this summer

While many things shifted this summer, the one thing that stayed in place was my plan to travel throughout the US to visit friends and have some very cool reunions.

I feel very grateful to have such amazing friends. People who know me and seem to like me anyway. And it was amazing to meet up with such a variety of friends--friends from college, from Peace Corps, new friends, old friends, Michigan friends. I got to meet families and significant others and drink so much coffee. I realized how important it was to have these people from different stages in my life and how together they are some of the best people.

Unfortunately my personal computer was stolen halfway through this trip and I am missing some fabulous pictures from Charlottesville and New York. But here is a little glimpse of what happened next...

In Idaho there is a thing that looks like an Idaho potato but is ACTUALLY ice cream. Whoa. 

The Portland Courthouse 

MK <3

Me eating a famous VooDoo doughnut

Porlandia, OR

#themarys

San Francisco, CA (the Goodfella reunion)

at the vineyards 

marcy mouse

Nobb Hill, San Francisco 

The Ferry Building

The Bay Bridge 

hiatus

9.2.13

As it was planned:

If everything had gone according to plan my summer would have consisted of me getting to travel for a while engaging my twenty-something idleness in doing way too much in every city I visited with people I love. I would have spent half the summer living out of two carry-ons, stuck my feet in both oceans and came back to Indiana exhausted and ready to dive into all things graduate school. I would have filled out all the paperwork and tired my mother by reading her sections of my development books totally fascinated by everything there was to learn in the world. We would have ordered matching sweatshirts and taken photos. I would have emptied my savings account and been happy as a clam. And right at this moment I would be prepping for the beginning of the school year nervous and excited and learning way too much about Scotch.

Because that was the plan. And I can count on one hand the amount of times I have gone against the plan.

You see, I love a plan. I do. I love to schedule my time and cross things off lists. I like to sit back and imagine my future, even if that future is five minutes from now. I daydream, I overthink, I zone out with images of what it will all be like. (There should so be a support group for this type of Type-A.)

As I am sure you have caught onto, the plan imploded.

I wish I could say there was a good reason. Something so huge that stopped me from going to school and taking that leap. Maybe something tragic happened, or I decided to become a nun or something way more impressive.

But atlas, that is not it.

The truth of the matter is, well, even I don’t understand it. One moment I was happy and the next moment I couldn’t shake the dread and fear that this was a mistake. The money. The distance. The uncertainty. It couldn’t happen. It wasn’t going to happen. And there I was, crying, sitting on the curb looking into a future I couldn’t predict.

Life is a wonderful thing because if you do it anywhere in the ballfield of ok there will be a group of people who seem to be grateful for your existence even when you feel like the biggest terd this side of the ocean. And that’s what happened. I called my boss from Michigan and asked for my job back. When, with nothing but the knowledge that something had gone amiss, she answered how happy she would be for my return, I wept some more as I realized that not only does she have a knack for teens, but also for the weirdness of the twenty-something.

When something doesn’t happen the way you anticipate it feels as though the whole world is watching and judging. But I really need to stop believing anyone cares about me as much as I think they do because even as my return to Michigan hit the airwaves one calls Facebook it certainly didn’t hit with anything other than a whimper. Of course the people I worked with before and who were also returning were happy for me and we bantered about how cool we were going to be, but the infamous high school Facebook friend I’m still trying to impress has better things to do than follow me.

To make a long story even longer, I’m back in Michigan. I’m back at this school. I’ve returned which in and of itself is interesting. In the three years since I’ve graduated from college I’ve returned to nothing. My parents moved three times. I’ve had three different jobs. So even just in the simple act as stepping foot on this space again, it feels right, and good.

My dear friend Marcy is still flying to Scotland on Wednesday and I am so happy for her.

But this year, this time, well this is for a future I haven’t planned, one that’s not scripted or perfect, one that may not be impressive or glamorous, but it’s the one that fits. And here I am. Just twenty-five year old me. Figuring it all out, one beautiful and messy step at a time.

Stick around. I can always promise interesting.

frozen

Do you ever get cold feet? I mean the, ohemgee what have I gotten myself into, can I run away without anyone noticing, do I even care if people notice, put me back in, holy mother, kind of cold feet? If you haven’t, well, first of all consider yourself lucky, and rest assured, it’s not pleasant. It’s a massive mind game, a push and pull, a never-ending pros and cons list. The worry will keep you up at night and the dread for changing your mind will keep you in bed.

You know what I have to say about that?

EW.

But, in all honesty, which is the purpose of a blog when the author is convinced five people read it including the four members of her immediate family, that’s exactly where I am…I’m stuck with cold feet.

