My Drive to Work

Once upon a time (three weeks ago) I had an interview with some corporation. I didn’t really tell too many people and I wasn’t very excited about it. It was actually a ‘mock interview’. It was set up through my school and meant to give me interview practice. The thing is, they really do hire from these interviews. So I showed up at the correct time with my updated resume. I get ushered into a tiny room with two people. I have come to refer to these two people as ‘the sharks’, ‘the corporate sharks’. The woman was named Buffy, that’s right, no shit, Buffy. The guy was named…umm…I never did get his name, however, the sight of his receding hairline flanked by stiffly gelled spikes of mousey brown hair will forever be singed into the dark crevices of my forever developing self respect. The interview went horrible, needless to say. I couldn’t force myself to do the (what I have come to refer to as) ‘corporate whore dance’. I stuttered, sighed, yawned and basically picked my nose. They tried to convince me to beg them for a job and instead I got up, thanked them for their time and asked them if they would be needing that copy of my resume. That was (basically) that.

Once upon another time (this morning) I was driving to work. Happy, late, excited about getting to Starbucks and generally looking forward to my day. I came upon a stoplight and realized that there was a car waiting to pull out of a dry cleaning parking lot and into the flow of traffic. I was feeling generally jovial so I didn’t inch up the extra feet and sincerely smiled at my fellow motorist, giving them the okay to pull out. EEERRRRRKKKKK- Stop the flipping press- it was him, Mr. spiked, receding hairline. He looked at me and I looked at him. He had a slightly confused look of recognition on his face and I looked like I just swallowed a guinea pig – a dead guinea pig. Thus began my ultimate race to the grand finale of who will have a better life. This instruments of this race were cars, Peachtree Street, morning rush hour and of course, my imagination! We even did a pit stop in the same strip mall, him to withdrawal money from the ATM and me to get my coffee. We were back in our cars and racing each other again within five minutes. I pulled back into the flow of traffic from the southerly end of the strip mall parking lot and he chose the middle exit that actually has a stoplight. Much to my beguilement, I was stuck waiting at the light on the main street while he was pulling out of the parking lot under the protection of the stoplight. Nonetheless, I caught up and it was on again. Eventually I realized that I was grossly exaggerating the situation of sharing a morning commute with this individual. I had turned the whole thing into this sick contest (at times reaffirming) of who would have the better life. While I was inside Starbucks I was imaging him walking in and apologizing for his (and Buffy’s) foolishness. I imagined myself saying to him, “oh that’s fine really, for the best in fact. I have found meaningful employment with something I actually GIVE A FLYING SHIT ABOUT”! AT this point I realized that I might be taking things a bit far. In the end, who won the race you ask? Well, Peachtree Street veers off to the right at the intersection of Roswell road and Roswell veers to the left. We were headed in different directions. I was fine with that, it was the only way it could have been.

Love and Paris and this old red journal I used to write in

I had a really mean post about me-and-Hugo-drama fired up earlier this week but I held off on it. I’m glad I did because last night I nearly fell in love with him all over again. Just, you know, over dinner and drinks at home. We let our conversation roll and jut out into a million different directions. We laughed and made lofty wishes about who we’d most like to have dinner with. We basically just talked, as simple as that. I realized half way through the magic hours that we were doing what we do best right then and that we really needed it. We were intellectually and emotionally inspiring each other.

When we fell in love it was all about art and passion and perspective. Besides being totally seduced by his gorgeous body I was seduced by his mind and ability to understand and amaze me. It is truly a case of loving the way he thinks.


~How I Feel About Paris Today~

Taken from my journal:

Written in a very cold chateau somewhere in northern France:
12/28/00

So this will be my first full day at this castle. I do not like it very much, mainly because it is boring. I was in paris for only one day after I arrived in France. After being gone for only a few hours I already missed it. Now I will go and write my sister.

Six months later – same red journal:

06/12/01

Sitting alone in this room in Paris, France – I reflect on my past and those events that have passed. Was it all a dream? Was I ever anywhere but here? Did I never leave at all – will I open my eyes tomorrow morning and still have a dog, a husband, a job and a car? Please someone reaffirm for me exactly where we are!

06/14/01

So maybe it was all just a moment in time that has already passed. I am not too bitter as I at least half-way understand. This Paris has worn me down- must find a way to make money so I will be okay. The universe seems to have taken from me mostly everything that I've held sacred. Yet I am thankful for the sun today and for the health I have to carry on. I don’t know why it is mapped out for me to be solitaire in this time – yet I do nothing but try to be thankful for this. Bob Marley runs trails through my head, “I know a place – where we can carry on”. Pulsating memories of endearment… We have truly fallen from grace in the eyes of one another. I have no normalcy here, only the knowledge that I am alone. So maybe it was all just a moment in time that has already passed. Maybe I can’t complain about this and should just be thankful again for what I have learned from it. Yes – “I know a place – where we can carry on”. I find solace in companionship – but none can truly hear me. My problems are met by the sighs and rolling eyes of those who are meant to be comfort in my darkest hour. This journal is a recollection of a journey in the making – one not yet finished- yet already over forever. I just must know - one day I will be okay again.


For song lyrics to I know a Place click here.

Catching Up

Hi there, so glad you have joined me! Isn't this wonderful?!!! I miss you, I swear, I'm talking to you. Yes, YOU. Before we start can I get you something to drink? No, alright later. This post finds me…exhausted, enthused, beguiled, adjusting, content and happy. I found a job, no…correction: the job! I will not go into any detail here just so I can never get dooced for blogging about my job. SO, what I can say are the following vague but (slightly) intriguing (I hope) thing-a-ma-jiggers about my new JOB.

