Bound

After missing my flight yesterday, waiting in a 3 hour line to reschedule it, a nice gentleman behind the counter giving me the Christmas gift of not charging me the extra billion dollars to change the flight, dropping a $50 bill in the bank that someone walked off with two seconds after it hit the floor, buying my mom an awesome gift that she'll love but leaving it at a friend's house and not having enough time to go get it before I fly out today, and seeing a horrible movie last night that was a huge waste of 2.75 hours of my life...I'M FINALLY HOMEWARD BOUND!!!!!

I fly out at 3:10. I'll leave for the airport in about an hour, maybe less. We'll get to my grandparents house in Quincy by 10pm, all together too late for an appropriate Christmas Eve. (We put the tree up on Christmas Eve in my family, since "Santa" brings the tree, as far as the kiddies are concerned.) But, I'm not gonna complain. Everything happens as it happens and as the Tao says, we have to learn to be satisfied with things exactly as they are. That's right, Tao, good advice.

So it will be a bit of an unorthodox Christmas Eve, but I'm going home, I'll be with my mom and my loving family, and then I'll be back in New York before I know it.

It's a beautiful day today. I'm sort of looking forward to going home, I guess. I wasn't before. But now I am.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go to the store to buy some gifts. Ahem.

Book It

I booked it. I got the job. Sweet. The temp agency woman says that I'm going in on Thursday and Friday of this week so they can try me out (I was in this same office on Friday, but temping for a different position) and if it goes well, I will return on January 2, after the holiday week off. So, I've basically got the gig. I'm quite quite pleased at this development. I won't adore working there, I don't think, but I will definitely live through it and that's all that matterz. Plus, money. Oh sweet, sweet delicious money. How I've missed you. I will never take you for granted again and our new life together will be better than you could have ever dreamed.

Only a few short days until I board a plane home to Chicago. Ooof. How did what was once awesome holiday time with my loving family turn into something that seems more like a chore? I love them all, it will be nice to see them and be together under one roof. But as I get older, it gets harder to stay patient and calm. I take LOTS of jogs outside when I'm there. It's the only way to get away. I don't have a drivers license.

Life is getting better every day. I won't go so far as to say things are perfect, but I feel a lot happier than I did a week ago. Work = got the job, therapy = back at it, holidays = in full swing and I think I'll survive yet another year, sketch comedy = awesome as always and we have 3 weeks off until our next show..oh yeaaaaahhhh, relationships = I'm feelin pretty good about stuff, which is a welcome surprise, healthy lifestyle = could always use improvment (she writes, as she checks the clock to see if she's going to be late for another holiday party complete with free beer and free food) but is as stable as it can be this time of year.

Oh yeah, and I have the world's cutest cat waiting at home for me every night. Sorry, but that wins.

:)

And WE'RE BACK...sorta.

Yo. Great news. I'm sitting at a JOB right now!!!! WAHOOOO.

Now, first thing's first...this isn't a real job just yet. I'm just temping today for the front desk person. However, it's at an organization where, most likely, I'll be employed full time starting next week sometime. They need someone until April to be the executive assistant to the CEO. My temp agency lady, who sent me on the round of interviews I had here last week, thinks they're gonna hire me because they really liked me best and because they asked to have me in today to temp the front desk gig...probably as a "trial." Sweet. So, fingers crossed, I'll be fully employed before Christmas. If this doesn't work out, I might give away all my worldly possessions and look into nomadism.

Things are on the up and up, methinks. I started back at therapy yesterday which is essential. The session was good and hard and that's why I go. It's also insta-perspective to sit there even for a mere 45 minutes. I heard myself saying stuff I've been saying for weeks, but suddenly when I said it to her, in that room, on that couch, it sounded totally different.

Being back in the workforce (I've been covering sporadic evening and weekend shifts at a theater I used to work at, but today is the first 9-5 deal I've had in two months.) is surprisingly refreshing. Having a job is a privilege. I see that now. My grandfather would be thrilled to hear me say that. It just felt really super to wake up this morning, even though it was early, even though I was sleepy, and know that I was gonna get some coffee, get on the train, go sit in an office, and get paid money in exchange for completing tasks. It's mechanically so simple, but delightful all at once.

I was able to write out a budget last night and soon I'll be able to make some payments I was really stressing about making. I'm pretty sure that Jobless 2006 is about to end. Two months was pretty much all I could handle. I feel like I'm being released back into civilized society with a new perspective on the choices I make and how they impact the things I want.

Plus, maybe I'll start taking some anti-depressant/anti-anxiety meds soon, right? Why not. :)

Fear

The thing about fear is, you can't let it dictate your life. I mean, it's such a simple concept, but one that everyone should work to constantly practice. I certainly don't want to live a fearful life.

I've realized recently that something in my life that's very important to me is also something I've been moving around in, based on fear. I can't keep doing that. I want to have full experiences, not half-versions of full experiences.

Sometimes we have to make really hard decisions when we realize that something is not enough. I've never been terribly good at that....at walking away from something that wasn't enough, in favor of finding something better. But I'm getting better at it and I intend to keep getting better at it.

I think I'm gonna go back to therapy this week, after several weeks off because I couldn't afford it. It's gonna feel like taking a deep breath.

I mean, did you know?

Sometimes we write stuff here:

www.harvardsailingteam.com/blog

Funny. Trustme.

zzzzzzzz

(Remember when I used to post photos on this damn blog? Those were the days. Apparently I might be getting a digital camera for la navidad from la madre. So GET READY. My cat's gonna be so overphotographed and overexposed, I'm gonna be rich.)

So I had a sketch show on Wednesday night, an improv show last night, and I have another sketch show on Saturday. That leaves tonight. I think I'll sit around.

