This is the view from my office, a.k.a. the couch.

… If I crane my neck around, that is. Now let’s just hope my butt doesn’t start to make an indisguisable dip in the right-side couch cushion.

I’ve learned quite a few things since moving to the Big Apple about how to appropriately associate with fellow New Yorkers, and generally stay afloat in a sea of people. But first, did I mention that you can see the Empire State Building from my bedroom window? It’s the phallic building in the middle there (in case you’ve never seen Sleepless in Seattle, King Kong or pretty much any Woody Allen movie based in NYC, which mannnny are)…

Anyways, when I first started sharing with people that we were soon to be off to New York city, I got a lot of interesting responses (mainly, “Why? Do you have a job lined up yet?” No, and more on that later). I also got a lot of unsolicited (though appreciated!) advice from people who live or have lived here over the years.

When I spoke with a family friend by the name of Suzanne, who also moved to Manhattan at the bushy-tailed age of 24 (though she had a job waiting for her on Wall Street, before that was a thing that people did, and long before it was a thing people might avoid sharing in mixed company), she offered the following three piece of advice–”all you need to know,” she said:

1. Don’t waste peoples’ time
2. Look down when you walk
3. Remember, everything is negotiable

I’ve heard this before. New Yorkers are notorious for being direct to the point of abrasion. I haven’t yet come face to face with a true fast-talking, no-time-to-waste Manhattanite, but I’d like to avoid any confrontation with said folks that ends with me being made to feel like a west-coast softy… so I’ll keep that one tucked away in the back of my pocketbook. Still, in my experience so far, a smile and a little genuine conversation goes a hell of a long way. But what do I know?

Except that apparently looking at your surroundings when you traverse the city is a telltale sign that you’re “not from around here,” or so I’ve been told. I haven’t really noticed anyone treating me like a tourist–but then again I wouldn’t, would I? I’m too busy looking up.

For someone whose just arrived on this slab of urban concrete, here are a few tips I would add to this incomplete, forever growing list:

