I’m Ready

To date again.

Well.

I mean.

Theoretically.

I am in no shape to actually go on a date.

I’m still pretty much tied to my bed.

Although I do feel increments of change, small shifts in my body signaling to me of my healing.

My dear friend was over yesterday and she said I looked “sooooo much better,” which is nice since I feel like I look like ass.

But she insisted.

It might have been the shower I had.

I was cleared to shower this past Tuesday.

It might have been one of the greatest showers of all time.

Rivaled many a Burning Man fresh back from the playa shower.

And if the after care hadn’t been so damn hard, it would have been the top shower of all time.

I mean.

I didn’t shower for two weeks.

Sure, I did a whore’s bath.

You know, baby wipes and deodorant and perfume.

Very 1800s French of me.

heh.

But really, I like a good shower.

In fact, I have often said that God is a good shower.

I mean, think about it, it feels so good to have hot water sluicing down ones back.

The sigh of relief when I get underneath a good hot shower with great water pressure.

Oh, so good.

So to go two weeks was pretty hard.

But I had to, the drains didn’t all get removed until two weeks after the surgery.

I had three drains, two of which were removed one week after, and the last 13 days later.

I cannot tell you how obnoxious they were.

Granted that first week I was on heavy painkillers so though annoying, I didn’t find them that uncomfortable.

Sans Percocet, they were infruriating.

Always this slight annoyance, not quite pain, although if I jostled myself too hard or took down my sweat pants too fast.

Egad.

Aside.

One of my friend’s calls sweat pants “my give up” pants.

For the record.

I have never owned sweat pants until this surgery.

I bought two sweat suits prior to the surgery.

I was told, loose pants and zip up fronts.

So sweatsuits seemed appropos.

And on the shelves they were cute, but on me, eek, I do not care for them.

Maybe that’s why I’m feeling better today too, not wearing a sweat suit and I put on a bra.

It’s the small things.

I did contemplate taking another shower today, but I’ll hold off one more day.

Three days is still a bit to go for me, but like I said, despite how fucking phenomenal the shower feels, the after shower routine is really hard.

I feel pretty tired just getting out of the shower and drying off.

Making sure I’m not vigorously drying myself, putting on Neosporin on the stitches, re-bandaging myself, and the skin tightens when it dries so I feel like I’m getting pulled apart and my range of motion gets much smaller. I end up feeling like a hunched over little old lady.

And don’t talk to me about drying my hair.

Holy shit.

Just getting to my blow dryer and doing a quick pass through is really hard.

I did manage it yesterday, but I was super shaky after just a few minutes of it.

Although like I said, I rallied and I put on leggings, a bra, a t-shirt and a button down shirt instead of the zip hoodie and sweat pants over the binder that I am wearing over the bandages, over the stitches.

I might burn the sweat pants in effigy when I’m done.

There’s also a psychological fatigue that happens.

I told myself both times that I showered not to look at the belt lipectomy, which by the way, if you don’t know, is not a tummy tuck, which would just be a midline scar across the front of the belly.

A belt lipectomy is like the name, think of a belt encircling your waist.

It is a full 365 degrees around.

Removing excess skin and tissue from around the entire trunk.

So, it’s a lot.

I know when it’s healed I’ll be ecstatic, but looking at it right now makes me a bit nauseated.

But yeah, I looked, and I think that makes it hard too, it’s not pretty to look at and I’m still bruised and swollen.

In fact, the post-op paperwork does say that many folks go through a regret phase and some slip into depression.

Now.

I won’t lie.

I have had some depressed mood, I mean, aside from two post-op trips to see my surgeon, I haven’t been outside since October 25th.

I am grateful, truly, that I live in a beautiful apartment and it is very sweet, but it is not outside.

Outside where it’s been sunny and late fall gorgeous and 70!

Sigh.

Just a walk to Patricia’s Green is all I really want, but I’m not quite there yet.

So, why do I think I’m ready to date?

It’s mental.

Not physical.

I think I’m finally over my ex, or pretty damn close to it.

I haven’t seen him since January and I think the grief of it all is finally passing.

It’s certainly lightened substantially.

Especially with all the work I put into my dissertation and also the work of transforming with the surgery.

I am the same.

Yet.

I am different.

And too, the new therapist I started working with has been a God send.

I’m ready for someone who is available, physically and emotionally.

I’m ready for some requited love.

I think I’m done with the unrequited kind, thanks.

I’m healing physically and emotionally.

I also, yes, yes I did, I also, booked myself a trip to New York in spring!

I’m going to go for the last weekend in May.

I got a ridiculous fare, $304 roundtrip!

And I scored a room at the Jane Hotel in the Meatpacking District.

I’ve only ever stayed in Brooklyn when I’ve gone to New York before.

Once staying with a friend on Myrtle Ave.

Once an Air BnB in Green Point.

Once an Air Bnb in Bedstuy.

This time I’m staying in Manhattan.

I am super excited.

I’m taking a red eye out after my last client on a Thursday, landing at 6:15a.m. at JFK on Friday.

