When You've Failed: Dear You

Congratulations: You!
12:00-1:00 p.m.
Biggest Conference Room in the Office

The meeting invite stares at me from the corner of my desktop. I scowl at it. My lips twist and eyes narrow. I have thoroughly failed in my planning for this meeting, and I’ve known of my failure for months. I’ve pondered this meeting in my head, rolled my choices along the roof of my mouth, worried the cracks with my tongue.

My company has a wonderful women in business group that my mentor hosts, and one of my dearest work friends is the Treasurer of Dreams. Many moons ago we had a meeting where we wrote our future selves congratulatory notes for the spring about our achieved goals and stored them in a box on her desk. I had two: moving to Seattle, and getting engaged to Lennon.

Lennon and I broke up in November. I suffered a psychotic break after I didn’t get my “perfect fit” job late this winter.

The past year has been hard on me. I have the gray hairs to prove it. But I started seeing a therapist, dyed my hair pink, and focused on my present self instead of what I thought my future should be. The box I thought I could cram myself into was not a viable future. The one I’m looking at now might not be either, I won’t know until I’m there. I have to remember this for my meeting in 70 minutes.

My friends Allen and Charli have a quote on their wall by their workstations (he's a programmer, they're a poet): Fail faster. Make better mistakes.

It's a quote about working tech; we create innovation by failing. It applies to our creative and "normal" lives too. If you're never failing, you're not pushing.

This is my new letter from present me to present me. I hope you, dear reader, get something out of it too.

Dear You,

Embrace the failure. These failures mark your survival, another groove worn into your hull of mistaken navigation and unclear signs. You are still here, and you are still fighting. Your eyes are open now, and you’re starting to understand that what you don’t agree with, you don’t have to do forever. You get an exit plan.

Now you’ve made an exit plan, and taken the very first steps towards getting there. The difference between this one and the other ones? The new plan is organically achievable; it runs into your blood like spring breezes. It grows flowers from your fingertips.

I am proud of you, even on the days when we mark high distress and shame on our Moodscope cards. Our plan may fail, more dreams may be broken, the plate might yet fall from your hands and shatter on the kitchen floor. Remember that plates and cakes are replaceable, but you are not.

You always say you never need anyone to save you - now, you’re living it.

Congratulations on avoiding trains for another year.

Congratulations on finally understanding the love song of your city, and writing yourself into it. Of wearing into your life with patience instead of hammering it like that’s going to do something besides make it weaker.

You lived. You win.

Love,
You

The Anticipation is Palpably Painful

I am waiting for a phone call that will not come for another three and a half hours.

While I was in Washington last Monday, brushing my teeth, I got a phone call from a WA number. Thinking it was my host confirming our lunch plans, I picked up the phone with the toothbrush still in my mouth.

It was not Grace. It was an Amazon recruiter. Who wanted me to skip four phone interviews and come into the office for an interview “since you’re in town anyway.”

Well, there are a lot of things I do not know about in life, but one thing I do know is that you do not say no to a big company when they are asking you to interview for a job you don’t yet have, but are already extremely passionate about.

The interviews went okay. Parts of them went swimmingly, and parts of them I disconnected and couldn’t pull it in. When they asked about times I disagreed with something that my customers did, or something that happened in a project. I am not great at disagreeing with how things are done, because often when I disagree in my career, I’ve done it wrong. I’ve been told simply to hush. Because I don’t know what I’m talking about yet. Sometimes I am pulled into a meeting and corrected.

I’m not great at talking about myself, and I am a rambler. I should be more succinct. I should have been more succinct. It would have allowed for deeper questions. Maybe I should have taken a Xanax those two interview days, but I wanted a sharper edge - not the fluffy girl who gets by easy, cloud-like in her glory.

I emailed the hiring manager today asking for a timeframe of when I might expect to hear about next steps. She had not responded to my previous emails of follow-up questions. She asked if I had some time this afternoon to chat.

So I’m sitting here, expecting a rejection. Anticipating this rejection. Oscillating between being zen about it, and coming close to tears the next minute. I am very good at internalizing “everything happens for a reason.” I am also very good at grieving. But I am so tired of being teased by the universe. I am tired of, with each rejection, re-committing to New York and re-realizing that I’ve put a band-aid over a sucking wound that this landscape cannot heal.

This is not the blog post I wanted to write. I had a dalliance on my vacation - I wanted to write you the beginning of a love story about mud flats and misty forests and really big dogs. I wanted to tell you maybe not a wife after all. I wanted to tell you about how you should only kiss sober, touch each other sober. Remember what potential feels like without the help of bourbon because I had it for days at a time.

They can’t say they want me. It’s only been three days. And when you ask for a timeframe response to hiring, they come back with a time frame, not “let’s chat.”

Let’s chat about my dreams for what you’re building. Let’s chat about moving vans and relocation assistance; let’s chat about the things I can’t allow myself to think about for the next three hours. Give me a timeframe. Please, give me a timeframe or welcome me home.

UPDATE: I did, in fact, not get the job. I failed in my success metrics and analytical capabilities, as I have failed in both those things for every job I have applied to. I am unsure where to go from here besides to business school, which is supposed to start on April 5th.

Have a Heart: My Relationship Is Not a Convent

I was really sad today. One of those “I could walk in front of a train” days - they start happening in November and follow until mid-Spring. These days often turn into me doing not-so-surreptitious research on joining a convent (usually Catholic, I’m traditional if nothing else. Though I’m not at all Catholic.)