1. Be courteous to the people serving you: the lady behind the counter at the post office, your hipster barista, the MTA employee, your cab driver, dog walker, waiter or waitress–whatever it is, it’s near impossible to go through a day in New York without an interaction with another person who is being paid to help you (and often not enough). I’ve been on both sides of this situation, and a little kindness can go an unbelievably long way. Most of the time these people are underpaid, overworked, and waaaay under-appreciated. Do yourself a favor and extend a little humanity their way. Remind them that they are a person, and that you are interested in how their day is going, at least for the period of your brief interaction. A little positive human contact with a stranger can turn a person’s whole day right side up–and it’s much more likely to get you what you want the way you want it faster and with the occasional perk. Back in Seattle I made friends with a number of baristas at all my favorite coffee places–and while it didn’t always get me a free pastry, I got plenty of laughs, the flattery that comes with someone remembering your name (and in my case, how to pronounce it), and the occasional gifted drink on my birthday or when I must have appeared to desperately need it. Give people what they need, and they’ll give it to you back. That wasn’t meant to sound sexual…
2. Don’t call the train lines by their colors. This was something that I actually was told by my roommate Alex the last time Sam and I were in town last year. Him and his then girlfriend informed us that we would be revealed as imposters and mugged immediately if we referred to the N as the “yellow line,” or the L as the “grey line.” While I’ve now determined that he may have been exaggerating about that, and I have since witnessed a true Manhattanite himself refer to them as such (which he claimed you can do if you’re on ‘the island,’ but not if you’re out in one of the other boroughs, whatever kind of excuse that is), it does seem to be the naive way to navigate trains. Mainly because there are often multiple trains per track. This isn’t the Tube people. And as a former Londoner, I can attest to old habits dying hard, but in this case evolve, adapt. Each city has its own customs. Learn them, live them.
3. Always carry cash. Not so much that every time your open your wallet to pay for a pack of gum or to retrieve your train ticket you’ll look like a walking bulls-eye. Don’t be Mr. Moneybags McRichFuck. But for whatever reason many, if not most, places in New York don’t actually accept card, so carrying some cash around is a near necessity…unless you want to be that guy whose always running into the 24-mini mart to use the sketchy ATM in the back corner next to the selection of canned Spagetti-Os, who then gets charged a $3.95 transaction fee and another equally irritating amount from your actual bank for the courtesy of letting you withdraw from said sketch-mobile. It’s a real thing–Google it if you don’t believe me. As someone who doesn’t love carrying cash around (it always disappears so much more quickly in its natural green form!), this has been particularly unfamiliar to me. In any case, it’s always good to have a few bills on hand to cover that coffee you just got, or the milk run at the local corner store. Better to be prepared ahead of time than to realize only after you’ve indulged in every last morsel of food from that Thai place down the street that you’re plastic isn’t going to cover the bill. Just sayin’.
4. Don’t bother checking the train timetables unless it’s 3 a.m. and there’s scheduled construction on the line that gets you home. Otherwise you won’t need it. Ever. Well, this isn’t exactly true – if you live on the G train, as I do, for some reason MTA likes to fuck you over a lot, so maybe check it more regularly, but for the most part you can cruise around during most times of day without having to worry about what increments the trains arrive at.
5. If, like me, you tote around your laptop and work in the mobile office, find a coffee shop that has power outlets and be the best fucking customer the place ever saw. Make buddies with the employees and remind them why having you around for several hours every day for the price of just one $1.80 drip coffee isn’t a bad thing.
6. Don’t be afraid to eat a deli sandwich from the bodega down the street, or stop in to try a dilapidated diner or taco stand – they may just have the best pastrami on rye, or pico de gallo, respectively, that you’ve ever had! This is New York City, where the talk is cheap and the rent is too damn high. There are a million places to eat, and if you’re new to the Big A, young and sans a trust fund and won’t work on Wall Street, most are probably out of your price range. Besides that, appearances aren’t everything, and if the logic of hipster chic is to pay way too much for new clothes that’s been made to look old, “vintage,” or worn out, then why not go straight to the source with your culinary excursions and try a little something straight off that dirty, disgusting counter.
7. Don’t expect much. People are who they are, and while in my experience most people have been nice and friendly here, New Yorkers have a reputation for being abrasive for a reason – they are. That doesn’t mean they are unpleasant people, you just might not be able to hold their attention for long, especially if you’re doing something they think is a waste of their time. DON’T waste anybody’s time, unless you want to feel that cold stab of New York City ass-wiping. Because then you probably will. If that’s what you’re after, then go right ahead.

Goodnight and good luck!

I can’t believe it’s been a week since Sam (the boyfriend), Gus (the cat) and I landed at JFK ready to start our new adventures in New York City—or “the borough” rather, which apparently is every Manhattanite’s version of “the burbs”. Nevermind that there are five boroughs and Manhattan is one of them… in any case, coming from Seattle, Brooklyn is city enough for me.

The first 24 hours were busy as hell. We ran out of time packing up our Seattle apartment, and ended up staying up until 3:30 a.m. the morning of our flight (promptly at 8), guiltily piling extra boxes, clothes, books and a random assortment of other things that never got fully packed (or packed at all) at our parents’ houses. We stuck Gussy into his carrier and crossed our fingers that he wouldn’t attempt to claw his way out from his spot under the window seat halfway through the six-hour flight. He didn’t…though he did try to claw his way out during the cab ride that followed, but that’s another story.

The first place we went after landing was the rental office to sign our lease, where we were met with the first surprise–we couldn’t move into our apartment until the following day because the current tenants were still moving out. We crashed on a friends’ couch the first night and locked Gussy in said friend’s room so that he wouldn’t disturb his roommates.

On Thursday just before midnight Sam, Alex (our roommate and couch-crashing provider) and I rolled his queen size mattress down four flights of stairs, folded it hot-dog-wise into the back of a mini van (thank you private car services!), and after a short and very illegal ride with me lying atop of the folded stuffed-in-a-car mattress, hauled it up another three flights of stairs at our new apartment. Almost a week later, this is still the only furniture we have. We  prefer the floor OK? Never mind–SHUT UP!

