Last Week #33 | My House Will Have a Roof

 I don't have a typical weekly vlog for you today. Instead I have something much more substantial for you. A portrait of the last three years of my life, with an emphasis on 2015 and 2016. 2016 took a lot out of me (it took a lot out of all of us). But I'm glad, in the end, that it got this short film out of me. 

I don't know if I'm that person anymore. The one who documents all the time. Maybe I am, maybe I'm not. But I am certainly grateful for the fact that I was that way, and got to document so much of this transformative time in my life, for myself, my friends, and my future self. I am struggling with whether or not to continue with this, because I do believe that you have a sort of responsibility to be the documentarian of your own life. Obviously I'm glad these moments were made, and recorded. Say what you will about the technological age and all its "good and bad" parts, but I will forever be a firm believer in the fact that there's more good than bad here. And if it is ever bad, it's the people that make it bad, not the technology itself. 

I love that Eli and I will be able to look back one day and see footage of us- 18, 19, 20, 21, young and angsty and falling in love. I love that I have been able to document my friends lives, their business success, the risks they've taken, the adventures they've embarked on, their peaks and valleys. 

This "overdocumented lifestyle" is mine, and I'm not going to apologize for it. Even if that makes me a "millennial," it also made something beautiful. So, no ragrets. I hope you like it. 

 -Fran

Last Week #32 | Strong Independent Woman™

 Sorry for the brief absence. The week after Thanksgiving, I had a bit of a meltdown. I realized that a lot of things were bothering me that I hadn't thought would be, and then criticized myself for letting them get to me. For instance, I realized that it did actually bother me that when I went home for Thanksgiving (literally less than two months after I'd left) my room that I'd lived in for more than half of my life was getting a complete overhaul. It did actually bother me that I felt like I had no place in my home anymore, even though I made the choice to leave. And despite these huge revelations, I still had school projects to finish, and I still had to go to work. I had too much to do, and no time to figure any of it out, or give any of it the time and attention it deserved.

 I felt like nothing was the same. Not my home or my job or my school or even my freaking hair. And then, Eli and I were just not communicating well. It's been a long time coming, this bout of us figuring it out. For a week straight, we had the same arguments. The same conversations over and over again. By Thursday, I was sick of it. I lost it. I stopped replying to texts, and I fled to the Art Park by my apartment to work on a project, because even in crisis mode I can't help but do my freaking school work. He met me there, and we hashed it out. We said everything we felt like we couldn't say, for fear of hurting the other person's feelings-- everything we'd never explored because up until three months ago we didn't have a place to have these conversations. Have them in the basement of my house when we only have two hours to watch a movie? Nope. Have them in his bedroom, with a million people walking by at all times? Nope. Have them in a car at 11 pm on a Tuesday night, when I have to be home by 11:30 and one of us has to drive 30 minutes to get home? Nope. We put it off until now, when for the first time in the timeline of our relationship we finally have a space to discuss, explore, and say what's on our minds. And we got it all out on the table. 

 When all of this change began a few months ago, I told him that I would need him. That when it feels like things aren't good with us, it feels like I have nothing, because literally everything else in my life is in transit. I'm trying to fight the feeling that that is unhealthy. Because it doesn't matter. It's just what it is right now. But I have hope, and faith, that it will change. After a bout of bad, we are good. We are communicating better, listening better, and expressing our emotions better. 

 I still feel stupid for getting upset in the first place. Because you see, if I get emotional over my mom painting my room immediately after I move out, I'm no longer a Strong Independent Woman™. How will I fight the patriarchy if I cry over such juvenile things? And while I will forever be an advocate for every woman believing that she is strong and capable, I realized in these last few weeks that that ideology can sometimes go too far, and become negative. Sure, we're capable of anything and everything. But do we have to be? Can it be okay for us to fall, to cry, to be mean and irrational and illogical sometimes? Can we simply have too much on our plates without being told, "See, this is why women CAN'T have it all." 

I am a Strong Independent Woman ™. But I am also flawed and fragile and f*cking human, in need of a support system. I need someone to sit next to me while I scream and cry and yell and call people who piss me off terrible names. I need someone to be patient with me when I make a grumpy face after they make me laugh, because I'm in a Bad Mood ™ and I don't want to laugh. That's what I need. And Eli gives that to me. I don't think that makes me less strong, or less independent, or less of a woman. (It probably makes me "more" of that last one.) I'm a little afraid to post this, because I don't want you all to see my ugly side and judge me. But at the same time, I think that's kind of the point of this post. Not for you to judge me, but for me to accept myself enough to share it. 

