Promises to myself

sometimes its the promises you make to yourself that are more relevant than the ones you make to others

1.) Breathe. You do not do this nearly enough when the anxiety sets in. Step away from whatever you are doing, no matter where you are and breathe.
2.) Remember the catharsis writing has always provided you. You have been so busy with graduate school, and other distractions that you have forgotten the medium you work best in. Remember it and lean in to it when you need it.
3.) Trust your instincts. They served you well as a child, why have you abandoned them as a grown up? When you abandon them, what is the motivation behind it?
4.) Self-reflection. Just because reflecting on others has become your vocation, this does not mean you should cease to self-reflect. You know yourself better than anyone, use that to your advantage.
5.) Don't be afraid of labels. Labels can serve a valuable purpose. They can help set you free.
6.) Look people in the eye when you speak to them and uncross your arms. You are a woman, not a little girl, stand up like a lady and speak with poise and confidence.
7.) Get off the internet and pick up the phone. Call people who you haven't spoken to in a while. If you called people more often, phone conversations wouldn't be 3 hours long and so daunting. Send emails or texts to your friends and family who you don't get to see or speak to often.
8.) Learn to say no. What is the loss behind saying no? Figure out why saying no, particularly to men is so difficult. Why do they have so much control over you? Why do you let them believe they are owed something from you. You don't owe anyone anything that isn't to your benefit.
9.) Let go of the past. Use it as a lesson, reflect on it as a fond memory and then move on.
10.) Don't Facebook stalk. If you must, do it once and then walk away from the computer. Resist the urge, you can do it.
11.) Value privacy. You don't have to tell everyone everything.
12.) Set boundaries with people. If your interaction with someone is completely one-sided, try to make it an equal relationship. If they resist, it may be time to cut them out.
13.) You don't have to be nice to everyone all of the time.
14.) Ask for what you need. From friends, family, romantic relationships. Don't be afraid to assert your needs.
15.) When you are feeling overwhelmed or angry, do YOGA. Whether attending a Yoga to the People class, or practicing at home, it will help clear your mind, and eliminate stress in your body.
16.) You are not 16. Stop acting like it. Just because you spent that year isolated and miserable, does not mean you can regress.
17.) Moisturize and exfoliate.
18.) Eat healthy. Go shopping often, buy only what you will use, and learn to say no to your parents when they try to pressure you to eat something you know is no good for you.
19.) Juicing. You have a juicer, use it. Learn to make your own juices, use them as meals, experiment and make your own as a means of saving money.
20.) If you are not enjoying yourself say no or leave. Don't feel the need to say yes and compromise for others at the expense of compromising your own safety, comfort, security, willingness or enjoyment.
21.) As Madonna once said "Happiness lies in your own hands." Don't expect anyone else to provide you with the gift of happiness. It's a gift you and only you can give to yourself. Start giving.
22.) Don't confuse love with infatuation, lust, longing, loneliness or friendship.
23.) You turn 30 in two years, take this time to figure it out.
24.) Relationships of all kinds require the efforts of both people in order to grow and flourish. Don't let your insecurities prevent you from reaching out and making an effort to stay in touch or make plans. If your efforts aren't reciprocated then that is one thing, but don't expect other people to do all of the work.
25.) Make money, save money.
26.) Feel your feelings. Don't run from them or avoid them with drugs or alcohol. Drugs and alcohol can make your problems worse the morning after.
27.) Turn your computer off, your cell phone off and get off Facebook every once in a while. Use that time to do something productive, like reading a book or phoning an old friend. Go for a walk or to a yoga class.
28.) Get out of bed more often. It's so easy to stay in your pajamas and lay in bed all weekend. Find a reason to get out of bed.
29.) Eliminate the attachments that no longer serve you. You can't fix everyone's problems and be everything to everyone at the sacrifice of taking care of you. Loved ones need to be their own savior just like you need to be yours.
30.) Cultivate new friendships and nourish old ones.
31.) Reading for pleasure is great, but read to help grow your knowledge base within the mental health, psychology and social work fields.

A New Year, kinda almost having it sorta together

Hello 2013, goodbye 2012.

