Filed!

I did it.

I got my taxes done.

I am so happy to have that out-of-the-way.

Especially since I will be getting a return!

It’s not a ton, but it is $2500 and that’s nothing to sneeze at.

That’s a ticket to Paris and walk about money.

I’m still waiting to buy my ticket, I would like to get that out-of-the-way, but I am waiting for my friend in Paris to confirm some family times.

I have the whole month of July to travel so I can be flexible regarding when I go.

My friend’s family has a summer home on L’ile de Re, off the West Coast of France.

I am more than willing to wait a couple of days for my friend to confirm what dates will work best for her travel and for the two of us to go to her family’s summer home, without the rest of the family–it would be just so much fun to have her to myself.

I may have to pay more for the ticket, but considering that I will stay with my friend the entire time I am there, I am fine with paying anything extra to get the ticket.

I think it may be toward the middle or end of July, she’s checking in around July 20th for us to be on the island.

If that’s the case, I’m thinking the 11th of July through the 25th.

I’ll have to be back to work by the 30th and I will want a few days to get over the jet lag.

I always have it so bad on the way back.

A little on the way there, but not as bad as the way back, man, that shit is awful.

Nonetheless.

So, so, so worth it.

I have missed my friend so much and it will be really good to reconnect with her.

And I want to see her version of Paris.

A Parisian’s version of Paris is going to be much different from mine.

I am excited too to see some of the things I didn’t get to the last time I went there, I still very much want to see the Frank Gehry building-The Foundation Louis Vuitton– that I have wanted to see the last two times I was in Paris and just never made it there.

Granted.

I did lots of other things, I always do, but it would be lovely to see it.

And.

I think that in summer it would be exquisite.

It’s located just outside of the periphery in Paris, in the Bois (woods) de Bologne.

Which I haven’t been to either.

It’s supposed to be really pretty, the woods, and I would love to see it.

I like that every time I go to Paris I find something new to explore.

Then again.

I think that I find new things to explore where ever I am.

I can find new things in my neighborhood if I let myself.

I am a curious creature.

And I love having experiences.

I also love going back to a place, like Paris, that means so much to me, that I have lived in, that I have gotten to have amazing growth in, spiritual and emotional, in no ordinary way.

I have walked through a lot of fear there, I have learned how important it is to let myself enjoy and explore and to allow myself more and more of the experiences that beckon to me.

I also love shopping there.

My God.

So much.

Not that I often buy  a lot of things.

But I always get something there, mostly Clair Fontaine notebooks.

But.

I also have four pairs of earrings from there, a cabbie hat, a satin jacket, a lipstick bag, in which still have one lip gloss from my last trip there, although it will soon be gone, postcards galore, prints from the Jeu de Paume as well as one from the huge flea market, Clingangcourt, an antique clock from another flea market, and a ceramic of two bunnies kissing from the market in front of Pere La Chaise.

I’m sure there are other things too.

And of course.

The cafe culture.

Just to sit in a cafe and sip coffee, write in my notebook, observe people, oh god, it’s damn good.

And with my friend I can only expect that it will be amazing.

I want to go to some places I haven’t seen yet.

And of course, I will want to hit the Pompidou and the Jeu de Paume.

I’m not sure about the D’Orsay, it depends on what the exhibitions are, or the Louvre, truth be told, I’ve been to both a number of times.

I’d love to hit the Louis Vuitton, like I said, and I’m sure my friend is going to have many amazing suggestions.

I’m also looking forward to the food.

Hello steak tartar.

Bring me the raw meat please.

Plus.

Just going to the markets, especially in the summer, will be really nice, fresh produce, I’m sure I’ll cook at my friend’s house, I usually like to make breakfast wherever I am staying, they have a place in the Marais on Rue de Temple and I know the area decently, not great, but there’s a great outdoor market very close to them and a lot of bio’s, organic markets.

Give me a bio for some oatmeal in bulk and a market to buy some bananas and apples and strawberries, and man, I will be set.

Oh my goodness.

I need my friend to get ahold of me with dates.

I’m so excited!

It’s going to be my carrot for getting through graduation and applying for my registered Associate Marriage Family Therapist paperwork.

I will definitely be ready for a vacation by then.

And a vacation where I can go swimming, loads of pools in Paris, plus L’il de Re has tons of beaches and my friend’s family home has a pool (shit, I’m going to need a new swim suit), and wear summer dresses.

Oh.

I am so very ready for warm weather dressing.

Ah.

It’s going to be an amazing summer.

I just know it.

 

 

So, So, So Close

I can taste it.

It tastes like Lacanian sherbert with Milly D. on top.

It sounds like Vagina Punk.

It swims in the electric blue seas of eros.

It is the Psych(e)dynamics paper.

And.

It is all I have left to do.

