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29March | i think i need a purging
Something is wrong. I don't know what it is. Rationally, I know that the premature end of my training isn't really a big deal - it may even be a blessing in disguise because now I can dedicate more time to other projects. But it's really only led to the unfurling of many other deep-rooted issues that I can't quite cope with all at once right now. I haven't even gotten to the point of fully realizing them, as I've been too caught up in trying to rectify what is, I think, a tired and sour relationship with work. You know what's funny? I feel like I'm going through a breakup. I look around my room and see remnants of the only emotional relationship I've been involved in since January - t-shirts and shorts draped over the railing of my bed, my sneakers strewn haphazardly on the floor, knee supports curled by the hamper, one last Gatorade bottle that was meant to be consumed after the next long run - and my heart aches a little bit each time. I want to throw it all in the corner of my closet and shut it away so I am not reminded of the life that I've been leading for the past few months. It's not really the loss of the race, I think. It's the loss of the knowledge that whenever I want to, I can lace up my sneakers and escape into time that is only my own. I know that I'll run again, but I need time to heal - just as one needs time to heal from a broken heart. Crazy... because now that I've put it in those terms, what I'm feeling makes sense. This is how I feel whenever my relationships end. It's actually pretty mentally unsafe, as my first instinct in those situations is always some form of self-destruction - which is why I've been pretty much avoiding any sort of real emotional risks since early January. Little did I expect then that I would unknowingly launch into an affair that was so involved. And now, while I am wrangling with the idea that I can't run for an undetermined period of time, I also see myself closing off to the idea of any sort of true potential romantic interaction. This is so completely weird... yet makes utter sense to me. Thoughts? (By the way, thanks to everyone who's offered words of encouragement and condolences to me - it means very much.)
27March | irony
Last night I saw Snow Patrol at Madison Square Garden's Theatre - the first concert I've been to that had actual seating since 2000 when I saw Christina Aguilera and Hanson in the same weekend, and the first popular concert I've been to since... well, Christina Aguilera. As much as I love a smaller club setting much like the ones in which I've seen Hanson in the past few years, there was something much more... ethereal about being one in a massive crowd, sound booming through the hall and through me... watching the band completely lose control of their bodies as the music inhabits them. Fellow fans around me completely shook free of their inhibitions and moved so affectedly with the beat - Jaymie and I giggled at them but as I sat back and let everything soak in I so admired their ability to fall in sync with the band and just... feel them pulsing through the air. And then as I continued to watch and listen, I saw love. Right there, exploding on stage. The deepest love - passion - for music and art and expression. I imagined this band's journey from formation and anonymity to playing adoring crowds across countries, night after night. Just... living a dream. I came out of that theater feeling like a new person, refreshed and inspired. I wanted to run again and I wanted to feel the pavement under my feet and I wanted to push through all my doubts and muscle soreness and know that I finished strong. Today - the warmest of days - the air smelled like freshness and springtime and new beginnings, the streets were brimming with people unburdened by winter wear, and I headed out for my run feeling completely unpressured and renewed. But my knees had already made the decision for me and even as I pushed myself down to Prospect Park, I knew I couldn't make it all the way around. I ended up walking most of the way back, trying to start running a few times only to stop from the pain. And as I walked down each block that over the past two and a half months I've only passed in runs, I started to feel helpless and angry - like I've lost something. This all built up into a sense of failure and loss of my vitality, as well as disappointment that I've worked so hard only to be sidelined by my physical limitations when I'm so close to the race... that when I got home I dropped my shoulders and just cried. I feel better now, but am still very sad. While it will be good to now have time to work on other projects, I really do feel robbed of something. When can I run again? How will it fit into my life then? I refuse to let it fall low on my priorities again. I guess I should sleep on it and start thinking about what to do to fill my time now...