I didn't sleep at home last night so I woke up earlier than usual and dammit if this might not be the key to getting back to a normal sleep schedule. As in, what if I started getting up before noon? Who's with me? Maybe I'll be tired enough to fall asleep at a human hour tonight. This rocks.

I feel like things are about to get busy, but things have generally been busy. Bring snacks.

You mean I gotta update this thing?

Oh blog-o-sphere.

I'm watching "Last Comic Standing" on Bravo. Soon, I will go to the gym. For those of you who don't know, I like to exercise. Thanks.

Whatelsewhatelsewhatelse. I know! I'll do a breakdown. BREAKDOOOOOOOWN!

These will be the categories....and I'm just making them up as I go, so who knows what I'll write! Omgosh the excitement.

Work
Health
Relationships
Friendships
Family
Home
Recreation

Also, I'm a dork.

Okay, here goes:

Work: I don't have a job. I can't wait to have a job. I want a job. I hope I get this job I'm being considered for. The second I get a job a huge weight will be lifted. I need to start looking for more jobs in anticipation of not getting this other job. Jobs. The word has lost all meaning. I've started covering sporadic shifts at a box office I used to work at in college and it's fun. Work = makes you feel like a person. Sporadic shifts = the illusion of an income where there really is no income.

Health: I have it. Good. I've been cooking a lot. (Me!) I don't eat things with high fructose corn syrup in them anymore. Never beeeen so healthy, I'd say. Hmph. Plus, the exercise. Toot!

Relationships: Oh boys. I love you all.

Friendships: Thank GOD. Am i right?

Family: I love you. But just stay in the midwest, kay?

Home: God this place is a pit. But Dan bought a new toilet seat cover. Does it get better?

Recreation: Sketch and improv! Oh it's all going so well I feel like someone should pinch me. It's really cool that I've found a niche like this.

Thanks. Bye.

This particular Thursday.

I'm home. In Chicago. I'm currently across town from my mom's house, at my Aunt Lisa and Uncle Kel's house, which sits on a cul-de-sac in typical midwestern fashion. Apparently some show called "Ugly Betty" is on in ten minutes and apparently some of us will be watching it. About 30 people (and one little baby) were in and out of this house today to celebrate the holiday. My Aunt Lisa's sisters and brothers and their wives and husbands and their kids have made a tradition in the last few years of flying into town for my Aunt Lisa's awesome Thanksgiving dinner, and my Uncle Kel's syblings (my mother is one of them) and parents (my grandparents) and all of us grandkids try to make it every year too. I have flown in from New York for the last seven or eight years to be here with my huge family, if only for a couple days. I love them all very much.

It ends up being an incredibly roudy time. The men get quite drunk, the women get quite tipsy, everyone gets loud, the kids get older and wiser every year and sit around and discuss how perspectives shift as we age. My cousin Trisha just got engaged to her boyfriend, who I met for the first time today. He's awesome. I approve. I'm a bridesmaid in the wedding. We're all getting older.

Now that it's almost 7pm (and dinner was at 2pm - and drinks have been flowing from 12noon to the present), there's a game of poker going on upstairs in the kitchen, some girlie chatter going on in the upstairs living room, a crazy old lady talking nonsense to a passionate middle aged man in the den, some people napping, some people laying on the floor in front of the fire, Mallory's reading a magazine, and I'm sitting here updating the ol' blog. How could you have it any other way.

Every year I dread the extra effort and inconvenience of two plane rides in three days and the predictable hellos and how are yous and the promises that we'll see each other in a few weeks at Christmas, and every year I end up feeling so incredibly blessed and lucky and grateful and glad to come from such hearty, happy, intelligent, lively stock who are all able to be here each year. I'm a lucky young lady.

In the car on the way home from the airport this morning I had to tell my grandmother that I got fired from my job. She didn't know yet. I was expecting her to be devastated as she concerns herself greatly with the details of my life. I wasn't looking forward to the conversation, but it ended up going quite smoothly. She's really mellowed out in her old age. Naturally, my mother told me later that my grandmother was fighting back tears in the front seat of the car, but I didn't notice at the time, so that's that.

At present, three people under 50 are giving an 82 year old woman a hard time about her new boyfriend, Clyde. Oh man, oh man.

I can't wait to get back to New York to my loving friends and my lovely life. But in the meantime, I'll do some relaxing, some shopping, some family bonding. And hopefully Grandma will slip me a few twenties before I go to the airport. :)

My BACK

I helped my good friends, Clayton and Carla, move yesterday and they didn't have a TON of stuff so we decided that just the three of us would provide plenty of man-power. We got it all done in a relatively short amount of time, but dammit if my whole entire body doesn't wanna kill all of you. Sorry.

It was fun, though, to be all super physical for a few hours, which apparently really takes your mind off everything else except for "OhmygodIthinkmythighsfelloffbackthere!" and my friend Carla gave me a really really nice and thoughtful gift at the end of the day for helping them. Their new apartment is gorgeous (if not up three flights of stairs - mythighs!) and we all earned the two cans of Bud Light that we downed when it was over. Then I went over to another friend's house who was cooking dinner when I walked in the door and it smelled like a home. We ate and chatted and hung out and he has too much left over Halloween candy. A lovely day, frankly.

I'm feeling a lot better than I was over the weekend. I think a weekend of partying due to a birthday, although great fun, can really make you feel like a loser when you don't have a job to back it all up with.

BUT, I signed up at a temp place yesterday and I have another interview tomorrow and I feel like things might start coming together soon. Awesome. I'd love to have something permanent before Thanksgiving so my grandmother doesn't keel over when I tell her I left my last job.

Pretty sure that lady's gon' keel over. She loved my last job. I think she's gonna be pissed. Needless to add, I haven't told her yet.

Today!: exercise, grocery shop, rehearse, watch comedy.

I've been sleeping in WAY too late. I got home at 4am last night. Q Train, you are my nemesis.