 -Fran

Last Week # 31 | Snow Day

For the past few months, ever since I started my new job at the library, I’ve been working on this thing called “self-care.” Self-care is the completely insane idea that when you feel like you have no time to do anything, let alone all of the billion jillion things you need to get done in addition to the things you want to get done, you do even less. That’s right— instead of tackling your to-do list right away, you take a breath, watch a movie, drink a cup of tea, or write in a journal, and you feel better after. As you can probably see from the last few blog posts, this has been my main area of focus lately. I’ve been doing okay at it. But this week I was put to the test. 

This week was actually way more low-key than the previous ones. I didn’t have appointments, didn’t really have commitments. Just a whole lot of PMS and a few movies to see. This means that when there were opportunities to do more, and there were, it was a challenge to say no, because I technically had no reason for it. On Saturday it felt like I was playing hooky when I hung out at Peaks in the morning, as I didn’t have to work until 1:30. But on Sunday, when Eli and I laid in bed doing absolutely nothing but sleeping, eating soup, and watching Gilmore Girls, I didn’t feel guilty. And when, later that day, my sister came over to visit my apartment for the first time, and we also did nothing but make food and lounge around, I was glad I had kept my day clear for her. The thing I realized is: my time is my own. And as Newt Scamander said in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (one of the two movies I saw this week), “worrying means you suffer twice.” 

Damn, J.K. Rowling serving some wisdom to my court once AGAIN. Now, here I sit, Monday morning after  a pretty low-key week, and it feels like the universe is rewarding me for chilling the f*ck out, as it is what we Upstate New Yorkers would call “a f*cking blizzard” out there. The library is closed, which means my day has opened up even more, and I now have time to pack for my pretty exciting week, write, do yoga, and drink more tea. It’s really freaking hard for me not to feel guilty about taking time for myself. I don’t know why, but I think I was programmed to believe that if I wasn’t being productive every second, I wasn’t a good person. We’ve been over this, I think. But now I’m revising what the word productive even means, and realizing that it can mean writing, or napping, or just sweeping the floor and laying with a cat. Productivity is a word that was created to make hardworking people feel guilty for not doing even more. We do plenty. So if you can today, chill the fuck out, drink some tea, and take a nap. That's what I'm about to do. 

 -Fran

Last Week #30 | Here Comes the (Love) Anxiety

 So this week I discovered that I am actually capable of what my therapist told me to try last week. Which was: take the pressure off yourself to get so much done, and see if it all still gets done anyway. This should have been a no-brainer for me. Of COURSE it will still get done! I should have thought. I didn’t. It was so hard for me to let go of the worry and anxiety this week, and trust that it would still get done in the end. But you know what? It DID. I realized that worrying in my down time doesn’t make the work get done any faster, it only makes me more exhausted by the time I have time to work. So I can’t do work. So, in essence, worrying about being productive makes me LESS productive. And I know what you might be thinking: But Fran, duh! Worrying gets you nowhere. Just relax and chill out! And to that I would say: HA. Because sure, I learned a valuable lesson about behavioral tricks this week. But that doesn’t mean I don’t still have anxiety. Anxiety means that all of my efforts are just that— efforts. Sure, they can help to rewire my brain and combat the negativity up there, but in the end, my anxiety is still gonna do what it wants to do sometimes. 

With anxiety, if it’s not one thing it’s another. Sure, I got a lot of work done this week. I made progress on my projects for my drawing class, and felt good about the other work I am doing. But I still feel bad and guilty and anxious about not being a better friend this week, sometimes, all the time. But the difference is, I now know that worrying about it isn’t going to change anything. That doesn’t mean I don’t still worry. This kind of ingrained behavior doesn’t go away overnight. But I now have a little voice in the back of my head telling me to relax, it’s okay, it’ll all be fine.

Yoga this week taught me just as much. As I stretched and twisted my body, and felt the pain that comes with not doing yoga for a while, I realized that this pain so obviously symbolizes life. You feel the pain, but it will pass. And learning that fact (“it will pass”) is one of the most valuable lessons, and something that will get you through both yoga and life. The thing is, when I feel pain my brain is like “UUUUUM bitch you are gonna die if you don’t end this right now.” So I panic and stop whatever I’m doing that’s causing me pain instead of working, pushing, breathing through it. I was afraid I was going to do that with Eli, with this job, with my apartment. But I haven’t, and my life is so much better, so much more as a result. 

