Obligatory statement on how I've been missing in action for so long. Generic and vague explanation as to why I haven't blogged in awhile. Repeated false promise to be "better" at this. Overdramatized emphasis on some event , date, amount of time passed or realization that serves as the inspiration for me to dust off the blog again.
And now that we've got the formalities out of the way, and despite my uncanny self-awareness, I do have some sort of overdramtaized emphasis on some event, date, amount of time passed or realization that inspired me to click on the "blogger" link while browsing gmail tonight. Because tonight, I want to ask you: are you pursuing your dream right now? Are you on the path to your dream job at the moment? And if you actually are, are you really doing it absolutely on your own?
Chances are, unless you're working 20 hours a day in order to keep your low-paying/no paying creative jobs (i.e. non-boring desk job), you're most likely not going at it completely alone. The sacrifice is displaced or shared elsewhere, whether you're living at home or your current mate or spouse is supporting you in some way emotionally or financially. When the mate or spouse is involved while you're pursuing your creative dream job, usually that mate or spouse has to work the more "serious" profession that may or may not lie within their own dreams or aspirations but hey, it pays the bills and provides some sort of stability.
My point is that in a relationship, one gets to pursue the creative dream job while the other serves as the rock, the foundation, the stability. One gets to be in the spotlight while the other keeps things running in the background. And whoever is following through on their dream has to keep in mind the pursuit may not yield dividends for anyone but themselves.
Of course, while my diatribe above just reeks of bitterness and cynicism, I bring it up because I've begun to question whether I'm really pursuing my true "dream." If you ask if I'm happy with the work I'm doing, I'd answer with a resounding "yes," if only because I know that I've found the perfect mix of creativity, stability, and free beer in the office fridge. But is it what I really want to do? To that question, I'd say no, not really, but I understand that what I really want to do will involve an inordinate amount of unpaid work hours that would not be possible unless I still lived with my parents, or had a sugar mama (neither of which is happening anytime soon). And as such, I will begrudgingly accept that I should be content with keeping my "dream job" as a hobby (for now at least), because most responsible adults realize that you can't have two creatives in a relationship who eventually plan on being able to afford to raise a family.
I know everything I said is purely conjecture, but prove me wrong in the comments.
"I'm glad you're worried. If you weren't, I'd be worried."
-SC
12/4/12
6/25/12
Day Zero Redux
"The Year In Review"
That's what the subject line read on an email I received today from the chancellor of my beloved alma mater. "Our commencement exercises earlier this month marked the ceremonial end of a year filled with outstanding accomplishments by UCLA’s students, faculty and staff" Good lord. What day is it? It's already past graduation weekend for the quarter-system students? Brace yourselves, summer is coming.
And while the idea of the summer season has not made any difference for me since I spend every season in the office on a chair behind a couple of computer screens nowadays, I know what it will entail: tourists swarming the streets, summer interns filling the empty desks around me, Facebook posts about people's study abroad adventures or 3 week vacations they've been saving up for, and the fact that I'll be dripping in sweat whenever I enter a room that is slightly warmer than the one I was in before.
But this year, the coming of summer marks a certain milestone people don't usually give a second or third or seventh thought about. You see, this being 2012, I have now been out of college for as long as I was in it. And I think that's what drew me to actually open this canned email tonight that I would normally have automatically sent to the trash. It's now been officially 4 years since I had any real commitment to Westwood (though I did take summer classes that year so technically…), and so naturally, the first thing that comes to mind is "what the hell have I been doing this whole time?"
I feel like I ask myself that a lot. But be honest, you've probably asked yourself that multiple times these past few years too. And I feel that this lingering bout of self-reflection is exacerbated by the fact that today marks another milestone for me. You see, this this the 366th day I've spent here living in New York (not 365, thanks to Leap Year), and needless to say, life is very very different from where I was a year ago.
I mean, plenty has stayed the same, if anything. I'm still living on my friend's couch, I'm still wearing the same basketball shorts at home, and I'm still drinking out of the same blue plastic cup I bought at Rite Aid the night I moved here. But yes, I do have to say that this grand east coast experiment has yielded mostly favorable results.
And I say mostly because I do still question some of my motivations for coming here in the first place. Career, new experiences, new people, and the fact that it is New Fucking York were what drove me here in the first place. But what worries me the most about being here is that the wonders of the internet and the omnipresence of the socially media active can't replace the familiarity and belonging you get with an immediate circle of people to rely on (being in a different time zone from everyone has its difficulties as well). While I wouldn't say that any relationships I have with anyone are strained at all, the feeling of missing out on experiences that bring you closer with those you love can be difficult. Anyone who's graduated and moved away from the locale of their college can attest to that. Anyone on active duty can too. My brother can vouch for it after moving to China 4 years ago, and missing out on our family growing up and growing old.
Dwelling on that too much is not healthy for anyone who's 2,924 miles away from home (ironically making me the one who lives closest to my parents out of my siblings, with my brother living in China and my sister residing in Spain for the summer).
And the best way to remedy that is to carve out the best experiences you can out of where you are and to expand the circle of people in your life that you love. Yeah, yeah, I know:
Which I have done, and I still do. And I can say that thanks to quite magical things such as meetup.com, I've met hundreds of different personalities here. Every other person I meet here in New York is not actually from New York. And though everyone has their own unique reason for being here in the first place, one of them most common stories I've run into is "I needed a change of scenery, and I just packed up and moved here." And they move here, with no idea where they're going to sleep their first night, no idea how they're gonna make money, no idea if they'll be able to afford to eat in the next week. They take their jobs at Foot Locker, at Starbucks, at Trader Joe's, and that's all they need to be content here, just because it's New Fucking York. And they enjoy every moment here because in a matter of weeks they could end up back where they started, whether it be St. Louis, Minnesota, or one time I heard, "back to old country." That kind of ambition takes cajones (or in the case of women, well, still cajones). And knowing that I'm nearly on the same level as these newly well-endowed travelers from afar is enough to keep me motivated.
