Labor Day Weekend

It's amazing how much obtaining a bed -- not a couch or air mattress -- can change your state of mind. It's even better when it's on loan for free for a year. I don't even care that the platform for the mattress is still at the owner's house and that my mattress is simply sitting on my room floor. I have a bed. I am happy.

Perhaps it's even more appropriate that I'm drinking my $3.00 apple wine from Grocery Outlet (and I thought Trader Joe's was awesome...) and microwaved chicken nuggets while watching podcasts. I feel like I'm reliving what most people would call the college experience, except that I am being meagerly paid for my work, I don't have nearly the same amount of people around me all the time, and there is no caf. I never realized how handy having a cafeteria, Jazzman's, or 1780 is. I could totally use a chocolatey chip muffin right now, by the way. The perfect complement for c-nugs. I still miss brunch c-nugs from the caf...*sigh*.

I promise I was pretty productive today -- my roommate Cortney and I went to get my bed, I went grocery shopping and walked around Madrona, watched UK drill UL in college football (woo CATS!), and drove to get a keyboard. Yes, that's another goal of mine: start playing piano again. The most fun piece I could ever play was some really evil-sounding 3-pager entitled "Tyrannosaurus Rex." I definitely appreciated it more than any Bach or Beethoven piece I learned. The cool part about this keyboard is that I also have the usb/midi hookup for the computer, so I can use Garage Band for the first time (!!!) A nice Yamaha keyboard with stand and usb hookup for 60 bucks. A total steal. If you realize the talent within me, you should apply to be my manager. Resume and 3 references please, and the ability to perhaps play another instrument other than keyboard is preferred.

I also managed to write down all the ideas for a career path for myself. Instead of narrowing the choices, per one of the goals of this move, they've expanded. Not good.

- editor
- physical anthropologist
- physician's assistant
- higher ed
- something outdoorsy
- anything relating to the news, particularly NPR.
- anything related to politics (lobbying?) and not involving me supporting the Republican party.
- writer/journalist
- anything involving me hanging out with nerds.

Yesterday was a less productive day, though probably more exciting. My roommate Kerry and I traveled to Heather Lake in the Mt. Baker - Snoqualmie National Forest. It was only a 4 mile hike in total, but it was chilly and a good bit of the trail was muddy. My fingers re-lived the marching band days by becoming rigid and almost immobile. However, the view was totally worth it.

I also met Alex Albrecht from podcasts Diggnation and Totally Rad Show at a bar in downtown Seattle:It took a beer for me to gain the confidence to approach him and the swarm of nerds surrounding him. Luckily for me, he was kind, hilarious, and totally natural. We joked around a bit, and then he had more fan dudes to appease. After quickly vacating the bar, I walked around downtown for a bit trying to find the bus to get up to the U-District to hang out with work people -- A night of Scrabble and a 24-ounce PBR. I can't help myself, I'm still reeeeeally cheap. I appreciate a good beer, but on my budget, I'll take what I can get. I did, however, give up the opportunity to see Bon Iver downtown, but I can't attend every cool show that comes around.

Tomorrow = Bumbershooooot!!! I'm seeing a variety of bands...Paramore, Langhorne Slim, Battles, Old 97's, and Death Cab for Cutie. Plus it'll be my first time by the Space Needle -- what better time to be a tourist than among thousands of other tourists?!

Busy busy busy, just as I like it.

lazy sunday.

