400 Days of Exile: Day 2

I realize I provided very little details of the condition of my exile.

I am still exhausted from the move so I will be as brief and concise as possible.

In short, my lease was up. My job doesn't start until August 9th - in the city, Thank God. So, looking at a couple months of no income, draining my savings account to spend three months in the city didn't seem too smart of an idea.

Additionally, I am currently studying for the CPA exam and have no life and won't be having much of a summer anyway - it would have been a summer of seclusion if not a summer of exile.

Now, I already know what you're thinking. 3 months = 90 days (give or take), why 400?

Well... I plan to stay at home until August 2016.

The reasons are twofold:

The simplest being - it really is economical. I can save almost $20,000 in rent and food alone by staying home for a year. Which, is, you know, nice.

However, I have a bigger motivation. My mother, bless her heart, is a wonderful woman. But very conservative and can be guilty of manipulation at times.When I was younger, I was terrified of her for no reason and that worked well enough to keep me in line. But, as I got older, the fear started to ebb, so she used another leverage point: money. Simply put, if I did not behave in a way she wished she would threaten cut funding to a, b, and c. (A. B. and C usually being college, really)

They were usually silly things like don't get a tattoo, which were very easy to live without. I didn't like being held back, but who was I to challenge my parents' generosity?

But, I think I have gotten to the age where "mommy not paying for stuff" shouldn't be a reason I base my decisions around anymore. By staying at home for a year, I can build a cushion of money where my mother;s input and advice will always be welcome, but never more than advice.

Ultimately, I want my decisions to be my own. I do not want to depend on anyone,

And, unfortunately for me, the quickest way to do that is to live at home for a bit.

Little Tornado

Random Meandering 4: Choosing What To Share Online

I think I can sum up every issue I've ever had with keeping a blog updated was what can and can not be shared online.

It is quite easy and somewhat cathartic to express the issues and problems you are having in your life with the facelessness and anonymity of the internet. Except, of course, when you are not so anonymous. You have made your blog semi public, by hiding links to your updates in the midst of your silly Tweets. But it is not like you are explicitly advertising.

Your blog will remain obscure and largely unread, until you post something "wrong" or too personal - then everyone will read it and things can get... very bad.

I say this from experience. My experience being the one and only time I maintained consistency with any sort of blog format and that was when I had a video blog when I was 14 going on 15. When the boys of my grade discovered them, I was a pariah for the remainder of my high school career. The scars from their cruelty are still not fully healed, though, now, they are almost as faint as the scuffs on my knees from when I tripped and fell on concrete when I was 10. Which is to say that they don't trouble me much anymore, but I have not quite forgotten them.

But what am I afraid of?

I am 22 years old. I rarely/barely break the law and, if I do, it's unintentional. I've escaped the illegalities of my vices (drinking) when I turned the victorious age of 21 and I can now say publicly that a glass of wine never hurt anybody - without fact checking it's validity. I have a small, but stable social life. I have a cluster of forever friends and a slightly bigger cluster of fun-for-now friends that I enjoy being with - none that I believe I would offend by my unassuming blog.

So... fuck it.

Let's test what I can share and what I can't. I can't promise I won't be vague, but I can promise that I will try not to be.

Random Meandering 3: Hookup Culture - Give it a break already **

http://elitedaily.com/dating/sex/get-rid-hookup-culture-bring-love-back/680826/

I get it. I really do. You meet a guy/girl. You hit it off. You take a couple shots, exchange a kiss or two, and wam, bam, skidoosh, you wake up the next morning next to them.

You skip out (or they do, depending on the location of the fornication) but you still hope for the call that, often, never comes.

I get the disappointment. And I get the blaming. You blame yourself, you blame the guy/girl, and, above all else, you blame hook up culture.

Well fear not! I have cited an article above that explains to you the steps you need to take in order to counter act hookup culture!

