I wrote this one a while ago, which becomes apparent. And I was feeling a little more bitter about life than I am right now, perhaps. At least, that's how I read it. Regardless, I like it. Ignore the bitterness and get on with it...
At some point, this all ends. The vines that peek over the side of the tent like they're trying to pull off a long glance. Like kids that climb Red Rocks to watch a show; Not really supposed to be there, but not exactly looking to leave. The sun hitting the driftwood that sits on my front porch. Sitting above and inside the trees. Strapless sundresses and tan lines three days before Christmas. It ends someday.
I spend too much time thinking about the past. Blowing kisses to ghosts. Wondering if it will ever again be like it was. Hoping at once that it will and that it won't.
I spend too much time thinking about the future. Questioning, rightfully, the sustainability of the life I am currently living. It's not sustainable, I know, and I dedicate far too much time to what might happen when the sand stops falling.
Live, Jamie. Live now. Look at your beautiful friends and your beautiful home and your days off filled to the brim with warm sun and deep breaths and just live. Once. Try it once.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Thursday, February 4, 2010
If you were to be me for this exact moment, your life would look like this: You would be drinking a grapefruit/pellegrino spritzer, listening to the new Backstreet Boys single on Pandora (Um, why didn't anyone tell me Backstreet was back? And why am I allowing Pandora to subject me to them?), admiring your new orange Ray Bans, which you're fairly sure will end up being your life partner, and you would be thinking a great deal about how you should be doing much more productive things than writing in your ridiculous blog. And then you would chuckle a bit, shrug your shoulders, say "Oh, Jamie..." and go back to writing. Also, you would have had Kix for dinner. Right outta the box. What is my life? Seriously.
I think I'm going to stay here for another season. Oooohhh, it took me about five full minutes and multiple backspaces and repeat typing to get that one out. The thing is, Maho will only be Maho for one more year. Even if the Trust comes through. Even if it actually manages to stay open somehow. It will not be run the same way...It can't be, really. As much time as I have spent here and as much as I have gone through walking around these creaky boardwalks, it would feel like a great injustice to leave for its last breathing season. Plus, that gives me one more year to really figure out what's next. My goodness, will I miss this place when it truly is no longer an option. Like an awesome ex-boyfriend who always still sorta had a thing for you and then goes and gets married. Suddenly, something you have always sweetly regarded as an option of sorts can no longer be that. Such is the inevitable fate of Maho Bay. To me, anyway.
Do you think Facebook ever realizes that the people it suggests you should be friends with might be people you have tried to avoid for years? They need to put more thought into this.
I feel very scattered today. I haven't been able to concentrate on a single thing since I crawled out of bed this morning. Cleaning my room would help, probably, but I rarely find that cleaning my room is the thing I would most like to be doing. I can always come up with something far more important or interesting. Like Kix or The Backstreet Boys.
I think I'm going to stay here for another season. Oooohhh, it took me about five full minutes and multiple backspaces and repeat typing to get that one out. The thing is, Maho will only be Maho for one more year. Even if the Trust comes through. Even if it actually manages to stay open somehow. It will not be run the same way...It can't be, really. As much time as I have spent here and as much as I have gone through walking around these creaky boardwalks, it would feel like a great injustice to leave for its last breathing season. Plus, that gives me one more year to really figure out what's next. My goodness, will I miss this place when it truly is no longer an option. Like an awesome ex-boyfriend who always still sorta had a thing for you and then goes and gets married. Suddenly, something you have always sweetly regarded as an option of sorts can no longer be that. Such is the inevitable fate of Maho Bay. To me, anyway.
Do you think Facebook ever realizes that the people it suggests you should be friends with might be people you have tried to avoid for years? They need to put more thought into this.
I feel very scattered today. I haven't been able to concentrate on a single thing since I crawled out of bed this morning. Cleaning my room would help, probably, but I rarely find that cleaning my room is the thing I would most like to be doing. I can always come up with something far more important or interesting. Like Kix or The Backstreet Boys.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Where is the curve, anyway?
Ohhh, goodness, here it comes again. I can feel it rising to my surface like a million pin pricks. Not painful yet. Not aching. Not intense in any real way, but certainly not willing to be ignored. It's restlessness. Dissatisfaction with the level of comfort that I have reached. It's wanderlust in its raw form; the very feeling which got me here and then got me out of here....the first time. I don't want this. Stagnant is stagnant, even if it occurs in the most perfect place I have ever lived.
I am looking at plane tickets right now. Round trip. Two friends whom I have known for pretty much as long as I have known anybody are getting married in June, and I am flying home (I use the term loosely) to celebrate with them. To walk into their new, expanding world for a minute and retreat slowly back into my ever-contracting one. I never know if I'm behind the curve or in front of it.
