Auld Lang Syne
Yesterday, a friend of mine told me about a girl who spent two years in a foreign country, only to realize on her last day that she had not made any friends during her stay.
She got me thinking about my past two years. Moving back to Santa Barbara after graduating from Cal felt like a giant step backwards – I was going home without any concrete plans, and, to be completely honest, rather embarrassed to be returning to my hometown after I had made such a big deal out of going away to college (and beyond). I packed my parents’ car (and some of my boyfriend’s car) with my belongings and headed south, weighed down by an incredible feeling of – failure.
Since middle school, I had convinced myself and everyone around me that I would become a physician. I finished high school in true pre-med fashion and tried to pursue college in a similarly stereotypical way. After struggling to balance the science classes I thought I needed with the literature classes I knew I liked, I got my bachelor’s with mixed results. Ultimately, after applying twice, I realized I would not be going to medical school. I wouldn’t be going because I couldn’t convince the admission committees that I was competitive enough, and I wasn’t competitive enough because I didn’t have a good reason for becoming a doctor.
I could come up with all sorts of answers to the question, “Why do you want to be a doctor?” None of them rang true. The real reason was because at some point, I thought about the possibility of becoming one and decided it seemed like a good idea. My honest response to that question was, “Because I said so.” And because I said so, I did all the things you’re supposed to do when you’re a pre-med student. I took all the necessary prerequisites, participated in the relevant student groups, and volunteered and worked in all the right places. But I didn’t do all of these things because I really enjoyed them. Sure, I had fun and I learned a lot of things I couldn’t have learned otherwise, but I did all these things because I was The Decider at age 10 and stayed the course. After so long, I was incapable of imagining any alternatives to becoming a doctor. I had no idea what else was out there; my tunnel vision had turned into blinders.
When I came home from Cal, I was still in the middle of my second attempt at med school applications, but had pretty much decided not to invest in it any more beyond what I had already submitted. Instead, I began searching for a job that would provide something new to look forward to every day, something different. Most of all, something that made me feel like a human being and not a mediocre transcript. The flood of two years’ worth of rejection letters had chipped away at my self confidence and the unstoppable waves of depression and anxiety continued to take their toll. I needed to find something that would help me rebuild my tattered feeling of self worth, and give me direction when I felt so disoriented.
There are no words to describe the healing that took place while I worked at Alpha Resource Center. I felt like my work mattered. I felt like I was making a difference. And finally, after so many rejection letters, I felt appreciated and recognized again. Unfortunately, I had no idea where this experience would lead, since I couldn’t shape any sort of long term vision at this point, and that lack of vision still caused anxiety attacks.
Every once in a while, I still had to answer questions about medical school. I felt like throwing up every time I had to explain why I wasn’t going to med school. It wasn’t their fault when others inquired about it. I had made such a big show about being pre-med that it was natural for them to ask about it. In the end, I settled with the one-liner that I still use whenever the question comes up: “I realized it wasn’t for me.” A hard pill to swallow after so many years of insisting that it was the only option. But most people let it go at that, since it’s pretty obvious I didn’t want to talk about it. I’m ok with talking about it now, but the nice thing is that most people don’t care anymore, and it no longer matters to me what people think about the fact that I’m not going to medical school.
It’s taken two years to heal from the loss of a mistaken dream. Now, at the end of 2008, I’m beginning to see recent events take shape in a way I had no way of anticipating, and it feels wonderful to hope again. In June, I said some very difficult goodbyes to my mentor and friends at Alpha, leaving an organization and a family I love very much in order to pursue the great unknown.
Doug and I drove across the country when I moved to Chicago – my first time living more than 3 miles from the Pacific Ocean. In the months that followed, I joined the ranks of what has become known as America’s “underutilized work force,” those who gave up looking for employment, too discouraged to continue job hunting. Luckily, I found a part-time engagement to help me stay financially afloat. In all the spare time I suddenly found, I got to do a lot of thinking.
After six months of facing my biggest fears, I finally found the courage to dream a new life for myself. For this New Year’s Eve, I’m writing this insanely long entry to put all of this behind me, finally. In the past two years, I have made and rediscovered friends that will last a lifetime, and discovered a new strength in myself I didn’t know existed.
Harry: [about Auld Lang Syne] What does this song mean? My whole life, I don’t know what this song means. I mean, ‘Should old acquaintance be forgot’? Does that mean that we should forget old acquaintances, or does it mean if we happened to forget them, we should remember them, which is not possible because we already forgot?
Sally: Well, maybe it just means that we should remember that we forgot them or something. Anyway, it’s about old friends.
Thank you to those who helped me find my feet in 2008. In some cases, we were separated by more than 6000 miles, 14 hours through various time zones, or just the street that stretches between our driveways. Persevering through the past two years would have been nearly impossible without your unwavering support and love.