Full disclosure, I still freaked out a little bit this week too. (You win some and you lose some.) Long story short, I watched my favorite movie (Amelie), and wigged out about the fact that I was nostalgic for her lost-ness, for her alone-ness. I worried that my wanting alone-ness meant I no longer loved Eli, and then my brain got out of control. It went haywire. I quite literally pushed Eli away, had a total meltdown, cried myself to sleep, woke up and cried some more. Then I sent him a lengthy, completely insane message that was full of my fear and anxiety and sadness. To which he replied, “Ok Fran.. you can do whatever you need to and I will understand- go see your mom, just lay there alone for today, go drive by yourself, idk whatever you need.  But all I can say / all I know is this:

I love you, I love coming home to you, I love when you come home to me, I love "seeing the world" with YOU, I *love when we figure out an argument and solve the problem together and it's all 100% ok, I love being with you.” 

Yeah. I f*cking know. He’s a goddamn unicorn. Always has been, always will be. Another thing my therapist recommended last week was composed of two simple words. “Trust. Eli.” Which is admittedly hard for me, despite the fact that he’s wonderful, because I am hard-wired to believe that I am the only one who can (and should) fix my problems. I’m the only one who will have the right solution. That, my friends, is called a control freak. I am one. But the difference now is, I’m trying not to be. 

Finally, before and after all this learning, I had a breakthrough. I realized on Tuesday that the reason I've felt unhappy, unfulfilled, and like I haven't been taking care of myself, is that I haven't been doing creative things for me. If you don't know, that's an enormous part of my personality. I'm the kind of person who's always doing a lot. That's just how I work. But lately, my time has been not-so-equally split between: work, schoolwork, and time with Eli and friends. Let me put this plainly: I HAVE NOT BEEN WRITING. I have not been CREATING. That's like...Beyonce not working on an album. It's just not good for anyone involved. So in a crazy leap of faith, I joined NaNoWriMo at the last second. Let me be clear: I'm not doing NaNoWriMo as it is usually done. I'm not writing 50,000 words and striving for 1,667 per day. But I've made it a priority to work on my in-progress novel, and give it the time, energy, and thought it deserves. Because not working on it has made me feel worse than the effort of finding time for it has. Another thing: Eli and I discovered that we like to read together. I think the problem I've been having is that the past year of our relationship has been so environmentally rocky. By that I mean, we've never known when we would see each other next, or if we were able to: where we would even spend time together. Now, knowing that we always have a place to come home to and relax and be together is so relieving, we almost don't know what to do with it. It's going to take us some time to get used to this. To relax, and realize that we have all the time in the world. This week, we tried that. We laid on my bed and he listened to an audiobook while I read The Walking Dead. And it was amazing! Uncovering this new element of our relationship, discovering that we can want to be together all the time, but that doesn't mean we have to talk or really even engage with each other the whole time. We can just sit next to each other and READ. What a freaking revelation. 

I know this blog post probably isn't perfect. But I'm trying to let go of the need for perfection. I'm trying to sink into the feeling that "it will pass." All of it. The bad, and the good. It will pass, and my challenge is to remain present and here through it all.

-Fran

Last Week #29 | Italics Fran is an A**hole

 I am drained. I haven’t had a second to check in with myself since I moved in to my new place. Well, maybe that’s not true. I have, but I haven’t been able to do anything about it. So it looks something like this, 

“Check in: Fran to Fran. Yes, Fran here, we are running at about 15%. Thrusters in critical condition. Pilot recommends rest and reading. And maybe a bath bomb.” 

“Fran to Fran. Fran here, yeah, we can’t do that. You’re just gonna have to work with what you got.” 

“Fran to Fran. Fran here, that’s bullshit. We’re at 7% now. We can’t hold on much longer.” 

“Fran to Fran. I have to go to work. You’re on your own. Bye.”

And now I’m at about 5%, I have no idea how to get it back up to working condition, and it just keeps getting worse. As you can see, italics Fran is a total asshole, and doesn't care about what bold Fran needs. Italics Fran is my brain with anxiety. She's very difficult to shut up. So in a nutshell, here's what happened this past week. 

1. I didn't write a blog post. It was a hard choice, but I ultimately decided I had too much going on in my brain to form into words that made sense. 

2. I had a bit of a meltdown and didn't recognize myself in the mirror. That was scary. Then I watched Gilmore Girls and tried to be okay. I wasn't.

3. I had another meltdown when trying to tell Eli about the first meltdown. I.e.: I cried a lot, he told me he thinks I need a break, and then he made me chicken. 

