Backwards with Time

This song is so appropriate for a variety of reasons.  I spent the last night I was home with some of my nearest and dearest  friends, the Kenney sisters and Jackie.  Per usual, there was mucho listening to the Avett Brothers.

Now, en route back to San Francisco I’m having a glass of red wine having just finished a phenomenal book and contemplating the state of my life.

After a constant weekend of being on the go, I am alone, listening to music, writing; I’ve never been more grateful for a six hour flight in my life.

How irrevocably my life has changed in the past 8 months.

“Some say with age our purpose comes clear, 
I see the opposite happening here.
Are we losing the fight?
Are we growing backwards with time?”

I used to know exactly what I wanted.  I would spend my summers in Rockland hanging out with my friends and family. Eventually I grew restless.

Times changed.

Rockland is no longer a desired place to live for me.

People have changed and most of my friends have moved on.

But when it comes to the matter of family how do we move on?  After living several months in San Francisco with a serious lack of love, in comparison to the immense amount of love when surrounded by so many friends and family I have back home in Maine, I was truly humbled on this last trip home just how much lighter life is when you let that much love in.

Spending some time with my brother and his girlfriend I was genuinely envious. My brother, most days, is content and happy with his life. A fisherman who loves a girl, his friends and his family. He spends his free time either hanging out with his best friends, his love or doing handy work for my parents.

A part of me is envious of that. I am envious that it could have so easily been a life I’d chose. A simple life.

However, when it comes to the familiar and the unknown I’ve always chosen the unknown.  A part of me is much more comfortable with it.

My question now is: is choosing the unknown a weakness? Is it instead choosing what we know the harder option? Being satisfied with what we know and wanting what we have, not constantly striving to have what we want?

Is my life now a case of wanting what I cannot have? And not wanting what I have? Honestly, I’m not sure.

I know what I have is an incredible heart and love and loyalty for my family and friends but I also know I have a talent as a writer and a love for travel.  How do I equally honor both those things?

Sigh.

“I was young and love was fun, now it’s so serious.
Now all the fun has equal pain, 
There’s something wrong with this.”

For Boston

My heart is with all in Boston tonight. I am still at a loss for words. The heartache that I feel for this city I once called home and the many residents whom I still call friends is deep and very real even across the miles. Checking in with friends today I was brought back to Boston in so many ways. I could sense their sadness and fear, but I think President Obama put it best: “Boston is a tough and resilient town. So are its people.”

So much love for you, Boston. Always. xo.

 

Fancy cocktails, silly parking tickets & a whole lotta passion.

Well I’ve officially been living in San Francisco for 12 days!  Technically, I didn’t really move into an apartment till last Friday, but I’m here. It feels like I’ve been here forever at the same time it doesn’t really feel like I’m here at all.

When you entirely uproot your life, I guess a sense of disconnect is normal. After we spend so many years of getting comfortable in one particular situation and living arrangement it’s hard to adjust to a new one.  Hard and yet so easy to do so at the same time that it is almost concerning.

I couldn’t be happier in a place that for me has been like a sacred promise land for months now. San Francisco, a land of greater opportunity.

Anyway, here are some things I’ve observed since being in San Francisco:

• The trend as far as cocktails go tends to be fancier (lots of muddling) and more expensive.
• People LOVE to honk their horns at you.  Even if you’re stopped at a red light, they honk.
• Pedestrians DO NOT cross the street unless the walk signal is displayed, even if there are no cars coming.
• Almost everyone is REALLY excited about what they are doing here.  Passion drives people, dreams are achieved and new seemingly impossible goals are being reached for.
• Almost EVERY restaurant we’ve been to serves good food.
• Fernet is the most popular thing to take a shot of at a bar.
• The possibilities for where you could end up on a Saturday night are endless- that includes Alcatraz- see tomorrow’s post.
• People are really into networking and helping you get connected.
• Despite the horn honking, I have found people to be friendlier than expected.
  

  Double wammy! Turn your wheels.

• In order to park on the side of the street on a hill you have to turn your wheels so that they are aimed at the curb. (I learned this the hard way- twice)
• I have the greatest friends- all over the country.  My friend Mary, who let me crash on her couch and made sure I moved my car on time couldn’t have been more accommodating and helpful in teaching me the tricks of public transportation, where not to walk, etc. And my dear friend Gwen, has been a constant source of support. ALSO- an amazing amount of friends and family who have reached out to make sure I’m okay out here alone and losing my grandmother have really helped me feel loved even across the country.
• Big things are happening around every corner! Just last weekend was the dreamforce tech event, which after I had just seen a ton of people tweet about, got off the Muni, looked up and boom, there it was taking place!
• Running is WAY more of a work out- HILLS.

My morning started at 3:30 am…

(wrote this hours ago…my hair does not have NEARLY as much volume! I do look a little more awake however.)

Currently en route to Los Angeles!  Jet Blue has live TV so I’m flipping between The Departed and Entourage.  How appropriate- flying from Boston to LA…

I think it was my dad’s love for the Beach Boys, that he introduced to us at an early age, that first turned me on to the legendary California culture.  While I don’t expect to find the Beach Boys or the 1960s on this trip, California has been calling my name for as long as I can remember.  This trip is huge for me and has been a long time coming.  Plus, it’s the first time I’ve had a week off since October!