I will stay at the Jane Hotel Friday night and Saturday night and check out Sunday morning, catching the noon back to SFO Sunday, and due to the time difference, get in Sunday afternoon and have a little time to recalibrate before going back to work on Monday.

I am super excited.

Yeah.

I know I already said that, but seriously.

It will be late spring, warm, but not too hot.

I will walk around in my new (ish) body, in sundresses and skirts and sandals enjoying the warm.

I will go to the Highline.

I will walk the Hudson River Greenway from the hotel to the Beekman for breakfast Saturday morning, it’s about 45 minutes.

I flirted with staying at the Beekman, but fuck paying that much money, I’ll just go have a breakfast there, I had lunch there with my ex when we were in New York summer of 2018 I think, and my God it was beautiful, the dining room is just ridiculous, the atrium, the velvet couches, the leather club chairs.

Then I will just walk the city.

Go to Central Park.

Go to book stores.

Go dress shopping.

Go to the Whitney.

I will likely hit the Whitney my first day in, on Friday, it’s literally a five, ten minute walk from my hotel.

Lunch somewhere in the neighborhood, walk over to Perry Street, a ten minute walk, to do the deal, meander around Greenwich Village, or Bleeker Street.

Buy a new dress.

Go out to a fancy dinner…maybe Catch in the Meatpacking District or Strip House, steak people, it’s a steak house, in Greenwich Village.

Though I do love Peter Luger’s Steak House, I’m not going to go to Williamsburg to get it.

I want to stay on the island and just meander.

And I’ll end my nights at the roof top bar, sans alcohol, just some bubbly water and me sitting underneath the night sky looking out over the city.

A romantic weekend away with myself.

And I have the feeling that sometime around then I’ll be ready to really date.

It’s going to take a few months for me to really feel able to get out.

The recovery from the surgery literally takes months, and can take up to a full year.

But I can see it coming.

All this work I have done on myself.

The emotional, mental, spiritual, and physical transformation, of me.

I mean.

I’m still me.

But.

I’m becoming, have become, something greater than the sum of me.

Even though, technically, there is less of me around.

I take up less space.

And yet I have more space, I am more spacious.

I have grown the space in my heart.

It is a grand thing this.

My metamorphosis.

Though not complete.

It is well underway.

Day Two

New York.

I’m beat.

I mean.

I walked so much today, I started to get shin splints.

But I couldn’t bring myself to get on the subway again after getting off it in Brooklyn at the Barclay Center stop.

I had gotten switched up on the trains as they were doing construction and the line that I was supposed to connect with was suddenly no longer available and I could have done another transfer but wanted off.

I wanted to walk.

That’s the best way to see things.

On foot.

I took loads of photos and saw some awesome graffiti and paste art that I wouldn’t have if I had been on the train.

That being said, I am pretty proud of myself at having navigated as well as I did.

The train system is smart and pretty easy to figure out, but I did find myself having some anxiety this morning as I headed off to the big city from Brooklyn.

And I realized now that it was my first time by myself figuring out how to go from one point to the other.

And I did fine.

I did get turned around, but, haha, not on the damn train, on the sidewalk.

I am so freaking dyslexic, I read my navigation backward, I literally look at the screen and go right when I should go left.

I am so grateful for the navigation and map apps on my phone.

I would have been wandering around in desperate circles.

I am a total know it by mistake person and a land mark person.

Oh.

That church there, that’s where I need to go, or I can go on this block, or I will remember, as I did earlier when I was at Union Square, which way I came the only other time I was there and did the deal at the Seafarer’s Union hall, but ask me if it’s North or South, East or West, and I am at a complete standstill and close to tears, if not in tears.

I don’t have pet peeves per se.

However.

Ask me to be your navigator and I will be a very unhappy lady.

Don’t hand me the map.

Don’t ask me to figure it out.

Just don’t.

You want a happy traveling companion, do not ask me for directions.

Or.

Expect to get lost.

Getting lost for some is fun, an adventure, a party, but for me, it just produces a lot of anxiety.

I know from a lot of self work and a lot of introspection and a lot of having done the deal and some outside therapy that has, oh, a little to do with needing to control my environment and being in fear.

It’s a safety thing.

I get it.

I let myself be gentle with myself when it comes up.

I have, however, been on the receiving end of some not so nice words having gotten lost with people.

It’s not comfortable.

I’m very well aware of it, but it will still catch me totally off guard and then I’m like, fuck, I’m lost, how did that happen?

But today, mostly, I just got lost in things I love.

I got lost in books.

Oh.

The books.

Stacks and stacks and heaps and piles and floors and aisles of books.

So many yummy books.

Oh.

The smell.

Such a good smell.

Not my most favorite smell in the world, wood smoke, bonfire, fire wood burning in the fireplace on a cold night, but right up there.

The clean, crisp, warm smell of paper and book binding glue and I just perused the aisles at The Strand and was a very happy lady.

My friend that I met today suggested popping into it.

And my.

What a good suggestion.

I actually put down all but one of the books I wanted to buy.