1.) It is better than I expected to find.
2.) I feel that I will be starting my career in a field that I
1a.) studied
1b) really care about
1c.) will thrive in.
3.) As 1a. alludes to above, this job is totally slap dab, right in the middle of, up my alley.
4.) Statement 1. is not referring to the financial side of the situation – so don’t get to jealous just yet- I know I was doing a lot of big talking about selling my soul to the devil to bring in 40K starting out. I probably had everyone convinced that I was about to become a mega-millionaire just by the sheer force of my insistence…and that would be great, but not very likely. (as I am sure some of you had already predicted).
5.) Really this is 4., continued. It is enough to live on comfortably. It is enough to save money and buy myself nice things and travel. It is about a million times more than I making now, not because I am making small beans now, but because this will be stable quantifiable income.
6.) It will be challenging on a daily basis.
7.) There is definite, for sure, room for growth.
8.) International opportunity.
9.) Did I mention I love it?

I hereby solemnly swear to only post really vague (worse than the above) things about anything slightly related to my JOB! I am happy to have one and I am going to try really hard to be great at it.

On other fronts, my life is still a mess of disorganization. I still haven’t cleaned and organized all of the papers, mangled and forgotten, living in a light blue laundry basket, in my hall closet. I cleaned the hell out of my apartment and Hugo cleaned the hell out of my kitchen. I have rediscovered the arranging of flowers. Shaka is getting older and older! It is horrible and sad, but I have her on a senior dog action plan for 2007. Upon other things, the plan includes keeping her and her doggy bed really clean. This is only a struggle because one of her favorite things to do in the whole world is roll in SHIT.
For 2006’s photo highlights go here: My Flickr account.

Don't forget to visit the archives.



~How I Feel About Paris Today~

Today’s Paris mood is quite hopeful. I feel that this new Ah HEM…thing I have going on in my life is a step towards Paris, not a step away from it. I knew I needed stability, I knew I needed to save money and figure out, actually put the pieces together for Paris. If this new Ah HEM…thing in my life is any indication of the path of brilliance and non-resistance from the world on matter concerning what I want with all of my heart, then Paris…will…be (for me, when it is time).

Direction

Desperately seeking, direction. My thinking is, if I say it enough I will be hit over the head with clarity and…direction.

I saw a concert Saturday night. Bebel Gilberto played with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. It was a part of a concert series they feature called “pops” because the singers they bring in are more…poppy than the usual ASO style. I really enjoyed it. The show was, of course, flanked by alcohol on both sides, before and after. The after party portion of the evening found me shuttled across the park to Noche for tapas and…more alcohol. This all wrapped up with Hugo and I being ushered into a cab that safely delivered us right back at my doorstep where the whole evening began. This was all fine and enjoyable but I find myself struggling with a way to brilliantly describe the evening. I don’t feel like myself lately, therefore, my evenings don’t feel so brilliant. I am half too okay to be okay with. The other half of me is anxious, worried and apprehensive about everything. I am doing my thing that I always do and obsessing over the next move, the next job, all of the stuff I want to buy and all of the places I want to go “as soon as I get back on my feet”. For now, I’ll have to settle for chilly but oh so sunny Monday afternoon trips to the farmer’s market with Hugo where we eat lamb samosas and walk arm in arm around the huge building of worldly vegetables and fruit. I sometimes wonder if Hugo knows how often he saves me. Even when I fight and resist it and silently wish he wasn’t there bothering me so I could be surfing the Internet for jobs and supposedly writing. He silently insists that I stop my obsessing and join him for a few lucid hours of rambling conversations and agitated togetherness.

And then…opportunity called, but more on that later!

How I Feel About Paris Today

I am still working harder than ever to get there. The current (on-going) identity crisis I am experiencing has everything to do with the fact that I know what I want so acutely.

I’m Good

I mean that, truly happy for the moment. Little graduated brilliant lifer has been working her first week of the rest of her life after college. It’s funny how everything fits into those terms for me. Throw a new year (Buon Giorno 2007!) into the mix and even my bowel movements have a new glow to them. Sorry, I know that was gross and you’re probably thinking is it really the new year giving your BMs that glow or is it all of the black-eyed peas and collard greens you ate in the name of preserving tradition on the 1st. This year, I finally had to admit to myself that I enjoy New Year’s day much better than New Year’s Eve. NYE puts so much pressure on an individual to have the best scrapping time ever. I put that kind of pressure on myself everyday of my life, therefore, New Year’s Eve is almost impossible for me to be satisfied with if I am not out of the country. I greatly enjoy the rituals, languages and parties that take place in other places on NYE. Something new I learned on the first. Southerners cook down their collards and turnips the way that we do down here because of the African influences on Southern Cuisine from the slaves. I have always taken a lot of pride in a couple of things as they relate to myself as a “southerner”. 1.) Dialect, I love the various rich southern dialects in all of their elongated wide opened mouthedness and questionable “grammatical” structures. 2.) The fact that I come from a very poor, uneducated, working class family that is deeply rooted in rural south Georgia on one side and the urban guts of pre-boom-economy Atlanta on the other. Reading up on the influences that African people, who were brought here against there will and have been totally subjugated against since the formation of this country, have had on my culture, because of proximity is something else that I can add to my list of things to be proud of. I love that such an indigenous, rich and authentic stamp has been left on all of us. So as to never forget the horrors of how things really went in the beginning.


How I feel About Paris Today

I’m not going to lie, I really miss Paris. I am still totally obsessed. Me and a crazy friend of mine were plotting to possibly attend a very special party in Paris in March. I am not sure if I will be able to do this because of money. I also want Hugo there. Talking about this Parisian rendezvous just made me more keenly aware that I don’t want to go back to Paris without him. So, that might just be one of my resolutions this year…I’ll keep you posted…right here in fact. Bonne année à tous!