21 December 2009

dreams

1. I drove my old red car onto a street in Manhattan that I knew I wasn't supposed to be driving on, but I was in a hurry. 20+ militia members, mostly women, appeared from nowhere to point their machine guns at my car. It was made clear to me that I, because I was somehow involved with the police, should have known better than to stray into their territory.

2. Someone was making a movie using some of my students, in our classrooms. They were filming while I was trying to teach, and our classrooms were so big that I was in charge of two classes at a time. In this dream, Kindergarten was in the basement, and the rooms were huuuuuuuuge. Andy had the starring role in this film, and Dylan, from college, appeared out of nowhere to visit. He took off his shirt. It was awkward.

3. I was trying to smuggle Ben and Eric to Mexico, through a tunnel in my basement. I got questioned by the police about it, hoping they wouldn't find the tunnel, in between the two-show-a-night I was performing of something.

The moral of the story:

inner demons + NCIS/CSI/X-FILES before bedtime = adventure

13 December 2009

I'm Not Sorry

(It's hard for me to post anything above #200.)

(But I'm just going to do it, and then it will be done.)

When I was a kid, my uncle Tom always used to get on my case for apologizing too much.

"Don't say your sorry."

"Sorry."

"QUIT IT."

"Sor...er, okay."

Who knows if I ever actually scaled back or not on the apologizing. It's like I was born apologizing for taking up too much space, for breathing too much air. He stopped bugging me about it, after awhile, so for some amount of time it must have gotten better.

Recently, though, the universe has decided to make a point.

First, Todd told me to stop apologizing. Stop saying you're sorry, you don't have to be sorry, etc. I understood the sentiment but didn't think much of it at the time.

A week later, a student that I've had for the past 3 months raised his hand in class.

"Teacher, why you say sorry?"

"What, Andy?"

"Every day, 'Sorry.' It's okay, Teacher, don't be sorry."

"Ummm, thank you, Andy. You're right."

I thought about what he said, and realized I do say "I'm sorry" an awful lot to my students. That is not to say that I don't mean it. I mean it, very much. I believe, however, that the point he was making is not to stop saying I'm sorry, but to stop actually feeling sorry about everything.

This week, he reminded me. "Teacher, I said stop saying sorry." Insert missing-toothed grin here.

Then, last night, at a bar, I squeezed past a large, middle-aged American man. I said I was sorry.

"Hey. Don't say you're sorry."

"Um .... okay. Pardon me?"

"Yeah, that's better. Huh, you're hot."

While I left that last encounter creeped out, I must say:

Alright, Universe. I get the message, and I'm climbing on board.

03 December 2009

two hundred

Sitting at a tiny table, listening to a dance mix, drinking a glass of wine, living on the East side of Seoul, South Korea, is not where I'd have ever guessed I'd be writing the retrospective, behemoth, epic, brilliant, funny, widely read and quoted, earth-shattering 200th post on this blog. However, where did I really expect to be when I wrote this post? Would I have had any guess at all? When I wrote the first post, back in September 2005, did I think I'd write 200 posts in a year or two? Did I know it would take me more than 4 years and 3 major moves to write a mere 200 brief entries on the state of life/ random musings? Did I know that 200 would seem like a milestone? Did I even think I'd make it to 200?

Probably not, since it took me 6 entries to quit writing on a Myspace blog.

I still contend that I've made the right decision. Even if, it turns out, there are myriad other blogging sites that are just as good or perhaps better than this one. I was still right in my assessment that Myspace is an ugly confusing waste of space, and not a place I want to keep my musings, trivial or otherwise. Especially not 200 of them.

Who read this when I first started writing it? 2005, when I wrote about my fascination with bees and random art in Lawrence, KS, and whatever crossed my mind (my style and content haven't every really graduated to a next level, only changing location drastically at certain intervals) ... my last year of undergrad ... I think maybe Josh Efron and LLM, probably Ari because I wrote a lot of it from her computer ... I was just writing for myself, which isn't such a bad way to begin. Even now, even today, my parents reminded me that no matter the audience, I am absolutely forbidden from self-editing, whether it be for content or style. Which is about the best thing your parents could ever forbid you from. "You are forbidden to be anything other than who you are, even if you are at times utterly crass and emotional." Thank you, parents.

So, you've been warned, whoever you are out there, all 3 or 7 or 100 of you, that this 200th post will be a swirling, shifting, non-linear epic retrospective bit of nonsense covering, well, whatever I feel like from the last 4-odd years. Don't say I didn't warn you. I may like lists in short form, but this will be nothing like a list. This will be like a short novel that has no beginning, middle, and ending, despite my constant request for that kind of information from my 8-year-old students. I am currently The Man, requiring that every sentence start with a capital letter and every story have a clear beginning, middle and ending ... but only so they can properly rebel against it when they all decide to write avant garde poetry, in English, when they're 14. Right? Right?

