The Jump

The bridge by her apartment has been under construction for months. The orange cones are a distraction and she has a healthy fear of hitting the temporary Jersey barrier. Driving in a straight line has never been among her strengths.

Earlier this week, the safety fences had been removed in preparation for what now appears to be the instillation of more safety fences.

“They took down the fences. You could jump if you wanted,” she had remarked to her passenger. “Well, not you. But you know... anyone could.”

'I could,' is what she had thought, but she chose to keep that to herself. As the week wore on her fantasies became more complex.

At first, she just pictured herself pulling her car to the side of the highway, as if it had simply broken down, and calmly walking to the edge and stepping up and off and then slipping through the water soundlessly. She gave little thought to how cold the water might be.

By the end of the week, she had decided the best way to go was to wait until no traffic would get in her way, run from one side of the bridge to the other, and jump over the wall like a hurdle. Her landing wouldn't be pretty, but it would be pretty fantastic.

Grace, she had concluded, is a horrible way to greet death.

The One That Got Away

She wonders how long it'll be until he's no longer a worn down cliché that she only takes out and plays with when she's just the right mix of wistful and melancholy.

She doesn't need wine to fall into a black hole of remembrance. Her triggers are more subtle and less Hollywood. She carries just enough anger to make sure that one day she'll let go, but not quite enough to ensure that day is today.

She knows he misses her, probably more than she misses him, but she does her best not to indulge him when he falls into his own hole and starts the calling and the messaging, declaring his love.

If he had truly loved her, he would have chosen her, instead of sprouting a bride to be without even consulting her. She wouldn't have found out long after the decision had been made and announced. There's no going back once the envelopes have been mailed.

The vision he had of their shared futures had scared him almost as much her own had wooed her. Hers lit her up, but his made him flee.

The irony strikes her as funny. He had run headlong into the future he was trying to get away from, and now she's engaged in building the life that he had wanted for them, but assumed she hadn't.

A rueful grin plays on her lips as she imagines him out West, in that house full of children neither of them wanted, as she sits sipping coffee and reading their favorite philosophers in her quiet apartment on the Upper East Side.

Vanity

Sometimes, the darkness becomes comfortable.

It's insidious that way. It may make you completely miserable and, eventually, stolid, but it becomes familiar and almost welcoming.

But there has to come a moment when you decide that being comfortable is less important than being happy.

I feel like time is slipping by. That I shamelessly murder time, waiting for something to happen, instead of getting up and out and choosing to make things happen.

Change takes will and time. By doing it, not wasting it.

It's not going to happen by spilling pixels.

Jerkface

I'm not entirely sure which of these chickens I actually am. I guess I don't have to actually choose, which is good, because I'm pretty sure I'm both. 

I'm such a needy little chickadee sometimes. I want people to read my blog, dammit! But I don't really write here all that much, right? But that doesn't stop me from wanting the attention! I'm a delicate little flower, who needs lots and lots of watering, but gives you precious little beauty. 

But that beauty is precious! Tell me it's precious!

But I am totally the other, more snarky, chicken. I believe pretty deeply that it's important to be nice to everyone and be a loving person and stuff, but I believe a little more deeply in a really awesome insult. 

Life is messy and dark, despite my struggle to make it all sunshiney and happy-like. As much as I understand the need for positivity and encouragement, I do think that a world full of only soft words would be a pretty boring one. 

I can hardly believe I am publicly advocating mean-spiritedness, but I guess that's exactly what I'm doing. 

Bitches. 

Know Your Role

Winter is in full swing here in New England, and my creativity seems to be buried under the ridiculous amount of snow we've been... uh... blessed with.

It's as if winter has come and killed everything dead, and having the audacity to create among all of this nothingness would be disrespectful.

We're all about respect around here...

Yes, and...

One of my hobbies is improv. I'm not a great player yet, but I'm a pretty awesome watcher. I love the distraction that comedy provides. Stresses and worries melt away, and laughter must produce endorphins. I'm sure there's a study somewhere by some really smart people confirming my suspicions.

One of the cornerstones of improv is "Yes, and..." Basically, ideas presented in a scene are accepted for what they are and built upon. If someone in the scene intimates that everyone is on a dairy farmer, they're now on a dairy farm and hey! we're milking cows!