As you may remember I got into grad school at the University of Edinburgh. I know,it’s awesome.  It’s a great opportunity. I will learn all of the things and in two years I could be sitting pretty in some swank office (or nonswank…but office) in some city and never look back. What could be sounds fabulous—so fabulous in fact that writing about it makes me feel silly for having cold feet. Who doesn’t want to flit away and study in Scotland? (Beside the whole haggis thing…nothing about that sounds ok.)

Now, as I am in the middle of summer and in the middle of figuring out VISA jargon and financial aid crap and the whole list of logistics that seems to elongate and never shrink adds up to such a point I can’t see straight. Where’s the money coming from? Am I ready for this? I am actually signing up to write papers? That just sounds stupid.

And all of the sudden, as quickly as I elevated to cloud nine I’m crashing down.

There was a plan. I was supposed to follow it. I didn’t. And now I’ve gotten carried away and in this headspace of uncertainty and vast annoyance (at myself really).

I guess I just want to go back three months and redo it all. Change some key decisions and be enjoying my summer and these weeks of freedom.

But I can’t. And now the question of moving forward seems like the hardest one on the world.

Cold feet sucks. 

take me out to the ball game...

you know you live in the midwest when you end up at the ball field on a sunday night. the cool part was that IU was in the regional championships for the NCAA baseball title--first time that as happened since 1930 something. 

and maybe it's the fact that my dad and brother played baseball for years. or that once upon a time i used to be able to keep score for real. but either way, sitting in bleachers for four hours eating pretzels and doing the wave didn't seem like a bad idea. 

watch the hoosiers (yeah, no one knows what that means, you just have to go with it) play in the super regionals this weekend! (and UVA and ASU) 

summer identity (aka the further ramblings of a prior military brat)

the coast line at La Jolla, CA 

Coney Island beach front, NY 

I was in a car with some friends last week in downtown Traverse City and we parked in front of this clothing store advertising every token beach brand you could think of—Roxy, Vans, Billabong, Volcom—everything was in the window. I said, without much thought, and a Vana White hand gesture, “Well, this is who I went to high school with..” One of the people in the car responded, “Not in Bloomington…” I scoffed, “Um. Nope.” “San Diego?” Wrong again. I finally said, now that the comment had become a conversation, “Virginia Beach, I went to high school in Virginia Beach.”

And it’s true. That was two years ago and, for me, three addresses ago. It’s hard to keep up with a prior military brat and her very moveable family. In the last three years I have had five addresses. No wonder people just email me. It’s like the real world version of Where’s Waldo.

It occurs to me, that due to various circumstances, I rarely work during the summer. Three years out of college, and here I sit on a rather warm day out on my parents’ sunroom (sun porch? Enclosed room with windows all around? Florida room?) on a Tuesday afternoon, in between jobs and life moments, yet again. I consider it very lucky. I love breathers. I love having time to reflect and spend time with family. It’s fun. I dig cycles and working for 10 months and then having time to travel and prepare for whatever comes next suits me. (In two years when I actually work in an office I’ll let you know what happens…)

That being said, my summer wardrobe harkens back to my inner beach child. Now, ask me even now and I will tell you I refuse to be titled a beach kid. In the nine years my permanent address was twenty minutes from the Atlantic Ocean I can count the number of days I spent at the beach on one hand. (It has to do with bathing suits.) But living at the beach is as much about culture as it is about sand and sun. My Mom grew up at the Jersey Shore, so I guess you could say sand and salt run in my veins.

I usually consider myself an urban dweller. I prefer the concrete jungle and human constructed parks. I am most myself roaming the streets of New York and if I never own a car or mow a lawn I will consider myself a successful adult.

Even still, something about the summer brings me back to the beach. And here I am, slightly loose light jeans, wide V-neck shirt, wayfarers, and sandals. Most of my closet consists of dark denim, tailored skirts, patters, and layers. Switching to summer brings out the plethora of blues and greens, Urban Outfitters dresses, vintage sandals, loose light jeans, and my new favorite fedora…all I’m missing are thrift store overalls (which if you find for me I’ll love you forever). There’s a juxtaposition somewhere in my closet, the urban girl channels her beach-like past.

And I get it. It’s summertime after all, everyone’s wardrobe shifts. You lose the plaid, and flannel, the cashmere and wool; you shed layers and shift to longer days and campfire nights.  

So maybe it’s just that now, the summertime is my season of nostalgia. It’s when I remember the kids who skipped class because the surf was too good, it’s when I crave the thrashing of ocean waves and I could seriously eat a s’more with every meal. I have less a desire to wear make up and want to smell of sunscreen and coconut instead of my go to Chanel perfume.

Maybe now I am just finally starting to get why people generally like summer as a season. It’s a time to be different, to act different, to enjoy the slower pace and to think different.

One day I’ll trade in my lazy summer days for lazy summer weekends. But for right now, I’m thankful I get one more summer to pretend to not the beach kid.

I guess it’s true, you can take the kid from the beach, but you can’t take the beach from the kid.

