Waiting for it.

I've been so lazy in my time off. My life has been simple lately, defined only by work during the day and watching television from my bed in the evening. I just worked five days in a row to help the Deli get through Welcome Week. School starts tomorrow and it just hit me that for the first time in almost two decades, I will not be going. However, I feel good about that, because I feel I've reached a new stage in my life and I have no desire to cling desperately to the one that has passed. But I do feel somewhat depressed at my stagnation. I've graduated but I haven't moved much since then. Everything mounted to culminate on that one day when I wore the cap and gown and now, my momentum has simmered, I remain in the same city, the same apartment I was in before, and I'm working the same uninspiring job I worked as a student, only now I'm working more than the weekends.

Ok, enough complaining. Let's look at some prospects. I've applied for an internship with AuthorHouse, a publishing company that helps self-published authors get publicity, etc. I had an interview and they said I was a candidate. A friend who works there told me I had the thing in the bag, from what she could tell. However, they haven't called or emailed, so I'll be calling Monday. The internship is paid, and would improve my resume, as I have no PR experience.

Also, I'm applying for a spring internship with This American Life. It sounds like I'm aiming low, with all these internships. But I've applied for so many jobs and I haven't gotten a bite. Until the economy picks up, it may be better to build, build, build and be ready when the jobs come back.

The internship application for This American Life requires I come up with a documentary story idea. I'm struggling. Bad sign, right? Spencer reminds me that I'm trying to hard, and he's right. I feel like one of those cartoon characters who sits down at her type writer, puts down a few words before ripping the page out and tossing it in the trash can across the room. Over time the can fills to the top and she is still there, bags under her eyes, frustrated, burnt out, blocked.
But I know inspiration will come. Doubt is a destroyer. "Rivers know this. There is no hurry. We shall get there someday."

My best friend Stacy's wedding is this Friday. I am the maid of honor, something I've never been before. I can't believe she is getting married. I can't believe I've been in Bloomington for four years - long enough to meet someone (many people, actually) and watch them exit and enter a number of phases of their life. Reflecting on those phases and anticipating the next ones is so much fun.

What else have I been doing lately? Lighting candles, visualizing big cities and planning. I've been trying to get in shape but I haven't been executing it very well. I've also got plans to go camping but will wait until Spencer is in town. He and I have been apart for a while - he is in Chicago and I remain here. Four hours is much closer than thousands of miles and an ocean apart, so it's not so bad. We got through my study abroad program just fine, and we're surviving long distance just fine, as well. We've become accustomed to talking on the phone a few times a day. My new computer makes video chatting easy.

As for the season, fall seems to be wrapping its crispy orange fingers around the summer heat and cooling it. It's been a mild summer, overall, but tonight it's like 40 degrees and today I was sporting a sweatshirt. Overkill. Late August and summer is already kissing our freckled faces goodbye. It never was really here, not in full. We had maybe a week of 90 degree weather. Weird. But I'm ready for fall, as I always am. That time of year tugs at my heart strings and makes me love everything. I feel more alive then than any other time of the year, which is strange because everything around me is dying.

I guess the best way to sum up my existence right now is to say that I'm ready for the next thing. I'm ready for something new and I'm ready for a big leap forward. I feel like a dog who just watched a tennis ball be tossed across the yard but is waiting for permission to chase it down. My ears are up, my eyes are wide and I'm on my toes, anxious to get started. But nobody's giving me the go. So I'm still waiting. And I'm trying to maintain my interest in the target.

Me and the moon, she said.

I'm sitting on my porch. It's 3:45 p.m. on a Sunday afternoon, and I just got off work. It's warm, but the humidity left with last night's rainclouds, so there is only a pleasant breeze and crisp rays of sunshine through the full green leaves that cover Washington Street. Someone down the road is playing "Do You Love Me?" on the radio and the song is so appropriate for a lazy summer Sunday.

Last evening Spencer and I watched the end of Frost Nixon. The movie failed to stimulate my thinking, and I spent most of my time silently criticizing Frank Langella's acting. Good idea for a story, but I think the best Nixon/Watergate movie will always be All The President's Men.

When the movie ended we video chatted with Jersey, Rick and Nick Vandermolen and we all decided we'd go bowling. Nevermind that it was almost midnight. It was Nick's last night in town and none of us had done much of anything all day. So we went. Upon leaving the house, I stopped dead in my tracks to stare at the half moon. It was glowing like a night light in the darkest of all bedroom corners. Its rays were like a shower of spiritual renewal for my neglected body, its limbs flimsy and burdened by empty activity, its skin sticky with sweat from a day's work at a stingy breakfast joint. I stepped out into the glow of the moonlight and I could feel - physically feel - my soul lighting up, juicing up, charging again after days of running on low batteries. I stood there, my arms stretched out at my sides, and I sighed. Behind me, thunder clouds lingered, invisible in the darkness except when illuminated by lightening.

