Life, or What You Will

"Well some say life
Will beat you down,
And break your heart,
Steal your crown.

So it started out
For God-knows-where.
I guess I'll know
When I get there.

I'm learning to fly
Around the clouds.
What goes up
Must come down."
-Tom Petty, Learning to Fly

When aspects of my life that were meaningful are taken away, other things lose their meaning, too. And that’s rough. But lately, a long series of occurrences have made me feel that certain things happen for a reason. That everything’s gonna be okay. Perhaps I’m just searching for meaning in my life. But perhaps there aren’t always coincidences – things were meant to be, or not to be. My mom says she’s always seeing “signs,” something in the newspaper or on TV that parallels some part of her life. She thinks it’s God’s way of showing approval, so to speak. I have noticed similar things in my life as well. Whatever the case, it makes me happy to believe that I’m making the right choices, and that’s good enough for me.

This has without a doubt been the hardest year of my life. Everything that I wanted so much to stay the same, changed. It took me a long time to notice that I was unhappy at YES – I thought I was just unhappy in general. When I decided to resign, the first thing I wanted was to visit my Nana. I sat with her at dinner in Seven Acres and told her about the guy I was currently dating (she hinted about wanting grandkids!) and, most importantly, I told her I quit my job. She was completely unperturbed, smiling and saying I’d figure things out. And that made it okay. She was always smiling, always proud of me. I’d call her my best friend when I was little and it stuck.

That’s the last time I saw her. She was in high spirits, talkative and happy to see me. I didn’t know it was my goodbye at the time, but just a few days later she had a heart attack. I’ve dealt with it by telling myself that quitting my job was the right thing to do – it granted me the best goodbye to my best friend.

So that made two important people missing in my life. It’s weird how people deal with things, and I could only handle one thing at a time. Months later, out of the blue I started feeling nostalgic about my Nana. I guess I was finally able to handle the pain of coming to terms with her death. I cried, and allowed the memory of her to flood my thoughts. The images of my last visit with her are etched in my heart. It goes without saying (yet I’ll say it) that she’ll always be a part of me.

It’s…odd, how quickly someone can come into/leave/reenter your life. I suppose it’s beautiful, I mean, the heart has such a great capacity to love. While I’ve struggled with recent losses, people from my past have revisited my life, helping to patch the broken pieces. Helene was my childhood best friend, but we grew apart and barely saw each other throughout high school and college. I was able to visit her in New York City in March and now I feel wonderfully close to her again! In fact, it’s crazy how much more similar we are now than ever before. Nicolette and I were close friends in high school but we lost touch my freshman year at Rice, simply because we were busy. She ran into our friend Maury a little over a month ago at the car dealership, I got her cell from him, and now she’s back in my life… When Linnea and Rachel were away, in NYC and abroad, respectively, we didn’t talk at all. Now, they’re back and it’s as though no time elapsed. Though I’m sad that Lisa and I aren’t as close, Marielle and I somehow are even closer. Orly, another high school friend, contacted me a few weeks ago, again after no contact throughout college. The cincher was when Mara contacted me this past weekend, adding to the ghosts of Friendships Past that kept cropping up like wildflowers. Though we were never close in high school – different schools and busy schedules – we got along super well. We’re getting together sometime, too.

As hard as this year has been, I like to think these people have been brought back into my life to help me out in some way. It’s been a crazy, hellish year, and “I’m learning to fly around the clouds” (which happen to be enormous, dense, dark stormclouds!). And it hasn’t been all bad. Within a week of quitting my job, I’d set up an interview at the Alley Theatre and secured an assistant directing role with Rob Bundy at Stages Repertory Theatre – their Early Stages show, The Toys Take Over Christmas. The Alley Theatre education internship and teaching artist school residencies are fabulous, and I’m going to Williamstown Theatre Festival for the summer, followed by another internship who knows where? It’s a good thing I’m “learning to fly” because Williamstown, Massachusetts is pretty far away! :)