Things are on the up and up, people. It turns out, if you just shut up about it, you start to feel bettah. Hmph.

Anyone wanna watch The Little Mermaid with me? I got the DVD version for my b-day. Colorful!

Alright, Fuck.

I'm pretty sure I'm depressed. Smoking, drinking, doing nothing...these are all pretty good indicators that I'm wallowing in some self pity, some I don't wanna, and some this is really boring.

I haven't had a job in a month. I'm pretty sure that, barring any major obstacles that should arise, I'll be getting up a reasonable time of the morning tomorrow, putting on some nice clothes, and going to meet with a temp agency woman. I need to start doing something with my day time. My birthday is over, the party is over, the Weekend Of Shows that I've been anticipating for a while now is over and I need to fucking pull up my boot straps and shut the fuck up about it.

I seriously MISS having a semblance of a real life. Because as much as doing nothing all the time is rather freeing and as much as you realize, DANG that job thing took up a whole lotta time, those feelings wear off pretty quickly and you end up getting real used to sitting around all day, waiting for your friends to get off work. And you end up getting real used to hating it. I miss being super busy and not being able to stop to think about whatever the fuck I want to whenever the fuck I want to.

The worst part of feeling blue like this is that the little things people do that usually wouldn't bother you at all, or usually would roll right off your back, are the things that make you feel like shit for 12 hours straight. And that's just completely unfair to everyone. Especially your loving happy friends who have lives that don't revolve around you.

I NEED A FUCKING JOB.

Omg i need a goddammed job.

Here it begins again.

So, I have turned twenty-six. It happened on a rainy Tuesday. I spent the day with my best friends Billy and Adam and then I went to improv class and out for drinkings afterwards. Tonight, I'm going out with a group of people to a bar downtown, should be fun.

Ever since I got fired, I've been living a very purgatory-like life. This hasn't been an easy period of time and I have to constantly remind myself that I'm a worthwhile human being. Tonight will probably be my last hurrah for a while; I need to regain a sense of what it means to be me and start taking some things more seriously. I really am so blessed and I wonder if I just create obstacles for myself more than anything else.

I should have a job soon. The comedy stuff is really awesome right now, I'm feeling good about what I'm doing and how much I enjoy it. I feel so so so lucky to have weekly opportunities to perform. Rehearsing, performing, taking class, going to improv practice, watching shows...these things take up the majority of my time, occupying almost every night of the week. I wouldn't change it for anything. It's a fulfillment I never knew I was missing and to have been so deeply involved in it for the past two years, to keep finding new things I love about it, to keep being moved and excited by the old things I've always loved about it...is awesome. I feel really lucky that I went to a great school and ended up with some sweet training and always followed my emotional desires. As much as my emotions plague me and as much as I live by them in ways that I wish I wouldn't, following my feelings might have always been a strong suit of mine, whether I've allowed it to serve me or not.

Being twenty-six feels older than ever. It's kinda awesome though. I haven't minded getting older as I've gotten older. Street cred, I guess.

I have been struggling to hold on to value lately, to hold on to what I value and to remember to find value in what I know I value, if that makes any sense. The party is over, my birthday has passed, I've been jobless for four weeks exactly and I'm ready to start the next happy chapter.

Now I'm going to go to the gym and go shopping for a new top for my party tonight.

And I think I'll have a goddammed latte.

Yes!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

I gotta run, I'm late for therapy. ;)

Executive Decision

Tomorrow's my birthday.

I've been sitting here trying to decide if I should splurge on a $15 mani/pedi. Tomorrow's my birthday. Decision made. See you at the nail place.

xoxo

Disclosure

Gonna start titling these suckerz!

I'm trying to smoke less weed.

And now I think to myself, is there anyone who reads this who I don't want to know that I smoke weed?

Nope. No one. Freeing.

Anyway, I'm trying to smoke less of it. And here's a quick tip. If you don't buy it, you can't smoke it. Durrrr.

This morning, at 4:40am, I woke up, put on pants, got into a minivan with my friends Billy and Adam, drove to the West Side to pick up a bunch of bundles of magazines, drove to Valley Stream, Long Island to "dispense" them, stopped at Billy's parent's house for orange juice and conversation, and drove back to the city. Many laffs were had. Then I got home to queens at 11:30am and zzzzzzzzzz'd. We got paid a lot of money, relatively speaking, to complete this task.

I'm going to the gym at 6pm. I AM. I really am.

I'll be 26 in 4 dayz.

I had a pretty awful therapy session on Tuesday. She was just particularly hard on me about some stuff she thinks I've been "glossing over." There's something very strange about one grown person paying another grown person to get in their face when they aren't being honest with themselves. I was sitting in that room, all huddled over my cup of coffee, which felt like the only normal object in the room for a few minutes, wondering why this all suddenly reminded me of being reprimanded for not having my napkin on my lap when I was in the 5th grade. I'm sure she, the therapist, would certainly scoff at my making this analogy, since the very point she was trying to make involves me equating something serious that's happened with things that aren't serious. And perhaps she has a point.

But her point is not MY point. My point is, why do I pay someone a million dollars a second to make me feel like my mom flew in from the Chicagoland area, rewinded me to age 8, and sat me down in the living room to raise her cruel eyebrow and wave around the note I wrote about kissing Brian Robinson, the note I folded up into a precious little triangle so only my best girlfriends would know how to open it, the note she found in my pants pockets when she was doing the laundry and somehow cracked my fail-safe note-opening scheme?

My 26th birthday is in 5 days.

Goonies is on! It just started! Will I watch the whole thing? Who knows. But there's a good chance I will.

Ohh hahaha, when Chunk knocks the penis off the statue of David and then glues it on upside down? Hahahaha. Wheew.

I haven't blogged in over a week! Amazing. I suppose I've been busy.

