Major Life Change Update

I have an announcement, and, for me at least, it’s a pretty big one. My longest successful relationship (outside of my pup) has come to an end. We have been through a lot together: five years, three cities, two continents (and hemispheres), dozens upon dozens of intelligent, perceptive, gorgeous people. The company I work for and I have decided to part ways. As of today, I will no longer work for the ad agency I had signed on to five years ago with distant hopes of a transfer abroad.

In general in this industry, this is not news. People jump from agency to agency like they change shirts, ruthlessly climbing ever higher, seeking more money, new client challenges or different managers and teams. Loyalty is not something this industry is famous for. Much the opposite, actually (I’m lookin’ at you Don Draper). So when people look at five years on my resume, they whistle between their teeth and silently wonder how underpaid I am.

But I stuck it out, worked hard, achieved much, learned a lot, and it paid off in the realization of a distant hope when I first joined this company – I moved abroad. And, since life is funny sometimes, just like that, our relationship had run its course. Of course I was plunged into the emotional turmoil that accompanies the demise of any relationship, and hence the cryptic blogs about boxes and chess games and connect-the-dots. But the reasons are irrelevant, only the result: It was time to move on.

And so I have changed companies, traded one set of initials for another. I haven’t given up on Sydney and still firmly believe this is where I am meant to be right now, even if my means of coming here is no longer part of the picture. I still see the opportunity, maybe even more strongly than I did when I first arrived. I feel poised on the edge of something great, I am ready to dive in and not be swayed from building what I want to build. And, even if that fails, I have already picked up a few lifelong friends.

And I will always look back on this relationship with the fondness that can only be created with blood, sweat, and tears repeated in an endless loop year after year. I will always remember what I have gained from my experiences here, how I was ground out from an eager young graduate into a savvy, respected businesswoman. I wouldn’t have been able to do that entirely on my own, and I am forever indebted to this company for putting me onto a collision course with people who shaped my life in so many ways.

And now I will take a mini break, visit a foreign place for the first time, turn off my brain and focus on my senses, and return ready for another incredible five years.

Til next time, xoxo!

From the Archives: Thoughts On Traveling Through Life

First, some background: In high school my very best friend Nicole told me I should start keeping a journal of our lives, chronicling what we do on the weekends when life was lived for which party you were able to get into. So I started said journal, and managed to keep it up well past high school, through college, and I still contribute to it sporadically today. Though the high school pages are a study in humility for me thanks to my immaturity and dorkiness, I can see how this journal eventually became an outlet for me. It’s a literary version of watching myself grow up, and sometimes some really great things came out of it. Re-reading some of the things I was discovering years ago almost feels like I’m giving myself advice from the past. As such, when it seems right I’ll share relevant portions of this journal.

This entry was written in 2005 – I was in college, working at a bank part-time, and living in Orange County. I hadn’t yet planned my life-changing study abroad experience, but you can see the seeds of restlessness were sown well before I ever stamped my passport.

We live in a world where we have to plot and plan every minute of every day, as if not knowing what we were going to do would kill us. We have to be on a career track, be going to school, always have a goal, an end destination. And when we don’t know what that destination is we freak out. Like death. Nobody knows what really happens when we die. So most people are so afraid of it, it can almost border paranoia. Unless you are one of those poor old people who are so tired of living that they don’t even care what happens, they are just over it. Some of those guys come into my work. Most of them are men too, that’s weird. I want to grab them and yell, “What are you thinking?! How can you be over it already? It’s only been 60 years!”

Maybe all this ‘have a foreseeable end’ stuff is making us live our lives too fast. It feels like I was 5 for years and 15 for minutes. What happened? Life was simple when I didn’t have a goal. Is that what makes it go fast? Racing, racing, racing toward what we want that we forget to look at the scenery on the way? Is maturity when someone has this goal? You know how they say, ‘He is so immature, so irresponsible, he is going nowhere in life.” Maybe he just beat the system, and is more interested in the scenery than the destination? What if these “deadbeats” have us beat? They just knew all along. I wonder how I can possibly remind myself to slow down and enjoy each day. It’s so easy to forget. There are little things I will notice, like how the sun feels good on my skin, or the sunset when I am jogging, but I don’t really savor it. And I can say, “Oh, I will try to enjoy this minute as much as possible,” but after a few days I will forget and go back to the hurry hurry hurry rush rush rush. Without even realizing it. That’s sad. Next time I feel something I really like, I am going to try to remember to savor it. Maybe it can become a habit. I guess we’ll see.

