jinners: why do you come here? and why do you hang around?
who is jinners?
why do you come here? and why do you hang around? ...it was just to see, just to see all the things you knew, i'd written about you... oh so many illustrations...
jinners is my nickname... hopefully in an affectionate sorta way.
Last night at around midnight I had an urge to start writing the book that I have always wanted to write. I always said I never really knew what I wanted to say to the world, but all of a sudden clear ideas were popping into my head and finding their way into my TextEdit. Wherever that burst of writer's energy came from, THANK GOODNESS.
It was exactly what I needed to make myself feel a little better this month. I love that I finally had the courage to quit the cubicle a year ago in favor of pursuing some of my deepest loves... but as with anything, there are sacrifices and trials along the way to keep me guessing and questioning. It keeps my life unpredictable.
But what a fucking horror of a month it's been! I know all of life has ups and downs, but February not only boasts the shortest number of days (despite the leap year, I may add) it can also add to its list -- the first snow storm of the year in New York, my first time actually working on Valentine's Day, various personal struggles and the brokest month of my life since quitting my full-time job and forging on to freelance life. I know in the end these growing pains will pay off (one can hope, eh?), but what a fucking ride, dude.
In all honesty though, I'm thriving off the whole goddamn thing. I'm not all complaints. There were a lot of bright moments, too, thanks to my lovely stable of close friends. I am thankful for having a great support system to keep me breathing in the city. THANK YOU!
I don't always get to capture the important, memorable moments of my life, but sometimes I get lucky and actually take the camera out for a quick snap-snap. Here are some of my favorite recent moments...
I have been living in New York for 10 years now. Maybe I keep saying this in wonder over and over again, but I just can't help myself. I am in disbelief that the years have passed me by so quickly.
When I was applying to colleges back in the 90s, I knew there was only one city I wanted to go to. New York City, baby! I had attended a nerdy high school newspaper conference at Columbia University, and I instantly fell in love with the loud traffic blaring by, thousands of swift stomps from commuters, the anonymity, the small world-ishness. I connected with it in a New York minute. There was no other place, as far as I was concerned.
Now a decade later, my mind feels like it's starting to come full circle. I had arrived in the city with a lot of baggage (literal and figurative). I had been determined to lose said baggage here and peel away the layers until I had discovered myself, my true self. As you may have guessed, the city has a mystical way of handing you some epiphanies right away, and others are tucked away until the right time.
The other week while chatting with a friend about our complicated, crazy-ass family stories, I had a self-epiphany that I never thought I would have and it led me to a book idea. A book idea!!! If you know me, I have been waiting for this moment for a while. Yes, I manage bands now, but the music industry side of me snuck up on me post-college. Before I started promoting shows, I started a blog so that I could write about what I cared about. So that I could write about whatever I felt like writing about. True freedom. Almost too much freedom, one could argue.
So yeah, I guess I have been waiting for that one moment of focus, and then all of a sudden the book idea popped up. So I have decided to start writing my story, my saga, and I actually feel like I have a meaningful (though personally terrifying) tale to tell about my life and my family.
I started running again a couple of days ago. My legs hurt from the unused muscles coming out of inactivity. Though I said I didn't make any New Year's resolutions, this life change just snuck up on me. I kind of love starting my day with a run now. I get to listen to some good music, mouth the words while I circle the track and come home with a clear head. What could be better? Hopefully I will be in tip-top shape for ruining my healthy lifestyle during SXSW this year. HA!
So I didn't make any New Year's resolutions this year. Not that I typically make a habit of making them, but this year I was at a loss when I thought about what I wanted to change in my life for 2008. The end of the year is always a hurricane of emotion for me because my birthday is in late December. I turned 29. My blog turned 5. I've been a band manager for over 4 years. This past year also marked my 10th year in New York, which I think makes me a real Nyoo Yawker. How crazy? How quickly does life pass by? Does anyone else feel this way?
I remember when I first dreamed of moving to New York as a teenager. It was the only place I wanted to be, and I knew I would find something here for me... though admittedly, my life veered into a direction I never would have expected it to take. But I have no regrets so far!
My friend Yuri got engaged at the Wilco show at Voodoo Festival this weekend... "Heavy Metal Drummer" was dedicated to her and her fiance Mike while her cute face was plastered on the big screen with a "Will you marry me?". Awwwwwww. Go, Mike! That's such a perfect indie rock proposal!
