Five Things I Would Tell Myself If I Knew I Was Listening:
1) Your to-cut-or-not-to-cut hair debate is boring for other people. I mean, everyone loves a good "Styles That Are Good For Your Face Shape" article, but just because your best friends have a high tolerance for your yattering does not mean that you should take advantage. Your time with them is precious. Do not waste it (or at least not often) on explaining your inner debates about layers and bangs.
2) You are probably not going to be a professional figure skater, ballerina, actress, or aerial fabric...-er. You should start the process of trying to get over that sometime soon.
3a) Life is short. Throw out the uncomfortable underwear.
3b) Picking wedgies is likely considered an unattractive quality in an intern.
4) Putting more vegetables on your plate than you used to is not actually the same thing as eating more vegetables. Also, if you are going to make New Year's Resolutions involving your diet, you should probably do some of the grocery shopping, or at the very least take stock of what is in the refrigerator on a daily basis. Food that is delicious and good for you will probably not levitate into your lunch bag. But thank you (and you're welcome) for the imagery of carrot sticks and ants-on-a-log sack racing in Ziploc bags.
5) Giving pretend interviews in the shower with Conan and Ellen about the bestselling novel-turned-hit screenplay that you just wrote is not helping you a) Get to work on time, or b) Write a bestselling novel or screenplay. Unless you are planning to write the bestselling novel or screenplay The Girl with the Delusions in the Bathtub. Also, you will probably never be interviewed by James Lipton on Inside the Actor's Studio. That is a pipe dream. Nobody cares what your favorite swear word is. Also, you are not going to be a professional actress. (See #2.) I don't even want to go into the Academy Award acceptance speech. Yes, writers sometimes get those, but from what I understand, they usually have to write a screenplay first. (See "b" of this section.)
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Monday, January 14, 2013
Lists For No Reason #1: Why I Miss High School
Reasons Why I Miss High School:
1) Getting dressed mattered more. The best way I can explain this is by saying that clothes are one of my favorite things. They are my tattoos. They are my extra piercings. They are how I give off the vibe of funky/artsy/cute/elfin/demure/chic/fairylike/ future novelist. Which, in case I am unclear, is what I amattempting to do absolutely pulling off on a daily basis. Note: Work clothes and yoga pants do not count. I mean, I try really hard to make my work clothes reflect my personality, and it's not like I'm wearing pleated pantsuits in pastel colors every day, but honestly, there is just so much I can do with a dress code on some days. And if I'm in yoga pants, it means I have given up most of the way, but I have retained some pride in the fact that I am skinny and I have an okay little butt. So basically, I have very lofty fashion goals, but if I am not achieving them, assume that it's because my jobs or my athleticism are holding me back.
2) Activities. I want to take a free art class, be in a choir, play an instrument for which I take free lessons, be in a band for that instrument, and go see games where I actually feel loyalty for a team. (A short aside on why this would be significant: I am a terrible sports fan. Not only do I not understand or care what is happening, but when I do make an effort to understand and care, I always look at the TV at the wrong time. Like when the quarterback is tying his shoe or or the manager is squinting aggressively into the sun for five minutes while the analysts analyze what he might be thinking about. This is a chronic problem for me. High school was so much easier; you go, you play "La Bamba" on the flute, you have a band geek explain what "Fourth Down" means, and you are very very proud of the men in green and white. Because you, too, are wearing green and white. On your pep band windbreaker.)
3) Theatre people. I did a lot of theatre in high school. School plays, community plays, plays that were kind of like camp/classes that your parents paid for. I miss running around the Civic Center in a leotard. I miss singing all the time with people. I miss dressing rooms! Oh my God, no wonder I don't have any fun putting on my makeup anymore. I am just now realizing that it's not fun unless there are seven other girls squished into a mirror meant for three, your retinas are being burnt by forty light bulbs, and you're inadvertently in the background of another cast member's sixteen turned-around camera pictures. (Which are a lot easier these days with smartphones--just in time for them to no longer be age appropriate unless I'm drinking alcohol. Shame.) So really, I guess this one is theatre people/makeup. But mainly theatre people--they were the BEST. I'm sure they still are, I'm just no longer sure where to find them or how to fit them into my schedule when it's not "Rehearsal 9th period" anymore.
4) Buses. I actually love school buses. I'm not saying this to be cute or ironic. I'm aware that it's weird. I also got my license really late in life (this past July at the age of 22) and I'm sure this is something like Stockholm syndrome--I embraced my big yellow prison on wheels because I really had no control over my method of transportation, being afraid of operating any motor vehicle larger than a golf cart. But whatever the reasoning, I sincerely loved (and still probably would love) riding a school bus.
