New Years Thoughts

Yesterday I went into the city.  I love DC.  I love DC in the way that only a native who has lived away from the city, has grown to appreciate it and has returned to the city can love it.  I don’t actually live INSIDE of DC because no one can afford that, but I do love it.

Anyway I went to the city early to go and watch my team lose spectacularly, as is our custom.

Come on Everton, how can you lose when I look this sexy?

Then I met up with a friend who went with me to visit another friend.

Oh Stephen Colbert. I hope your new show is also amazing.

Then we went to go see the Imitation Game.  If you don’t know who Allen Turing is, then shame on you.  As you sit here reading this on your computer, then mosey on over to Wikipedia and look up the man who fathered the very idea.  Imitation Game is a good movie, and deserves the Oscar buzz its been getting, but it left me deeply reflective.  An openly gay man and a consummate nerd during the 40’s in Britain, its unsurprising that he was eventually persecuted.  I’m entirely unqualified to speak about a large portion of his persecution, but I recognize that it compounded his situation in a way that I’ll never understand.  However as a nerd, I can relate to some aspects of his situation.

There is a part in the story that I am not sure is historically accurate.  I should look it up, but whether it is or not, it was powerful.  There is a moment when he could have had almost everything he’d ever wanted.  He would have never been brought on charges, he would have had the facade of the respectable life with a person who accepted him as he was.  And while I think that is only a ghost of what he was entitled, It would have been the safe route.  And he rejects it.  He rejects it because he wants to keep the other person safe.  And in that moment the whole theater gasps.  It underlines the heroism of the man.  In the light of history it is absolutely the wrong choice, but at the time he had incredibly important reasons for doing it.  He loses so much, and gains nothing, and if that’s not how the nerd life felt growing up, I don’t know what is.

Today being a nerd is a very different thing.  Today it’s not a bad thing, in fact nerd is cool.  All those years my dad told me that geeks would someday rule the world, and that day has come.  I see the nerdy kids in my class and they occupy a place in the social hierarchy that would have been far above my pay grade at the same age.

And I’m not bitter about it.  I know it sounds as if I might be but I’m not.  In some ways the climate in which I grew up in shaped me in pretty beneficial ways.  I’m super observant, I read social cues pretty well, I’m incredibly self sufficient, and I’m comfortable being on my own.  These are all things which sometimes seem like super powers in the modern world.

But I walked out of that theater super sad. I’m glad I had a friend with me, because watching that fall from greatness, the isolation and eventual destruction of such an important and heroic figure really kind of was emotionally destroying.  I think it showed exactly what happens when everyone’s deepest fear is realized.  He saved 14 million people, but no one would do the same for him.  The movie was amazing, I think that everyone should see it, but for me at least, it was also profoundly rattling.  I think it was the constant juxtaposition of high and low points, the film hammers home over and over again that all his achievements, all his success, all his work will not, in the end, save him.

Anyway, I parted ways with my friend after the movie and went down the Zoo so I could enjoy the last night of ZooLights, a Christmas tradition in which the zoo stays open late and puts Christmas light displays along the major thoroughfare.

Good evening, Moon

As I checked in on Swarm and began to wander through the pathways I became struck by my own sense of apartness that I was feeling.  We have come so far as a society but I still felt isolated.  I took out my phone and texted a friend who lives near buy.  Hey nerd, you should come to the zoo tonight. And within minutes he was on his way.  Moments later another friend texted. I saw your checkin on Swarm.  Do you want company? Umm. Yes.  Yes I do.

When I was in college my roommate would tell me that my radical independence was not really a strength.  She would tell me that I needed to work on letting people know when I needed or wanted something.  That seems like mooching to me, but in the past few weeks, I have been struck by the fact that I have a stronger network than I appreciate.

I know this is a rambling post, but I really am trying to make a point.  My first point is that going into this new year, I’m super grateful to the people who keep fighting to make this world better.  The LGBTQ community isn’t automatically shunned and persecuted like they were in Turing’s day.  There’s still a lot of work to be done there but it does seem to be getting better.  The protestors that are bringing awareness to police brutality and overreach are important.  Even the angry 13 year-olds on tumblr who are growing up not with a sense of complacency but with the fire to change their worlds.  These are things that encourage me and strengthen me and make me feel hopeful.  Last night as I walked through Mount Pleasant with my friend it occurred to me that 15 years ago we would have been considered to be crazy to wander DC at night, but now it’s a new city.  There are a lot of reasons from all over to be hopeful about 2015 and the world in general.