I don't have a job yet, but things are coming together in that area. In the meantime, please send all $1000 checks to me.

So much has changed so quickly in my world and adapting to it has been different-feeling each and every day, but it's all good.

I wish I had something funnier or more interesting to write. I turn 26 in six days! There's that.

Please send all $1000 birthday checks to me.

I'm eating a mini-bagel with egg whites, tomato, and cheese and my cat is spending 100% of his energy trying to get a bite of it. I'm smarter than him, whether he thinks so or not, so I'm simply identifying whatever new tactic he's implementing (the sneak-up, or the act-casual-so-she-won't-notice, or the often effective "what? i'm just looking!") and moving the plate with the bagel on it to the other side of my body JUST as he thinks he's about to succeed. It's genius, really. Because it makes me feel like a big, strong, industrious human and it makes him feel like an insignificant, easily out-smarted feline.

Of course, I'm the one of the two of us stopping everything I'm doing to blog about how I'm proud of myself for stopping my cat from eating my breakfast. He's the one calmly sitting in the window acting like he has no idea what's going on.

Everything's changing. My whole life feels like it's in major transition. It takes some basic breathing to get used to the idea of letting things go and making room for new things and generally adapting to change. Because change can be a very hard thing. Change can also be a very good thing.

It's pretty intense.

I'm looking forward to tomorrow morning though. I've felt that way for a few days now -- that I look forward to waking up to find what the next day will be. Cool.

I bought some lite cheddar cheese. And i'll tell ya what. Not bad. Not bad at all. Totally worth it.

It's rainy today. I could eat anything you put in front of me. Let's see if I can't get that in check before I go out for the evening.

I'm going out to do something expensive tonight. It's $18 to get in and a 2 drink minimum! But it's a show that friends are in. So to it I go. Look at me, acting like I have an income.

Goals for this evening: do not overeat. do not overdrink. Fridays can be tempting.

Big weekend ahead. Gonna see two shows tonight (one play, one improv-karaoke show), gonna rehearse and perform in a show tomorrow night, gonna rehearse on Sunday as well. I can also see some vigorous exercise taking place. I've been running outside like it's my job.

A friend just got a new apartment in Brooklyn. It makes me want a new apartment. That seems like a long way off.

Getting another job thoughts: okay I'm seriously, for a few days now, considering getting a job at Trader Joe's for a little while. Is this insane? I've never worked somewhere like that. Might be good for me. I'm waiting to talk myself out of it, but that hasn't happened yet. Then, after I get sick of that, do I go corporate again, for the money? That makes me a little sick. So i'll just live day by day. Right now: it's friday!

I've been sleeping. A lot. I slept waaay in today. I think I've needed this. I've been on a gotfired-imposed vacation for exactly one week now. This is not half bad. I'm gonna have to find a source of income soon enough. But sitting around doesn't blow.

For now.

I can see how it might get boring though. Or can I?

Improv! I just wanna get better and better at it! Sketch comedy is awesome too. Things are movin and shakin and it's fun.

Bye.

I haven't posted in a few days because being jobless has a nice relaxing hum to it. No need to interupt that with unnecessary blogging.

I'm watching Martha Stewart's show right now and Rod Stewart was just on singing some awful bullshit song that made me want to poke out an eye. Phew, we're at commercial now. Phew.

Alright, so what HAVE I been doing. Well, I'll tell you. And I'll tell you first that it's not half bad. I've been hangin out. I've been tying up loose ends. I've been dealing with the details of being fired like putting together a loose budget for myself so I don't overspend the money I have, telling my mom and dad I got fired, updating my resume, and generally getting organized. Perhaps I'll start applying for some jobs later today. Perhaps not. This has been a week of vacation and I needed it.

I've also been reading and doing crosswords and seeing comedy shows and having drinks and having nice chats with good friends and having dinner and watching tv and listening to music. It's been excellent.

I'm gonna keep takin it real easy for a few days. I'm really enjoying where I am right now, mentally, which is in a pretty zen place. And it doesn't hurt that I just bought my very first copy of the Tao.

Fired: Day One.

This has been one of the most interesting days, intellectually speaking, I've had in a while. My entire reality was turned upside down yesterday at 12:30pm. Needless to say, I spent most of the rest of yesterday simply absorbing what happened. I spent time with a friend, I went to an improv practice, I went to see a show, I went out for drinks at our bar, I did some more late-night hanging out. I needed to totally zone out, decompress, and distance myself from Reality. Luckily, a friend of mine, also had some bad luck job-wise yesterday and he was out with us last night, so I wasn't the only one receiving empathy from everyone for having a pretty interesting day.

One nice thing, and I'm discovering there are actually many (because why not make the best of it), about getting fired is that everyone you know is empathetic about it, everyone you know has a When I Got Fired story, and a lot of people also confess to things they're doing this very moment at their own jobs that could get them fired. Makes one feel like less of a horrible screw up.

Something my friend Jess posted in a recent comment rings very true: I wanted out of that job. But it was too "good" of a job, from a benefits and general ease-of-work perspective, for me to willingly leave it. As an almost 26 year old, it would have been a big decision to leave a great job like that. Evidently I decided to take the hard (or easy, perhaps) way out. I'm outta the job now. Mission: accomplished. One way or another.

Today was a new leaf. Responsibilities that have weighed on me for over a year are suddenly gone, new burdens and stressors have taken their place. But it's nothing more than I can't handle. And I don't mind the whole new set of circumstances. I'm always one for a surprising change of pace.

I'll start focusing on new ways to earn money on Monday. This weekend is about remembering how NOT defined I am by my workplace. I went running today. I'm gonna get my sleep schedule and general health schedule into a nice, relaxing routine. I'm gonna be frugal with my money and enjoy my friends and hobbies and love my New York City Life.

