The more I feel like this place is my home, the more I seem to miss the other parts,
the politics and the relationships.
It’s like… In Limbo you don’t need to make any definitive choice,
so nothing’s ever completely out of reach.
Once you choose… You shut so many doors.

I don’t know how it happened, that I started to feel like I was home here in SoVA. I don’t know if it’s when I started working at the bar and made friends there, or my first road trip by myself, or if it only hit me when I realized I was willing to turn down opportunity outside of the Peninsula… But it’s happened. I feel home here. Home is walking into the club & the girls sweeping me up in their arms to make me up and teach me new things. Home is driving with my top down at sunrise. Home is a cigarette in the cold night just marveling at the world. Home is shaking & feeling dizzy with the happiness of it all. It’s mindblowing & humbling & surprising.

I’m again surrounded by music, taking my own time to do my own thing, and I feel so happy I said last night: “If I were a crier, this would be the happy-cry moment. This would definitely be the moment.”

I don’t even know how to put it to words, except that I woke up this morning, sat down, and started writing fiction again. Working on my Guardians stories. I haven’t really written – even wanted to – in years. It hasn’t felt right, it’s felt fake, off, whatever. Last night the flood gates opened and I’m terrified of that. What if I lose it again? What if I crumble again? I don’t know that I’d ever get it back if I fell apart this time. But… I want to write. I want to feel this way again.

It’s a tenuous hold that I have, this feeling, but I’m grasping it tightly and holding it close to my chest. I’m letting these feels wash me over and keeping my eye out for more definitive proof that I’m not insane in all of this. I never thought anywhere would feel like home like DC, like the family I have there and our cobbled together house in Petworth. But the world has always had a way of proving me wrong, and I’m glad to see it happen this time.

I feel like I’m slipping out of Limbo, moving onto more solid ground, and it’s been so long since I had that feeling, I don’t quite know what to do with it. Limbo has been me for so long, it’s hard to believe the crisis might be passing.

1. Ke$ha; Your Love is My Drug – When I’m on the road, there is nothing like this song, I really don’t know why. The video is completely cracked-out (forgive the pun), but the song itself is catchy, tells a fun story, and gets you belting along while you’re zooming down the highway in the beating sun.

Check out more beneath the cut, with the youtube music videos to go with it!

2. Usher; OMG – Perhaps it’s the club environment and the talented DJs I’m spending so much of my time with lately, but there is nothing like a good beat hitting you and just going with it. This song is a popular, fun, versatile example of that and so I can’t get enough!

3. Augustana; Boston – I found this band thanks to last.fm and their song “Fire” – I cannot express my love for them enough. My selections over the last two months (especially with my melancholy mood thanks to the move & the upheaval) has been built almost exclusively of Dan Layus’s heartwrecking voice.

I’m not particularly good at being ‘inside’ my own head. Time in the quiet, meditation, yoga, vacation – none of these things have ever fit for me. My brain tends to go into overdrive with all the other things I should be doing rather than just sitting. However, when I’m driving, I am in my element. I am inside my own mind, thinking over life’s big and little decisions, singing loudly to music I’d probably be embarrassed to admit loving (my recent performance? Definitely Ke$ha). In this moment in my life, it’s exactly what I need, I’d say.

Life in SoVA, thus far, has been surprisingly good to me. I’ve found a job; slinging cocktails & tasty bar food at a club in Newport News. It’s different than anything I’ve ever done before, and for that I’m thankful, it’s also been good for me in other ways – the confidence it takes to survive in a club environment, the dress code of the place (my uniform in particular is a test for me!), learning a new industry from scratch. I’ve made friends in the community through it, enjoyed girls’ days and chilling out at 4am (because after a long shift it is simply impossible to sleep no matter the hour). I celebrated my birthday with the staff and new friends I’ve made in the area and have fully embraced being a car owner (a first for me).

And yet, you know me by now, I’m already concerned with “what’s next”. Today on my drive – a glorious, sunny, six hours down I95 South – I ruminated on the exact question: What’s Next? With the dust finally settling from the most recent move, it’s time to start planning the next – back to DC? My home, my heart? Spend more time here in the south with Mom & Pop Limbo? (Things are easy here, it’s comfortable, welcoming, stress-free). Do I head north to Maine, to watch my nephews grow up having missed the first years of their lives? Do I pick somewhere new? That’s the question I asked myself last time; job searches, friends across the States, a million possibilities every single day – do I throw a dart at a map? It’s hard to let pieces of your heart go whenever you pick somewhere new, start where no one knows your name, but there’s a thrill to it, too.

