Two in one day - how's that for exciting?!
Although my blog documents the decision-making process that led to me deciding to matriculate at FES this fall, this month, my last in DC, finds me a bit mired in nostalgia, with more affection for the city than I would generally like to admit to.
I have 26 more days in the 20010 zip code, 26 more days of my fantastically diverse neighborhood, with all the drama and problems that that encompasses. 26 more days of sitting on my shoddy back porch with the housemates, doing almost nothing at all besides enjoying the gorgeous DC spring. 26 more days of this fabulous cast of characters being my housemates, at all.
Of course, there are good reasons to leave, but it's easier to see the reasons to stay when you're facing your own certain departure, especially when the line, "this month, my last in DC," is so familiar.
As I've said or alluded to in previous posts, December 2007 was supposed to be my last in DC, and January 14 was supposed to be the day I tried not to cry while driving away.
Luckily for me (mind the change in perspective!), my then-boyfriend broke up with me, leaving me to reclaim my room in the group house I share with four others, reestablish ties with people, friends I thought I was leaving, and rediscover that, truly, I love DC.
Instead I stayed, and re-did all of those things, and accomplished a few new ones as well.
I learned to work from home, as a consultant, and manage my time better. I created a home office to work out of, saved up for and paid some big bucks for a friend's destination wedding (which was worth every cent), and made new friends. I followed up on barely-there friendships from my last 9-to-5 (or 6, or 7), and turned them into true friendships, and I learned a lot about myself as a person. Like that I'm just as strong as I thought I was and, in many ways, stronger.
I even came around to see the bright side of Paul breaking up with me, which is that I don't know if I would have decided to pursue the graduate school program to which I was admitted if I was looking the debt in the face with him by my side (he is profoundly debt-averse), especially since he wanted to go West, not North and East. But instead, I was able to take stock in my options, and decide to go North and East alone. (So there, Paul!)
But now after all these good and healthy realizations, the renewed direction and reinvigorated...EVERYTHING, I am leaving this base that has provided the foundation for all the self-defense and self-reflection I needed to do in the last few months, and I admit it's a tad scary. DC has been good to me. My friends have been good to me here.
So with 26 more days, what's a girl to do?
I want to go to the National Gallery and the Sackler, the museums I never got to. I wanted to go to the Hotel Washington rooftop restaurant and watch the sun go down over the National Mall, but late last week I found out it's been liquidated (oh, well). I want to go camping with my friends and do happy hours, and I want to walk around Columbia Heights more. I want to explore my neighborhood and meet more of my neighbors (belatedly, I know), and I want to dance with my girlfriends. I want to sit out on the back porch with my housemates wrapped in a comforter, tea on the wicker table in front of me, as I did yesterday, and do nothing in the company of friends.
For my last 26 days in DC I want to be still and content, and just be here, and not anywhere else.
I have loved DC.
May 05, 2008
My First Blog
While procrastinating on work today I spent some time catching up on Feministing, one of my all time favorite Feminist blogs, and one which I have been reading for almost two years now, as I realized with a shock about a week or two ago. Feministing blogger Ann (a fellow DC resident - Hey-yeah!) had given props to another Feminist blog, Feminist Finance, which she recently discovered, and which I promptly read, enjoyed, and bookmarked under my blogs tab (where all good procrastinators go to die, or, at least, to find some interesting food for thought to power them through the long part of the afternoon).
While on the topic of Feminist Finance, the post I particularly enjoyed (on 'Marrying Debt') can be found here.
Finding a new blog I liked made me think a bit about my first one, and how I became interested in blogs altogether.
I know there's a healthy proportion of our population that don't do anything with (read, write, comment on, or discuss) blogs, but I think they have a lot of value. Although I was interested in blogging as an idea and a venue for writing (and for practicing writing), I probably wouldn't have ever become a blogger (albeit one who is thus far inconsistent, and as far as one can tell, unread!) or reader of blogs if it wasn't for the Washington Post and Bad Feminist.
Two years or so ago I read a Washington Post article on some vaguely feminist issue, and saw that the sidebar included a list of blogs that had recently commented on the piece. I don't think they have this functionality anymore (that, or I just haven't read the WaPo recently enough), because they probably realized they were driving some seriously valuable traffic away from their site. But the blog's name was "Bad Feminist," and the blogger was awesome.