Out of the Box

In life, you will meet people who will be very eager to put you in a little box with a pretty bow and say, “there, that’s where you belong.” And when you peek your eyes out to see what’s happening, they will do everything in their power to slam the lid down on your head. And sometimes you might not realize you’re being put in the box until the lid comes down and it gets dark for a moment. But when that happens, you need to do every single thing in your power to rip the box apart at the seams, escape, and flourish out in the light and open air. You may need help doing this, and that’s a humbling experience. But once you’ve done it, you’ll emerge smart enough to know how to stay out of the boxes people wish to place you into, you’ll know the people who will be by your side when you need them, and you’ll witness and be empowered by your own mental and emotional strength. You will re-emerge smarter, stronger, tougher, and more aware. So don’t despair when things get tough (well, okay, despair a little bit because that’s only natural), it is just life’s way of identifying that you need to grow a little bit. So grab it, feel it, and grow.

Melbourne

I had the pleasure of meeting Melbourne for the first of what I plan to be many times. Such a great city, at least at first glance – shops, cafes, fine dining galore, a beach (even if it can’t rival Sydney’s), and best of all, MY COUSINS! My cousin Kelly has been in Melbourne since September, and we’ve had the chance to meet up three times since her arrival down under, but always in Sydney or Noosa. My cousin Ericha had just arrived in early January, but had been busy doing the things you do when you’re studying abroad in a foreign country, and I hadn’t been able to lure her down from Queensland until this past weekend. So a glorious reunion in Melbourne was staged, and we were all excited and happy about the good fortune of overlapping expatriation in the same nation (poet, heyyyy).

We’re Related – YAY!

After a relatively cringe-worthy Friday night that robbed me of both my voice and my dignity (think one of the more embarrassing episodes of Girls – awkward sweaty dancing, saying embarrassing things to relative strangers, multiple social faux pas, etc.) in St. Kilda, we spent most of the rest of the weekend bonding, eating LOTS of Ben and Jerry’s, and sampling the local cuisine around the city and South Yarra, the suburb where my cousin lives. It was great to spend time with people who at least partially share my genetic code, to catch up, and to compare notes on the weirdness of living in an English-speaking country but still feeling ridiculously out of place. Considering the tumultuous last few months I’ve been having, hearing the familiar Philly accent and tell-it-like-it-is advice of my cousins left me with a pretty serious “holiday hangover” come Monday. There’s nothing like a few days of connecting to make you feel alone, huh?

So Monday dawned a rainy kind of overcast that made me ache for Seattle (weird, I know), which did nothing to improve my mood or push me into a more positive frame of mind. Fortunately, a friend from home telepathically picked up on my shit mood from 11,000 miles away and treated me to an hour-long phone conversation that more or less rid me of my Debbie Downer attitude. After that, I was able to face the challenges of the week with renewed vigor (or at least cast off my grumpy cat face).

This is Grumpy Cat

If you’re interested in where we ate:

Republic Cafe

Misty’s American Diner

Senoritas Mexican Restaurant

Another Weekend in Sydney

My cousin, who has been living in Melbourne on her working holiday since September, had the opportunity to pop back up to Sydney for a few days last week. This meant I had the equivalent of a roommate, except this one cleaned up after me, stocked my fridge with groceries, made me breakfast, and happily entertained my pup while I was at work (read: best. guest. ever). It also meant I had companionship for dinner three nights in a row, which we took advantage of by way of delicious sushi at Sushi St. in Bondi and a giant plate of carby goodness at Mad Pizza Bondi Beach (I’m minorly obsessed with their truffle mac and cheese).

On Friday night, I had been invited to a farewell dinner for a new friend’s boyfriend who was heading to Canberra for a year to work for the Australian Government. Since I a) highly enjoy this couple’s company, b) saw an opportunity to meet new people and make new friends, and c) wanted to show my cousin a good night on the town, I dragged her from the Eastern Suburbs to Surry Hills to have Thai food and hit some hipster bars. Dinner was at Lemongrass Thai – amazing green curry (but I imagine it’s pretty hard to mess that up, no?) and a really fun group of people.

