Since I haven't blogged since JULY, I figured I should say something.
For starters, since the middle of July, I've been employed by a church in Long Beach. I LOVE LOVE LOVE my job there. I'm the Family Ministries Associate, which basically means I plan events and activities for children and families at the church. I could go on and on about this, but I won't bore you. Just know that I love what I do and who I'm with there ,AND right now I'm working on a six-week summer day camp at the church-- their first ever. It's so much work, but it's good work, and it feels right.
I still work for Amp , and it continues to be somewhat fun and easy. I occasionally get to see bands, and I enjoy the people I meet for the most part, so I will probably stay there a bit longer.
I always struggle with what to talk about when I take several months off from blogging. Everything has changed so quickly, and there is no good place to start. I was just reading over some of my old posts, and though I remember writing them, my voicing feels somewhat different. Now I just feel.... older, I guess, and maybe more responsible.
Lately I've been thinking a lot about traveling. A lady that goes to my church said that if there is any way possible for me to travel while I'm young and single to do it. I REALLY REALLY REALLY want to take her advice. I'm filled with wanderlust right now. At least there is a lot to see here. Last weekend I went to the mountains and saw snow (Big Bear-- fake snow this year, but it's normally real), and then hiking in different mountains where I could see the ocean (Malibu). Despite this, I really feel the need to get out of the country. I'm hoping to do that in September. I'm not sure where, but I need it to happen. I'm not afraid of going somewhere where I don't know the language. The idea of that used to freak me out a bit, but I'm over it now. I need to experience other cultures and other places. There's so much to see in this world, and I haven't even scratched the surface.
To appease this longing, I'm focusing on a trip I'm making to Virginia in April to see some of my very best friends. I've never been to Virginia (that I can remember), so I'm really looking forward to it.
I have tomorrow off. I would like to take a little road-trip, but I've been pretty hard on my car the past few weeks. Should probably give it a rest (and an oil change and possibly new tires). I think it may just be an errand and beach day. Maybe I'll go to a beach that I haven't been to-- gotta break routine.
Dreaming of far and distant lands,
Liz
Sunday, February 23, 2014
Thursday, July 4, 2013
Worth
I have a lot to say, but have to get up too soon to say it all tonight. I will try to take some time in the next few days to reflect on this past year, as I celebrate my one year anniversary of being a California girl. A quick thought....
I find that I doubt myself more than any human being ever should. I'm not sure why, or for how long I've been doing it, but I know that I need to knock it off. It effects the way I think and act, and my level of confidence. It's silly, and I know it. I know that, despite what the culture I live in tells me, I am enough the way I am. I am loved. I am smart. I am beautiful.
Please don't forget that you are worth everything.
I find that I doubt myself more than any human being ever should. I'm not sure why, or for how long I've been doing it, but I know that I need to knock it off. It effects the way I think and act, and my level of confidence. It's silly, and I know it. I know that, despite what the culture I live in tells me, I am enough the way I am. I am loved. I am smart. I am beautiful.
Please don't forget that you are worth everything.
Monday, June 24, 2013
Stars
I want to see the stars.
I'm looking out my window, but the city lights are so bright, that I can't see anything, and the sky is a hazy purple. I'm going home in a couple weeks, and can't wait to just lay in my driveway and stargaze. I'm sure there are good places to do that here, too, but so far I haven't found any good spots without driving to the dessert. My aunt got me a great little toy that shines stars on my bedroom ceiling, so for now, that will have to suffice.
I don't really have anything else to say tonight. I'm sunburned and going to bed.
Love,
LH
I'm looking out my window, but the city lights are so bright, that I can't see anything, and the sky is a hazy purple. I'm going home in a couple weeks, and can't wait to just lay in my driveway and stargaze. I'm sure there are good places to do that here, too, but so far I haven't found any good spots without driving to the dessert. My aunt got me a great little toy that shines stars on my bedroom ceiling, so for now, that will have to suffice.
I don't really have anything else to say tonight. I'm sunburned and going to bed.
