i love planning trips

there is something invigorating about picking my seats on the flight...especially when i have enough miles for a free trip to Vancouver....YAY!!! heh...its kind of funny...I wonder who I will sit by on the plane? I'll never forget the over-eager Jewish mother on the same row as me on my last trip to L.A....telling me about the magic of her son's long distance, 8 year relationship. ha. Sometimes I feel like talking, sometimes I don't. It is always interesting to get into someone's life story. Then the guy on the way home for Thanksgiving, who was going to meet the new love of his life...someone he met online after a divorce from a cheating wife.

I always get anxious and hope no one sits directly next to me...I usually plan well enough ahead that I don't get a middle seat...and there is always the strategically placed purse in the middle or the glaring looks. Or, if I'm in a good mood, a friendly smile, and "sure, go ahead." I'll never forget Jess's inspiring story of meeting Mr. Right Now on a flight home for the holidays. Some things in life are random, some are not, and some things I guess you just never know, and it is up to one's own mind to make that determination.

Dust and his friend Leah are skiing in Whistler for a couple of days...then spending three nights in Vancouver...for which I am joining them. I will get there a day early for 24 hours of solo exploring. Looks like they've picked a sweet hotel...I'm sure I will be positively freezing...but I've never been there and why not.

time to research things to do in Vancouver!

familia

after pigging out, we took out dad's 47 Ford tractor and took some family shots for the "New Year's" letter. I laid food-coma on the couch and passed in and out of sleep...ate some coconut cream pie and watched Ice Age...we played Monopoly...and I won for probably the first time ever. Maybe law school is paying off? I actually know what a mortgage and title deed are now, so that is exciting. basically ate myself silly today and plowed through my amazing book...life is good.

A called me and we talked for a good while...what a strange strange person and situation. But I still love the kid...I guess now it has just evolved into a sisterly love. I read this in my old blog about him, shortly before we re-connected last New Years:

"there is a lot of baggage that has come between but i'm excited for the opportunity just to live and experience whatever it is that is in store for me with him. i don't want or expect anything from him -- i would like him to be needy and desperate so i can be like, ha, joke's on you. but my MO is just to be the incredible, confident, sexy girl that i know is in there and have a blast. he needs to see what he's missing."

I'm so glad I read it......the journey this year has been another amazing one, with lots of ups and downs, but i've still got everything going for me and every reason to be that incredible, confident, sexy girl. i am disgusted that i would ever think anything less.

so enough boy whining. seriously. me and my little panic attacks about the future...i swear... then i have moments (like now) when i realize how incredibly ridiculous and distorted my perspective can get at times. I heard a cool quote the other day: A life lived in fear is a life half-lived. TRUE THAT.

if i lived at home

i would probably eat myself to death. no reason NOT to dip that last piece of bread and turkey into gravy. yum. love it.

love being home for the holidays. it is even better when there is pretty white snow on the ground. no matter what ridiculous things are stressing me out at the moment, it is still Christmas, I am still home, and my parents are still here.

My last Christmas as a student...wow...eeeee...i think most people go through this crisis in college...i just extended mine a few years. what am i doing? am i even goign to be a good lawyer? what have i REALLY learned in the past few years? what have i accomplished? what can i still accomplish? have i made all the right decisions? stop having a quarter-life crisis. i'm ready for it to be gone any day now.

i sporadically get inspired with bouts of positivity about the future...and i love these moments and i know THEY are true and right. it's that whole in between part that is killing me sometimes. although i still recognize it is completely pathetic and misguided. i feel like i'm sort of digging out of a hole, and i'm digging and digging and someone just keeps pouring dirt on top ofme. i'm not giving up and i see the way out, but it is just unattainable at the moment. i mean i don't WANT any of the things that i think i want, RIGHT NOW. so CHILL.

pooo. anyway. Christmas rocks, about to lay my fat stomach under a down blanket and read "Of Human Bondage"...currently captivating me.

Crisis?

Or fear? Just sent in for an LLM brochure from NYU.

On the way back from Phoenix. LOVE the west/southwest. Sigh. Looked up LLM programs at ASU too.

Clearly still questioning my direction. Dang it. Maybe just feeling restless or something. Lonely for sure.