Each year my post- new years blog entry just keeps getting less organized and more 8th grade girl stream-of consciousness.
Things I Accomplished in 2012

*Finished my first field internship working with the formerly incarcerated.(June)
*Learned how to navigate tense work situations with a ballbuster of a boss.( Sept 11'- June 12')
*Learned that no matter where you fall on the corporate hierarchy it is still important to stand up for yourself and the issues you believe in. A good agency will respect your candor and determination.(Sept 11'-June 12')
*Fell in love with a second cat, Buster. He is just a purr machine who I am so lucky to have rescued.(February)
*Finally got the tattoo I had long wanted.(March)
*Met Alanis Morissette and got to speak to her(and I got to share the experience with someone special)(June)
*Saw Alanis in concert(and got to share the experience with someone special)(October)
*Spent a lovely week with my two great Aunts and extended family in Jacksonville and Ponte Vedra, Florida. (beer drinking, gun shootin', bbq'ing, beach bar hopping, sun soaking, hookah smoking good time) (July)
*After a boss that tore down my abilities as a clinician, I had the spirit-lifting experience of interviewing at Laguardia Community College where they all saw my tenacity and abilities and unanimously agreed I would be an asset to the program.(June)
*Received a glowing  report for my mid-year evaluation from my two supervisors at Laguardia---more spirit-lifting.(December)
*Met Elizabeth Wurtzel and gave her a letter I wrote to her(December)
Things I Hope to Accomplish in 2013
* Get a positive report for my end-of-year evaluation.
*Get offered a job at Laguardia after I graduate.
*Graduate from Touro College with my Masters of Social Work
*Graduate with a cumulative GPA of at least 3.8.
*Get another tattoo
*Take the LMSW licensing exam(and pass!)
*Get hired at least part-time at an agency where I can expand my skills and knowledge about LGBTQ youth.
*Begin to save money so I can move out within the next year--hopefully before the end of 2013.
* Eat healthier, more plant based foods, less processed foods.
* Walk more
*Work on my book.
**Get it together.

questions and answers

All my life I waited for a guy like you
Someone so honest someone so true.
Someone who'll hold my hand when I start to cry
dry my tears and kiss my eyes
A person to stand with me by my side
forever and always till the end of time
Childhood memories that I have held so dear
precious reminders of innocence
Spring time I will  be born anew
but all my seasons lead back to you
You see the beauty within my scars
You see the answers to the questions within my heart
You see the beauty in my smile
I look at you and see the innocence of a child
Every few years we start over
hoping one of these days it'll be our time
No pressure baby, I will wait for you till the end of the line

In Support of Girls and Lena Dunham

Lena Dunham seems like a girl I would hang out with. She is Jewish(on her mom's side, you know the side that counts), she is from New York City, she has tattoos and not the trendy kind that good girls get to be edgy. She is not conventionally attractive, but seems entirely comfortable with that as reflected in her willingness to throw her slightly overweight and pale body into tons of unflattering sexual situations in the name of art. Oh and she was a Creative Writing major---much like myself, and she graduated the same year I did 2008.

Putting all that aside which I'll admit may be difficult, the real reason I am even aware of who she is having never heard of her prior to last week is because of her much maligned and in my opinion unjustly criticized new TV show GIRLS on HBO.

Girls is about four friends in their mid-twenties navigating life post-college living on their own in New York City. The hipster style of Hannah and her friends(which reflects certainly Lena Dunham's personal style if not all of the cast), the choices they make which many critics labeled unsympathetic, and their struggles that seem to be told with cinematography and editing that make you feel like you are there walking down the street next to them as opposed to being a spectator watching a fictional show on your laptop all make this show extremely truthful and relatable to young women in their age range facing similar predicaments such as the characters.

The sad hard truth many college students face(not just the girls) is that after college there isn't this amazing land of opportunity just waiting for you. You may have to work as a waitress, or babysit the same kids you have been watching since you were 16, or you may end up working retail, or at a fucking TGIF is a bitter pill to swallow when you are 23. It may be especially bitter if you come from a middle class upbringing. I know that the last 4 years since I graduated have not been a cake walk. Yes, my parents still support me financially, no I am not rich, yes I appreciate it but hate it as do my parents who threaten to cut me off everyday much like Hannah's parents actually did in the first episode. I too landed an unpaid internship after college at a trendy hipster blog in DUMBO that I thought would lead to a paid position, which it never did and I ended up four years later still reliant on my parents financial support. It sucks, but it is a fact, and it is a fact  all of my middle class friends who attended college have had to grapple with. If you attended a state school or a nice private liberal arts university in the suburbs somewhere and you graduated between the years of 2008 and now, odds are you are either moving home with mom and dad for the next 2-8 years while you scour Craigslist daily for job postings. Or Mommy and Daddy buy you your own apartment while you look for that amazing job. This is the reality. It is not the reality of every New Yorker, or every twenty-something but it is the reality of most. It is indicative of New York City and more to the point, the times.