I’ve fantasized about being a nun almost my whole life, and I absolutely blame Rodgers and Hammerstein, and bloody Maria von Trapp.

One of the most poignant moments for me as of late was about Mother Superior and How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria? She’s a devil - she’s an angel - she’s a giiiiirl! And with that the nuns promptly decide that perhaps Maria does not belong in the convent and perhaps Mother Superior should hire her out to be a governess to a cranky widower. “You’re not really cut out to be a nun, Maria,” they say, “Being a child in a tree and looking down at our quiet, holy lives does not prepare you to make these vows.”

The more important part of the story comes later when Maria gets frustrated and comes back to the convent, citing that it was too hard and she couldn’t get through to the children. Mother Superior tells her to “climb every mountain” in one of my favorite solo songs. At its essence, the song (and Mother Superior’s role) is to encourage Maria to stop hiding from her problems. A convent is not built to keep your secrets, or for you to ignore your unprofessed love of the Captain, or to… hide. (We know because Rolf found them in the end anyway. I know, it’s a true story, but hush. I’m making metaphors out of molehills.)

Relationships, like convents, are not good places to pretend you don’t have problems. A habit cannot save you from your reckless dreams, and a relationship can’t save you from the problems you’ve been trying to avoid your whole life.

Maria has wild abandon. She’s not suited for a quiet life of being a nun. I have issues that look like whatever the opposite of wild abandon is. I’m not suited to be a wife right now.

So, unable to afford the therapist I want to see, I’m borrowing a leaf out of my own crazy book and turning (after 15 years of holy abandon, practicing almost entirely by myself) to organized(ish) religion. Because I’m craving so much solitude and contemplation, I started going to the weekly dharma gathering at the NYC Shambhala Center. I don’t know a lot about Buddhism yet (beyond what I can glean from the Beats), but I am pretty great at sitting still for long stretches at a time and focusing on my breath.

Today we did a love-kindness focused seven-part guided meditation and I was really bad at it. I had trouble focusing on our meditation phrase, “May you find happiness.” We started with a benefactor, then ourselves, then a neutral person, then someone who annoys us, then all the people in the room, and then the whole universe. Not only did I have trouble picking a benefactor (because there were too many!), but I had trouble picking a person I was neutral towards, and an even harder time picking someone who annoys me. People who just “rub me the wrong way”... I don’t have very many of those.

I could’ve used more love-kindness focus - I ended up mostly annoyed with inability to focus.

Anyway, once I abandoned the phrase and focused on drawing the warmth from my heart and center, I was able to radiate compassion for the universe like the sun. I can’t imagine what I must have looked like, but I felt like a sunflower. My face raised towards the ceiling, shoulders relaxed, smiling like an idiot. Wrapping the world in love and kindness like a babe.

In our brief one-on-ones, I spoke with a young woman who had the opposite problem - she couldn’t focus on extending to the universe, but individuals didn’t give her too much trouble besides the crying. She felt so deeply towards her friends and benefactors, loved them so much that she cried. I cry a lot too, but usually only when people I love leave me, or I’m just too sad to find another expression.

I liked her - she reminded me of Maria.

Sometimes, The Lateral Move: An Update of Sorts

After being rejected (see Shot Though the Heart) from a job within my immediate company, I went hunting for one within my parent company. And outside my parent company, as long as it wasn’t based in New York City, or anywhere in its surrounding area.

I found two: one at a university press, and the other at my parent company. The parent company position was extremely similar to the role I had been rejected from, so you can imagine my excitement!

The parent company makes attempting a transfer extremely casual. Before you send a resume, before you speak with your own HR department, before anything else happens, you schedule an informal information chat with the hiring manager.

The “informal chat” is secretly a phone interview, by the way. Thanks, mentor, for pointing that out to me so I went in completely prepared! I had a great, if nerve-wracking, conversation with the hiring manager, who referred me to her number 2, and I had a blast chatting with her as well. I didn't repeat any answers from three years ago - that was a big success. All went well, and hope floated in me, refusing to settle down. I had butterflies for a week.

Well, the she called me back today and said, with regret, that they wouldn’t be continuing to the formal interview process because I hadn’t had enough experience. They really liked me, and thought I would be a great fit, but I just wasn't experienced enough. Just like my learning tour manager said. Am I disappointed? Absolutely. This stinks. Like many other humans, I'm extremely impatient. I don't like working and waiting to get things, I just want them. Now. Please.

But I’m also elated because she’s referring me to two other departments for similar openings at a lower experience level. I feel justified, and vindicated, as if there is actually more to me than just data points and rote reporting. I am a human, and I am good at more than just statistics and filling in Excel sheets.

I haven’t heard from the university press beyond that they’re interested in speaking with me, but already have a list of finalists. If they don’t end up interviewing me, they’ve promised a more extensive reply, and possibly a short advisory session where they’ll tell me all the things I need to do for next time. This job isn’t a reach for me, it’s a remarkable combination of my current position, and the work I did on my learning tour.

I guess today was not a win in the short term, but the war is still raging. I’m not seeing a reason to be discouraged. My mentor (thank god I have a mentor, she really is the cat’s pajamas) thinks it’s all going in the right direction, and I’ll come out on top. This might be my late-twenties patience test; I've had one every five or so years for as long as I can remember.

