Shipping Out

In a matter of hours the rental van will be loaded and we will be on the road to dump me in Manhattan. Updates about the coming week may be very, very delayed due to business and sheer WTF factor.

FutureMe

I just got back from the hair salon and was planning on posting a picture of my new hair when I checked my email and got an email from the past. Check this out. I surprise myself sometimes. It's just the kind of boost I needed now that I'm getting nervous to go off to Tisch in a few days.

My relationships with these people have changed very much in the past year, but this has reminded me of what's really important, sometimes.
____

The following is an e-mail from the past, composed on Sunday, October 25, 2009, and sent via FutureMe.org
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Hey girl hey -

A few months ago I got a different FutureMe email and it pretty much made my week. I recognized the girl writing that letter but she seemed like someone entirely separate from myself, like it was impossible to have ever been the same person. But I was alive and well, still, and realizing that gave me a smile and some hope.

It's October 25, 2009, 11:27am. I'm sitting in dad's recliner watching Liverpool play Manchester United. I'm home for the first time in months, and it feels so good.

I'm writing to remind you of something I've learned over the past month, because I feel like it's one of the most important things I will ever learn. It isn't fair how I had to learn it, none of it is fair, but I want to make sure I never forget it. I know I probably won't, but I know how things change in a year.

It's been just over three weeks since Mike killed himself. Just over three weeks since that hideous, horrible Saturday morning where life froze and I couldn't breathe. I want to tell you that you're not going to forget him. You're never going to be completely okay with how you never said sorry for being so naive and angry, you'll never be okay with ignoring him at Delaney's that Tuesday, never going to find a way to come to terms with your justified anger and your incredible sorrow all at once.

But life goes on, no matter what. You put on a bangin show that next week - you rocked Desdemona and got yourself an Irene Ryan nomination for it. Classes continue, shows must go on, tears will fall. But you're still okay. Times can be shittier than you can imagine, but you'll be okay, even when you can't imagine how.

(You are a wonderful young actress. Stop being afraid to accept it - never stop working your ass off, but don't cut yourself short. Keep on going, don't you ever stop.)

When you get this, call someone you love. Text them, call them, email them, go see them, for all I care. But remember that in that time of desperate sadness and broken-hearted emptiness, you had each other. You had Kerry and DMD and Eric and Anthony and Jason and Billy. Never miss a chance to show someone how much you care. Forgive; don't forget, but forgive. You don't know how much time anyone has. Love like you don't have any more time. Appreciate the people in your life. Live each day like sundown is your last.

I love you. You love I. Take care of yourself, love the girl you are, whoever she is. She's special. You're beautiful. And as I write that, I truly believe it, so when you read this, you'd better damn well believe it.

See you on the flip side, ginger.

Love,
Me

Unicorns and Glitter

Been a little while since I posted. Packing insanity and last minute figuring out of nonsense. Lot of stuff to keep me busy.

First real goodbye today. Was very abbreviated. I was fine until I walked back in the house and realized I wouldn't be seeing my unicorn every other week anymore. My arm hurts and I'm kind of disoriented. Huh. Unrelated, maybe, but still. I hate goodbyes, even if it's only for a little while. They stress me out.

Happy Birthday to my darling unicorn - you're the bestest ever and we will have Pommes Frites very, very soon. <3

Went into the city to get work study paperwork done, and I needed to have my ID card, so that's what I did first. Ta-dahhhh; official student. With a scarf. It totally should have said Harlequin on it. That would have made me giggle.

That's better.



Went to check out my dorm room as well this Wednesday - I am quite literally a stone's throw from Chinatown. Amazing Asian food, here I come!

Lafayette

80 Lafayette Street, New York, New York - there's a large apartment building overlooking Franklin Street and White Street, and in room 601 is a small room waiting for me to move in. Low cost double housing, apartment style with my own refrigerator, stove, a bathroom to share with only ONE OTHER PERSON, and the NYU campus a meager 20 minute hike away.


Loading pictures on here has always been a slight challenge...

Lafayette Residence Hall and the NYU main campus, or Washington Square Park and the surrounding areas.

I now have a butt-ton of stuff to do. Yes, butt-ton is an actual, scientific measurement of physical matter and also intangible energy output. I need to do the paperwork for the work study job at the Steinhardt theatres, fill out my immunization forms because apparently I'm going to give everyone measles, mumps and rubella if I don't, email my new roomie, one Monique East, deposit my paychecks - three weeks worth, jeez - call about a discrepancy in my transferring credits, figure out if I want a meal plan, figure out when I will be getting my NYU ID card, and also start in on those summer reading books. Lots to do.

Lesson for the day: Do not transfer schools unless you really, really, REALLY want to be going somewhere else. You have to know that the effort required to make everything work out will be worth the reward in going to a new school.

Update.

Harlequin officially has a job as Event Assistant under Shuhei Seo at Steinhardt School of the Arts and Education at NYU - got my confirmation email and paperwork all sent to me today. So stoked.
____

Some issues with scheduling of event assisting and orientation (which is a week long), and my orientation schedule conflicting with itself, but I have sent out a series of emails in the hopes that these issues will be solved in the very near future. I'm nervous enough as it is, I don't need anything else to help me stress, thank you.

Still waiting to hear about housing and where I'll be living and who with. As edgy as I'm starting to get about leaving, I'm in desperate need of some space of my own. I love my family so very, very much and always miss them when I'm gone, but seriously, I need my own bathroom.

Summer reading: I need to get cracking on that. I have to finish Atlas Shrugged first, and I just haven't had the time. I have so much to read. Here's a handful, if I can remember them all.

Krik? Krak! - Edwidge Danticat
A Challenge for the Actor - Uta Hagen
Respect for Acting - Uta Hagen
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert M. Pirsig
Poetics - Aristotle

I only have to read Krik? Krak! for summer reading, but I want to read them all, I just don't have the time to sit and absorb them all like I should. Mum started reading Zen, so I'll see how she likes it. A friend of mine read it for his class last year at Marymount Manhattan and said it changed his life.

I'm in a place right now where I am so happy and I love the people I know and who love me - there is so much love in my life, and I couldn't be more grateful for it. This place I am in also has grey fog fear creeping in around the edges, threatening to take away everything I know and drop me alone in a city that lives to chew up and eat those who dare cross its path. The place I am in knows love, fear, but also sadness. Sadness for some of the love and sadness for the fear. I love my life, but my life confuses me.

Two more weeks of work - then freeeeeeeedoooooooooommmmmmm!