Not from a place of frugality, although, that did rear its head a bit, but more from the perspective of, oh, wait, how much weight do I want to carry around?

And.

Can I get this book in San Francisco?

The answers were obvious.

But I did buy some notebooks, yay!

And some stickers.

Double yay.

And a magnet.

And one book for the flight back.

So that was nice.

My friend departed before me, off to work on his film project, and left me with directions to get to the MOMA.

Which I promptly forgot when I was on the second floor of The Strand.

Where did he say to go?

Get out the phone.

Map it out.

And yes, still spend way too much time when I got off the subway walking the wrong way down the streets.

Seriously I have a problem.

I did, however, make it to the MOMA.

And started at the top.

Rothko.

Although, to be honest, not my favorite, not in my top ten Rothko’s at all, I didn’t like the lightness of the colors he used, I like the deep oranges and greens or the super dark brick reds almost black or the indigo violet blue ones, this one, though luminous and gave me a pause to look at, was not something that held me for very long.

I was drawn to Van Gough’s Starry Night.

Me and too many other tourists, good grief, too many, too many, too many fucking tourists.

Which is probably why I enjoyed the walk home through Brooklyn so much, like that, “home.”  I have caught myself saying that a number of times, I’m heading home, I’ll be home soon, or I’m at home, and it’s the Air Bnb I’m staying in.

Off all the places I’ve been in the city, I actually like this neighborhood and Greenpoint the best, there’s a mix of cultures and ethnicities that make me happy and I feel right at home and yeah, there’s projects, but I have been in the projects before and I just put on the walk and I am not bothered.

If I were to move to New York, which I don’t foresee, at all, the winters, yo, I would live in Brooklyn–but not Williamsburg, too white, too many hipsters and man buns and women reading tarot in a way too serious manner selling over priced hyper curated vintage and emergency sage smudging kits.

Dude I think I had seen it all at that point.

REALLY?

You’re selling emergency smudging kits?

Where am I?

Santa Cruz or Brooklyn?

I feel better in this neighborhood with the barber shops and the families and the hair salons, the little bodegas and the funky art and the graffiti.

But that’s just me.

I’m often at home where ever I go.

And yes, I got asked for directions again.

This time in Greenpoint by a woman from the city trying to figure out what train to get back on.

I had to laugh.

And.

Of course.

I helped.

The blind leading the blind.

I also walked, because I had a funny feeling about being on the train past the point where I had gotten off.

I don’t know why, I don’t have to know why, but I had to turn around when I was heading down the stairs to the underground, it felt wrong.

And it was raining and I was tired and I thought, shoot, just call a car, but no, the walking.

The brownstones and the lights within, the big leafy trees, the sound of the rain falling like that, the smell of wet sidewalks.

It was a nice way to sort through my day and recall all the lovely art I saw.

I only got to the Rothko before digressing.

The ones that stood out for me, Andrew Wyeth, Christina’s World, that stopped me in my tracks.

The two Klimt’s I saw, Hope II, Adele Boch-Bauer II.

The Mondrians, three of them, just stunning.

The Hopper, House by the Railroad.

Stumbling upon the Monet Water Lilies, I did not know they were there, at least this version of them, and I was brought to tears to think that I have gotten to see them in Paris and in New York.

How lucky am I?

The Seurat, Evening Honfleur, brought me to tears.

I was so startled by it and just stood transfixed.

I don’t always know that is going to happen with me and art.

I get something deep within, I am moved, I am transported, I feel deep joy.

And gratitude.

From my humble, poor, meek beginnings.

To a bit of a traveler and a bit of an art junky.

It’s so nice.

I’m so lucky.

I really.

I’ll say it again.

The luckiest girl in the world.

And.

All tuckered the fuck out.

One more day New York.

Let’s make it smashing, shall we?

I hear you have some art for me to see.

Next stop.

The new Whitney.

But first.

Bed.

Night y’all.

One More Day!

One more day of work.

Then.

Off to New York.

I have made some decisions regarding my trip.

One.

I am not taking the subway to the Air BnB when I get into JFK at 10:30 p.m. at night.

I don’t feel like showing up to the place after midnight.

I’m going to get a car.

I am going to let myself not worry about navigating the trains, I’m going to let myself have a little experience, see the city from a car at night.

I think the view alone from a car will be worth the splurge.

I am also going with a good amount, obscene it feels like, of money.

I have saved all semester and I have a comfortable little cushion to let myself spend and the luxury of not being anxious about making the right train and transferring to the right line is well worth the cost of a car.

In fact, I’m also going to take a car to the airport when I return as well.

My flight back is way early, 7:30 a.m.

Which is awesome since with the time change it puts me at getting back to SFO around 9:30a.m. and I took the whole day off from work.

I’ll probably train it back to the house from SFO.

I’m hella comfortable with that commute.

But in New York, I’m going to let myself have the experience of not being anxious about train times and getting here to there.

I will take the subway while I’m there, I won’t be on a time frame, it’s loose and flexible.

