Our Worth

Mary Oliver once wrote, about approaching death:

"When it's over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real

I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world"

How do any of us really know the impact that we have made? How do any of us know how much we really matter? It's all relative any way - our definitions on what makes one matter. I guess we all matter, we all make an impact - no one comes into this world and then leaves it without touching someone, somehow, for better or for worse.

It's all the pressure we put on ourselves to accomplish this or accomplish that. Anyone who read my last blog post probably knows that I've been struggling with this - living a life that matters, living a life that's mine. I've fallen into this weird loop of living for everyone around me and not for myself. But I don't want to get into all that again. The thing is, now that I recognize that in myself, what's next?

I am currently in the middle of watching a person I love fall out of this earth, losing his body to disease, and to say that this is the most painful time in my life would be beyond an understatement. To say that I'm in a bad place right now would be the same. But - I am surrounded by family, constantly receiving words of love and encouragement from friends and colleagues alike, and I have the California sunshine embracing me in its warmth. Pretty soon I will need a lot to heal - I am  trying to prepare myself but really, you can never prepare for anything like this. However, it's good to know that when the darkest days arrive, when I'm in my worst moment, I will have people there ready to try and pull me out of it if I drift too far away.

Is that the way you measure your worth? By the love you have gained and given? If so, I guess in one way, this year has been great - because it's helped me see that I do have a lot of love in my life, even though it doesn't feel that way most days.

So what now? I'm sitting in limbo. I'm on the edge of something I can't speak out loud. I can see its face. I can hear its name. It's so close and I don't know how to make it go away - because there is no making it go away. You can't stop a storm. You can't stop the world from turning. It's what you do with the time you've got left - that's what it all comes down to. Thinking beyond this moment in time is too hard so simply being here and living is all we can do.

The Thirty Spiral

Sometimes it’s weird when I think about the end of my 20s. Nineteen year old me steps outside of my body and looks at 29 year old me and it’s hard to believe I’m not that same kid who lived in a house with seven people, living off of spaghetti, cheap vodka, and Marlboro menthol lights. I journaled regularly, I traveled, I went to a different concert almost every night, and I was open to just about any new experience life threw at me. I was convinced that I was going to save the world. I knew where I was going, and I knew how I was gonna get there. Life was nothing but a series of open doors and it was up to me to decide which ones I wanted to walk through.

It’s ten years later, and if I have to be perfectly honest, I feel like most doors are being closed and locked and I’m just standing here without any keys.

I don’t want to get into all of my sorrows but I’ll say that this has been a troubling few months for me and it’s getting hard for me to stay focused on the things I want to do. I don’t volunteer much these days and I attribute that to a) my exhaustion and b) my lack of motivation for pretty much anything outside of trying to keep my head above water – which I kind of feel like I’m barely doing most days.

And then there’s that 30^th birthday looming over me. I never thought I’d be that person who wrapped up all my hopes and dreams in that stupid number. I never thought I’d care about turning 30 – it’s just a number, right? It doesn’t mean anything, does it?

I have a lot of friends who happen to be older than me and it’s difficult to communicate around them what it feels like for me, turning 30, because I feel like it’s just indulgent whining and it’s always met with, “30 is nothing!” or “You’re still young.” I suppose that’s all probably true, but the fact of the matter is, I wanted to be in a certain place by now. I admit it – I have targeted expectations for my life and I feel like I haven’t met them. Ten years ago, work was such a low priority for me. Not to say that I didn’t care about work – more like my focuses were firmly placed in enriching my everyday life with art and community activism and nature. And I’m so far away from all of that. I always believed that by this point in my life, I’d be living in some flat in a different country – probably Italy – with a not-too-stressful job, having casual dinner parties and regularly visiting vineyards in the countryside. Or at the very least, I thought I’d be on the West Coast, which I’ve always considered my real home, watching the sunset against the Pacific Ocean every night and going on weekend adventures to Mexico because why the hell not.

