simply put- i'm still learning.

I've thought as I'm rushing through so many things in the past couple of weeks "man, I should really blog about..." this or that, and lo and behold, none of those posts have come into fruition. So now I'm sitting here, waiting for past inspiration to re-spark, perhaps, and I've got nada. So, as opposed to picking a topic, maybe a summary of my semi-recent past, a recap-ing of the year, of sorts?

I have a very hard time seeing past where I am in the present into the future, so I think back to college, specifically senior year, and I have no idea what or if I had any expectations of where I'd be right now. I hoped working in a theatre, professionally, somewhere East Coast, so of my most minimializing details, I managed to fill those aspirations.

However, I know for a multitude of reasons that this isn't "it". Many really don't need to be gotten into, if only because I found it ironically disturbing watching a movie earlier and an older actor was commenting on how this young generation right now (in which I am at best in the oldest category of) likes to blog their every single thought, no matter how trite or insignificant. So, I'm trying to stop myself, while being the rambling, angsty, post-adolescent I strive to grow out of.

There are people I miss in places where I have little artistic future if I want to continue in this field. There are places that are full of dreams, if only I had the financial means to throw myself into them. There are places where I can have a house with a white picket fence and buy every little cutesy thing I want because I'll have a house to fill that will be mine, that I won't be leaving in a year, or two, or three. There are places where I know one person for the entire city, state, but it would be such a great place to live. There are jobs all over, where I know not a soul, where I would be starting at the square one again of not knowing where to go, how to get anywhere, not having a friend or companion. And there's my great inability to see past the present to know which direction I should shoot. And not for a lack of effort either. I ask my present self what I'd like to do, and that person just kind of scratches her head and stares back at me, puzzled, perplexed, utterly distraught at the idea of change, that every altering state that brings terror to all.

A week ago I was in Lawrence. At present, I'm back at the ol' staff house, listening to Pink Floyd (I'm so bad ass, I know), after having watched not one, but two Redbox movies- back to back, no less- get down with yo' bad self. That's right, "Easy A", followed by "Going The Distance". The first, while well-intentioned (and with a not half-bad soundtrack), was trying to be a little too John Hughes, while being completely disconnected and scattered- I'm not sure whether to blame the original story, the directing, or the editing. Regardless... meh. Cute, but meh. The second, had a much deeper undertone. Very light and funny and jokey and Justin Long even reminding me of my own friends at times, but also deeper and harder and relate-able- something about that missing somebody who lives across the country thing- frak, that blows. And you can know each other so well and be so compatible and then not see each other for so long that when you do, you're nervous and you say the wrong things and it gets awkward when there's no reason for it to be. Not that I'm speaking from personal experiences or anything...

Other, bigger things- death. I feel weird "blogging" about specifics, because I feel like to put that sort of topic into the social media or a blogging atmosphere in anyway whatsoever is trite and devaluing somehow. So, sans specifics... I don't really know where to go.

Alright... this is a disconnected ramble of a post, the length to write equivalent approximately to the amount of time it takes to listen to "Echoes"- thanks Pink Floyd.

iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou... i love you.

the lies we tell.

What a cheesy title. Sorry about that. This is a post about lies. (We used to do journal entries in J-1 and then end them with 'this is a story about... so, same idea).

Remember when you were a kid and your mom or dad would be leaving to go somewhere and leave you home alone but they said if someone called, not to tell that person that you were home alone, so tell them your mom or dad was in the shower or something? Well, I was terrible at that lie. I'm terrible at every lie, but I look back on what should be the simplest of lies and remember a stuttering, stumbling 7-year-old going "Oh, uh, um, my, uh, she's, um, I think she's in the shower?" And yet, however many odd years later, here I am in theatre, still incapable of telling the smallest white lie. They're just not my style. I will avoid the truth, but if you ask me point blank, I just can't lie.

I found in talking to one of the questioners (see back entries) that as all those life questions get thrown out like it's the weather, I skirt all around, with ums and ohs and shrugs and nods. If there's a question I don't know the answer to, I'm completely and utterly speechless.