So, chin up, I guess. Keep crossing your fingers for me, and hopefully early next year will find me in the Sound-swept arms of Seattle.

The Perils of Taking Online Dating Offline

*This is not an exploration of the pros and cons of online dating - nor offline dating, for that matter. This is just a story about a Friday night. Or more accurately, it's a story about a Saturday morning.

This was too perfect...

I woke up on Saturday at 1:24 p.m. - which is about four hours later than I ever sleep in. I rubbed my eyes, my head, wondering if the previous night was just a bizarre dream. I check Facebook - the most reliable and uncompromising record of recent history in most of our lives.

Status update from the early hours of Saturday morning: OH. MY. GOD. NO.

I wish I could just leave it there. I wish a lot of things with regard to Friday night. However - in the interest of processing what happened, and hopefully preventing someone else making the same mistakes - I will share my experience with you, albeit with a bit of reluctance.

The picture: I'm sitting in my gorgeous apartment on Friday night, having finished work late. I'd eaten a delicious dinner, read my book, and had settled down with Netflix and a glass of red for the evening. At a few minutes past midnight, my evening bliss was broken by the buzz of my phone ringing.

It was the guy I'd been talking to online for a few days, with whom I'd made plans for Saturday afternoon. We'd talked about going for a walk through Bute Park, which runs alongside the River Taff in the centre of Cardiff, then maybe finding a pub for a quiet drink. I hadn't felt butterflies, but he seemed nice enough, cute enough, just enough for a Saturday afternoon.

I assumed he was calling to talk about our plans, or possibly to cancel. It was late, and I was tired, but I picked up the call, curious to hear his voice before meeting in person.

As soon as I picked up the phone, I could tell he was having a good night. He laughed a lot, I could hear the smile in his voice and it was infectious. He cajoled me into agreeing to meet him for a drink, and I dragged my butt off the couch and got dressed - nothing too impressive, I didn't want anyone to think I was prepared to put in effort for a last-minute meeting after midnight.

As I walked toward the buzz of Cardiff Bay, I couldn't keep myself from yawning and hoped the guy wouldn't be too put off by my obvious exhaustion. Turns out, I needn't have worried about what he was going to think - about me or about anything else. He was already wasted, with the sole intention of getting even more so, and no interest in getting to know me at all.

As we walked into a bar, we ran into three boys - I can't call them anything else, they looked like they were about 14 - and ended up chatting with them for a while. One was tall with Bieber-sweep hair, and formed an instant drunken bond with my date. One wasn't drinking, and was kind of cute (for a man-child.) The third one . . . well, he at least had some interest in getting to know me. Over lunch, the next day.

I politely declined, at first out of respect to my date and the plans for the following day, which I could tell I was probably going to cancel at this point, especially after he went outside with his new little bro to smoke a cigarette. Dating smokers just isn't my thing.

Before they went outside, Bieber asked me what I wanted to drink and then bought me some sickly pink cocktail that I couldn't drink. I pretended to be sorry, he pretended to be offended. Or perhaps he was truly offended. Either way, I ordered three shots of tequila and said thanks for the drink, while his two friends, and my date, looked at me with bewildered admiration.

Manchild #3 asked me again if he could meet up the next day for lunch. I asked him how old he was.

"I'll be 22 in nine days." I couldn't help myself, I burst out laughing. I almost told him I was 24-and-three-quarters, but caught myself.

He was persistent, showing his age as he began to beg - beg! - me to let him take me to lunch, or coffee, or anything. At a couple points, he leaned in to kiss me, and my own laughter wasn't enough to stop him, though pushing him away to arms' length was.

He told me he was mature for his age, in spite of my efforts to explain that a mature man knows what "No" means without continuing to beg for what he's already been denied. I continued to decline his offers, less politely, for a myriad reasons, some more legitimate than others - but none of them were enough.

Weary from trying to explain why I didn't want to go to lunch and trying to inflate the kid's self-esteem, and feeling tired from the booze, though unfortunately nothing else, I watched Bieber stroll in with my date and announce he had to leave. Who knows what happened out there, but suddenly I was left with a swaying, slurring guy who kept calling me dude (which I kind of like) and accidentally hitting my boobs every other emphatically gesticulated sentence (which I didn't like.)

Now he was sufficiently shit-faced, the topic of conversation (read: monologue) turned to getting high and coming back to my place to hang out. He leaned in to kiss me, his tongue rapidly going from right to left as it approached my face. He didn't even register my look of disgust or my laughter as I pushed him away and told him I'd be going home alone.

Regardless of any "stranger danger" element here - the guy was clearly harmless, just someone who'd had a bad week and gotten too drunk to do anything but drink and rant about work - there was no way in hell I was bringing anyone home with me. I told him as much. I didn't want to help him walk anywhere, I didn't want to help him up four flights of stairs, I didn't want him crashing at my place, I didn't want to deal with him in the morning, I didn't want to meet up in the park.

I. Don't. Want. You.

I wasn't sending mixed signals, I was being completely unequivocal. I was done here.

Well, almost done. He'd lost his sense of direction, and I knew he had to get to the other side of the city, probably two miles from where he currently stood, leaning on me for support. I hailed him a cab, took out the cash I'd withdrawn to pay for drinks, and gave it to the driver, telling him to take my date to wherever he could unlock the door.