Bad Feminist took some seriously, awesomely antiquated 1950's and earlier imagery and used it to spice up her blog posts, and posted about personal issues, in her own voice, in a direct and engaging way that inspired me. At a time when I felt a bit adrift in my own feminism, and relatively unsupported as an as-yet-unconnected (read: newly arrived) feminist in DC, Bad Feminist made me feel like I was not the only one wrestling with many of these ideas, or ascribed to the values that are to me what feminism is all about.
It is ironic, then, for me to recall that Bad Feminist was some level of Yale student, as I will soon be, and saddening that she eventually closed up shop, and stopped blogging. I keep her on my blogroll as a kind of tribute, and also for the other blogs she exposed me to.
From the Bad Feminist blogroll I eventually branched out to discover Feministing, F-Words, Broadsheet (for which I have some serious love and respect), Bitch Ph.D., Pandagon, Feministe, and many others, and started to develop an interest in blogging, myself.
That I would continue to discover new blogs by moving from these more well-established bases, and that this process would continue to unfold, has been exciting, as I love the moment when I read a new blog and something clicks. I know not all blogs will hit home with me (of the ones listed above, Feministing, F-Words, and Broadsheet have been nearly daily sources of information and inspiration for me), just as I know not everyone will like my writing, or my little blog project. Some people might think writing about personal experiences, and in the first person, is boring. But I like personal experiences, and I enjoy learning that my own experiences are common to others - it's reassuring, surprising, exciting, and validating.
I just hope that at least a few people will find my blog worth a read, once in awhile, and that I will continue to develop my voice, much as I have watched these other ladies develop theirs.
While on the topic of Feminist Finance, the post I particularly enjoyed (on 'Marrying Debt') can be found here.
Finding a new blog I liked made me think a bit about my first one, and how I became interested in blogs altogether.
I know there's a healthy proportion of our population that don't do anything with (read, write, comment on, or discuss) blogs, but I think they have a lot of value. Although I was interested in blogging as an idea and a venue for writing (and for practicing writing), I probably wouldn't have ever become a blogger (albeit one who is thus far inconsistent, and as far as one can tell, unread!) or reader of blogs if it wasn't for the Washington Post and Bad Feminist.
Two years or so ago I read a Washington Post article on some vaguely feminist issue, and saw that the sidebar included a list of blogs that had recently commented on the piece. I don't think they have this functionality anymore (that, or I just haven't read the WaPo recently enough), because they probably realized they were driving some seriously valuable traffic away from their site. But the blog's name was "Bad Feminist," and the blogger was awesome.
Bad Feminist took some seriously, awesomely antiquated 1950's and earlier imagery and used it to spice up her blog posts, and posted about personal issues, in her own voice, in a direct and engaging way that inspired me. At a time when I felt a bit adrift in my own feminism, and relatively unsupported as an as-yet-unconnected (read: newly arrived) feminist in DC, Bad Feminist made me feel like I was not the only one wrestling with many of these ideas, or ascribed to the values that are to me what feminism is all about.
It is ironic, then, for me to recall that Bad Feminist was some level of Yale student, as I will soon be, and saddening that she eventually closed up shop, and stopped blogging. I keep her on my blogroll as a kind of tribute, and also for the other blogs she exposed me to.
From the Bad Feminist blogroll I eventually branched out to discover Feministing, F-Words, Broadsheet (for which I have some serious love and respect), Bitch Ph.D., Pandagon, Feministe, and many others, and started to develop an interest in blogging, myself.
That I would continue to discover new blogs by moving from these more well-established bases, and that this process would continue to unfold, has been exciting, as I love the moment when I read a new blog and something clicks. I know not all blogs will hit home with me (of the ones listed above, Feministing, F-Words, and Broadsheet have been nearly daily sources of information and inspiration for me), just as I know not everyone will like my writing, or my little blog project. Some people might think writing about personal experiences, and in the first person, is boring. But I like personal experiences, and I enjoy learning that my own experiences are common to others - it's reassuring, surprising, exciting, and validating.
I just hope that at least a few people will find my blog worth a read, once in awhile, and that I will continue to develop my voice, much as I have watched these other ladies develop theirs.
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