But you're taking the time to read my blog, so here's some truths about me I do know. Little facts I don't go out of my way to make public knowledge- not like I'm hiding them or anything, but just things that never seem to come up, perhaps? I don't know. Anyway... In the indeterminable future, I would like to run a marathon. Perhaps start with a half or something like that, but run a marathon. Or maybe even a freaking triathlon. I love swimming and biking, running is the hard part. So the running is the important part to defeat. I weigh on average about one hundred forty-seven pounds, as far as I know, the most I've ever weighed to date. I think flirtatious people in relationships are skeeeetchy. I think it's possible I think this because I've been a flirtatious person in a relationship and I know the thoughts that have crossed my mind when flirting while in that relationship. And yet, I find myself attracted to and simultaneously turned off by flirtatious people in relationships. Maybe it's the fun with no fear of commitment, but then there's that feeling of what kind of person would be in a relationship and flirt with someone else? Am I projecting fears about myself on other people? I'm currently listening to Death Cab's "Transatlanticism" album because it's my favorite of all of theirs- I listened to it on repeat junior year of high school. I obsessively do sudoku puzzles. I love mental math. I still sleep with my retainers in. For reasons undisclosed even to myself, I make it impossible to love me. I haven't worn a dress in over two weeks and this bothers me. I have yet to figure out where I completely one hundred percent fit in. Before my grandmother passed away, she gave me the Anne of Green Gables books and I still have yet to read them- but I should. They're sitting on my bookshelf in my room here, because they are special enough to have needed to travel with me the 1300 miles. I really like breakfast, but I rarely get up early enough to properly eat it- I miss first semester of college when Erin, Andy W, and I would get up early just to go eat breakfast together daily. I think being outside with a drink on a warm night with terrific company is one of my favorite things in the world. The older I get, the more I hate talking on the phone- I don't seem to be getting any better at it than I was at 7, though I tried and enjoyed it for several teen years.

This started as a blog about lies, but sort of turned into a blog of random facts... I am a scatter of strangeness. Take that and this for what you well. I am still in the process of "growing up", of figuring out who I am, who and what I want to be. So for now, I am a scatter of random facts, trying to figure out which pieces make up the significance of the future. One of the multitude of things that only time will tell...

X's and O's, Peace and Love.

decisions then, results now.

This is just one of those isn't-it-crazy-how-I-got-here posts. Basically, I was thinking, what got me into theatre? First, I danced. When I was going into first grade, we moved. I started all over at a new school, having only done it a year prior. For an extremely shy kid, to do it all over was terribly difficult. When I started second grade, my mom thought maybe dance would help me to be less shy or to make more friends (not that I didn't make friends in first grade, but still) or something. So she took me to sign up for dance, where I met Kathy, one of my teachers, who told me I had the perfect legs to dance (at 8! Who knew!), something that I have never thought to question since that day, because who would just say that to an 8-year-old? No one. IT MUST BE TRUE.

Anywho, fast forward to freshman year of high school. Still dancing, on the drill team, yada yada. One of my best friends convinces me I should audition for the musical. I do, terrified, do a horrendous job, and don't make it (to this day, thank you dad for going with me to brave the cast list results). How utterly disheartening. Regardless, this somehow started a curiosity and interest in participating in theatre. So for that, I have to thank a girl I no longer talk to. I digress.

After that musical, I saw all the shows, sometimes would go into the theatre and watch a minute or two of other rehearsals throughout the year. My sophomore year, I auditioned again and made it. Thus began the bloom of friendships that my teen years thrived upon, some of the best and brightest and funniest and full-hearted people I have ever known, who filled me with joy and love and confidence and laughter. The fact that I am still in theatre is owed entirely to them.

As, I had a choice once to give it up. End of junior year, I ran for the officer board. There were ten spots and I tied with one other girl for the last spot. Our teacher made the final vote, and since the other girl had already been on the board the year before (and perhaps for other reason as well that I'll never know), she chose her. And that absolutely flat out broke my heart. I spent a long summer trying to figure out if I still wanted to do theatre, as that was a tragic hit to my self-confidence, and now, looking back, probably a complete destroying of my relationship to my teacher, as at 17, she voted against me. I think I see it as more profound now then I did at the time, but my god, as a teenager, for someone who is supposed to help you and support you and build you up and teach you and make you a better person and belief in you- to vote against you, to say you are unworthy or not good enough- holy crap. How much more opposite of what you're trying to do with your position in my life could you be going by being the person to make that sort of decision?

But back to the amazing people that I could never give up. Ten people on that board. Two were the boys who reassured all of my teenage fears by showing me they had the exact same ones, by showing me what I was going through was what we were all going through. By holding my hand, by making me laugh when I cried, by making me cry from laughing so hard. One of them knew I still wanted to be on that board, and while going through his own stuff, didn't want to be on it anymore, so two-thirds of the way through the year, he resigned his position- to me. And he and the other nine officers made me my own officer ceremony, with official words and lights of cell phones in lieu of candles. Ten people did this for me. Ten people found me worthy.