Freedom, Keith. I won't forget it!

I got fired today.

:)

Whew.

It's been a strange couple of days.

As I get older, I continue to surprise myself at how much I'm capable of learning about myself.

Sometimes sad stuff happens, but I can definitely handle it. And I realize I haven't lost myself anywhere along the way.

It's about looking forward; it's about being exactly where I am. It's about trusting the path I'm on, living the life I'm actually living, and being willing to say YES fearlessly. It is exactly what it is. And that's okay.

Harvard Sailing Team doesn't have a show tonight and I think we're all grateful for the Saturday night off. It's been a while. Industry show on Tuesday and then back into a Saturday night run for two months! Whoof!

I have been very tired all day today. And very hungry. And I had improv class practice. And I'm going to go to sleep early tonight and I'm eating a grilled chicken salad right now, thank god.

I have a few things to accomplish tomorrow and I'm loving the new fall weather.

Also, I'm watching Fast Times at Ridgemont High and I'll tell you what, it's a classic.

This is turning out to be a pretty excellent weekend.

Today is my adorable mom's adorable birthday. She's a young 45 years old today. I love you, Mom! Even though you don't read this or know it exists.

Anyway, I sent her a package including a cat mask, which is a long story, but I know she'll love it. Sometimes she drives me up the FUCKING WALL, but my mom happens to be a really awesome, amazing, beautiful woman. And she smells really good like a mom, like MY mom, and that's all that could ever matter. Happy Birthday, Mama!

In other less pleasant news, I had a bizarre evening, last. I have been a lot happier in the last calendar year, consistently, than I've been since I was a kid. And it's a strange sensation to realize that you rarely feel a depressiveness that you used to feel all the time. When I was working my way through and out of that depression, I spent a lot of time alone. I loved it. I needed it and I preferred to avoid intimacy of any sort with any sort of person. I've quit doing that; I'm now intimate with the best of em. But last night, for some weird reason, I wanted nothing more than to be in that depressed, alone, hiding-away place. Except I couldn't muster the ..what..willpower? to actually act on it. Like, I felt these feelings but couldn't quite bring myself to "medicate" them with the isolating actions I used to rely on.

So instead I went for a run and lifted some weights and then had some Chinese food. And I felt better.

I know what I wrote above might not make complete sense, it doesn't make sense to me either. I've grown out of the kind of depression I used to know, and I have, without even really knowing it, developed a whole new way to cope with the world around me. I spent years in emotional and psychological strife. Then I spent years climbing out of that hole of strife. And now I'm not doing either of those things. I'm not making a mess and I'm not cleaning up a mess. I'm just being Me.

And I love comedy.

It seems to me that if they made those little deli napkins much larger and more absorbent, they wouldn't have to give you so many at once. You end up using like 85 napkins to wipe egg off your chin when in all actuality, one big paper towel would also do the trick. It's common sense. And also, frugal.

Ohhhh, they want me to actually do WORK to at work. Ohhh, I'm EARNING money. Okay, cool. I get it now. I'll get right on that. Glad we cleared this up.

Meanwhile, this woman is why I wanted to become an actor:

I got some kleenex and some medicine. And friends try to cheer me up over the instant messenger. All nice things.

But the best thing is in an email I got from someone-sugary. And after checking her blog to make sure I wasn't stealing anything, I decided everyone needed to see this picture that My Favorite Sarah sent me "for balance," which, whether she knows it or not, made my afternoon.

How swank is THIS:



Sorry, Sarah, for stealing your kittens-as-a-heart-photo. I dare you to tell me you mind.

Headache. Fuzzy brain. Stuffed up nasen. Coughing. Sore chest. Sneezing like it's my 9-5. I'll live. But man, it sure makes ya sleepy. I went to sleep really early last night. The theme of this week = sleep.

I'm sitting at the front desk at work right now, covering for the receptionist while she attends a meeting. Attends. I just used that genuinely. While she attends a meeting. Whilst she participates in an arranged gathering of other employees who will discuss certain workplace goals and ideals.

She's really neat and tidy, is the thing I learn about her from her desk. She's got all these little systems and files and I just found her "Tuesday, October 3: To Do List" which is written on formal stationary. Her business cards are in a fancy little business card holder. Everything is just-so, a cup of Starbucks coffee to the left of her monitor, a random pen laying lazily askew, perhaps just for affect. This makes me feel a little like an idiot. Because my To Do List is chicken scratched in a notebook and on post-its all around my desk. My business cards are buried deep in a drawer somewhere and I can assure you I've never handed one out. She's also like 5 years younger than I am and just started this job a few months ago.

Well, FINE. AT LEAST I'M FUNNY. HAHAHAHAHAHAhahahahahahaaaa...ahem.....>cough< >sigh<.

It's Monday! It's October. Aww, October. I'm a fan. I'm a fan of September as well, but October, ooo, crisp yummy October. I'll take 'er.

I enjoy the fall. This is a truth.

I think I'm coming down with a wee ailment. A sickness. A coldette. It's alright. It's fall.

Last week was inSANE. I was so busy, got very little sleep overall, had to get up way too early way too many days in a row, and I was just consistently running from activity to activity. Then, of course, in a desperate attempt to recover a normal sleep schedule over the weekend, I failed tremendously. The weekend was just as busy as the week and it all came to a crashing halt when I ended up sleeping until 3:45pm on Sunday afternoon. No joke. SICK. I needed it though. I was sure that falling asleep the next night would be impossible because I slept so late. Wrong. I was out like a light. I think I am finally back on track, getting a solid 8 hours last night. It's a miracle. I feel pretty good today.

I'm looking forward to having a low-key, sleepful, healthy, gym-going week this week where I don't spend a stupid amount of money and I don't stay up past 2am every night. Revolutionary. I feel all responsible and centered like it's fall and I can take on the world.