27March | i didn't think this meant so much to me but
I tried to run today and I could barely get two miles in before I knew I had to stop because of the burning pain in my knees. So I walked two miles home knowing that I will most likely not be running the half-marathon on April 14th. Even if the pain subsides next week I don't think I should push my muscles to breaking point. So I withdraw. I'll write more later but right now I have to get in the shower and cry. :(
25March | i don't know what to do
Today I didn't finish my 12 mile run. It was mostly very painful - I felt tired, sluggish, slow, and had difficulty breathing normally. My right knee (which is NOT the one with the old high school tennis injury) hurt intermittently, there were no sidewalks for a good portion of it (like... what the hell?), there were way more hills than I'd anticipated, and after about 8 or 9 miles I just couldn't bear to continue. I had just kind of hit my breaking point... and then once I'd stopped to walk I couldn't start again because my knees really started to bother me. I was really disheartened that I couldn't finish, even though I knew that I had done a decent amount of work just by virtue of the hills... and more I'm really worried about my knees. Going up and down stairs for the rest of the day was excruciating and the thought of heading back out for my next run on Tuesday just makes me want to crawl into a hole and die. Except I can't crawl, because it would hurt my knees. So, I am stuck. The race is so soon and I know that part of me wants to finish it, but the other part of me is really disappointed that I didn't finish my run today... and wondering how I'm going to be able to pull off 13.1 miles with my knees in the shape that they're in. And I think I'm just... really... tired. :(
24March | sorry i haven't written in forever
And this will have to be short... 1. Home in Jersey this weekend - had a cavity filled... am I the only one who thinks I would feel more comforted if the dentist narrated while he was drilling and poking weird things into my teeth? I'd just like to know what's going on. 2. Saw a couple kids I went to high school with at Old Navy today. The girl was carrying a baby which led me to believe that it was their child - I don't remember them dating in high school but then again I don't remember too much of high school. I ran away and did not say hi =X 3. I'm running 12 miles tomorrow. I'm scared!! More in a few days, maybe tomorrow night...
19March | tell me about your best kiss ever
For some reason - the excitement of seeing the sun after the bout of last week's storm, the freedom of a day with no responsibilities, the strength of realizing that despite all of my recent self-doubt I do indeed hold the reigns to my own life - I was reminded today of one of the most exhilarating, blood-rushing, knee-weakening moments of my life: my BKE (best kiss ever). I won't disclose his name (although it is probably one of the best names to have entered my life to date), but he was a friend of my roommate back when I lived in Williamsburg in '05. He and his band stayed in our apartment a couple times when they played shows in New York - the first time I only spoke to him once, briefly. It was July and I was still working my first job then, deeply hating it and feeling very lost; one night I sat out on the fire escape smoking and he stepped out to join me. I was a bit shy and intimidated (he stood at 6'4", wore eyeliner and had long, dark, emo rock star hair) but we had a surprisingly candid conversation - one that clearly struck me enough to resonate through the months that passed before the band came through again. This time it was September. I'd quit my job three months prior and was now working part-time at the GAP, generally peaceful and much happier. He showed up with his hair cut short, eyeliner intact. and a shy smile as he poked his head into my room to say hello. During the band's week-long stay, we proceeded to spend almost every night deep in conversation, sometimes stretching the night into dawn before parting ways to go to bed. I knew that there was a connection there - but I didn't know how to navigate it and wasn't sure if it was a path I even wanted to take. One night, we kissed - but he was unsure, still dealing with residuals from someone else. Not wanting to press, I let it be. We continued our nightly talks, though, and one thing he said to me as we crouched on my roof, a light summer rain sprinkling down on us, has always stuck in my mind: "You are one of the most wonderful people I have ever met." I believed it then and through all of the ensuing cynicism that I have since built up, a part of me still firmly believes it now. The night before he left, we found ourselves back out on the fire escape. As it grew later, I told him I needed to sleep - we bid our goodbyes, my hands clasped in his, and I turned to go inside. I had taken two steps when he pulled me back by the hand, drew me in close, and kissed me. It was the most surreal feeling, like it was out of a movie - I was on my tiptoes, hand still caught in his hand, knees nearly buckling from the whirlwind that had just taken place... and in that moment I felt inexplicably safe, that he was someone who could never hurt me. His lips were gentle but hungry, and the impulse with which he had pulled me away from the door lingered in the way he leaned down and wrapped his arms around me, lifting me off my feet. To this day I don't know what ran through his mind in the seconds as I turned away from him - I suppose I'm okay with that. I saw him twice after that, about a month later in New York and then in Philadelphia. He was back together with the girl who had held him back that first night with me, and our meetings were brief, ostensibly innocent. Shortly afterward we fell out of touch; it's probably been over a year since we've talked, but those precious minutes that night in September '05 will always bring that rush back to me - the quintessential, appropriately romantic moment that would fit nowhere else in time but where it fell. ----------- And now I want to hear yours. If you'd rather not post it up here, email it to me - I would really love to read it.