In our first day in New York I made several observations about the city and its people, many of which, after a weeks’ reflection, still hold true. For example, yes the city is dirty. There’s no denying it. New York is a dirty place. Not all of it, but certainly many if not most of the public places… and a great deal of the neighborhoods that Sam, Alex and myself could afford to live in. But the thing about dirt and grime in New York is nobody seems to care… or notice… or both? It’s simply accepted as part of the landscape–like your average everyday neighborhood corner store, or the homeless man who camps out outside the subway stop.

Not that Seattle didn’t have litter, or homeless people–most cities (that I’ve been to anyways), have both. But it all comes down to density. Seattle is simpy a much smaller place. Plus Seattleites have this weird yuppy-liberal relationship with the environment and garbage. We Seattle folk love to recycle and compost, and somehow have a strange guilt complex when it comes to trash on the street… or maybe it’s just that most Seattleites are more uptight than they’d like the rest of the world to think. We dress in our flannel and Birkenstocks, walking around with our unkempt hair, beards, and reusable porcelain coffee mugs monogrammed with the logo of our favorite coffee shops (because we want to support the independent, fair trade, shade grown roasters, but we’re not down with over-packaging and disposable single-serving containers, yo), while all the while we’re dying to tell every asshole littering to get his goddamn Starbucks 31 ounce Trenta cup off our fucking streets! Why? Because we’re Seattle. We’re clean, we’re hip, we’re relaxed, and we don’t stand for public displays of filth–NIMBY! Don’t repeat this to the token Seattleite in your circle–they will vehemently deny it (remember, we’re chill, relaxed, accepting folk, right?), but that doesn’t mean it isn’t true.

So yes, New York is dirty, but it’s something you grow accustomed to, or so I’ve been told. Yes, in a perfect world everyone would pick up after themselves and be conscious of common spaces and our shared environment, but we don’t live in a perfect world. So for now I will just have to accept that in New York you often see litter that’s been walked over so many times it’s almost part of the pavement. And yes, sometimes when you walk down the street you’re suddenly overtaken by the smell of urine. Cringe if you must, but it happens. Either urine or the garbage that’s piled up on the side of the road post-hurricane (echem, tropical storm, excuse me). But the weird and often unpleasant smells are just another part of the New York experience, and are inevitable in such a large city. Just breathe through your mouth and walk it out, alright?

When Sam and I visited New York, both for the first time, in March of 2010, we were overcome with how accessible the city is. And this still holds true. Mass public transportation that’s efficient and actually works (echem, echem Seattle!) is one of the greatest parts of this world renowned city. It’s definitely up in my Top 10 anyways. Yet most New Yorkers don’t seem to know or remember what it’s like to live in a city without an existing mass transit infrastructure. They take it for granted. Every New Yorker I’ve talked to has boasted about all the cultural opportunities, all the arts venues and museums, parks and free events, and food (Oh the FOOD!)–all true–but lets not forget how you get there. To which I say: All HAIL the subway system.

My transit nerd-dom is nothing new. I experienced the same love for trains during my brief foray in London. And this hasn’t changed at all. Back in July of 2009 Seattle opened the first stretch of its new light rail system–a project which is seemingly never-ending to those of us who actually like to go places and hate having to worry about parking cars (more on that later), and paying for it on top of that. Steven Blum, a hilarious writer and my oldest friend, rode the rail for all of opening day and wrote a wonderful piece for Seattle’s independent weekly The Stranger entitled “Oh, the Places We’ll Go”. In the fashion of any true writer confident enough to throw-back to Dr. Seuss, Steven took in what was around him and translated his observations and experience to paper for us all to read. The last paragraph of the article was as follows:

On the train back to Westlake Center, I sit next to a more diverse group of people than I ever see in my regular life: an African-American couple from Rainier Beach, two Vietnamese women from Othello, a lesbian couple from Capitol Hill, and a Somali family from Beacon Hill. Most of them are talking to each other. Just like in a real city.

This resonated with me then, and still does now. That’s what New York feels like to me. In almost every situation I find myself in, I am in the minority–a strange feeling if you come from a place like Seattle, that is surprisingly segregated for a region that most people associate with liberalism and progression. In Seattle, people often stay segmented in their particular neighborhoods because, well, economic disparity puts them there, and a lack of strong transportation options (among many other injustices) keeps it that way. But New York is beautiful in this way–the transit system levels the socioeconomic playing field. Anyone can get anywhere in the city for $2.50, and most people use it. On any given train you can find yourself in the company of mechanics, students, small business owners, financial executives, professors, buskers–you name it. And it really is awing. As Steven said, it’s the way a real city should be, and New York is nothing if not a big, bustling and very real city.

