Another West Side Story

Robert Frost (via reconstructingrachel)

(Source: words-in-lines, via inthecac)

T.S. Eliot, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”  (via victorielle)

(Source: larmoyante, via inthecac)

Happy Sunday.

(Source: thefoodogatemyhomework)

Just a little loveliness for your afternoon.

(Source: npr)

I saw this on the America’s Test Kitchen blog (duh, I follow that blog) and it was the almost perfect image to illustrate my lunch on Monday.  Monday I woke up late and wanted pancakes.  I felt really guilty for sleeping through the Inauguration so… I decided to add a little cocoa powder and make chocolate pancakes… to honor both Obama and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  True story.  I am a patriot.

(Source: americastestkitchen)

I am listening to this song on repeat.  I really like it, musically, but also (and I hesitate to use this phrase) it is really speaking to where I am in my life right now. 

I moved to New York a year ago.  This past year has been many things: exciting, stressful, really stressful, scary, fun and uncertain.  But today when I woke up I thought about the above mentioned feelings and realized that even with all that, I am happy.  I am happy to be in New York and trying to figure out what kind of life I want to create for myself.  I also woke up less scared, less anxious; I am starting to feel confident in my decision to live here and dance.  I woke up thinking “yea, this whole thing is totally going to work out, whatever ‘this whole thing’ ends up meaning.”

This is not the first time I have felt this way.  My senior year of high school I was wait listed at Williams.  After going to the accepted students weekend at Haverford (a truly wonderful school), my dad said “so, is it Haverford?!” and I simply replied “I think I am going to go to Williams.”  

At that moment in time the fact that I had been wait listed seemed very minor to me; a pebble of a road block.  I had no reason to be, but I was confident I was going to end up at Williams.  And I did.

So I find myself in this new year, for the first time since moving to New York, feeling confident in my future.  So, there is that, and that feels really nice.

Part of my new confidence, my new calm was inspired by this song.  Some of the lyrics that “spoke to me” (eye roll) are the following:

“And now you’ve got this worry in your heart, well I guess it’s only life, it’s only natural, we all spend a little while going down the rabbit hole.”

The song concludes by saying:

“I’ve been down the very road you are walking now, it doesn’t have to be so dark and lonesome, it takes a while but we can figure this thing out.”

I went down the rabbit hole of stress and worry and I have come out the other side confident for no reason at all that my life will come into focus.

Happy New Year.

(Source: Spotify)

Yesterday I was listening to my music on shuffle and realized that I had the same reaction to many of the songs that came on.  That reaction: “Gaaawwwwd.  That song is still SO gooood!”  Here is a short list of the songs that elicited that response (in no particular order).

1. Hide and Seek, Imogen Heap

2. Let Go, Frou Frou

3. Call Me Maybe, Carly Rae Jepsen

4. Don’t Explain, Keb Mo’

5. Back to Black, Amy Winehouse

6. California, Phantom Planet

7. A Case Of You, Joni Mitchell

8. Change Your Mind, The Killers

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

Thanks to a commercial I looked up this song… and now I really like it… Damn you marketing!!! (I shake my fist at you!)

(Source: Spotify)

A very happy and healthy Thanksgiving to everyone!

(Source: newyorker.com, via newyorker)

I am impressed by how unimpressed they are. Topical gold.

(Source: theatlanticwire.com, via theatlantic)

How true.

(Source: sarahlcomics, via nprfreshair)

Gillian Wood

Skyfall.  On repeat.  Can’t stop listening to this.  It really makes me want to go on a top secret mission… Who knows, maybe I will… Or maybe I am already on one…

A little bit rainy this morning.

(Source: trentgilliss, via beingblog)