Expectedly Heartbroken

I'm on the plane to New York City. I sit restless, my laptop on my lap. The only thing I want to do right now is write. Just write. It doesn't even matter what I write about. Maybe, a part of what makes me a writer is that when I don't know who or what to turn to, or feel desperate in my life, I turn to writing. I write it out. Whatever it is that I'm feeling--confused, sad, happy ... lately, usually the first too, to be honest. It's easier to write when you have issues. Luckily, I always have issues and unresolved emotions. I'm human. Lately, especially lately, I have begun to realize that life is hard. I know people say it all the time, but I never really realized the harshness of reality until I graduated from college. My twenties have been a fucking mess. A fun mess, but a mess none the less. This is what I've done for the past 5 years, since I graduated from college:

YEAR 1
1) Road trip from Seattle to San Francisco with my two girlfriends, to start my new life back home. No plans. Just a room at my parents house and an able body and mind.
2) Confused as fuck, apply to random corporate jobs, while secretly wanting to be a writer and move abroad. Fed up with looking, get a job at a random coffee shop.
3) Meet my ex boyfriend, my boss--a tumultuous affair.
4) Fed up with my ex's lack of commitment and my life at home, working at a coffee shop, I apply for a job in Tokyo to teach English, something I always wanted to do.
5)Ex finally commits, a month before I move to Japan. How fucking convenient. I should have told him to fuck off.

Year 2
6) I move to Tokyo anyways. Teach English for a year. Stay with my boyfriend (perhaps, regretfully). Make new friends, fall in love with my Tokyo, find myself piece by piece, and slowly learn what it is to be happy again.
7) Eight months later, move back to San Francisco for my boyfriend. Bliss for a few months, then disastrous after.
8) Get my first writing/editing job at DivineCaroline.

Year 3
9)Ex boyfriend breaks my heart in a devastating way. I lay in bed and cry for weeks. Every single part of me felt like it was dying. I believed I would never love again.
10) Slowly move on, like a fragile bird with a broken wing ... who will eventually learn to fly on its own again. Cheesy but poetic.
11) Move to my North Beach Apartment.

Year 4
12) Have a blast in my new apartment spending time with my friends. Date multiple douche bags in a row. None of them have a lasting impact. Singledom is my game. Wake up one day and realize I am over my ex who I thought I'd never get over ...
13) Meet Denny, he tells me about his backpacking trip to Asia he's planning. I tell him, jokingly, if I get laid off, I'll come with.
13) I get laid off. Call Denny. Start planning trip ...
14) Save money for 2 months working random jobs to travel around Asia for 4 months.
15) Actually do it and have the best four months of my life. I learned life lessons, met amazing people, had some amazing romances, and awe inspiring adventures.

Year 5
16) Return home. Again for the millionth time it seems. From another trip. From another bout of running away from myself, only to find myself here ... in the same position I was in years ago.
17) Try my hardest not to meet a guy to date. My life is too uncertain to fall for someone. Immediately meet someone I really care for--the most I've cared for someone since my ex two years ago. That's a long ass time.
18) It ends ... unexpectedly, with my heart broken, expectedly. Story of my life. A recurring theme. My fate it seems. Every time I open my heart, even reluctantly, it gets wounded. How many times can a heart be broken without piecing itself back together again? Who knows. Maybe at one point, it just doesn't. It just can't and it gives up. I'm not there yet. At least, I still truly believe everything happens for a reason. Reasons unknown to me now.

Looking at my track record, one would ask .... who the fuck is this girl. She must be confused with life. I am. But then I look at it again closely and I think, I've done some pretty cool shit. Really cool shit. I've loved. I've lost. I've been sublimely happy. I've been devastated. Now, I'm just confused. I still love life ... heartbroken, but still ready and willing to move on.

The Debt of Happiness

I'm trying my hardest not to think about the debt that this recent trip has put me in. I've never been in so much debt in my entire life. Currently, the only way I have to pay them back is via unemployment checks, which are so small, I can't even live off them. Concurrently, thinking about moving to London and going to grad school brings my mind into an even more stress full yet excited place. Instead of a few thousand, we're talking 50,000 dollars or more. I feel like money has never been a huge issue in my life, but I'm finally feeling the stress and weight of debt in my life. I'm an adult. I no longer get to write about finding solace on tropical beaches, hiking up temples in Cambodia, or spending nights in sketchy guest houses while having the time of my life. At least for now. My life today, at home in California, is all about being poor and dealing with the debt I put myself in by having this time of my life. Experiences are amazing and I've had a shitload of life-changing ones that I will be forever grateful for, but maybe, just maybe I've reached a point, where I need to start making monetarily smart decisions instead of just spontaneous ones that provide me with amazing memories. I've always thought the latter, until I got to this point.