I wish more things made me feel so alive as a clear night sky. I feel small and huge, insignificant and diminished, giant and invicible all at the same time. I heard someone say once that through meditation, they achieved a state of consciousness that made them feel as though the world is in harmony, that we are all one living being, and the only thing that matters is this moment. That's what the night sky does to me. It brings me back to home base. It gives me stable ground to stand on and observe from. It clarifies everything for me. And the moon, with her milky rays, reaches down and soaks up all heaviness in me and absorbs it into her silk skin. She leaves me like a fresh pearl. She leaves me like a newborn baby.

Roots and bobcats.

We went Bobcatting tonight. Bobcatting is tradition. We've been doing it since my freshman year, at least. It's when we drive to Brown County to watch the sunset, run around in the woods and have a blast. Sometimes we get yelled at by passerbys. Tonight, the chosen phrase was, "White power!" They yelled it twice. That's all it took to remind me that Bloomington is still part of southern Indiana, and if you leave the city, you're in unfamiliar waters. Dangerous waters.

Today I also started my volunteer work at the community garden. I spent two hours turning soil, raking and planting grass. It was nice to be somewhere new, doing new things, meeting new people. The weather was fantastic for digging in the dirt.
My plants here at home are surviving quite nicely. I'm growing basil, tomatoes, aloe, sage, chamomile and a number of other things. I love watching them poke their little green heads out of the dark, damp dirt. All I can do is encourage them to keep growing (and I do so, audibly). People must think I'm a little nuts, with all the time I spend on my back porch, peering into the pots, obsessing over temperature and sunlight. It started pouring a few days ago while I was at work and all I could think about was how my plants were surely drowning. Silly.

Also, I cut a few pieces of spearmint out of the giant batch that grows in Spencer's yard. I brought them home and put them in water and a few weeks later, they've begun to grow roots. They're reaching out, adapting, making it work. Soon I'll plant them and they will have survived.

If you wait long enough, you'll grow roots anywhere.

Salsa and such.

It's 7:03 a.m. and I have to leave for work in 10 minutes. But, I wanted to write about my Friday, as it was fantastic for several reasons. First, it was almost 80 degrees and sunny, which brightens anyone's mood. Second, I had the day off and I got to sleep in. Around 10 a.m. I met a Tajik man for coffee at Starbucks. I had to interview him for a class I'm taking. He talked all about Tajikistan, the issues it faces, the people there, the troubles in Afghanistan and the surrounding countries. If he said anything that stuck, it was, "When you hear of the trouble in the middle east, always remember that it's not religion, it's politics." He is disgusted by the way people are using Islam as an excuse to do harm. He became visible angry when the topic came up. The two hour conversation was enlightening, and it encouraged me to travel.

Last night we stumbled upon a Turkish dance party where I learned to salsa and we mingled with new people and new music. It was fantastic. Blaine was in town for one last hoorah before he ships out to Iraq. And we spent most of the day frisbee gofling.

Really, I don't know how it could have been a better day.

Now I'm off to the Deli and I will no doubt be paying for yesterday with homework today. But, that's alright. Sometimes all you need is a day off.

Never more will trouble us.

I got an email today from an old professor of mine, Konstantin Dierks. He teaches in the history department and I took a beginning U.S. history course with him last year. We have since kept in touch and he has added me to what he calls his "A-Team." It's a group of several past students who have stood out as being "interesting and strange," as he put it. Or something. My placement on this email list was finalized after lunch this past fall. We met at Chow Bar on Indiana and talked about culture, Italy, film, music, my plans for the future, etc. He has written letters of recommendation for me in the past and kindly corresponds when he has time. Well, he has a newborn so we haven't been in touch often. Finally I got this email today and was delighted to hear from him. Amazing how contact with other people can be so fantastically uplifting.

I checked out the other students on the email list. Michael Sanserino is one of them. I laughed. Sanserino is the editor in chief of the Indiana Daily Student newspaper here on campus. We worked together last semester. He landed a summer internship with the Wall Street Journal. I feel happy to be on the same email list as him. I feel happy to know we both have intellectual curiousity.

More later, I suppose. Just a short update.

It is finally spring here in Bloomington. The trees are so lovely. Life is springing from every branch, and the sticky little flowers are opening to the sunshine. The smell the blooming trees release is almost intoxicating. It's thick and sweet and warm. I am delighted and content.