I started this blog when I turned 28. It perhaps was a bit before but the birthday as a marker isn't a bad marker.
Today I turn 32. Thirty-two is a nice round number a lot like 28. It's arbitrary, but I feel better about 32 than say 31. Thirty-two has purpose where 31 is just a number waiting to change.
I was feeling bad about life a few days ago and I stopped to try and clear my head. "Think about something positive, God damn it," I said out loud to no one but myself.
During year 31 I did a few things well:
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
Friday, August 31, 2012
Conversations No One Had
I got an angry(lite) emal from one of the artists we're working with on creating a DVD saying that she was sorry nothing had come of her DVD, that it had been almost a year since filming, and I guess she would have her lawyer contact us about who owns the rights to the footage.
Yes we told her it would take four months, and it's taken almost a year. Yes we've done a bad job communicating this with her. Yes the DVD is almost finished being edited, and we don't have a good communication structure set up for this. (All of those thing btw Z and I have been trying to fix for years and every time we were close we were totally fucked by my parents. End side note.)
There's this really interesting thing in human behavior...and I see it more so in female human behavior... is the strategy to say nothing until the negative emotions build into a super offensive explosion. And it often is the direct result of time dredged down by purely defensive behavior.
It's hard to say what we need. It's hard because first we have to understand ourselves well enough to know what we need. Then we have to look out into the world and define how the current situation isn't giving us what we need. Then we have to do the very hard task of figuring out if we can change it for the better and how to go about taking those steps.
Yes we told her it would take four months, and it's taken almost a year. Yes we've done a bad job communicating this with her. Yes the DVD is almost finished being edited, and we don't have a good communication structure set up for this. (All of those thing btw Z and I have been trying to fix for years and every time we were close we were totally fucked by my parents. End side note.)
There's this really interesting thing in human behavior...and I see it more so in female human behavior... is the strategy to say nothing until the negative emotions build into a super offensive explosion. And it often is the direct result of time dredged down by purely defensive behavior.
It's hard to say what we need. It's hard because first we have to understand ourselves well enough to know what we need. Then we have to look out into the world and define how the current situation isn't giving us what we need. Then we have to do the very hard task of figuring out if we can change it for the better and how to go about taking those steps.
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
August 2012 Goals
I love arbitrary dates, and this means that each and every month on the first, I feel like life is opening up to me as much as it does on a January 1st. So here we go. I'm allowing myself 10, which statistically is 9 too many to really stick with something, but alas. Goals.
Sunday, July 22, 2012
Look. Listen. Learn.
This weekend I ran face to face with my past. Not that I'm running from anything in particular, and I've never been one of those people who holds high school up to some pillar of greatness. But I do have to say it's strange to suddenly discover that you are selling $1 candy to your favorite childhood English teacher.
We feel the gentle tug of the daily ups and the daily downs and how smooth that all seems when held side by side to the face plant of your 18 year old self. I walked away from the experience completely torn. It was really lovely to see a man I so admired. He said some really nice things to me. I got to meet his family. But on the other hand, I was selling him candy. He asked me what I was doing with myself and there was no good way to answer. I didn't want to disparage the theater when I really do enjoy my job. I didn't want to talk about my bigger goals because they won't happen in that particular place no matter how great it is.
It's too easy to hold yourself up against what you thought you could be, but it's a false act. Life is harder in ways we never imagined. Childhood is easy. Childhood is easy and no child knows it. And it's from only that place of comfort and naiveté can you hold these ideals up and say, "I want to be great." To a child, greatness is a thin thin line. And that line is cartoonish to an adult.
We feel the gentle tug of the daily ups and the daily downs and how smooth that all seems when held side by side to the face plant of your 18 year old self. I walked away from the experience completely torn. It was really lovely to see a man I so admired. He said some really nice things to me. I got to meet his family. But on the other hand, I was selling him candy. He asked me what I was doing with myself and there was no good way to answer. I didn't want to disparage the theater when I really do enjoy my job. I didn't want to talk about my bigger goals because they won't happen in that particular place no matter how great it is.
It's too easy to hold yourself up against what you thought you could be, but it's a false act. Life is harder in ways we never imagined. Childhood is easy. Childhood is easy and no child knows it. And it's from only that place of comfort and naiveté can you hold these ideals up and say, "I want to be great." To a child, greatness is a thin thin line. And that line is cartoonish to an adult.
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Carving Out Our Own Space
When you grow up with one family you think all families for the good and for the not good, are like yours. Then you step out into the real world and discover it is not so.
It's the same for your place of work.
I worked for a company for seven years. It had its ups and it had its downs. I could chart both but only within the context of what I knew. As I've made small steps out into the world beyond our family business, I've started to see the bigger reasons why those good and bad things existed as they did.
I volunteer at an arts organization and I work part time at another. Let's call them Arts Org and Theater Org respectfully. The longer I've volunteered at the Arts Org the more I've come to understand just how dysfunctional it is. The organization works really hard and does amazing work but the people within the organization are overworked and hate their office life. There is a pettiness and passive aggressiveness and a defensiveness that reflects a bit of what I felt at my old job.