Keep in mind, this article is by no means a groundbreaking article. There are many just like it littered across the internet amongst the pages of TSM, Upworthy, and Thought Catalog. But, among its sage and well researched advice, this article gives you the keys to your future relationships and happiness…

Unless, of course, you know, it doesn’t.

I’m going to get crazy radical on the internet here and say maybe the problem isn’t hook up culture. Maybe, now stay with me here because I’m about to say something completely unheard of, there isn’t actually a problem at all.

You don’t have to hook up with people to get a relationship. But you don’t have to abstain from hooking up with people to get a relationship either. Relationships are not that black and white. What works for some people, won’t work for others. Giving a blanket list of rules of what you should do to fight a nonexistent problem is ludicrous.

Sure, I suppose, in general, if you really like someone, you probably shouldn’t sleep with them immediately… but, shit, sometimes it works out with that person anyway. Life is weird like that.

One of my favorite lines in movie history is from the movie “He’s Just Not That Into You.”:

“All my friends used to tell me about how things might work out with these dipshits because they knew someone, who knew someone, who dated a dipshit just like mine and that girl ended up getting married and living happily ever after. But, that’s the exception and we're not the exception. We're the rule.”

And I fully agree with that statement… as a rule.

But, in life, there are always exceptions. And the exceptions are the ones you wait around for.

So you can continue following all the rules you want to, as long as you remember that they are rules not guarantees. And rules are meant to be broken especially when following them doesn't promise you anything.

Use your judgment and do the things that make you happy. Yeah, you’re going to meet some dipshits who you should have avoided in the first place but you typically don’t figure that out until it’s too late anyway, so don’t beat yourself up over it. Keep doing you, and you’ll meet a good one or two.

And let’s be honest: if someone is really going to write you off because you didn’t wait the socially acceptable amount of time to sleep with them (which is different for everyone, by the way), that person probably sucks anyway and you’re better off without them. ON TO THE NEXT ONE!

Keep Keeping It Real,

Little Tornado

** This is advice coming from some random 22 year old that typed this up during her lunch break at her internship and forgot to run it through spell check. If you want to take it as scripture, that’s your prerogative. But, this same random 22 year old wouldn’t recommend it strongly. The only thing this random 22 year old would recommend strongly is finding yourself a delicious slice of macaroni and cheese pizza, pictured above. Because, out of everything in this post, that is the only thing scientifically proven to be delicious.

Random Meandering 2: Managing Disappointment

I interviewed with Deloitte for a tax internship last fall. I was feeling really good about myself because I made it to second round interviews.

I didn't get it.

I was pretty bummed, but it had felt like a reach to me, in the first place, so I managed. I didn't give up, I kept interviewing (I think I had at least 12 interviews) and I managed to land 2 jobs. One for the spring and one for the fall. I was happy... but if you think about it, that's a 75% rejection rate.

My father, one of the most successful men I know, graduated from college with zero job offers. He got rejected everywhere until a forensic accounting firm hired him. He got lucky. He got back up. Now he's the CFO of his company (different company).

The reason I mention this is Turtle Man just applied for a job and found out today he didn't get it. He was one of 12 candidates considered. I worry how he's going to react to this.

But almost all of the greatest years have failed dramatically before they became great:

Winston Churchill

He was estranged from his political party from 1929-1939 over ideological disagreements, before he became the Prime Minister of Great Britain.

Oprah Winfrey

She was fired from her first anchor job in Baltimore due to sexism and racism, before she amassed a media empire.

Thomas Edison

His teachers told him that he was "too stupid to learn anything," before he invented his world-changing devices.

Vera Wang

She failed to make the U.S. Olympic Skating Team and, when she was an editor at Vogue, she was passed up for the editor-in-chief position, before she became one of the most famous designers in the fashion industry. She started her fashion career at 40!

Walt Disney

He was fired from a newspaper because the editor said he "lacked imagination and had no good ideas," and many of his other business ventures failed before he became WALT FREAKING DISNEY!

J.K. Rowling

She was single mother living off welfare before she wrote Harry Potter and became the first billionaire author!