Now, there has been a lot of criticism for the lack of diversity of this show. I feel like this is a cop-out criticism. Like some guy didn't like that his Sunday nights that were formerly occupied by such testosterone-driven shows like Entourage and Eastbound & Down that they had to find some excuse to tear down a show that was created, written and staring a female, especially a female that doesn't look like Scarlett Johansson.

Where are the black co-stars in most mainstream popular television shows, I ask you. Friends, Sex & the city, Two and a Half Men, Seinfeld, Entourage, Sopranoes, Eastbound & Down, the list goes on and on, none had a single black star. Why were there no complaints targeted at these shows? The reality is with the exception of a select few, most television shows are highly segregated. There are no white characters in Tyler Perry movies and there are no black characters on Girls. Is that television's way of being prejudiced or is that actually a reflection of our society? I personally believe it is the latter. While, yes I interact with people of all races and ethnic backgrounds on a daily basis, if you were to make my life into a TV show, you would find that my core group of girlfriends are all of the same ethnic and religious background and socioeconomic upbringing as me. Does that make me racist for not having more diversity within my immediate social circle? I don't think so. I think it shows that people, myself included, seek out others who are similar to them both racially as well as socially. Girls, much like most televisions shows are meant to show a segment of society, they are not meant to be indicative of an entire generation, or an entire city or an entire group. This is a depiction of what it is like for this group of girls, from a specific demographic at a specific juncture in their lives. It is not meant to speak to everyone.

I think the critics and viewers who are choosing to criticize this show for its lack of diversity need to take a look at the reality of other televisions shows, the industry as a whole and even their own circle of friends before making this show the scapegoat for it's lack of diversity.

For Kristie...

Dear Kristie,

It's been 13 years since you moved away. It feels almost like another lifetime. It's surreal how at 26 my childhood is starting to feel like a distant memory, almost like it was another lifetime entirely. You left in the fall of 1998. Our friendship didn't end well. I will never forget that day you broke my heart when our friendship came to an abrupt end like it did. You moved away, we never got to say goodbye to each other and now we never will. Please know that I didn't want to end our friendship but at the time you had left me no choice. The details of why our friendship ended are not important. Not now. Not anymore.
I remember meeting you on the first day of Kindergarten. You had blonde hair in a high pony tail and bright blue eyes hidden behind big glasses. The other kids stared and judged, even at 5 kids knew how to judge others who looked different. But I didn't. I saw beyond what those kids saw. I ran home and told my mother she must schedule a play date with my best friend Kristie immediately. For weeks all I could talk about was my new best friend Kristie who I never wanted to be away from. My mom sent me to school with a letter in my book bag to give to you to give to your mom requesting a play date for us. That same year 6th graders were making fun of you in the school yard because you were different. I remember standing up to them telling them not to make fun of my friend. I was not much bigger than you. We were always the smallest kids in the class, but I stood up to them because it was right. Nobody was going to mess with my friend. From that moment on we were inseparable. We had endless amounts of play-dates, sleep overs and we were in all of the same after-school activities. We watched the same TV shows(90210---You were Kelly and I was Brenda and we both loved Dylan) and listened to the same music( Mariah Carey, TLC, The Spice Girls) and we were in the Girl Scouts and Chorus together. You and I both were outcasts and easy targets for school yard bullies but we stuck together. We both had this pain inside of us even as children, both for very different reasons and I think that is what drew us together and bonded us.