Love,
LH
Saturday, June 22, 2013
I hope this doesn't sound like a high school essay
“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”- Howard Thurman
Starting with a quote is probably the cheesiest, most high-school-essay-sounding way to start this off. I came across it a while back, and read it again yesterday... and then again today. I think I'm going to keep reading it, day after day after day, and just see what happens as I keep it at the front of my mind for a while. My friend Will (who you have heard of before if you read any of my posts when I lived in Jackson, and possibly even after. He's a smart guy, and if he read this, would probably blush a little at my mention of him.) always asks really great questions, one of them being, "what makes you feel alive?". My answer to this for quite a while has been "music". It's actually way more specific though, in that it's not just music, but that sense of togetherness you feel with crowd at a concert, when the band is playing a great song and everyone is singing along. That makes me feel alive. There are other things too--writing, good conversation, playing outside-- but that is usually my first thought. I don't know what the practicality of this is though. What does that mean to the world? Nothing, I would say. It means I'm a human being and that I like the feeling of being part of something greater. Who doesn't? How do I take what I know about myself, and translate that in to something that's good for humanity? Every answer to this question that I've come up with just sounds so gimmick-y.
Howard Thurman, the man who got me stirred up about all this, was an incredible individual who I confess I don't know enough about. Here's his wikipedia page in case you are curious about him, or know as little as I do. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Thurman. In a nutshell, his life was dedicated to reconciliation and non-violence-- he helped form the first racially-integrated church in the U.S. (1944), was Dean of Chapel at Howard University and Boston University, advised Martin Luther King Jr, and wrote a ton of books. When someone like this says that the world needs people to come alive, I have to wonder what exactly that looks like.
My second thought on this, upon reflection on some of Thurman's accomplishment, is that maybe this "live everyday like it's your last" mentality that is encouraged isn't necessarily right, or it has been skewed. I think about movies and songs about living every day like it's your last, and frankly, I think they are kind of crappy and deceiving. I get this idea that it's made to sound like you shouldn't care about anything but making it the most fun and self-pleasing day ever, without the responsibility of creating legacy. I'm not saying that a young Thurman envisioned doing the great things he did as efficiently or for as long as he did. Rather, he seems intentional about how he spent his time-- that he didn't live every day like it was his last, but did live it like it counted, as he worked for a greater good, a greater purpose. It's 1 AM, and I don't know if I'm really making sense right now. Maybe this is more clear: I want to live like there's more than the present. I want to live like I'm working toward something greater than today, than this time, in this place. I still have a thirst for adventure and for knowledge, but I want all of this to go toward something that I can't wrap my head around quite yet, but some day will be able to. I want to think that my experience is not in vain, and that the decisions I make will lead to more than self-fullfillment.
And now all I have stuck in my head is Dave Grohl singing , "come alive, come alive, come alive, come alive... etc". If you don't know what I'm talking about, listen to this song.
And then get inspired a bit. (Also, Arrested Development fans--isn't that Buster?)
"These dreams started singing to me out of nowhere
And in all my life I don't know that I ever felt so alive"
And in all my life I don't know that I ever felt so alive"
Sweet dreams,
LH
Friday, June 21, 2013
I'll answer to "Missy"
Just a quick note for tonight:
My whole life, everyone who knows my mom has told me I look just like her. In reality, we only kind of look alike--we have similar coloring and hair and face shape. I definitely act like her though, and I sound like her on the phone. Sometimes it scares me. Some days, I look at what I'm wearing and I feel like she would wear it, or at least have picked it out. I love my mom a lot, so I don't mind looking or feeling or acting like her much really. We are different in a lot of ways too, but that's not what this post is about. I've noticed lately in pictures of old friends, that everyone is REALLY starting to look like their parents. I grew up in a very small town, where everyone knows everyone's everything, so of course I knew all my friends parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins (etc). It's crazy to see how people change as they grow up to become even more like their kin-folk (no matter how hard they fight it).
Now we all just look, and sometimes think, and progressively act.... like our parents. At least mine like good music.
LH
My whole life, everyone who knows my mom has told me I look just like her. In reality, we only kind of look alike--we have similar coloring and hair and face shape. I definitely act like her though, and I sound like her on the phone. Sometimes it scares me. Some days, I look at what I'm wearing and I feel like she would wear it, or at least have picked it out. I love my mom a lot, so I don't mind looking or feeling or acting like her much really. We are different in a lot of ways too, but that's not what this post is about. I've noticed lately in pictures of old friends, that everyone is REALLY starting to look like their parents. I grew up in a very small town, where everyone knows everyone's everything, so of course I knew all my friends parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins (etc). It's crazy to see how people change as they grow up to become even more like their kin-folk (no matter how hard they fight it).
Now we all just look, and sometimes think, and progressively act.... like our parents. At least mine like good music.
