KEEP IN THE SUNLIGHT

While death continues to plague me, I am recognizing the freedom that it can provide. Despite the uncertainty surrounding death, I can see that life imprisons our souls, and that only in death can we truly become detached from the burdens of this world. I look forward to this release, yet I still am afraid of letting go of all that I have grown accustomed to. I am scared to abandon the relationships I value and the sense of purpose that I have worked so hard to attain. I am hesitant to invested more deeply in earthly pursuits, because I know they will be entirely insignificant the moment this life ends. I feel as though I should remain only partially grounded at all times, aware of my ephemerality, and separate enough from society to remain unaffected by unnecessary stress and anxiety. I wish I could be more easy-going. I could be if I didn’t think so much. I am easy-going in my interpersonal relationships, but with myself, I over think everything. 

woke up around 9 had apple cider vinegar and an apple then headed to the gym with A and C elliptical for 30 then machines for 30, then crunches. came back, took a shower and straightened my hair. I was def feeling a lot better. Walked all the way to bluebird with the usual— had rocket salad, focaccia and tomato and fennel soup. rocket salad was SO good and the focaccia had the amazing flakes of rock salt that I love. stopped and got starbucks (earl grey soy latte).. and am studying history of modern middle east/watching arrested development. whole foods shopping trip at 6:30 then cooking dinner after that.

Sunday morning, we left London bright and early around 9am. The drive to the airport was less than enjoyable.. the coach driver was quite obnoxious with his music selections. I spent the time in the airport in bookstores, reading and, of course, eating. I sat with Jen Chen as I like to call her, and the voss. It wasn’t too bad of a flight—read Scar Tissue the whole time pretty much. Upon arrival in Athens, I met up with Carson and Azzurra—they had been in Rome, and had an awful time trying to get to Greece but finally made it! So we all hopped on the coach that was waiting for us and headed to the hotel. I got settled in and we had dinner in the hotel. then met C & A and we went to the plaka for drinks. I had a glass of wine and then a mojito. Mojito’s are pretty good in Athens, who knew!Came back and sat on the 5th floor roof garden that had an amazing view of the lit up acropolis. Went to bed relatively early because we had an early wake up call the next morning.

London is continuing to amaze me. I am still happy, loving it here and can’t wait to explore more. I feel like there is so much to see and do and I haven’t even touched the surface of it. I need to make more time to take advantage of the city I am LIVING in and really get a lot out of it. I feel like I spend too much time in routine just doing the same things and I need to get out and do things I don’t necessarily want to do at the moment, but that will be so interesting and important to my journey here. I always remember how my absolute favorite thing in life is travel, and look how much traveling I get to do! I get to see so much, and really give not much back.. It is basically a free ride that my parents have set in my lap. I mean, I definitely worked hard to get to where I am.. but they never once have complained about funding such an expensive education and year abroad. My dad is truly an amazing man. He does so much for me. I have to constantly be happy because, really, it is just stupid to be any other way with all of the things I have been given at this time in my life. I don’t know how to channel all of my gratitude without seeming fake or cheesy (as I tend to when I write, ha) but I think I will finish the letter to my dad that I have written. I know he’ll appreciate it. maybe I’ll post parts of it on here.

Reasons I am thankful

1. my room is clean
2. I have been sleeping well
3. I have friends that I like
4. my classes are not stressful
5. I am done with 2 essays that I was worried about
6. I am being pretty healthy
7. jcrew size 2 shorts still fit!
8. CONVENIENCE—gym across the park, tube, classes downstairs, museums, kitchen..
9. my parents are truly amazing.
10. most of the people that are important to me are alive and happy

People I need to talk to more

1. DAD
2. forrest
3. annie
4. ada
5. josephine
6. lizzy
7. lauren sols
8. *lauren vick
9. hanna
10. kooper

Things I want to see and do

1. Fabric
2. English countryside
3. BARCELONA
4. amsterdam
5. bloody mary’s at brunch
6. speaker’s corner
7. meet some more locals!
8. travel journal
9. skydive
10. skiing in the alps

Things I need to work on

1. getting enough sleep
2. not talking shit about people
3. spirituality
4. reading.. for school and recreationally
5. working out
6. eating smaller portions
7. keeping everything clean
8. journaling*
9. blogging often
10. being productive