Kristie, you touched my life and impacted it in so many ways. Ways you probably never knew and I wish I got the chance to tell you.
My love and knowledge of music was truly influenced and shaped by you. Your parents inspired and encouraged an appreciation and love of music in you from an early age. They took you to concerts all of the time and each concert you saw you told me about. Music was always playing in your house-- on the radio, in the car, on the t.v., in your parents bedroom where we would watch MTV back when they played videos. I remember sitting in front of the tv, listening to the 80's and early 90's music of the time. I discovered my favorite singer Alanis Morissette thanks to your parents taking you to see her Jagged Little Pill tour. After you saw her in concert I ran right out and bought her Jagged Little Pill album which was at the top of the charts at the time. It was 1995 and I wore that cassette out listening to her songs over and over, even though I had no idea what she was singing about.I just related to her anger and her passion. Even at 10 I had so much anger I didn't understand, but Alanis knew that same anger. We both loved her and to this day she is my all time favorite singer and that is because of you. I remember watching MTV in the early 1990's, back when MTV was good. When Beavis and Butthead and The Real World were the only shows they played that wasn't music. I remember listening to Bryan Adams, John Mellencamp, Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson and all of the amazing bands of the 80's and 90's on the radio driving in your mom's Taurus. You truly loved music and you introduced that love to me.
As children you and I were attached at the hip. We would giggle and laugh non-stop. We just looked at each other and laughed. I remember staying up all night during our many childhood sleepovers just laughing and thinking of ways to cause trouble. Prank phone calls, running around your neighborhood, watching Scary Rated R movies, eating candy and junk food and playing with our dolls. We always had so much fun! You had more life, more spunk than anyone I knew. You loved to play and party and have fun. Loved to laugh. I can still hear your laugh after all of these years. I will never forget it.

I remember the first time I saw you after you had your bone marrow transplant in the 5th grade. You had been out of school for months recovering, when I ran into you and your family at McDonalds on Metropolitan Avenue. Your back was turned to me but I knew it was you. I ran right over to you, so excited you were okay. So excited to see you after having been separated from you for months. When I walked up to you and your parents you wouldn't look at me. You turned away and hid your face. You had lost all of you hair, and your face was puffy and swollen from all of the medication you were on. You didn't want me to see you like that. You were embarrassed and afraid I would start to judge you, the way many of the other kids in school cruelly had. You were scared and ashamed of the way you looked. But to me you were the same person, just with a cute flower hat. You were my beautiful, funny, strong, incredibly brave best-friend. I admired you so so much my beautiful best friend. I had so much love and admiration for you, for what you had been through.
I remember days when you were absent from school and I was miserable, because I had nobody to talk to, nobody to eat lunch with when you weren't there.
I remember one time at lunch, you had a pear in your lunchbox, and you offered to share it with me. However, being kids we had no way to cut it seeing as they didn't provide kids with knives. So you came up with the idea to cut it using your nails. You always had long, red-polished nails. We spent the entire lunch period mutilating that pear, trying to cut it with your long nails and my stubby nails. You were so determined to cut it down the middle so you could share it with me. By the time lunch ended that poor pear was disgusting we just threw it in the garbage. But that is exactly the kind of friend you were. So determined to share your snack with me.
I remember all the time we spent sitting on your stoop playing and talking, drinking our quarter waters we had gotten from the corner store by your house. I always loved going to your house. My house, while only my parents and I, was rather boring and full of fear, your house was filled with so many people and fearlessness. So many friends and family who were always there, always surrounding you and loving you. You had a home full of love and excitement. Always something to do, somewhere to go, people to see. Your aunts, uncles and grandparents always embraced me and I spent a lot of time with them. Ordering chinese food with your beautiful ma ma(grandma) and having a sleepover at your Aunt Gina's apartment when we were 12. Time spent together was always an adventure. Your birthday parties, where we played spin the bottle in the basement taking turns kissing the same boy on the cheek over and over(usually Anthony Montalvo or Matthew Burke.lol)


You were my best-friend. The frick to my frack as my mother would say. We were two peas in a pod. But when I only narrowly missed getting my head smashed into the concrete right outside my own building by that gang-girl Theresa, I knew our friendship had reached an impasse. I was scared what danger I might face if I kept seeing you. I was scared of what you were capable of. I wanted nothing more than to protect you, to be your best-friend. I never ever would have hurt you. And now 13 years later you are gone. It isn't fair. I forgave you long ago for what happened to our friendship. I understood you more than you maybe understood yourself back then, and I knew how much you struggled with on a daily basis.

Kristie--you taught me so many lessons that have stayed with me today. My friendship with you shaped my view of the world and the values that I stand for. You helped make me the person that I am proud to be today. You taught me that we must not treat those that may look different than us like outsiders or less than. You taught me that everyone is special regardless of the way that they were born and they are deserving of respect and kindness. That what you look like on the outside does not matter, because it is who you are on the inside that counts. You taught me to stand up for those who can't stand up for themselves. You taught me that good things come in small packages(you and I are both a testament to that), and that you must fight for what you believe in. You showed me friendship and laughter, and you were my very first friend. You taught me that size doesn't matter and to not let others push you around. You taught me and inspired me in ways I never get the chance to tell you, but I know someday I will.