Plus, my 26th birthday is in a month. Cool.

At the bar on Saturday after our show a fight broke out! It was awful. But a little exciting. But mostly awful. And we got the hell outta there.

Thanks. Bye.

I'm watching Scrubs, eating dill cheese and triscuits, and I must now go to sleep. I am more tired than nighttime and it feels bad. I'm like a tired bug. I have been operating at full speed on incredibly little sleep for too many days and I'm fucking wiped out.

Why am I still writing this. Good night. See you on Friday. (Friday!!!!)

This is my mom's cat:

Today, September 27, is the exact day, four years ago, when I started losing weight. Over the last four years, I've lost 113.8 pounds.

This is not a particularly easy post for me to write. There are certainly a great number of people in my life who know about my weight loss, as I'm still quite close to many of the people who were in my life four years ago, but there are also a great number of people who know nothing about it whatsoever. I've met a lot of new people in the last four years and I don't really walk around wearing a tshirt that says "Former Lardass." (Although that would be an awesome tshirt.) (Hmmmm....)

It's not a pleasant memory, it was not a pleasant time, and for as little as I invest in a belief in a higher power, I feel nothing short of blessed for having gotten to the other side of it. So it's not necessarily enjoyable to broadcast, especially to people outside of my safe little bubble of close friends and weight loss supporters. More frightening for me, though, than discussing it, is showing people the before photo. No matter how thin a formerly fat person gets, she still feels ashamed of what once was. So this is not an easy post for me to write. Yes, and. Follow the fear, right?

I sat at a diner late last night with a group of improvisor friends and classmates, none of whom knew me when I was heavy, none of whom know I've lost a lot of weight, which is definitely not something you can tell just by looking at me. We were playing a game at the diner called "two truths and a lie" where you share two true things about yourself, you tell one lie, and everyone guesses which are which. Once the game really got going, some people were sharing some really vulnerable stuff...stuff about death or surgery or other painful experiences in their lives. So I jumped in feet first and chose as one of my "truths" to share that I've lost over 100 pounds. It wasn't a terrible thing to share; people don't run away or cower in fear or turn their heads in disgust when you share something like this. But it still isn't a comfortable discussion for me, so watching myself make an active choice to share this information was interesting to me. For some reason, I felt compelled to share with this table full of new friends this piece of my history. (Does anyone want me to use the word "share" again? I'd be happy to.) Perhaps some of the shame of that which "once was" is dissipating. I'm so far away from that fat person now, and today, four years later, I'm going to honor that.

I will never forget the sensation of being heavy. It's a terrible, painful, lonely, constant struggle. It is one of the most crippling diseases a person can live through, especially a young woman, because it impacts literally every aspect of her entire life. Being fat is a filter through which she experiences the world, the same way being blind might be, except that being fat is not a condition that society has much patience or compassion for. Being fat alters her sense of her friends, her job, her family, her education, the men in her life. It impacts her understanding of communication and need and want and desire and love. It's like some kind of drug that skews her perception of the whole world around her until she can no longer see where normal problems end and fat problems begin and, like substance addiction, the longer she tolerates this condition, the more mired she finds herself in a spiral of confusing, murky, cuttingly difficult feelings and experiences that never seem to improve.

I would never go back to that time for anything in the world, but I suppose I do feel a little lucky to have a very intimate relationship with such a different world view from the one most healthy, thin people experience. It's a unique perspective on life to have seen it from two completely different windows, almost like I've lived two separate lives. It has, if anything, provided me with a wisdom and depth of which I'm not afraid to be quite proud. (Who's gay? Me.)

It's incredibly strange to be so far away from being fat that it's only a vague memory. In this case, though, incredibly strange = really fuckin cool.

Here's to Four Years.

(I love how I'm making the same face in these two photos. It's the "Fine. How's this smile?" face.)

Okay. Enough with the serious topics. Back to hilarity and guffawing....

There's a girl at my work who's my age and married. Lovely girl. She's not a New Yorker, having just moved up here from Virginia earlier this year. There are a lot of things that are very different about our personalities, but we seem to get along quite well. Probably mostly because I'm a delight. Alright, fine, she's a delight too.

The point is, she's married. And it's fascinating to me. I'm not entirely sure why her being married is that much more interesting to me than anyone else in the office being married. I'm sure it's partially because she's my age and very few people I know who're my age are married, so I'm captivated by her commitment level. It's also probably because I work pretty closely with her, so I'm privvy to more of the mundane little details of her marriage...like how often he calls...and what cutsie names she calls him...and little anecdotes about married life, all of which add up to give me a (likely quite warped) outsider's perspective on the whole deal.

Please note that the following is most certainly not a judgment on this lovely young woman at all: I can safely say that hearing her talk about being married, and "her husband," and "we" sometimes makes me want to become a "we" even less than I already do.

It's not that I don't want to get married. I do. (No pun.) It's that, at this point in my constantly developing sense of conscious, adult reality, getting married makes me want to barf on your face. And not in a good way.

Whenever she says "we" it makes me shiver a little. Perhaps I'm about to alienate all potential suitors with this statement, but the idea of being a "we" forever and always from age twenty-something onward is possibly one of the more depressing ideas I can imagine. I'm not even sure why that is. I guess it's because I'm pretty sure that that stuff doesn't last nowadays, so why jump into the inevitable end of my own happiness?

All of you reading this who're married, about to get married, or currently dating the person you imagine you'll marry are shaking your head at my naive, unfortunate, loveless perspective on the world, aren't you?

Well that's just FINE. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go take an improv class.

I had about eight seconds to get from 14th Street to West 4th Street this morning, but the R/W train was nowhere to be seen. So I went upstairs and got a cab.