I may be over-dramatizing the whole thing quite a lot, but it is because of those ten people and several more I met in that department that I am who I am and where I am today. They touched my heart and had a profound impact on my life and shared my passion and drive for theatre. They are people that are not easily forgotten, even when I live thousands of miles away from all of them. There is a love and a respect and feeling of gratitude that will never go away. They are fantastic human beings and no matter where we go in live and how far geography may separate us, there was a time when all of our hearts worked as one and for that, I am forever humbled to have been a part of something so special and it is why I continue to strive to work so hard at what I do and who I am today. So thank you, my loves, for sharing you with me. All my love to you.

X's and O's, Peace and Love.

past, present, and future participles.

a late night post... because when better to clearly express your thoughts than three-thirty in the morning?

First thought: So, the difficult thing about blogs is you never know who is reading them. Could be no one, could be your mom, could be your boss, could be everyone you've ever met. Apparently, my blog has a following in Iraq (what?), so who knows. Regardless, trying to figure out how to discuss specifics without being... specific.

That being said, something that has been bugging me lately is deteriorating friendships. Not my own, per say, but a situation that was brought to my attention about two months ago based on a situation that started about five months ago... Confused yet? Bear with me. Here's the deal. Two people were dating. Then they weren't. One person decides to turn the other person's best friend against them. Mission is successful. Why? How? This bothers me so much. Mostly because the person I care about most in the situation is the one whose best friend now won't talk to them, but also because I have seen similar takes of this situation in my own life, with friendships, and crushes, and when those things fall apart, somehow people always try to take other people from the situation with them. Why? I understand the need to vent frustrations, but what causes someone who is not involved in the situation to completely turn against someone who was involved in the situation when that particular party didn't do anything that can be faulted other than simply not want to be in that situation anymore? I just don't get it.

My second thought is simply a memory, as I had looked over at my bulletin board earlier, and it includes a multitude of photographs, quotes, fortunes from fortune cookies, pins, coupons (thanks Mom), a postcard, and finally- a label from a Jones soda bottle, which brings me to (ta-da!) the memory: In high school (not saying this was the thing to do or that anyone did it but us or that we even did it that often, BUT), sometimes we would go to the local grocery story (oh, HyVee), get Jones sodas, drink them, then play this game of throwing them into a dumpster behind the HyVee from like 20 feet away to see if we could make it. Why we enjoyed this so much, I just don't know. When I think of this particular memory, it makes me think of two people in particular, both of whom are near and dear to my heart and saw me through a lot of emotionally awkward growing situations throughout my teen and early twenties years. One though, I haven't really talked to since high school, as he got involved with a person who does not like anyone of the opposite gender to talk to him but her... so, sad. The other I still talk to, lived with briefly, and see when I am home. Delightful boys.

My third thought involves the ever-popular "What's next?" question, something I am struggling currently to answer for myself. In dreamworld, I will find an amazing theatre job, or work on SNL (I will get them coffee, I don't care, I want to be surrounded by funny), or maybe work somehow in photography (this will require extensive class-taking, as I do not have the talent of many whom I have evidently started cyber-stalking by subscribing to stranger's photo blogs of brilliance). In dreamworld, I will move to NYC or Boston, or maybe even Chicago or DC. I will get to sleep regularly, workout and do yoga regularly, get to walk all over, listening to my iPod, protecting my eyes from the sun with my oversized sunglasses (a trademark of mine by now, along with my curls that are still mostly chopped). I will get to regularly interact with people my own age, perhaps develop relationships outside of the only three people I get to see with any regularity (whom I love dearly, but still, I crave more people). I will get to live in a place with closet space and a full sized bed (I feel like a child in this twin) and I will for-go the dream of proper air conditioning just to have proper insulation come winter (on the Upper East Coast, this is mandatory). In whatever dream job, I will make enough to be a little bit frivolous, indulgent, generous. In order to accomplish any of these things, I need to not allow myself or my work or my goals to become stagnant, but to work vigorously to maintain what I want and my fire to go after it. By putting this out in the universe, I am making some sort of public vow to do the best I possibly can for myself, and the universe can hold me accountable to follow through. And so help me, I will.

Now who says you can't clearly communicate your ideas at random early morning/late night hours?

X's and O's, peace and love.

thinking before you speak... is for other people.

I've had quite a few 'blonde' moments over this past weekend. Some are just dumb things I've said, much to the amusement of others. "It's a hilarious!" (what?)... Others are more substantial.

For example, I thought my phone wasn't charging this entire weekend. Oh, the battery must be going, time for a new phone. But, no. (Well, it is time for a new phone, but not due to a bad battery.) Instead, when I was in NYC with my folks last week, I was reminded by a banner on the subway about conserving energy that having a charger plugged in when it's not being used still uses energy, so I unplugged mine when I got home. However, I forgot that, so I was plugging one end into my phone, without the other end in anything... wow.

