how embarrassing that i have been so terribly delinquent in the last week after making such a huge declaration to be back on here and writing just a few weeks before that. embarked on what now feels like a whirlwind comeback/reunion tour as i blaze through dc, nyc, now richmond, then back to dc again, all in a week and a half. it’s been exhausting but amazing. have seen sooo many friends – jill & matt, carter, jenny, sara, cheri, jane, and jesse and tracey tomorrow and wednesday. i really feel like my batteries have been recharged, especially making my way through each of these cities in which i used to live and somehow realizing that those times were then and have led me to the place i am now. it brings to me a real sense of peace i think i have been missing.
staunton
‘got my blueprint / it’s symphonic’
in brooklyn for spring break having major epiphanies. example: i love nyc more than any other place i have ever been, but i do not want to live here anymore. leaving brooklyn to move to be with todd in staunton always seemed like a slightly premature exodus from the city that never sleeps. pangs of city-sickness hit me over the last 2 1/2 years. but today walking around i suddenly realized that i don’t really want to pack up and move back, for all my love of this place and walking and stores and people and diversity that i wouldn’t trade my house and yard and job and friends to be back. it came as a quite relief to have this revelation, and to understand that i wasn’t being disloyal to new york in so much as loyal to my new home.
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‘cool my brains and soothe my head’
yesterday, as i sat down for a sandwich at the ravenwood cafe, i had a bit of a loveburst for my little city. the ravenwood is new transplant in staunton, and the best way i can describe it is what i imagine edgar allan poe’s kitchen would be like – a little dark, but very southern, yet progressive, as well.
anyway. i have such acute aches for new york sometimes that they are practically physical. but now that i have been in staunton for a year and a half, it’s found its own place in my heart, and i love that.
i have “my” things in this town now – my routines and places and things. i’ve realized this sense of belonging is crucial to my comfort in, or with, a place. when i poke around at celebration!, the owner asks me how my crazy german relatives are doing. when we greet the door guy at clocktower, we talk about what’s going on with big boots. i order my usual at blue mountain without glancing at the menu. i have my nice little artsy movie theaters, my crunchy veggie-friendly grocery, my favorite route to walk at the park.
i might not wear a staunton, VA shirt with the feel i’d have advertising my brooklyn pride across my chest, but at least the idea of wearing that t-shirt doesn’t seem quite as foreign as it once did.
‘seriously?’
patrick dempsey, paris hilton, and goldberg are going to be in little ole staunton monday night. no shit!
i wish i could be cool enough to say i didn’t care and not be feverishly making sure my path crosses some celebrity itinerary, but i am so not.
of particular mirth to me is the inclusion of staunton as “ONE OF THE PARTY CAPITALS OF AMERICA.“ holla.
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‘i’ve searched the world over’
staunton has a wooooonderful new bar/restaurant, zynodoa.
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‘everyone knows i am in over my head’
i’m walking a weird line here, having been in staunton for a week. there’s been no epic flipout like last year; no tears and no tipping into the xanax bottle. i’m leaving the townhouse and running errands and functioning like a normal person. this is a world of difference from my last move.
but -there always has to be a but, right?- yesterday and today i’ve felt slightly on edge, perhaps finally digesting the actuality of this move. i didn’t have gus with me until tuesday when my dad brought him down, and somehow something in that has caused being here to feel more like the Real Deal and less like a vacation.
orientation for my new job begins on monday, and i’m glad. over the last week i’ve gotten into a little housefrau routine of cooking and cleaning craziness that is kind of like junk food – all well and good in smaller amounts but not true sustenance – nothing to live off of.
many people who care about me have cautioned to me about falling too much into todd’s life, rather than carving out my own niche here. well it’s kind of weird to see that i’m not sure he really has that much of a niche here. he’s a lot less of a people-person that i am -how i am i forever matching up with these introverts?- and doesn’t really have friends here who are close. i guess he’s really been doing the loner things, but people to hang out with are exactly what i need and crave.
so i am again confronted with that particular dilemma facing the post-college young adult – how do you meet people??? the most hopeful i felt about making friends so far was last weekend when we went out and got drinks at baja bean company – one of my favorite hangouts from richmond whose staunton outpost is basically the main nightlife spot here. but i hesitate to let drinking facilitate my hanging out, too. i’m glad that over the last year in new york i was able to get away from the whole drinking-as-focal-point-of-social-life thing. and i’m reluctant to return to that.
i met our next door neighbors last night, another young couple (how old do i sound saying ‘young couple’?!) and they seemed cool and it was all i could do from metaphorically flinging myself at their feet and hugging their ankles.
to be continued…
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‘you can’t stop progress’
well, here i am, stealing a few minutes at todd’s computer. i have moved. i am surrounded by boxes and boxes of my shit and am acutely aware of the fact that i have far too many material possessions. i also need to learn to shake the feeling that i am invading todd’s space, and that this is our place. can’t help but feel like i would be a lot more territorial if it was my townhouse he was moving into. it’s hellacious to look around and see how much work there is to do, but so lovely to be able to nest to my heart’s connect. twitter. chirp.
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