October 17

OH! Where do I begin? Was it only one day since I blogged? Really? Every day seems like five or so. Today was fantastic. All of this time living in the present- eyes wide open - is making time pass a lot slower. I’m glad that the rule about time dragging only when things suck doesn’t apply at the moment. There are a lot of rules of conventional wisdom that don’t apply to me at the moment. I guess that’s one of the benefits to living life unconventionally.

Tonight I met up with Sue and Duane. It’s funny. I lived in San Diego for so long and always intended to get together with them more often when I lived here. It has been a very rough two years…I think today might be the anniversary of when I left my husband, but I really, really, really try not to keep track of these things. I can’t even keep track of anniversaries that commemorate happy things. I’ve been in a big fog from then until about the time I began this journey. Lots of phone calls went unreturned, and many space-out moments happened. I’m very grateful that my friendship with Duane and Sue survived my flakiness. There are a lot of people I’m going to attempt to get together with in San Diego whose most recent memory of me was “flaky, wiggy, divorce girl”….ouch. In my normal life, I would avoid the awkwardness. There have been a lot of times in my life, but particularly in the past two years when I just didn’t look good at all. A lot of people dumped me, and a lot of people stuck around. I absolutely have to love the ones who stuck around… even if I tried not to it wouldn’t work. The inconvenient flip-side of that is that I still love the ones who didn’t stick around, too.

My #1 priority, besides taking care of myself and George, is visiting all of the “friends” on my friends lists. I don’t have 17 years to do this. So, I don’t have the time or the luxury to wait until I believe the timing is exactly right. I am contacting every friend on facebook and myspace with the goal of making a genuine connection, and getting to know what all of my “friends” are about. For this, I have to be present with the people I am visiting, and approach every meeting like it might be my best friend that I am visiting. I am very open when I see people, and it has led to wonderful things. It has also left me wide open for devastating things, and this trip has become somewhat of a dragon-sleighing- safari. I am revisiting my entire life, through all of the people of my facebook and myspace friends lists in a very short period of time. I probably wouldn’t see everyone in person again in my entire life under ordinary circumstances. People are the essence of drama, and I am seeing a lot of people and I don’t have much of a budget to do it, so there is uncertainty. I’m pretty sure lots of people and lots of obstacles = lots of drama. So, as much as I try to shy away from the drama queen persona, there are a lot of times on this trip where I am interacting with people in the middle of drama-situations not yet processed (Sorry, Dan). The funny part of it is, I have to pick up and keep moving on, or else I won’t complete what I set out to do. I can’t be present with the person I am visiting if I am distracted by a previous person I visited, so I have to get over things quickly. This trip has presented so many situations where I would have dwelled for months on end, but the time constraints don’t really permit that now. It’s a good thing! My recovery time is a fraction of what it used to be.

My fear of becoming a drama-queen- or worse, just a nut-case, made me fully appreciate the feedback from Duane and Sue. They were trying to put their finger on how I looked “better” than the last time they saw me. They both looked at me for a while- I could almost see the wheels turning in their heads. Then, Duane said “It’s your eyes. You look more relaxed. You’re making direct eye contact”. Sue agreed and said I looked “centered”, and Duane quickly said that was the perfect word. Ahhhhh…music to my ears. If I can find a way to be centered in the middle of all of this chaos and drama, then I just might be on to something. My first few nights in San Diego were so bad. It was like a letter bomb sent express from Left Field. Something like that might have destroyed me not long ago, or at least devastated me for a long time. With all I have going on now, it is more than a giant relief and compliment to be told by old friends that I am showing up as “centered”… How completely fabulous. Things are getting better…including me.

Casiotone for the Painfully Alone saved my blog.

I think I must be at the midpoint of my trip by now. It's really impossible to say because my journey can't be measured in any way that can be reasonably planned. Some visits with casual acquaintances turned into lengthy, wonderful reunions that lasted many days. Other visits with people I thought of as my nearest and dearest friends were disappointingly short and errrr... disappointing, but not time consuming. Some visits are so fantastic I feel so recharged and optimistic about the human race I want to meet everyone as soon as I can. Some visits are so draining and sad I want to hide out from the world for a month or two. Actually, I think I might be there about now. It's funny that I am posting another entry at a time I am strongly considering changing my name and running away to join the circus in North Korea.

I've wanted to blog again for a long time, actually...I've wanted to blog again since I saw Casiotone for the Painfully Alone in the Chicago area. It was a turning point in my trip. The first month was so full of struggles and adjustment and emotional upheaval, and absurdly hot and humid temperatures and living on the road without a budget or much of a plan. There wasn't a lot of time to enjoy the journey. I was too busy trying to adapt to this insane way of living, and trying not to freak out that my life consisted mostly of high voltage surrealism. The first time I could take a step back and realize that I was having the time of my life was when I was in a stranger's living room in Champagne, Illinois watching a private show of one of my very favorite bands, Casiotone for the Painfully Alone.

http://www.myspace.com/cftpa

It was one of those rare, sublime moments when you catch yourself enjoying the hell out of life. I finally realized this wasn't a seminar or a weekend retreat (hahahaha I often feel like the Tyler/Jack from The Fight Club)... this was my life, and it was amazing. In the past few years I have gone through so many changes: marital status, career, a million different addresses, new friends, new experiences...I will not sugar coat it...I had so many bad days in a row that I started to wonder if they weren't bad days, but normal days in a new crappy life that exceeded the crap proportions of my old life (that was crappy enough for me to want to change in the first place). This was the first time I realized I had several days in a row that were not only good, but wonderful, and I felt a new level of confidence and optimism about what was possible.