16March | i stole this from ellen it's awesome
15March | because all i think about these days is running
You know what a big pet peeve of mine is? When people say, "Well, if it makes you feel any better..." and then usually proceed to explain how they're going through a situation that is far worse than mine. Let me disclaim that I completely understand the rationale for saying that, and trying to show me that I'm not that bad off. But 1. why would it make me feel better to know that someone else is suffering? and 2. yo why you gotta trump me? I just want to wallow for a second, not have my problems trivialized in light of someone else's. Let's take it up a notch to stress my point: Person #1: "I'm hungry." or Person #1: "I have to run 11 miles this weekend I'm crying just thinking about it." Incidentally, I do have to run 11 miles this weekend, but the weather is proving to be a huge inconvenience for me. We got a real teaser of a nice few couple days - last night I ran a sixer in shorts and was outside til around 8:30 feeling completely comfortable. And tomorrow and Saturday the forecast is accumulating snow. What the hell. So now that it's crunch time and I can't fall behind in training because the race is a month away, I have to constantly be rethinking my schedule because the FREAKING weather can't make up its mind. And no, it will not make me feel better to know that anyone in the world is experiencing anything having to do with cold weather.
11March | the namesake
I had the wonderful opportunity to see Mira Nair's The Namesake (adapted from Jhumpa Lahiri's novel of the same name and one of my favorite books) when it opened this past Friday and was tempted to write about it last night but thought that I needed a day or so to digest it and adequately sort my thoughts. I find it very hard to find a film that moves me with just the right amount of truth and subtlety, in which emotions are raw but not overdone and a story is told in a way that hits me square in the chest. Maybe I'm too picky - or maybe films these days just aren't up to par. Either way, I spent two hours in the theater on Friday night alternately falling in love with the nuances of immigrant parents and their estranged, Americanized children, and clutching a wad of napkins so tightly in my hand that they molded to the shape of my palm, tears streaming off my chin and onto my shirt as my heart broke just as it had when I read the book. I won't give away the plot (follow the links above to get a summary) but I have come away from it feeling so compassionate for the experience that my parents - that all first-generation parents - have had here. There is so much unspoken love in the sacrifices that they make for their children - that my parents made for me, that for too long I haven't taken the time to appreciate or reciprocate. And then it angers me that there is so much ignorance and discrimination regarding the immigrant experience - poking fun at hard to pronounce, non-"American" names, at thick accented English, at unfamiliar customs - just because it's not what American people have known their whole lives. There are just so many stories to be told. Endless stories, and I haven't been diligent enough to even sit down and crank out one. Seeing films like this only pushes me harder, only invigorates me. I would see it again in a heartbeat. Who's in?
08March | watch this
And if you like it, you can download it on ITunes. All proceeds will be donated to PHRU in Soweto, a hospital that helps reduce the transmission of pre-natal HIV/AIDS. <-- click to read article
06March | everything in exclamation!
I love this blog! I am taking care of sticking issues one by one in ways that I have forgotten were fundamentally good for me and it is giving me such peace. Something in me has changed - maybe it is the band - but I have come to realize that I've only been living halfway, for far too long. I've surrendered to the banalities of a day job and allowed those stresses to weigh me down when those should not be the things that worry me. I've let my running become an obsession - to the point where I think about the prospect of missing a couple runs and worry that I am going to lose all of the muscle mass I've built up in my legs. That is not where I wanted to be. So I am taking the rest of the week off until Saturday, because I know my body and mind need the rest and because I really need to realize that the world is not going to end if I break my schedule. And everything is going to be okay. In the spectrum of my life, the half-marathon is only a small blip - what's more important is the journey I've made to get there.
06March | i find hope and it gives me rest
Lots of weird things going on lately and it's making me really question what I'm trying to achieve at this point in my life, as well as what kind of people I want and need to be surrounded by - and where I can find them. I'm so glad to have my band back with me for the ride. They have so always embodied the soul that I know is buried somewhere within me.