Another, I realize, was from when I was in 3rd grade, but I realize only now I may have gotten what was said entirely wrong. 3rd grade, the cusp of pre-teen life. I was the oldest sibling, so I had no one to look up to or talk to, but a girl in my class, named Jessica, had an older sister- who was in middle school, the epitome of cool. Jessica told all the girls in our 3rd grade class that she had started shaving her arms and legs, because her sister did it. Only now do I look back and wonder if she said arms or "armpits". Or had said arms but assumed everyone knew she meant under arms. Because, after she told us that, and that we should all do it too, I shaved my lower arms, like the tops of them, for several weeks, until my parents noticed and made me stop. I now wonder what my mom thought when she learned I was doing that. I laugh now at the idea of a kid coming up to me and telling me they were shaving their arms... their lower arms. Just me who finds this hilarious? Perhaps. Alas...

X's and O's, peace and love.

repeat

I knew it was bound to happen at some point. But still, so soon? I'm only 24...

Here's the thing. I've grown up with a most common name my entire life. There are only so many names and mine is pretty popular... ha. So, as I've gotten older, it's amusing to see the name similarities or identicalness I've found with the more people I've met. These tickle and confuse me simultaneously as at some point I know my old mind will start to confuse the people.

But as of late, what's even more intriguing to me is the personality similarities. I mean, please, people my whole life have had similarities and reminded me of each other. But now, living so far from home, where no one from my day-to-day live here is related to or attached to my life at home in any way, I find the personality similarities fascinating.

In the past month, I've met two people who each in their own way remind me of people from home. The first reminds me of a close, close college friend, the second of an ex-boyfriend. Both similarities are so similar, not necessarily in look or personal relationship to me, but in senses of humor, reactions to situations, speaking patterns, mannerisms... it's uncanny. I find myself utterly at a loss of words and just kind of starring at moments because I'm so confused by the feeling of seeing someone else when I look at them. And of themselves, I think they're great people... or are they? Am I seeing them, am I getting to know them, or am I confusing myself with the feelings I feel towards the people they remind me of? Most perplexing.

At any rate, I mean, I know there are only so many people in the world and things we can do and like and think and feel about situations, but isn't 24 a little early to be meeting so many people that remind me of so many other people? Shouldn't I still be meeting people who are simply people? (I mean I am, but also these double people.)

Just a little food for thought...

And, not to sound like a broken record, but I plan on writing more frequently. I think I get bent out of shape about having to have a long thing to write about, but maybe I'll try to insert some short, sweet posts in here, just so I seem a bit more reliable. :)

x's and o's, peace and love.

ice cream for one

let me paint a picture for you. this picture would be titled: my friday night. i spent a large portion of my day away from work, and as often when i'm not working, alone. this doesn't bother me. the older i've gotten, i've found that i enjoy the independence, the time to think, absorb myself in music, or get lost in a book or tv show. the perks include always getting to do what i want to do, when i want to do it. really, there's no downside. at any rate, so, as it was a lovely day out (after a week of cold and rain), i thought i'd take advantage of what could be my last afternoon of sunlight for awhile and go walking on a walking path about twenty minutes from where i live. so, i go about my merry business, plug in the ipod, take it slow, just walking, enjoying the weather. a little over an hour later, i'm like, i could go for some food. there's a quizno's down the block, so i grab a grinder (oh, east coast...), sit at the bar by the window and eat my grinder. then i walk down the block, a cute little very italian block, with lots of italian restaurants and outdoor seating, and can't help but note that i've stumbled into date night. every table is a couple, which, i suppose, makes sense as it is dinner time on a friday night. regardless, i continue to stroll on my merry way. i spy an ice cream parlor and decide to go in, order a small cone. i do this, the girl gives me the largest cone of ice cream of my life. not one to complain, as i do love ice cream, i take it and go sit on a park bench outside. in the span of the 20 minutes that i sat there, the only people who passed me: couples. and every single set looked at me with judgment. what is a 20-something girl doing by herself on a friday night, sitting solo on a park bench here on romance road, eating the largest ice cream cone that man has ever made? and despite the fact that i am so used to and so comfortable spending time solo, something about being out there for all to see and judge just shook me. and i thought realistically, this could still be me in ten years, twenty years, fifty years down the road. at what point would it be okay with everyone for a girl to sit solo enjoying an ice cream cone on a park bench on a friday evening?

i chose this profession and so for as long as i choose to keep it, i am married to it. i love it so, but then there are the rare friday nights where you are by yourself, eating an ice cream cone on one end of an empty bench while love blooms for all around. a marriage where your spouse doesn't go out to eat with you, go for walks with you, go to concerts or on picnics or grocery shopping. a marriage where the other half of the bed is empty. for now, this is what i choose. and i'm okay with that. so i hope you can be too.