Waving them off, I turned, shuddered, and walked home, where I finished the bottle of wine I'd started earlier, and looked at the clock. Almost 3 a.m., I though, shaking my head. What a weird night.

After finishing the wine, the movie I was watching on Netflix, and skyping with my best friend to regale her with my crazy night, I collapsed into bed at around 4 a.m., struck by the surreality of the night, and laughed gently to myself as I drifted off to sleep.

Now, I realise I shouldn't have gone out for a drink with a guy who calls at midnight. But when he said, "Why not?" I literally didn't have (or perhaps want) a reason why not. I just moved to a city where I don't know anyone, and was getting pretty tired of sitting on my own in the evenings. I wanted the spontaneity of deciding to go out at midnight, having a wonderful time with a guy I'd just met, and coming home again. The potential was there. Unfortunately, the guy was not.

I think I'll keep my spontaneous meetups to the daylight hours from now on.

Did They Send Me Daughters When I Asked for Sons?* (Spoiler alert: Yes!)

I read the New York Times Room for Debate on “Are Modern Men Manly Enough?” the other day, and it infuriated me. The current trajectory of deciding to attack men and masculinity because it’s no longer PC to attack women and femininity is really frustrating. Gender roles are frustrating and problematic, and I’m going to leave it right there.

Yup, right there.

I did not find any persuasive arguments in that particular RFD: I agreed with the common sense authors, and found those stuck in Leave it to Beaver, well, stuck in Leave it to Beaver.

It did, however, get me thinking about what I think a good man is, and subsequently, my father and his father. My grandfather died earlier this year, leaving behind a legacy of gentle faith, natural living, and beautiful carpentry. All his sons learned woodworking from him, though my father is probably the best at it because he uses it the most often. (Don’t worry, uncles, you’re both very talented also!)

My grandad built me a dollhouse when I was six, and a carved pen and pencil set when I was twenty-three. My dad completely restored the house I grew up in. It’s not for me to say whether or not we should always follow in our parents footsteps, but reading that RFD made me realise how much the builder’s aspect looks like love to me, to my family.

Love also looks a lot like this. That's my granddad. And a wild fawn.

So, I’m going to learn woodworking from my dad. I’ve always wanted to, but never had the wherewithal to just go down to his woodshop and start helping him. Like me, my father is an introvert, and the shop is very much his space.

But it’s not just about love and family tradition. It’s also about practicality. The other half of modern culture where I live (and who I’m friends with) is “throw money at the problem until it goes away”. I am firmly entrenched in this camp. My brother can reshingle a roof. My mom can fix and replace pipes. My dad can… do everything. I can write blog posts, make cookies, and make you a mean martini when you get home from your hard day. If something breaks, I wail into my candy-striped apron until Lennon fixes it.**

I have some basics down. You don’t grow up in a family like mine without getting excited about sawzalls (my parents each have their own) and tablesaws and knowing to watch your fingers while you’re cutting that plank because that’s how pop-pop lost the top of his. That led me to tech theater in college. I can build a set. But, I couldn’t build you a chair. Or a cabinet. Or a door. I can’t install a doorknob. Or sand a floor. Or put up real walls.

Ultimately, I’m hoping the tutelage will turn to finishing the master bathroom - the very last room to be done in the house my parents bought twenty years ago. I learn by doing. I should have all the practical DIY skills I need by next year.

And next Christmas, everyone gets reindeer made of pipe sockets and copper tubing.

*To clarify my title, my father was tickled pink at having a daughter. I am the only girl child in my family. 

**To clarify that entire paragraph.

First World Problems: We Got Cable, and Suddenly My Three-Bed Is Too Small

I’m an introvert. I know the internet is currently on tail-end of its “WTF IS AN INTROVERT” phase, but it’s relevant. I much prefer quiet and solitude. I need personal space. Lots of it. It's hard to come by when a) you work in an open plan office, b) live with your boyfriend, and c) do not have a personal space in your own apartment. Right now it’s causing a lot of emotional distance problems in my relationship. I'm not checked in, I admit it.

When we were finally forced to get our own internet and stop mooching off the landlord, Lennon put the account in his name, and got us some goddamn fancy FIOS. The kind that has cable. I have never owned a television, and the last house I lived in that had some form of TV entertainment (besides my parents') was in my sophomore year of college. His television was old, and not flat. We have limited space. You can see where this is going.

Not here, though.

Enter his (he paid for it) new television. I like putting on pilates, yoga, or watching Netflix via the XBOX. I could do all this with my laptop, but TV is bigger and nicer and the sound isn’t coming out of a three-year-old Macbook’s blown-out speakers. The rest of the time, it drives me a little crazy.

Did you know TV still has ads?

Lennon is a media junkie with ADD. He’s an multi-concentrator. Last night when we got home from dinner, he started watching Family Guy on television, and a nerd-stuff webseries. At the same time. With audible volume on both. I have a thing where if there’s more than one type of noise going on at a particular volume, I can’t concentrate on anything but getting out of there as fast as possible.

I took my Kindle into the bedroom to read, just like every night since we got the television. At the end of the day I am desperate for quiet. Lennon is desperate for distraction. We don’t spend time together in the late evening anymore. I know we don’t have to watch television: he can turn it off and read comics, or play on his phone, or any number of other things.

But the television asks the least of him, and he needs that recharge too.

It's not a total wash; the quiet downtime is necessary for me to continue functioning. But, relegated to the bedroom because of the TV... there is no space left in the apartment to be mine.

