banana split

weirdly, i'm craving a banana split. it's a fantastic blog post title. you want one too, don't you now? funny enough, the only banana split i've ever had was one in france, in a cafe called les varietes. i got into a really strange habit of ordering one every sunday night for dinner for like, weeks.

it's monday, but i'm craving a les varietes banana split like it's sunday.

maybe it has something to do with this feeling i have every morning when i wake up, that same feeling i had in france, of newness and nervousness. every day, i get up and i've got two new jobs now and i'm meeting so many different people and every day i'm bombarded by the impression that i need to make an impression.

i'm excited, don't get me wrong, and i'm positive about everything that's happening and it's such a spectacular feeling, this one of going out and going after things and doing things, but at the same time, it's fucking scary. exhilarating, but terrifying. i've always been haunted by the possibility of failure, that threat. it's always been one of my greatest fears. at the same time, i haven't felt truly challenged on any kind of regular basis since macon, and it's refreshing feeling like i have to prove my smarts to myself, instead of just waltzing through the routine that had snuck up and taken over parts of my life.

so. as an update: i'm challenged, i'm scared, but more than all that, i'm really darn excited.

and i'm craving a banana split.

interview tomorrow

i responded to an ad on craigslist for a part time receptionist at a salon here and got an email the very next day, which i'm choosing to believe is a great sign. i'd love for it to be something than can transition into full time, for sure, because...it just sounds perfect, something at which i could really excel.

either way, if i do get it, even if it's only part time, it'll certainly be more money than i'm making now (which is none, just to be clear).

in the meantime, i strolled around town the other day in the 100 degree heat filling our applications and dropping off resumes. hopefully that bears more fruit than the efforts of april.

for now, i'm enjoying just being here. it's more expensive than i ever thought, moving, but we're doing okay. a quiche is in the oven as i write, made with eggs from my neighbor and cheese and local broccoli, and all that good stuff. dinners with my boyfriend, what a treat!

i had gotten accustomed to sorta snacking at the restaurant and calling it, plus my shift drink "dinner." it's nice to be able to make things and sit at a table and be normal. refreshing.

we'll see what happens on the job front, but send me some good vibes tomorrow afternoon, so i can at least have something...

when i come back home, to this sweet new wonderful home, i'd love to have good things to report over the dinner table with my love.

en souhaitant des bonnes nouvelles, mes amis...

we made it! now what?

so we're here and mostly moved in and have been for exactly a week. it feels like less time and so much more simultaneously--one moment it feels like we've been here for years and the next, it's like we moved in yesterday. we're still getting accustomed to everything--new neighbors, new sounds, new smells, where everything is, where to go, what to do, who to meet, what to eat, what to spend our non-existent money on, the whole deal.

if you ever want to test your relationship with someone you are under the impression that you love, move with them. it is trying. nate and i have done a decent job with this. every now and then, we get frustrated and very rarely, if at all, with each other, but when you don't know anyone else and no one returns your calls, and you're stuck with that one person...well, we were bound to take out a couple things on one another.

but it certainly hasn't been bad and i think we've passed a test of sorts, going through this and not wanting to kill each other. in fact, it's made us closer and that must be a good sign. now everyone who keeps asking, 'when are you getting married?!' the answer can be sooner rather than later. probably.

so i'm sitting here, still in my pajamas, eating french bread and brie and fresh garlic, because i'm that much of a weirdo. the animals are all settled in and resting, napping, as they do. i'm looking past my computer and out the sliding door at my deck, because i have one. it's gorgeous. huge and freshly painted and wonderful. i can't wait to have visitors, and we can hang out there and have some beers and watch the woods that are my backyard.

we still have to put up pictures, paint some bookshelves, put away books. but that's the fun part. all the lifting and sweating and pushing and tears...that part's over.

now it's the decorating and buying and trying to find a job in the midst of it all. but i have an interview this week, for a part time receptionist position at a salon, which should be fun for me. and it's something. and there are more possibilities on the horizon, i can feel it.

for now, it's fun for me to try a little something new while i try to figure out what exactly it is i want to do with my life.

bonne chance a moi!

TOMORROW

tomorrow is the big day of all big days, the biggest day i've had in three years, my last big day being college graduation.

wow, haven't done much in three years. that's depressing.

i mean, i have, i've worked almost every day for the past three years and have been very involved with that, and i've learned a lot, and i've loved it (and sometimes i've hated it, i'll be an honest person), but nothing huge and exceptional has really seemed to happen.

i haven't gotten a big promotion, i haven't gotten pregnant (knock on wood!) or engaged, haven't made a big move...all the things my friends have been busy with.

but now i get to be excited for my big move--i've been talking about it long enough!

it's fucking scary--i don't have a job, i don't know anyone but nate where i'm moving, we're taking such a leap.

i'm just soooo tired of complaining about where i live, and how much i'm phoning in my life and i think it's gonna take something like this, a big leap, a change, a shake-up to jumpstart my life again, which sounds like my life has sucked for three years, which it definitely hasn't, but i do need a shake-up. it's not necessarily a bad thing, i think some people need that sense of novelty and danger even in their lives. i might be one of those people.

and now is the time where i've got absolutely nothing to lose and where i could take a real chance and get a real career and not be a 'restaurant lifer' and i hope something opens itself up to me and i hope something magically reveals itself as my dream job, because i certainly don't know what i'm looking for, but in the meantime, i'm pretty terrified but very excited to pound the pavement and at least get some sort of job to pay the bills... i know that i don't want to get stuck in anything that i don't completely love and this move is showing me that i'm capable of breaking free when it's time to do so.