My life looks very different than how I’d always imagined it but not completely unsatisfying. It’s the people I have in my life that make it worthwhile – work friends who are always down for happy hours & roof top lunches filled with laughter; the Clacker folks who keep things interesting, always; Rachel, Jeff, and Mike, who I don’t get to see often but still my second family; the Club Dumas, who inspire me beyond all reason, even when they are not with me; and even my Virginia guys, who are all living their own separate lives in all different directions but still provide me without some of the best memories from my post-college days.

The problem is… I’ve stopped and looked at my life and I feel like I am living it for all of these people and not for me. My life has become less about what I want to do with it and more about doing what’s best for those I love. There’s nothing wrong with that, theoretically, but I don’t even feel like I have a life of my own anymore. I’m a spectator, watching everyone else move forward, while I’m in the world’s longest rut, trapping myself in a world that I don’t truly want to be in. But what does one do when she need to make a drastic change in her life? I guess the answer would be to summon the bravery to take a risk.

But would changing everything I know about my life really make me happy? What is happiness really? How does a person really achieve that? I don’t know the answers and so I’m stuck, just watching everyone – and I just keep wondering how does everyone have it figured out and I’m still flopping around, confused and scared? I’m not even content. I’m restless. I’m restless and bored and sick of sitting down – I want to jump on a plane and just take off, someplace, somewhere, sometime, without plans or itineraries. I want to wake up every morning knowing that I am doing exactly what I want to be doing and feeling so happy that I’m contributing something that matters to this society. I want to welcome art and music into my life – not to look at it and hear it, but really be immersed in it somehow.

When did I stop being that person that took chances? I know that as an adult, you have to make sacrifices. You have responsibilities, and they are real and you have to reshape your life somewhat to meet them. I see friends with husbands and wives and mortgages and babies and I know that I don’t want those things because while I am so happy for them for having the things that make them feel complete, I honestly just see them as giant anchors taking away even more of my life choices. But then I get caught in a spiral – if I choose to turn my back on these things, what’s going to happen in another 30 years? I am probably about the most independent person there is, but I’m actually starting to wonder… when I’m old, and all of my friends are in their family bubbles, am I going to be sitting here, still alone? I hate myself for even caring about this. I hate myself for letting the fact that I’m turning 30 transform me into this person I’ve never been. But I can’t turn my thoughts off.

The uncertainty in my family right now is also contributing to all of these fears and it’s also making me questions a lot of things in my own belief system. I have two strong feelings that are constantly fighting each other right now: living life to the fullest, because life is short versus what’s the point of it all? It’s playing a lot of crazy games in my head right now and it’s making me feel kind of like I’m going crazy. I wake up one day, thinking that I’m going to make the best of a horrible situation and the next day, it takes everything inside of me just to get out of bed and get through the day without crying every ten minutes.

Naturally, being me, I’ve decided to put all of my “feels” into a playlist because music has always ALWAYS been the one thing that I can count on to pull me out of the darkness. Music is the best therapist I’ve ever had. So, I pulled up my iTunes, and created a group of 30 songs (because I’m nerdy like that) which all represent a lot of what I’m going through right now and I’ve been listening to it a lot. I’ve also been reading some of my old journals and flipping through pictures from college and high school, considering that maybe there are pieces of younger me that I can still incorporate into 30 year old me’s life.

For now, the journey continues, and I’ll try to get through it the best I can without losing the best parts of myself.

And I suppose I’ll close with my “30 Songs for Turning 30” playlist, in no particular order:

·         “Under Pressure” by Queen & David Bowie

·         “Forever Young” by Alphaville

·         “Hang On” by Dr. Dog

·         “Home” (from The Wiz) by Stephanie Mills

·         “We Use to Wait” by Arcade Fire

·         “A House Is Not a Home” by Field Music

·         “I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times” by The Beach Boys

·         “God” by John Lennon

·         “There’s Never Enough Time” by The Postal Service

·         “Where Have All the Good Times Gone” by David Bowie

·         “Shake It Out” by Florence + The Machine

·         “Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)” by Arcade Fire

·         “Beware of Darkness” by George Harrison

·         “Here Comes a Regular” by The Replacements

·         “Just Do You” by India.Arie

·         “How It Ends” by Devotchka

·         “Light & Day / Reach for the Sun” by The Polyphonic Spree

·         “Stand By Me” by Otis Redding

·         “I’ve Gotta Be Me” by Sammy Davis, Jr.