The cabbie had a giant Santa beard, he was wearing an army hat with pins and medals on it and some kind of army style jacket, he was wearing one glove on his left hand, the other hand was bare, and in his gloved left hand, while driving, he held a giant silver cross.....

"Where are you going?"
"Just West 4th Street and Broadway."
"HUH?"
"Just West 4th Street and Broadway."
"I had to ask you to repeat it cuz I'm deaf."
"Okay."
"You don't have to say 'just.' You can just tell me the address, you don't have to say 'just West 4th Street and Broadway.' You don't have to feel guilty about where you're going. I don't care where you're going."
"I'll remember that for next time."
(To someone invisible:) "She knows."

Stories:

The yogurt plus cereal I'm eating right now is not cuttin it. And it makes my jaw hurt to eat it. So, coffee. Mmmmm....

HST went to Chris' parents' house on Long Island yesterday to shoot sketches all day long. There were many, many highlights to this day, including the wonderful nap I took on the leather couch in the den AND his gratious mother and father feeding us the most delicious foods all day long. They're always so hospitable, despite our taking over their home like a band of giggling apes. She made lasagna. Do you understand? Lasagna. Plus, lots of other FOOOOD.

It seems that the people I spend the majority of my time with can still make me fall to my knees in hysterical laughter and evidently that's not gonna change. Also, etched into my brain is the image of Chris falling off the back of the couch and subsequently knocking the lamp out about eight times in a row.

On Saturday night, we had a show in the city, which was awesome. I received a few special surprise treats that night, including, but not limited to, Clayton randomly singing the lyrics, "Raphael is cool but rude!" (from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle cartoon theme song) during the Go Go Go sketch. Since I'm sure that sounds incredibly out of context, especially to those of you who've never seen the Harvard Sailing Team, let me assure you that nothing has been lost in this translation. It was completely out of context and I spit-laughed on Rebecca when he sang it. Lesson 1: The audience loves when the players laugh when they aren't supposed to. Lesson 2: Your friends will screw you over onstage. Lesson 3: Clayton's a punk.

My cat has been without his mother all weekend long. I was home, not. I feel a little guilty. But he made up for it by scratching up my arms and legs and chewing on my hair while I was asleep this morning. Thanks, Floyd. You're tops.

I got a manicure on Saturday that's already chipping a little.

I wanna buy an S.U.V.

So get a load of this!

I went to sleep last night at a really nice time. Midnight. I got nice and tired while hanging out with my roomie, Daniel, watching Law & Order (Uncle Mark didn't do it, it was the captain of the lacrosse team!) and eating egg whites, and I decided to excuse myself to my precious little bedness. I laid down, I closed my eyes, I was asleep within moments. Bliss. Plus, I have this adorable black cat, whom I've mentioned, who's happy to sleep with his mommy. Bliss.

I was resting so nicely, so enjoying my nutritious sleep, that when I opened my eyes at 7am, I literally thought that the universe had accidentally inserted another hour of time into the day. Of course, this was a half-awake/half-asleep theory, but I fully believed it in every respect. I thought, Daniel's gonna be so surprised! I wonder what everyone thinks of this! I thought, how can they do this! Just give us another hour? Did I miss the end of daylight savings time or something? Did we set the clocks forward and I just forgot? No, that's in October. We just got another hour! Oh, universe, THANK you. So thoughtful.

I woke up this morning fully believing that god or love or humanity or infinity had added another hour into Time. And it was pretty frickin cool. Oh, Time, you rascal.

It's like this: Sit around and feel grumpy and bitch about shit and say nasty things about yourself in your own head OR get over it. Turn that frown upside down!

Somewhere around age ... I dunno what age actually, but somewhere along the way I got the idea in my head that letting yourself feel really good stuff, without pooing on it, was a mistake. I was wrong. Letting yourself feel good stuff is the best. Do it always.

I'm a lucky girl with lots of loving and caring people in my life. And I can think of about eight of them who would blow chunks all over themselves if they read that sentence. Which is precisely why I adore them all to begin with.

That said: Love.

Damn you, UPS!!! DAMN YOU.

I don't know what I need. A nap? A hug? To lay around and watch The Princess Bride?

Yesterday when I was running at the gym I actually happened upon the last tenish minutes of The Princess Bride, which is my favorite movie of all time. The last tenish minutes are excellence, as are all the other minutes, but the last tenish are bliss. Everything happens! When Inigo finally kills The Count, when Westley and Buttercup reunite, when Westley threatens Prince Humperdinck with his "to the pain" speech. Gold.

I've realized that a great deal of my concepts about true love, romance, friendship, and fighting people with swords come from that movie. When I was a kid I watched it on repeat for probably about six months straight. So, like Saved by the Bell and ALF, it really molded a lot of my values and ideals. What that mostly means is that I'm going to expect my future husband to almost-die and then come back to life and rescue me by storming a huge medieval castle. With a giant.

p.s. I love every dress Buttercup wears in this movie. Every single one. Shutup.

I had a difficult commute to work this morning, complete with "troubled train" and "idiot girl who wouldn't move out of the way" and "deli guy who refuses to turn around and acknowledge that I'd like to place an order even though we're both perfectly aware that he knows I'm standing there." Oof.

Perhaps those who know me best will find the following concept amusing, but I tend to think of myself as a pretty laid back person, at least when it comes to stuff like this. Unless I'm running seriously late for something, living in New York for eight years has forced me to refine my ability to breathe, relax, and be compassionate toward my fellow city-dweller - cuz, ya know, we all gotta get where we're going.

I was not running late this morning, but I was all stressed about getting here on time because my boss breathed fire into my soul last week and now I'm afraid of her and the things she writes down on her dumb note pad. I think it's time: I'm gonna look for a new job. Because, I mean, nobody likes themselves when they're hatin on the deli guy. Who needs that. He's really nice most of the time.

Who wants burgers?