The other point I’m trying to make is that isolation is dangerous.  I know that I just said that I was comfortable being on my own, but there is a difference between getting some alone time and isolating yourself.  I think there is a very healthy aspect to being comfortable with the person you are when you are buy yourself.  Isolation is when you shut yourself off out of fear or whatever.  And that is really not healthy.  I keep thinking about how solo I felt walking through the crowds at the zoo and how much better the night was once a few friends had shown up.  And I get it, really I do.  There’s that trepidation right?  What if my company isn’t wanted?  What if I get blown off?  Etc. etc. etc.  Don’t isolate.

I think about the people we lost in the last 12 months while they were feeling isolated and that seems like the greatest tragedy to me.  We have so many ways to be connected today, with the assistance of our Turing machines, lets use them to be healthier people.

I love you all, like this goat loves his heater.

The Great Move of 2014

If you’ve been confused about where exactly I live, you are not alone.  Since September of 2012 I have had a fairly nomadic lifestyle.  While it’s true I have a small house in Pennsylvania and a Post Office Box in Maryland, I’ve not really had a fixed address, a place to commune with my stuff as it were.

That changed this month.

So here’s what happened.  Up until September of 2012, I was happily living in Omaha, Nebraska, a fabulous city in a fabulous state.  But things being what they were some family/personal stuff came up and I ended up moving back to where my parents were in Pennsylvania.  Now Penn isn’t a terrible state, but it’s not really my cup of tea so it probably shouldn’t surprise anyone that house or no house I escaped within 6 months.  Where did I go?  I headed south, to the sunny shores of Florida.  Season Affective Disorder is a real thing ladies and gentlemen and it can make even the brightest among us a little insane.  That’s all I’m going to say about that.  Anyway, I arrived in Florida for the start of the awful season, when you can almost melt into the parking lot should you dare cross it during the middle of the day; I stayed there for another 6 months.  Adventures were had, good times were shared, but when it was time to go, I went.

I returned to the Washington, DC area.  I grew up here, I know the area, and what was supposed to be a temporary stop, in which I would make some money substitute teaching while I figured out my next destination has turned into a semi permanent thing as I got hired as a full time teacher at a school I rather like.  Anyway, constant adventuring is good for the soul and good for the spirit, but it turns out fairly bad for the budget.  So I spent a year kind of recovering from my slap dash experiences and now I’ve moved into my own place in Maryland.  This is an exciting time for me.  I do have my own distinctive uh. style.  And while I think I’ve proven conclusively that you can live without the stuff that ties you down, I don’t really want to anymore.  So I needed my stuff.  Which is where this tale begins.

So I signed a lease on the apartment on December 2, but on December 3 I was flying out to watch EFT1 (as previously mentioned, I think, in passing) and I didn’t get back until the 7th.  Then the next two weeks were filled with progress notes, and winter festival type things at school, and so I wasn’t actually able to move until the weekend of December 20.  YAY CHRISTMAS MOVING.  Now if you are familiar with the great state of Pennsylvania you can probably already guess why I was suddenly nervous.  If you aren’t, allow me to share.  Pennsylvania  is a pretty mountainous state.  During the summer and fall it is glorious, but during the winter, those windy, deserted roads with terrible cell service are pretty treacherous.  Now my moving date had been pushed into… the white months.  It’s the snow.  The snow which falls and blankets anything.  Winter is coming and it seems to come to Pennsylvania first.  And sure enough when I checked the weather… 80% chance of snow.  WELL CRAP.

I moved moving days but the snow seemed to chase me.  It was going to snow on my moving day, I was definitely going to die on a mountain in Pennsylvania, the state had gotten me at last.  But, I mean, I still was going to do it.  It was moving time, baby.  Electing to come on this adventure were two of my #spacesisters, Charissa and Brandi.  Thanks y’all.  I can’t believe you signed up for this.

ANYWAY.  We drove up Saturday.  My parents happen to have a bed and breakfast in the town my house is in so accommodations were sorted.  We arrived in Johnstown, and it was the average sort of fun.  We checked into the BnB, drove over to my house, got snackies at Sheetz, tried to break into a caboose.

No really, we did.

Then we drove around and discussed the ways in which the town reminded us of District 12.

See the Hob? Do you see it? It’s right there, Katniss.

Finally Charissa arrived, and we went and got dinner.  Then we watched the Hobbit.  And I might have cried a lot.

The next day was truck/movers day.  And getting the truck went surprisingly well.

