at least, I think it would be, based on my first day. Maybe after a few weeks I won't feel like the new kid no one wants to play with at recess. But will I ever feel comfortable here? I hope for that, just to make things easier, and at the same time remaining in a cubicle, not doing anything that FEELS worthwhile for the rest of my life is one of my biggest fears. I've never thought I was cut out for the corporate world and I don't really see that changing. I've always wanted a job that I loved, that I felt meant something. A job like this might actually mean something to someone, but it doesn't to me. I've never wanted a job where I work 9-5 and come home and wash off the 'dust from the walls of institutions,/Finer than flour, alive, more dangerous than silica,/Sift, almost invisible, through long afternoons of tedium,/Dropping a fine film on nails and delicate eyebrows,/Glazing the pale hair, the duplicate grey standard faces.'
(Theodore Roethke, Dolor)
That poem has always summed up what I think of the corporate world, and I know there are great jobs out there and great people who do them in office cubicles but I really don't think they're for me. Office Space, despite its hilarity, also terrified me because I didn't want that to be my reality, and now I find myself counting down the minutes of the clock and hoping not to be seen by anyone in authority because I'm afraid they'll ask what I did all day and I'll have to tell them. "I read sweet juniper all day. "

Say Wha?

I got a job. I got a job. I got a job. Sorry. I'm just a little surprised. I never really thought it would actually happen. I'm not super thrilled about the job but I know I can do it and I think I can do it for at least a year. I'm going to be proofreading things that military men write. Yay. It will pay well. That's the saving grace. I'm going to be commuting down near the Pentagon every single day. Every day. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that I have a desk job and have to be there five days a week. At least now that I'll be sitting down all day I can buy some sweet heels and wear them without losing the feeling in my toes. And maybe even a car.

I've also been gearing up for the school year again. I'm trying to take a grad class at GMU this semester. Lots of good reasons, like working on my GPA, getting a good recommendation, getting some experience in a grad class and keeping my brain awake. But, in order to take the class I have had to run around like crazy trying to get all the documents in time so I can register and pay for classes by August 27th. Yup. Monday. (I think.) Wish me luck.

Surprise!

There's a sound in my house that I haven't heard in quite a while. It's a strange, bombastic, deep throated sound. It makes me happy in a way I've never felt before. Joining it are other melodious noises but this one sticks out more for its loudness and all encompassing hilarity. It's the sound of my brother laughing.

Last night my mom, Julia, Wendy, Joong Woo and I went to dinner with Ariel, Graham and Graham's family. We met at an Outback in Centreville. Sitting, waiting at the table, wondering who is joining us at a table for 15 we speculate on the announcement Ariel says she has for us. Is it an engagement announcement? Are she and Graham getting married? Julia threatens to walk out if that happens. Is she pregnant again? We can't believe either of these could be possible and we will be very sad if they are, because she and Graham aren't done with school yet. Ariel and Graham's brothers and mother walk in and Ariel looks beautiful in her dress, and the baby is adorable. Julia's afraid that because she looks so pretty she is getting engaged and she's preparing to be angry.
After they're seated Graham and Graham's second oldest brother walk in and behind them comes someone that looks kinda familiar, looks like a cousin or something, looks like he belongs with this group of people.
I hear my mom screaming and she runs around the table.
Julia and I are dumbstruck, Wendy starts yelling too.
I can't figure out what is going on.
Why is this person here?
Why shouldn't he be here.
It's my brother.
My brother who was in Iraq, and is supposed to be on R&R in Germany.
What is he doing here?
He was in Iraq and now he's here.
How?
Those are the confused thoughts running through my head.
Then it occurs to me that he is actually here now.
I get up and try to fit my arms around him and my mom and Wendy.
We're crying and laughing and stunned at his presence.
It's like when we saw him after boot camp all over again.
My mom is crying and Julia is crying and he's here.

He told everyone he was going to Germany for two weeks and we all accepted it without another thought, but he emailed Ariel and Graham to tell them it was all a lie and he was actually coming home and they planned the whole surprise. He arrived yesterday and will be here until August 19th. That's so long, he's here for so long, it will be the longest we've seen him for about two years, and the first time we've seen him since January.

I feel so shocked and as though it's not real, even though I hear him in the other room talking to Wendy. I almost don't want to spend too much time actually with him because I don't want to wake up, or miss him too much when he is gone. My heart hurts.

What Do We Want? Help!