I’d love the solution to be setting aside another room, so he can be comfortable owning spaces in the rest of the apartment. Unfortunately, everything I would use to furnish it is needed elsewhere, and I don’t want to take anything away for fear I will say he can use the room for a specific purpose and suddenly it will "belong" to him... which is what tends to happen.

I'm very good about respecting other people's spaces. I don't like disturbing the energy, or otherwise changing the feel of it. I try to keep my own energy small if I'm in there. It's why Lennon now has the whole office and I generally don't go in there except to get a book from a shelf, or if I need to work from home. I don't go into his dressing room (the second bedroom) unless I need the iron, or a towel from the closet. The kitchen is common space. The living room is common space. The front bedroom is big closet storage and the rabbit's space, because she's destructive, and pulls books off the shelf.

And she will eat them.

Houston, we have a problem. We have a three-bedroom apartment, and I don't even fit in it.

Lost in Transition

When I was offered my first well-paid job outside childcare after a year and a half of being broke as a live-in au pair, my first response was: Oh my god – I'll be able to afford my own apartment. I can walk around naked whenever I want to. And drink. And play loud music. I can be drunk, naked, and dancing whenever I want to! Huzzah!

That makes my post-childcare life sound like one big naked party, and it isn't – after all, I still have to work at my new job to get paid. But there's nothing like live-in childcare to make you truly appreciate being in your mid-twenties – even if it's only at the weekends. And occasionally on Tuesdays.

Being an au pair taught me some of the best – and worst – things, about children and families, about the relationships between mothers and nannies, about education and child development, and about myself. The biggest and most important thing I learned is that I will never take another live-in childcare job again in my life. I may even move out of my house when I have my own children. Well, that might be an exaggeration, maybe, but my 18 months as an au pair for three different families put my feelings about starting my own family into perspective.

I used to be one of those girls who would melt at the sight of babies, cooing and fussing over the small children I saw on the bus or in the supermarket. I have one other friend who is like this, and she once said her uterus would ache at the sight of a baby – that's what I felt once, too. The uterine ache of longing for babies.

Then I started getting paid to look after children.

As much as I love children, I never planned to go into childcare after college – it was close to last on my list of post-graduate jobs I would be willing to take – but after moving back to the UK from the States and discovering that care jobs were the only ones available in abundance, my choices were narrowed down to one question: old people or children?

I chose childcare because I thought I'd be good at it – or at least, better than I knew I'd be in eldercare. I'm ashamed to admit that old people who need care – especially personal care – gross me out and frankly scare me. I met plently of eldercare workers who said the same of children, so I guess they're in the right job, and that's what I was afraid of the most. I didn't want to be in a job looking after old people when I knew I'd be the wrong person for the job. They didn't deserve to have me looking after them.

I quickly learned that I wasn't exactly the right person for childcare, either.

My first 'job' as an au pair was in Wales, living with a close family friend, someone I've known since I was nine years and have always considered a big sister to me. When I moved back to the UK, I needed a place to live, and Lucie needed some help with the kids and the house. We were eager to reconnect and grateful that we were able to help each other out; we both felt like we were each getting the better end of the deal, me room and board plus as much pocket money as she could afford to pay me, her a clean(er) house and childcare that allowed her to establish and develop her new business as a grower of fresh produce and herbs as well as herbal bodycare products.

Another upside? Buying birthday / Christmas / baby shower gifts are a snap!

Looking after her two children didn't feel much like a job, but it was definitely hard work. Thankfully, their mother and I, despite seven years without seeing each other and rarely writing, seemed to have near-identical childcare philosophies. Food and nutrition, playtime, schooling, discipline: whatever was happening, we gave the children consistent messages, which I didn't know at the time was a rare and precious thing. When the children were with their fathers, or away at sleepovers, we would get all the mums together and go out dancing, or stay in and cook delicious meals that were uninterrupted by children, and these women became my friends, my support system. Having to move back to the UK, away from my mom and my college friends, could get lonely sometimes, but they were always there for me. I felt completely at home with them, and loved all their children too. We were one big happy [crazy] family.

Lucie and me on a to-scale bouncy Stonehenge. The kids complained about it being too wet. We had a blast.

My next two jobs were far from Wales, with families I didn't know, and I'm not sure whether I truly had less personal space during my time with these families or if I was simply more aware of the fact my space was being invaded by strangers instead of people I considered my family. I was still lonely, more so than when I'd first moved, but I was never alone. Close by there was always the noise, and the needs, of others.

To cut a long story short – though I've got plenty of stories from those families that I'm sure I'll share in other blog posts – my third au pair job ended abruptly in May just as I was being approached by someone from the Mozilla Foundation to work on their Open Badges team, and I was suddenly back in Wales, looking at potential apartments online, and getting set up with my new position at Mozilla. Within two months, I had a new laptop, I'd been flown back to Maine for the team retreat, and my bank account was in shock, having reached a figure it hadn't seen since I was in high school.

This summer has been one of transition. I try to use “transition” instead of “limbo” to describe my life, because being in limbo feels static, and out of my control. Transition means change, and I like change. It's been a long summer, with many steps forward and almost as many steps back – but I saw somewhere that optimism is seeing one step forward and one step back as a cha-cha. I like that.