I woke up this morning yet again much too early, but just early enough to be decently productive. Laundry was at the top of my list (joy of joys) right past eating and crawling back into bed to watch Under the Tuscan Sun, a movie I always watch in hopes that it will make me feel better about my general state of loneliness around Seattle.
I need to elaborate on this, because it is part of the reason I moved here. Since high school, at the very least, my top priority has been my friends. Perhaps others my age also feel this way, although they perhaps mean it differently than I do. When I develop a friendship with someone, it’s usually through some sort of common bond – a mutual friend, an appreciation for silly humor, introduction to music that one of us has never heard before, etc. The friendship grows and we find, evolve, or adopt similar interests and just the joy of being around one another.
Here’s my issue. I tend to adopt the interests of friends to such a point that I lose what I like to do entirely. I rarely do anything for the pure satisfaction of the activity itself – I do it because it’s with my friends and loved ones who I care about so much. Thus, when I’m not around those people, I feel generally uninspired, bored, and ultimately alone. Even though I’m in Seattle I know people back home care about me – most of you let me know in some form or fashion about that – but because I’ve lost their physical presence, I also feel incredibly absent, like a part of me is completely gone. Yes, I enjoy walking around, exploring the city, reading a good book or going on that strenuous run, but it’s really nothing unless you have someone awesome to tell about it or share the experience with. While I prepped for the half-marathon purely for my own satisfaction, it was always great to see friends at the Beck Center or at least see them afterwards for a good episode of Grey’s or, the hall favorite, Rock of Love. Sometimes I would take yoga classes with friends, or laugh once I ate Thai food with them and realized I didn’t hate international cuisine after all. There’s a common thread, a common interest, that I never would have developed had I not been friends with the amazing people I’m still friends with.
At work, we learned the concept of Ubuntu, a South African word roughly translated to, “I am because you are.” I would definitely consider my Ubuntu power to be over nine-thousaaaaaand!!!
Somewhere in my learning, probably my very complicated junior year of high school, I figured out that this was not necessarily a good thing. Why? Because people move. Friendships and relationships change. Morals and desires may change, and shock of all shocks, you might change. But you need to have some sort of stable ground to plant your feet on. Even though I have absolutely no psychology background (I used to sneak out of that virtually friendless and endlessly dull high school class daily to – guess what – hang out with Jessie in ceramics conveniently located right down the hall) I can tell you that people are not stable. The most stable people I have in my life are my parents, who seem so ridiculously moored in their lives back home that I’m jealous of their contentment. But I digress. I have to face the fact that someday, they won’t be around either. And when they aren’t, I don’t want to just fall to pieces. (Okay, that seems harsh. But there’s a difference between being very sad and being so depressed you can’t take care of yourself. And no one else will want to take care of you because you are an aging, ornery cat lady who has no desires of her own -- just cats.) I want to have something solid, something that is very much me, something in me that I can depend on whenever I feel lost or alone or just plain bored. I want to find that autonomy and personal contentment that my parents, and so many of my other friends, have. Drive is not my issue – I mean good God, I moved to Seattle of all fucking places to space myself in hopes of finding that solid Corey – it’s the actual product. So far it’s manifesting itself in the following interests: NPR. Cupcakes, especially from Cupcake Royale. Online word puzzles. Tea. Being really cheesy or sarcastic in hopes of making people laugh. Walking aimlessly around downtown, but ultimately ending up at my favorite gelato place on 1st and Pine. Running, though the hills make it incredibly difficult and I mainly use it as a distraction. Trying to have a slight smile on my face in hopes that someone will chat me up. (This was clearly a bad idea on the bus, but mainly I just blame the population that rides the 18.)
Clearly, I lead a very interesting life. This may be because I have been without internet and tv at the house (yes, I missed a great deal of the Olympics, and I am VERY upset about missing it) and, as I’ve said before, enjoy doing anything with friends. It’s a vicious cycle, much like alcoholism or any addiction, I tell you!
But what do I know – again, I never learned anything about psychology. So maybe my plan and logic to come here was completely fucking flawed, which I didn’t realize until this moment. But I’ve received at least a little good advice while I’ve been here – trust yourself. So simple, but at least it makes me feel like I’m here for the right reasons again.
The Feminine Mystique only backs up this claim. Betty Friedan (one of my personal heroes) researched many studies that basically found that once a woman graduated college, she was only at a “halfway point” to completely being autonomous. She needs to grow and find other meaning in life, and a connection and personal importance to society, than her relationships. And in a way, this is what I’m searching for.
Wednesday is a big day – the rest of the corps comes, I give my first big presentation about my civic-leadership-through-service-learning program at a 6th grade orientation, and I get to go to an Avett Brothers concert – phew! But right now, I’m off to see if the house finally has internet. Maybe I’ll get a bit of the normalcy of my life back…sad but true.