Sofia and I just went to see 'Sicko', the new Micheal Moore movie. Oh my god, this should be a national requirement. It's so subversive it's like stumbling across a pot of untaxable gold. I sat in the theatre clentching my fists watching those lucky bastards the French, British, Canadians and Cubans laughing at our shitty health system. Every cell in my body screamed out "I want the fuck off this boat!! I want to go to England!" Get me the hell out of this country. How is it that we are the only, (ONLY, ONLY, There are no others) Industrial country that doesn't have universal health care? The poorest British citizen is in better health than our wealthiest because of the preventive and FREE care that their country provides. They understand that to take care of the problem before it begins, and to take away the burden of debt that lingers over the sick means their patients will either stay healthy, or get better quicker, and then be able to return to being a productive member of society. They aren't trapped in a cycle of poor health care and mounting debts. They don't have to choose between going to a hospital that is 'in the company's network' or the one that is closest. Dying on the way to the pre-approved network hospital isn't an option for these citizens. Their country actually cares about the well being of ALL of its citizens, rather than the ones that donate the most amount of money to the politicians' campaigns.

I propose a change. I refuse to vote for any politician that does not make these three topics part of their platform
1. Exit Strategy. Getting us out of the war, and rebuilding the country we've destroyed, in a peaceful healthy way should be a priority. We would save billions of dollars a month, not to mention the lives.

2. Global Warming. We can do a lot as private citizens but we could do so much more as a nation if our government would sign the bills that would help this along.

3. Universal Healthcare. Reforming our healthcare system is a necessity at this point.

All of these issues would show the American people that our government does care about THEM, not about themselves. We want a government for the people. That was our initial reason wasn't it? Somewhere along the way our ideals got lost and now we have a government that is for themselves. The point of democracy is to have a government that is afraid of the people and will work for them. This kind of candidate is the only kind I'm interested in. Once I've found him, or her I'll let you know.

I just wrote a letter to my Congressman and Senators telling them what I wanted. You can too. Do it HERE.

Go Get A Job, You Bum!

"I'm freakin' out here, man!" Those words, so true, so true, were spoken by an old hippie but they could have been stolen right out of my mouth. Except for the fact that I was quoting that old hippie in an ironic way. It's always ironic! I never say stupid things without the old ironic excuse to back me up. Thank you hipsters.
Sorry, I'm drinking my coffee very strong and black today. We ran out of sugar. Waht was my point? I've completely lost it in the haze of irony and coffee. Which is a good thing because now as I've remembered why I decided to write this post I'm starting to freak out again.

Looking for jobs is HARD! I've never really had to begin this process. Jobs have sort of come easily to me. Especially jobs I don't really care too much about. I've gotten every single job I've ever interviewed for, except one. That's a pretty good track record when you consider how many jobs I've had, and the fact that I rarely bother filling out the application and then returning it. That holds true for restaurant jobs, retail jobs, internships, you name it, I can interview for it.
And the past few jobs I've had I haven't had to apply or interview for. I think I was a little spoiled by the TV community. Someone recommends you and then all of a sudden you're hired. Now I have to look up jobs, send them my resume and hope they'll call me back for an interview. I get the distinct feeling that my resume doesn't meet standards. Who knew people would be so picky about who tutors their kids? (just joking...sigh.) I've applied at tons of places (okay, maybe not tons but it feels like it) in NOVA and haven't really heard back from many of them. I haven't heard back from Fairfax County yet about substitute teaching and I know they probably have tons of resumes and assessment tests to slog through but it's making me antsy, like I can't even get a job as a substitute teacher.

I'm sure I should keep at it and give it time, all those reasonable responses but I really hate this. I feel like once someone deigns to hire me I'm just going to be so angry at this whole process that I'll throw it back in their face. Or be so servile and grateful that I spend the next 6 months on weekend duty. All my experience and college degree doesn't seem to get me far. They seem to want people who have experience teaching or tutoring rather than experience in running for coffee or the subway.

A Capitol Fourth

Sorry about the lack of writing recently. I was pretty overwhelmed by the show for a while and then after that I didn't want to think about it for a while and relax. But the show was interesting and so much happened that I wanted to write about it, all while it was going on. I just didn't have a spare moment. Really. Starting the Monday before the show on Wednesday I was completely crazy all day. Tuesday we had to sit through an hour long security sweep. All of us in the catering tent. I had so much work to do when I came back from our forced lunch break. It was the busiest part of the day for me. As soon as we got back from lunch I had about 5 interns that were coming to volunteer for us. I was spinning faster than a tornado trying to get everything ready for the dress rehearsal. People needed their guest passes for the night but we ran out of Tuesday night passes and had to come up with some way to make some up. I printed "Tuesday Night ONLY" on white labels and made the interns put them on extra Band & Chorus badges. It's nice having interns that can do these time consuming boring tasks. I was one about 3 months ago and I totally appreciate it.

