Indefinitely, For Now

I have been home for almost 3 weeks. Much of this blog has been dedicated to bemoaning my discovery that adult life isn't easy, and that it is especially not easy when you move away from home - from family, friends, the familiar. It's funny how after six months of wishing I could click my heels three times and be in Tulsa, I am now finding myself anxious, jittery, nervous about being back here. For the first time in at least 5 years, I find myself unloading boxes and bags with no intention of packing them up again. Instead of returning to college, or trips abroad, or commuting back to Kansas City, I have no definite plans to move anywhere. It's a strange feeling. I find myself relating to Edward Bloom, larger-than-life, bigger-than-his-small-town, adventurer in the delightful film Big Fish, who said: "The truth is, I'm just not ready to end up anywhere." After all the tears, lonely days, and long-distance phone calls, part of me became accustomed to living away. I could see myself easily settling down in Tulsa. It's a great city, lots of young professionals, job opportunities, low cost of living, plus the nearness of those I love. I'm surrounded by a lot of pro-Tulsa people who are excited about this city and its potential. Ending up here wouldn't be bad at all. But I don't know if I'm ready to end up anywhere yet. There are cities I want to visit and move to, jobs I would like to try out for a little while. Am I ready to stay in one place?

A Farewell Letter

Dear Kansas City,

Strange to think there was a time I barely knew you. In a few short months you've gone from a stranger to a place I cannot imagine not being a part of my life. Sometimes it still feel like I don't know you. Sure, I've learned your streets, I've seen your charm. You've won me over in more than one way. But there is so much of you that I have yet to discover. I realized today, that to you, I am just a girl who moved in and who is moving away. I guess I always thought it was something more. That you would ask me to stay, woo me to explore more of you. That you felt something more for me. I shouldn't be so hurt by your nonchalance. The truth is I chose not to let you in either. You are not my home. As much as I want to love you with my whole heart, I couldn't bear to let you in. So I suppose this is partly my fault. I can't expect you to feel more about me. It's her you love, the one who is from here. The one who knows you in a way you wouldn't let me know you. She will be here once I am gone. She will stay with you. Your dark I know, your city lights, your exciting and dangerous parts. But she has your mornings, your breakfasts, your long conversations. So I suppose it's partly my fault. We remain shallow friends. Sure I will come to visit. And I'm sure you will embrace me with open arms and take me through your streets once again. But I want you know that you have changed me, Kansas City. You have been here through some of my best and worst moments. I left my home for you. I have made so many mistakes with you. And now I must leave you. You will move on, you will find another girl who will move in and hopefully she will love you more and no less than I have. You may forget me, another face lost in your long memory. But I won't forget you. I am sorry I didn't let you in. I suppose it's partly my fault. It will make this departure easier, but I will always have this regret: that I didn't ask you to love me like you love the one who will stay here, that I kept you at a distance, because part of me thinks you would have been a lovely place to call home.

I will miss you and care for you always,
Chelsea

Allowing the Story to Soak In

Water for Elephants.


Began and finished in a day. Feeling accomplished, I wanted to immediately move on to my next book. Start ticking off their numbers one by one. A goal of 50 books this year. An arbitrary number which put me at a pace of about one book per week. But that wasn't really my goal. I don't want to just speed through a booklist. This should be a year of reading well. I make myself put down the next book. Stop. Take a day or two to reflect on what I just read. Don't be too eager, too greedy that I miss out on allowing a story to soak in.

What did I love about Water for Elephants? Jacob. I loved Jacob. Yes, he is the narrator of the story, but it was more than just because I see this world through his eyes. It was like his fears were my fears at times. To be old and left alone. With only memories. Family moving on without you. Being left in a nursing home - above all else I fear that. That is not the end to a good life. That is not the end I want. Strange to think of such things at the age of twenty-three, but I do. Perhaps it was our visit to a nursing home while filming. The cold hallways. The group "exercises." The lonely men and women lined up in their wheel chairs, who I know are someone's parents or grandparents or uncle or something. This is not the end I want. 