It wouldn't further the scene if some malcontent was like, "No we're not! Farms are stupid!"

And yet, it seems, in my daily life, I tend to do a lot 'No, and... now I'm going to go pout like a big baby!"

It certainly doesn't further my life. It makes me a whole lot of unhappy, and I'm sure that there's a study somewhere that says I'm willfully murdering my own endorphins.

One of the books I've been reading posits that there are two kinds of people in the world: people who see problems and people who see challenges.

A lot of us have jobs that train us to identify problems. And it's pretty likely to cause us to be unhappy.

As a manager, it's my job to stand back from a situation and size it up--to figure out how to make things run more smoothly, and hopefully stop problems before they come up.

Unfortunately, it means I am really good at identifying what is wrong.

This isn't the kind of outlook I want to have. I want to retain my ability to recognize problems for what they are, but use that to find the opportunity that results from it.

So, business is a little slow right now. It's winter and we're coming off the holidays, and people perceive themselves as having a little less disposable income than usual.

For me, this translates into less hours at work and a smaller paycheck. This could be a problem.

Or it could be an opportunity.

'Yes, I have a smaller paycheck, and... I can eat more meals at home, improving my cooking skills, and making me feel better physically!'

That's how it's done.

Seeing Things as They Are

We don't see things as they are, we see things as we are.

Anais Nin

This week, it has been really difficult for me to gain a clear perspective, and see things are they, instead of how I am.

It's so hard for me to transcend how I am feeling in the moment and remember all the things I have struggled to learn.

I have a natural aversion to things I refer to as 'new agey.' And things like self-validation smack of new agey to me, as do breathing exercises and meditation and clearing my mind and all those things that are good for a healthy and balanced life.

I know I see things as I am and not as they are, because when I see pictures of myself, I literally want to hide my face in shame and never look at them again, because I am so FAT. Like, omg, someone wire my jaw shut fat.

Except that I'm not.

I'm more like, get off the couch and eat some freaking vegetables fat. The Biggest Loser wouldn't cast me, even if I had an amazingly sad, sappy story that needed triumphing.

I need to run some laps, but I'm not exactly a candidate for desperate measures.

But every time I see myself, it's like there's a fun house mirror filter in my brain that changes the nature of what I see.

I know that so far a lot of entries in this blog have been about my insecurities, but this is where I am right now. It's who I am and I need to process it all before I'll be ready to change.

Process.


Sounds like new agey bullshit to me! ;-)

Latest Lessons

So, the first life lesson of the new year was (and still is!) a pretty tough reality to face.

We can't make people happy by changing in order to make them happy. And we certainly don't make ourselves happy when we try.

There's nothing wrong with us just the way we are, at least at the core. The things that we do may be wrong (e.g., neglecting nutrition and fitness), but the fundamental parts of our personality (being empathetic, choosing feelings over thoughts) are not objectively right or wrong.

And trying to fight who we are just causes unneeded suffering and unhappiness.

I also forgot one of the primary lessons that economics teaches: the concept of sunk costs.

So, the goal (at least in my little corner of the world) is to maximize utility. We do that by making correct choices at the margin.

And, given our limited access to information, we sometimes make the wrong choice and choose something that makes us so unhappy that it costs us utility.

Sometimes, these are minor things like buying a hot dog at a baseball game and not actually enjoying it. We feel obligated to eat it, though, because we just spent $6 on a freaking hot dog. But because it is so terribly horrible, we're actually losing utility.

We feel invested, and therefore, compelled to see the investment through.

In the case of the hot dog, it's not really a big deal. We eat it because we paid for it, and experience minor discomfort at its yuckiness.

But in the case of things like relationships, especially longer term commitments, we feel like we put so much time and energy into making it work, that even if we are unhappy, we should continue to put more work in, because we already put so much darn work in.

But relationships aren't as harmless as price-inflated cheap eats. No one gets hurt by hot dogs.

But feelings and hopes and dreams are so important that when we throw everything we have unto a sinking ship, the drowning is slow and suffocating, and more often than not, we drag someone else down with us.

So, here's to letting go and catching new fish.

Me? Slacking?

Color me shocked.

Oh Noes! Journal Time!