On Monday, I'm supposed to be moving into my new apartment – which, after weeks of delays and staying with friends and in hotels, has been a long time coming. I will have my grown-up job, my all-to-myself apartment, and my friends will be living nearby. Bring out the wine and turn up the music, for I will no longer be in transition, no longer in limbo.

I will be on my own, but I won't be lonely. I'll be dancing.

Waitressing Chronicles, Part I:

Hello. My name is Kay, and I am a waitress.

I’ve already decided this is going to be a line I relay in front of a meeting group circle of pitied human beings, all trembling from the harm inflicted to them by the real world; the cruel, scary place outside where nobody cares about what you’ve done, who you think you are or who you think you can be.

Don’t get me wrong; I don’t look down on people who are servers, or who are employed in other service duties, for that matter.  It’s just that I am an embittered college grad who is back at square one (or minus ten or twenty, if you include the accumulated debt obtained from those four years—the best years of my life, man!), and am thankful enough to have even found a job as a server in the first place. College didn't prepare me for post-college, and I was jettisoned off into the real world after graduating, landing with a thud on the cold, hard, unforgiving ground. I am seriously fortunate, though. There are a lot of people my age who are unemployed, and while being a waitress can be challenging and unpleasant at times, tips rock and can be awesome, and my job is never boring or dull.

You see, waitressing was always something I thought I could never do. I romanticized it for whatever reason, but it was always something I never fathomed was in my cards.  I’m horrible with strangers—I’m that person that avoids the grocery store until it is an hour before closing, because I can’t stand unknown people. I don’t like interacting with anyone, or feeling their eyes, or seeing that they are picking up dry room-temperature goods after they already gathered their frozen and refrigerated dairy items, and their ice cream is melting, and oh my god that milk is probably warm by now... and, you get the hint. So, waitressing just seemed like a bad idea.

Now that I am a magical food-bringer and drink-filler, I can honestly say nothing could have prepared me for the joys, pains, and ‘what-the-fucks’ of being a server. I’ve gotten to know my regulars, hold disdain for teenagers, crowds of young children, and feel exceptionally exasperated with really confused old people. Every shift is new and never boring. I guess in that sense I am really lucky.

The first time I realized what I might be in for, was during my first week or two of training to be Master Waitress. It’s when I was still freaked out, but ever-so-slightly less freaked out that I was beginning to notice something that was likely there the whole time... creepy old men. Everyone knows the kind. They seem unassuming, with their plaid and their boots. They like gravy on their fries and ask for every refill they can get out of that $2.50 Pepsi they are drinking, repeatedly having to lick the perimeter of their mustache/beard mouth of the liquid and gravy combo inevitably created by the unity of the two. These guys are the outlaws of the American small-town home-style restaurant. They don’t care if you were still cozy and warm in your mother’s uterus while they were watching their son rock their grandchild. You have ovaries (or at least you look like you do, anyway), and you are serving them food. As long as you’ve hit puberty you are fair game to be hit on. Their five to fifteen percent tip DEMANDS that you allow them to hit on you, because that is almost like a surcharge for the harassment they will make you endure.

It all began with the innocent enough “Hey there sweetheart,” “Hi blondie,” and “Hey there good-looking.” Mind you, I don’t and never have gone to work dressing to impress. In fact, I figure the best waitress in the world is very unassuming in appearance; they try to blend into the background, like a ghost of sorts, magically appearing and disappearing in ways that make you think, “I’m not sure how my food just got here, but that was fast! What a great day!” I actually wear all black, keep my hair back, and purposefully make myself look plain but pleasant. This doesn’t stop the creepers, though. I’ve experienced a wide range of discomforts - greetings with ever-so-slight sexual undertones, repeated and relentless requests for hugs, hardcore leering, attempts to touch my hand when I’m putting plates of food or placing drinks on the table... the list could go on.

These incidents made me feel very nervous when I started working at my job. To this day certain moments are fresh in my memory, branded in my brain as if I were another bovine on the market. Thankfully I have a strong-willed, tough, take-no-crap boss who would rush to my assistance if there were ever a need. My own strength of will in regard to defending myself has gotten much better over time, too. Still, the prevalence of the mindset where you just have to accept the existence of these creepy old men baffles and unnerves me. Every single day I wish I could go to their place of work and make them as uncomfortable as they make me sometimes. I know this would never work, though - they would probably love it.

While working in the service industry, there will always be a big part of me that wishes I could blend in like I do in at a 24-hour grocery store at 1:30am, but even then I am able to shroud myself from stranger’s eyes with hats, glasses, scarves, and other implements, something I could never do unless I worked in a very cold restaurant in Iceland. Until then, I suppose all I can do is practice my own Terror-Inducing Leer Defense Glare, doling it out as pleasantly and with as much ease as I would a glass of ice water. I think I get better each time.

Shot Through the Heart: Rejection and the Modern Workplace

I’m still not entirely sure what I want to do with my life, but I am happiest when it involves stimulation and creativity. Entering my full-time job was a dream come true: an easygoing nine-to-five with low overall stress in a fast-paced, quickly growing creative media company. I had started eighteen months earlier with them as a contractor, covering for two people on learning tours in other departments. I was pretty good at it. Every eight weeks or so I had a new project on my hands and happily dedicated myself to it. When the time came for my contract to end, my boss let me know that new full-time position was opening up and strongly hinted I should apply.

After a year and a half of doing the same two or three things without new projects, I grew bored. I lost all intellectual stimulation outside out of my work friends and stalled. The company made a few really exciting changes, but having to suddenly handle content I found extremely offensive wore me down daily. Looking back, I think everyone could see it. 

