Say yes

My new years resolution was to eat more ice cream. Eating more ice cream seemed like a reasonable resolution because I've abandoned the ideology that packing my lunch 4 days a week will make my life better or that making up my bed everyday really matters. It just doesn't, for me.

I wanted a resolution to match all the other "yes saying" I've been doing for the past five years. I've said yes to lots of things because I thought I might need the experience one day. Saying yes to volunteering, to extra work, to extra friends, to extra well, life, because my current cadre of life experience wasn't doing the trick. I felt perpetually unprepared. Saying more yes and less no, I thought, would give me more opportunity. As it happens, it does.

Taking every opportunity and doing it (whether or not you want to) creates a little nugget of stuff to put in your pocket and use when you need it. Volunteering for that grant writing project that you don't have time for leads to conference invitations, to best friends, to your biggest champions. Becoming a sexual assault counselor because you might want to be a genetic counselor one day gives you the opportunity to hear everyone with fresh ears, with greater compassion, and better coping skills. Writing a eulogy for your dad lets you hear yourself be at your most vulnerable in front of 200 people and learn that the only way to grow is to be vulnerable. Taking on an extra project at work just because you want to say you did it lets you talk about it in your next interview.

Opportunity to be better and do more is all around us all the time. It's just so hard to say yes to it. It seems like too much. It seems like too much until all those experiences lead to landing your dream job. It seems like too much until all that extra effort leads to friendships that last a lifetime. It seems like all those people out there got their awesome jobs and awesome lives because they were just awesome. They aren't. They are like you and me, except they say yes when everyone else says "no" or "not right now".

And when that opportunity taking pays off it seems like there was never any other way to live. Like saying "yes" instead of "later" or "not now" was the key to really living how you always wanted to. So say yes. Take the opportunity. And put it in your pocket. Then grab some ice cream.

Stop tilting your head.

Six people have told me that getting a title, registration sticker, and driver's license in the District of Columbia would be among the worst experiences of my life. I listened to someone talk about how his trip to the DMV was like being in Sarajevo in 1994. Another new resident told me that to get an inspection I basically had to sell my soul and do everything that no human can do. It's no surprise, then, that I waited almost two months to get a D.C. driver's license and register my car. This doesn't seem like a long time but in D.C. if you have out of state tags it's basically like you are violating parole. I received two warnings in 24 hours by the same officer in different parts of town. Officer Sanders and I were becoming fast friends.

Sigh. So, I decided to just make this happen. I made a spreadsheet with all the documents I needed. I double checked them. Triple checked. I put my warning violations in my window with an annoyed sign that said "GOING TO DMV TOMORROW. THANKS". I wish someone had added it to my collection on passiveaggressivenotes.com but to no avail--yet.


I went to bed at 10:30 and was up at 6:15. In the shower that morning I took some yogic breaths. I decided that I was only going to get mad if I waited longer than three hours. I reminded myself on the drive down that DMV workers were people too.


As I pulled up to the inspection station, a man wearing a uniform motioned for me to roll down my window. He greeted me "Hi! First time to the DMV?" I nodded and started pulling out paperwork in some sort of frenzied panic. He laughed and said "Where you from?" I explained that I just moved here from Texas. We then chatted about people being a rush here all the time and how they were meaner here. He asked me to say y'all in a sentence. I obliged. Then he said, "Well, hope you can bring that laid back attitude to D.C., pull forward, we'll be with ya in a minute. Here's my card. My name is Richard if you need anything." Richard flashed me a bright white smile.


I pulled forward, sort of stunned. I kind of wanted to keep hanging out with Richard and shooting the shit. Long story short, ten minutes later I was out of the inspection station with my paperwork, no problems, and a Dum-Dum sucker. Everyone was nice, professional, and ready to get me the F out of there, which I totally appreciated.


Around the corner, is the actual DMV. I parked and commenced standing in line in 30 degree weather for an hour and five minutes. I was fifth in line. As more and more people filed in line, I tried to decide who would survive if we were all in a survival situation (which wasn't THAT far off). I tried to figure out who would be my friends and who would get eaten first. I wondered if anyone else in line was thinking the same thing. I decided not. At 8:15 exactly the doors open and everyone floods in. I get called to have my paperwork reviewed in two minutes flat. Mr. DMV gatekeeper guy is impressed that I have all my documents. He doesn't even ask for half the stuff they (internets) said I needed. I make it to my final counter.