LH
Monday, June 17, 2013
Babies shouldn't wear brown
It's been a strange past couple of weeks, getting used to a new normal in a new neighborhood. I have it really good right now, as far as location goes. I'm about ten minutes from the beach, and go there at some point almost every day. I'm enjoying these two months of housing bliss before reality hits and I'm in a small one bedroom or studio sharing 400 square feet with another person (Hopefully it's a little bigger than that. We are apartment hunting again.) My roommate, Dominique, is awesome though. We get along really well, and I learn a lot from her. She's an artist, and a very wise and inspiring individual. She asks really good questions, and because of this, I'm expanding my scope of possibilities of what the next couple years have in store.
No one ever warns you about what happens after you are done with schooling. In the words of an old roommate, "It's all downhill after graduation." That may not actually be true, and I don't usually feel that way, but there is some seed of truth in it. I guess I always thought that school was the tough part that you have to work through to make it in life and that after school was over, it was just a matter of getting in with the right company or organization or whatever, and then BOOM you are making money and never doing homework and it's awesome. Maybe it does work like that for some people, but most people I know that make a lot of money or have a really fantastic job worked their asses off to get there AND continue to work their asses off to keep it. In other words, starting your "career"(fancy, grown up word for more than a temporary gig) is no cakewalk. I don't know how I ever got the impression it would be. This is not to say that I don't like my current job-- I really do! It's so much fun, and I love the people I work with, but lets face the facts people--it's a gig. (Though I'm told it could lead to a career? We will just have to wait and see about that.)
I don't know what society expects from me right now, but I'm okay with taking on gigs for the next couple of years. I have a lot of places I want to see and experience, and people I want to spend time with before we get old and attached to places and people and all we have left to talk about is what our kids are doing or what ailments we have. Bleh. So, though I love California, I am considering only spending one more year here, or maybe less. Now this is all just talk. I don't really have any formal plans. If I feel I should stay here, I'll stay. The thing is, I've always wanted to check out Ireland. It may take more than a month, so I'm considering moving there, and just taking on a job as a nanny or something like that, which would be a little easier to get a work permit for than any corporate or "business-y" job. I don't think I would stay there more than six months. The distance from my family to California has been rough enough. I don't think I could put them through a year of my being in another country (or put myself through that). This could all be crazy talk, so don't come back to me in a year and say, "Hey I thought you were moving to Ireland. Why are you still here?". Don't you dare do that, because the idea that I can't dream outloud a bit without having to hear about it later stresses me out.
As I was saying earlier, this week has felt really weird. I have been missing my friends in Pomona as well as my best California friend who is now in Seattle. Also, my roommate has been in the Bay area with her family, so I've felt a little lonesome. The beach is keeping me temporarily entertained, but I wish I knew more people in the area to chill with. I'm looking for a new church, since the one I was going to before is in Pomona, and that is just too far to drive every Sunday morning! I went to a Presbyterian church in my neighborhood, and brought the median age down about fifty years. There was one lady who was probably 35ish with two kids, but her and the babies were the closest to my age. Don't get me wrong, I love old people. I don't know that they would really want to play sand volleyball or go swimming with me though. The one "young lady", the mom , dressed her 9 month old in brown, and I called it a boy, but apparently baby girls can wear brown too. Oops. Please parents, until your kid is old enough to look like either a boy or a girl, dress them in blue or pink respectively. You can also use green or yellow as long as you don't act surprised when people don't know what to call it. For the love of Pete, whatever you do, please don't put a girl in dark brown. It confuses people (me). And brown isn't even a good color. No one looks good in brown, really. I can't think of anyone. Maybe redheads--but only in the fall, and only with denim. I might be alone in this idea. I do have a brown dress, but it has polka dots ,which are soooo cuuute!
A couple of people got fired from the radio station I work at earlier today. I feel bad for them. They reaaalllly messed up, though. There were four of us that got hired at the same time, and me and Mad Mike are the only ones left. I guess we are about to get some new people, which will make me feel like a seasoned promo assistant. Being the baby has been fun (and no one ever made me wear brown!).
Time to say goodnight.
Love,
LH
No one ever warns you about what happens after you are done with schooling. In the words of an old roommate, "It's all downhill after graduation." That may not actually be true, and I don't usually feel that way, but there is some seed of truth in it. I guess I always thought that school was the tough part that you have to work through to make it in life and that after school was over, it was just a matter of getting in with the right company or organization or whatever, and then BOOM you are making money and never doing homework and it's awesome. Maybe it does work like that for some people, but most people I know that make a lot of money or have a really fantastic job worked their asses off to get there AND continue to work their asses off to keep it. In other words, starting your "career"(fancy, grown up word for more than a temporary gig) is no cakewalk. I don't know how I ever got the impression it would be. This is not to say that I don't like my current job-- I really do! It's so much fun, and I love the people I work with, but lets face the facts people--it's a gig. (Though I'm told it could lead to a career? We will just have to wait and see about that.)