Everything was fine actually, until I got within about 20 minutes of my house, about 25 minutes before the movers were supposed to show.  Then I got a phone call.

Not on this phone.

And this is what they said.  It was the movers.  Because of course it was, they had gotten a job 3 hours away from my house and would only come load my stuff if I would pay them a butt-ton of money.  I had a written price quote from them but now they were changing it.  So I said to them “You can’t do this, we have our agreement in writing.”  And this is what the guy said.  “Yeah, but you have to move in like 20 minutes.  What are you going to do?”

So anyway, I was probably fairly glowing at that moment, Charissa said I migggghhhht have driven slightly off the road.  What I did was give him some fairly detailed pointers on what he should do with himself in his private time, perhaps with his mother.  Anyway, so he was then like “well we will see you on Tuesday for the unload!”  At which point I started laughing maniacally and asked him why he would think I’d ever want him near me.

Anyway, so we pull up at my house and I explain the situation to my friends.  Who had signed up to come and drive and watch and now… Well here’s the thing.  I’m okay with facing the consequences of my temper.  My temper and I have been together for a very long time and the fact is that we are good together.  I don’t like making my friends share my fate though.

But Brandi and Charissa saddled up anyway, and we got that truck freaking loaded.  Girl power everyone!

Angels

Finally, tired, dirty, covered in spiders, I was ready to head to my new home.  And shock of all shock, the weather, the thing I had been WORRIED about…. was great!

Afterwards we rode the incline (the world’s steepest vehicular incline!) to get some dinner.

WHEEEEEE

And a good time was had by all.

Martini flights. Who knew?

And then we came back to party all night… and promptly fell asleep after single glasses of wine. #OldPeopleProblems

The rest of the move was pretty anticlimactic.  The threatened snow never showed, and over breakfast the next morning I hired new movers to unload my crap in MD.  They turned out to be super competent and efficient and fabulous so if anyone needs movers in the DC area I used iMoversUSA which I’m pretty sure is one of those companies that facilitates movers connecting with people, but they were amazing and also holy crap I appreciated it.

I returned the truck and I’ve been kind of puttering around my house getting things organized ever since.  I have confidence I will be fully moved by the time school starts which is good because once school starts I won’t have time for anything else.  #TeacherProblems

As much as I’m loving having my place again, here’s the real take away from this tale.  Johnstown could have ended pretty badly.

*Insert menacing music here*

What I’ve found in life is that sometimes it’s not the adventure you are having, it is the people you are having the adventure with.  I am always 125% up for the adventure, but the fact was that this would have been a miserable move without my friends.  With them, I actually had a fantastic time, spiders and all.

That more than anything is the thing that keeps me from pulling the trigger on another move.  I have always been about the adventure, and the seeing new things, but.

Me too, John.

Call it end of the year reflection, call it finding a crap load of dead spiders in the boxes, call it whatever you want, but

Moving really made me appreciate the friends I’ve got all over again.

Goodbye Says it All

I am spectacularly bad at goodbyes.  We can psychoanalyze this if you want.  We can talk about security issues or how death entered my circle of friends disturbingly early, but nothing really changes the fact that wringing a goodbye from me is nothing short of impossible. 

I am that person who will sneak out before everyone wakes up and text you later to tell you how much fun I had, or the person who needs to run to the store when I know you need to leave for the airport, or the person who will hand in their resignation to HR and never mention it to the rest of the team until that last lunch maybe, where everyone looks like you’re kidding right? 

As much as I am in constant motion, you’d think that goodbyes were something I’d have gotten better at.  As much as I’ve moved and traveled, I should have a fair amount of goodbyes under my belt after all.  And to be fair, I do, it’s just that most of them are super awkward, rushed, and escape ridden. 

That’s not to say I can’t end a phone conversation, or that I’m still crashing on the couch of some friend that invited me to dinner in 2007 but whose house I can’t figure out a way to leave (with the group, always leave when a group leaves).

But when the goodbye matters?  When it’s someone I care about? I can’t do it.  I’ve stood there, and looked at the person, and the thought invariably invades my brain: what if I never see you again? What if this is the last time, and the last place we’re ever together? That’s not normal right?  That can’t possibly be what happens in the minds of everyone else, because I’ve seen the graceful heartfelt goodbyes I can never give.  A goodbye from me, if you can get one, is probably deflective humor, a quick side-hug, and a snarky remark as I turn away. 