I wait patiently while second mr. dmv guys puts stuff in the computer and just looks at me when I need to pay. No words, just grunts and eye rolls. I get my picture taken for my license and the lady is yelling at me to stop tilting my head. I'm really not. We go back and forth. I'm moving my head in really tiny motions every way I can think of. I wonder if I'm dizzy and leaning, I wonder if this is a joke. I wonder if the floor is tilting. I think of Willy Wonka. Finally, I just say, "Mam, I think this is just how my head is." She snaps the picture.


In the next five minutes I'm back in my car on the way to work. With new plates, title, licesne, and normal blood pressure. I was only a little upset that people weren't more congratulatory of my achievement. I thought for sure I'd get a high five or something.


It was no big deal. Everyone was fine. I didn't get yelled at too bad. I wasn't told I had to come back with my first born. My expectations for service were SO low that just a normal experience was a reason to celebrate. Everyone hates the DMV because they don't have their act together. Over prepare and you are fine. People expect the DMV to be GOOD, friendly even. I expected to cry and possibly have to leave the city.


I mostly hate things because other people tell me it's awful. Expectations are the root of all heartbreak. How we think things are going to be is largely how we see them. It takes a lot for something I think is going to suck to not suck (thanks Richard). I'm going to stop listening to other people so much. But I won't stop tilting my head. Boom. Check it out


(Sorry folks, had to remove picture. It was coming up in google searches and had my address. Safety first! )

Is it Friday yet?

In the olden days, it seemed that the weeks bled into weekends. Weekends weren't the respite that they are now. There were just days. Back then, weeks were sprinkled with fun things like extra long recess, or candy, or a party. School was interesting because maybe, maybe someone would ask me to the dance TODAY, this day. Week? Weekend? It didn't matter. Life was awesome and everything was new.

College made it worse. Tuesday night? Sure, I'll drink a box of Franzia and watch Rudolph. Thursday? See ya at Flatts! Sunday? Just another day to catch up on my sleep and maybe clean the bathroom.

I always felt sad for adults that worked and hated their weeks. I wondered why all days couldn't be fun, or, at least interesting. I never wanted to be one of those adults that lived for the weekend. THEY, those people, weren't doing it right. They just didn't know how to live.

On Friday last week, I signed an email TGIF. People asked me what my plans for the weekend were on Tuesday. I have a feeling of dread and anxiety on Sunday nights. It creeps in around 4pm and stays into my finger hits the elevator button on Monday morning. I day dream about all the life I could live if paying my bills didn't mean sitting at this desk. Some days are worse than others. Some days are good. But they are all work.

Fitting a life into the weekends doesn't work. That's because life isn't all chocolate, sex, and poodles; it's mostly work. It's mostly doing things that suck so you can do stuff you like. It's a tradeoff. Sometimes the tradeoff is worth it. Sometimes it's not. I think if you are living Friday-Sunday and just functioning the rest of the days it's probably not a fair trade.

Life is too short to shorten it any more. Long live the work week.

Job Opportunity

To have a space to park your moving container in the District of Columbia you must obtain and pay for a permit. This permit process is all online EXCEPT for actually getting the permit. For that, you must visit your friendly local District of Columbia police station. There, you log into a computer circa 1999 and a printer provides you two large signs that say "EMERGENCY NO PARKING" and have your phone number and name on it. If you don't do this, you'll get fined and, in my mind, arrested and imprisoned forever.

I had been a resident of Washington D.C. for four days when I worked up enough courage to go to the police station. After missing the turn TWICE then missing the next turn THREE times I completed my 3 mile journey in only an hour. Win. I've got my confirmation number, my email, my driver's license, and my passport. I'm prepared to give blood and submit to a retina verification process if necessary. I park and walk past what is for sure a crack house (that's right, next to a police station) and open the door to my Ward 5 police station.

As I open the door the smell of whiskey and White Diamonds hits me. Hard. I have walked into the police station at the exact same time that four local hookers are being let go from their night in captivity. A large, potentially male dressed as a lady, hooker stops in her tracks, puts her hand on her hips, leans back, and looks me up and down. She's wearing a short, tight, sparkly blue skirt, heels (one is unbuckled), and a puffy coat with fur. I start to hear "boots with the furrr.." in my head just as she says, "Oooooweeeeeeee, baby gurl, we could make you some MONEYYYYYYY". The cop escorting the ladies of the night tries to hurry them along but is holding back a laugh. The receptionist screams "LEAVE THAT CHILD ALONE". And I start smiling, standing wedged between a trash can and a metal detector. My hooker friend goes on and her friends laugh, "Baby, if you get tired of being a good girl, you come let us know. We got you". They are laughing. I'm laughing. The cop is laughing. As they walk out the door one says "Fuck, I ain't go no money for one of them egg Mc..Mc...What the fuck you call them sandwiches?" I hear then talking about how many egg McMuffins they can buy as the door shuts and the cop walks back in.