Merry Christmas!

and man, we had the time of our lives

on a post from a couple of years ago

There’s a picture of us in Baha, California
Eating fish tacos and drinking cold, cold beer
And man we had the time of our lives
Yes that was a very good year
Drove all the way up the coast of California
All the way up to 101
One time we cruised all the way to Vancouver
Just to watch the setting sun

Every time I looked in those far away eyes
I could see me getting left behind
I gave her my best
But her west was wilder than mine
Got lost in the desert and found an Indian casino
And she started rollin those nines
Stackin up the chips half way to heaven
Without even trying
We watched it all go at the roulette wheel
She let it all ride on the black
She said don’t worry baby
You can’t keep what you never had
You can’t keep what you never had

Laugh like the devil and howl at the moon
I knew I was losing my mind
I gave her my best
But her west was wilder than mine

I was gasin up in a dust storm outside of Sedona
She was chasin tumbleweed
She flagged down a kenworth and jumped in a cab
It was the last of her I’d ever seen
It was the last of her I’d ever seen
Where the wild wind blows and anything goes
As long as its over the line

I gave her my best
But her west was wilder than mine
It was wilder than mine
Theres a picture of us down in Baha, California
Eatin fish tacos, drinking cold, cold beer


What amazing lyrics... (Brooks and Dunn, Her West Was Wilder Than Mine)....an interesting time of my life when I originally posted them: first year of law school. It was so tumultuous and I was so confused about so much. i guess I found comfort in the lyrics of this song and related to it 100%. And it is so awesome because reading it just now STILL gives me the chills. I've got a wild heart. But I get sad and lonely too. I love the chasing and the being chased. I love that I drove up highway 101 this year with someone who used to mean everything to me, but not enough. I'm thinking of going to Vancouver in January. Been to Baja California. its a song of love and losing, of good times that shape who we are. I still love adventures, but they have such a different connotation than they used to... they are more personal now, more than about just "going" somewhere. but not totally. I STILL just love going places. I hope that never changes.

i love the line "and man, we had the time of our lives." It reminds me of so many adventures and flings and loves over the years of my early twenties. while i don't want that to end, those things just don't really fulfill me like they used to...well actually, they probably never did, but i just didn't care then. I guess it is virtue of where I am in life...about to embark on a career and some degree of seriousness, but still trying to seize the last few months of my young, uncommitted life to the fullest without hurting my heart or being reckless. anywho...lots of time for thinking over the holidays...sort of what i need and sort of what i don't need.

home for the holidays!

something is so exciting about doing nothing...and by nothing i mean wrapping presents, sitting my the fire, watching tv, reading non-law books, eating goodies, and being with my familia. the holidays are the best. i keep thinking this will be my last chance to spend an extended amount of time at home...as a student anyway. Exams went ok...it is always such a black hole for that week or two... but I really have no one to blame but myself for having to cram 12 hour study sessions for 10 days. Two of my classes were pass/fail, but there is such a fear that you actually will fail that it is necessary to study as just as hard as otherwise.

After exams I was feeling crazy and couped up...went golfing with Chocs and pool day drinking with W at the Floridian and then hit up Blue Martini with law school friends. Spent Wednesday driving to Ikea only to discover I had left my wallet at home...traced back, went to Aventura mall for retail therapy... then met De and we tried an awesome new wine bar, Eno, on Lincoln Road then had dinner (Foie gras stuffed filet mignon and skewers and wine_ at a cool place with a cute Russian waiter. Then I went to check out Feldy's new place (awesome...rooftop terrace!)...went home, packed (i.e. threw things into suitcase in random order), hopped over to Eye's, hung out with him and another friend from study abroad. Reminisced about our summer abroad, played guitar hero, bowling, and golf...tried to feel out if I wanted to stay the night and potentially hook up. Finally around 5 30 a.m. decided against it and realized my 8 am pick up for my flight was going to be brutal. went home, slept for two hours, got on a plane and now i'm here. wish I would have had a few extra days in MIA before coming here but it's all good.

it was fun to see Eyes...not going to lie, I had guilty and selfish motives...the good kind though. I'm on the prowl... I wanted to make out and was hoping it would happen. maybe it was me or him or the Joe or the lateness or just the fact that we haven't seen eachother since like Sepetember but whatever. He's a sweetie. Besides, I want to focus my attention on Chocs. oh MAN, i'm a mess.

I really hope I didn't mess that up in the past by like pushing him off because i wasn't feeling it. of course now i realize the error of my ways...i am tempted to think that i am drawn back to him from being lonely and lack of any other distraction. although i am pretty sure he can see right through me at this point. he's always there when i need him, always secure, always safe, always sweet. i don't know if it is anything, but it is nice and comforting. i'm just scared i've spent too much time pushing him away, and i don't know what to do about it now.