I lied. It doesn’t sound easy at all. I mean, I do it all day long already over at the ol’ ball and chain day job, but blog every day on my personal bloggy experiment? Impossible! Impossible, I say! But that’s the key, it would seem. Or at least that’s one of the habits working for my favorite ‘terriblemind’ – all-around self-proclaimed penmonkey Chuck Wendig.

Last week Chuck wrote a post called “The Official Terribleminds Writer’s Guide to Blogging About Blogging”, an activity that is taboo and looked down upon in some writing circles, and very much the norm for every other writer and their mom in others. But Chuck takes a different turn than most writers who tell other writers not to dare dare dare writing about writing, especially if you’re more of a self-proclaimed writer looking to be a self-realized writer – then writing about writing is even more not what you should be doing. According to some. Chuck disagrees. His attitude is, well, exactly the way I feel every time I read a blog post by some (writer) important high-up there so you should listen to them industry person who says I shouldn’t even attempt to blog about writing – I immediately want to tell my computer monitor to fuck that!

But even though I want to write about writing, as well as anything else that’s on my mind because that’s the role these self-expressing blogs play – allowing you and avenue to tap into and explore your narcissism on a level even you couldn’t anticipate (and this is not necessarily a bad thing, it’s just the way of our media and technolgy-saturated world), reading these foreboding messages from some higher writer power plants a tiny little microscopic cell of self-doubt. And then those cells start to divide and replicate, and woop before I know it I have a tiny little colony of unknown writer self-doubt fungal-izing all over my hands. And believe me, you can’t type with a bad case of unknown writer self-doubting fungalitis. No way.

But that’s where Chuck’s post restored the little writer kid in me who’s still buried down there somewhere. His two (yes, only two) rules for blogging about blogging (which, lets face it, most blogging writers will end up doing every now and then whether they mean to or not) were as follows: “Blog about whatever the fuck you’d like!” Finally some rules after my own heart. Oh, the second rule: “Don’t be a Dick” – always good advice. But the part that jumped out at me like headlights of a semi-truck speeding the wrong way down a highway straight for me was this bit about blogging: do it ‘every damn day, seven days a week.’ Now Chuck didn’t actually set this down in stone, but it sure helped him grow his blog’s readership from 900-something views in a month, to 18,500 visits in just one day two years later. Not bad Cap-i-tan! Not bad!

I’m not saying Chuck’s figured out the recipe for a successful blog, much less as successful blogging-to-writing full time attempt for the newbie writer, but he sure does seem to get to the heart of why most bloggers – or at least why I – even got myself into this crazy newfangled blogging thing in the first place: to satisfy some incessant need inside me to write regularly, and put it out there for the world to experience without the complete commitment or red-pen review of the entire publishing world. Blogging for the wanting writer is, essentially, a way to practice publishing your own work without actually publishing your own work (through a publisher or your own hard-worked elbow grease). It’s a way for you to dip a tow into the pools of public criticism, developing audience building and marketing skills if you’re really savvy with it, and perform some much needed regular maintenance on those rusty old writer gears, all in relative anonymity (if that’s what you’re going for).

This is not the case for everyone, but this is definitely what I aim to get out of it, at least for now. And the biggest problem in my daily routine? The fact that I write all day long for work, and have fallen into a schedule where I lapse and often don’t commit myself to buckle down to some dedicated writing time every day, and even when I do, I put it toward journaling rather than blogging or working on any ongoing pieces. I would like to be submitting a few pieces for publication every month, and am not at all doing that right now, and if I want to ween myself off of these bad habits, I’m going to have to expand my daily writing ritual. Chuck’s got me there. Can’t be a writer if you don’t write much (at least about what you want to be writing about, and not what someone might be paying you to write about, though that has it’s place too).