I hate that I just said that. I think I take it back. I've always been a firm believer in traveling for the sake of traveling. For the sake of opening your eyes to other cultures, other beliefs, other people, other views on the world. It's been amazing and I don't regret it. The debt is shit. The debt stresses me out. But, at the end of the day, I have those memories. I will always be able to say when I was twenty-six years old I tubed down a river in Laos and met some of the coolest people I've ever met, I fell in love with some Cambodian children on a beach in Sihanoukaville and wished I could take them home with me, I felt chills down my spine and salty tears down my face at The Killing Fields in Phnom Penh, I spent my twenty-sixth birthday in Saigon amidst new friends and old ones, I've been on more overnight buses than I care to admit, stayed in shit holes that I never thought I could handle. I wore the same outfit almost everyday for four months. I learned to appreciate the little things in life, I learned that I don't need a fancy outfit and makeup to feel beautiful; I actually prefer to be in a sundress and flip flops on the beach than in heels any day. I learned to find solace in myself, by myself. I learned I am happiest when I am free. I am stronger, smarter, more worldly, more confident, more spontaneous, more independent, and for the rest of my life, I will take this experience with me, wherever I go. As I sit in front of a computer in another cubicle, in another office, I will know and understand what it feels like to truly be happy. I learned so many things that money can't even attempt to quantify. I couldn't buy these experiences. The debt that I am in will someday go away, these memories will hopefully never. Just because my trip is over doesn't mean I ever have to stop learning from it, or believing in my ability to be happy again. I know I can be, I know I will be, and that gives me hope, if nothing else. Things can only get better and I'm grateful for what I have received. I've gotten to travel more than most people I know. I've experienced completely different worlds and I don't think I'm ever ready to truly stop.

I know I have a hard time being happy in where I am at, but I'm trying. I'm grateful and thankful for everything that life has given me. I have an amazing life. I have the most amazing family, my friends are the best friends in the world. There isn't a day that goes by that I take that for granted. I know I'll be OK. I am OK. Hopefully soon, I'll be more than just OK.

Debbie Downer

Someone once told me that not writing in your blog daily is blogger's suicide. I guess that means I jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge months ago. I've been home for about two months, maybe longer. To be honest, I've lost track. It makes me feel better that I have no idea what the date is, or what day of the week it is, or even, what time it is. When you don't have a job, time really is relative. I know that might be the most cliche thing I have ever said, but it's true. I no longer wait for the weekend, because, everyday feels like the weekend. When waking up at 11:00 a.m. feels early, that is a bad, bad sign. This unemployed lifestyle is starting to take its toll on me. I'm bored, restless, depressed, somewhat unmotivated, lazy, and lacking in inspiration. I feel like I'm starting from scratch ... again. I feel like I've done this about twenty times. Scratch that, about fifteen million. Ever since I graduate from college I've been moving, then coming back home to figure my shit out, then moving again on some adventure, then coming back to figure my shit out. It never gets easier. Why can't I just figure my shit out like everyone else? Looking for jobs is never fun, especially now, with the economy in such shit. (How many times can I say shit in this entry?) Everyday I hear of someone new losing their job--one of my friends, someone at my friend's company, blah blah. It blows.

Snap out of it Debbie fucking downer. I really am trying to manifest positivity in my life. I've had a few really great things happen in the past two months since I have been home. I'm not going to go into major detail right here as I'm currently trying to be somewhat discreet about my personal life on this thing, but it seems to defeat the purpose of honest writing. I've already revealed too much anyways, might as well give up on having anything personal these days. I'm a member of Facebook, enough said. Anyways, it's not like the two people who read my blog (thanks Anita) will give a shit. Let's just say I have some sweet things going on that aren't necessarily career related. Well, one of them is.

My wanderlust has led me to apply to grad school in London for Journalism. This is an option. A very viable one. It's an option; I like having options, even though I am the self proclaimed, most indecisive person on the entire planet. It takes me about ten times longer than the average person to make a decision.

This is a step by step guide to my decision making process:

1) Stress out/have an anxiety attack
2)Ask everyone and their mom what they think I should do
3) Listen carefully to everyone's opinions and think about them in detail, wavering
4)Smoke 15 cigarettes
5)Drink 15 vodka tonics to accompany 15 cigarettes
6)Eat a pint of ice cream and think some more
4) Daydream about both options and think about how my life would be in either situation
5)Follow my gut ....

Basically, if I just followed my gut at step one, I would make decisions in half the time. I even have to ask someone's opinion on what kind of snacks to purchase at the grocery store. Do I want Flaming Hot Cheetos or Nacho Cheese Doritos? Do I just want some White Cheddar Cheese It's, or go healthy with some Quakers? It's a hard decision. This little, unimportant, minuscule decision takes me about five minutes to make. Now, think about how long it takes me to make life-changing ones. Really, think about it. My head feels like tangle-weed. I don't even know what tangle-weed is, or if it is an actually thing, but that's how it feels. Indescribably confused. Indecisive. This is me.