Even in Jacob's youth, his struggles with faith, with his feelings for the married Marlena. Doing what is right can be difficult when your heart betrays your logic. That is a lesson I have been learning over again this year. His desire to stay, but choosing to leave. The moments he chooses to stay. That tug of war with which I am all too familiar. What I don't understand is why he chooses Marlena? Her character seems so shallow to me. Other than her beauty and fragility, what does she have that enraptures Jacob so? Perhaps it's because he wants to rescue her, to be her savior. Again, a feeling I know all to well. In some ways I feel Rosie, the elephant, is a more complex character than Marlena. I feel that her love and understanding of Jacob is so much deeper and more real. They need each other, Jacob and Rosie, they look out for each other. Maybe I find Marlena shallow and irritating now that I've finished the book because I see my own Marlenas, the people I want to rescue. Jacob, I feel, deserves better. Then why is it so hard to say that I deserve better?

A Year of Reading Well

As with most of the world, when December begins its final countdown to the end of the year, I find myself reflecting on what has transpired over the past twelve months. This year, perhaps more than any other, has been a year of transition and new experiences. And I am glad it is over. Not one for making New Year's resolutions, generally because I have a fear of failure, so why make resolutions you won't be able to keep? I did find myself asking What have you learned this year? How will you live differently based on your experiences? Will you look at the world differently? Have your priorities changed at all? Here is what I came up with, not so much a list of resolutions as it is a framework by which I hope to live my life this year:

2011, a year of living well. A year of returning home and growing roots. A year of uncertainty and taking risks. A year of being alone and being okay. A year of getting to know myself. A year of reading well, of discovering the classics and revisiting old pages. A year of investing in friendships. Of saying yes to experience more than I say no. A year in writing, in self-exploration, in self-expression. A year in honesty.

Strangely enough what has me most excited is "a year of reading well." Those who know me at all, know that I almost always have a book in my hands or tucked in my bag. This year has been altogether dismal in terms of my literary explorations. Working on a film leaves little time to spend between the pages of a book. This year I wanted to begin living well by reading well. So far success! I know, I know. It's 9:00 p.m. on January 1st, so it's not like I've even given myself the opportunity to fail. But I have completed my first book of the year, Water for Elephants. I spent the whole day snuggled up on various couches and chairs around the house with my aunt's Kindle, diving into the post-stock market crash world of the traveling circus.

First of all, let me point out that this was my first encounter with the Kindle. Although it wasn't a negative experience, there is something to be said about the turning of a page. The soft, yet sometimes rough feel of the paper between my fingers, the smell of ink and pulp, the weight of a book in my hands. It's too much to give up for the sake of technology and a lighter book bag.

That being said, the story Water for Elephants, itself was just beautiful. I have to admit that part of why I chose this book was because I want to see the film based on this novel that will be released later this year, and I refused to see the movie without having first read the book. So much of my inner imaginings have been tainted by viewing the trailer to the film. Perhaps tainted is too strong a word, influenced may be better. The colors and even the song used in the trailer helped me form this beautiful world of big tents, gaudy costumes, gilded trains, and elaborate performance rings. The story begins at the end. There is a murder, and subsequently a mystery unfolds. How did it come to this? Why has he kept this secret for so long? The answers to these questions do not come until the last few pages. And they are not really the answers I was expecting. By this point I find myself totally immersed in the freakshow of the circus. Rooting for drunks, cheering on the adulterers, praying the antagonists will get theirs, and that love truly will prevail. I found myself doing all of this, yet at the same time asking when it became okay for us to champion the adulterer? Why am I hoping the most immoral characters will meet a truly gruesome end? I found myself intrigued by these characters, rising and falling with them as they fight for acceptance and fall in love. Swept away into a life I had never even dreamed about. It was the perfect, quiet way to begin this new year, the year of reading well.

Gray.

The color of this past year. The high and low moments, the light and dark have passed in a blur. Gray. When I think of what this year has taught me, of the places I have been, of the people I have met, I think of it all with a sigh of relief that the year is over, that this season is passing. There have moments of unbelievable beauty, standing on the side of a hill looking over the Spanish countryside, waking up to the orange sun over the Kansas cornfields. There have been moments of bittersweet sadness, leaving home for the first time, sitting on the floor of my room with a friend as we try to look up from our lowest points. There have been entire weeks and months of walking through life in a fog, not sure of who I am, even when I'm looking at myself in a mirror. But then there have been moments of clarity, moments when I was so sure of what I was to do, like it was written out before me. Graduation to new job to new home to new life. Oklahoma to Spain to Kansas. All of it has passed in a whirlwind. Friends who moved, friends I left behind, new friends who I must leave in a few days. My heart has planted itself in so many places this year. Home sits between two houses now, and I am torn to stay with them both. I think the year ahead will hold more simplicity, and hoping it will have more color. Good days, bad days, holidays, hellos, and goodbyes. Each high has had its low, each spot of light, its dark. In the haste of moving from location to location, set to set, state to state, the only color I see is gray. And I think it has been worth it all.