For a bit there, it looked like this blog was going to be one of those projects that started with good intentions and died a quiet death of apathy.

But what really happened is Crystal caught her winterly case of bronchitis and did a whole lot of nothing for over a week.

I did manage to make burritos the entire time, though. People need their Qdoba, baby! (Might I suggest the Chicken Queso, with black beans and guac?) I swear, I ought to start a blog chronicling the exciting world of Mexican Grilling. I even have a name all picked out: Black or Pinto?

Today, I am infinitely grateful that it is my day off. New England is blanketed in a pristine layer of snow and I prepared with a pre-Snowmegeddon trip to the grocery store last night.

I'm streaming Michael Graham on 96.9, organizing my living space, so as to encourage inner peace, and strawberries covered in cream cheese dip are in my future.

So, this blog lives on, even if it's pausing a little to catch its breath.

I'm not going anywhere...

...but up!

Keep Yo' Goals to Yo'self!

Conventional wisdom says you should broadcast your goals to the whole world, so as to have people to whom you will be help accountable.

And as a girl who benefits greatly from "accountability partners,"  I can attest to both this instinct and the well meaningness of those who do such things.

The only hitch is that sharing goals simply does not work.

I know. I was flabbergasted, too.

But as Derek Sivers tells us in this brief, but immensely informative TED video, thanks to brain chemistry, keeping your mouth shut is the way to go:

So, is it any surprise that I posted all about my goal to post a picture every day, and then failed to do so?

Nope. I'm a rational actor. (Please, out of respect, try to hold your laughter in!) I got the little buzz of pleasure in my brain from sharing my goal with y'all, and then, given my warm and fuzzy state, I did not post pictures the next few days.

"You are aware that it's only Day Two?" my friend Ellee admonished.

"I know, but I promise I'll post on Day Three!"

Well, it's Day Four and I finally hopped to it!

And it is completely indicative of how I feel about taking pictures oh myself. ;-)

hmph

In a Name

I have to admit that I stumbled on the idea for the name of this blog quite accidentally. 

What I wanted to name it was 'At the Margin,' because, as all wannabe economists know, all good decisions are made at the margin. But someone got to the address before me, and even if he isn't using it, he forced me to come up with something a little more original. 

I knew I wanted something sufficiently geeky, but I am also wanted something indicative of the forward motion that I've been experiencing during the very end of 2010 and the desire to carry it forward into 2011 and make lasting, permanent changes. The kinds of changes that shift paradigms and save lives. Or in my case, one life: mine. 

So, why a blog whose namesake involves indifference curves, and the hopping thereof?

Indifferent Curves

No, not those kinds of curves. More like these:

Indifference curves are so named because no matter where along any given curve a consumer finds himself, his utility is always the same. He can't increase his utility given his choices unless he up and hops to another, higher, utility curve. 

And that's the goal, folks. To become unsettled with the comfort of Curve 1 and figure out how to boost oneself all the way up to Curve 5, or Curve 6 or 7 or 8. We aren't limited by pictographs here.  

Just good, old fashioned determination and discipline. 

Having an audience won't hurt, either. 

1/1/11: Make a Wish

I have a really dirty secret, and in the spirit of self improvement, I'm going to share it with you.

I'm painfully self-conscious.

I cannot stand to look at pictures of myself. Especially of my face. I cringe when I see it, and think to myself that I have the fattest face in the entire universe.

And then I go to Wal-Mart and observe that this is categorically untrue.

But I continue to believe it anyway. Because I am painfully self-conscious.

So, I would never ever dream of taking lots and lots of pictures of myself and posting them on the internet for everyone to see. Unless...

Unless I decided that it was completely ridiculous for a 28 year old woman to think she is ugly. Especially given the frequency with which she finds herself perusing People of Wal-Mart.

And I happen to believe just that. And I have a mustard seed-sized kernel of faith that aversion therapy just might work.

So, every day for a year, I am going to take a picture of my own face and post it on the internet for all the world to see. I'm curious to see if any of the internal changes I'm working on so feverishly will be reflected on the outside as well.

If nothing else, perhaps I will not be so quick to shy away from the camera when one gets pointed in my face.

Every one of us desires and deserves to be comfortable in his own skin. My wish is that this is the year it happens.

Here goes nothing!

Oh noes!