Things to make the world/community better

1. recycle more
2. pick up more trash
3. walk more than taking the bus
4. clean up the kitchen when I see the need
5. ask more questions to people I feel I don’t know
6. spend time with someone I haven’t spent time with yet
7. show that I care
8. compliment people more
9. write positive notes/spread optimism
10. acts of love/generosity—secretly

I have to say, I am proud of myself. I don’t know if it is the simplicity of my classes, the people I am around, or truly a change within myself, but I am doing really well at letting my life flow by without worrying or planning too extensively. As I have mentioned before, I am an avid planner and a huge worrier… neither of which seems to help much. So this year, I have taken it upon myself to abandon this aspect of my personality and try to just be. I am just letting things work themselves out because I know, and have actually always known, that life pulls itself together when I have faith. This weekend in Munich is an amazing example of how worrying is unnecessary. I did not allow myself to feel stressed about the trip even though lots of things could have gone wrong—- We were two girls alone in Germany speaking NO German, knowing nothing about the public transportation system, with no experience with Oktoberfest or Germany in general, having no idea where the hotel was and couldn’t have known less about what exactly we’d be doing all weekend. THINGS COULD NOT HAVE RUN MORE SMOOTHLY. It truly gave me confidence in my ability to navigate, use common sense, and travel on my own… I need to constantly be in this mindset. worrying is the biggest cause of failure and disaster. positive energy truly causes positive outcomes. my mother would be so proud of me, she is the queen of not worrying. But it is so true! the things I would have worried about were totally trivial and unimportant when it came down to it. If anything were to go wrong, I had a phone, enough cash, and an emergency credit card. I was secure. no reason to stress.

In addition, I was worried about my two in class essays this week.. and they turned out JUST FINE. I need to apply this to school so much because my test anxiety has been so bad in the past. I have the abilities to succeed, and I do not need to worry about tests because they are truly CONQUERABLE. I am believing this so much more as this year becomes evidence that situations truly work out in the end.

I was worried about food and eating healthily enough and not eating at restaurants too often— and look what I found! Two friends that have similar concerns and we can support each other and are on the same page with our eating habits.

I was worried about spending too much money and being around people that didn’t feel guilty like I do when using parent’s money.. and THEY CARE AS MUCH AS I DO.

I was worried about having friends that have similar interests and goals and travel destinations, and I couldn’t have found better ones!

I was worried about roommates, and it worked out wonderfully! better than if I had been in a two person room.

I was worried about being away from David and us never talking.. but we talk often and are friends!

All of these things are truly amazing! I must remember to stay in the mindset of keeping in the sunlight— remembering to see the good, be optimistic, be healthy, live freely, and most of all realize that the sun comes up every morning without failing and darkness does not last forever.