04March | weekend list
Well! After spending two weekends away from New York, it was good to be back in the city and do a lot of things that I've been too frenzied to do, such as: 1. Run well. Last week my weekday runs were much better than the week prior - still a bit tough to do in the mornings, but I think it's just a matter of adjusting back to the outdoors. Yesterday I went up to Central Park and did 8 miles with Jaymie... the longest distance I've ever run outdoors. There were definitely times when I felt discouraged about how winded I felt, but we ended strong and if pushed I probably could have done another mile. If pushed. ;) 2. See Mat's play. It was definitely a little strange to be going to an event for him after all the transitions that our relationship w/ each other has made, especially because one of the girls he's "seeing" was sitting right in front of me. :p I was so proud of him. But the play itself made me want to shoot myself in the eye. 3. Have nights in. Not that I don't love spending time with my parents and my BFF's (and Hanson), but I really just relished some alone time to just kinda veg and watch Nick at Nite. 4. LAUNDRY. So I haven't done a full load of laundry in a really long time - for the past however many weeks I'll just take the stuff I really need to wash (underwear, socks, running clothes) and leave the rest in my hamper. But not today! I broke out the granny cart and took it all to the laundromat - sheets and towels included - and now everything is fresh and clean. 5. Clean my room. Seriously it was a sty in here. Papers, shopping bags, clothes, dust, hair, more dust... I finally cleaned out my overhead storage space (the sliding door popped out and hit me in the face in the process and I have a tender spot over my eye now...) and put some bags of old clothes up there, threw out some old boxes, re-folded all the clothing on my shelves, fixed my stupid breaking IKEA dresser, made my bed, wiped all flat surfaces and television down with disinfectant wipes, dry Swiffered twice and wet Swiffered once!! And now everything is nice and clean and I love it. 6. Return all the things I've bought recently but didn't need and have been sitting in my room taking up space for weeks. Pretty self-explanatory. 7. Drink hot chocolate and play online. Specifically... I joined Hanson.net the other night so Allison and I can share access to all the lovely goodies that apparently only fans with $40/yr to spare can see - and have been watching all of their studio and rehearsal videos all weekend. Their album drops May 22nd... until then I have little 30-second clips to tide me over. This week at work is probably going to be a little crazy... I'm dreading it a bit, especially coming off of such a great weekend. I guess we'll see...!!
02March | truly - the music lives
So I spent all day thinking about how I was going to write this tonight. I've written about Hanson quite a few times during the five years that I've had a blog, and each time I think how my words almost don't do my heart justice. They are more than a band, more than three people, more than just music to me. They have come to symbolize so much... dedication, passion, art, intelligence, creation, and most of all - the unending fight for one's truest and staunchest beliefs. As I wrote yesterday, it's been 10 years since they came onto the scene with "MMMBop" and their debut album. 10 years since they "sold out," their faces emblazoned on merchandise whose ridicule factor was surpassed only by the likes of the New Kids on the Block and, later on, the legions of boybands whose careers they inadvertently spawned; 10 years since a money-hungry record label saw what a commodity they held in these three kids (they were 16, 14, and 11 years old) and decided that the integrity of their music was not as important as the number of soulless records they could sell. And damn, how much has happened in those 10 years, both in their lives and in mine. One could say that they've disappeared underground - they are, in all senses, an independent rock band now, signed to their own label and making their own decisions. They've become leaders, entrepeneurs, husbands (one a father!), collaborators - so if achieving that cost them what could have been really cushy rides to fame that would likely have imploded before they finished puberty, I'd say that their journey underground was fully worth it. I really wish that more people could see their documentary. It's not a fan film. It is truly about the struggles that happen to many artists who are just trying to reach out and impact people with their ideas and passions - the "music industry" is not about the music so much anymore, and it's that very attitude that drove Hanson to go into hiding and refuse to put out music that wasn't theirs, to instead push and push and fight to write what they felt in their hearts was THEM. And I'm not sure which came first, but that is a way of living that I have striven to uphold for years. They are my inspiration to continue on, and to know that I can send messages with my words and my art, and to hold true to what I believe is right and is me even through heartbreak and disparagement. Not to mention that they were the ones who catalyzed and fueled my love for music and helped me discover my voice and the ability to found and lead a musical group that continues on long after I've left. All this and more surged through my head as I stood mere feet away from the stage last night, surrounded by screaming chaos that I felt was just so far removed from my state of mind. I didn't want to scream, or jump onstage, or cry (well maybe a little?). I just wanted to hear them - to the point where I covered my ears in order to drown out the audience and let their harmonies ring through. You can hear their incredible love for music in every note they hit - I've often said that all you need to do is sit and watch their faces for a minute to know that they are real. There is no way that Mercury Records could have ever hoped to turn them into some manufactured pop sensation. And then I inevitably started to feel sad - and in a way much more complex than the sadness I used to feel when I watched them hundreds of feet away onstage in some huge arena. I felt sad because more than anything, I live to impact people and I live for relationships... but my relationship with them is purely one-sided - I will never mean anything to them other than another upturned face in a bulging crowd in a club. What would I give for them to appreciate my art the way I do theirs - what would I give for a chance to put our heads together and let their ideas influence and inspire mine? I can't even qualify it. 10 years and they are closer to my heart than ever before - they've renewed my romantic vigor for life and all that I want mine to be.
01March | wow
I'm going to see Hanson tonight for the first time in three years. Very soon (March 24th) will be the 10 year anniversary of their industry debut. So much has changed since '97...
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