Things I love about Seattle...so far.

Things I love about Seattle (so far):
- My shower. Seriously – it’s the best showerhead I’ve ever had. It’s probably pretty wasteful too – but it shoots out water like a river busts out of a dam just before it bursts. The heater also turns on about 15 seconds after I turn the phallic silver knob (Silver Surfer, anyone?) about 210 degrees, resulting in less water wasted while waiting for the heater to warm the water. This isn’t like a Transy shower that is so clogged with calcium, or lime, or whatever that crummy white stuff is that makes the shower spray in every which direction. Plus, it’s all white, which adds to the general clean feeling I get while scrubbing away the nastiness of my morning run.
- Verite Coffee and Cupcake Royale. Not the most delicious chocolate cupcake (Mo Fro!) or skim latte to grace my oral orifice, but pretty damn close. It’s particularly convenient that it’s located only about a half mile from my house in Madrona. The suck factor is that it’s only open until 8 on weeknights and 6 on Sundays. What’s the point of writing emo things on my hipster Macbook if I can’t do it where people can see how dark and tortured I am?! (Sadly, I’m only half joking. I think it could actually be cool to meet someone in a coffee shop. This is why I’m lame.)
- Water. I’ve always lived in landlocked places, and it’s fascinating to run about three-quarters of a mile from my house to Lake Washington or to go downtown and see Puget Sound full of cruise liners and cargo ships alike. Running sans iPod isn’t really my idea of fun, but having a nice view definitely helps. As busy as Seattle seems to be, it’s soothing to look out onto the water, let everything else turn into white noise, and just enjoy the view for what it is.
- The men in my volleyball referee certification class. Normally I’m not a fan of older men (note the divorced economist from the bus), but these guys were friendly without hitting on me. They actually were excited to be hanging out with someone who has played the game before! Most were old baseball or basketball refs, and because their knees and backs aren’t what they used to be, they’re switching to volleyball officiating. The assignor, a ridiculously friendly guy named Riaz, talked my ear off for thirty minutes after the meeting ended. Even if I can’t meet people my own age outside of City Year, at least I’ll have old men friends.

I promise to write more often, and more descriptively about my daily life and such, once I have internet at the house. I’ve been without readily available cable or internet for over a month, and while it’s encouraged me to take care of other things, I’m definitely ready to get back to my idea of normalcy – a connection to the rest of the world. Until then, I’ll eat my idea of baked deliciousness – the Lavender cupcake (yes, it tastes just like it smells!) and bask in the few warm days left in Seattle.

Be kind to your bus driver.

I'm trying to decide if I'm rightfully annoyed or just need to relax. Being on a bus with retirees is not exactly my idea of a good time -- on the other hand, I'm not exactly making the effort to get to know these happy-go-lucky couples either. A very kind lady named Rona has decided to befriend my family though, and I enjoy every story she has to tell about her past. Despite her cheesy shirt, which depicts Buffalo Bill and stereotypical American western scenery, I think I found an older person I like. Our tour guide, Carlene, feels like she has to talk on the loudspeaker on the bus often enough to wake me up just when I manage to doze off, and she also plays this horribly twangy song called, "Be Kind to your Bus Driver." Gag.
Yesterday was a much better day though -- we went on a cruise in Prince William Sound and saw orcas, sea lions, a sea otter, and a humpback whale! We cruised to Columbia Glacier, a rapidly declining glacier in terms of length, while scanning the waters for the aforementioned sea critters. Hanging out on the bow of the ship while by the glacier was cold enough, but when the ship started to cruise around 16 knots my ears began to numb up and I had to head inside. Three cups of tea and two cups of "Russian Tea" (Tang, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, etc.) kept me warm. Cute moment of the day: a 5th-grader named Megan decided to be my Mom's friend. With a cool, confident attitude, she walked right up to my mom and asked, "What's your name?" and proceeded to tell Mom about her town (some small town in Iowa), her family, and her calf which won at a show while her cousin's calf died because "it just kept barfing." You have to understand that this is incredibly rare for Mom. We're cut from the same cloth -- we aren't known for being outwardly friendly. I joked that Megan was attracted to Mom because they were the same size. She didn't take that too well.