There is something to be said for living in a place where every day is essentially the same. You have no choice but to live for today, as there doesn't seem to be a rear-view mirror to look into or a future to contemplate. You have to figure out how to be happy rightthissecond because the second after that will be a spitting, glaring image of the last one. That said, I am tired of my days melting into one another.
A friend of mine recently commented on how nice it is to have so much free time here. No dishes to wash. No groceries to shop for. We even get to skip the drive to and from work, which takes up much more time than you may realize. She said that it's great to work and to live and only those two things. I nodded, and thought to myself, "What? No!" The best way to live is to have days teeming with beautiful to-dos. The seams at dawn and at dusk shredded with energy and fullness. No room to spare. And absolutely no time that could ever be called "free." Of course, this is all from my current state of excuseless boredom. The grass is always greener, isn't it, and begging to be explored?
I am looking at plane tickets right now. Round trip. Two friends whom I have known for pretty much as long as I have known anybody are getting married in June, and I am flying home (I use the term loosely) to celebrate with them. To walk into their new, expanding world for a minute and retreat slowly back into my ever-contracting one. I never know if I'm behind the curve or in front of it.
There is something to be said for living in a place where every day is essentially the same. You have no choice but to live for today, as there doesn't seem to be a rear-view mirror to look into or a future to contemplate. You have to figure out how to be happy rightthissecond because the second after that will be a spitting, glaring image of the last one. That said, I am tired of my days melting into one another.
A friend of mine recently commented on how nice it is to have so much free time here. No dishes to wash. No groceries to shop for. We even get to skip the drive to and from work, which takes up much more time than you may realize. She said that it's great to work and to live and only those two things. I nodded, and thought to myself, "What? No!" The best way to live is to have days teeming with beautiful to-dos. The seams at dawn and at dusk shredded with energy and fullness. No room to spare. And absolutely no time that could ever be called "free." Of course, this is all from my current state of excuseless boredom. The grass is always greener, isn't it, and begging to be explored?
Sunday, January 17, 2010
rainy days and bacon feet
So, let me tell you about Sundays. I work on Sundays, as I don't have a three day weekend worked into the 35 hours a week that my salary says I should work. I COULD have a three day weekend, but Maho doesn't quite work like that. So, I work on Sundays. There is nothing to do on Sundays. Every vendor or distributor or random human whom I do business with is off on Sundays. Every single one. So, any call I make will be made to voicemail. Any e-mail will be responded to tomorrow, when the masses return to their 9-5 jobs. Miss Emily works the counter this particular morning, which means the store looks awesome and is running perfectly without my constant supervision. Basically, I have nothing to do on Sundays except get paid to sit at my desk and surf the internet. I peruse the cyber world looking for cool t-shirt designs or touristy tropical knick knacks. I hate Sundays and I question the logic of Maho Bay sometimes...
In short, I'm bored. In other news, I have a tiny, jagged bit of glass in the heel of my foot right at the moment. It is inhibiting my ability to run (my genius brain figured out how to beat 5am Jamie. Drumroll, please….run in the afternoon! What a concept.) In my net-surfing stupor, I have looked up a variety of home remedies for splinters, glass shards and the like. The most popular and sworn by method seems to be putting a piece of bacon fat over it and then covering that with a band-aid. Apparently the fat draws the sucker right out. I have my doubts, but I'm willing to give it a shot, as I don't love digging around inside my appendages with sewing needles or tweezers. I guess I’m just worried about the critters that might be involved once I secure the scent of their wildest dreams to my foot. I’ll let you know how it goes.
It is a rainy, rainy island day. Strange for January. It’s been rainy for a while now, but as my manager curtly pointed out, “With all the earthquakes and hurricanes going on, I’m not going to bitch much about the fact that it’s raining a little bit more than it usually does this time of year.” Good call. Besides, I love a good rainy day. With my laundry done, my room clean and my toenails painted, I have nothing to do when I go home except sit. Read. Do crossword puzzles. Interesting, the kind of chill that is reached with no choice.
My sister just brought in a tiny branch full of mini-air plants. She said “I thought you would like these.” She’s right. I have the best sister ever.
Ugh, I need to get out of this office. Time to go eat junk food and affix pork to my heel.
Yum.