What do I even remember of the time in between? What have become the prevailing memories and attitudes of these last 4 years? It's easy to forget how much you can pack into that little amount of time. Especially when you're young and you haven't settled anywhere in particular and you experience a huge range of emotions at all times.

I just had a really self-conscious moment, you'd think I'd have more of them, where I realized that I'm totally just airing my dirty laundry here for anyone to see. Here it is, flying in the breeze. Who am I hoping will be interested in my dirty laundry? I guess it all stems from my fascination with creative non-fiction. Perhaps I'm hoping that practice will make perfect and someday I really will end up working for This American Life.

Anyway, here it is. Here's the version in brief, and in some places, in detail. Here is what I remember, or what I choose to remember.


There are things I remember which may never have happened but as I recall them so they take place.


So.

Fall 2005. I was living in a studio apartment, sharing a private entrance with one of my best friends who lived across the hall from me. I could leave my dirty coffee cups wherever I pleased, she could eat crunchy crackers for breakfast out of earshot of me (read: we could keep our neuroses beautifully separate from one another). We shared a toaster oven and a coffee pot. We watched movies on her TV, snuggling in her bed. We both did a little bit of pining. Hers panned out, mine was the beginning of the end of yet another painful romance in my life.

Spring 2005. I had a chance to travel to Memphis, Minneapolis, and Santa Fe. I briefly dropped 15 pounds and felt prettier and more physically self-confident that I had in years; I have not ever felt as good since. I drank a lot of water, ate a lot beets, and managed to finish my last semester while finishing my senior project and two plays at the same time. I had crushes on men who designed lights and sound. One dark, one sandy. I speak to neither now, but they still exist somewhere out there.

I moved home, went on dates with two different boys in three months, eventually regretted ever having to leave the second one because he is truly beautiful and talented and kind and really liked me. I directed kids, performed a solo performance, ran around like crazy in a green dress in the Doctor's directorial debut, and spent a lot of time using my new computer, stealing internet and smoking countless cigarettes. I walked around in summer rainstorms and watched bands in basements and bookstores and living rooms.

Fall 2006 - Spring 2007. I moved out of Kansas for the first time in my life, into an apartment that I couldn't afford the security deposit on. I got a job at a bakery, where I proceeded to be consistently late, constantly convinced I'd be fired, and thoroughly looked after and loved. I even spent Thanksgiving in my boss's mother's apartment, looking at original art dedicated to said mother, meeting relatives that worked for NPR and eating 5 different kinds of pie. I got hired at my other job the same day I went to see Little Miss Sunshine with my ex-flame, the one I didn't really tell anyone about until 2007, hereafter referred to as "Collegiate Romance." I, for the first time, really felt the flush of having a major goal and accomplishing it, as an adult. I went to New York to work for a major living idol and not only never got yelled at by him, but got hired to sell tickets, stood in for an actor, and got a hug from one of the grumpiest men on this planet on my last day. Cheers to you, Mr. Sleepy! You are everything I had hoped you would be. You would think I was a twit for talking about you like that. Doesn't make it less true. So, goal accomplished.

I spent some quality time living with two vastly different, beautiful New York ladies, hailing from Kansas and Texas, respectively. I was, incredibly, visited by 1. an adorable Russian beauty, 2. my mother, 3. my father (separate trips, mind you), 4. my best friend since always (we both had colds and watched movies the whole time and it was awesome), and 5. my best friend since college (we drank whiskey and snuggled and fell in love with NY together). That's love - 5 people who paid countless dollars to get on planes and fly to see me.

I had the following restaurants burned into the pleasure center of my brain: 1. liquiteria (juices, smoothies), 2. Blue 9 Burger (the first hamburger I ever spent my own money on), 3. Round the Clock Diner, 4. Dumont, 5. Roebling Tea House, 6. Oslo Coffeeshop, and nothingcanevertopit, 7. MOTO. Baked Apple Pancakes, Baked Eggs with Mixed Greens and Grilled Toast, Daily Risotto, wine and Americanos and not a single taste that wasn't a freaking ballet in my mouth, plus live music in a restaurant with a capacity of about 20... I melted the soul of my favorite boot there, on a space heater at the table by the door... I wish that someone could fly me there to eat RIGHT NOW.