Sea lions in Prince William SoundIcebergs and mountains by Columbia GlacierMummy and I react appropriately to the chilly icebergs!

After spending a night attempting and failing miserably to find any bar or liquor store in Valdez, a town of only 4,500 people, that would understand the fact that my wallet was stolen and that I really didn't have any form of picture ID anymore but that I definitely was over 21, I ended up getting very little sleep. Today we traveled from Valdez to Fairbanks, which is east of the Alaskan range of mountains and as a result is much clearer and sunnier than Anchorage or Valdez. The price of being in better weather seems to come with visiting more and more tacky destinations. Take, for instance, North Pole, Alaska. A mere 10-20 minutes south of Fairbanks, North Pole has street lamps covered to resemble candy canes, Santa Claus lane, and Santa Claus's House, complete with Mr. and Mrs. Claus and letters from their young believers. The letters were adorable -- the locale was far from endearing. Think of a smaller, Christmas-themed Gatlinburg sans expensive thrill rides, attractions, and anything but fast food.

"Dear Santa, My mom said you don't give out American Girl Dolls. If you do you will give give out only that. But I want Molly and a couple other things. How can I salve (solve) that? Love, Regan. P.S. Please Write Back!" This chick has the right idea.A smaller, Christmasy version of Gatlinburg just wouldn't be complete without...that's right folks...Santa Land R.V. Park.

It's definitely time for bed here -- we have an early morning river boat ride, salmon bake, and a plane trip to a small town about the Arctic Circle.

Loves,

Corey

Alas-kaaaaaa...

After being patted down in two different airports and getting three hours of sleep between flights, I made it to Alaska. How is it, you ask? Green and overcast, mainly. Snowy mountain tops are obscured by a thick, swirling layer of clouds and nearly everything is green. Christin wants to go polar beat swimming, and although I managed to stick my toe in a river created by a nearby glacier, I don't think we'll have the opportunity to dive right in...even though you know I'd do it! To satisfy my need for activity other than chatting up the old folks on the tour bus (yes, I'm on a guided bus tour), I've decided to take pictures and buy the most ridiculous products of tourism that Alaska has to offer. If you are lucky enough to receive one of these effects, such as a postcard with an eagle flying in the scenic Alaskan sky, let me know if you think it's a cheesy as I do.

I had to cancel all my credit cards and such since I couldn't find my wallet in Boston. My only other true expensive casualty was my iPod, but luckily that's easily replaceable. If I didn't have my camera, I couldn't take awesome pictures of Alaska, and if my laptop was stolen once again I would have been so angry at myself! Life could be worse though -- especially if the airlines hadn't let me fly back to Seattle and Alaska.

I already feel myself looking more at the positives of life than the negatives, which was part of the reason I moved away. However, I never plan on adopting many of the ideals that my work strives for. I've already found that I disagree not necessarily with the ideals, but the ways that it strives to achieve them -- such as the curfew and zero-tolerance alcohol policies. I guess that's one of the reasons I joined this organization though -- to enact change. I just didn't think it would have to be in this manner. Eventually I think I'll get to be in on the change that needs to happen in parts of the Seattle school system, but it's just going to take a while to get there. Training quite frankly drives me nuts, and I just can't wait to actually go out in Seattle and work with communities to leave a positive mark in the world.

Once I actually do more in Alaska besides travel in a tour bus with people that scream when they see an animal out the window (Rabbit!!!), I'll write again. Wi-fi is a bit scarce, and pictures would definitely help any descriptions I could give you, but it's worth documenting -- trust me.

Loves loves loves,

Corey

P.S. -- a plus of my new crackberry is that I'm not bored despite the loss of my iPod. I found this cute article on the New York Times -- http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/opinion/03dowd.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin -- and I've always loved Maureen Dowd :)