What It’s Like To Grow Up (as illustrated by my Blackberry)

So, listen, shut up for a minute.
It’s my 6th month-aversary in the “real world.” And I feel I’m in a good place to tell you one unwavering truth I’ve learned about becoming an adult.
Ready?

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They
make
you…
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…Get naked.

Like so; In which my roommate had to cut my Santacon dress off of me. Adulthood knows no integrity.

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Well, okay, seriously. In every way possible, you are peeled like a banana.
You know how you never realize how cold it is in the morning until you take off your blanket? It’s like that. For the first time, you’re let out of that cocoon of don’t-have-to-think-about-it-yet, of structured deadlines and structured social gatherings and structured communities, of everything you’ve known your whole life essentially being just a little stretch of the arm away. Like that constant 2.5-foot radius you keep between you and your Blackberry, at all times, ever? Just about that far.

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Hark, ye post red-eye flight straight-to-work sunrise. You're like coming home to the world's ugliest, most affectionate puppy.

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Out in Adult Land, it is truly every man for herself. You hit the ground running amongst people who’ve been sprinting for miles, people who’ve slowed to a mosey with their arms held out, helmeted douchebros on Segways, hipsters splayed out on the floor taking Instagrams of themselves… No signs, no orientation advisers, no freshmen, no brakes.

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And very little to no mommies.

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However, a mother's love knows no bounds. Especially when she knows your work address.

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You feel really, really stupid.
You get really, really humble.
You’re stripped of all of your false co-ed confidence, flakin’ off of you like rusty paint. You’re a baby again..
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Much like this baby. This is Over-it Baby. She's our office signal for when we've reached that critical editors' point when you "just can't."

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And then, like a baby, first a little and then all at once,
You get to start over.
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As soul-sucking as it can get, on the best days, it’s incredibly liberating. Feeling the wind in your hair bun beast is never bad. I know, everyday, that these are the days I’m going to look back on and say, “I’m so glad I did that for myself. All by myself. I’m so happy I allowed myself to grow that way.” I’m feeling okay with falling on my face, and I know the difference now between saying that and meaning it. I’m growing a real thick skin, the kind that only comes with facing discomfort, movement, failure, challenge, every day. And while it doesn’t always feel like it, I know I’m adopting the kind of common sense and confidence I would’ve never learned if I hadn’t flown the coop.

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I’m exhausted, scatterbrained and a baby-bit homesick.
But to tell you the truth, I’ve never been more proud of myself.
And I should tell myself that more often.

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It's autumn time in my happy place. The fact that I found a happy place -- I'm proud of that, too.

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And y’know best part? No one person, not one, skips these ugly years. I’ve asked many an adult specimen. Hell, some people never shake them off.

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It’s hard, you guys. Harder than we were ever warned. But the big secret is that all of those who are brave enough to face it are knee-deep in it. We’re all overwhelmed. In the “real world,” you can’t hide behind Facebook-fake happiness — everything is not okay.
But we grit our teeth. We go on rooftops. We live for happy hour. And one day, I think we’re gonna miss being this young, messy, stupid and at the core, happy.

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Turns out successful growing up is not ever growing up: Hence, endless childhood clapping games with some brewskies and some rooftop.

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After all, striking out and attacking the world face-first — it’s the way my mommy did it.
It’s the way a lot of our mommies did it.
And if my story makes my kids half as proud as hers makes me,
Bring on another day.
I’ll be good.

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Creator’s Block

Click to read!

Letting my brain wander tonight, I used MindNode to map out an issue that’s been plaguing me for the last few months or so. I tried to be as true to my real thought process as possible.

I’d really, really love some help on this.

Basically:

I get an idea and I want so badly to act on it.
But the creative process gets blown up bigger and bigger and bigger in my head,
until I feel so overwhelmed and distracted that I just run away,
get on Facebook, watch The Office.

By the end, I get half-finished drafts and double the contained-creativity anxiety I began with.

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BLEGH.

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I would love nothing more than to break this cycle.

What’s up with me?
Does this happen to you?
Does it chafe, like mine does?
How can I snap out of it?

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Growing (Com)p(l)ains

There’s a quicksand made of routine and self-doubt that pulls at the eyes of many adults I pass, every day, on the D train, on the A train. I’m fortunate enough to work in an office where virtually everyone dreamt of making it there, and are working their tails off to make something of their moment. But for far too many, adulthood isn’t so gracious.

Is that bad luck or a lacking?

There’s a food coma made of disappointment and shouldas that has so many grown ups’ eyes glazed over. People get a lot of good-enough out here, plenty of okay-I-guess to pick through. The chase for incredible seems funny to some people. Cute, even, when you’re my age.

Is that deafening reality or defeat?

There’s a muffled yell made of that look in a dog’s face, when it runs like mad towards a cat but is yanked into submission within a few feet of its target. It feels like what everything sounds like when you’re underwater. It looks like what so many people look like on uptown trains home.

