Friday, April 26, 2013

A Smattering of Ideas

I'm way scatter-brained and nuts right now, but I'm also feeling juicy, creatively speaking, so I just want to jot down some cool shit that I've been thinking about. Here are six ideas I've managed to hang onto for more than five seconds:
  • Travel. Okay dudes, Iceland last year changed me. I never thought I would be that girl who would browse airline fares to places like Belize or Osaka, but here we are. I want to see more of the world. And it's not that Canada's not a total babe - she is! - but I've lived in three different provinces and visited four more. I've seen plenty of America, too. I want to go somewhere where the buildings are a thousand years old, and those places just don't exist in the New World.


  • Also, let's just give a warm hand to Iceland in general. I loved it there. The fresh air, the billions of sheep, the insane one-way tunnels, and the dried fish jerky at every gas station? It. Was. Amazing. I want to figure out a way to be there more, because I felt so alive, so much like myself, that it was incredible. I've been researching Icelandic novelists, keeping my eye out for job openings, and occasionally find myself scrolling through my trip photos with a wistful sigh on my lips. It's an unrequited love affair.

    That seal-duck is not to scale.


  • The Royal Tenenbaums, which I've been thinking a lot about in a family sense. My boyfriend posted these amazing old-tyme-y epitaphs on his Twitter feed recently, and it reminded me strongly of Royal Tenenbaum's lying headstone, "Died Tragically Rescuing His Family From The Wreckage Of A Destroyed Sinking Battleship." And that made me remember my crush on that movie. We saw it New Year's Day, 2001, in a packed Manhattan cineplex. Our family were the only people who laughed during the post-suicide attempt hospital scenes. That movie is all about family - chosen, rejected, begrudgingly loved and lied to - and watching it with mine reminded me that I am related to lunatics and I couldn't be luckier.
    Us too.


  • Switching up my appearance in some way. (Beyond the ongoing paleo diet, which has been a life-changer. At some point in the future, I'm going to inflict this horrible, pseudo-scientific blog post about the way I eat onto the world, and I'm going to be an asshole) I've been thinking about meaningful tattoos. I've been thinking about dying my hair. I've been thinking about my fashion sense; I finally have a closet that makes sense to me, and I love that. What does the inside-me look like, and how can I get my outsides a little closer?

  • Next steps. I'm at a crossroads, professionally speaking. Personally, I'm starting to feel the tidal pull of my 30s, and while half of me wants to throw my hands up in the air and spent my food money on airfare to Oslo, the other half whispers that maybe we should start saving for a condo, or when am I going to have kids (which makes me ask, can I even have kids? Let's all lie in bed staring at the ceiling and not blink for a while, yeah?), and maybe I should stop thinking about marriage and maybe I should stop eating meat and maybe, just maybe, someone out there has it all figured out, and I need to find that person and shake them by the lapels and make them tell me her secrets.

    Breathe, girl. I know things will work out fine - they're working now! - and I just need to chill TFO. Also, I need to stop watching Girls and How I Met Your Mother, because those shows deal with exactly this type of thought process and they are infuriating. (And we all know the secret is healthy BMs and good friends, both of which I'm good on.)

  • Crafts. Holy shit, crafts. I went to the City of Craft fair with my mom recently and it was so inspiring. And not in a "I could never do that" sort of way - although the vendors were all mega-talented - but in a way that asked, if those are their niches, which ones are mine? I've always loved working with fabric, and I've always loved collage (which I think explains my unreasonable lust for Pinterest), and I tweet these little poems about food and topknots and gold, and when I do, I feel better. I want to feel better more often. So I need to inspire myself.