That's what the subject line read on an email I received today from the chancellor of my beloved alma mater. "Our commencement exercises earlier this month marked the ceremonial end of a year filled with outstanding accomplishments by UCLA’s students, faculty and staff" Good lord. What day is it? It's already past graduation weekend for the quarter-system students? Brace yourselves, summer is coming.
And while the idea of the summer season has not made any difference for me since I spend every season in the office on a chair behind a couple of computer screens nowadays, I know what it will entail: tourists swarming the streets, summer interns filling the empty desks around me, Facebook posts about people's study abroad adventures or 3 week vacations they've been saving up for, and the fact that I'll be dripping in sweat whenever I enter a room that is slightly warmer than the one I was in before.
But this year, the coming of summer marks a certain milestone people don't usually give a second or third or seventh thought about. You see, this being 2012, I have now been out of college for as long as I was in it. And I think that's what drew me to actually open this canned email tonight that I would normally have automatically sent to the trash. It's now been officially 4 years since I had any real commitment to Westwood (though I did take summer classes that year so technically…), and so naturally, the first thing that comes to mind is "what the hell have I been doing this whole time?"
I feel like I ask myself that a lot. But be honest, you've probably asked yourself that multiple times these past few years too. And I feel that this lingering bout of self-reflection is exacerbated by the fact that today marks another milestone for me. You see, this this the 366th day I've spent here living in New York (not 365, thanks to Leap Year), and needless to say, life is very very different from where I was a year ago.
I mean, plenty has stayed the same, if anything. I'm still living on my friend's couch, I'm still wearing the same basketball shorts at home, and I'm still drinking out of the same blue plastic cup I bought at Rite Aid the night I moved here. But yes, I do have to say that this grand east coast experiment has yielded mostly favorable results.
And I say mostly because I do still question some of my motivations for coming here in the first place. Career, new experiences, new people, and the fact that it is New Fucking York were what drove me here in the first place. But what worries me the most about being here is that the wonders of the internet and the omnipresence of the socially media active can't replace the familiarity and belonging you get with an immediate circle of people to rely on (being in a different time zone from everyone has its difficulties as well). While I wouldn't say that any relationships I have with anyone are strained at all, the feeling of missing out on experiences that bring you closer with those you love can be difficult. Anyone who's graduated and moved away from the locale of their college can attest to that. Anyone on active duty can too. My brother can vouch for it after moving to China 4 years ago, and missing out on our family growing up and growing old.
Dwelling on that too much is not healthy for anyone who's 2,924 miles away from home (ironically making me the one who lives closest to my parents out of my siblings, with my brother living in China and my sister residing in Spain for the summer).
And the best way to remedy that is to carve out the best experiences you can out of where you are and to expand the circle of people in your life that you love. Yeah, yeah, I know:
Which I have done, and I still do. And I can say that thanks to quite magical things such as meetup.com, I've met hundreds of different personalities here. Every other person I meet here in New York is not actually from New York. And though everyone has their own unique reason for being here in the first place, one of them most common stories I've run into is "I needed a change of scenery, and I just packed up and moved here." And they move here, with no idea where they're going to sleep their first night, no idea how they're gonna make money, no idea if they'll be able to afford to eat in the next week. They take their jobs at Foot Locker, at Starbucks, at Trader Joe's, and that's all they need to be content here, just because it's New Fucking York. And they enjoy every moment here because in a matter of weeks they could end up back where they started, whether it be St. Louis, Minnesota, or one time I heard, "back to old country." That kind of ambition takes cajones (or in the case of women, well, still cajones). And knowing that I'm nearly on the same level as these newly well-endowed travelers from afar is enough to keep me motivated.
"New life goal: Hundreds of years from now, it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove... But the world may be different because I did something so bafflingly crazy that my ruins become a tourist attraction."
-ES
3/3/12
3/2/12
3/1/12
2/29/12
2/28/12
2/26/12
2/25/12
2/24/12
2/23/12
2/22/12
2/21/12
2/19/12
2/18/12
2/17/12
2/16/12
2/15/12
2/14/12
Day 208
Everyone else's greetings in the office had their names on this. I don't think my coworkers know my name:
2/12/12
2/11/12
2/10/12
2/9/12
2/8/12
2/7/12
Day 201
One nice thing about working with Google regularly is that whenever you visit their offices, they always provide food (even if does happen to be in miniscule portions)
2/6/12
2/5/12
2/4/12
Day 198
In my quest to visit all the major cities within a bus ride of NYC, I decided to take a quick day trip to sunny, sunny Pittsburgh (cause when you think of a hot touristy vacation spot, you obviously think Pittsburgh). Why there? I dunno. Cause it's there?
My trip started off at the Duquense Incline, a historical Pittsburgh cable car incline up to the top of neighboring Mt. Washington.
As such, the top of the mountain offered oh so pretty views from a natural vantage point I thought didn't exist on the mostly flat East Coast.
I didn't realize Occupy was still going strong in some places:
And given that I had run out of things to do by 6pm there, I figured I might as well ride the incline up again at night.
Pretty, pretty views.
My trip started off at the Duquense Incline, a historical Pittsburgh cable car incline up to the top of neighboring Mt. Washington. 
As such, the top of the mountain offered oh so pretty views from a natural vantage point I thought didn't exist on the mostly flat East Coast.
I didn't realize Occupy was still going strong in some places:
And given that I had run out of things to do by 6pm there, I figured I might as well ride the incline up again at night.
Pretty, pretty views.
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