I have finished my Ethics and Family Law take home final and sent it in.

I have finished my last paper for Applied Spirituality and sent it in.

I sent in my huge 11 page paper with references on transference and countertransference last night.

I have one paper left.

ONE.

I can’t do it tonight.

Oh.

I suppose I could.

I probably could spit something out in an hour and a half of so.

I know what I want to write on, although I may change my mind, I already discussed it with the professor, Mildred Dubitzky, my punk rock, radical feminist, pro-Freudian, professor, and she gave me the thumbs up.

The only fly in the ointment is that two years ago another student wrote on the same topic and I’m a little loathe to write on something she has already read about.

So.

I may change my topic slightly, depending on my mood.

But, not tonight.

No.

Tonight, the rest of the night, is not for going out or being crazy or trying to get across the bridge and hit the party at NIMBY, although I got umpteen requests and questions regarding whether or not I was going to go.

I turned them all down and said, not today, Ethics final has to get done.

I’m actually pretty fucking proud of myself today.

I got a lot of stuff done.

I got up and went to yoga.

Showered, breakfasted, coffee’d, did some writing.

Hopped on the scooter went up to 7th and Irving and hit Tart to Tart for some heart to heart with my person and some discussion of amends.

Amazing that.

I don’t owe anyone any direct amends.

NO ONE.

Fuck yeah.

This shit works.

I, of course, will stay the course with the living amends that I have had outlined and really I am doing well with those and having fun, actually, who knew, amends could be fun.

Being light.

Letting myself have fun.

Even with all the school stuff hanging over me.

I have had my moments.

I also had a great hour of sitting with my fellows and hearing someone with a lot of time, a lot, 37 years, break it down.

So freaking grateful.

After that I treated myself to a little lunch and a new pair of silver hoop earrings.

Because this girl cannot get enough hoop earrings.

I will be buying some when I go to New York.

I always buy earrings when I travel.

I actually am wearing a pair of pink heart earrings that I got at a brocante (flea market) in Paris that was around Square D’Anvers, right before I left Paris three years ago this May.

I love wearing earrings that I have gotten as souvenirs, never fails to remind of the moment or the place where I got them.

I don’t spend a lot of money on them, typically no more than ten bucks or so and they are small and travel easily back with me from where ever I am.

I’ll be at 262 Taafe Place, fyi, in case you were wondering, in Brooklyn, in Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, which is not as gentrified as Williamsburg.

Which means a little sketchy but good vintage shops and coffee.

As long as I have coffee I’ll be fine.

And I’m not afraid of rough neighborhoods and I won’t look like a tourist in New York and I’m not staying in a place that tourist typically stay.

Ironically it’s maybe a mile away from where I stayed the last time, my first time, in New York, so I have a pretty good feel for what the area is like.

Dirty, bodega, bodega, subway stop, ooh coffee shop with house roasted beans, vintage store, bodgea, bodega, etc, and hopefully, some good graffiti.

God I love me some graffiti.

I could just do a walking tour of the neighborhoods and take photos of graffiti.

I would pee my pants if I saw a Banksy.

A girl can dream.

I have not done a ton of research yet around my trip, I’m still rather in the throes of school.

But I also got my grocery shopping done for the week and my cooking.

I had to grocery shop today.

Tomorrow will be a shit show out here what with it being Bay to Breakers idiocy.

Drunks running around in costume.

Whee.

I’ll be too busy writing my paper to notice.

Or I’ll hang out in the back yard.

Or.

Ooh.

God, wouldn’t this be nice.

I get the paper done early.

I’m not going to make any promises.

But I should have it done by dinner time.

I really do believe that.

Most of my papers for the class I have gotten done under two hours.

Really what it comes down to is reviewing the reading and my notes and just sitting down to my computer and starting.

And now that I have the proper software to format my papers, thank you so much to my friend in cohort who turned me onto it (it format’s your paper automatically in APA so I don’t have to beat my head on the Purdue OWL or the Chicago format page), I won’t have to worry about references being wonky.

I really do think I’ll be done by dinner time.

What will I do to celebrate?

Run around the park naked?

Oh wait, every body else will be doing that tomorrow.

I’m going to New York, I am going to be celebrating there.

Although, you know, finishing my first year of grad school does deserve some instant recognition on the day I turn in my last paper for the year.

I’ll come up with something.

I’m clever.

Heh.

God damn.

I’m excited.

I’m almost there.

It’s been a crazy ass year.

So much has happened.

I have changed so much.

So fucking much.

“You have changed,” she said to me, across the table at Tart to Tart, “you really have, it’s amazing to see.”

I smiled.

I have changed.

I am in awe.

I am amazed.

I am in love with my life.

Fuck yeah.

I really am.

Yes.

The luckiest girl in the world.