I want to go to the MOMA, the Guggenheim, the Whitney, but if something comes up and I miss one of those because I am having some other grand adventure, than cool.

I’m going to be flexible.

I um, heh, want some souvenirs, because that’s how I roll.

And I did actually come up with a tattoo piece that I may go have checked out at Three Kings in Green Point.

If I can get it for a good price I will.

If it seems like it would take up too much time and energy then I won’t.

I do want a pair of earrings, or three, a bunch of notebooks, bunch of stickers, postcards from the museums I make it to and what ever the hell floats my boat.

I would love a sweatshirt and I always love getting a hat from the city I visit.

I don’t actually have the one I got there two years ago, I am not sure where it got off to, but I don’t have it.  I do have the one I got in Paris in 2007 and I love wearing it, I am always reminded of the street where I got it, the time of day, and how I just fell in love with it.

I’d like a good New York cabbie hat or fedora.

God damn.

I am excited.

Coffee galore, walking, oysters at a restaurant somewhere, photographs, graffiti, I want to make sure I bring my camera and rechargeable batteries.

I am also thinking about getting one of those brick recharger deals.

I drain a lot of juice on my Iphone when I take photos or when I use it to navigate anywhere.  And if for some reason I’m out and about in a part of town and don’t feel like subway back to Clinton Park, I’ll get a car and that means having my phone powered up.

I will be out on the town.

I will not be hanging at the Air BnB.

That is simply to have a place to sleep and do my blog at night.

I plan on being up and out and going the majority of the time and it would be handy to have an extra bit of juice for the phone.

I met with a lady this evening after work and told her about what I was doing and why and her whole face lit up.

“That’s like bucket list stuff for me,” she said her face glowing.

Girl, if I can do it, so can you.

So grateful that doing nice things for myself helps the women I work with give them the allowance to do the same things too.

Travel was such a dream for me when I was younger and I am so grateful that I am allowing myself more and more to embrace it.

I was writing this morning about where I want to go and things I want to do.

Take the Empire Builder Train Line.

Go to Paia, Maui–see the place where my grandmother was born.

Go to Burning Man in 2017 since I can’t go this year.

Go to Hudson, Wisconsin and see my best friend and her family.

Those are the tops on the list, but there are so many others.

I would love to go back to Alaska and really see it during the summer.

I still want to see Venice and go back to Rome for more than a weekend with more than the 50 Euro I went with.

I am still in awe how that happened.

Rome for 50 Euro.

Cape Town, South Africa.

Toulouse, France–I owe it an amends to be seen truly instead of the drunken, hung over stupor I did it the first time.

So many places.

And you know.

I’m going to go to all of them and more.

Because I am alive, I love myself and I am fucking awesome.

Yeah, yeah, I know.

But for a woman who came from where I did to be where I am at it is only by grace that I am here and I feel like I owe my God the happiness and joy I find in traveling.

It fills me up, it lights me up.

New places, new experiences.

New faces.

New art.

God.

I can’t wait to just cram my face full of art.

I’ll have something to compare the new MOMA to when I get back.

I haven’t been to it yet, not having really had time to what with school and work.

But I will when I get back.

Especially since I won’t have to be doing homework every weekend.

Hell.

I’ll also do some little trips around here.

Why the hell not?

Get on a train and see where I can take it.

Scooter down the coast.

Or up it.

I’m not sure about taking my scooter over the bridges, but I could see going around the coast  a little.

Oh summer vacation.

I am so happy to meet your acquaintance.

Feels funny to say that at the ripe old age of 43, but there it is.

One more day of work and then some play time for me.

I have so earned it.

Seriously.

School’s Out For Summer!

I’m done!

I’m done!

I’m done!

Take that Psychodynamic Lacanian theoretical paper, I see you, raise you a parental confrontation, a castration complex, and further, you can’t squash my jouissance.

Ha!

I slay you paper dragon.

“That was fast!” my friend in cohort text me back after I gleefully texted her to let her know I had finished my Psychodynamic’s paper.

It was.

And still I am surprised at how fast I can write.

It doesn’t always mean it’s good, I’ve some modicum of humility, not much, but some, but it does mean that I am capable of doing the work in an efficient manner.

And.

Not to put too fine a point on it.

I had done the reading.

I had taken good notes in class.

I participated in class.

So when I needed to review the material and I did not know what I was going to write on, I did not in fact, write on the topic that I was going to, I google searched it and there were too many theoretical papers already out there.

So.

I used an experience from my youth and wrote about that.

I actually thanked God after the paper was finished for being able to use the traumatic event to write a positive piece.

I am amazed.

Constantly.

By how the wreckage and dreck of my past can be put to use.

“Carmen,” a famous writer once told me, “most writers would kill to have the material you work with.”

Meaning that I have lived a lot of life and have had a lot of experiences.

Some of them dramatic, traumatic and packed with pain.

Pain that I have been able to turn to something else.

If not gold, a kind of beautiful word garden that I can pick and choose what I will present in this bouquet of meaning and language.