Shortly before my departure from that dirty, pretty city, I busted my chin on the face of a short, gorgeous blond in dark specs named Thom. I remember that evening in the most beautiful detail: a really sharp outfit, including ridiculous mustard yellow boots, The Fall and Rise of the Rising Fallen, free German beer, talking to Peter about books and how he knew that Miranda would quit smoking when they got serious about having a child, smoking cigarettes out the window once most people had cleared out, betting Thom that we would be the last two people there, though we didn't know each other, winning that bet, and having a pretty lovely time wandering around Manhattan and Brooklyn with him thereafter.

Collegiate Romance made an appearance at my going away party, I feel in order to bookend my experience in NY, having unexpectedly appeared at my housewarming party, as well. I remember running down the 5 flights of stairs after him to tell him that I was glad that we were friendly again after all the time that had passed. Which was not untrue.

Summmer 2007. A trek to my version of the Great White North. Finally made a go of it in the city that always acted as a place of solace when it acted as a strange vacation destination. Sat on the couch, unemployed, watching Huff. Worked one day as a temp food service worker, only to show up early and sweat through my white and black, to be rewarded by drinking wine at the temporary boss's digs in the burbs. As pleasant as that turned out to be, luckily I got the only job I really wanted in the Twin Cities, working for the people who reduced a proscenium to a pile of rubble before my very eyes, who could make me laugh at the cruelty of human beings before crying at the beauty, who could turn it all upside down and then make it all make sense again. I got hired to answer their phones and their emails, to arrange their school matinees, and if I could still be there right now, I would be. If I could have saved them, I would have. If I could have won the lottery and been their benefactor, consider it done. Granted, I may have had my complaints, but I was working for people I respected, doing work I didn't mind, and the perks really outweighed to the annoyances, til the very end. I got one of my favorite friends out of the deal, I saw beautiful things being created, I got to spend time creating in their space, and I got to work for yet another of my real, living idols.

"Production Managing" America:aciremA, and I think costing people more money than they made, just to run the sound cues.

Due to some vouching from Elliott, wrangled a coffee date with Skewed Visions. First, it felt like accomplishing a goal, in an embarrassing sort of way. Later, it felt like I was exactly where I had always wanted to be without even knowing it.

Winter 2007.
A Christmas Carol Finale, Version I. Met future boyfriend, who ditched me, eventually, via email. Felt like that was karmic retribution, while at the same time feeling like I deserved someone who could quit me to my face. Found out later he was not only a coward but also a cheater. Oh, well.

Did a show I felt was a chore, but got to hang out with great people and play the accordion in the meantime.

Went on a date with a red-headed narcissist. He is alternately worse and much better than I make him out to be.

Spring 2008. Wrote and directed a show that was able to explain more in 10 minutes about my heartbreak than 4 years of alternately talking about it and keeping it a secret had. Got my heart all tangled in something else as a result. May have broken a heart in there somewhere, too.

Saw Rilo Kiley, and realized I really did like their last album.

Quit smoking, with the help of some Juicy Fruit-flavored nicotine gum that really tasted like pepper and eventually I REALLY liked. Smokeless after a decade of delicious cigarettes daily.

Spent a week in California. It's beautiful and looks like a movie set. At least, it does if you spend a week in Orange. I ran into a classmate from college there, which made the world small. I had a week long crush on a boy who was twenty and had a mustache.

Summer/Fall 2008. Haze of job loss and too much fun and too many feelings and a trip to Colorado. A calm descended for a few months, and while the storm that followed perhaps has ended, the aftermath is still being sifted.

Coffee was slung and paper suits were worn and that was beautiful.

My Poison Ivy costume for Halloween was pretty awesome.

Winter 2009. A Christmas Carole Finale Mach 2. More songs, better voice for lack of cigarettes. Handled the Minnesota winter and my life weakly. My car totally made it through the winter, and wasn't so bad, once I got the heater fixed.

Got a job stocking natural foods at a fast-growing and fabulous market. (All food stores are markets at this point in my life, due to teaching vocabulary to small children.) The health of my knees declined while my knowledge of health foods increased exponentially.

Spring 2009. Coffee and kombucha. Pinter. Waking Up in a Strange Place Called Home, running around in uniform, sharing the spotlight with my Mercury Tracer that could be heard for miles around.

Summer 2009. Love Me or Die!, and all of the wonderful people that it involved, and all that it took to accomplish.

Shortly after rehearsing for Artery 24 and eating a giant burrito, my car broke down on Central Avenue and was pushed out of traffic by a variety of strong and very loyal friends, who let me drink their Sonic beverages in the heat, and eventually, my car got towed to the municipal lot. In the end, I donated it, which is the best ending to that story.

My love of a certain few friends swelled beyond measure, just in time for me to board a plane with a suitcase full of unsuitable clothing and a head full of muddled thoughts.

