Regular

I'm embarrassingly a little bit too tired to get up and write a blog from my computer, so I'm doing it from my bed on my phone. Hopefully this becomes a Monday tradition as unlike most of my friends, I have Sunday and Monday off instead of Saturday and Sunday. It's fine by me.

Today I'm going to meander my way down to Chinatown to get some dumplings. I figure that when it comes to taking my lunch to the office, dumplings are easy, filling and transportable. Of course I won't forget to purchase my good ole' Chili Chow. Hopefully I'll refrain from eating it out of the bottle with a spoon at my desk when no one is looking. 

Honestly, I'm down for the adventure. I have been to Hong Kong Supermarket before, but after my recent acquisition of FitBit on my phone, exploring new territories feels like the perfect merge of cultural learning and exercise. Perhaps I'll pick up some lunch on the way back or cave and head towards Rice to Riches for a decadent scoop of rice pudding. 

I see blogging as way of sharing information to an audience interested in the topics any of us choose to write about. What I've found is that with me, those topics have changed over time. I no longer want to use blogging as an outlet to take out my frustrations on a public platform. Some such blogs are very entertaining. I guess for me now, I'm just trying to communicate little slices of life I pass through on any given day and hope that they guide whomever reads my blog towards a fun or inspiring place to which they might not have been otherwise. If I'm going to revel in the mini adventures I have throughout my day, why not share? You never know which places you stumble upon will become someone else's regular spots. 

Living The Questions

Two more days on the west coast to go and a new life starting for me on Friday as soon as I get back? I guess that means I qualify for celebration today.  Celebration in Seattle means wandering.  Right now, I'm parked at a cool, hip brunch space on 15th Avenue called The Wandering Goose.  I'm waiting for my platter of fried oysters and pork belly to show up.  When it does, I'm sure I will be satisfied enough to fuel a day of walking.

When I was an 18-year-old senior in high school about to graduate from Juilliard Pre-College in May 2010, my good friend Anya who had graduated two years before sent me a quote:

"Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue.  Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything.  Live the questions now.  Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer." 

I don't know if she knows how much this quote meant and still means to me.  I live by it.  A lot of the anxiety that all of us experience comes from our inability to deal with the unknown.  A lot of my anxiety in college came from the fact that I was not yet able to appreciate the spaces between conclusions within which life happens.  It's never a comfortable feeling to be pushed off a cliff when the rope to swing hasn't come yet.  And that's how it feels; when the situation that fully supported you changes and the next one hasn't come, or when an important relationship ends and you have yet to find one that won't.

Living the questions is my mantra for dealing with lingering anxiety that I may have.  I should probably get it tattooed on me at some point.  My favorite part of the quote is the ending sentence that says, "perhaps you will then, gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."  It describes so accurately the resolution that often comes to our questions when we're least expecting it.  When I was struggling with getting over some of my past experiences, I used to say that I can't wait for the day when I'd wake up and realize that I wasn't hurting anymore.  Part of me would doubt that that day would come and part of me believed in that day more strongly than anything.

Living the questions, overall isn't really that bad.  After all, that's what most of us are doing.  Even when we do accomplish something and some of our questions are resolved, more come up.  The beautiful thing is that we all live together in the in between spaces and are forced to rely on each other for comfort and camaraderie while we all live together into our own individual answers, hoping that our demons play well with others'.

Just this quote alone would have made a worthwhile post without all my musings on the side.  I hope that by sharing it, I've encouraged you to live through some of your questions today instead of attempting to pass them by.

À tout a l'heure, mes amis!

Reality

I am still quite sore from my 8.5 miles of walking yesterday, but it was so worth it. Something about Seattle just makes me want to walk!  Wandering from the bustling Pike Place Market down to the ferry terminal was a welcome adventure.  I followed the steps I had taken four years before and as I walked, the memories of the path started coming back to me.

The ferry itself is not to be missed.  Even without picturing myself as Addison from Grey's Anatomy riding to work from island to corporate hospital, the view of the skyline shown above is breathtaking. Getting off at Bainbridge Island felt the same, walking down the main street to where the knitting shop is and exploring the fancy yarns until I lost track of time.