In short, I'm bored. In other news, I have a tiny, jagged bit of glass in the heel of my foot right at the moment. It is inhibiting my ability to run (my genius brain figured out how to beat 5am Jamie. Drumroll, please….run in the afternoon! What a concept.) In my net-surfing stupor, I have looked up a variety of home remedies for splinters, glass shards and the like. The most popular and sworn by method seems to be putting a piece of bacon fat over it and then covering that with a band-aid. Apparently the fat draws the sucker right out. I have my doubts, but I'm willing to give it a shot, as I don't love digging around inside my appendages with sewing needles or tweezers. I guess I’m just worried about the critters that might be involved once I secure the scent of their wildest dreams to my foot. I’ll let you know how it goes.
It is a rainy, rainy island day. Strange for January. It’s been rainy for a while now, but as my manager curtly pointed out, “With all the earthquakes and hurricanes going on, I’m not going to bitch much about the fact that it’s raining a little bit more than it usually does this time of year.” Good call. Besides, I love a good rainy day. With my laundry done, my room clean and my toenails painted, I have nothing to do when I go home except sit. Read. Do crossword puzzles. Interesting, the kind of chill that is reached with no choice.
My sister just brought in a tiny branch full of mini-air plants. She said “I thought you would like these.” She’s right. I have the best sister ever.
Ugh, I need to get out of this office. Time to go eat junk food and affix pork to my heel.
Yum.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
I'm in a fight with my running shoes right now. The funny thing is, we both have the same argument. They want to be used. They miss the road and the sand and they miss the way this island feels at 6 in the morning. I, too miss the road. And the sand. And I miss how the island feels at 6am way more than those stubborn shoes could ever understand.
Come to think of it, maybe it's not the shoes I should be angry at. It could just be my sleeping self, content to close her eyes to the awesomeness that is the early morning Caribbean. The one who groans when that wretched alarm clock goes off at 5:00 and moves barely the bits of herself required to change the alarm time to 7:00. That's right. Asleep enough to only manage a groan, but passionate enough about being asleep to stretch her fingers more than just "snooze."
I would never hire a personal trainer. The thought of paying someone to tell me what to do (in some cases, shout at me what to do) is laughable. In my day to day life, someone has to be able to pay me before they can try and accomplish such a frustrating task, thank you very much. But maybe I could stand to have more than the non-threatening beep of my cell phone alarm clock telling me to wake up and get off my lazy butt at 5:00am. What I need is the 7 year old version of Alley, my kid sister, on Christmas morning. I need that every day. There is no way any human could possibly sleep through the kind of noise she was able to produce on that particular morning. I probably shouldn't limit that to humans. If I remember correctly, whatever variety of dogs, cats, hamsters, fish and birds we housed at the time were no more immune to the shrieking wake-up call of a little girl waiting to open gifts than any of us were. Oh, tiny Alley. I will invent a time machine and bring you to 2010 just for your incredible 5am lung power. And then maybe I'll be able to stick to that already-forgotten resolution to run at least most mornings. Maybe.
Come to think of it, maybe it's not the shoes I should be angry at. It could just be my sleeping self, content to close her eyes to the awesomeness that is the early morning Caribbean. The one who groans when that wretched alarm clock goes off at 5:00 and moves barely the bits of herself required to change the alarm time to 7:00. That's right. Asleep enough to only manage a groan, but passionate enough about being asleep to stretch her fingers more than just "snooze."
I would never hire a personal trainer. The thought of paying someone to tell me what to do (in some cases, shout at me what to do) is laughable. In my day to day life, someone has to be able to pay me before they can try and accomplish such a frustrating task, thank you very much. But maybe I could stand to have more than the non-threatening beep of my cell phone alarm clock telling me to wake up and get off my lazy butt at 5:00am. What I need is the 7 year old version of Alley, my kid sister, on Christmas morning. I need that every day. There is no way any human could possibly sleep through the kind of noise she was able to produce on that particular morning. I probably shouldn't limit that to humans. If I remember correctly, whatever variety of dogs, cats, hamsters, fish and birds we housed at the time were no more immune to the shrieking wake-up call of a little girl waiting to open gifts than any of us were. Oh, tiny Alley. I will invent a time machine and bring you to 2010 just for your incredible 5am lung power. And then maybe I'll be able to stick to that already-forgotten resolution to run at least most mornings. Maybe.
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Let us toast
But it don't snow here. It stays pretty green. Gonna make a lotta money, then I'm gonna quit this crazy scene...