Katy's hotel is in the worst part of town... midtown. But we managed to have fun anyways on her last night in the city. The bar inside is really cute and right next to a pool, where you can see people swimming behind the bar. Among the bands I heard in the hotel's playlist: Fujiya & Miyagi, Real Life, Calvin Harris, Information Society and some others. HA!
In most pictures, smiling makes me look like I have no eyes. But I swear, they are open. However Facebook's FaceDouble Celebrity Look Alike Program totally shut me down. See below.
So my sister told me that our grandfather died over the weekend. Usually it would follow that there would be some sadness felt here, but I don't feel sad. I didn't even know the man. He had abandoned my grandmother long ago, and was still living in Korea at a monastery or something.
Here's my question: If you are blood-related to someone but you didn't really know them while they were alive, should you feel sad when they pass on? Connected? Sad for the disconnection?
Most of the stories in my family's life follow the typical dysfunctional family outlines. No one gets along. There are a lot of myths floating around about various members of the family, in particular mine, because my immediate family is the only one with a broken marriage... two broken marriages, in fact.
I know I have some family out there on the West Coast, too, that I don't really know well, but at least I've met them before. But I've often wondered the same question about them -- them being my birth mother and my "whole" sister, who happens to be a year younger than me. I'm almost positive I would be sad. I think I've always hoped that when I got older, I could reconnect with them in a meaningful way, without all the dysfunction. Perhaps that will still happen one day.
As far as the family I grew up with, I am definitely getting closer to my sister Cathy. As she's catapulted into her 20s, I find we have more and more in common. And it's a nice feeling when I can actually help her with different aspects of her life. I actually feel like a sister. Go figure!
i can't believe that hilly kristal died. i remember when i first came to new york, and i was a budding journalist-in-training at the nyu paper. they assigned steph and me to a story on "how punk is dead." we hit the streets of new york and asked various people on the street what their thoughts on the issue were. eventually somehow, we wandered into cbgbs. we thought, this is the perfect place to find the answer.
the venue was as smelly and dirty as ever, and hilly kristal was sitting up front just like in the photo above. we asked him about whether he thought punk was dead and got into an entire discussion about the history of cbgbs. i think we were there for well over an hour listening to his amazing stories. i don't know why he talked to us, but he did. i need to find that cassette interview. it's somewhere in my pile of dead interview tapes.
one day i will resurrect all my funny interviews for all to hear. don't you love technology?
oh the daze of summer is soon approaching its end, and here i am, sitting in front of my computer on a rainy tuesday morning.
i leave for a wedding on thursday. i am a bridesmaid. it is my first time being in a bridal party like this, and i feel as if i have been the least helpful bridesmaid. of course, the bride, my best friend steph, lives in maryland and the wedding is in dc, so i've just been around more for moral support over the phone.
i remember when i first heard that steph got engaged. it was a moment that definitely signified the end of something, and the beginning of something else. but of what? at first i thought it was the end of best friends and the beginning of best couple, but i realized that those thoughts were brought on by my own insecurities and issues.
it's true that i don't really believe in marriage, but i don't think that was the issue since a couple of my other friends had gotten married over the last couple years. i think the real issue was that i had been holding on to the hope that steph would some day move back to new york and we would be reunited as best friends in the same city once again. but with her engagement, i knew this hope was no longer a feasible option.
however, once i accepted this change, it was fine. i knew that life would be a little different for me, but i would continue to be friends with steph. just not in the same exact way. and i was ok with that.
mike and i spent approximately 36 hours in amsterdam last week, and it was quite amazing and surreal. we basically went coffeeshop-hopping the entire time we were there. we wandered around the red light district. we tried a couple new things... we had the wildest time, and we will probably go back for mike's big 3-0 in november... here are some photos from the trip...
i am currently abroad on business and pleasure! going to the benicassim festival again this year in valencia, spain and then off to a brief trip to amsterdam afterwards. awesome! see you when i return... my biggest goal for the weekend is to stalk amy winehouse and try to convince her to do shots with me. yeah right!
last week mike and i went to visit the Quik-E-Mart located near port authority in New York. yep, the 7-Eleven convenience store was transformed into Simspons-mania. it was fun! this is all part of the crazy, omnipresent simpsons movie promotion. they sold buzz cola, but i couldn't find any. my friend jason though bought a six-pack of buzz. i was looking for duff beer but they didn't have any. all of the pink-frosted donuts were gone. they had squishees instead of slurpees. we bought a box of Krusty-Os, still uneated above. i loved it all.