Abraham Lincoln

He failed in business, lost his sweetheart to death, and failed to be elected into various government positions SEVEN TIMES, before he became the president of the United States.

Lucille Ball

She was in so many B-Movies that she was called "The Queen of B-Movies," before "I Love Lucy was picked up.

Stephen King

Stephen Spielberg was rejected dozens of times before he became a famous author. (He put each rejection letter on his wall) 

Louisa May Alcott

She was a servant and a war nurse before she got her big break for "Little Women"

Failure is a part of life and it's how we deal with that failure that will make us grow. I'm not expecting  Turtle Man to become world famous, but I am expecting him to get back up and keep on chugging like he always has.

Tis All For Now

Little Tornado

Trivial Drivel 24: How I Got My Groove Back

I've kind of been taking this life changing ethics class.

Unfortunately I'm so stressed out all the time with taking 6 classes (5 undergrad and 1 grad) and working 30 hours a week while trying to get straight A's - not gonna happen this semester, by the way - that I can't enjoy it and concentrate on it like I'd like to.

Even so, I've learned so much about self control and having your own value system and they are all topics I want to write about on this blog someday.

But today, I want to talk about self esteem and self worth.

My professor posed a question today: "If tomorrow everything you have was gone - your family, your possessions, your friends - what would be left?"

For me, while losing everything would, quite frankly, suck, I wouldn't be left with nothing. I would be left with me. A sarcastic, down to earth, dreamer who is optimistic, enthusiastic, and gets trapped in her head sometimes. I like to be outside, on the beach or in a field. Give me a pen and a pad of paper and I could write down all the stories I ever wanted to write but kept getting distracted by things and people.

I don't know how many people would know themselves. Before I was 16? There was no way I could tell you who I was.

My professor said that people who lose things they love tend to have a better idea of who they are. "What does not kill you, makes you stronger." I don't know if that is necessarily true for everyone, but it is true for me.

Now, my professor lost everything when she was 9 - her family, her money, her nice clothes, but that is her story to tell. I didn't lose everything, but when I was 16, it sure felt like I did.

I had always been the weird one, skinny, awkward. I had had a shot of having a real friend group but I had the horrible combination where I was intelligent, passionate, and dramatic. I wanted to read epic stories and learn new things, but I also wanted the human drama that is usually only accompanied by the popular crowd. The smart kids were too boring for me and I was too "wild" for them. The popular kids were too vapid for me and I was too "weird" for them.

I had attained this truly awful human being of a best friend in junior high, I'll call her Frenemy. She was super fun to be around but it was laced with her consistently putting me down and dictating what was "cool." (Literally, everything, too. Down to what razors and shaving creams were "cool" and which were "lame." I had to BEG my mom to get me Satin Care over Skintimate. It was obnoxious.) Plus she had gained a posse who were also not very nice to me. They bred me to be very insecure. They would joke that I was the 40-year Old Virgin - that movie had just come out - and that no one would ever want to date me. Boys were not exactly beating down my door at the time, so, who was I to prove them wrong?

However, by staying friends with Frenemy, who desperately wanted to be popular, she got me an "in" with the popular girls in eighth grade and that's when I met Free Spirit, who then introduced me to Blondie.

They became my best friends and they actually liked me and were nice to me. They tried to build me up - and change me in the process, but whatever - instead of kick me down and make me feel hopeless. And they were cool! They were the coolest of the cool girls. Which made me feel cool too! Alas, I wasn't.

I remained best friends with them all through freshman year and into sophomore year. But then, tragedy struck! I had been videoblogging at the time and some boys at my school discovered it and I became publicly weird. I was jeered at in the hallway and people were relentlessly mean about it. My friends had know about them but once they stopped getting invited to parties because of me, they started to distance themselves.

Then I actually had no one.

Or so I thought.

I didn't want anyone else, I just wanted them. Honestly, I loved them so much before I even knew what love was and my heart was torn to shreds when they left me.

I spent about 6 months without any friends.