Ideally this is how my daily writing ritual would go, after all necessary freelance work is done, of course, which could only happen in a utopian society where I have mastered the art of completely efficient time management and self-motivation, so it’s safe to call this one a pipe dream… Anyways, this is how it would go:

1. Early morning (post- coffee, yoga and a leisurely reading of the morning headlines): Complete morning pages at 750words.com (I have been doing those good old Julia Cameron morning pages, or trying to anyways, off and on a couple of years now, but on the New Year I took the pledge seriously and switched over to 750words because the easy, clean interface is motivating for me, plus the writing stats are fun and slightly addicting). [Side note: If you haven't checked out Julia Cameron's "The Artist's Way", or any of her other books, it's definitely worth looking into. As far writing inspiration, how to, and help me I need to find away to get out of my own writing funk before I lose it books, this one is a total classic.]
2. Mid-morning (pre-lunch hopefully, depending on No. 1): Blog post! Write (complete and publish) a blog post. Any old blog post. I say I want to do this early because there’s the strong likelihood I will find justifications for pushing it back if I allow myself, so I should really try to keep to a rigid schedule when I can so I don’t forget to write as the day progresses and wake up with a terrible start sometime between 2 and 4 a.m. in the middle of a terrifying nightmare where my computer has sprung sprinter legs and gigantic chomping teeth and is chasing me through my apartment snapping its jaws and turning all of my books into confetti as it goes.
3. Afternoon/evening/middle of the fucking night because I can’t sleep due to being too ramped up about my awesome idea that I thought of during No. 1, No. 2, or any other stroke of genius had throughout the day: Spend 1-3 hours working on an ongoing project. These could be that screenplay idea I thought up for ScriptFrenzy last year and then never even attempted to do anything with, or that spec sitting half done on my hard drive, or (eeep) a whole novel with a narrative arc and everything, or even a goddam poem – though if I’m being truthful, I’ve never been a great poet… I want to be, but it’s just not my natural jam in the pb&j, but who cares because this time is time to work on that kind of stuff. The shit that piles up and piles up and stays in its tiny idea pod, never to be cracked open or turned into anything… until now.

If I could do all that (ha! EVERY writer wants to do all that)… But let’s just say I could, for arguments sake, I would be the happiest little writer you ever did see. I’d still wear my pajamas to work and realize, only horribly after the fact, that I’ve been dressed in the same juice-stained t-shirt for three days (and nights). But I’d be happy as hell! And the only way I’m ever going to get every writer’s big old dream of a daily writing routine, is if I just start doing it. If I keep on doing boring old regular work and justifying that I don’t have any time for personal writing, I never will. But if I put the time into my day tomorrow, and then beat myself over the head for 30-days or so as I try to develop the godforsaken habit of putting myself first, and set alarms and leave post-its around my apartment incredulously quizzing me on whether I’ve done any REAL (non-work, personal, for fun, out of the blue) writing today – it’s harder to lie to yourself than you’d think! – and struggle through the habit-forming process, one day *poof* I’ll have a fully developed daily writing routine up and running. Just like that! *Poof!*

At least that’s the plan. Other people tell me not to be so hard on myself, but I know me, and secretly when you don’t all know it and you think I have a headache, or am sick the pneumonia, or have to work late, or aren’t feeling well, or have an errand to run, or am dealing with a sudden and catastrophic car problem, really I am feeling antisocial and lazy, am instead eating ice cream in my pjs watching “Say Yes to the Dress” with my cat, put off my work all day and that’s why I have to work late, am on a major Buffy the Vampire Slayer or anything Joss Whedon bender and can’t be bothered to socialize with real people, or am just plain lying because I’m bored and tired and jaded and all that blah, blah, blah. Except for that one time that I actually did change a car tire on the side of a highway in the middle of nowhere while it hailed all over the place in 30 minutes flat. That was awesome, but it was during a road trip so it doesn’t count. Oh, and that one time I actually did have pneumonia.

What I’m saying is, I know me, and tough self-love is the way to go. So to take a feather out of the hat of Mr. Chuck Wendig, here goes my attempt to write. Daily. It won’t always be pretty (but hey, it’s not supposed to be!), and it won’t always be in the mid-morning time frame I so dream about, but it will be as regular throughout the day as I can manage. At times I might ask you to be lenient with those time zones, just between us (thanks! *wink*). And if I miss a day, I’ll try not to kick myself harder than I usually do (but secretly will, self-punishment is my curse). Here goes!