4. Bold Fran tried really hard to convince italics Fran that taking breaks would be okay, and not result in failing classes and losing her job. Italics Fran wasn't convinced.

5. I went to therapy on Friday night, and my therapist told me the exact same thing. In fact, he told me that taking breaks was part of it. That I'd be more productive if I slowed down. That was news to me, but then I tried it. And it went well?

I'm not going to be perfect, or even good at it right away. But I'll tell you something: this weekend I did a lot of relaxing, a lot of cuddling, and a lot of TV/movie watching. I also finished an entire graphic novel (the first book I've finished all month!) and completed a drawing for one of my classes. I'm trying to convince myself that slowing down will actually work, and will actually allow me to accomplish more. Even though the evidence is there, and even though I've read it about a million times in blog posts and self-help books, it's really hard to do. I have this thing where I want to be really good at everything I do. Otherwise, what is the point in doing it?! I'm convinced that if I'm not good at everything I do, and I don't do everything I could possibly be good at, I'm a failure. Because that's giving up, right? Listen, I'm writing this post and I'm asking all these questions like this is going to have a resolution at the end. The truth is, I don't know the answers. All I know is, Eli and my therapist and my mentor and probably loads of other people have told me that's not true. So I'm going to try to do another thing that my therapist recommended and trust them. 

I'm sad because this means I probably won't do NaNoWriMo this year.  Something I've participated in every year since I was a senior in high school. (Or at least not to the extent that I have in the past.) I'm sad because this means I might take a break from school. And by that I literally mean, one semester off. Or one less class. And sure, that means I might get my degree one semester later. But at this point, who the f*ck cares?! At the end of the day, I logically know that life isn't a race. But this anxiety that has been ingrained in me says differently. And it's really hard sometimes to fight it, and ignore the person in your head telling you you aren't moving fast enough. I literally do not have a pretty, soothing conclusion for this. All I can say is, I am happy. When I allow myself to slow down, I love so many things about my life. I love my apartment. I love my boyfriend. I love my friends, and how they continuously inspire me and thrill me. I love my creativity. I love my commute. I love my coworkers. I really like a lot of things about this new job. (We aren't at love yet. I don't want to move too fast.) I love the lazy Sundays I'm so privileged to have now. Right now, in this season of stress and excitement, I'm simply trying to keep the love at the forefront of my mind, and not the anxiety.

 -Fran

Last Week #28 | Parks & Renovation

 This is big. Late in the summer of 2015, as I was driving away for a vacation that was much needed but not really wanted as it required leaving my friends, I finished Parks & Recreation for the third time. And as I helplessly cried in the front seat in traffic on the New Jersey turnpike, I made my family promise me something-- "Don't let me start this show again for a long time. Even if I tell you, 'oh I'm just gonna watch the first episode again for fun' don't let me do it. I'm a liar and I have no self control." They agreed, probably because they were sick of hearing me laughing over the same lines at 3 am. And when I got home, I told my friends the same thing. My best friend Kelsey said to me, "Let's make a pact that neither of us will start it again until we move into an apartment together." Which was an admittedly adorable idea but was it PRACTICAL? No. Neither of us had any game plan for moving out anytime soon, we were just trying to get by in the life we were currently living. So I begrudgingly agreed, and held onto the fact that I had only finished season 6. I could still watch season 7 again and I wouldn't be breaking any rules.

I eventually did finish season 7, and felt a void in my life that I attempted to fill with other amazing shows (like The Mindy Project and Jane the Virgin), but there's nothing quite like Parks & Rec. 

The months wore on, and for different reasons Kelsey and I both began to feel that moving out of our childhood homes and in together was no longer a dream but rather inevitable. In April, we got word that an apartment might be available. I was hesitant at first, as it is my way to say no to anything new immediately. But then I started thinking about it. It might not be as hard as I thought. 

The plans were made, a little bit at a time, the lease was signed, and suddenly, faster and sooner than I was even prepared for, furniture was being moved out and bought and moved in and arranged. And now, here we are. On Wednesday night Kelsey and I finally made good on our promise. With the boys in Colombia, we'd been mostly focused on getting the place together in their absence. But on Wednesday, she made a pretty amazing soup, and we decided to watch the first episode of season 1. And it struck me that this week has been something like the first episode of our new adventure. It's new, but oddly familiar. 