Heaven Forbid
I’ve said several times in the last few days I would refrain from commenting on certain recent events because I don’t want to inflame an already incendiary situation about which so many are intensely passionate. Also, I realize that my two cents will do nothing to influence the current world situation. So instead of indulging myself by writing a diatribe on something which I know relatively little about, I’m going to keep it simple by saying history (and its continuing consequences) grieves me; I wish things could be different.
Across the Universe
The number of can-do self-help books out there never ceases to amaze me. Although the handful of messages relating to empowerment and positive thinking haven’t changed in at least two millenia, new books come out every month, toting yet another version of how to believe in yourself, others, the world around you, etc. I’m impressed the market isn’t yet completed saturated and that people can still make money re-writing the same books over and over again. I guess we’ll never run out of demand for feel-good products.
I’m currently benefitting from the miraculous effects of Sudafed and Advil, so I figured I’d take some of this down time and finally write about the things I’ve been hopeful about. Or, in general self-help speak, putting my hopes and wishes out there (or into the universe), with the intention of seeing things turn out the way I envision…
At the reception last Sunday, the bride threw the bouquet after several courses of great food and I lost count how many bottles of wine and Jack Daniels. A group of her girlfriends crowded just behind her, and I, at the urging of a couple of my girlfriends, begrudgingly participated in the flower launch by standing all the way at the back, where I thought I could look like I was participating without really having to. Turns out, gerbera daisies are a lot heavier than they look, and the bride had quite an arm. The bunch nailed me on the side of my head as instinct made me turn and duck as it neared. A good friend had the reflexes to dive for the flowers before they hit the ground, where they were destined to land if destiny rested in my hands. As it turns out, she was headed for London the next morning and couldn’t take the flowers with her, so the bouquet ended up with me anyway. It’s now sitting in a pitcher, still in full bloom a week later. I’m pretty sure I won’t be the next to get married among the single ladies who attended the wedding (Universe, this part of the message is for you), so I’ll just be thankful that I had the opportunity to attend a fun reception and got to come home with a pretty buch of flowers. I’m perfectly happy sticking to the current live-in situation going on without all that matrimonial nonsense. Oh, the irony.
On a totally different note (head’s up, Universe), Doug laid out some ideas for his post-doc options in a few years. A few possibilities involve overseas posts, and I’m really excited about the prospect. We might have to learn another language, which would be really fun, and have the experience of living in another country for a few years. Ideally, I’ll have my master’s from the University of Chicago by that time, and the two of us can work from the same university. Sweet. He’ll have to finish his dissertation and I’ll have to accepted at UChicago first, but things are theoretically lining up, and I’m really liking the way things are looking so far.
Don’t Worry Be Happy
So the three things I was most anxious about this holiday season proved to turn out either the way I wanted them to, or better. Just goes to show that excess worry doesn’t help all that much – just the right amount of worrying provides enough motivation to see things through.
First, the weather in Chicago when we were leaving wasn’t the greatest (*understatement), but our flight was only an hour delayed.
Second, I thought I’d have a hard time getting my parents up to speed with all the new events and changes going on in my life. They’ve all happened so quickly, and in succession, that I feel like I haven’t been able to keep them in the loop properly. On the contrary, they’ve been like sponges while I’ve been spilling all the details of my new Mary Kay business and adjusting to living in Chicago. On the more difficult fronts, apparently Doug explained everything having to do with school – his graduate studies and my soon-to-be graduate studies.
Third, I packed two suitcases of MK products for the holiday season, with high hopes of being able to launch my new business at home. It turns out my expectations weren’t too out of reach, and I’ll be replenishing my inventory once I get home. =)
I don’t have much on my schedule over the next few days. Still winding down from the wedding on Sunday and the family shenanigans yesterday, so after a couple more days of vegging out on books and playing the piano, I’ll have digested the events of the past week or so enough to write coherently…ah, the holiday season.
2 AM
It’s not actually 2 in the morning, but it feels a lot earlier than it is. Here’s something just for fun, since I’ll probably be sitting in an airport all day later today.
IF YOUR LIFE WAS A MOVIE, WHAT WOULD THE SOUNDTRACK BE?
So, here’s how it works:
1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that’s playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button (Disclaimer: I’m hitting “refresh” instead of next because I have over 40 gigs of music and this will make for more interesting results…)
6. Don’t lie
Opening credits: “Hey” – Red Hot Chili Peppers
Waking Up: “Partita No. 2 in d minor, BWV 1004 – 1. Allemanda” – J.S. Bach
Falling In Love: “Mood Indigo” – Duke Ellington
Fight Song: “Out of Nowhere” – Charlie Parker
Prom: “Spotlight (Twilight Mix)” – Mutemath
Life: “Chim Chim Cheree” – Julie Andrews/Dick Van Dyke
Mental Breakdown: “Touch My Body” – Mariah Carey
Flashback: “Song of our Country (Sketches of Spain)” – Miles Davis
Getting Back together: “Dancers in Love” – Duke Ellington
Loosing your Virginity: “Unaccompanied Cello Suite No. 3 in C Major, BWV 1009 – 111. Courante” – J.S. Bach
Wedding: “Gravedigger” – Dave Matthews Band
Birth of Child: “Old Devil Moon” – Miles Davis
Final Battle: “Strange Planet” – The Starseeds
Death Song: “Un Homme Déserté” – Camille
Um…no comment. This either failed miserably, or my life is made of the stuff that makes Disney’s made-for-DVD B movies possible.
