Thanksgiving Thankfulness

Time to be Grateful 

Obviously, Thanksgiving is the time to give "Thanks", a time to reflect and appreciate your life and the people and things who have chosen to be a part of it in the past year. With Thanksgiving being tomorrow, tonight I have spent my time reflecting on my year and I've realized how much I've forgotten and how much I have to appreciate!

The beginning of the year, I celebrated a year of nanny-ing and being an important part of two children's lives. It was hard at times, but mostly amazing. The relationships I built with the children were life-changing. I spent lots and lots and lots of time learning patience and if you had asked me a couple years ago, there is no way I ever thought I would be a nanny, especially not for a year and a half of my life. But I am so glad I was because it was such a great experience and an extremely steady part of my life that I needed and missed from my college days.

Also, in the beginning of the year, I was four months in to living down the street from my best friend again. Growing up, we were a five minute walk away from each other. College separated us, and then again separated in our young adult lives, by work and our desires to live in different places. Finally, we were able to live down the street from each other in Philly, now just a five minute Uber ride from each other. It was amazing and I got to spend weekly Yoga and wine sessions with my two favorite people and there was nothing better. Reminiscing, we got to explore the city together on snow days, St. Pattys Day, random concerts in North Philly and of course, eating the best Nachos that have ever existed at El Vez. As Andy Bernard once said, "I wish there was a way to know you were in the good old days before you actually left them".

Of course, in the middle of the year, I took an extreme leap of faith and decided to be a "grown up" and moved to Coastal Virginia by myself. As my six month anniversary date draws near, I can't help but think of all the great things that this place has brought me! First, it has brought me a new Best Friend. The second week I moved here, a girl I worked with, but had not really met texted me and said, "Hey. We are going to the beach this weekend, if you want to come". I cannot even explain how excited I was to receive that text because 1. I love the beach and 2. I now had plans. We ended up going to the beach together and it was the worst beach day. It was extremely cloudy and the wind was whipping the sand right at us. We tried to stay for as long as we could, but after 1.5-2 hours we were completely done. I can't remember any specific details of how our relationship developed after that, but now I have my "Tiff Tiff" and life is good. Second, a great job! My job is a lot of hard but good work! Work that I enjoy and even through the frustrating times, one that I appreciate! My life in Coastal Virginia has included lots of beach time, lots and lots of breweries and the perfect little town where I live. Couldn't have asked for a better place to move out of Pennsylvania to for the first time.

Lastly, I am more than thankful for my continuing relationship with the man I love. I'll say very little to avoid mushiness. But, we have been together for 20 months and 85% of that time has been spent living at least 3 hours away from each other. It has been so, so challenging and the most wonderful thing at the same time. I am still in awe of how I found someone who enjoys the same things that I do, has the same humor, and 90% of the same personality. (I know, a lot of math in this section of the blog..) One day, we won't be so far away, but this is probably the greatest learning experience that we will both encounter and I somehow feel like I have gotten to love him harder because of it.

Overall, thinking about 2018 brings me to happy tears. There are so many things to be grateful for and lots I've left out (visiting California and Connecticut for the first time, spending time with my cute little nephews, laughing until I cry with many) and I've said this for the past 2 years or so, but this may have been one of the best years of my life. I know we still have a month left, but 2019, I AM READY FOR YOU!

Handsome little nephew

First Road Trip! 

My BFFs visiting me <3 

Apartment hunting in Norfolk

St. Patty's Day in Philly!

The Blinking, Red Light

The blinking, red light that has lulled me to sleep for the past 365 days is about to be no more. This girl is moving from her sweet, little studio apartment in Wayne, PA to a four-bedroom, roommate-filled Manayunk house! I can't believe that it has been two weeks short of a year that I have lived in this little town that I've really come to love so, so much and I can't believe that I am actually leaving it. I can actually remember the very first night I slept in this apartment, well stayed in it at least. I couldn't sleep at all and I ended up staying up most of the night building my ikea furniture and staring at the red, blinking light outside my apartment window from the AT&T building down the street. I find myself doing the very same thing as my time in this apartment counts down, waking up in the middle of the night, staring at the blinking, red light....

As I look back at my time in this apartment, I cannot help but figuratively roll on the ground with laughter. Where I thought I would be when I first moved in to where I am now are so different, but yet I am so grateful. Currently, in my professional career, I am more lost and confused than ever, but I am at peace and know that I can take my time figuring out what I want. And in my personal life, I have some really, really great best friends and as of two days ago am in a really, really great long (but not too long) -distance relationship after four months of living 10 minutes away from each other. When I moved here, I thought I knew exactly what I wanted out of my career and moved for a boy who ended up dumping me a week later. Life's pretty funny, don't you think?