The Theater Org on the other hand doesn't have that. Or at least not enough to become aware of in the first few months. Sure, it's still a group of overworked, underpaid, passive people, but the way they talk isn't passive aggressive. There isn't a culture of blame and defensiveness. I find it startling but I think I've also begun to figure out how the two evolved.
It's the same for your place of work.
I worked for a company for seven years. It had its ups and it had its downs. I could chart both but only within the context of what I knew. As I've made small steps out into the world beyond our family business, I've started to see the bigger reasons why those good and bad things existed as they did.
I volunteer at an arts organization and I work part time at another. Let's call them Arts Org and Theater Org respectfully. The longer I've volunteered at the Arts Org the more I've come to understand just how dysfunctional it is. The organization works really hard and does amazing work but the people within the organization are overworked and hate their office life. There is a pettiness and passive aggressiveness and a defensiveness that reflects a bit of what I felt at my old job.
The Theater Org on the other hand doesn't have that. Or at least not enough to become aware of in the first few months. Sure, it's still a group of overworked, underpaid, passive people, but the way they talk isn't passive aggressive. There isn't a culture of blame and defensiveness. I find it startling but I think I've also begun to figure out how the two evolved.
Friday, May 11, 2012
Well, This is Embarassing
We're in Play Month so I have been dead to the world and those in it for May weekends.
As part of my job, sometimes I get House Assistants from the Intern Program at the organization. Interns are a mixed bag. Most of them are kind of amazing. So tonight, I had a great intern. His name was C. And C like some of the teens I've met is really agreeable. He spends a lot of energy trying to make sure people feel included and welcomed and more importantly agreed with. (The latter being a teenager trait I'm beginning to see.)
C is talking with one of the staff (who I don't know very well at all). I'll call the staff guy T. T makes a joke that C seems to be really getting the hang of his House Assistant duties. (This is all going on while I'm setting up some last minute concessions and sort of laughing at what they're saying. You know when you're a part of a conversation even though you're not necessarily one of the speakers.)
C says, "I guess I am."
T says, "In no time you'll be up for the head job." (Referring to, well, my job.)
C laughs a bit uncomfortably and says, "I think that would be awhile. Also it seems to be in pretty good hands." (Or something trying to be nice to me..who is just continuing to work at the stand where they are.)
To which T says laughing and saying sarcastically, "Yeah, like your big dream is to grow up and be a house manager for a living. That's your big dream."
At this point C had no idea what to say. *I* had no idea what to say. And I don't know how long it took T to realize that he basically just 100% insulted a person who is standing RIGHT THERE. He may not have. And at this point I realized that this wasn't my problem and I turned around and left their conversation.
I'm rarely in situations that are so awkward that they actually become funny. It could have felt really damaging to me and the big self worth questions. But because it was a situation I'd never actually found myself in before, it felt oddly hilarious.
As part of my job, sometimes I get House Assistants from the Intern Program at the organization. Interns are a mixed bag. Most of them are kind of amazing. So tonight, I had a great intern. His name was C. And C like some of the teens I've met is really agreeable. He spends a lot of energy trying to make sure people feel included and welcomed and more importantly agreed with. (The latter being a teenager trait I'm beginning to see.)
C is talking with one of the staff (who I don't know very well at all). I'll call the staff guy T. T makes a joke that C seems to be really getting the hang of his House Assistant duties. (This is all going on while I'm setting up some last minute concessions and sort of laughing at what they're saying. You know when you're a part of a conversation even though you're not necessarily one of the speakers.)
C says, "I guess I am."
T says, "In no time you'll be up for the head job." (Referring to, well, my job.)
C laughs a bit uncomfortably and says, "I think that would be awhile. Also it seems to be in pretty good hands." (Or something trying to be nice to me..who is just continuing to work at the stand where they are.)
To which T says laughing and saying sarcastically, "Yeah, like your big dream is to grow up and be a house manager for a living. That's your big dream."
At this point C had no idea what to say. *I* had no idea what to say. And I don't know how long it took T to realize that he basically just 100% insulted a person who is standing RIGHT THERE. He may not have. And at this point I realized that this wasn't my problem and I turned around and left their conversation.
I'm rarely in situations that are so awkward that they actually become funny. It could have felt really damaging to me and the big self worth questions. But because it was a situation I'd never actually found myself in before, it felt oddly hilarious.
Monday, April 2, 2012
Reflections and Lessons from My First Weeks
Yesterday, as in all days when I finish a house job, I come home giddy and exhausted. My fingernails are so destroyed that I have trouble popping gum out of its case. My feet arches groan under the pressure of one more step. But my brain is on fire. I want to share every single little interaction and undertaking. I can tell Z braces for impact when the apt door swings open wide.
But the last 2.5 weeks has taught me a lot of things. I think I'm fortunate that I'm incredibly different than my predecessor. I'm not a bad version of her. I'm no version of her at all.
But the last 2.5 weeks has taught me a lot of things. I think I'm fortunate that I'm incredibly different than my predecessor. I'm not a bad version of her. I'm no version of her at all.
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