For one thing, my high school bus driver was insanely awesome. His name was Randy, he would wait for me at my stop, (yeah, before you judge me for not being outside at my stop on time, which I am defensive about even if you weren't gonna be judgmental about it, know this: I was the first stop in the morning. I was picked up at 6:50 am. Boom.) he had highlights and wore a leather jacket, was insanely skinny, smoked like a chimney, and had OCD. We talked about his kids and his need to get up at, like, 4 in the morning to vacuum every day. My mom made him brownies for Christmas. He was great. I wish I had his contact info, actually. We were real buddies by the end of my senior year.
Other than my everyday bus, I just loved buses in general. There's a very specific camaraderie that comes with using public transportation that is free and full of other people whose ages are within three years of yours. Where some people riding are actually friends, and you all know each other. And you all know where each other lives, but not in a creepy way. Where else does that happen?
5) (I always feel like I need at least five things in a list before it's legit.) I miss feeling well-known. Not that I had an inflated sense of self-importance in high school (or at least not any more than any other 14-18 year old) but that everyone kind of knew where I stood, and I kind of knew where everyone else stood. I was idealistic and smart and artsy and kind of a smart ass and I sucked at gym. And all of those things were assumed to a certain extent--people knew stuff about me. And I knew stuff about them. And as the Cheers theme song says...
Now, I would like to point out that any of these things could easily also be a reason why I don't miss high school at all. I love not feeling stressed out about not owning Hollister jeans, I love having my independence, and I am glad that not everybody I meet knows that I'm an unathletic Christian band geek who is completely afraid of boys. (Although on some level, I'm pretty sure I still manage to give out that vibe. If anyone knows any way to stop this, please let me know.) And as much as I miss the activities and the theatre, these are the most re-creatable things in this list--I could easily take an art class (though it wouldn't be free) and if I looked, I might be able to find a place to perform again. But I will probably never again be able to take free French Horn lessons with a borrowed instrument and play the theme from Pirates of the Caribbean in a band. And I am not entirely over this.
1) Getting dressed mattered more. The best way I can explain this is by saying that clothes are one of my favorite things. They are my tattoos. They are my extra piercings. They are how I give off the vibe of funky/artsy/cute/elfin/demure/chic/fairylike/ future novelist. Which, in case I am unclear, is what I am
2) Activities. I want to take a free art class, be in a choir, play an instrument for which I take free lessons, be in a band for that instrument, and go see games where I actually feel loyalty for a team. (A short aside on why this would be significant: I am a terrible sports fan. Not only do I not understand or care what is happening, but when I do make an effort to understand and care, I always look at the TV at the wrong time. Like when the quarterback is tying his shoe or or the manager is squinting aggressively into the sun for five minutes while the analysts analyze what he might be thinking about. This is a chronic problem for me. High school was so much easier; you go, you play "La Bamba" on the flute, you have a band geek explain what "Fourth Down" means, and you are very very proud of the men in green and white. Because you, too, are wearing green and white. On your pep band windbreaker.)
3) Theatre people. I did a lot of theatre in high school. School plays, community plays, plays that were kind of like camp/classes that your parents paid for. I miss running around the Civic Center in a leotard. I miss singing all the time with people. I miss dressing rooms! Oh my God, no wonder I don't have any fun putting on my makeup anymore. I am just now realizing that it's not fun unless there are seven other girls squished into a mirror meant for three, your retinas are being burnt by forty light bulbs, and you're inadvertently in the background of another cast member's sixteen turned-around camera pictures. (Which are a lot easier these days with smartphones--just in time for them to no longer be age appropriate unless I'm drinking alcohol. Shame.) So really, I guess this one is theatre people/makeup. But mainly theatre people--they were the BEST. I'm sure they still are, I'm just no longer sure where to find them or how to fit them into my schedule when it's not "Rehearsal 9th period" anymore.
4) Buses. I actually love school buses. I'm not saying this to be cute or ironic. I'm aware that it's weird. I also got my license really late in life (this past July at the age of 22) and I'm sure this is something like Stockholm syndrome--I embraced my big yellow prison on wheels because I really had no control over my method of transportation, being afraid of operating any motor vehicle larger than a golf cart. But whatever the reasoning, I sincerely loved (and still probably would love) riding a school bus.
For one thing, my high school bus driver was insanely awesome. His name was Randy, he would wait for me at my stop, (yeah, before you judge me for not being outside at my stop on time, which I am defensive about even if you weren't gonna be judgmental about it, know this: I was the first stop in the morning. I was picked up at 6:50 am. Boom.) he had highlights and wore a leather jacket, was insanely skinny, smoked like a chimney, and had OCD. We talked about his kids and his need to get up at, like, 4 in the morning to vacuum every day. My mom made him brownies for Christmas. He was great. I wish I had his contact info, actually. We were real buddies by the end of my senior year.