·         “Some Days Are Diamonds” as sung by Amos Lee

·         “You Only Live Twice” by Nancy Sinatra

·         “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” by Nina Simone

·         “Supply & Demand” by Amos Lee

·         “Inner Revolution” by Adrian Belew

·         “I Shall Be Released” as sung by Nina Simone

·         “Hungry Heart” by Bruce Springsteen

·         “That’s Life” by Frank Sinatra

·         “This Is the Day” by The The

·         “To Build a Home” bye The Cinematic Orchestra ft. Patrick Watson

·         “You Get What You Give” by New Radicals

Much love,

N

"Little Things Mean A Lot"

Today's blog post is inspired by my beautiful, amazing friend Lindsay and her absolutely delightful blog Smells Like Sunshine (which, by the way, was nominated for an AWARD for how awesome it is). I don't post nearly enough and sometimes it's hard for me to come up with new and fresh topics. Part of the problem is that I write so much for work and now school again that when it comes time for "personal" writing, I go blank. What do I write that isn't just more of the same ol' same ol'... or even worse - and even more pathetically - what do I write when I'm pretty much not being told what to write? Yikes, amirite? What kind of journalism grad am I?

But wonderful bloggers like Lindsay give me hope that maybe JUST MAYBE... I can keep this blog going. So that's what I'm going to do.

As previously posted, most of my friends will be out of town this week. Plus I have limited funds anyway, which is why I opted not to go out of town this weekend with my friends. So this is going to be one of those weekends where I actually have very little distractions preventing me from doing the following:

*Cleaning my apartment, which is a total sty
*Looking up fun new recipes to try (I've got a chicken summer salad that I am dying to make)
*Making a dent in one of the three books I'm reading right now (I swear I'm going to finish Dance With Dragons one of these days)
*Maybe visiting the record shop and get a couple of new goodies?? (I'm jonesing for some old folk albums because sunshine always puts me in the mood for some old fashioned folk. Margo Smith, anybody? I need some of her in my life right now.)
*Starting to set up my yardless backyard (with chairs, potted plants, hanging lamps!!!)
*Going on a journey around Meridian Hill Park with Lee and hoping that he doesn't steal anyone's lunch this time
*Taking myself to the movies - and yes, I will be seeing The Great Gatsby, duh

My brother wanted me to come out to Woodbridge again to hang, but honestly I'm exhausted with making my lazy ass travel out to the boonies every weekend. So this is going to be the Weekend of Natacia (WoN) where I only do things that I want to do. I think I've earned it - classes have ended, I have no work to take home (knock on wood), and my family is currently enjoying a period of stability (GASP!) - and thus I am taking some time for me.

Is it sad that I'm really really excited about cleaning my oven and folding my laundry? Yeah, probably.

Oh, back to the Great Gatsby - words cannot convey how excited I am for that movie! Have I mentioned how much I love that book and how many times I've read it? But really, mention it because early this morning I was horrified to learn on Twitter that Levar Burton has NEVER READ IT. Mr. Reading Rainbow Himself has never read one of the greatest novels of our time?! Is anyone else horrified? I'm horrified. I think I may have to write a letter to him about this travesty. A tweet is not enough.

....Though he did praise Carey Mulligan and since I have a huge girl crush on her, I mean, maybe I can forgive him or something.

Still a travesty, though.

Whew! Lindsay, how do you do this so often?!

Quiet Times & Little Changes

So here I am – again, after far too much time – but as it turns out, grad school sucks up a lot of time. However, as much time as it sucks up, I do need an outlet… lest I start randomly bursting into tears or becoming hysterical.