Dear Internet, I have a problem. I call it “digital hoarding” – something of a cross between attention deficit disorder, and good ol’ fashioned save-everything-that’s-even-remotely-salvageable-because-it-could-be-used-for-something-sometime hoarding. And boy is it not pretty. Let me explain. Right now I am suffering from a serious case of D.H. At the moment I have three different Internet browser windows open, with a total of 56 tabs. “Wow,” you might say. “That’s crazy! She must have a good reason.” Well no, I’m sorry to report, I really don’t. Unless having an almost obsessive inability to close out windows counts as a good reason.

My digital hoarding issue, something I’ve been nursing for some time now (in years), has gotten to the point where it slows down everything – my attention span, my thought process, my ability to take on and complete tasks, and my computer’s processing capabilities. It’s, how you say, not good. I have so many godforsaken tabs open that, two years ago I installed a Firefox plugin that takes all of said open tabs and organizes them into a collapsible side ‘tab tree’. In retrospect that might not have been the best idea… Take a look. It’s pretty brutal. (And yes, I do have two pages on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer wiki open – what of it?!?!)

I’ve never been a hyper-organized person. I have a friend, who shall remain nameless, who can’t stand to have any disorder in his life and he keeps everything so orderly to the point of reading each and every email and archiving it appropriately upon receipt, leaving absolutely nothing in his inbox. Ever. I’ve never been that disciplined. It always seemed like too much work, and anxiety inducing work at that. What would you do if you were in a rush and didn’t have time to categorize all of your emails before you ran out the door? OCD breakdown ensues. But given that I currently have 1138 unread emails in my inbox, (a revelation which might give my aforementioned friend a heart attack) I’m starting to think he may really be on to something. Clean, succinct, un-overwhelming organization. It’s so simple.

In all fairness, my tab overload originated as a weak attempt at some semblance of organization. Most of my tabs are work-related, and serve as a sort of living “to do” list. If I stumble across a great story for work, I generally keep a tab open to a related web page (which reminds me that the story still needs to be done), and order it under the work-related page I’ll be writing it for, in the general order of which stories will be finished first on toward last. The trouble is I rarely get through the list, and inevitably end up adding more and more tabs forever and ever until my head and/or hard-drive explodes, whichever comes first (hopefully the head – replacing a hard drive is rarely a fun, or cheap, task). And then there are all of the little personal interests, things I have to look into, errands, etc.

Once you get started, the feeling of lining up items to put off indefinitely, well, it’s intoxicating. But like all good drunken stupors, it leaves you with one hell of a hangover. Every day when I open my computer, I’m met with 56 open reminders of things I still have to do, and I’m beginning to worry that this severely alters my state of mind for that coming day (and all of the tasks I’ve rolled over on my perpetual responsibilities list). It can’t be a productive or healthy habit. So with that in mind, I’m making a change. Starting today I will be quitting my tab obsession. I will leave windows open indefinitely no more. From now on I vow to close all windows and tabs that I am not immediately using when I have finished with them, bookmark things I need to go back to, and find another less digital-ADD way of reminding myself that I’m perpetually overworked and under-productive.

And so I’m off to close some tabs, and in the process, hopefully save a little corner of my sanity that has made it this far without wanting to throw my computer out the window. Digital hoarder no more! Here’s hoping I don’t bring about an aneurysm in the process.

Once again my life emulates a comic. This one (from the fantabulous The Oatmeal) is exactly why I’m not web designing any more. By the time you get through a seemingly never-ending parade of back-and-forth reviews and changes by people who clearly can’t open email attachments, much less understand how a website structure and design works, you always end up feeling like this – or at least I do.

Read the full comic in all of its splendiforous glory here.

It’s wet and drizzling outside, and the sky is gray from the thick cloud cover. But it’s not really cold–the warmth is insulating. Definitely a ‘May showers’ thing happening here. And somehow, even though I’m all dressed (meaning I’m also wearing a bra and shoes, which I never do unless I’m going out), I just don’t feel like going anywhere. Something about the weather has got me in a dampened, foggy, lazy, thoughtful daze.