Oh, Joni. I heart you. So here we go, Christmas. Colored lights inside palm trees and if I close my eyes tightly enough, I can pretend that those are snow clouds outside. Tonight, I will go home and rock around my mini-tree. My counter is piled with presents from one home and presents from another. I have about 15 Christmas songs on my reggae-riddled iPod, which will play and play and play until the holiday ends unfairly and abruptly and we all go back to our white sand weekends like nothing ever happened. The reality that Christmas day is, in the end, a day, is weird no matter where you are. It almost seems like an island Christmas is a perfect way to acknowledge that. There is no Santa sitting in a mall, as there is no mall here. We put lights up in our tents, but then, we always put lights up in our tents. It would be hard to bake Christmas cookies on a Coleman stove, and pine trees are a little hard to come by. Unlike you statesiders, we are not bombed with the holidays as soon as Halloween passes. I would like to see the shops in Cruz Bay trying to pull off Christmas music in November, when the weather is just clearing up and the hibiscus printed tourists are pouring in. Nope. It just doesn't work.
Don't get me wrong; we try. It's just that forcing Christmas doesn't feel right. And forcing anything does not get you far in the islands, anyway. So, we watch Christmas movies at a friend's house and then climb back into our open-top jeeps and talk about how we're losing our tans and which beach we're going to tomorrow. If we are on the schedule, then we go to work. If we happen to have the day off, we do not treat it much like any other day off. A Friday is a Friday is a Friday. And then it's Saturday. And that's all there really is to it.
I've come to prefer Christmas this way, I think. Where it actually sneaks up on you. Where you do not even realize what day it is until it's here. And then you look around, quietly and without show, and thank the universe for the people around you and the life you live. Do I wish that I were somewhere else this time of year? Sometimes. But I have a family here whom I am infinitely happy to spend this time with. And besides, it's not that Christmas makes me miss people. It just reminds me that I already do.
On that note, Merry Christmas, all. Be happy, drink egg nog, sing Christmas songs and breathe in the cinnamon and cookie scented Christmas air. Breathe it in as deeply as it will go. Before you can even exhale, just like for me, it will be summer again. It is, at the end of it all, just a day.
I'm ending this with a Hunter S. Thompson quote, which has nothing to do with Christmas at all. But I love it.
"Let us toast to animal pleasures, to escapism, to rain on the roof and instant coffee, to unemployment insurance and library cards, to absinthe and good-hearted landlords, to music and warm bodies and contraceptives...and to the "good life," whatever it is and wherever it happens to be."
Oh, Joni. I heart you. So here we go, Christmas. Colored lights inside palm trees and if I close my eyes tightly enough, I can pretend that those are snow clouds outside. Tonight, I will go home and rock around my mini-tree. My counter is piled with presents from one home and presents from another. I have about 15 Christmas songs on my reggae-riddled iPod, which will play and play and play until the holiday ends unfairly and abruptly and we all go back to our white sand weekends like nothing ever happened. The reality that Christmas day is, in the end, a day, is weird no matter where you are. It almost seems like an island Christmas is a perfect way to acknowledge that. There is no Santa sitting in a mall, as there is no mall here. We put lights up in our tents, but then, we always put lights up in our tents. It would be hard to bake Christmas cookies on a Coleman stove, and pine trees are a little hard to come by. Unlike you statesiders, we are not bombed with the holidays as soon as Halloween passes. I would like to see the shops in Cruz Bay trying to pull off Christmas music in November, when the weather is just clearing up and the hibiscus printed tourists are pouring in. Nope. It just doesn't work.
Don't get me wrong; we try. It's just that forcing Christmas doesn't feel right. And forcing anything does not get you far in the islands, anyway. So, we watch Christmas movies at a friend's house and then climb back into our open-top jeeps and talk about how we're losing our tans and which beach we're going to tomorrow. If we are on the schedule, then we go to work. If we happen to have the day off, we do not treat it much like any other day off. A Friday is a Friday is a Friday. And then it's Saturday. And that's all there really is to it.
I've come to prefer Christmas this way, I think. Where it actually sneaks up on you. Where you do not even realize what day it is until it's here. And then you look around, quietly and without show, and thank the universe for the people around you and the life you live. Do I wish that I were somewhere else this time of year? Sometimes. But I have a family here whom I am infinitely happy to spend this time with. And besides, it's not that Christmas makes me miss people. It just reminds me that I already do.
On that note, Merry Christmas, all. Be happy, drink egg nog, sing Christmas songs and breathe in the cinnamon and cookie scented Christmas air. Breathe it in as deeply as it will go. Before you can even exhale, just like for me, it will be summer again. It is, at the end of it all, just a day.
I'm ending this with a Hunter S. Thompson quote, which has nothing to do with Christmas at all. But I love it.
"Let us toast to animal pleasures, to escapism, to rain on the roof and instant coffee, to unemployment insurance and library cards, to absinthe and good-hearted landlords, to music and warm bodies and contraceptives...and to the "good life," whatever it is and wherever it happens to be."