Rehoboth Beach, DE 

Lake Michigan

PS--I get the irony that none of these pictures are of Virginia Beach, like I said, I didn't get it until I left. Here are some of the beaches I've been to in the last three years. Not too shabby, right?

the hard parts

sunset over lake michigan

I’m sitting here with my sister trying to write this blog post about endings and beginnings and the fear in the transition in between. I’m drawing a blank. I’ve started this post numerous times the last week as my time at Interlochen faded to a close, and everything I come up with right now sounds trite and tired. It feels slightly unnecessary, but I know that there is something to be said about this ending.

 +++

When I got out of the Peace Corps I was lost a little. I felt defeated. I had battled Mali for ten months—I had given it everything I had and I wasn’t sure what I had gotten in return and constantly feared that I still hadn’t done enough. Stuck in my head, I slowly started the job search. I didn’t feel pressured by my parents, but I knew that I couldn’t stay with my head in the sand.

Deciding to move to Michigan, to live in the woods, it was a jump, and it was an effort to reset myself after living in Mali. People would ask me what prompted that move and I would always say that coming back to the States and living in the woods seemed like the best idea. I was told I needed confidence and purpose and I needed to do it on my own. So last August I packed up the car and off my mom and I drove. And there in a dorm room my life started again.

To say that my work this past year has been easy would be the understatement of the decade. It was hard. The thing about being the quasi-parent of teenagers is that the worrying and the emotions start immediately. There is no separation, there is no way not to care. I went from being a single 24 year old to a parent of 36 teenagers. They became my whole world.

But I wasn’t alone. I had the rest of the residence life team—a solid group of twenty-somethings who seemed to know without a doubt that the year was going to be a wild ride. There we were, thrown together by chance and resume, everyone around us crossing their fingers, hoping for the best.

What we got was more than we could have imagined. What started out as forced friendships and coworker relationships merged into best friends and family. We were all we had and we knew it. We became the Dream Team, always together, the force behind the daily life at school.

And my kids, my students, my residents—in helping them I did re-establish myself. I found my solid footing and I attempted to merge my Malian self with my American self. I grew up—again. They pushed me and molded me into the type of person that looks ahead, without hesitation (but maybe with a little fear) and here I am finding myself planning another move, abroad again, this time to Scotland.

It’s funny though. This wasn’t the plan. Leaving Michigan was supposed to happen after two years, not just one. Scotland was never really in the cards. But, I’m trying to go with it all, to adapt, to groove, to plunge forward with all the hope and faith a twenty-five year old can muster.

For some reason, all of this just made the good-byes that much harder. And sure, I’m a military brat, saying good-bye is part of the job, leaving is something I do really well (we can delve into that later), and I am old enough to know that if you are meant to be friends with people, you will keep in touch. I have the friends to prove that one. So, it’s not really leaving the people. The thing is leaving the time. I’ve closed another chapter. It’s hard to let go of a place the means so much. (Six months of winter, granted; February and March: horrible times; infractions and dean meetings: no fun—but still…) To know that no matter what happens next, the people I grew to love so dearly and admire so much, will never convene at this place again. What we had was magic. It was partial circumstance and probably fate.

After I left the Goodfellas in Mali I thought my luck of having a group of people to work and play with was gone. I figured that kind of good karma doesn’t strike twice.

I guess if you work hard enough and chose carefully, you realize that good people are everywhere and maybe, just maybe, magic is everywhere.

So, here’s to the Dream Team, the residence life department 2012-13, the group of people that through their kindness, sass, generosity, sarcasm, humor, dedication, sleep depravation, hugs, texts, late night conversations, youtube videos, vines, Bud’s trips, and everything else that took up every moment of the year, helped bring me back. You all helped me believe it myself again. We may be crazy, but at least we are crazy together.

Cheers.

me dancing a jig while the sunsets. obviously.
(sometimes you gotta end these semi-thoughtful posts with some humor...)

a look at lately

It’s been a long time coming, the writing of this post. Really, the writing of anything. I’ve had a lot floating about my head, a couple of ideas about how to explain what’s been going on the last week or so.

I’m not sure I have it yet. I’m going to keep at it. In the meantime, here’s a look, while I search for the words…

6:01--when we kicked out the kiddies :) 

here comes Picasso to 6:01 

 sweet Caroline

DeRoy

the day after--full circle at Peterson Beach 

trying to be artsy

Ellen and Molly

the gatherers

chris hiding amongst the shelter (thanks EW!) 

the music makers

our couple's photo: The Marys 

<3 

the rockstar 

andrea

JUMP!

they were singing and dancing along to shaggy

libs 

mica

group lovin'

singin' "summer lovin" and walking down the beach

zach and roxy

watching the sunset over lake michigan 

tryin' to stay warm

good night moon. and goodbye northern michigan. cheers!