Tag Archives: Writing

Musings While Shoveling Snow

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about time. There are only a few months until I move for my new job and there are so many things I want to do before I leave! Five months is definitely not enough time to do all of them, but I’ll be back. This is home, after all.

There’s also a lot that I’m going to miss when I’m gone. I don’t really know what I’m walking into all the way around the world (honestly, why couldn’t I just get a job halfway around the world?) but I do know that it’s nothing like what I have here. It’s probably easier if I make a list of what I won’t miss:

Things I Will Not Miss When I Move
-Shoveling snow (the act of which led me to brainstorm and write this post)
-Bitter cold winds
-Weather that goes from beautiful (yesterday) to trapped inside because of a blizzard (today)

I honestly think I’m going to miss everything else. Someone remind me, why am I going?

To teach at an international school. Right. Got it.

Things I Will Miss When I Move
Anything not on the first list including, but not limited to, the following:
-My books
-Having a roommate (Shay, Mary, Emilia, it’s been pretty great)
-Shabbat dinners with my family
-My family
-Living in a 1920s house with stained glass windows (at which I am currently staring), a window seat (on which I am currently sitting), and a front porch (on which I wish I were sitting)
-All four seasons (though not the windy, shoveling parts)
-Wegmans
-Being anywhere in town in 20 minutes or less
-The Genesee River and Erie Canal
-My current jobs
-Friends who are close by
-Friends who are not close by but will be even farther away once I move
-Cute winter clothes and boots

I could go on, but I think you get the point. I don’t know yet what I’m going to have or have access to abroad, so I guess I shouldn’t pontificate about what I’ll miss; for all I know, there are more similarities than differences.

Something tells me I’m wrong about that. But I also know that I’m going on an adventure. No one says I have to stay forever. I’ll be gone two years and four months, and then I’ll either come home or go somewhere else. I’m 24 years old, my family is grudgingly supportive, and my boyfriend is actively job seeking. A friend mentioned that stars don’t align by accident.

I really hope she’s right.

Writing, Wine Bottles, and Christmas Lights

I started following a blog a few weeks ago about writing. A recent post from this blog suggested keeping a list of five things you’re grateful for each and every day. I read this right before Thanksgiving, which may have influenced my decision to give it a try. (Try it – it certainly brightens the bad days and acts as a culminating reflection on the good ones.) I don’t really think I’m enough of a writer to be following a professional writers blog, but one of my favorite aspects about blogging is that it’s somewhat anonymous; anonymous in the sense that we can reinvent and recreate ourselves and no one’s the wiser. When it all comes down to it, no one knows who I am or what I am; readers only know what writers choose to share, and who’s to say it’s all true?

My roommate, on the other hand, is an excellent writer and actually gets paid to write, which makes her not only a great writer, but also a professional. In addition to her superior command of the written word, she (let’s call her E) is also rather creative. E is lucky enough to have an equally creative boyfriend (we’ll call him T) who visited from Austin, Texas last week. Bored on a recent cold, gray day (also known as this past Monday) E and T decided to work some magic on house. Within a couple hours, they transformed our porch from a porch into easily the most festive porch I have since a music and arts festival this summer.

Wine Bottle Lights

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In E’s words, “These will look good in June, too, right?” I’d say so.