I don’t hide my feelings well. It’s a professional flaw.

Coming full circle, around that time I did my own learning tour during a co-worker’s maternity leave. She decided to stay home with her new baby, and thus, the job I had been covering for the past four months was now open. Ecstatic, I stalked the job board like a crazed lion waiting on the wounded gazelle. I had my resume ready, and a stellar cover letter. I worked eight a.m. to six p.m. with them every day, they knew my dedication and loyalty. Best of all? No surprise penises or rape in my afternoon inbox. (For real. I am not kidding about that.)

I don’t know what I was expecting when I walked into the interview. I mean, I did prepare for the interview with all the normal types of questions, so I think I thought I knew, but then most of the questions caught me off guard and I realized I was recycling answers from my very first interview with the company three years ago. Was it really possible I hadn’t grown professionally since then?

I walked out of the interview feeling bewildered and blindsided. A sudden sinking feeling overtook me. All my patience in waiting for this job was going to be for nothing: I had the confidence, but lacked the acumen to back myself up. I had proven myself in the setting, but was unable to speak of my accomplishments in my regular department. I felt like I had no translatable skills beyond the four months I had just completed.

I got the call a few weeks later. My boss from the learning tour thanked me for going through the interview process and told me the position was offered to an outside candidate. I’d been a contender, but this woman arrived with the appropriate background: she knows about apps and analysis. I know about books and organizing collected data. (Although I am really good with a semi-colon, and I think that should’ve weighed heavier in my evaluation than something like knowing about apps. Anybody can learn programming; a good semi-colon is bred into you like wine-making. It takes generations. GENERATIONS!)

It's fine. I'm fine. NBD, right?

The department is stretched thin. They probably needed a candidate who already had a few years of experience, and not the deep-end crash course I had. Somebody who wouldn’t potentially have so many teachable moments. This is what my logic is saying.

Or maybe I really did just suck. This is how my heart feels. My failure to make a minor upward move after almost two years as a full-time employee feels like the car died. The drive train is shot. This is where I am right now, and despite my friends telling me to chin up and try again, I’m worried this is where I will stay. 

In the end I know that I am very good at my current job, and both the company and I benefit from where I am. It's stable, steady work that requires an extreme attention to detail and the nuances can be hard to pick up. For now I keep repeating this to myself, hoping for another opportunity with better timing: I am lucky, I have more than work. I have a career. 

I just need to figure out how to better steer it.

I Have a Vision for Dinner. And It's Bigger Than My Wallet.

Being a dog walker brings a whole new level of understanding to the term "Feast or Famine." When the money is good, it's really good. When the money is bad, you panic and scramble to make rent. Unfortunately, you never know too far in advance which way it's going to be. Clients come and go for a multitude of reasons. Oftentimes, there's way too much work or not nearly enough. If you're good at what you do, you can hustle to make ends meet. But you're never really in a position to wear a cashmere catsuit while eating beluga caviar from your finest platinum china - or whatever it is that rich people do - because even if you feel like you're rolling in Benjamins, you could be pawning it all next week when your clients choose to go long-term "summering" in "The Hamptons." Bottom line: Being a dog walker requires a certain amount of frugality. I am not very frugal.

Three more pennies and I can buy a six pack!

My biggest weakness is food. Hands down. Some people have a soft spot for vintage clothing, designer shoes, exotic vacations, cats... I am constantly eating my paychecks. Come to think of it - equal opportunity spender that I am - I'm drinking them, too. It doesn't help that my epicuriosity tends to exceed my pay bracket.

Sometimes I find myself wandering through ritzy shops and specialty markets like a real-life Orphan Annie, smelling all of the delicious smells, reading the placards like I can actually afford what's beneath them, and making eyes with the teenagers behind the counter like a starving mongrel dog. Please offer me a piece of that $75 per pound limited bleu cheese from the Northwest corner of Mordor. Please. 

And sometimes they do. 

Probably because I'm making them uncomfortable.

Anyway, here's what I'm getting at: Expensive tastes combined with fluctuating income occasionally leads to poor decision-making, especially when I'm given the opportunity to show off. Now, don't get me wrong. On most days, I'm humble. I'll even go so far as to say that humbleness is a cornerstone of my personality. But on some days, a little part of me wants to be impressive... likes it, even. I take pride in my cooking. It's nothing gourmet, but more often than not, it is tasty. When I'm by myself, I'll spend 20 minutes torturing over the price of pork chops in the subpar local supermarket before ultimately settling for beef heart, because organ meat is cheaper by the pound. But on days when I'm cooking for two, I magically possess this strange conviction that I can afford to eat whatever the hell I want, that I can afford to serve whatever the hell I want.

If there were Olympics for the pure power of self-justifcation, I'd win.

And with this very reasonable thought process in place, I think, "I, too, can shop at Whole Foods."

Whole Foods - while definitely a mainstream supermarket - is a veritable mecca for anything in the universe that you could possibly want to eat as an upper middle class American. They have a section for everything. Hell, their sections have sections. There's a multicultural food court, a beer-tasting room, machines for making your own peanut butter, loose eggs from under the butt of every bird imaginable, and all the natural, grass-fed, organically-raised meat, fish, and cheese your body has room for. And most of the produce is local. And there is a lot  of produce. This overflowing consumer cornucopia of edible delight, however, comes at a price. Truth is, Whole Foods would be better rebranded as Whole Paycheck.