I don't know what society expects from me right now, but I'm okay with taking on gigs for the next couple of years. I have a lot of places I want to see and experience, and people I want to spend time with before we get old and attached to places and people and all we have left to talk about is what our kids are doing or what ailments we have. Bleh. So, though I love California, I am considering only spending one more year here, or maybe less. Now this is all just talk. I don't really have any formal plans. If I feel I should stay here, I'll stay. The thing is, I've always wanted to check out Ireland. It may take more than a month, so I'm considering moving there, and just taking on a job as a nanny or something like that, which would be a little easier to get a work permit for than any corporate or "business-y" job. I don't think I would stay there more than six months. The distance from my family to California has been rough enough. I don't think I could put them through a year of my being in another country (or put myself through that). This could all be crazy talk, so don't come back to me in a year and say, "Hey I thought you were moving to Ireland. Why are you still here?". Don't you dare do that, because the idea that I can't dream outloud a bit without having to hear about it later stresses me out.
As I was saying earlier, this week has felt really weird. I have been missing my friends in Pomona as well as my best California friend who is now in Seattle. Also, my roommate has been in the Bay area with her family, so I've felt a little lonesome. The beach is keeping me temporarily entertained, but I wish I knew more people in the area to chill with. I'm looking for a new church, since the one I was going to before is in Pomona, and that is just too far to drive every Sunday morning! I went to a Presbyterian church in my neighborhood, and brought the median age down about fifty years. There was one lady who was probably 35ish with two kids, but her and the babies were the closest to my age. Don't get me wrong, I love old people. I don't know that they would really want to play sand volleyball or go swimming with me though. The one "young lady", the mom , dressed her 9 month old in brown, and I called it a boy, but apparently baby girls can wear brown too. Oops. Please parents, until your kid is old enough to look like either a boy or a girl, dress them in blue or pink respectively. You can also use green or yellow as long as you don't act surprised when people don't know what to call it. For the love of Pete, whatever you do, please don't put a girl in dark brown. It confuses people (me). And brown isn't even a good color. No one looks good in brown, really. I can't think of anyone. Maybe redheads--but only in the fall, and only with denim. I might be alone in this idea. I do have a brown dress, but it has polka dots ,which are soooo cuuute!
A couple of people got fired from the radio station I work at earlier today. I feel bad for them. They reaaalllly messed up, though. There were four of us that got hired at the same time, and me and Mad Mike are the only ones left. I guess we are about to get some new people, which will make me feel like a seasoned promo assistant. Being the baby has been fun (and no one ever made me wear brown!).
Time to say goodnight.
Love,
LH
Monday, June 10, 2013
City of Angels
I've been a Los Angeles resident for eight days, and I'm loving it. There is so much to see and do, all of the time. I had been thinking about moving again, but I might want to give this city more time. I'm excited about this summer, and have a gut feeling that I'm in the right place, and that good things are going to come from this. I had two people last week tell me at work that I looked happy, and though I didn't realize I looked any different before, I do feel really healthy and happy right now--probably because I'm no longer sitting in traffic 3-4 hours a day.
Today was my day off, and I went to LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art). It was incredible, and if you ever get the chance, go. I could have spent days there. There are so many exhibits and I didn't even get close to seeing everything. I took one of my roommates, and he had to get back for class this afternoon, so after dropping him off, I went to the beach. I'm happy to report that I live only 10 minutes from the beach now. Hallelujah! My goal is to learn to surf by August 1. Ask me that day if I've done it. This has to happen.
Sorry, I just really don't feel like writing tonight. Know that I'm tired, but happy. I have a lot to write about, but just not tonight. I will soon, so stay tuned.
With love,
Liz
Today was my day off, and I went to LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art). It was incredible, and if you ever get the chance, go. I could have spent days there. There are so many exhibits and I didn't even get close to seeing everything. I took one of my roommates, and he had to get back for class this afternoon, so after dropping him off, I went to the beach. I'm happy to report that I live only 10 minutes from the beach now. Hallelujah! My goal is to learn to surf by August 1. Ask me that day if I've done it. This has to happen.
Sorry, I just really don't feel like writing tonight. Know that I'm tired, but happy. I have a lot to write about, but just not tonight. I will soon, so stay tuned.
With love,
Liz
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