Mixtape 3

Mixtape time!  Listening to Robyn makes me feel like I'm in middle school again (Show Me Love, anyone?) and I've got to tell you, I sort of love it.  A lot.

Gallivanting

California is a beautiful place, really.  Sometimes I forget, my eyes so totally fixed on getting out of here and moving to New York.  Luckily, every time I forget this, California is there with the put back, reminding me that where I grew up really is a lovely and magical place.  Here are some reminders, from gallivanting around my hometown with the gents:

 

Mixtape 2

Friday means mixtape.  And this week I'm in love with Patrick Watson's "Man Like Me."  I mean, come on--the voice? the guitar playing? the silly beard? the fact that he's playing in his shower? What's not to love?

Decisions

View from the Liberty Island Ferry, taken with Jenny Tighe about a hundred years ago.

A about a year and a half ago, I was offered a full time position at a regional theatre near my hometown.  At 22 years old, the idea of a full time job (with benefits!) was just about the most amazing thing I could ever imagine.  At that point, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.  In fact, I still felt overwhelmingly like a child/college student.  I'd been living at home since graduating from NYU and I had no plan.  So, all of a sudden, here was this job at this great company and BAM--plan.  I had literally no idea what I was getting myself into, no idea the breadth of my responsibilities as programs manager of in-school outreach, no idea how much this job would challenge and change me, but I did know one thing--it wasn't going to be forever.

Almost as soon as I'd moved back to California I began to feel that old, familiar tug of New York City.  This wasn't surprising to me, New York is imprinted on my heart and soul.  So I put a timeline into place for this job-1 season, I said.  Just one and I'm out of here.  On to something else.  I made that choice, told my boss, and promptly forgot about it....until about 4 months ago when we started looking for my replacement.  Then, reality came crashing into me and I realized that I was soon to be unemployed.  After a brief moment of panic, I began to grasp on to any option I could find, all of them included moving out of my parents house to the East Coast (or Mid-West).  Easy, right?  Find a job out East and move my ass back, just like I'd always planned.

Not so much.

Because what I didn't factor in was the fact that, in between living in New York I'd still be living in California.  And I mean Living in California, capital L.  I'd be starting projects and making friends and building a life as an adult here.  I'd be Living.  And these projects turned out to be AMAZING (hello, The Violet!) and soul expanding.  And I began to feel like an adult here.  It happened about 5 months ago, when I realized that I was actually comfortable making decisions in my job and that, in my personal life, I didn't need to run things by my mom as much as I needed to use her as a sounding board for decisions I'd already made.  The change was actually noticeable, which was a very odd experience, let me tell you.

And so, with this new "adult" mindset, I step towards the ending my current job and looking for a new one...but now I have projects that I believe in (again, The Violet!) that truly need development and as much time as I can give to them.  So last night, after a huge amount of thought, I sat down with my mother and talked through my plan.  And I've decided that, as much as it pains me, I can't move to New York....right now.  It is absolutely still my plan to move there, but there are some things I need to stay and dedicate time to in California.  I haven't put any sort of timeline on this--I am going to stay until I feel like I can go.  I'm going to continue to reevaluate my situation throughout the summer and see how it goes.  Perhaps I'll be ready to move in September, perhaps in December.  Again, there's no timeline, which is perhaps the most terrifying thing I've ever decided.  It is also extremely liberating and I feel simultaneously responsible and childish for even considering it.


So....here goes nothing.

"I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." 

~Martin Luther King, Jr.

(ok, apparently this quote is partially fake.  

The first line is MLK, the rest is  Random Twitter Guy.  Too good not keep though)

Thanks to Vanessa (and her mom) for the quote.

I Usually Don't Do This

At least, not on the blog, but I believe that today calls for breaking some rules.  What rule, do you ask?  My own personal rule about politics.  Generally, I try to keep politics off of here because I hate when people get all preachy about their views and ignore the other side of things.  I'm not here to preach, absolutely, but I do have specific opinions that I feel inclined to share, and they involve politics and grey areas and things people get heated about.  If you aren't a fan of this sort of thing, I totally understand and I kindly urge you to stop reading.  But, if you'll allow me, I'd like to share how I'm feeling right now.

Just a few hours ago, President Obama told us that Osama Bin Laden is dead.  And I think, in a small way, the world changed.  I think we have begun a shift into a new paradigm, one that we've been waiting for for a long time.  I certainly don't think that, come 8 am, everything will have changed for the better and we will all be able to stop thinking about security and the risks out there, definitely not.  But I do think that this is the first step in a series of many (many) steps to creating different world.  Change is hard, and it doesn't come easily or quickly.  It comes one drop in the bucket at a time.  But eventually, the bucket will be full.  And that is what we are working for, at least in my opinion.

This is my favorite picture from the NYTimes coverage.  from here, by Michael Appleton

Of the 3 years I spent at NYU, I lived all of them in Lower Manhattan.  2 of those years, I lived right in the heart of the Financial District,  on the same street as Ground Zero, just on the opposite side of the island, a 5 minute walk away.  I loved living down there (it was very quiet and clean--thanks, Wall Street Business Men) and, most of the time, where "there" was never entered my consciousness.  But each time that day in September rolled around, I would wake up to this deafening silence, cut through by the mourning song of bagpipes.  Ground Zero was (and is) a strange place.  When I was living there it was still a huge hole in the middle of the city.  And when I say huge I mean enormous, much bigger than you'd imagine.  There was an emptiness there that never seemed to be filled....except on that day in September, when people from all around the world, including the President himself, would congregate there, filling up the emptiness with their prayers for a better, more peaceful world.  And while this day was always particularly hard, it was also extremely beautiful and it gave me hope--hope that there will one day come a time when this sort of thing will be a relic of the past, where hate and terror have no place in our every day lives.

This moment is historic because it is a kind of period on the end of a sentence that we've been writing for nearly 10 years.  It is both an end and a beginning.  This moment if full of promise.  So, how am I feeling?  I think the way I feel is best summarized in this quote:

"I have never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure." ~Mark Twain

Mixtape 1

If you've ever met me, you know that I constantly am listening to music. There is rarely a time that I don't have something playing--while I'm getting dressed, in the car on the way to work, in my office, making dinner--9 times out of 10 there is a soundtrack running in the background (my family will tell you that this soundtrack puts them to sleep.  I happen to disagree with them).  I'm sure you all read in The Violet about making monthly mixtapes.  This is something that my girlfriends from college and I have done in the past as a great way to keep in touch since we are terrible at the phone (really, it's pathetic).  It is great because every month you get a new set of songs so your music library never gets stale.  I am lucky because in addition to these cds, my dear dear friend, Hilary, is a total audiophile (she is seriously considering a career as a Music Supervisor, which I think is just about the coolest thing ever) and makes kick-ass mixes.  Truly, my ears are always so much happier when she comes home to visit.  And because one person shouldn't keep all of this excellence to themselves, I'm going to start sharing.

Today's pick? Ryan Adams, "Come Pick Me Up."  Because no one has ever made the phrase "screw all my friends, they're all full of shit" sound so pretty.



Enjoy! (and thanks, Hil)