I love poetry and words and sonnets and prose and sex and eros and flowers and life and apples and culture and French and travel and all these things add up to something, more than who I am and all of them inform me and build me and shape me.

I am so many things.

I am over the moon to be finished with my first year of graduate school.

I am officially a second year student now.

I am proud of the effort I put in and aware that I did not do any of it on my own.

It was with joy and humor that I spoke with one of my friends today from my cohort.

“Oh, don’t worry,” I said, so and so and I messaged and text and I know people are skyping, I’m totally fine with going over the take home with you.”

We did it together.

I had already turned in my final but I was more than willing to help my friend.

And when I think about all the help I had getting through this first year I am blown away with gratitude.

Friends who bought me groceries when I had to go down in hours at work and I hadn’t gotten my financial aid disbursement yet.

Friends who let me study in their living room when there was a kid’s birthday party here at the house with some many children it was like being inside a bouncy house trying to study.

Friends who bought me readers from Copy Central.

Friends who gave me rides to and from classes.

Friends who commiserated with me about the amount of work involved and how they did it, my nurse and doctor friends, my lawyer friends, my fellows in cohort.

My employers for being flexible and once a month letting me have off on Fridays so I could go to classes all day.

All the people who cheered me along the way and said, you can do it!

I did it.

Thank you friends!

I couldn’t, really, have done it without you.

That is not to down play the amount of work I did.

I did a lot of fucking work.

I showed up consistently, I didn’t miss a single class (which also helps me in writing the papers, let’s be honest, it’s a lot easier to stay on top of things if you are in the classroom, the importance of every class when it’s an intensive full time program taught on the weekend is huge), I did all my readings, well almost all of them, I may have missed an article here or there, but I really read all the books and texts and the majority, over 95% of the readers, I turned in every paper on time and I showed up for every project I had to present on time and prepared.

Yeah.

I know.

Fucking perfectionist.

“Now you can relax,” a friend text me.

Yeah.

Sure.

How though?

It’s going to take me a minute to unwind from all of this, I already know that, it feels very surreal to have all the work done when I consider that over the past year there was always something I had to be working on.

Going back to full time work is going to feel like a vacation.

Speaking of vacation.

New York in four days!

OMG.

I’m fucking going to New York.

I can finally get excited about it.

I have all my work done.

“That paper isn’t due yet, though, not for two weeks,” my friend text me when I said I was going to do the Psychodynamic paper today.

Yup.

Except that I will be in New York next weekend and I don’t want it over my head and I didn’t want to have to worry about carving out time after I got back from the trip either.

Although.

Heh.

I was a smart cookie.

I’m going to be coming back really early on Monday morning, flying out of JFK at 7:30 a.m.

What with the time change it will be 9:30 a.m. or something like that, and I asked off for the whole day from work.

Yup.

A full day to decompress from the trip and not force myself right back into the grind.

I’ll get to ease back in.

Super grateful I planned that out.

I have also made loose plans for the trip.

Friday I will get up and walk around Clinton Park, the area I’m staying in, grab some coffee and eat some breakfast and then make my way around Brooklyn.

I’m just going to wander.

I have an 8p.m. date with a friend to go do the deal in Williamsburg at Northside, so I figure  I’ll just mosey about Brooklyn all day Friday.

Hit the vintage shops.

Hit the coffee shops.

Wander around the Brooklyn Botanical garden.

Maybe pop into the Brooklyn Museum.

Go to book stores.

I’m very tempted to also hop over to Green Point and see if I can get into Three Kings Tattoo for some fresh ink.  I wouldn’t be able to get a tattoo that day, I’d have to go back after the consultation but they’re open late and I was thinking late Sunday I could get the work done.

It’s a thought, I have very tentative ideas about a piece.

I just like the idea of getting a piece done there, as I have in Paris now twice, it would be fun to add New York to the geographic map of my meandering travel life.

Then Saturday hit the city.

I want to go to the Guggenheim and the MOMA.

I know that’s a lot of museum to do in one day, but I’m on my own and I’m good company and I walk fast, I take the subway into New York, I hit the MOMA first, it closes earlier than the Guggenheim which will be open later, then onto the Guggenheim.

I drink lots of coffee.

I see art.

I buy notes books and take pictures of graffiti and get stickers.

I walk.

I soak it the fuck up.

I eat what ever I want.

Raw oysters.

I drink bubbly water till the cows come home.

I go do the deal somewhere if it makes sense to do so.

I plan on doing the new Whitney on Sunday and then walking the High Line Park and wandering around the little independent galleries around Chelsea.

If I decide to get a tattoo I head back over to Green Point and do that.

Part of me also wants to go to Coney Island.

But I’m not sure.

And I think that’s something to do with another person, ride the Ferris Wheel, go on the tilt-a-whirl, ride the Cyclone, seems like I would want a person to do that with.

Museums and walking about and exploring though.

That’s the deal.

That is my celebration.

I gave myself a trip to New York when I headed into the beginning of this semester.

I am so glad I did.

I am so excited to do this for myself.

I’m so grateful I made it through the school year.