The receptionist who called me child says, "You look like you just need a permit. Go print it over there, sweetie". As I print my permit, I see another hooker snoozing in the corner, her eyelashes falling off, glitter smudged across her cheek. I gather my permits and signage. I walk back to my car and get on the main road. My heated seats kick on. NPR news is on the radio.

I'm so glad I'm a good girl. And I'd bet, if you asked, those ladies (or men) thought they were good girls once too. I think they still are.

Opposite side of myself

Endings come all at once. Lives, friends, hang-ups. School, homes, and boredom. Love, security, and comfort. I'd like to think that one big ending causes lots of little endings but I'm not sure that's the case. I think endings come all at once because too much hanging-on would happen without forced endings. You'd never get to really know what it's like to start fresh if only one thing ended at a time, life is much, much too complicated for that.

If endings come as a package deal so do beginnings. Beginnings are more than a new house, haircut, job, or city. They are a small and precious window to be that person you said you'd be if you just didn't and if you maybe could. Beginnings mean new lives, new friends, and new hang-ups. More school, new homes, and new ways to be bored. More love, new security, and greater comfort. And if beginnings didn't offer those things, endings would never last. It would just be too hard. We'd be back where we started all the time.

I'm not back where I started. I'm on the opposite side of myself. I'm on the opposite side because I've had a lot of endings that have pushed me beyond what I thought of myself. I've had new beginnings that pulled me beyond what I knew of myself. If you give yourself the space, the challenge, and the sense of adventure to end and begin you wind up in places you never knew you could be.

Experience

Experience is weird. If, 10 years ago, you had told 16 year old Alix that she’d be flying to D.C. for interviews, riding the metro alone, making mistakes and recovering and not having an anxiety attack, she would have laughed. She would have laughed and said “Oh that’s dumb. I’m going to be married and living in Houston and pregnant then. I’ll be a stay at home mom. Also, I’m way too nervous to do any of those things. Can we go to Chipotle?”

Experience is that thing that divides people. It’s the delineation between those people that find value in anything and those that think everything sucks. The most interesting people don’t talk a lot about how much something sucks. They’ll talk about the highlights, the good things, and let the rest go. Their experience is positive no matter what actually happened. Those with experience try new things and find good. They try old things and find the good.

Everyday is a chance to put some more notches in my belt (not like that), a few more tricks up my sleeve, forge a new way, and make a new plan. If we look at experience like that, at life like that, the pressure’s off. It’s ok if it sucks or you suck, you don’t have to remember that part. Just remember how to not suck the next time. It's all about interpreting your experience.

To today’s events, 26 year old Alix would says, “F*ck yes I rode the metro. No, no one helped me. Yes, I crushed those interviews. Yes, I tripped on the sidewalk and didn’t care. No, I’m not married. And, can we go to Chipotle?”

How’s that for positivity? Boom.

Yoga Mat = Life

Tuesday night at yoga the room was packed. Like, move your mat over so some jerk who is 5 minutes late can squeeze in kind of packed. I was squished between one middle aged lady with a huge engagement ring and an older lady wearing a Wheatsville Co-Op shirt.

For those of you who do not know, yoga involves extending your body far beyond the reaches of your allotted mat space. So, when the room is packed you encroach on other people's space. Usually everyone will adjust a little to give the folks around them the maximum space. Not on Tuesday.

I am uber socially conscious and restricted my movements so I didn't even get close to Ring Lady and Wheatsville Chick. I didn't fully extend, I didn't fully twist, and I certainly didn't reach my potential. They however, had their feet on my mat at some points and their heads uncomfortably close to my crotch. My arms were bent and awkward to not interrupt them as they fully extended swan dove to the floor like angels. My leg extensions were at 25% so they had room for 100%.

I went into savasana (basically quiet time) annoyed that they didn't make room. Then, I thought, I didn't make them. I gave up so much of myself that I let them take what they wanted to make them comfortable. Then I thought, this room is not big enough for everyone to have their own space for everything. Some other person in this room did the same thing I did and was laying there unsatisfied. And, we had to. We had to sacrifice so that other people could do their thing. If we had all taken all the space we wanted, people would have gotten hurt. The world needs people who sacrifice their own happiness and potential so that others can be comfortable.

But next time, it's my turn to swan dive and stretch and push myself. Ring Lady and Wheatsville Chick take note, I won't always let you have your space. Sometimes, just sometimes, I take what I need.