Now, as a 27-year-old woman living in New York City and working full time as a dog walker, I think it goes without saying that, while I do statistically have more than most of the world's population, I definitely do not qualify as an upper middle class American. So, when I push through the pristinely-polished revolving doors of the hermetically-sealed Columbus Circle Mall - which is redolent with wealth and privilege - and cautiously board the escalator that takes me down, down, down to the crisp air conditioning of Whole Foods Heaven, I become acutely aware of my crusty, beat-up Keds and my threadbare Forever 21 yoga pants (which can barely hang onto their seams, but still somehow manage to pick up every stray Manhattanite dog hair within a 10-foot radius of my body).

"You do not belong here," my mind warns me. "Your wallet does not belong here."

But my eyes brighten with every step. My heart sings. 

"Fresh figs are on sale for $3.99," it coos lovingly.

It is Christmas, and I am young again.

There are two things about this magical journey worth pointing out. For one, to most people, a trip to Whole Foods on a Wednesday evening contains all the untapped joy of a weekend trip to the DMV. For them, there is nothing exciting about trekking to their regular, overcrowded, subterranean, urban supermarket after a long day at the office. You can see it in their harried faces and defensive body language, the way they deftly maneuver those strange little shopping carts around the market's many standalone islands, like drone bees with a tedious - but necessary - task at hand. Whole Foods contains no magic. It contains food. There's no mistaking it: This is a chore. 

I, on the other hand, am like a tourist from the deep South, seeing Times Square for the first time. And fully understanding how annoying both Times Square and first-time tourists are, I'm aware that just because my heart bubbles over with joy for the two-inch-thick grass-fed New Zealand lamb chops doesn't mean that anyone else gives a shit. In fact, all they're aware of is that I'm walking too goddamned slow. I'm a wrench in a well-oiled machine. But that's okay. Because... well, because meat. Everybody surely understands the Logic of Meat. Even vegetarians.

"One of those, please. No, don't wrap it. I need a snack while I shop."

The second thing worth pointing out is that I'm only planning on buying lamb at Whole Foods. Nothing else. And at $8.99 per pound - though significantly more expensive than my $1.50 per pound beef heart - it's only a mini investment, and well worth the look of adoring admiration I'd surely receive upon transferring it from a crackling skillet - glistening with melted butter and fresh herbs - into the waiting mouth of a hungry man. 

So, there I am, standing at the meat counter, watching the butcher wrap those sacred lamb chops, and listening raptly as he tells me to rub them down with citrus before laying them gently into a lightly-oiled pan to sear for two-to-three minutes per side, which would bring them to that perfect melt-in-my-mouth medium rare I'm so ardently seeking... I swear, I could have made love to him right there inside the glass case, stretched languorously atop the sticky pork loins and marinated chicken breasts. He was speaking the language of love. Or at least he was speaking my language of love.

"Citrus," I think, gingerly taking the brown paper package from the butcher's hands and tucking it into my strange little cart. "I need citrus." But then a small voice - you know, that small, persuasive, insidious whisper behind all terrible choices - lightly suggests, "You know you need more than just lamb chops and citrus to cook a praise-worthy meal, right? Are normal tomatoes as good as locally-grown organic tomatoes? Why don't you just, I don't know, buy all of your ingredients here? You don't need that many things. How much could it possibly cost?"

Fifteen minutes later, as the resolutely cheerful cashier is ringing up my beautiful items, I look down at my grocery list and wince: Lamb chops, garlic, parsley, rosemary, cauliflower, tomatoes, cucumbers, red onion, green peppers, fresh figs, Kalamata olives, Greek feta cheese, and baguette. More than I planned for when I get right down to it, especially considering the fact that the dinner itself was just as spontaneous as my hideous splurge. Kind of a lot of things for one two-person meal, really.

"I'll be impressive for sure," I think, brushing away the knowledge that he finds me plenty impressive already. Just as I'm starting to feel better about my embarrassing lack of financial management skills, the cashier speaks:

"That'll be fifty-seven dollars and forty-nine cents."

Fuck.

Utilizing every ounce of willpower to control my fight-or-flight response, which would be to blurt out, "I'll just take the lamb chops, thank you," before running, screaming, from the supermarket, I force a polite smile and meekly hand over my debit card. Minutes later, I'm back outside, trundling along the South end of Central Park with a heavy brown paper bag clutched anxiously to my chest.

I'm pleased to report that, once the shock wore off, I succeeded in creating a truly delicious meal. I rinsed the lamb chops and marinated them in olive oil and balsamic vinegar with fresh garlic, parsley, and rosemary before pan searing them in butter, just as the butcher instructed; roasted the cauliflower until it was golden brown; and combined the chopped tomatoes, cucumbers, green peppers, red onion, and feta into a traditional Greek salad, all enjoyed with a yummy bottle of Pinot Noir, courtesy of my charming and thoughtful dinner companion.

I was feeling pretty good about myself. Almost good enough to forget the horror of the total cost... which is probably why I found myself back at Whole Foods two weeks later, poring over the sunchoke roots and chayotes. I needed one vegetable. I bought both. The cashier had no clue what they were. Neither did I.

Hint: It's not a pear! (Well, then what the hell is it?)

A day in the life.

Someday I'll learn.

Maybe.