In Sydney, it’s a very common and allowable practice to bring your own booze to a restaurant – many restaurants advertise that they are BYO. And none of the wine-snob rules that apply in the US when you bring your own bottle to a restaurant apply here (thank god, because I usually didn’t understand them anyway). You can bring anything you choose, even if it’s something offered on the menu. Pay a small per-person surcharge (usually about $3) and whatever you have at home can accompany you to dinner. It’s a great way to save some cash when dining out (just check with the restaurant first to be safe) and since Sydney is ridiculously expensive, I recommend this practice to any visitors.

So we BYO-ed (I think some of the group actually made a liquor store run between spring rolls and the main course), then headed to a bar called The Forresters, a restaurant-bar a few blocks away. Since I was recovering from another nasty Australian mega-cold and had a big night planned the next evening, Kelly and I begged off around midnight.



Yay! Friends! Cousins!

The next day, after Kelly’s departure, I had to prep for a concert – Swedish House Mafia’s farewell tour, Sydney stop. This is apparently a big deal in House Music circles, but since I only recently began running in these circles on occasion, I have to admit the significance was a little lost on me. Nevertheless, we headed out to the deep West to have some pre-concert drinks at my friend Ricky’s condo, then went into the show. It got a little blurry after that but I remember lots of dancing, losing some people, then finding them again, then everyone surging the stage past the hapless security guards when the most famous of the group’s songs started playing. Since the show ended at 11, by midnight we found ourselves smack in the middle of Kings Cross, which could best be described as “the seventh circle of hell” on a Saturday night. Imagine streets packed like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, except instead it’s all drunk kids spilling out of bars and clubs. It’s a recipe for disaster, and there are usually several fist fights (and occasional resulting fatalities) every weekend. However, on Saturday, I fit right in. I managed to vacate myself of about $50 in cover charges bouncing from one club (yes, I bypassed bars and was straight to da clubs) to another and finally dragged myself into a cab somewhere around 4 a.m.

Only Photo I Managed – Train To Kings Cross

Needless to say, my sore throat is back with a vengeance and I’ve solemnly sworn that I will be going straight home after work every day this week because it’s a big week and I have to seriously have my shit together. Plus I’m going down to Melbourne on Friday to see Kelly, and our little cousin who is studying abroad up in Queensland is finally joining our shenanigans for the first time since she arrived last month, so I have to show them how it’s done.

Til next time, xoxoxo!

More Failures in Aussie Dating

Seriously.

So in my last post on the subject, I mentioned how my natural state of being when it comes to the dating game is the pursee, not the pursuer. But I recognized that Australian culture doesn’t exactly jive with this attitude, and that I need to adjust how I play the game if I ever hope to successfully date in this country.

So I underwent a scientific experiment where I tested out this new theory, except instead of taking small steps with multiple targets to assess where I have to draw the line between the way I like to play the game and making sure I actually get a date with an attractive Aussie male (the smarter way to approach it), I went whole-hog-forward chick with the next person who caught my fancy. Never mind that the target I chose was definitely not optimal (too close to home), but I also was reminded (yet again) that there is such a thing as overdoing it.

Pretty much how it went.

Basically, I did the opposite of every gut instinct I had. Did I text first? Yup. Did I suggest grabbing a drink without being asked first? You know it. Did I still make an attempt at contact even after said drink was declined (politely and flirtatiously, but still declined)? Mhmm. And did I finally just say – “Listen, should we keep texting or just call it a day?” God, how embarrassing, I totally did. Even though every cell in my body was screaming at me to let sleeping dogs lie, I remembered how I had promised myself to approach dating differently (plus I was desperately close to my self-imposed “get a date on your own or you need to start using the Internet” deadline of end of January). The response? In true Aussie form, it wasn’t a “yes,” and it wasn’t a “no.” In true American form, I’m interpreting that as a resounding “no.” Sorry, but I read He’s Just Not That Into You, and I think that probably still applies no matter which continent you were born in.

And so, when my battered pride/ego/whatever and I sign up for the Aussie equivalent of Match.com, I will simply consider this a failed experiment (that I probably set up poorly and took too far), and will pathetically accept the assistance of the tool that keeps a roof over my head. But you bet your ass I’m waiting until after Valentine’s Day before I set that shit up. I bet there’s a massive influx of desperate singles on February 1st. I may be single, but I am not desperate, despite this most recent performance.

A Candidate for my Dating Profile One-Liner. Thoughts?

And next time, I’m aiming for an English guy – word on the street is they’ll follow you around like a bad smell.

Onto the next disaster, xoxo!