But I have this song on my playlist.  It’s one of those peppy and relentlessly upbeat pop songs, but it makes me introspective, and It makes me remember all the people I’ve had to say goodbye to.  If you’ve ever been the recipient of a shitty Kristen goodbye, I want you to know, when I hear it, I think of you.

Remember the time when we stole the whole day?
And nobody knows it, we took it away,
And it will be forever mine,
And it will be forever yours

• I think of white rental cars, and driving through Dundee, and the can of Diet Dr Pepper that I never drank, but was so pleased that you’d remembered.
• I think of that wall at California Academy of Sciences where you told me the story of the Universe through the graphics they’d chosen (wrongly).
• I think of that time that we all drove 4 hours through a snow storm from different directions so we could walk around a science museum together.
• I think about the year we decided we’d make a gingerbread house and you were so good at sculpting model trains from Starburst candies.
• I think about the time we drove out to a small town to see the World’s Largest Front Porch Swing and that cop followed us around all day and then bought us cookies at the local bakery and they were so good.
• I think about the time we went to the Chicken Festival and it was so hot and the air conditioning broke down, and you HATED it and how you don’t get overheated anymore and I’m so proud of you.
• I think about the time we went to the Lancers game and I felt like I was cheating on the Stars but I loved every second anyway.
• I think about the time we packed a lunch and sat on the top level of the Eiffel Tower because we wanted to eat lunch where Gustav Eiffel probably had. 
• I think about the Frank Lloyd Wright road trip and how we got chased by dogs because I had to see the private homes too.
• I think about the time we went to watch Catching Fire at the Cinnedine and how SOMEONE kept ordering drinks and flirting with our waiter.
• I think about days when I honestly thought that I was a failure and you’d swing by my classroom with a fistbump and a story about someone else doing it worse. 
• I think about the time you got me to go to a baseball game and we walked over the top of the seats to get to where we wanted to be, like the 10th Doctor in that movie theater, and I felt like a total badass. 
• I think about walking through London and finding a random statue of a roman emperor in a random green space, and being perplexed as to why it was there but taking pictures with it anyway.  Because how often do you take pictures with Roman Emperors?
• I think about the night the outhouse fell over on you in the storm, and then how the clouds cleared out and later we laid on the grass because our tents had blown away and watched the Milky Way travel across the sky.
• I think about that camping trip in Shenandoah, and how it rained almost the whole time, but it made the hills look purple and we decided that we must have gone to Narnia. 
• I remember that time you came over and my dog had just been hit by a car and you put him in the backseat of your Explorer without thinking about bloodstains on the seat when the new car smell hadn’t even worn off yet.
• I think about that time I went to dinner with strangers and walked away with new friends.
• I think about the time that we went to that midnight showing and some kid made a comment about us being too old, and you snarked off to him about being dressed like a troll (which he was not cosplaying).
• I think about the time that we’d all had too much to drink, but you decided you were going to go door to door begging the neighbors for ketchup at 2 am, and how we all ran out of the house and hid around the side to watch you.
• I think about the time we all ate Jimmy Johns the night before you left for Iraq and how we were all so worried about you, but we made you drag out your keyboard and sang songs from Rent all night instead of talking about it.

I have been gifted with some of the greatest friends in the world.  I have one friend who lives in the same town that her parents grew up in.  She is so connected to that place.  Her kids go to school where she did, and have some of the same teachers she remembers.  She’s grounded in a way that I’ve never been and honestly probably never will be.  She has said before that she is a little jealous of the adventures I’ve had, but sometimes I’m a bit jealous of the roots she has. 

I don’t feel rooted like a tree.  I’m more like an aquatic plant that grows on top of the water and travels where the currents take it.  Sometimes I like that and sometimes I don’t.  I do know what happens when I try to stay in one place for too long though. 

My feet start to itch.  I start thinking about coastlines I haven’t explored and trails I want to hike, and festivals that I want to be in the middle of.  Its a great big world, filled with adventures and experiences I haven’t had yet.  And I also know that I’ll meet new people, people that I’ll like and be annoyed by and have adventures with, and whose stories will make me laugh or make me think.  People who I also won’t be able to say goodbye to. 

That’s part of the reason I love the technology we have now.  I might not be in the same room with my friends, but we can talk over twitter or text messaging, we can video chat with FaceTime, and when I’m really lucky I can book a ticket to go see them in person. 

But change is coming, and I’m not real sure what direction it’ll take.  Just don’t ask me to say goodbye when it happens. 

Also the song I reference is called Forever Yours, and its by Alex Day.    http://youtu.be/qOW2eEz9cYk