Hello, big, wide, scary Internet! It's been six months and I think that I've deprived you quite long enough of my literary genius! (Only joking... I really don't think anything nearly as epic as that of myself). However, I do think that I owe my ever loyal and loving band of eclectic and wonderful followers an update on my life and where I am "at" right now.
The past six months have been kind of crazy for me. I've learned a lot, grown a lot, absorbed a lot, experienced a lot, and changed a little... but in a big way. Life has a funny way of tossing you the hard (but good) stuff in huge bundles - not little paperback lessons you can stuff into a rucksack and cart around with you to refer back to when the going gets tough, but huge tomes that fall out of the sky and whack you back into reality out of your perfect little daydream. "Wake up, kid. Life needs to be addressed, and it wants your full attention." Guess that's how I can sum up my comings-and-goings lately.
The second semester of my sophomore year of college was certainly a hard one in many ways, but as I already stated, also a good one. A wise man (or woman) once said, "There are no bad experiences, only learning experiences," or something to that effect. I've been trying to convince myself that I just got hurled through those quotations marks and came out on the other side stronger and more informed. I wouldn't recognize myself or my life if I'd met the present me say, two or three years ago... But I also wouldn't change a thing about the journey I've embarked on to get here. As (excuse my French) shitty as things are in thick of it all, hindsight always brings me back to earth and kicks me in the butt saying "I told you so. Now take this ass-kicking and run with it, chica. You've got a whole lot more living to do."
Love has been a central theme in my life for the past six months. Being madly, deeply, and totally in love; fighting to hold onto all different kinds of love; questioning love(s); being hurt by people and things I thought loved me and that I still try to love back; finding new loves; rekindling old loves; and cherishing the unconditional, beautiful, and radiant love of those dear to me have filled every pore of my existence lately. And for all of this (the good, the bad, the hard, and the amazing), I am so grateful and privileged to be imbibed in. As Jennifer Hudson's character, Louis from Saint Louis, from the movie Sex and the City said, "Love is the thing, you know." And yeah, I get it now. Love IS the thing. It makes and breaks us (sorry for the cliché... But REALLY!). It holds us together when we fall apart, and it's the thing that we can never give or receive too much of. I know all this now. Or at least, in my short twenty years, I am slowly coming to grasp the concept. And I must admit, I love love.
Speaking of me right now, there's a little news to be relayed, which may not be news to some of you. I am having open-hip surgery on June 29th at Duke University at the hands of a very accomplished surgeon that deals exclusively with ailments of the hip. Yup. I'm scared shitless. And to top that all off, let me just say that I haven't danced in coming onto two months and it is KILLING me. After this surgery I will have to wait another four to six months before I even start thinking about taking barre again. Hopefully my arms will look great though - considering how proficient I should be at the end of this in the art of using crutches! Let me state it again: I am scared shitless. I actually haven't been this scared before. Ever. But I have to have this operation, and like the messes and lemons (and messy lemons) life throws all of us, I know that I will come out the other side a stronger, healthier, more informed, and more aware person and artist. I am going to have my leg literally sawed off at the bone, get my hip socket re-shaped, have the torn labrum (cartilage pad) reattached in my hip socket, and get pieced back together again. Sorry if that put you off your dinner. I'm just stating the facts in layman's terms.
So between now and then, I am busying myself with going to the gym everyday in an effort to stay in some kind of shape, spending some much-missed time with my family, and meeting up with a few good friends from my high school days. I have the odd adventure here and there in this little town of a city of Raleigh, but truth be told (and it's really not that much of a secret), I miss San Francisco and the Bay area so much already. In an ideal world, I wish I could pick up my family and bring them with me to California when I am out there during the school year. I really only get to see them once or twice a year, and it makes me kind of crazy. I have people on either side of the country that I love more than anything, so you see my dilemma. But it's absolutely amazing what some good time at "home" can do for your sanity. This will actually be the first summer in many, many years that I will spend my entire summer vacation at home instead of dancing at intensives or working with choreographers and doing the "adult thing" in my bicoastal home in NorCal.
My mother and I had brunch today with a wonderful and good friend - who encouraged me to pick up my blog again (if you are reading, "merci," "gracias," "gratias," and "thank you" for the inspiration and incredible conversation!). We talked at length about how much we both absolutely LOVE San Francisco and the Bay area, and how lucky we've both been to have spent the formative years of our lives there (I of course am still in the middle of this chapter)... It made me miss it that much more, and made me realize how fortunate I am to be able to call that wonderful place one of my dearest homes. To keep it short and sweet: I have found a lot of love there. A LOT of LOVE.
That's where I am right now.
More to come, very soon... And I promise it won't take me six months this time.
Wishing you all the LOVE in the world, XO