Is that sacrifice, or is it surrender?

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In Spite Of Me

I never write about my boyfriend. Right? But I’m going to let myself today.
This is a disclaimer, to co-workers, to head hunters, to those who generally respect me: Do skip.

Yesterday was John and I’s 2-year, 11-month-aversary. Yeah, we do those. Last night, we let our celebration dangle on hope slash faith slash pleasemercifulAphroditeplease by trying the Wicked lottery — and losing, for the 7th time. As we walked down 50th and I, for the 7th time, quietly tried to brainstorm ways to make the night not suck, John handed me two tickets to Wicked that he had bought earlier that week anyway. Just in case.

He left today, and I’m writing about him because I’m allowed to be sad.
But before he did, he hummed a few bars of this song.

Yes, And

Since about 8pm last night, when I wrapped up my day teaching kids about magazines at summer camp, finished my first batch of New York sinigang the way my dad taught me, and settled in to finally watch a 2010 Blockbuster I’m ashamed of admitting I hadn’t seen until said-last-night — I’ve had nothing but delicious free time. Free time to watch my favorite Will & Graces, eat more sinigang out of a mug, flop around in my comforter, watch the rain fall since I woke up at 9am this morning  (it was less of the usual jarring shake-awake, more of a gentle ping of a realization that my eyes were already open)…

Actual view; not actual size

And I’ve been thinking about the tiny, gray blip I see peeking out over the horizon — the teeny corner of the blanket of fog that is this coming winter, my first on the East Coast, my first without John, my first few months, really, completely by myself. It’s been hard making new friends, keeping up with all two of my family members this side of Vegas, not to mention keeping up with those I love on the other side. With John and the warm weather leaving… I figure I’ve got a long winter ahead.

But I got a simple start today.

On the “Real World”: Dis-Orientation

You know what they don’t have out here in the “real world?”

Orientation.

Think about it, Twenty-Somewheres: Every one of our major milestones up until now have been rung in by some kind of ceremony, ran by some group of eager Been-There-Done-Thats, providing some kind of comfort amongst a little mass embarassment and a lot of Party City supplies. Someone was always there to distract from our self-consciousness and actually be more embarrassing than us — an Orientation Leader, a Rally Committee member… a calculus teacher in an animal suit.

Out here in this sick place, can you believe it’s frowned upon to let adults in animal suits cuddle you in public?

Sorry. Too much, too soon.

What It Takes

It took two hours to duck out of work early, pack up all of my earthly treasures and haul them out to the curb. Do you know how strange it is to remove everything you own from somewhere you’ve lived for a month, but when you leave it, the room is still entirely lived-in, with personal baubles and bedsheets and cubbies organized in a way only someone else understands? I stepped back and it looked like I’d never been there. Subletting made me feel like a ghost in a lot of weird ways.
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It took 15 minutes to convince a cab driver, one of the many that stopped and then waved me away, that driving me and this pile of luggage behind me to Harlem would be worth his time. I had the faintest idea that the relief and breeze washing over me as we passed through the Robert F Kennedy Bridge, maybe, kinda, felt something like what a woman feels after giving birth. To two cardboard boxes, a duffel, a Swiss roll-y bag and a ricecooker.
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It took $21.76 and just a little bit of pouting to get me onto this island, instead of navigating an $100+ uHaul through Manhattan traffic. It took everything I had to get that last box up 3 flights of stairs. It took one “Hrrrrrng.”-sound of approval from John to seal the I-already-thought-it-was-sealed deal in my head: I really, really love my new place.
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Tab-itha & The Real World

Wondering what immediate-post-grad quasi-quarterlife adulthood looks like?

I want you to take a look at this with me.

I’ve always been a firm believer in the theory that you can measure a person by the tabs in her Firefox (and if she’s using Safari, then I’m just about done with my judgment of her). Please view the above and ponder for a bit.
Reflect.
Consider.

Chicken Skin

Today, I got goosebumps.

Curtains Up

Tonight, on the eve of cashing my first really-forealforeal-big-girl paycheck, I am sinking into a realization like one lowers themselves into a hot, bubbly bath: I am officially living and working in New York — grindin’ in Midtown, rooted in Astoria. I feel like I’m in the grad school of life, stressed until I’m cross-eyed, making a thousand mistakes everyday, hitting every wall face-first and, most incredibly, coming out sweaty but smiling (literally — out of the N train, out of the Hearst sushi line; out of long one-on-one’s with the boss…). I almost forgot how wonderful such sweet, sticky challenge feels between my fingers. And I’m having a difficult time discerning the feeling between “I’m an intern staying for the summer” and “I’m a grown-up staying… indefinitely.”
(This changes, however, with every passing Happy Hour.)

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On a rooftop in the Upper West Side; "To the big girl life."

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I thought about it.