Other than my everyday bus, I just loved buses in general. There's a very specific camaraderie that comes with using public transportation that is free and full of other people whose ages are within three years of yours. Where some people riding are actually friends, and you all know each other. And you all know where each other lives, but not in a creepy way. Where else does that happen?
5) (I always feel like I need at least five things in a list before it's legit.) I miss feeling well-known. Not that I had an inflated sense of self-importance in high school (or at least not any more than any other 14-18 year old) but that everyone kind of knew where I stood, and I kind of knew where everyone else stood. I was idealistic and smart and artsy and kind of a smart ass and I sucked at gym. And all of those things were assumed to a certain extent--people knew stuff about me. And I knew stuff about them. And as the Cheers theme song says...
Now, I would like to point out that any of these things could easily also be a reason why I don't miss high school at all. I love not feeling stressed out about not owning Hollister jeans, I love having my independence, and I am glad that not everybody I meet knows that I'm an unathletic Christian band geek who is completely afraid of boys. (Although on some level, I'm pretty sure I still manage to give out that vibe. If anyone knows any way to stop this, please let me know.) And as much as I miss the activities and the theatre, these are the most re-creatable things in this list--I could easily take an art class (though it wouldn't be free) and if I looked, I might be able to find a place to perform again. But I will probably never again be able to take free French Horn lessons with a borrowed instrument and play the theme from Pirates of the Caribbean in a band. And I am not entirely over this.
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Five Resolutions
I am a big believer in New Year's resolutions. I like having goals. I like setting the bar high for myself. The fact that setting resolutions and keeping them are two entirely different endeavors can result in some challenges and frustration (such as the frustration in trying to actually finding the time to go to the gym three times a week or choose a night every week to do something new and crafty.
Even so, mine is an optimistic soul. Plus, making lists is fun.
1. Visit Pittsburgh and Providence
My friend Katy lives in Pittsburgh, and so does Mike's friend Nick. I love being shown around a new city by someone who loves it there.
Providence is such an artsy place--I was actually researching some grad schools there recently, and there are some great programs. Plus it's on water.
2. Join a book club
I feel better mentally (more imaginative, more mentally exercised, more...well-used) when I'm reading something good. Good mental health = much higher chance of Lizzy achieving dreams and goals. And a book club would ensue that I actually set a deadline for myself to read stuff that somebody else decided was good. Plus there would be other people there who like to read. So it's a litmus test for friends and books. Now, if I can only find one that works with my regular schedule... or lack thereof...
3. Sketch at least one thing per week
I already write every day, and I should really sketch every day too. But I'm trying to stay realistic here. And sitting down with my sketchbook once a week would be good for keeping me in practice.
4. Sew/modify some of my own clothes.
I think the blogs about this are so cool and I really want to try some of the techniques, for like turning a frumpy shirt into a sleeveless shift dress, or an old lady dress into a cute dress, or a scratched up purse into a cool, funky one...You get the theme here.
5. Set myself a writing deadline, like one chapter per week.
This one is really important to me. I am serious about this book. And I have to make it happen.
Awesome cartoon with a freakish resemblance to my life!
Even so, mine is an optimistic soul. Plus, making lists is fun.
Lizzy's Top Five New Year's Resolutions 2013
1. Visit Pittsburgh and Providence
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| Pittsburgh |
 |
Providence |
Providence is such an artsy place--I was actually researching some grad schools there recently, and there are some great programs. Plus it's on water.
2. Join a book clubI feel better mentally (more imaginative, more mentally exercised, more...well-used) when I'm reading something good. Good mental health = much higher chance of Lizzy achieving dreams and goals. And a book club would ensue that I actually set a deadline for myself to read stuff that somebody else decided was good. Plus there would be other people there who like to read. So it's a litmus test for friends and books. Now, if I can only find one that works with my regular schedule... or lack thereof...
I already write every day, and I should really sketch every day too. But I'm trying to stay realistic here. And sitting down with my sketchbook once a week would be good for keeping me in practice.
 |
| This is from a blog about remaking $1 dresses every day. |
I think the blogs about this are so cool and I really want to try some of the techniques, for like turning a frumpy shirt into a sleeveless shift dress, or an old lady dress into a cute dress, or a scratched up purse into a cool, funky one...You get the theme here.
5. Set myself a writing deadline, like one chapter per week.
This one is really important to me. I am serious about this book. And I have to make it happen.
Awesome cartoon with a freakish resemblance to my life!
Happy New Year everyone! :)
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