Let me backtrack a second. For a few years now, the biggest thing on my "Accomplish This Year" list was: move in with Kelsey. And for a long time that seemed impossible. But now, here we are. Without even realizing it, I've achieved the most insurmountable task on that list. It's happened. And it's insane. I don't totally know how I got here, and when I talk to people who I've known for a while, who have known me for a while, they're surprised when they hear what I'm doing now, where I'm living, what my life is looking like. They're like, "WOW! Look at you!" I've demurred and ignored them and acted humble. But the thing is, it isn't an act. I genuinely haven't realized all that I've been doing, all that I've accomplished, because I've been so busy doing it. I know that probably sounds pretentious, or ridiculous, or like some combination of the two... But I have. I've been so focused on just getting through each simple task (moving my bed in, making that video, writing that blog post, going to work) that I haven't seen how all of those things pile up and equal where I am now. 

I think it hit me this week, and I realized just how much I've been doing. And I got really freaking anxious about it. There were other factors, of course, but it culminated in me calling in sick to work on Friday, and spending the day feeling like shit and watching Jane the Virgin for 10 hours straight, trying to ignore my anxiety insisting that everything was huge and scary and I shouldn't do anything.  I'm still trying to get my brain used to the idea that: this is it, we've done it. We can check this one off our list. But I'm pretty sure my brain is still in zombie "get that next thing done" mode. I'm trying to reset it, and see and live and dwell in these beautiful moments that are cropping up all the time now. But it's hard. When you've been dreaming of something for so long, it's almost hard to accept it when that thing finally happens.

-Fran

Last Week #27 | Couraging

Okay, I don't know about you, but I often get this feeling. It's usually when something really cool is about to happen, and I'm excited for it, but then my anxiety chimes in and says "but what if it sucks though? What if the world ends because you decided to do this probably great but also maybe catastrophic thing? We should just not do it. Wouldn't want to risk it." 

I felt it before OVERDUE. It almost choked me, this feeling. This fear of not being good enough almost kept me from even trying. I felt it when I first started dating Eli. Not many people know this, but I almost broke up with him like the first week we were dating. I sort of tried to. I got really sad and was like "what if I’m mean to you?! I won't be good enough. Let's just not." And he was like, “Well no, you already are good enough and I don't even care if you're nice to me because I like you too much." (These are not his exact words. I don’t remember what he said. But this is the general idea.) And here we are. I am sometimes mean to him, I am sometimes not good enough to him. But we learn, and it's a wonderful, happy learning curve, so I’m grateful I didn't give up before it started.

I have that feeling again, now. Friday night I moved into my first apartment. This marks the first time I've ever left home. I'm a part time student, a full time employee, and I'm teaching a class as well. And now I've just moved out. (Or in, depending on your perspective.) At times, this all feels like too much. In fact, I'm almost positive this is all too much. But I'm doing it. And I'm trying to choke, gag,  fight and silence that asshole in my head telling me to give up already. 

On Wednesday, I taught the first in a four week children's film class at a local library. It was a little overwhelming, as anything involving ten year olds is, but as I listened to twelve ten year olds all try to tell me their thoughts at once, and one particular ten year old tell me, "I have too much up here to explain it all" and see him fluff his hair like a mad professor, I realized. These kids, this behavior this kid described, this is what the inside of my brain sometimes looks like. Sixteen screaming ten year olds all shrieking to be heard first, so you literally cannot focus on anyone or anything. 

My brain looks like this today, because Eli (and Kelsey's boyfriend Sam) just left this morning for a weeklong trip to Colombia. The freaking country. COLOMBIA. It's an incredible opportunity for them both, and for Peaks Coffee Company, and I would never want Eli not to have gone, but at the same time, it's freaking hard. It's hard because he's going to be however many miles away, in a place with limited wifi, for seven days straight. And I think I would be okay with that, if this wasn't also my first week living in my new place. In a completely new situation. I have to form new routines, patterns, etc, while balancing the old ones, all on my own. I tell him everything. Every stupid little problem that arises in my day, in my life, he helps me with. Even if he has no advice, he helps me with it all just by virtue of my being able to tell him about it. And I know I have other people. And I'll be okay. But it definitely, uh, sucks. 

Earlier last week, as I was nearly drowning in how overwhelmed I was, I stumbled upon this quote by Brene Brown, someone who I've been told to familiarize myself with a million times, and haven't until now. She said, "You get [courage] by courageous acts. It's like you learn to swim by swimming. You learn courage by couraging." I'm really hoping she's right. So I'm going to be courageous this week, and much like Harry Potter, hope the sorting hat was right when it put me into Gryffindor. 

-Fran