And whenever I get in one of those kind of dazes, I inevitably think about writing. Writing and a number of other creative, fun activities I continue to punish myself for never doing. Acting, music, drawing, painting, singing, dancing, and on and on. Right now the two things I torture myself the most over are as follows:

1. Kicking myself continually for never doing ‘my own writing.’ At first it was a true and justified complaint–I wasn’t doing any writing outside of work and school, and then just work. Nothing. Not even a practically sub-conscious dictation-like journal entries. And now I’ve kept myself in the habit of doing “morning pages” every day, and have even endeavored to do a little extra sometimes (though not often), and rather than rewarding myself for the notable step forward (because it really is a step for me), I just kick myself again for not doing more. It’s a long process. It takes time. At least with me it does.
2. Not ever developing any taste (or skill, for that matter) for performance. I’ve always wanted to try out acting–even only to the point of taking drama in school, but JDS never had it, and once I hit high school I was already too self-conscious to try. I made a goal to at least audition for one play by graduation, and I chickened out. Then I half-halfheartedly set the same goal for college, and didn’t hold myself to it. At the end of the day I’m still very scared, even though I can’t rationalize that fear. It’s just something I haven’t gotten over yet, and have maybe even developed a bit of a phobia toward. And now I think it’s to the point where I just have to face it or it will only grow and become a stronger deterrent. Still, facing things… sigh.

These two self-sabotaging thoughts have a canny ability to sink in and fester until I allow the debilitation to spread to other things. Like giving up on working out four days a week after a good solid month of maintaining the pre-makings of what could become a habit (the jury’s still out on this one), or even the daily writing exercises. Still, with those thoughts in my head constantly, I know the only way to get past it is to power on–find the strength to get over my fears and remember why I put myself through all of this in the first place. I know I won’t feel fully comfortable in my own skin until I give in and let myself find solace in this. I don’t even give myself that pleasure right now. I was always too guilty, or too preoccupied with other things (likely fueled also by guilt… what can I say?).

So I guess my thoughts on writing for today are that I love it, and need it, and need to allow myself to play in it. I can take the time. This needs to be my priority, or at least the top of my personal priority list, in between things like being as courteous as possible to as many people as I can muster in a singer day, and keeping to some admittedly generous standards of daily hygiene.

But, as always, before I can set that little stifled writer in me completely free, I have to force myself to finish one more writing “assignment”, of sorts–the dreaded This American Life internship application (dreaded because I’ve tried and failed to complete it the last two times I’ve set sights to applying, not because there’s actually anything unpleasant about it). But hey, we are actually moving this time, so it’s got to be done. I always seems to light a flame under me, being pushed into a corner, even a bit of one.

While doing my daily perusal of Craigslist jobs the other day, I decided to click over to the “missed connections” section to see if I couldn’t find anything to amuse myself with… and boy was I pleased when I found this:

I started first reading missed connections back in high school in the “I Saw You” section of the local weekly paper, which proved an immensely entertaining pastime (don’t believe me, try it!). It wasn’t about finding an actual missed connection for myself, it was about getting a tiny little glimpse into heads of perfect strangers, and the other perfect strangers who happened to ensnare their thoughts so.

When I saw the above ad, I couldn’t stop thinking about a book of comic depictions of real-life missed connection ads that I came across, and read cover to cover, a few months back. It’s (aptly) called “I Saw You…” by cartoonist Julia Wertz and a bunch of other artists, who each selected and drew comics for random missed connections found on CL and the like. (It’s a great read, by the way—I highly recommend it!)

So this is my official plea, Julia, please do a missed connection book round two, and include the above ad. Please, please please. If I were a cartoonist, I’d do it myself, but alas, I have no skill with sketching.

But then again, who’s to say that couldn’t be my style, right? Nah, probably best if you do it. Thanks!

Anyone who knows me will be able to verify two things about me that, although I acknowledge as true, I’ve not yet figured out how to circumvent (or overcome entirely).

The first is a combination of some psychological work ethic inherited from my mother, blended up with my own insatiable ambition and need to “do something” with my life, both of which I’ve been working to tone down for some time now. Being a passionate person, I tend to bite off WAY more than I can chew. While many people overwork, overexert, or generally overburden themselves with responsibility, I can not stress enough that I do this to the nth degree. I take on all sorts of projects, work loads, and personal goals – all manner of responsibilities – like the sinking Titanic took on water. I kid you not. It’s a problem.