My Life in Soundtrack: November

I often think of my life in terms of a soundtrack, there would be a perfect song for every situation. For night drives, for sunny days, for angry moments. Right now that song, appropriately enough, is called "November." Some of the lyrics read: So I'm waiting for this test to end, so these lighter days can soon begin...But we cant go back we're on our own. But I'm about to give this one more shot. And find it in myself. I'll find it in myself.
 
The whole month of October has come and gone, November is marching steadily toward December. I watch the days speed by in rapid succession. Days and weeks pass between phone calls home and visits from friends and writing and doing anything other than think about film. It's all-consuming. The tiny part of my life left unscathed by this zealous workload has as of late been tumultuous at best. Suddenly thrust into real adult situations I find myself trying to figure out important life questions about who I am at the heart of it all. Times like this are best handled with self-assuredness, with a solid grasp on who you are. Not so for me. I feel like my Grandpa is giving me a swimming lesson, he's thrown me in the deep end and is trying to teach me to swim while I am just trying to keep me from drowning. There was a period of uncertainty a few weeks ago, the crew was all under the stress of possible layoffs from our jobs. As terrible as it sounds, I was hoping that I might get to be one of the people laid off. Then I could go home, be with my family, start over, and get a clean slate. Almost as soon as the wish crossed my lips, I knew in my heart that these lessons which were making life so difficult, were not the kind easily learned. There would be no clean slate. I would have to swim my way to the surface, because drowning was not an option. There's a verse in the Bible that talks about a man who looks at himself in the mirror then walks away and forgets the look of his own face. I never understood that passage until now. For weeks I would catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and literally not recognize the person I was. I found myself asking the person staring back, "Is this who you want to be?" The answer was a slight but stern shake of the head, no. And so came the hard decisions. And the hard questions. What kind of person do I want to be? Why do I make these choices? And the answers haven't all come easily. Some haven't come at all. There have been hard conversations with friends, some of which have tainted the relationship, perhaps permanently. There have been sleepless nights and days spent in a melancholy fog. There have been incredible moments of grace too. There have been the strong and loving arms of friends who have helped to pick me up in my moments of brokenness. November has been a test for me. A test of character, of will, of humility. I'm waiting for this season to end and a lighter one to begin. But I know that through it all, I will find something in myself, something that makes me more of the person I hope to be.

Living in Limbo

For years I understood Limbo only as that obnoxious party game in which you must unnaturally bend your spine completely in half to walk under a stick that works its way closer and closer to the ground as a group of people chant your name, hoping that your spine will snap and you will drop to the floor whereby losing the game. Not ever really my idea of fun. Then I learned of the metaphysical Limbo, the place which is not here neither is it there. And it is in the place that I live now. Working on an independent film, I feel like I'm in Limbo a lot. I'm in between assignments or in the middle of a task, but not really sure what's going on. One of my coworkers made the comment one day that I looked lost, and to be honest he's right. I really think that any time you start a job in a totally new field, being a little directionally challenged is to be expected. I am starting to get a handle on some things though. For example, I am in charge of maintaining shot lists. These diagram and list in detail the lighting, blocking, and camera angles for a given scene. But I also find myself location scouting, collecting props, making breakfast, turning off buses, among other random things during the course of a day. It's a constant state of "do this, no do that." Not to mention that I've been struck the last few days by the reality of this being a Terminal job, quite literally. This will be over in about three months, so although I would like to think that Kansas City is becoming like home, I may be packing my bags once again and moving onto the next great adventure in a new place. I am also in Limbo in terms of what I want to do with my life. I was hoping that this job would be a clear, resounding bell indicating that this is the direction my life is supposed to go. Ironically, the connections I have been making lately appear to be steering me back towards the world of advertising and public relations. So I'm back to being neither here nor there. Not quite sure of anything. Stuck in a place that at once feels homey and permanent yet at the same time feels temporary and fleeting. It's a strange place, but I may as well roll out my mat, make the bed, and settle in, for I feel that I may be here a while yet.