alive

Today’s Mood Ingredients: Contemplative, Introspective, Grateful. Hi! It’s been a while. Life suddenly leaped out at me & bit me in the rear. However, in the time that pretty much everything was happening all at once, I did realize a few things. I live a pretty good life. It’s not perfect by any means (& obviously no one’s lives are), it’s absurdly stressful, I’m ridiculously worried 20/7 (which is a spectacular upwards movement from 26/7, congrats to me), I want to do 9 million things with the time to do only 30, and I get frustrated that all of the above is occurring. I do, however, have working (albeit mildly arthritic-sadly, not a joke) legs, mobile arms (wing span situation notwithstanding), a functioning brain (up for debate), and a plenitude of opportunity (which I abashedly admit to not taking advantage of enough).

Ok, so don’t close this blog yet! I promise it’s not a preachy post on how we should all be thankful for what we have (even though we should) & how what we have in this life is enough (even though it is). This is a post about how I realized that the words “average” & “normal” have two different meanings and depths with respect to my life. I was always the person who would get incredibly annoyed when people would tell me to think of those less fortunate than me when I was having a bad day. I mean..I am aware that there are people who have no food & no water & no families, & no one feels for them more than me & my over-empathetic self does, but sometimes, I just wanted to wallow in my own misery. COULD I LIVE!? Over time though, I realized that as much as my most terrifying fear was to be “normal” or “average” in the achievement sense, I have never been more grateful to be “average” & “normal” in the life sense. I have an immediate family of 11 that loves me unconditionally & whom I love obsessively back. I have amazing friends who have seen me through some morose times and some euphoric times. I have my health, my family (even through everything as of late) has theirs, we have a roof over our heads, we have food on our tables, and although we are wanting in many other ways, the most important thing is that we have a support system that people would literally kill for (seriously, they’ve creepily told me so). So although I want my business to succeed more, my dreams to be fulfilled more, my worries to be calmed more..I’m truly grateful that on my way to hopefully being able to realize all of those things, I have the ability and the resources that allow me to excel..& all I have to put in is the work.

If you follow this blog, you’ve heard me say this plenty of times, & I’m clearly still going through some form of PTSD from it, but I will never ever be more grateful to whomever, wherever, whatever, that my parents are still with me. To have my greatest fear nearly realized within a short span of 7 months, & to have us all restored to an almost normal (for us, anyway) level is something that I will never be able to express enough thanks for. And for better or for worse, that heavy emotional trauma was the catalyst for me to realize that I have enough. In fact, I have a lot. In fact, I have the most. I know I said this wouldn’t be a preachy post, but honestly, I just wanted you to keep reading because if a self-admitted, everyone-proclaimed pessimistic wallower can find a way to revel in all that she has, you guys can do it eeeaaasily! The point is, sometimes, shit is gonna suck. A lot. And sometimes, things are going to be so amazing, you can’t imagine them getting any better..& then they do. But if you want to get through the roller coaster labrynth & come out unscathed on the other side, find ways to be appreciative of the things you have, and even of the things that you don’t. A new perspective never hurt anybody!

**For those who want some ideas on how to get the ball rolling, check out these two links below which have helped me become less of a negative person.

8 Things To Remember When Everything Is Going Wrong

100 Happy Days

Today’s Interlude: Grateful by John Bucchino performed by Stephen Carr

TRAVEL: New York, New York, What A Wonderful Town: It Can Revel You Up, It Can Level You Down

Today’s Mood Ingredients: Enamored, Exhausted, Conflicted.

MY.NY. I’ve called it that for the past 8 years, lived in it for the past 32. It’s home, it’s always been home, I’m pretty sure it’ll always be home. I’ve been in love with the whole state, but mostly my city, my whole life & when people speak of their excitement or their “dream” to visit NYC one day, I get it. I feel lucky that I’ve lived in the center of the chaos; I feel lucky that now I’m only tens of minutes away on the outskirts of the hubbub. However, recently, things have had a subtle shift. The geographical love of my life has begun to fray at the edges, blurring my vision from behind my rose-colored glasses, adding an anxious thrum to the usually enthralled pulse that runs through me at just the sight of the concrete jungle.

New York, NYC, MY.NY., The Big Apple, The City That Never Sleeps is..amazing. It’s awesome. It’s incredible. It’s a world of its own with the population of the city being so diverse, you might as well have a passport for the island. You can be proffered a taste of a little bit of everything, a little bit of something, but sometimes that can transform into a little bit of nothing. New York has an inherent electricity far different from the literal Times Square sense. Even the subways have an energy, even the sidewalks have a story. New York, the emotional oxymoron; a place with over 8 million people that struggle to find just one or two true connections. The palpable nature of the city can either be arousing or overwhelming, sometimes both. Opportunities call kindly to you from every neon sign, from every sky-scraping window, from every glittering marquis; but they also dangle temptingly in front of you like a carrot, making you walk blindly & aimlessly that one extra step after another in the hopes that you’ll be allowed to take a bite someday. Someday. Nightfall in NYC can be a startlingly different experience from one 12 hour gap to the next. One night you’re out at a restaurant, a jazz bar, a club, & life is good and jubilant and you’re a firecracker about the town without a burden to shoulder. The next, you’re home in your shoebox studio that’s costing you your pension eating Ramen noodles & watching Sex & The City’s glossy glammed up version of a very different reality, & wondering why you feel alone in a city full of promised promise.

Don’t get me wrong, I am still thoroughly obsessed with my town. I love the “melting pot,” the variety, the camaraderie (it does happen sometimes!). I live for feeling alive when I walk through Central Park in the summer or 5th Avenue in the winter, Union Square in the fall, The Met in the spring. The sparkling lights still set something ablaze in the pit of my stomach (that is not attributed to the spices from an NY slice), my colorful memories leap out at me from every psychic-resided corner. I roam my undergraduate hallways of Washington & Waverly, gazing at the billowing purple NYU flags that are now ubiquitous at every turn from FiDi to SoHo to The Village to Midtown, reminiscing about that first day that my address read “New York, NY 10003” & how I was ready to embrace the place like a long lost love that I never knew I had. The creativity, the individuality, the temperament that is solely New York still tugs at my heartstrings like a child determinedly pulling a mother into a candy store. But now & again, I wonder if “MY.NY.” will forever be in the throes of a lifelong identity crisis.

“I carry the place around the world in my heart but sometimes I try to shake it off in my dreams.”-F.Scott Fitzgerald