Monday, December 21, 2009
I am glad that clouds are rounded at the corners. On a 6am run today, the world said good morning with clouds decked out in cotton candy trim. I needed rounded corners this morning.
It's time to get off my butt again. I can feel it. I wish I was back in housekeeping, but I'm not, and I need to do something different with myself before I go crazy. A good long hike. A midnight skinny dip. One of those small things with enough bite to kick you back into being thankful that you get to live here with the tree frogs and katydids.
I seem to be thinking a lot lately about what I'm going to do in the store next year. Which means I've been thinking a lot lately about being here another year, without really giving credit or weight to what that means. Maho again? Another year? Do I mean that? In an effort to not get too comfortable, I am going to compose a list of all I still want to do in life. All the things I can't do if I stay on this easy island for too much longer. Because I am not done yet. My curiosity about every place and every person I don't understand has not been squashed. This is a beautiful life, truly. Fairly simple. Plump with cushions and padding...and rounded corners. Nothing too sharp or harsh. No reality to face. But when does a place stop being virtuously comfortable and start turning into an enabler of sorts? I need to be scared again. Bumped and scraped and torn down by a new situation that I have to figure out on my own. I want another fresh, frightening start. Another new thing.
So. A list. This is what I want. This is why I'm not done.
-The thrill of being really, really lost
-The sky in Montana
-Christmas in New York City
-A tiny coffee shop full of overstuffed couches and overexpressed hipster poets
-Mud football
-A big city life, if only for a few months
-A sweet small-town life, if only for a few weeks
-Museums and galleries and theaters
-Fresh oysters
-Learning a language through immersion
-Toy stores
-The Tattered Cover
-Music festivals where you sweat all day and sleep in the cool grass
-Red mittens
-Farmers' Markets
-The way Christmas lights look under a new, thick layer of snow
-Every ocean and every sea
-A little fishing village
-A beautiful running route (I have this now, but I want to see a new one)
Oh, there's more. There is much more. I envy people who are happy enough here to want to stay indefinitely. They are done exploring. They wanted their perfect place and they found it in the still sea and the slight breeze. They want nothing more than this coconut life and don't feel the need to look any further.
Alas, the more you see of the world, the less you feel you've seen.
By the way, I am madly and wholly in love with Owl City right now. I wish their songs never ended and they could be streamed directly into my ears all day and all night. It still wouldn't be enough.
It's time to get off my butt again. I can feel it. I wish I was back in housekeeping, but I'm not, and I need to do something different with myself before I go crazy. A good long hike. A midnight skinny dip. One of those small things with enough bite to kick you back into being thankful that you get to live here with the tree frogs and katydids.
I seem to be thinking a lot lately about what I'm going to do in the store next year. Which means I've been thinking a lot lately about being here another year, without really giving credit or weight to what that means. Maho again? Another year? Do I mean that? In an effort to not get too comfortable, I am going to compose a list of all I still want to do in life. All the things I can't do if I stay on this easy island for too much longer. Because I am not done yet. My curiosity about every place and every person I don't understand has not been squashed. This is a beautiful life, truly. Fairly simple. Plump with cushions and padding...and rounded corners. Nothing too sharp or harsh. No reality to face. But when does a place stop being virtuously comfortable and start turning into an enabler of sorts? I need to be scared again. Bumped and scraped and torn down by a new situation that I have to figure out on my own. I want another fresh, frightening start. Another new thing.
So. A list. This is what I want. This is why I'm not done.
-The thrill of being really, really lost
-The sky in Montana
-Christmas in New York City
-A tiny coffee shop full of overstuffed couches and overexpressed hipster poets
-Mud football
-A big city life, if only for a few months
-A sweet small-town life, if only for a few weeks
-Museums and galleries and theaters
-Fresh oysters
-Learning a language through immersion
-Toy stores
-The Tattered Cover
-Music festivals where you sweat all day and sleep in the cool grass
-Red mittens
-Farmers' Markets
-The way Christmas lights look under a new, thick layer of snow
-Every ocean and every sea
-A little fishing village
-A beautiful running route (I have this now, but I want to see a new one)
Oh, there's more. There is much more. I envy people who are happy enough here to want to stay indefinitely. They are done exploring. They wanted their perfect place and they found it in the still sea and the slight breeze. They want nothing more than this coconut life and don't feel the need to look any further.
Alas, the more you see of the world, the less you feel you've seen.
By the way, I am madly and wholly in love with Owl City right now. I wish their songs never ended and they could be streamed directly into my ears all day and all night. It still wouldn't be enough.
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