bvi, here i come... in six months

this afternoon, i booked a trip to tortola !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
i will be going in may and staying a whole week.
on the beach.
with some good friends.
a real vacation.
much needed.

(wow, i am giving myself a lot of gifts lately).

oh this world

today is a very special friend's birthday. happy birthday to you, sweet old-soul friend. your golden birthday. it's a comfort to know you've made it twenty-eight years. always be careful. the world is a better place because you are here, always laughing.

softhearted no more

i am sad to announce that my soft unguarded heart has been broken again.

resolution: i must build a battlement to protect it.

so say goodbye to the all-loving, trusting, forgive-and-forgetting, i-love-you-forever-no-matter-what person you know me to be.

enter steel. no longer will i freely give love. i will demand profits. i will work you to the core.

i have often said that the world is too harsh a place for my soft heart. but now i realize that the opposite is true. my unconditional, steadfast love is too sweet for this world. now i'm reserving it only for myself.

birthdays are for love

i had one of the best birthdays in years. not that all of my other birthdays were bad- to the contrary, i have always had kickass birthdays, surrounded by lots of friends and food and alcohol. huge drunk vacation birthdays. this birthday was exceptional and different because it was small and intimate and i remember most of it. it was just me and two girlfriends with some fancy dinner reservations. there was no pressure to talk to everyone or open gifts in front of a group or drink every drink that i was handed. it was simple and elegant, but, after creme brulee, quickly turned rowdy. we drank martinis (mine a free grey goose extra dirty), ate steak (mine a medium rare filet), and met boys (the one i wanted to take home was an andrew firestone lookalike. the one who sat with me on my front porch at 2 am looked like a young dustin hoffman. not bad). all in all, a perfect night, save for the hangover the next day and the zillions of people i only slightly remember drunk dialing. oops.

thank you everyone for making me feel so loved on my 29th.

a writing life

i am buying myself a computer for my birthday. this means that i finally will begin writing creatively again. writing is one of the few things i am really damn good at and when i am not writing in some capacity, be it journaling, writing memos at work, or blogging, i am somewhat incapable of really knowing how i feel about things. writing is how i figure myself, and the world, out. when i am writing, i am happy. oblivious. whole. in this vein, novelist Andrea Barrett has said: "It's hard to explain how much one can love writing. If people knew how happy it can make you, we would all be writing all the time. It's the greatest secret of the world." i totally agree.

it seems the stars are aligning for a (hopefully) spectacular and productive writing period for me. i just moved to a new city and i am not dating anyone. as a result of both, i am spending long contemplative evenings alone. i also have been actively working on self-discovery and self-repair, which is generating heaps of ideas, thoughts, and feelings. basically i have the time, motivation, and fodder. and now i will have the hardware! happy birthday to me.

yay blue

i love myself some blue congress!

my weekend

was great. it was the first weekend that i can remember that i have not had a drop of alcohol from start to finish. i woke up at 6:30 am on satruday and 7:30 am on sunday. i went hiking in the mountains. i made pot roast in the crock pot. i ate a fresh hot apple-cinnamon doughnut from The Apple House. i went to church. i didn't cry, transmit any diseases, drive drunk, or vomit.

can this weekend get better than that?
can you bring it atlanta?

i can't resist

one reason to love october

we all cry "november!"

i want november to slow down already. i used to think october was my favorite month until this past october, which, for me, was filled with anxiety and lonliness and just the general strangeness of having just moved to a new city. i had a hard time exjoying the pumpkins at all the doorstops and the bright fall foliage. i didn't feel like dressing up for halloween. i made chili and beef stew, but it didn't feel right. it was too sunny outside. too warm. and everyone seemed too happy.
then came november. already its been better- there's been a shift in the weather- it's cooler and rainy and feels like fall. the light is different, and darker, and makes me feel cozy after work as i walk my dog. i ate dinner last night with my two female coworkers- i feel like i have made two new friends. and now that it's november, it's that much closer to my trip home to atlanta.