Fall 2009. Oh, yeah. I came here, in part, to be in a position to have lots of time for self-reflection. For self-improvement. I feel like neither is being accomplished, but at least I'm getting a sort of jump start on the first bit by doing some written reflection here, and beginning to write a bit on the weekends. I wanted to be someplace where I didn't need two jobs, where I wasn't constantly attached to extra-curricular activities.

I'm wondering if maybe, while often rendering me too busy for sleep, if perhaps those extra-curriculars didn't offer me a bit of grounding that I'm now missing here in these far reaches. I do miss being with people and making things, and part of my quest was to confirm whether or not I would, in fact, miss that. Okay, I do.

I was asked recently when the last time I'd done something purely selfish was, something that focused inward and attempted to make my life a better one, and in the moment, I completely forgot that this trip was supposed to be that, completely. I've gotten so caught up in whether or not I'm any good at my job, whether I'm ruining the lives (or at least the afternoons) of small children, that I'd forgotten that I came here for no one other than me. That I didn't come here expecting anything more than some solace. Solace that I've not been allowing myself to find.

I came here hoping I'd feel a little more calm, a little less crazy than I had felt back home, by stripping away some of the time consumption ... forgetting that I'd have to learn a whole new skill set, perhaps make a new set of friends, create a whole new temporary little life.

I guess it's time for me to remember what I'm here for and get to it. It's time to be self-centered, in the best way possible. Give myself as much room as I need to become, well, myself. Do all the things I've always wanted to do but felt too busy to actually get done. Learn that making myself happy isn't selfish.


Hey!

List time!

Korea!


PROS:

1. The kids are adorable.
2. They make me laugh.
3. It's cheap to live here.
4. The public transportation is awesome.
5. There is plenty of coffee to drink. (Though I continue to drink powdered instant coffee at work even though it tastes poisonous. I can't stop! MUST GET A COFFEEMAKER!)
6. My job pays my rent.
7. I don't need a visa to go to Thailand for vacation.
8. I get to live alone.
9. I have a friend close by, and we care about what happens to each other.
10. I have some other friends, not too far away, who are delightful.
11. I have internet access.
12. The wine at the Home Plus Express is pretty cheap.
13. I talk to my parents on a regular basis.
14. Teaching is making me want to learn.
15. I have enough time that I will have enough time to go to the gym. When I stop being a slacker.
16. I may get to teach even tinier students next semester. BRING IT.


CONS:

1. I sometimes fear I am confusing my students more than I am teaching them.
2. I hate disciplining students.
3. STOP TALKING. No, I don't mean my students.
4. I am deathly homesick for my parents and those currently braving winter in Minneapolis.
5. I just want to get healthy, and as said above, I am being a slacker. I get no exercise. I eat vegetables only when they come with rice at a restaurant. I eat mostly bread and noodles. I drink mostly coffee and wine. Really, this just sounds like I need some good, serious New Years Resolutions, doesn't it? I just feel like a pale, puffed fish every day, and if I can't get around to doing anything about it now, it's only going to get worse.
6. Please be patient.
7. All my crazy is coming out full force, and I have only a hand full of friends with whom to share it in person. I feel at risk of alienating them with the crazy. It's made me realize that I'd at some point like to work through the crazy, instead of just living through it when it rears its head. I want to feel stronger. I want to be less scared of admitting those parts of myself.
8. I can't explain adverbs and that makes me feel like a fraud.

So, PROS currently outway CONS, in both quality and quantity. So, that's good. I'll keep working on that PROS list. Not so much that I'll stay here forever, mind you, just enough to make the next 9 months as awesome as they can be.

THINGS YOU CAN DO TO MAKE YOUR LIFE BETTER STARTING FROM THE MICRO AND BY YOU I MEAN ME or WINTER 2010:
1. Join a gym.
2. Buy a coffeemaker for the teacher's room.
3. Get some clothes that make you feel less like a slob.
4. Have more dance parties. Alone in your room, just like you like them.
5. Take deep breaths.
6. Go outside more.
7. Really start researching grad schools.
8. Drink more water.
9. Write more. It always makes you feel good.
10. Learn Korean.




Hey. You. I like you. Thank you for reading, and for caring enough to do so. If you made it all the way through this, this MONSTER, congratulations. You win a prize and my unconditional love and gratitude. It was more than a little melodramatic at times. It was more than a little long-winded beginning to end. But for two hundred I've extended "don't self-edit" to "don't edit at all" and this is what you get. So there.


1 degree,
2 bad knees,
2 and 1/2 boyfriends,
3 broken hearts,
4 years,
5 changes of location,
12 jobs,
137 zits,
200 posts,
870 grey hairs,
1000 tears,
2920 cups of coffee,
9430 emails not deleted,
at least 10,000 laughs,
and so much love,

b