• HISTORY 390:
  • This is my upper-division History class that is about the Middle East and its politics, wars, history (of course), religion, and current events. We have already learned a ton and I feel much more informed about everything going on there. It is a very relevant class to my generation especially because most of the Middle Eastern issues that involve America have been going on most of my life, so I feel familiar with a lot of it while still having a lot of curiosity. This is the course in which the professor told us would be the most challenging course we ever take. So far, he is right. It is very difficult and challenging, but I have been keeping up with current events, my reading, and have been taking good notes in class. We had an in class essay this Monday about “Sharia’ah,” or Islamic Law, and how it defines the “Ummah,” or Islamic Community. I think I did really well, but I will find out in a week or so. This essay was fortunately not for a grade, but what he is doing is reading it, analyzing and critiquing it, and then meeting with us to discuss how we could improve our writing and knowledge. We will eventually have another paper in his class that counts for a majority of our final grade that we have to demonstrate how we have improved as writers, historians and critical thinkers.
• ENGLISH 380
  • This is also an upper division class about Modern Drama. Initially I was kind of bummed, because I thought it was going to be about British Literature, but I have actually found this class to be very interesting. I knew very little about Theatre prior to this class, and I seem to be learning a lot. We had our first exam this morning, and I hope I did well. I studied enough, and read 3 of the 4 plays that is was over. It was an essay test, and I think the content of what I wrote was good, but I am not so sure about the format. Oh well, I will find out soon enough. Anyways, this class is cool. We read plays, then discuss them in class and learn about the historical context, the author’s life, and then watch the play in the following class period. We also go to plays once a month with the class. We went to one on Tuesday night called “The Black Album.” It was a very controversial play about the life of a young man of Pakistani descent that lives in London during the time of the publication of Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses. It is really interesting, and talks a lot about important, but uncomfortable issues like racism, religious extremism, multiculturalism versus assimilation etc. I liked the play a lot, but it was very very controversial and a little bit explicit. Interesting and thought-provoking, though.
• ART 200
  • My art class is probably my favorite class. The official title is Art in Permanent Revolution. My professor, Rachel Barnes, is a world renowned art critic and has even written a book on Salvador Dali (one of my fave artists!). She is AMAZING. I love her class. Every Tuesday we come to class with a little info prepared about the previous week’s museum trip. Each of us are to have chosen two paintings each by a different artist of similar backgrounds and discuss the similarities and how they have influenced one another. It is very cool. We get to talk a lot and listen a lot. We are currently learning about Impressionism and Realism and Turner and John Constable are the artists we are focusing on. We start with Realism and go over the course of time and how art changes with history changing and we analyze the artists and the differences of the works as society evolves. We will end with modern art!
• Equestrian
  • My equestrian class is amazing!! We have class, in Hyde Park. We started out on lead, with our instructors attached to our horse on their horse. The third week of class, Azzurra and I were the only two out of our group who got to ride off lead!! Which was amazing. Riding English is so much harder than Western, I can’t even explain it! But… I am not awful at it for just starting out, so that is exciting. I led a small group last week and got to canter on my own. We’ll see how I end up by the end of the semester. If I am really good, hahah, I will do it next semester too! Hyde park is also really beautiful, especially at this time of the year with all of the leaves falling and the green everywhere contrasting with the brown, dead leaves.
• HUMANITIES
  • My humanities is also a very interesting class. I have 2 hours of lecture on Wednesdays followed by 1 hour at the museum (with my art professor, actually). We get to learn a lot about things that are very near to our location. For example we were learning about Gothic Architecture and the Salisbury Cathedral, and we had already BEEN there so it all made sense and was relevant to things we had seen. It is a great class, and I love taking it here because so many of the things we discuss are close enough to go see in real life!!

Today for some reason I have been thinking about flying a lot and how much I miss taking lessons or even just going with my dad. There is something so amazing about the sky and being in control moving through the sky that just makes me feel so free. I miss that SO much. and I miss my dad.

München. What a great place. We definitely had a fabulous time. The last day, though, was a little rough for me. Carson and I woke up around 6am for no reason at all, laid in bed for a couple of hours and recapped the day before, laughing uncontrollably all the while. The moment I sat up, I realized I was a little more hungover than I previously thought. Horrible, horrible headache, dying of thirst, nauseated.. SO, I went over to the minibar and reached in for a water. I popped off the cap, and began to drink it. TURNS OUT it was sparkling water which is virtually unsatisfying in every way, especially when you are as dehydrated as a decaying corpse.. morbid I know, but this is how awful I felt at this moment. We eventually made it to the Hauptbrahnhof station(/heaven) and after I nearly died by trying to climb the stairs, into the starbucks. I FINALLY got a bottle of water and my mental state returned to normal. Okay, scratch that.. it went a little further in the direction of happiness and I became a little nuts for a bit. but nonetheless, I was doing much better than before. I then ate the most delicious piece of pizza—yes I know, cheese… vegan… whhhhat? but it was very delicious and detrimental to my survival at this point in time. So that helped as well. We then made our way to the airport and I continued to be in the odd mood that I loved. I bought some eyeliner, we shopped around for a bit… had some DISGUSTING food at this restaurant (did not phase me really in my manic mood).. and then hopped on the plane around 11am. the short 1 hour flight was not bad, I sat next to carson and I played a lot of word mole. If only I had brought my iPhone.. I could have played tetris. We made it back safe and sound with absolutely no complications in the whole trip. What a success! carson and I were so proud of ourselves. Everything ran so smoothly for a trip that was hastily planned and in a country where we knew none of the language or anything really about the city. We did great! and public transportation is our new bff. successful first trip. Greece is next.. but that will be even simpler!