I'm hungry. God knows why. I had a fiberous salad from Chipotle at lunch and something with eggs for breakfast. Roar.

Today, I had lunch with two of my closest friends. I live with one, I used to live with the other. Well now all work for the same institution. We've all three known one another since we were wee freshman at NYU, so it's cute how we're still best friends and stuff. They're awesome boys. We sat at lunch today, though, with little to say. After you've known people for a long time, after you've spent hours and hours talking and talking...while sober, while on all sortsa drugs, during class, on the subway, waiting for fireworks to start, waiting to board a plane, in the hospital, from adjoining jail cells...you wind up running out of things to talk about. Rather, you wind up running out of things you feel compelled to talk about. Because you've said it all. And what you haven't said, can wait until you're less sleepy. Of course, we can always count on each other for the occasional politically incorrect, racially inappropriate remark, or the (more-popular) snarky, rude, and belittling remark regarding one anothers' personal existence, sometimes from a religious or racial perspective. I get off easy, though, because one's a gay jew, the other's half black and I'm the white girl. So instead they just tease me about the fact that I used to be fat and have been in therapy for four years. It's really the perfect system.

I can't sleep. Not that it's really late or anything, but I was hoping to fall asleep early tonight so as to ensure a timely arrival at the workstead tomorrow. Blech.

So I have the details on my mind: laundry, groceries, exercise, I should probably consider changing departments at work, improv and sketch comedy are both getting busy, I need to clean my dumb room, I'd like to paint this room too, some day, it's fall. You know. The details.

The conversation I had with my boss on Friday was a little eye opening. I don't think I'm gonna be happiest trying to satisfy this woman's expectations; they feel a little unreasonable. That might just be me, but regardless, putting effort into impressing her and changing her opinion of my "recent performance" seems like a futile, uphill kinda battle. I'm not sure I can win with her and I'm not sure I want to try. I wonder if I might just cut my losses and move departments. It's an open option, one that I might be wise to explore. Ugh, these grownup decisions. I don't even clean my room.

Clean my room. Anybody.

Oh and HST had a kickA$$ show last night. It was so fun, lotsa people came out, and aside from the tipsy fellow in the front row burping in my ear during the marionette sketch, nothing but excellent awesome stuff happened -- and who are we kidding, the burp was a welcome surprise all the same. (But, the picture above is from last year.)

Drinks afterwards. Drunk. Lovely, cherished friends. Lucky, lucky girl. Nice lazy day today. Back to it tomorrow morning.

Sleep, grace me with your presence, eh?

Oh yes I will do it on the weekends. Oh yes I will.

In 2002 this man asked me to marry him so he could stay in the country. I said no. Then I wrote a sketch about it. I shoulda said yes because I would have gotten a lot more hilarious sketches outta the marriage deal.

I woke up at 10:30am this morning for a job I'm supposed to be at by 9:00am. When I got in, I got a real talking-to from my boss. I feel kinda blue about. I kinda need a hug. Good thing I own a really adorable cat.

Oooof, I'm sleepy. After a night of delicious, magical improv performed by some of my very favorites, I stayed out way too late.

I did get to have a nice chat with a drunk Irishman who was visiting New York on business with his twenty-something drunker Asian butt buddy in tow. This Irishman said some very interesting things to me, including, "You should go by Jenifer, not Jen. You're selling yourself short. You have a very intense mouth." Call me crazy, but BANG. Dead Irish guy.

It's gonna be a busy weekend full of performance watching and performance doing and I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have it any other way. It's hard being a constantly sought after super star.

In Case You Don't Know

I do this:

We do stuff like this:

Some of us look like this:

Go here:

www.harvardsailingteam.com

And now, a list of mini-dotes, which are like anecdotes, but mini ones:

I spent the entire morning under the assumption that today is Thursday. It's not.

My roommate has pneumonia. He's been bed ridden for ten days in a row. One of the tvs in our house has therefore been playing a great deal of Law & Order: SVU, Law & Order: Criminal Intent (woot!), Extreme Makeover, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, and The View.

My cat, Floyd, has recently lost weight due to a new diet we've put him on. (The less food diet.) Since the weight loss, he looks like a goddammed super model. I'm not kidding. He's gorgeous. He's sleek. It's agonizingly adorable.

I exercise. Regularly. It's nice. But tell that to my right-ass-cheek-meets-upper-thigh-perhaps-hamstring. He has this to say about exercise: "It's not all it's cracked up to be."

Two of my friends who are slightly older than I am have no idea who Jem is. Two of my friends who are my exact age know exactly who she is. Who dropped what ball?

Eggs. Regularly eaten here.

I wondered to myself just now, "If I've quit talking to an old boyfriend, eliminated him from my life, complete with an email to him explaining why I'm not interested in carrying on any sort of platonic relationship, is it creepy if I still look at his myspace page at least once every two days?" And by creepy, I mean unnatural and contradictory and completely pathetic.

I'm over him. TRUST me. I'm over him. I'll have a fist fight with you over how over him I promise I am. But something compels me to look at his stupid myspace page. (I mean, I do have this pesky boredom issue I'm constantly trying to quell while at the workplace so I've probably seen every myspace ever created, even yours.) It's like the one window into what's going on in his life that I'll still allow myself. As much as I sometimes wish I hadn't had to institute the ol' Never Speak Again clause, as much as I still have some nostalgia in my wee heart for the poor chump, as much as I sometimes hope I bump into him on the street some day so I can say "Hi!" and smile at him so he doesn't feel unloved in life, I know that it would just be like baiting a fish hook with a cancer worm and catching a cancer fish if I were to reach out to him in any way. So instead I look at the poor kid's poor myspace page. And then I write my very first blog entry about it.

If only I had a digital camera. I'd take a picture of myself reading his myspace page. Because photo blogs are cool.