Here’s to the beginning of my awesome summer vacation.

I have no idea where it’s going to go.

I just know I earned it.

And.

It’s going to be fucking awesome.

It already is!

The Count Down Begins

I was looking at my calendar and trying to figure out when my person and I could meet up again.

We had just had a really nice re-connecting after my lapse in being available over the past week with it being my last school weekend of classes.

I asked if we were going to go back to our regular schedule and that would have meant meeting up next Thursday.

Except.

HOLY SHIT.

Next Thursday I fly out to New York for some well deserved rest and relaxation and as much modern art as I can get my paws on.

The Whitney.

The Guggenheim.

The MOMA.

Walking the Highline.

Walking around Brooklyn.

Doing the deal, because it’s awesome fun to do that in other cities.

Sunshine on my face and spring/summer time dresses.

OMG.

I am almost there.

I still have so far yet to go though it feels ages away instead of just around the corner and maybe it’s time to unearth your carry on, except, well, I won’t because I know how to travel and I know how to pack.

I mean, come on, I went to Paris for six months with this same roll on luggage and my bicycle in a box, I can do New York packing for four days in a matter of minutes.

The packing will not be the issue.

It will be getting all my papers, posts, and final exams done.

I have no juice left in me today.

The affects of the weekend of school and two back to back slumber parties has me all tuckered out.

There wasn’t, um, heh, much sleep at my sleep over last night.

My.

Though.

There was fun.

And every once in a while I would catch myself walking around at work gob smacked and silly, with a grin splashed across my face.

I actually kept it pretty well together, all things considered.

The red eye from Trouble Coffee did not hurt, and it was fun to be in my neighborhood on a Tuesday and instead of doing my little morning routine, going out with my company and grabbing some coffee and then catching breakfast at the Sea Breeze Cafe up the street.

Totally felt like a tourist in my own hood.

It was awesome.

And.

Since I will be a tourist again soon, in a hood all the way across the country, I do need to take care of organizing my time.

Tomorrow I get up and do my morning routine and then I start sorting through my notes and my readings for the appropriate topics that I will be covering for my class The Clinical Relationship, wherein I will be writing a ten to twelve page paper on the topics of transference and countertransference in the dyads that I worked for the class–12 sessions, 12 pages.

I can do it.

I have done all the reading.

And I take great notes.

Ask any of my classmates.

I am a good little school girl.

I figure once I have my notes organized and the supporting reading references to back up my experience with theory the actual paper itself will take me about three hours to write.

Maybe four if I include working up the reference page and doing a couple run through edits.

I’ve got a half day Friday at work.

Thank God.

I have a doctors appointment at 4p.m.

I figure I’ll be out by 5p.m. back home in the hood before 6 p.m. and I’ll grab some Thai Cottage take out and start the writing.

Or.

Better yet.

Finish the writing.

Because I do actually plan on starting the paper on Thursday.

I, ahem, have another date tentatively scheduled for Friday and may well be, well, er, heh, occupied for the later part of the evening.

Happily so.

It will be my moment of celebrating having that paper written.

Saturday I’m pretty open, I’m assuming I’ll be a little sleep deprived for part of the day, but I will still be showing up to meet with my person as per our usual at Tart to Tart at 12:15p.m.

Then maybe a little nail spa action or something else, not sure what, don’t have to figure it out now.

There will be reviewing material for my Ethics class and prepping for the take home exam Saturday, who knows, maybe I knock it out and do it Saturday as well.

Sunday I’ve got a couple of ladies in the early part of the day and then my Psychodynamics paper if I still have any stuffing left in me.

If not.

A day of rest, an hour of doing the deal in the evening and I’ll knock out the last paper in the mornings before work next week.

I want to have it done by Wednesday.

No matter what.

I am not going to New York with a Psychodynamics paper on Lacanian theory still to do.

I am just not going to.

I want to be free and clear to travel and not have any papers.

I have one more big push.

I can do this.

I did it before going to Burning Man last year–what did I write, six papers?   Right after the 8 day long retreat, aka “bootcamp.”  And then I went to the event with a clear conscious and the ability to be fully present for the experience.

I did it before going to Paris at Christmas time as the first semester closed and wrote I think four big papers to finish out the coursework.

I will be able to do this last.

Especially since I am completely finished with all my readings.

Last semester I was still doing reading as the last weekend of classes came to a close and still had reading to do before being able to write those papers.

Plus.

And this is a big plus.

I really understand the material.

I had an “aha!” moment in Psychodynamics as the professor was giving her last lecture of the year on what I could write about and I scribbled down some ideas and approached the professor after class and got the thumbs up.

As for the big paper, again, just the showing up.

Just like everything else in my life.

Say yes.

Show up.

Watch the magic happen.

I am sure that I will feel some anxiety, I always work through a little as I prepare to write a paper, but having the promise of a date Friday night.

Well.

That helps.

Helps quite a lot.

I get to be a good school girl.

And.

Have fun.

Yes sir.

Let’s get this party started.

Just Another Day

Just another blog.

And I also tried what I preached last night and started a poem today.