Memory Lane
I’m reading a library book. There’s a pocket glued to the inside of the back cover that holds the check out slip (Northwestern University Library, checked out to Doug. Well, checked out to his student ID account number). There’s nothing glued to inside of the front cover or the first cover page.
Back in the day (“when I was your age”), you could check out a library book and see the due dates for all the people who checked out the book before you. If it was a children’s book, you could be sure that a due date stamp meant the book was actually read – and read at least once, if not a hundred times during its 3-week sojourn to someone’s house. You can tell a lot from the little flap of paper where the due dates were stamped. Some librarians cared about whether all the numbers lined up exactly, other librarians couldn’t care less if the numbers were lined up at all, and these were probably the same librarians who also didn’t care if they stamped the due date upside down in the designated rectangle, or outside the lines of the box. Sometimes the date stamps included the year, and you could see how long the book’s been in circulation. You can also tell when the library was loaned from a different location or when the library renewed its stamp pads by a change in ink color.
Sometimes, in much older books or more popular titles, you could see traces of adhesive where prior due date slips were attached. You couldn’t know for sure how long the book’s been in the library system then, but you’d at least get a sense of how many times the book’s been checked out. These are the books that get the funny smell from being on carts and shelves for so long; the paages are usually a lot softer and the corners are rubbed smooth; the binding gives way at just about every page, instead of just the couple of spots when recent borrowers tended to put the book down. Sometimes I feel a little sad looking at all the old, worn books in the generic “Literature” sections of libraries – they’re easily overlooked and people aren’t clamouring for them. Everybody wants to fight for the 7-Day Express Read books…those fancy new releases that have “#1 New York Times Bestseller” splashed across the cover. No one really cares for the cloth-bound volume resting just above or below eye level without a jacket, let alone a gripping back-cover blurb that’s meant to grab your attention, complete with quoted praise from reviews hardly anyone’s actually read.
Every once in a while I check out a copy of a book that still possesses a trace of its last environmenet – the home of someone who enjoys cigars, maybe a tiny apartment whose inhabitant was way too obsessed with Bath and Body Works, and there’s always the occasional reader who can’t comprehend words on a page unless they somehow mark it, although that’s more likely in copies of The Prince and Das Kapital than, say, The Red Tent.
The one reason why I like going to libraries is because you can walk in the door knowing that if you find something you like, you can go home with it immediately. Bookstores like Chaucer’s, my favorite bookstore of all time, and the ubiquitous Borders are great because everything’s new (new books require a separate post of their own and used bookstores need their own blogs entirely), but you can’t necessarily walk out the door with the first thing that alights your fancy (I’d be way beyond broke). For the exact opposite reason why bookstores are great, libraries are fantastic as well: the books are worn, well loved, and you can find anything you want (never underestimate interlibrary loans!).
The modern computerized library is a wonderful thing – you can request titles, place holds, transfer materials to a nearer branch, review catalog materials, and check the status of a title from your own computer/iphone/blackberry etc. You can also download audiobooks from larger library websites (although mac compatible download software is still a rarity). I love the automated library system and its amazing capacity for efficiency and convenience (like performing the checkout process yourself! OMG I need to write another post about this topic, too!), but I miss the old school ways of stamping a due date on the inside front cover and hearing that satisfying “ker-shink” as the rubber part of the stamp moves along its tracks and flips, inked-side down, fitting itself in the little white box, signifying that this title is now yours for the next three weeks, with the option to renew up to two times as long as the book isn’t requested or recalled by someone else.
Say
It’s been a long time since I’ve been involved with this many people on so many fronts all at once. It’s a bit overwhelming, launching myself back into a social world. For the past two years, I’ve been shuttling myself between home and work, content with the small group who shared my daytime activities and my family in the evenings. I didn’t do much outside of work and dinner and hobbies at home, and it almost felt like high school all over again, minus the SAT studying and swim team practice….
Now I’m running in various circies, networking and expanding my Chicago connections to make this place somewhere I can belong. I’m loving this new feeling of being a newly rejuvenated social creature – it reminds me of the busy days at Cal: there’s always something to do, somebody I need to get in touch with, somewhere to go, and usually somewhere to go with someone.
