New York, Baby

I’m going to New York on Friday. I, a girl who has never been further East than Reno, Nevada, am getting on a plane with my family and heading to the Big Apple. Start spreading the news.

I’m at once incredibly excited and absolutely terrified. To me, New York is where the cool kids hang out. It’s the Mecca for artists and writers and creative types hiding behind varying degrees of reclusiveness. It’s the capitol of all art and writing, the hometown of my two first loves and best friends. I have always tried to hang with the cool kids. I have rarely fit in with them. I’m witty and beloved in my head; I’m awkward and shy in real life. You can see how trying to hang with those for whom “cool” comes effortlessly could be a major problem. Not that this matters much in real life, but it makes me think. I have dreams of maybe one day being an East Coast resident, an intern at one of those major publishing companies which reside in that big city full of dreamers like me. I’m afraid my visions, my delusions of grandeur, will get chewed up and spit back out by reality, the way most of my visions do. I’m afraid that these delusions will become crushed by a tidal wave of realization. I’m afraid I’ll run home with my tail between my legs and never want to try my hand at life outside of Northern California again anytime soon.

I’m too safe. I’m too afraid. I’m too easily frustrated by my own failures, my ultimately inconsequential shortcomings. I need to get off the computer. Away from the internet. I need to actually get out and do things. I need to stop sitting around feeling sorry for myself for never having done anything, for never having any proper adventures or doing anything that feels real. This changes now. Or, maybe, in the morning, as it is currently almost 10 PM and old habits die hard. Keep your eyes peeled, though, World. ‘Cause I’m a’coming.