I did not quite get as far as I wanted.

I did not finish the sonnet.

But I wasn’t even going to write one this morning, then I thought, why wait until I have to?

Just get going.

I will have to open up that syllabus soon, in fact, all of my syllabi need to be looked at.

It’s three days after my first weekend of classes and it’s time to get started back in on the reading and the paper writing.

Because, yes, I do have papers to write.

That’s a big part of my program and I just need to, er, let me rephrase that, I get to, do the work.

It’s pretty amazing when I think about it.

I am in graduate school, I work close to full time, I am in involved with my community, I am living a full, well rounded, meaningful life.

Today there was nothing wrong.

So much nothing wrong that I thought at one point, something’s up.

But that’s just silly.

What’s up is serenity and balance and feeling like I am in a comfortable groove with life in general.

I don’t have any drama, although my head can manufacture some I am sure, I am doing well at work, I worked extra this week and I will work extra next week, little extra cash for my upcoming hair geographic.

Looking forward to that, even though it is with some nervousness, it’s mostly excitement.

I ran into a litter mate of mine, totally unexpected, in fact, I just realized the last time I saw her I had just turned ten.

Really good to catch up.

Another friend on the East Coast also just hit eleven.

It’s really astounding and I am constantly, perpetually grateful.

I got a message from my friend who I used to live in Paris with wishing me a happy anniversary and another message from a student in my cohort thanking me for my experience and light and color and presence in the classes.

Both unexpected and lovely messages.

I am seen.

I am.

It’s nice to be seen.

I forget that sometimes.

I was crossing the street today on my way to grab my bike from the shop on a brief break at work and someone going through the intersection hollered out my name.

I have no idea who it was, but it felt nice to be called out to.

I love that I am a part of the cityscape.

It’s lovely to be involved in so many diverse communities.

School, work, recovery.

Burning Man.

A friend asked today what my intentions were.

I intend to go.

How?

Who knows.

But it is funny.

I just started writing down what I wanted in regards to the event a couple of days ago.

There are some things in my morning pages that I always write an affirmation for, that I have done so for years and will continue to do so as they are things that I wish to continually have in my life.

Then there are the things that I will write down and they happen, trips, travel, experiences, and so I write something else down in their place and Burning Man is back in the mix.

It replaced the I am going to New York in Spring manifestation.

I am still super stoked about that.

The Guggenheim, the Whitney, the MOMA.

Oh my.

New York in Spring.

I hope it’s warm.

I want to wear sundresses and crinolines and have my hair swept up on my head and walk through the park and walk around Brooklyn and of course, walk through all those lovely museums.

I have a place to stay, I have the plane tickets, I have the time cleared at work.

I can officially take it off my list.

It is not the exact trip I was thinking I would be going on, but that’s ok, I’m going.

The Burning Man event popped up pretty fast in my writing I feel because this year is an anniversary too for me, it will make ten years of going, ten consecutive years.

I can’t not go.

The event this year is August 28th-September 5th.

The dates for my second week long retreat for the second year graduate school program are not up yet, it will happen in August, but I believe it will be similar to the dates this past year and it will occur before the burn.

I should be clear to go.

Granted.

I won’t have it paid time off if I take it, I will have used up my vacation days at work with the second year school retreat and my trip to New York.

No matter.

It somehow worked out last year.

It will work out again this year.

I am willing to work it to get in and I will put out feelers to that end.

But.

It first starts with the affirmation.

The writing.

It starts by putting it out into the Universe what I want.

And what’s always funny, sometimes it is in hindsight, but I can see, quite clearly, how I get what I write for.

Not often how I picture it or without having to do some work.

But it almost always happens.

Put the intention out there and let the Universe come to me.

I realize that I don’t have to struggle to get what I want.

I just really need to show up and be honest about what I want.

To love and be loved.

To be a poet.

To be a therapist.

To see a lot of art.

To stay sober and abstinent.

To be serene, emotionally sober, you could say.

Travel.

Burning Man.

More art.

Let’s put kissing in there soon, but no rush, you know.

I don’t have to get what I want.

God usually gives me better.

I just have to let God know that I want to be happy and I will show up to the necessary work to get there.

Letting go.

Surrendering the results and seeing what shows up.

Burning Man.

It’s early.

But, there you go, you’re on my mind.

Let’s see what we can put together.

Meanwhile.

Back to the books.

And forward into the next phase of my development.

Open to being flexible.

Open to not knowing how it will happen.

Showing up anyway.

And always.

With love.

Where Do I Begin?

Eep.

I did something today.

Actually.

Ha.

I did two somethings today that I have been thinking about doing for a little while now.

One thing came up this week, Saturday afternoon in fact, in a cozy little nook at the back of Tart to Tart it was suggested to me that I go home and do something.

It took me until today.

Part of that, I will blame on the internet, which FYI, is working smashingly.

My housemate re-booted the connection and I am back up and running.