The second verifiable fact about me is that, when it comes to any of those items on my big plate of never-ending “to dos” that are for me and not anyone else, I tend to procrastinate like you wouldn’t believe. If I’ve signed on to a freelance project, or am in the midst of building a website for someone, I tend to push those items to the front of my check-off list and get those done before all others. You could call that my mom’s insane work ethic at work once again, and in that sense it is a good thing – of course it’s important to make good on your promises, especially professional ones. Unfortunately, what always ends up happening to me, due to verifiable personal truth No. 1, is that I end up having so many work-based “to dos” that I push my own goals – like taking time for personal writing every day, finishing my own website, signing up for an improv class, pitching freelance stories, submitting to literary journals, exercising more – down that list so far, over and over, every day, until two years gos by and I’m still copying the same items off of last week’s list and on to this week’s (see NaNoWriMo Fail–Day 10 for evidence).

Now I’m not going to belabor this point. Time flies. Everyone wishes they exercised more and took more time for themselves. This is not something unique to my experience. The unique part is the crazy self-sabotage involved in verifiable fact No. 2 that keeps me from doing not just some, but all, of the things that I enjoy and want to do for myself, my life, and my future career. Which is why this next part is important.

I’m happy to report that on this fine day, the 1st of March, I have, in fat, completed one of my own personal goals – one I’ve had for some time, but only seriously committed to paper, along with 30-something others, on my New Year’s list of things I’d like to do/accomplish/attempt/cultivate in 2011. I’m not calling them resolutions. I refuse. But still, here we are.

The very first item on my list was to do my “morning pages” (see Julia Cameron’s “The Artist’s Way” and you’ll be captivated and hooked all in one too) every day. This has been something I’ve been trying to do for over two years now, and I think I’ve finally gotten into the rhythm to keep it going. I started writing these pages, just three pages of whatever comes to your mind (even if it’s “I don’t know what to write”) January 1, by hand. On the 9th I started writing my pages on 750words.com, a place (also inspired by Ms. Cameron’s teachings) where you can type your words and have your text kept private and analyzed for trends (how fast you wrote, if you stopped for any break of time, what you were concerned with most, if you were introspective/extroverted, which words you used the most, etc.). It’s kind of fun. Mostly I’m just a faster typist than hand-writer, and I like having all of my back pages stored in one place so I can look at them later.

In February I signed up for the monthly challenge on 750words.com (write every day or end up on the dreaded ‘wall of shame’) and I’m happy to report, I did it! I wrote at least 750 words every day in February, totally some 27,982. And again, for those who know me, this is a HUGE step for me. Now I just have to keep it up and work on expanding my daily writing routine beyond the morning pages, and into the realm of actually crafting and editing ongoing work.

But for now I’m going to be pleased with reaching my first goal. Only 35 more to go this year (in eight months)! In the meantime, to keep you inspired, 750words gives out badges for accomplishments (“undisractible” if you write all of your entries without taking breaks, multi-day streaks, etc.).

Today I saw my badge was entitled, simply, “Awesome,” and that just made my day. So for all of you other writers out there struggling to meet your own high expectations for yourself, remember that small victories are just as important as big ones (if not even more so). So give yourself a little “Awesome” horse badge and actually believe me when I say you deserve it.

Apparently web comic xkcd decided to hone in on the particular psychosis of being me for their most recent strip.

At least that’s what my friend Eric thought when he sent this to me with a note that it reminded him of me, and himself. I suppose it’s actually quite a common experience (lets not be a narcissist Thea!) with all people, particularly in this economic crisis. Why wouldn’t you want to stay free to try and delve into all sorts of things?

When I was in college all the hullabaloo over choosing a major seemed like a pretty sizable life choice masquerading as a mere academic requirement. You had to have a major, and it didn’t seem to matter much what is was. And while I believe that the major certainly doesn’t make the man or woman, it does have a lot to do with your personal academic experience, and what you end up doing after your formal education comes to an end, so to speak. How lame is that?! I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather major in the universe.