Apparently though, I hurt someone's feelings. This girl, Candice, who is the full time receptionist in the main Capital Concerts office. I thought nothing of her at first, she was nice enough, cute. After hanging out with her for a while I started to get annoyed. She was young, thought she was funny and was pretty fake nice. She was coming over to help us out on Tuesday and came shortly after all the interns had arrived. I had showed the interns around the stage and backstage and then told them they could watch the show because I didn't have much for them to do and was already overwhelmed. Candice, however, wanted to be part of the team because she worked for us too. Well, she'd been working in the main office, far removed from anything we were doing. She also hadn't brought a computer to help us out with the paperwork. She was basically reduced to an intern's role and she resented it. She thought I had been rude to her. I don't really know why or how she got this impression. I was busy and so not really able to chat but I was trying to be really nice to everyone because I know I can get short when I'm busy but I didn't want the interns to be intimidated. Anyway, she wrote my boss an email saying she didn't feel part of the team and I had been rude to her and therefore she was going to go help the Talent people instead. You don't do that! You can't decide you don't like where you are and change your job like that, without asking anyone. My boss was annoyed, and so was I. If you can't deal with a little rudeness, or what you perceive to be rudeness how are you going to make it out in the real world, and especially TV? It's a rude, crude place. Get the fuck over it. And I'm one of the nice ones.

The National Anthem Makes Me Weirdly Patriotic

Unlike Memorial Day I am much more inclined to be patriotic on the 4th of July. I know a lot of people are, but I'm usually never patriotic. I feel like those people who only go to church on Easter and Christmas, I'm only patriotic on Independence Day.
The whole 'rocket's red glare' and the 'flag through the night' thing really sets me off. Especially when it's sung by someone who's got a soaring voice. I guess it's the whole day, like Christmas is so much more Christmas-y when the tree smells good and the people around you are kind and the snow falls. When the weather is balmy and the picnic is great and the people are good and the fireworks explode so inticingly and the sky is that dusky blue shade and the fireflies blink. The smell of hot dogs and gunpowder really makes me happy. I feel oddly elated and amazed to be a part of this country. It doesn't happen often, that I'm proud of who we are and even on the Fourth I get angry and upset, but I still somehow think it will turn out alright. Overall we're decent people who believe in these abstract things like Freedom and Liberty and we have fought wars to keep it that way. Even though we screw up often, and I wish we never went to war, especially the current one, I think Americans have this funny decency buried somewhere and after a while the cruelty gets intolerable and we do something about it. Granted, it's usually followed by bloodshed. It's strange, isn't it, how many of our boys have felt the same way, and how many of them have decided that they would be willing to die for that. I wish they could decide that and feel good about that decision, but not actually have to prove it by dying, or getting maimed or scarred, emotionally or physically. I wish we could show our pride in our country without having to sacrifice these boys needlessly. Even though I think these things I am amazed at the fact that someone would care enough about these things to do that. Amazed, awed, grateful and saddened.

Man, this wasn't supposed to go down that path. I was actually just going to comment on how cute the cheerleader from 'Heroes' is, and how she has a decent voice after all. Thank god she's not just some actress who THINKS she can sing, or a singer who thinks she can sing coughbritneycoughjessicacough cough.
That's all I meant to say. And that her singing 'The Star Spangled Banner' makes me oddly patriotic, something I never really intend.

Another Day Closer

Sorry, I know I'm just feeling sorry for myself and I should quit gripping, like I did in my last post. I know that this job is short and then I get to go home and have days off. It's just that when I'm in the middle of working a lot, and don't get much time off to do the things I like to do, I forget that I have it alright and I sink into that blind frustration that sees no end. This might be why I hate working so much. I should remember that when I do have a real job I won't have to work weekends (or at least, not constantly) and I won't have to work a second job and go running from place to place like I did last summer. It also doesn't help that I spontaneously like to do things like bake or paint and so to be constricted in an office where I can't just do that seems so very cruel. The days seem long now and they're fairly boring, but in a few days I will be past all that and can indulge in things and people. And do yoga again. It's surprising how much I miss it.

As you might know, if you have been following this blog assiduously, as you should be, you would know that I have come to the conclusion that I would much prefer the lifestyle of an educator. Being able to educate young people and help them see the world in a different way, and the freedom of summers and not working in a boring office are all things that I kinda want. And the freedom to write and go back to grad school. So, after this show is finished I'm going to retire from the entertainment business and hang up my credentials and get a full time job and go to grad school. As interesting as this career blip has been, seeing the other side of all those live shows broadcast throughout the country, or filmmaking, I don't think this is for me in the long run. There are too many things that I want out of life that I see myself compromising if I continued on in this career. I don't want this badly enough. I want academia and time to read and contemplate and discuss.