I don’t have answers to these questions, yet, and I don’t know that I will anytime soon. But let me as you this one: how do you decide? Wherever it is that you make your life – what made you pick that place? Was there a moment of clarity? A specific set of circumstances? A chance meeting on a street corner? Love? Money? When you look at the rest of your life, where do you see it playing out, and does the where really matter? Because, on that last one, I’m starting to think… Not so much.

By the end of this October (most likely on 10/23/2010) I am planning to take my GRE (finally). I’m terrified and have quite literally procrastinated this for over five years. Five years. I’m only 26; let’s consider this… I’ve been putting off taking this exam for 1/5th of my life. I’m beyond anxious and petrified of this exam, even if I’m not totally sure why.

So here’s where the ‘OH EM GEE I NEED HELP!1!1!’ comes in. I have a study guide, I have the time, but I need the butt-whippings that only my lovely friends and tweeps can provide me over the next two and a half months. Anyone game to help me stay motivated?

It’s time for drastic action.

I admitted the funk and yesterday I drove 300+ miles, chased down the east coast by heat lightning, Paramore & Lady Gaga mix tapes to keep me company. The top was down, the sun was setting, and I was free. This freedom? Exactly what I want in this world. I’ve been fighting Limbo for so long that I’m tired of the constant battle; I’d forgotten that the girl I used to be was one who embraced Limbo. I reveled in it. I’ve been trying for the last 2 years to figure out who I am, but I think I might have just been denying it rather than ignorant to it.

Today I’m taking it all in, sitting on my parents’ porch in South Carolina yet again (sometimes you just need to see your parents, and sometimes they just need to see you) with the family cat that hates me. I’m counting my blessings and working on a mental list of things that just make me happy right now, because a girl always needs it in her back pocket.

What’s on your list these days?

from drinkingupstream @ wordpress

I’m feeling much better these days than I was when I last posted. Thank you everyone for the words of encouragement and the birthday wishes yesterday! Yes, I survived 25. I remember last summer, coming up on the big Quarter Of A Century and feeling wrung out but hopeful. I was ready for 24 – an age that saw my personal life take turns I’d never expected nor welcomed – to be over with. I was curious as to what 25 would hold, what I would make of the next year of my life.

And here I am, post-25, officially 26. And I’ve come to a conclusion: the day before I turned 25 was just like the day before I turned 26, the only differences being the location and the players. Rather than my personal life falling apart during 25, it was my professional life as I knew it. I left the city I love, my home in this world, and over a month later I still don’t know if that was the best idea. I’ve got a job, which is something to cheer me up, but it’s not the sort of job I ever saw myself in, and I’m not even sure if it’ll pay my bills.

I thought, at almost-25 that heartbreak and loneliness and fear were the worst things that could happen to a girl. That turning 25 would solve all that drama and give me new strength to battle through the day. I was wrong. Limbo is difficult no matter your age, no matter your job, your place, your drama. Limbo is about not knowing who you are, and the struggles we go through to find that out.

I’m still working on it. I’m enjoying myself in the mix, serving drinks at a local club and making new friends everyday. It seems my grand plans for moving South have been adjusted; rather than grand, I’m feeling cautious, taking baby steps. I’m hoping to get more involved here – I’d love to meet the local Young Republicans, find a church, and spend time with the friends I’ve made – before I make any big decisions. Perhaps that’s the first step out of Limbo, just taking a deep breath and seeing where you are once you’re done with that.

“I believe in books, politics, honesty, writing, sex, history, blogging, trust, choice, public displays of affection, God, the strength of a well chosen word, fantasy, pride, film, forever, hugs, shoes, the power of touch, possibility, hope, family, love, and music. I love intensely; I leave marks; I burn bright. I’m proud of the work I’ve done; I’m still young; I have so much more to do.”

Didn’t she once decide to move to Cuba, and then go and do it? I remember so well, when she first moved to D.C., sneaking downstairs at night to put on pointe shoes and dance on the stage of the amphitheater as if she owned it. The lights shining down, the warm air… She was someone who wore short skirts because she felt strong in them; who never wanted to sleep because it would mean missing out on whatever happened next.

Now it seems like she simply can’t sleep at night, for what reason she has no clue.

So there I am, in my lovely, angry, yellow Cavalier Convertible Z24, in the center lane of a high way with absolutely nowhere to go. A large truck behind me started honking its horn despite the two empty lanes on either side of me (seems like most people would just go around the offending car in such an instance, but not this morning!), a State Trooper saw me and drove right by. I began to panic – my car may be little, but I am much, much smaller and not capable of doing a danged thing about a car that won’t move of its own accord.

