I've been skipping through life this week in a way that I haven't been able to in years. I feel lighter and younger. I feel the world open up in front of me.

My thoughts keep wandering back to college, to a certain point in time when I finally felt like myself and not just a person waiting for her life to start. I miss those days. You never appreciate anything until it's gone and all you have left are hindsight and memories.

But I'm going dancing tonight! Life is good.

resolution update

I just wanted to update myself on how I'm doing with my New Year's resolutions. I'm the kind of person who works better when I'm held accountable, so I'm glad that you're reading this.

I haven't eaten fish since I got back from Japan, which feels great. I know it will be way harder once I return, but I am going to be strong. I'll also eat some fish products occasionally if it's unavoidable.
My skin is prettier than it has been in a while. I've figured out that forking out money for a decent moisturizer is really important. The most important steps to getting pretty skin are sleeping and drinking plenty of water. I really need to get more exercise, too.
As for the other goals, I'm on my way to getting a work visa. I haven't really touched my novel since November, though. I'm going to force myself to work on it once I'm done writing this piece that I'm currently working on.
And I've been really good at having self-control while drinking with friends. I'm actually relieved to be 24 and not 18 when I go to bars. Growing up has its perks, like the ability to have a good time out without getting plastered.

So that's it. I'm going to try and get some sleep now. Good night, internet.

cola town

I've been writing all week and it feels really good! It feels like I'm moving towards something, making something happen, which I am. It makes me feel like I should be a writer, and I really think I should.

I am staying with my BFF Amanda (AKA Panda) this week in Columbia, South Carolina. It's a really cool city with some really cool people. A nice place to visit--but according to inside sources--not a place you want to live.

I have a job for sure, but as with all things for an immigrant, it's more complicated than that. I'm now waiting to get my Certificate of Eligibility in the mail so that I can get my work visa through the Japanese Consulate in Atlanta. I'm leaving for Japan in a little over a month (March 23), so now I'm just playing the waiting game...and praying that it all works out.

I might accompany Panda to her Japanese class this week. I'm a little nervous to be around those students. I don't want people to judge me for being in Japan for six months and still barely knowing the language. I really want to get serious about learning Japanese this year. I'm hoping to enroll in a class once I'm working full time and can actually afford it.

The search for the Dress continues. I'm not letting it consume my thoughts as much, though. My quest will continue this week as I scour the consignment shops and thrift stores of Columbia. I guess I just want a dress that reflects what I see in our relationship: a good fit, not too complicated, and uniquely beautiful. I swear that someone injected me with Bride Serum or something. It really goes straight to the brain.

I'm looking forward to a week of relaxation, reading, writing, and partying at Art Bar. And of course, hanging out with my BFF since eighth grade.

I found a book called The Eleventh Draft: Craft and the Writing Life from the Iowa Writers' Workshop in the library the other day. It's really amazing; it has essays by Barry Hannah and a lot of other talented people. It makes me feel closer to Peter Christopher somehow. I really want to make him proud one day.

I am itching to get a tattoo. It's been at least 3 years since my last one. I would really love for my whole back to be covered by tattoos by the time I'm "old," whatever that means. Not by pointless images, but by images that help explain who I am and what I love. My next one will be fairly simple: the words "All thrive" curving around the Truffula trees. I don't know how easy or expensive it is to get a tattoo in Japan...I know I'd have to go to a city at least as big as Matsumoto to find a place. Can you register for a tattoo?

My grains of wisdom for the week: The truth will set you free. And a library is a terrible thing to waste.

white

Whenever it snows in Georgia, I think of that scene in To Kill a Mockingbird when all the kids thought that the world was ending because there was snow in Alabama. People are afraid to drive, school is cancelled, and we all stop. We stop everything that we're doing to go outside and be mesmerized.

It was strange to watch the snow actually stick to the ground and collect. It was like I was someplace else, a place where there is a real winter and a real spring and a real fall instead of one blurry season of warm, hot, and rain. Snow is even better here because it's so rare. You truly appreciate the beauty of it because it's something that you never see.

The next day we drove to Savannah so that I could try on wedding dresses. We drove past fields and houses all covered in snow and little amateur snowmen and people throwing snowballs, trying to soak up all the winter wonder that they could while it lasted. The snow was gone by the time we got back.

I still don't have a dress after two hours of standing in front of mirrors. Running in and out of a dressing room. All I know is that I don't want to look like I stepped out of a catalog. I don't want something predictable and perfect. I want something beautiful and strange.
I want to be like snow in Georgia.

My eyes are burning.

Looking at Livejournal and Myspace and all these virtual places that I inhabited during high school and college is like driving past old abandoned shopping malls and Wal-Marts. These artificial places that used to be so full of life and now they're just empty. They just stand there indefinitely, like a memorial. The empty shells of my old life.

I'm so proud of how my life has turned out since I was an 18 year old on the brink of alcoholism. My old blog reminds me of my first college relationship, which was just as toxic as my relationship with Golden Grain. It makes me shudder to think of how things could have turned out.

I'm healthy now. In the way I see myself and the world, in the way that I treat others, and in the way that I love. I have people in my life who help me be healthy.

Even if they are an eyesore, I'm glad that those memories are frozen in a place that I can return to sometimes. I'm glad that I can see them from far away and know that I don't ever have to go back there again if I don't want to.

I went on a virtual walk down Memory Lane today. I found my old Livejournal and reminisced for a while. It's amazing how different my life was only four years ago. How different I am.

But I think I'm getting a little sad because I haven't been able to talk to Zack as much as I would like. The Internet here is screwy and doesn't like Skype.

It was a pretty day but also kind of blah. I think I just spent too much time in front of a computer screen. I need to do something soon.

no place i'd rather be

I have a plane ticket! I return to Japan on March 23. If all goes well, I will have a work visa in hand to show Immigration.
This song is the theme of my life right now, just like it was last year when I was waiting to travel across that big ocean:



A better version of the video can be found here (it wouldn't let me embed it):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6rxbgAm-Do