My first semester of my current program is at an end and I am happy that I a) survived and b) stuck with it. I am, however, taking a break on classes over the summer – I need some time to decompress and really assess how my schedule will work in the fall because this spring was brutal and I need to make some very serious lifestyle changes.

It’s difficult because I want to be with my family and friends all of the time – but I can’t. I’m learning that. Things cannot stay the same. I tried to maintain my life the same and all that did was make me feel constantly stressed out all. My sleeping has become increasingly erratic and my headaches have returned. My stress eating is off the chain. But I mean, I don’t want it to seem like I’ve been miserable – I love my program. Plus, I’m getting to know my new neighborhood (Columbia Heights/U Street, what what) and I’m kind of falling in love with everything from the dog parks to the 11^th street district to my new favorite coffee shop, the Blind Dog Café. Lee and I are settling nicely, and I’m really digging how much more space I have in my new apartment. I’m even – gasp! – having people over occasionally!!! So I have a few things to be grateful for and happy about.

One thing that I do really miss is the movies. I haven’t been in forever in months. What has become of me? However, the upside: this weekend, the Great Gatsby comes out in theaters and I’ll be there watching it, even if it means taking myself on a date. With most of my friends gone this weekend, it’ll be a good opportunity to just… relax. And I plan on doing just that.

I’ve been hanging out with myself more lately in the last couple of weeks and I think it’s been good for me to take a step back from a lot of things. While I don’t feel less stressed necessarily, I feel less… pressured. If that makes any sense.

I guess the catch is making sure that I'm not actually taking so much time by myself that I end up completely alone. I have a history of this and then I get a little too comfortable in the silence.

For now, I think I'm on the right track and I'm feeling good about where I'm at. Now to get back on a decent diet track....

Contributing to Joy: Why It's Challenging but Necessary

OK, so it's been a REALLY long time since I've posted. Like two months or something? First of all, I want to apologize, I swore I wasn't going to do this again... but let me try and explain myself.

I want my blog to be a place of positive reinforcement - both for myself and others - but over the last couple of months, things have been rough in my world. I don't want to go into great detail about everything but I will just say that my father's state of health has worsened, school has intensified, and work is... well, work is (as always) very time consuming and stressful. Truth be told, I haven't really had a whole lot of positive things to say lately - I was in a serious funk, which I tend to fall into from time to time. My "funks" sometimes last for weeks, maybe months, and they involve me not really want to interact with people and also being super sad all the time. The worst thing about when I get like that is no one can really pull me out of it. I have to be ready to pull myself out. I'm sure this is frustrating for my friends - even though they'll never admit it - because there are few things worse than watching someone you love fall into misery while all you can do is just stand by and watch it happen.

But good news! I am out of my dark period, and feeling better about things. Spring is in the air in DC (finally, after winter flat out REFUSED to get the fuck out for a long while) and I am seeing good things in front of me. A recent dinner with my advisor really helped me out, she gave me some sound advice that really struck a chord in me: "Strive to succeed but don't be afraid to fail and don't live in your fear. People fail sometimes, and it's OK. The world won't end."

And that's the rub because I am always TERRIFIED of failing and of letting everyone down. My family, my friends, my boss, my colleagues, my professors. I put an unbelievable amount of pressure on myself and then I hate myself for not being perfect at everything. It's crazy, and I know it's crazy, but what can I do? I just need to give myself a fucking break already. I know I keep saying that and I'm sure if you go back and look at my other blogs I've probably said this same thing over and over again but it's so hard not to fall into that pattern over and over again.

Anyway, while things definitely have been rough, they haven't been all bad. My dad has started chemotherapy and radiation and the doctors are very optimistic about his chances. He didn't want to go this route, treatment-wise, and fought it for a long time (and in fact is still bitter that he's doing it now) but I think he realizes that he wants to live long enough to watch his kids and his grandkids grow and succeed. He wants to get married and live with his new love for as long as possible. He wants to be a really old man sitting on his rocking chair on the back porch, watching the Pacific ocean waves crash against the sand at dawn. And I'm so relieved! He's fighting to live and thank God for that.