And boy, it sucked. It was super painful and awful but I wouldn't change any of these events for the world.

Because in those 6 months, for the first time since puberty, I actually LIKED myself. I learned who I was and what I liked. I learned that liking video games and fantasy novels wasn't a bad thing. I made friends with a girl in my science class that I had always clicked with, Tender Heart, and opened my mind and heart to things I had never experienced before.

I became better and confident and if I had continued hanging out with those girls, I wouldn't be where I am today.

This self-discovery, self-knowledge is not new, obviously, but it is ever changing. Every day I try to love myself a little more so I can continue being the confident, enigmatic, and a little zany woman that proudly pounds the streets of Chicago in stiletto Heels and torn up short shorts (in summer, in winter it's Uggs, Uggs, and more Uggs - They look like bear paws and I like feeling like a snow bear).

I know my direction got a little back and forth there in the middle but I've been up since 7 am and I need to go to bed so I can study for finals tomorrow. LEAVE MY BRAIN ALONE!

Happy finals to all my college kids out there and I hate everyone else,

xoxo

Little Tornado


** DISCLAIMER ** Free Spirit and I still remain close friends and I have gotten some solid apologies from her some time ago. She is a wonderful person, one of my dearest friends, and her tattoo actually came out a lot better than I thought it would.
I may not exactly get the path she's going down right now, but that doesn't mean it's a wrong path.

WWPD
(What Would Pocahontas Do?)

Trivial Drivel 23: People Who Hurt

It is so hard to watch your loved ones go through difficult times. Whether from outside factors like relationships ending or inside factors like depression and anxiety, there is an overwhelming feeling of helplessness.

There is nothing you can do except be there and that doesn't make it all go away.

Trivial Drivel 22: "Tough" Decisions

Have you ever been friends with a couple? I'm not talking about your friend being in a relationship. I'm talking about being friends with both members of a relationship. It definitely has some great pros but that is not what I'm about today.

What do you do when your couple friend is fighting? Who do you side with? Are there sides? I typically try to talk to each party constructively. Letting them vent and giving advice if they want it but never bashing the other person. This typically has worked well for me. However, what do you do with secrets or shady information?

I have been put in this situation twice now. Most recently last night. Though they are different. I will detail the first as it's less fresh and more unbiased.

SITUATION #1
I have a good friend, let's call her Kitty Cat. Kitty Cat is dating 007. 007 doesn't have the squeakiest of reputations and that's always caused a bit of turbulence in their relationship. Well, it came to my attention, that 007 had been nefarious with another woman at the beginning of him and. Kitty Kat's relationship. Being good friends with both of them, I had to decide what to do.
WHAT I DID: I let 007 know that I was going to tell Kitty Kat what I heard and then told Kitty Kat.
HOW IT WORKED OUT FOR ME: 007 was very pissed at me and I had to deal with his anger (by crying mostly, for as direct as I am, I'm also a huge pussy). They are still together and everything is out in the open and 007 is much less shady. I do not regret my plan of action. Plus he seems to have forgiven me. Probably because of all of the crying.

SITUATION #2
This time I was an eye witness to the shady event. Also there is a bit more gray area on the rights and wrongs of the situation but pretty black and white about how the person would feel if they knew.
WHAT I DID: I told my friend.
HOW IT WORKED OUT FOR ME: I don't know yet. Time will tell. But this isn't about me. All I know is that two of my friends are really hurting and I don't want them to. I don't know if they'll stay together or officially end it. Or how they talked about it or anything really. But it's not my business if they do not choose to share it with me.

I know they will both be ok. Eventually. It may take time. But they are both wonderful people and are going to lead wonderful lives, regardless if they are together or not.


Bottom line: I made this post under the illusion that I had a choice in this matter, when I didn't. I will always tell my friends something they should know. My only regret is that I did not give the accused party the chance to tell my hurt friend before I stepped in. But a clouded mind and a throbbing morning after headache did not exactly help my judgement.

We'll see how it all plays out.

Little Tornado