However, I’ve recently re-realized that this perk comes with its frustrations. After two years of keeping to my self (relatively, anyway), I’ve become accustomed to a low-drama lifestyle. I wasn’t in contact with anyone who could make a bigger issue out of something small more than I could. =)
In recent weeks, I’ve had various conversations and experiences that ultimately lead to the same conclusion: there’s too much BS going on. While it’s true we can never underestimate the value of courtesy, etiquette, and playing nice in general, we forget that it’s also considerate to be honest without playing politics or other games. When we throw people for a loop, send them on wild goose chases, or knowingly lead them astray, we think we’re sparing their feelings, reducing possible strife, etc., but what we’re really doing is causing unnecessary anxiety and, ultimately, annoying the heck out of the individual’s friends and confidantes, who will ultimately bear the brunt of the person’s inevitable over-analysis or, at the very least, some venting.
This makes me sound like I can’t stand it when my friends gripe about what’s bothering them. That’s not true. What I can’t stand is the fact that we all do this to each other. I think the biggest component of friendship is empathy – if our friends don’t care about our greatest concerns, we’re in big trouble. The most obvious thing most of us appreciate about our friends is the ability to rely on their good opinion. We accept what our best friends say at face value, maybe with a pinch of salt, but always with the understanding that whatever they communicate is in our best interest. If our most cherished relationships are founded on trust because we value honesty above all, why do we engage in dishonest practices so often? If we are to put our best selves forward at all times, doesn’t it follow that we maintain that same level of credibiilty and integrity across the board?
Yes, it all comes down to the golden rule. At some point, doesn’t everything? But I’ve been thinking about this in particular because of the conversations I’ve been privy to recently. This holiday season, get down with your better, more honest self and say what you need to say to the people who need to hear it. Better yet, start dishing the empathetic truth this winter and don’t ever stop. This doesn’t mean you need to be brutally honest or harsh with the truth. We can be honest and caring at the same time.
It’s almost always easier to hear directly from someone news we didn’t really want to hear, but at least delivered kindly. This way we’re not confused or frustrated about their intent or meaning, and we can move on with the information immediately. Let’s not sugarcoat things too much – it’s these false overtones that cause others to spend too much time analyzing, stressing, or futzing in general. Communicating in roundabout or sugarcoated ways (including, but not limited to: avoiding practices, vague language, mandating cumbersome or unrealistic requirements, etc) just makes things unpleasant for everyone. History’s role models have shown that we can, with careful thought and well-chosen words, articulate sensitive opinions and thoughts in ways that demonstrate our well-meaning intentions. And if we don’t carry well-meaning intentions, well, there are ways to make that politely plain as well.
Doomsday Clock
Why is it so difficult to come to terms with the fact that everything comes to an end? An ending doesn’t necessarily need to be a bad thing. Just because something ceases to exist the way it previously did isn’t reason to panic. Things don’t so much “end” as they adapt, evolve, transform, become absorbed, or, heaven forbid, improve. I am adamantly opposed to maintaining status quos of any kind. Circumstances, people, relationships, interactions, environments, conditions, etc. could always be better, more efficient, more pleasant, more satisfying, quicker, slower, or, for lack of a good way to assess alternatively, just plain different.
Spotlight
After a few lazy google attempts, I haven’t been able to find the technical term for a person who’s addicted to getting haircuts. It’s been six months since I last changed my hairstyle, and I was getting incredibly antsy. I probably will never have long hair again, as I’m too impatient to let it grow much beyond shoulder length, which takes a good six to eight months or so. Instead, I experiment with styles going shorter and shorter, then longer and longer… Amazingly, I’ve never done anything with color, texture, or extensions. Imagine the possibilities…alas, I take no risks and keep it natural (read: low maintenance on the everyday level).
There’s something refreshing about getting a new hairstyle. Shedding the old, unveiling the new, releasing the weight, and emerging a whole new person, at least aesthetically. Just for kicks, I tried to count the number of unique hairstyles I’ve sported since I can remember getting regular haircuts. Total number of different hairstyles I’ve experimented with: 17. This doesn’t count the times when I’ve re-visited alternative versions of the same style, e.g. the 4th grade chin-length bob and the Katie Holmes/Rihanna-y bob I tried last year both count as one hairstyle. 17. That averages to a different hairstyle every year since I was 7. Realistically speaking, I’ve had two or more different hairstyles a year since I was 12.
Today, I had a fantastic experience sitting in the chair of the very magical, very adept – very Italian – Tony at Carissima. I could not be more ecstatic about my new style, apparently inspired by and designed for the Italian/French runway designs of Spring 2009. And I’m sure somebody out there understands when I say that I love it so much, I can’t wait for it grow out so I can go back and try something different. I’m hoping this haircut high will last until I get a dose of real sunshine later this month…