School has become more manageable once I got serious about it - in the sense that I was feeling overly confident in those first couple of months, thinking I could handle it all and keep the same lifestyle I've had over the last few years. And just so you all know, I cannot. For one, classes aren't cheap and I'm not rolling in cash. For two... and this is the big one.... I just don't have the time. I just flat out don't. I can't do a bunch of happy hours. I can't party all weekend. And frankly, I don't have the energy to stay up all night reading because I decided I wanted to have a late night dinner with friends. The amount of reading I have to do for my law class is outrageous and good lord, will I be happy when it's fucking over (which will be very soon) but that's the way it is and I need to accept that. And my excess time will decrease with each passing semester.

Though, at the same time, I cannot isolate myself because when I do that, I become sad and lonely. So it's all about finding a balance and hopefully I'll get better at that.

Also! I am moving from Logan Circle to Columbia Heights. A slightly bigger place (though not as nice, with no hardwood floors and no dishwasher and no W/D in the unit) closer to most of my friends in the city. Closer to my gym. And right down the street from Satellite, 930 Club, Town, and Nellie's. In fact, I timed it yesterday, and it takes me approximately 7 minutes to walk to that awesome corner of U Street. Holla! That could be dangerous for me - my love for gay men, live music, and alcoholic smoothies knows no bounds.

So things are looking up. Fun projects like painting my new apartment (which wow, how are my friends awesome enough to want to help me out with this?) and planning a charity event to raise money for Whitman-Walker's AIDS Walk are helping me to be creative and stable in their own ways.

And now... I have finally posted something on my blog. I'll end it with a quote from the amazing Roger Ebert, who lost his battle with cancer this week but will always always always be an inspiration in my life:

"I believe that if, at the end, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do. To make others less happy is a crime. To make ourselves unhappy is where all crime starts. We must try to contribute joy to the world. That is true no matter what our problems, our health, our circumstances. We must try. I didn't always know this, and am happy I lived long enough to find it out."

Much love, you guys.

-N

How Lena Dunham & Girls Are Hate-Mongering

Usually, I really love HelloGiggles.

<insert Natacia is a hipster joke here>

Honestly, I think it's so nice to have a website that is devoted to happiness and cuteness and positivity. It's so refreshing. I also think there's something to be said for a group that says, hey you can wear flowery dresses and get fancy manicures and eat piles of candy and still be a "feminist" and a strong woman. I hate when women judge each other on how they SHOULD be acting in order to be independent and progressive - and goddammit, if I want to wear a dress with a peter pan collar with baretts in my fucking hair, so be it. Don't tell me that if I do that, I'm not being woman enough. I can do whatever I want.

That being said, the below HG article really enraged me:

http://hellogiggles.com/lets-leave-lena-dunhams-looks-alone-now-please

 It's not just because I don't care for Lena Dunham. The point that they're making here is that Hanna (the character that Lena plays in the bullshit that is HBO’s Girls) may not be traditionally pretty but using that as a reason to hate her is completely ignorant. Sure, OK, I'll totally buy that and had this article just left it at that, I would have just let it go. But the fact this chick has the nerve to say the ONLY criticism that the media (or anyone) has against Dunham is her looks - that's what really gets my goat. Lena Dunham could look like fucking Mila Kunis and I'd still think she’s awful. She comes off as a “voice of a generation” - MY generation, to my absolute horror - and her show is just a parade of overly privileged, obnoxiously affluent, hateful, selfish, self-important, pseudo-intellectual, mean-spirited, distasteful, culturally-dead city brats who like to constantly play victim when they’re cushy lives get even slightly disturbed. Oh, and they also lack any diversity, despite the fact that they live in FUCKING NEW YORK CITY. I cannot express to you how tired I am of hearing people rave about Lena Dunham and her show but what I hate more is the people who have the audacity to act like this horrible, disgusting show is an accurate representation of how “real” women are in this day and age. In the beginning of the first season alone, there was a “hilarious” scene in which some asshole fuck buddy has sex with Hanna in what is essentially a fantasy that she is an 11 year old he snatched off the street and is now raping. Another scene features a blasé attitude in regards to the matter of abortion – and no matter what your stance is on the subject, I feel like it’s a topic that at least deserves some fucking respect when addressing it. Oh, and the priceless scene where Hanna’s parents tell her she is going to be cut off financially and she plays the victim and disrespects her parents so thoroughly that I’m STILL shocked she didn’t get slapped.