Without my even noticing him stop, a man was then at my passenger side window – on the highway, in morning rush hour – instructing my panic-addled self how to put the car in neutral and get it to the side of the road. Turns out, this kind, patient person worked at a Chevy dealership about two minutes down the road. He offered me a ride once we settled my car on the side of the road and said that we could have it towed to his dealership (where he’s a mechanic) for cheaper than it would take to get it all the way back to my house (roughly half an hour away). He said it’d be a bit pricey, but the garage there could also look at it, my car being a Chevy.

I reluctantly agreed through my haze and called my roommate to let him know what was going on. I called the lady I had an appointment with and rescheduled (thankfully!).

The guys at the dealership were so understanding of my intensely tight budget, my roommate came to get me, and my car was pampered by geniuses all day. I got a phone call this evening to pick it up, and word that because they couldn’t figure out what had caused the stall – even with all the time and testing they put into it today – they were only going to charge me for the tow and a ‘check in’ fee, rather the hundreds of dollars worth of labor that it would have been.

Seriously!? I kept feeling all day – all week, I have felt like this, to be honest – like I just couldn’t get a break. And then here are some random people who just went out of their way to make my day much easier than it should have been. I cannot thank them enough (though am totally planning on sending an adorable, cheesy thank you card to the dealership!), and I just wanted to take a moment to show my gratitude to the universe.

Have you had times in your life that strangers have gone the extra mile to make a great difference? Let’s use this moment, this space, to let the great unknown how much that means.

and here's the offending darling himself...

]]> http://atlimbo.com/2010/07/132-the-kindness-of-strangers/feed/ 7 http://atlimbo.com/2010/07/131-rilke-says-were-to-live-the-questions/ http://atlimbo.com/2010/07/131-rilke-says-were-to-live-the-questions/#comments Thu, 08 Jul 2010 02:52:23 +0000 atlimbo http://atlimbo.com/?p=1451

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer. Rainer Maria Rilke

I saw Knight & Day today as an afternoon break from my job hunting – which is going, though neither slowly nor perfectly, I’ll admit – and I think it was exactly what I needed. The comedy, the action, the beautiful locales (Boston, Seville, Strasburg, D.C.) unplugging my mind (something I’ve been unable to do since the ‘official’ move); I came home after, took out a book, listened to some of my favorite D.C. music, and generally felt better about all of this than I have so far.

The real question I’m battling is why. Why have I done this to my life? Why did I leave everything I’ve ever known? Why am I starting over? Why do we make the decisions we do? I could have left D.C. years ago, but never did. I could have picked some place that I actually have an artistic or personal or professional connection to, but I didn’t. In moving, I have packed and unpacked and reorganized my entire life four times over the last three months – every photograph has been rehashed, old luggage has been jostled and slammed shut, all of my memories have been laid out before my eyes and I keep asking myself why.

Why somewhere new. Why Virginia. Sure, I have friends here but… I don’t know anything about the area, I had never once planned on moving here, I have no job prospects and no clue how long it can all last. In sorting through everything I’ve asked myself why not about every other place I love. Brooklyn, where a brilliant best friend of mine is running a state assembly campaign. Maine, where my nephews are growing up too fast without my consent or witness, where I grew up and so much of my family and contentment still reside. South Carolina, with my parents whom I love and friends I have made over their time there and a beach that I know like the back of my hand. Boston, with my favorite churches, my favorite crazy liberals, and the best sports on Earth. I think of bookstores I can get lost in for hours, scents that immediately put me at ease, music that fills me with the desire to do, be, live, love, and breathe deeply.

None of these things are in SoVA. I know that I had to leave D.C., and I’m still feeling out my emotions concerning the move in general, but I keep wondering why I did it like this. It’s not a negative question, but as I job hunt, apply to hopefully take music lessons of my own, and get to know this area as if opening my eyes for the first time — I wonder.

Perhaps it’s the heat wave rattling my brain. Maybe the movie today made me miss Boston more than I normally do. Or it could be, I’m just going crazy. Rilke said to live the questions, and Emily Dickinson said that she “dwelled” in possibilities – so how do you walk the fine line? Do you give it a go and pick up again if things don’t go as planned? Do you set timelines and make plans that must work out? Or do you just go nuts, with the questions and the curiosity swirling around you like dust to be allergic to, flies to swat at. I’m not sure, and so for now I’ll keep blindly groping, looking forward to wherever this adventure takes me, and whatever it is the next ones have in mind, too.