Obligatory End of the Year Post

Bear with me, this will hopefully be my last navel-gazing post for a while. Something in the air in December makes me really, really introspective.

Remember when you were a kid, and you always listened to grown-ups complaining about time going soooo fast and not knowing what they were talking about? And then all of a sudden you blinked and you were a grown-up?

Well, all of a sudden, I blinked, and I've been out of college and time just keeps going faster and faster and I want to scream stop! I need to enjoy this! But time doesn't listen, because time is a motherfucker.

December of 2004. I graduated college. (Tip for those of you still in college: Don't graduate a semester early.) I had only just met Jon a couple of months previous, and I was still dating him. I went home to NJ. I was antisocial over "winter break" and played a lot of Super Mario World. I had a definite feeling of "Now what?" And in January, I started looking for jobs, starting with a "part-time" job at B&N. (I was full-time inside of 3 weeks. Wheee.)

December of 2005. I was the head cashier at B&N. I spent my time working, sleeping, or drinking at O'Malley's. I think I was depressed. I was disheartened by my inability to find a real job, but still unwilling to look outside of publishing. I got a wretched cold on Christmas Eve. I got dumped and my brand new boots broke all in the same night. I felt trapped. I hated my job. It was bad.

December of 2006. I was an editorial assistant at Prentice Hall. The job was too easy, and I missed Boston. I'd been applying to jobs in Boston unsuccessfully. I'd been so thrilled to get the job, but I was beyond ready to move on, even though I had only been in the job for 10 months. (See: me going on an interview in January, and telling my boss I was doing so. But without that, we wouldn't have any of the stuff in December of 2007) Living at home was driving me insane)

December of 2007. I'm an assistant editor now, all because I did something kinda stupid and really ballsy. Wow. (For the record, the interview was a disaster.) I moved back to Boston, I've got an awesome group of friends here, I was brave and braved the Midwest. For the first time, life is really looking up in December. Even though the EA job > B&N, and B&N > unemployment, I was so...stuck that December sucked. But I had an awesome year, and I'm looking forward to 2008. (I had to double check this earlier. The thing about working in textbook publishing is that you lose track of what year it is, because our copyright years are so skewed from the calendar year.)

I hope your New Year's Eve is everything you want it to be, and that 2008 is an awesome year for everyone.

"and it goes fast...you think of the past..."

Somewhere between Boston and Northvale, something changes. I think it's when I'm crossing the Tappan-Zee Bridge and heading into Rockland County that something in my head reverts and I become some I used to be. It's not just my accent that code shifts, but the way I think changes.

I went to the Palisades mall on Saturday to finish off last minute Christmas shopping. Considering I worked there during Christmas 2 years ago, you'd think I'd know better. I parked down in the Home Depot lot (and it was just like when I worked at B&N) and I started walking up the hill to get to mall proper. And I think, "Man, this is far. I can't believe I used to walk this all the time!" and then I thought, "I can't believe I just thought that, this isn't far at all." I walk farther than that all the time in Boston--I walk at least that far just to get to the T stop. But something flips a switch in my brain and all of a sudden 200 feet is far.

I went out with old friends while I was home, too, and the same thing happened. I'm not that person anymore, but I was when I was with them. How can change be so impermanent? When I read old journal entries, I don't recognize that person anymore. So how can I become that person so easily?

I'm back in Boston, now, so my Jersey accent is mellowing again. You are probably all lucky you didn't hear it while I was home.

obligatory holiday post

Happy Winter Seasonal Holiday of Your Choice!

You are being spared the rant I was fuming over last night about NORAD's Santa tracker and blatant propaganda and so on. But, there are many more important things to get angry about, and more appropriate occasions.

I hope you enjoy your holiday, whether or not you celebrate Christmas.

If It Snowed Cats And Dogs, That Would Hurt. A Lot.

It is, you are no doubt aware, pissing down snow on Boston, and has been since about 1 pm this afternoon. I left work a little early as a result--I'm mostly glad that I beat the rush, though I wonder how many T-riders really stayed it out?

Snow generally turns me into a huge Grinch. There is something about the gray sky, the cold, the wet AND cold things that are coating my jacket and sneaking into my shoes, the need to shovel, the ice, the salt, the--you get the picture--that just makes me absolutely Grumpy. Granted, I can sympathize with Grumpy Bear, the Grinch, and Squidward on the best of days. But snow? Forget it. I just want to crawl into my bed and give everyone the finger until the snow has melted.

No, I don't know why I moved back to Boston either.



But when it's snowing this hard? When a New England city practically shuts down in the face of the rapid accumulation (we're getting 1"-3" an hour)? It does get pretty. And I like the reminder that Nature can kick our asses any time it wants, and there's not much we can do about it, all our technology aside.

Touché, snow. Well-played.

Can I just say how much this terrifies me?