I honestly don’t understand the appeal of watching a show so hateful. It’s worse than reality TV somehow. It’s like the producers of that show – ahem, I’m looking at you, Apatow – combined the public’s love of reality TV, hipster culture, and twee intellectualism into one ugly mess. It’s horribly exploitative without any real commentary. It’s shitty comic timing. It’s hip quirkiness that is totally all about how hip it’s being. Yeah, the characters are all completely unlikeable but that’s not new. Seinfeld is, I think, one of the best sitcoms to come out of TV’s history…. and let’s be honest, none of those four people where “likable.” However, that show succeeded because while the characters were kind of selfish jerks and they never really learned from their problems, the show itself wasn't angry – and the unlikability of the characters is acceptable because (for me, anyway) it doesn't revolve around self-entitlement and just all around shameless trust fund-grubbing. I think the worst part for me is how these girls use their money – wealth, by the way, that they are not earning in any way, shape, or form – to support their dreary, self-involved lives but have no interest in using this wealth to actually IMPROVE their own lives or (GASP!) give back to anything or anyone. It’s reprehensible.

So, in conclusion, Marissa Ross – rest assured. Lena Dunham’s looks are the least vile thing about her. In fact, I happen to think she’s a fairly attractive looking person. It’s her view of the world that is ugly. 

Forgiveness & Personal Growth

Recently I experienced the official end of a friendship and it was a somewhat surreal experience - mostly because of the things that this person told me, airing out hateful grievances that quite honestly came out of nowhere. However, that's not really what this post is about. It stinks when a break from someone is messy but such is life. What really stuck in my mind was discussing with a group of friends my inability to let people go even when they have done something reprehensible and one of my friends telling me that people are often better than the worst thing they've ever done. It's a phrase I've heard before but somehow I haven't been able to get it out of my head since she said it.

I've started wondering what my line is, if any. It's an odd thing because I can be a highly critical person - sometimes as a joke and sometimes for real - but I have the fundamental belief that all people have the capacity to be more than what we see and more than even they think they are. I can forgive a person for just about anything because we're all fallible and I want to believe that if I did something "unforgivable," that there would be someone there who might still believe in me anyway.

I suppose where things get sticky is when it's quite obvious that a person has no interest in changing or growing or honest self-reflection. I think at a certain point, the groundwork of a person is what it is - such as their values - but I also think that a person should be learning more about himself every single day. We never finish growing and that's the beauty of life! Also? I have a level of respect for someone who accepts that they don't have all the answers and is constantly looking for more of them.

Essentially I think just about everyone is worth the effort. Even the people I walk away from... I honestly hope they have a person who sticks around and tries to help them be better versions of themselves. It's just the emotional and psychological toll that some relationships take in my life that I can't handle and sometimes we have to be a little selfish and think about our own self-preservation.

In truth, I'm lucky to be surrounded by such a rich and diverse group of friends. I feel like not everyone has this luxury. I know when things get hard, I'll have people to lean on... I just like thinking that I can provide that level of comfort and peace to others as well.

In the end, I don't think people are built to be alone and I feel like they should have freedom to make mistakes without ending up alone. Measuring our own capacity for forgiveness, tolerance, and acceptance is what makes us exceptional beings.






....Too uplifting for a rainy Monday morning?