Seattle is a corporate city.  Even sitting in this coffee shop, every table near me hosts a group of people conversing about their newest and brightest business idea.  But it's a corporate city with the feeling that if you walk just a few blocks away from the center, you could lose yourself in a mystical energy that's not quite in sync with reality.

We make our own reality.  That's why it's never truly productive to call anybody crazy.  There will always be gaps between any two people's realities, but that is a beautiful thing, because we can use mediums such as art to try and fill those gaps.  In fact, I often say that art's main purpose is to fill the gaps between our own realities and the standard reality we are supposed to adopt to function in this world,  Is there a standard reality?  It sure seems that there is sometimes.  Or at least that we are expected to shake off our own perceived realities in favor of fitting what is deemed "normal" or "functional" by the people around us.  I definitely use my songwriting and blogging to help me accomplish this, rationalizing my way away from my need to push on with my own desires.

I used to be of the opinion that everything I feel, I should do.  It's not that I realized that was my thought process.  I just never questioned my methods.  My opinion was that if I feel intensely about someone, I should pursue them, even if it's only a temporary feeling.  If I felt hatred or a strong negative emotion towards someone, I could feel justified.  There was never the option of deciding not to engage with those emotions and feel empowered to move away from them.  I'm still working on it. Everyone seems to be.  Our feelings are often the strongest compass we have in making decisions and they tend to overwhelm our senses with more impact than rational thought ever can.  It's a matter of controlling them, using them when they are productive as a powerful tool and stepping away from them when they seem destructive.

I feel that walking around a new city is the best way to find grounding within oneself.  The thoughts that come into your head merge with the stimuli from new atmosphere you're taking in.  I look forward to more Seattle walks within the next few days and am intrigued to witness and share what types of thoughts come into my head.

Royale

The place in which I'm sitting is a heaven made of royal cupcakes: Cupcake Royale. It's one of the first places I discovered on my maiden voyage down Pike Street four years ago.  And it stuck. Excellent wifi, Stumptown Coffee (holla to the East Coast) and amazing lavender cupcakes that are as good as my idolized memory said they were.

As much as I travel about, I like tradition.  If a place looks the same as it did in the past, and I sit there quietly observing, there's no easier way to notice the changes within myself.  Today, it feels as if there haven't been any.

I remember working here at this table facing the cupcake bar all the mornings I was in Seattle the last time.  I typed while watching each new fresh batch of cupcakes being frosted like 30 little promises for the new day.  Now in the same situation, I'm trying to think about how personal I should get with this blog.  In the past I've been very personal in my blogs and sometimes it was a hit and sometimes it was a miss.  When I was a senior in high school, cranking out my daily blog, a lot of people told me that my openness in my writing encouraged them to open up and was cathartic for them as readers. Over time though, I lost confidence in my writing, wondering if my openness came off more to others as self-centered rather than something I was sharing in order to relate.  If I were giving another writer advice on this topic, I guess I would say, "Be as open as you feel like with a constant focus on how that open dialogue will relate to others and help them better understand themselves."  I suppose I should give my own advice a try.

Often times when I sit in coffee shops, even in my native NYC, I am in a state of panic.  I have many times left my apartment feeling that the calming atmosphere and chill vibe of a coffee shop will ease my worries, whatever they may be at the time.  I'm usually wrong, which is why I have a lot of memories sitting in coffee shops, even this one, with a lump in my throat and a wave in my chest.

We are supposed to work through our pain.  And often, we do in time without realizing it.  The pain of my eating disorder, the pain of my parents' divorce, the pain of a lost companion:  these are all things I have worked through just by living.  Sometimes they come out of the depths to haunt me for a day and sometimes I realize in late-night bar conversation that an uncharted area of one of these issues may still bother me.  When a problem first surfaces, it often seems to me that it will never be solved and that I'll be battling negative forces forever. They seem stronger than me.  And sometimes it feels not only like I can't win, but that I've already lost.  I let fear consume me.  I let it creep into my relationships and wreck havoc.  I let it tempt me to mistrust and create convoluted stories in my head that become truth to me the moment I speak them.