All in all, I have grown so much as a person this year, which I really think comes with the territory of living by yourself, having and quitting your first "real job", and being a young adult in general. I no longer question "what did I do wrong" or "what is wrong with me" when something bad happens, but instead "what can I do better next time" or no questions at all and just a simple, "this didn't work out for you, but something else will". And maybe you're reading this and saying, "Could she be any more naive????". But at this point, I truly believe that everything will work out EXACTLY how it is supposed to in the end and yes, that may sound naive, but I have no doubt in myself, in my work ethic and in my personal ethic that my life will turn out well. (And honestly, if I thought any other way, life would be pretty depressing and harrowing.)

I guess what I've really taken from this year is to have no expectations for anything. Yes, have your dream, have your plans, and execute them well, but also have an open mind to how they might turn out. And if they turned out exactly how you planned, well then, that is so awesome! And while I am a little jealous (why lie?), I am also genuinely happy for you! But if they didn't, keep the faith, hold on tight to the rocky road of life, because maybe, just maybe, life will trick you and create something beautiful out of your adversity.

Now...back to packing!

                                            

Phillies Beer Fest (before the moonshine) 😊

 "Baby Nathan" at his cutest! 

 Allison's 24th!

Ch-ch-ch-changes

What I've realized about this blog, as of yesterday, is that it mostly only gets updated when I go through a life change, which is why it is so sporadically updated. "Girl on a Street Bench" has really become my sounding board for those changes and how I cope with them. Changes are harder for some more than others, I used to be one who feared change and resisted it until I realized how much I've grown and developed from it. This blog was created because of extreme changes this summer, after my first real "heartbreak", after moving to my studio apartment to live on my own for the first time and after starting my first full-time job. Those changes coming at me all at once were a little too much for me to handle, but that's when I realized that writing was my outlet and more so, public writing.

So, with that, welcome to my first week of my newest change, my second full-time job, a complete 180 degree turn from what I was doing to nannying. I decided to take this leap after many months of being unhappy with my last position at the Y. It was not a decision that I made easily and had been thought about many times during my short time at the Y. Ultimately, I decided to take the time to find out what I really wanted to do with my life and how I wanted to live it and temporarily nannying will help me accomplish this. I will return to school in Fall 2018 to begin earning my second degree, Doctor of Physical Therapy.

I am extremely excited for this new chapter in my life. I have an uphill battle to fight, but I've suited up and I'm ready to defeat it. Gaining therapy observation hours, taking the GREs, completing college essays, and then when that's all over, going to school full time for three years will not always be fun, but it will be worth it. And in the end, that's what is important to me, making myself and my life worth it.

Marinating in Meditation

We, as humans, get caught up. We get busy in our everyday lives, in the so called "whirlwind". We forget what is important to us. We tell ourselves we'll get to it later because we don't have time or we don't make the time. We live everyday jamming as many activities as we can without time for reflection on our lives and on the lives that we touch. Today, after a bit of a shock to my "whirlwind", I realized that I had been "caught up".

I have always been a spiritual person, believing in a greater power and wanting to get more in touch with myself whether that be through prayer, yoga or meditation. I truly believe that I have some control over my choices and decisions in my life, but at the same time I believe someone has already mapped out my life and while I may take different turns, everything happens exactly how it is supposed to happen at exactly the right time. But recently, I had forgotten to just breathe and live and be satisfied and was trying to control my life, being selfish in what I desire and not what the universe desires for me.

Luckily or not so luckily, depending on how you look at it, a challenging morning was able to snap me out of that "whirlwind" and allowed me to focus on myself and realign with my beliefs. While I've had plenty of time by myself, I haven't taken time for myself and for self-reflection. So, this afternoon, I took four hours by myself for self-reflection and meditation. Four hours without any distractions to empty all the negative energy out of my body, to look at the person I've been lately and to remind myself of my ultimate goal in life, inner peace.

In those four hours, I was able to relocate my zen (which had been the most off kilter lately). To find my inner peace. To remember the person that I want to strive to be everyday: loving, caring, understanding, full of joy. To remind myself that you have to "Let go, and Let God". My suggestion to you, dear reader, is to take the same time for yourself, you might be surprised on what you find when you are done. I'm leaving this day and this blog feeling a little more blessed with what I have in my life, a little more open to what may happen in the future and a little more loved by myself for who I am and what I stand for. And at the end of the day, that is all I can really ask for.

A four-lettered "H" word.

Hope.

A gambling word. A word filled with good intentions and limitless possibilities. One that can bring you from feeling on top of the world to falling on your knees in despair in a matter of seconds. Of all intangible things, I think that "hope" is the thing that plays with my emotions the most, but let me explain before you go on thinking that I'm just being cynical...