The best part about this trip is that I’ll be meeting up with some friends I haven’t seen in ages.  When living in Boston I made some of my greatest friends at a bar on Boylston Street.  For many years it was like a second home to us.  Now we live all over the country, Maine, Mass, Ohio, Hawaii and California.

Traveling with Kelley from Boston, we are meeting Rose, form Cleveland, in LA.  On Monday I’m headed up to San Fran to visit, Mar and maybe Anya (fingers crossed girl!) from Hawaii.  It’s crazy how we’re all living our own lives all around the country and yet we can still pick up where we left off every time we meet up.

This vacation is coming at a great time.  I officially have my first PR client as of yesterday morning, well second, if you count the work I do for the restaurant.  I’m gearing up to dive into that, but first a week of fun adventures in California!

I have no plans for the next week.  We’re going to take each day as it comes and see where we end up.  I’m excited to experience LA and San Fran with some great friends!

Will be blogging from California for the next week!

Friendship, love and loyalty

This year’s St. Patrick’s Day has come and gone, and I must admit, that I did not indulge in one single car bomb, shot of Jameson and/or pint of Guinness.  I’m pretty sure this is what they call growing up.

Yesterday, I awoke on my friends couch in Charlestown, Mass.  I couldn’t think of a more appropriate predominantly Irish-American location to wake up.  I knew I had to get out of the city quickly before the rowdiness and partying ate me alive.  At 9am the city was already pulsating, you could feel it. So I headed down the street in search of coffee.  Obviously, the first coffee shop I stumbled upon, 50 feet away, was a Dunkin Donuts…when in Rome!

Instead of indulging in alcoholic Irish beverages and screaming classic Irish folk tunes and/or Dropkick Murphy’s songs that I’ve heard one too many times, I spent this year’s St. Patrick’s day doing some reflecting.  I recently found out that my mother’s father, my grandfather, passed away on St. Patrick’s day- before he got to eat his boiled dinner.  I think this is part of the reason why we ate boiled dinner every year on St. Patrick’s day growing up.  On my drive home from Portland, I called my brother, my mother, my grandmother, etc. and wished them all a Happy St. Patrick’s Day and that I was thinking of them.

In honor of the family tradition, upon returning from Boston, I set out with my best friend, Amber Kenney, also of Irish descent, to find some boiled dinner before work.  Naturally, we ended up at Ruski’s, my favorite neighborhood dive.  I’m pretty sure the dinner I had was 5 pounds.  While I ate almost all of this massive feast, I saved some for later that evening.

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As I work in a French Bistro, the atmosphere at work remained untainted by St. Patty’s, though there were a few green-wearing folks at the bar.  By the time work was finished I was too tired to attempt to mingle with my friends downtown.  It just didn’t feel right.  I headed home, ate the rest of my supper and thought about my friends, family and loved ones, past and present, departed and living. I went to bed extremely satisfied, knowing that the luck of the Irish is with me and is evident in the friends and family I’ve been blessed with.

too much SNOW day

Ugh, Maine winters.

I woke up to a whirlwind of white and about six inches of accumulation this morning.  The snow is falling and there are no signs of stopping. This morning, a feeling of dread instantly set in while I sipped my coffee envisioning a dead, boring night at work. Clearly struggling to find motivation this morning, I luckily woke up to my two lovely roommates, both blessed with snow days. I was instantly super envious and wanted to be spending the afternoon at Ruski’s, the local dive bar, with them.  However, Alex thought it would be best to have a snow day work group first.  So, we headed down to one of our favorite local coffee shops, Yordprom. EXACTLY what I needed to 180 my mood.

Alex- Fixtures Showroom manager, chai green tea lover.

Jackie- full time nursing student, oldest friend.

Yordprom Coffee is owned by Tommy and Todd and their big friendly Golden Retriever, Nathaniel, who never fails to lay down at your feet shamelessly looking for some attention. It is a friendly Vietnamese-inspired coffee shop that offers big conference tables, comfy couches, a dog-friendly and local West End atmosphere and endless delicious lattes and coffees that provide the perfect amount of sweetness and caffeine, much needed for a snowy morning of writing. Chai latte and a blueberry scone all the way for this girl, screw the calories, it’s needed.

After picking up my new glasses and ordering my treats, I opened my email to find a whole slew of good news.  What’s more is that it felt so good to be able to share said news with two of my closest friends.

I finally received some responses to my surfing pitch (thanks to my continued efforts on Tuesday)! AND got some other writing-related meetings set up.  The glasses couldn’t have come at a better time.  I’m feeling very much so like a writer.

I also received a sweet note from my host mum in South Africa.  Her words, like her presence, have this intense calming affect that I have seen replicated in no other person.  After catching me up on the happenings of her life in Cape Town, she concluded her e-mail, “Africa will always be with you wherever you go.”  Now, despite the freezing mess of snow, I am imagining the warm sands of Cape Town and picturing watching the sun set while sipping mojitos in a summer dress, instead of sporting thick wool socks, Soreal boots and my dad’s old itchy sweater while huddling over a latte for warmth.

While I may not be getting as much work as I should be done, I’m enjoying the distraction of Jackie rereading old Facebook posts from 2005 we exchanged and Alex showing me the newest trends in bathroom cabinets. The feeling of youth and a dumb optimism of possibilities shared between friends over lattes is an unmatchable feeling, one that surely trumps the winter blues.

Yordprom is embracing the snow day with these festive plates. Honestly, how can you not LOVE this place?