The funny thing about anxiety is most of the time it does come from a somewhat rational worry.  It's the reaction to that worry that can spiral into unhealthy thinking.  Most of the time when I get upset, I can understand why.  I don't want someone on the outside affecting my most important relationships, sharing the same methods of conversation that I do with them, receiving the same texts, knowing them well in a way only I'm supposed to.  Let's be honest:  Does anyone?  No.  My overprotective feelings may have not changed from four years ago.  However, I can say that I have learned that encroaching down on such situations only results in more secrets, more worries and more feeling on the outside of my own game.

How do we deal with situations that exist but that kill us on the inside?  Don't ask me.  I really don't know.  We can naively hope for them to pass, which sometimes works as a fluke but isn't a reliable solution.  We can beg and assert and go crazy.  Or we can just hope and pray that we will live through our pain and wake up one day with its feeling miles behind us.

In some ways I'm never going to change.  Some fields will always feel more like battlefields than open pastures.  And at least for today, feeling vindictive and stomping around Seattle to the soundtrack of Carrie Underwood sounds just fine.

À tout a l'heure, mes amis! 

Nomaderie

I just made the switch from Vancouver to Seattle, having arrived in Seattle today for the first time in four years.  My work at True Contrarian first brought me here at the end of July 2011.  Now I'm back sitting at the same bar, Boom, drinking the same cocktail (The Kasai Margarita), taking the same same selfie in the same pose and feeling just as hopeful but in different ways.

I'm undergoing a social media Renaissance.  Maybe it's because I'm experiencing a lot of change in my life and it's made me realize how grounding a solid online presence can be.  I miss blogging and the way words feel when they flow out of my head, though my hands and onto the screen.  As my dream is to dominate the online space like a true femme fatale, I figured being more present is a good idea.

The name for this blog originated when I walked into a bar named Nomad the first day of my stay in Vancouver.  I thought it was a great name when I first saw it on Yelp and it's a relatable title to me, given that I never can seem to stay in one place for more than a few weeks at at time.  I entered the beautiful high-ceilinged space and sat at the bar, which was lit naturally by the sunset outside and looked very inviting.  I've never minded entering bars alone, especially on business trips in new places where I already feel somewhat anonymous.  THe first drink on the list of craft cocktails was named "femme Fatale."

I decided to go for it.  After all, who doesn't love a cocktail with a clever title.  I soon found out that all of Nomad's cocktails were as perfectly balanced and uniquely crafted as the first one (if you are a Vancouver reader, go and try The Divide.  THe cocoa and vanilla bitters truly make the drink.)

Let's say I'm nomadic to a point.  Even when I'm in a new place for work, I have a tradition of finding a spot to return to daily throughout the duration of my stay.  How quickly can I become a regular as a stranger to a town?

 I found out just a few moments ago that boom, the restaurant at which I'm currently parked, just moved back to this corner location after spending some time by University of Washington.  To me, it appeared that nothing had changed since my departure from Seattle but in fact, it's only recently the same.  Boom reminds me of Nomad a bit, with the high ceilings, spacious bar and hip-looking staff.  I laugh in the same way, making conversation.  And yet part of me misses the Canadian West Coast.

My last at Nomad yesterday was a riot.  It was their first venture into live music with the talented singer, guitarist and electronic technician Mark Woodyard.  My new friends, the bar's owners, nodded with hopeful smiles as he began his first set and drew the place into a mystical trance.  The night drew on with covered mash-ups, the most memorable being "No Diggity" and "Hit The Road Jack."  I bobbed my head with intrigue, watching Mark loop his vocals back through the system as he recorded new ones.  By the end of my time, I had been appointed to honorary staff, picking up on their inner vibes and jokes.  When I finally tore myself away, there was still a vivacious crowd dancing past closing.  One of the group was even sporting a characteristic Storm Trooper mask.

Gratitude comes to mind when I think about my journey with True Contrarian and how I've come full circle back to Seattle.  I wouldn't say the main thing I've learned is the technical details of investing.  It's important, but there's something I've picked up from the fearless CEO that strikes me even more: Living the experience of a new place and making it my own.  The point of business trips is not only to make profitable connections, but to create lasting hubs within the places you go.  My boss always assumes he will return to a place and when he does, he treats it like his home, remembering every place he's been and sharing it with the newcomers he brings.  I'll return to Vancouver and bring whomever I am with (hopefully my best girl and/or my fiancé :P), sharing with them the memories I created the first time.  Until then, I'm just happy I have one more place in this vast world to call home.