Everyone's always hoping for the best, hoping that this time it will work out, hoping that everything goes to plan. And when those things work out you can say you "knew it would work out all along" and you have no problem telling everyone around you to "keep the faith". Which is great, until hope fails you. When hope fails, you tell yourself that you're stupid and foolish or maybe you skip the self-loathing and you stick to the "it's simply not meant to be". Whatever you do or tell yourself, when hope doesn't pull through, it stings, no matter how strong you are.  And that right there, my friends, is exactly why hope is the worst... (until it's not).

Of course, you have to have hope, or else you become a 'woe is me' type of person. And let's get real, what's hope without a little effort on our part. Hope needs a little effort to give it some drive. But sometimes even with all of our drive behind that hope, it still let's us down. Well, maybe, just maybe, that's okay. Maybe that's how we grow and we learn, by having hope fail us sometimes and building ourselves back up after. We endure the sting, we understand that it won't last forever and we take that same hope and use it again and again. We don't let it make a stance on all future situations, but we take that lesson and keep hopeful because what's life without a little hope. 

I really do believe that everything turns out exactly how it's meant to be, so, at least for now, I'm not going to give up on you hope ... just start behaving yourself.

A Love Letter to my Four Best Friends as the Summer Comes to an End

I swear that there's a spark that ignites when you meet your best friends. From the moment you first meet, there's an undetectable change in the atmosphere that revolutionizes your life. I am lucky enough to have this spark happen to me four times. From my oldest best friend who I met when I was eleven to my newest one who stumbled into my life a couple of months ago, these are my people. My biggest supporters. My unconditional love bugs. My soul mates. The ones who have helped to make Summer '16 one of my favorite summers yet.

They've seen me at my lowest lows and have helped celebrate some highest highs. They've laughed uncontrollably with me in Target over nothing. They've inspired me to run over ten consecutive miles. They've eaten thousands of gallons of ice cream with me. They've laid in bed for hours with me watching the worst of the worst horror movies. But most importantly, each of them has always picked up the phone when I've needed them the most, giving me the support and strength I need to get through absolutely anything.

As you know, this has been my summer of changes. I've graduated from college, started my full time job, and moved to a new apartment in a new town. Through this all, they have been my constants, my rocks. Those days when my emotions overtook me, they knew a shopping trip and some ice cream would make it better (and they were right). But mostly it was their overwhelming love that kept me together. The tears and the laughs wouldn't have wanted to be shared with anyone else. 

So one last thank you for the concerts, the beach trips, the ice cream, the beer, the phone calls, the hugs, and the faith. To be honest, I would've survived this summer without you, but it wouldn't have been half as fun.

 Right before we decided to it would be fun to run 10 miles. LOL. 

 I never want summer days and concerts with you to end. 

 A galaxy button down, jorts, a visor and boat shoes. Couldn't describe him any better than that. 

A throwback from our high school days, since Mul wasn't able to make an appearance this summer. 

The Habit Forming Truth

I've officially made my move one month and one day ago! Not sure how it's gone by so quickly, but at the same time it feels like I've always been here. Taking this journey by myself has definitely helped me grow into the person I want to be. I think that there's a change that occurs when there's only you to help yourself daily. I was the one who had to fight with Peco for weeks about my electric, I am the one who carries all my groceries up my apartment steps (still haven't mastered the art of one trip), and I am the one who motivates myself to get out of bed every morning and "carpe diem". I wouldn't want it any other way though, things have been really great, I am running my life more than I have ever before and I am running it into the right direction. 

Now for the real topic of discussion...

Routines and habits, they have never been my strong point. They say if you do something 21 days in a row, it becomes a habit, but I've never found that true and don't ask me who "they" are. I could do something for 53 days in a row, not do it one day and never look back. I think the real secret to forming a habit or routine is to form it around something you love, which is a realization I've recently made. Since moving I have found routine to be something extremely important to me and no, I do not have every moment of every single week planned (and I never will), but it is nice to know that I have constants in my life. For example, every morning I know that I will wake up at 6 AM, turn on the news, drink my coffee and spend that time with myself, I know that every Tuesday night I will work late and then go to Yoga, I know that every Monday evening I will have dinner with my parents, I know that every Sunday morning I will be reading outside and then writing a blog post with a coffee next to me, and I know that every Thursday afternoon will be spent at some happy hour with some happy person next to me. 

The people who I choose to spend time around are important to me (obviously) and I've built my routines around the people I love and the strengthening and nurturing of those relationships. I love knowing that I will be spending time with my parents and myself and my best friends and my yoga teacher (Lauren, you know you rock). My time with all of these people fill my heart with so many different types of love and gratitude and maybe that's what I've been missing from my other attempted routines for so long. 

So, my unsolicited advice to you is to go find what you're passionate about and if you want to find routine or habit in your life form them around your passions.  If you are passionate about music, include a little music into the things you want to do, if you are passionate about snacking (like I am) include some snacks into what you love to do. 

Then again, maybe everyone already knew this and I'm just a little late to the game, if so, I guess it was better for me to learn late than never.