When I couldn’t get online all weekend I did find myself getting frustrated I really wanted to be taking the suggestion, in fact, when I ran it by my next person I got the unequivocal thumbs up as well and a direct mandate, to yes at my first convenience, take the fucking suggestion.

Except.

Well.

Can I?

And then.

Heehee.

I did.

I just did.

I’m nervous, blushing, high color in my face, excited, happy, can’t wait to tell my people I took the suggestion, and a tiny bit overwhelmed by it.

But.

l did it.

I booked a ticket to New York.

HA!

Yes.

That’s right.

I’m going to take myself to the Big Apple this Spring.

Oh my God.

Peeing my pants.

Not really.

Why are pants wet?

Rain.

Please, people.

Although, yes, I am quite excited.

Also a little nervous, I won’t lie.

This will be my second time going to New York, but this time I won’t be meeting a friend there, like I did last time, I’m just going to go.

Granted.

The idea was not mine.

But.

I couldn’t get it out of my head.

And.

I thought, what a way to celebrate having finished my first year of graduate school?

I booked the ticket for two weeks after my final weekend of classes.

Just in case I have any final projects or papers that need to be done, I will have the time to do so before I travel.

I’m going to fly out Thursday afternoon, getting into JFK around 10:30p.m.

I don’t know where I am going to stay yet, I just posted on my facecrack page that I would be traveling, so hopefully a friend will say, hey, spare room, or yo, I got a friend who Air Bnb’s their spot.

I have time.

I’m not going until May.

It’s January right now and I have a full semester of school work to go.

That was also one of the reasons I was holding out on booking the ticket, I was waiting to make sure I had enough money to buy my readers for my classes.

But.

The damn things are not ready yet, the earliest may be on Friday, but I was told today most likely it will be Monday.

Which means, I will have another paycheck land in my account and I could use the money I have had earmarked towards books to get the plane ticket.

So.

I took a big, deep breathe and started hunting for tickets.

I found a good price, one that I could afford, though it leaves little in my account, I have nothing else I have to buy this week before Friday and pay day (I bought coffee tonight, really, what else do I need?), and I pulled the trigger.

Even though it means taking off an extra day of work, because the best price and what made the most sense for me to fly, was to fly out on Thursday afternoon.

I wanted a red eye, so I could work Thursday, but the cost was prohibitive and I thought, I’ll have the vacation time accrued, might as well take an extra day off to travel.

I’ll get there late Thursday eve, but have all day Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to walk everywhere.

Go to museums.

Oh, The Guggenheim, and the MOMA, and the new Whitney, to start.

That’s one for each day that I am there.

I am going to fly back early morning Monday so that I am back in SF and give myself the day to recover, lay low, get my ducks in a row.

I have found that it is really important to me to give myself a day to re-adjust after time spent traveling.

So.

Yes!

A trip to New York City in Spring.

I am pleased as punch.

Really I am.

I got just a taste the last time (my first time) being there and it was helpful to have a friend, though it was not as present as I could have hoped for, who was a pretty damn good tour guide and he let me crash at his place for free.

This time.

I won’t have a tour guide.

This time I’m on my own.

And.

Yes I will wear my big girl pants and figure it all out.

Suggestions, comments, thoughts, ideas, you throw them my way.

I’m open to it all.

Mostly, I am just excited to have given myself the permission to do something for myself and to celebrate my first year of graduate school.

Assuming I make it through this upcoming semester.

Ha.

And I shall be making it through the semester with a little something sassy to keep me going.

Heh.

I did mention that earlier, I was going to write about that first, but I got swept up in the whole, holy shit, I booked a ticket to New York thing.

I have an anniversary coming up.

I have a little spending plan allowance money set aside for a tattoo, I usually get something, but I realized that I don’t have to, I got one in Paris, which has healed up so well it’s rather shocking, but there is something else that I have wanted to do for some time and I told my person about it last night and well.

Here’s to taking more suggestions.

I’m finally getting my hair done.

Yes.

That’s right.

I’m fucking going blonde.

Eek a mouse.

I’m just going to do it once.

I can’t think that I can afford the upkeep, it’s going to actually cost more than the tattoo I was planning but I said, fuck it, I pull the extra from my clothing allowance and do it right the one time.

I’m actually going to have to go to the salon more than once.

I’m getting the initial cut and color done on one day and then I have to go back a second time to do the color again.

My hair is dark.

And I have a lot of it.

I may also be losing some of the length, I’ll find out when I go.

But.

I have always wanted to do this, I’ve written about it before and gotten close, I have highlighted a bit, but never the whole damn thing.

I figure I’ll do it the once, it might break my hair, but that’s ok, it’ll be hella fun, I can say I did it, instead of deciding I want to then not doing it.

Willingness without action is fantasy.

I took a lot of action today.

Even though, in reality, they were just small actions, they both felt really big.

One was to pick up the phone and call and make an appointment.

The other, to pull my debit card out of my wallet and commit to booking a ticket.

Small.

Tiny.

Wee little actions.

And yet.

Such big results.

It’s been a day.

Happy.

Joyous.

Free.

And soon to be.

Blonde.

In the Big Apple.