i don't even know if anyone reads this blog or if i'm making any sense. it's early for me, and i haven't had nearly enough coffee.

all i know is i've got about six hours to pack up all my STUFF today, then relax with a drink with my mom and a one last nice dinner with my boyfriend that needs to hold us over for a while, and then i get to get out of here!

ohhhh, columbia, i'll miss you just the tiniest bit.

but not that much.

moving

we helped some friends load up the uhaul today...i feel like an awesome friend. people always say true friends will help you move and that is true, because moving is awful and only people who reeeeally love you are going to willingly put themselves through that.

helping them today definitely doesn't make me more excited to do the same thing...packing and moving and loading and carrying and sweating it all out on these southern summer days that are so horrifically hot.

but seeing a moving truck and boxes stacked up and everything... it was a lovely picture of my new, rapidly approaching future.

i haven't blogged in seven months, you say?

you thought i was over it, didn't you, mes amis? never to blog again! you heaved sighs of relief, or you cried tears of disappointment. either way, i'm back.

i've been busy, not even within life per se, but within my own head. i'm always thinking. about something. everything from how to budget for the next few months to what i want to order from starbucks to how much i love my boyfriend.

nate and i are moving and i couldn't be happier. we always said we'd give this place three years and then move on. we just didn't see ourselves living here for any really long period of time. three years was enough to sort of establish ourselves within our jobs and it was nice for me to be so close to family for that time, right after college graduation. but it's been three years and so here we go.

i'm trying to think back on any experience i've had moving and i will confess: as much as i've moved place to place to place, i've never had to actually really pack. i've always had mom, packer and mover extraordinaire to do that for me. she's a pro, really. i'm thankful to be moving in the summer, when she is available to help me a bit, packing and moving here and then helping to decorate and make the new place homey and cute and perfect there.

i'll miss seeing her almost every week, hanging out together with a bottle of bubbly, talking about tv shows and venting about work. hopefully she'll visit a lot. and hopefully, i'll be able to visit a bit as well.

the promise and optimism that comes with unpacking makes packing a bit easier to deal with. i can't wait.

leaving the restaurant will be bittersweet, but i'm fully aware that it's the right time for me to go. it's time for me to move on...to a new restaurant, probably. but we'll see. we've got a place, but neither nate nor i have jobs, which is terrifying (and rather exhilarating). while there is a sense of fear in the air, the unknown is also a bit exciting...talk to me in two months when all my money's run out and i still don't have a job, and i will kill you for quoting me saying that it's exciting. i'm sure it won't come to that.

expect more updates from NC when i'm all moved in. hopefully, i'll do better with this blog and we'll go through it together. for now i'm just looking forward to working super hard and trying to get together with friends and family here before i move forward in my life.

a mes aventures nouveaux!

as taken from my journal...

i wrote today, but decided perhaps it was a sentiment worth sharing with the internet world. amusez-vous bien, mes amis:

>>i recently found an old webshots album online. i posted some pre-france and first semester france photos on this site, in the pre-facebook days and then forgot about them almost completely.

seeing some paris pictures 1) reminded me that, actually, i kind of love paris and 2) inspired me to cut my straight-across bangs. again. i seem to get into a bangs mood every two years. 2005. 2007. now it's 2009...

those first bangs, 2005, were cut during an evening in angers, as i was holed up in my little bedroom, trying to stay warm as christmas and a brief parisian vacation approached.

i remember being slightly terrified as i took that first chop, a big one, one where there was no option of backing out, with a pair of just regular old scissors.

it was exhilarating.

there was a slight, short-lived moment of regret, but as i layered on cute french-y clothes, i found myself feeling more chic, more french, une vraie francaise, une vraie parisienne. it sounds funny, but something in me clicked and i found myself experimenting more with clothes than i ever had in the us. mixing colors, patterns, textures, layering with scarves and jewelry, and accessories. hats, which i had never really thought to wear before.

i felt myself feeling more poised, confident, dangerous, sexy, mysterious. i could wear more eye makeup...coquette-ishly glance through my new fringe, batting my eyelashes, smiling flirtatiously, smiling confidently.

i was an american who had a grasp, a true, strong grasp, on the french culture, on the french language.

from there, i vacationed with my friends jeremy and tranisha through the streets, the museums, the late night bars and parties of paris, making new, one night only friendships.

we heard the bells of notre dame chiming midnight on december 25th while drinking champagne from plastic cups and eating chocolates in our pajamas. we ventured into the cold streets looking to see if anything was open, if there was anything to do, invigorated by the cold and the bubbly and the last-chance feeling of it all, and we took what we thought were vodka shots (which turned out to be tequila), toasting the holiday with strangers. we danced, we skipped, we ran through the night, stayed up until 6am, downing violet and rose infused vodka and having drunken "intellectual" and pseudo-intellectual conversation and ill-informed discussions on religion with randoms. jeremy shared an early morning kiss with a pretty french girl and everyone laughed.

it was one of the coolest nights i've ever spent, just feeling beautiful and young and indestructible.




and every two years or so, i get some of that experience, that emotion, that poise, that confidence, that very same feeling back.

i want to infuse my vodka with violets and roses and roam around dark, cold streets, warmed by the company of good friends, new friends, and strangers, warmed by the most fashionable coats and scarves, warmed by the beauty of the world and the knowledge that i have a place in it.<<

anyone else remember a time when they had this feeling? tell me your story. i know that i have plenty.