I have connected with so many friends since I last blogged. Many of them are on facebook or myspace, many of them are not, and many are new people I've met along my travels that were added as friends and many "friends" who upon closer examination made me realize I was in the presence of holiness (with a capital A) and were deleted from my friends lists. So, I feel a much greater freedom to write about experiences I've had and change names and genders and cities in which these things happened, and be able to preserve anonymity in a way I wasn't able to when I was blogging every day. So, Jane from Colorado might be Mickey from New Jersey. Oh, the fun of protecting the innocent. Hahahahaha.

There are a lot of times when I don't want to be public, and I skip my facebook updates and blogs. For instance, I am so exhausted from a series of completely unnecessary drama scenarios that happened this week. I probably could have handled all of that better if I wasn't still trying to recover from everything else. I am in dire need of recharging and a break from my project before I vow never to talk to another human being again and live in a tree house with my cat forever. I have met up with so many people in San Diego, and had so many wonderful experiences. I've also had some bizarre and tremendously sad visits here too - I have so much to write about, and so much further to go...but I need to step back - not sure when, but if I run for the hills, don't worry...I'm coming back. I have every intention of completing my journey...and when I am out of touch I haven't been eaten by bears. I just turned off my phone and stopped going on the Internet for a while.

I plan on continuing on with my blog and my travels and I thank everyone who has been so, supportive on my journey. There are a lot of amazing people out there that have helped me in so many different ways...if I've been too exhausted or uncivilized to remember how to say thank you, please try to understand I have a lot on my mind and you have made a huge difference for me even if I forgot to acknowledge it. Love you guys.

Julia

Last blog entry...thanks everyone!

Hey all...a lot has happened since I last blogged, and I finally had to take a step back to regroup. It is pretty intense meeting up with all of these people from my past, and revisiting so many important events from my past with a new perspective. It is very powerful, and important, but it is exhausting in a way that you can only really understand if you are putting yourself out there day after day and experiencing it first hand.

I am running into a lot of challenges lately. It is very hard for me to write authentically, and also respect the privacy of the people I am visiting. Although everything I blog about is true...I am finding that the biggest epiphanys, and the most colorful experiences are not appropriate for a public blog. For anyone that knows me at all, you know that sincerity, authenticity, and respect for people are my highest values. It is a fierce juggling act to get all of those right for my blog. A lot of times there is so much left out that I wonder if it is even possible to approach a project like this authenticly.

To make blogging matters even more challenging, or even impossible... during a tax call with my ex-husband recently, he mentioned that he reads my blog, and he talked about all the things I write about during our call. Apparently, he found out from a friend of one of my friends that I am blogging, and they gave him the site address. Although it was "innocent enough" it wasn't innocent enough to have Kevin reveal the name of the person who gave him all the information. I am very good at living in denial, and I probably knew he was reading my blog...but hearing him bring up the experiences I write about (but chose not to share with him personally), totally eliminated my ability to write as if all my words were not being shared directly with my ex-husband. This trip, in many ways, is about breaking free from that relationship, and rediscovering myself. I can still do that, but, unfortunately, not in the way I have been.

It is possible for me to set up my blog so that each person must register with blogspot in order to read my updates...with a limit of 100 readers. That sounds like way too many steps and hoops, and far too limiting for the purposes I would like to blog in the first place. So... I have decided to end my blog here. I wanted to explain why I came to this decision, and at the same time, I want to minimize drama...so, any comments to my last blog will be for my viewing only.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for your support...it meant a lot.

Fondly,

Julia

Meeting up with Dan...part 2

Dan's kids completely blew my mind...in a really good way. Their ironic sense of humor and overall social/cultural sophistication threw me a few times. I actually had to remind myself that they were not grown-ups and stop myself from wandering off into adult conversations. Yeah, everyone thinks their kids are really smart, whatever... Dan's kids really are smart. I had to instantly love Halley when she asked if we could all go bowling. What is not to love about that? Back in the day, bowling was a favorite pastime in our crowd, and I was proud to see that Dan passed the love of bowling down his family line. We mixed it up a bit with bumper bowling and slowest ball to roll down the lane contests. As a kid, I attended many birthday parties at Bay Bowl, bowling alley. I don't believe bumper bowling technology was available back then...so, inevitably, there was always a kid crying at the end of the party because they rolled 24 gutter balls in a row. In High School, bowling was not just something to do at Herrick's Lanes on a Friday night...there was bowling fashion... bowling shirts, shoes. I once found a great black leather pair of bowling shoes that I wore around town until the soles fell off. There was bowling culture.."Bowling For" hip kid zine...you name it, the never-ending bowling world totally covered our entertainment needs. Now, as an adult, I can appreciate bowling even more deeply with the help of a martini from the bowling alley bar, and if I get really bored or lonely...there's always a league. I wonder if church services are ever held in bowling alleys.

Up until a few days ago, my memory of Dan would have been that he was a good guy in our High School scene, who always surprised me by the kindness he showed me, but who hung out with the cooler kids in our clique so our paths didn't cross very often. That was 20-24 years ago and we were 15-18 years old at the time. These dumb High School politics should have been easily forgotten since more years have passed in our lives, since the ages we were when it all went down, but life doesn't really work that way. All the conquests and failures during those formative years actually are really important. I have been on this trip for about six weeks and I've spoken to about 40 people from my past. Some people are more stuck in it than others, but it seems just about everyone has some kind of attachment to their High School identity, for better or worse. Some people bask in the glory of all the fun times (so jealous of those lucky ones), some people still hold resentments about how they were treated in general, and some people carry grudges. Some people carry guilt and shame about how they treated people. There was a time I couldn't walk into a bar in Port Washington without a bully from my past trying to bond with me, and buying me a drink. Hey, whatever gets the demons off your back, buddy...I'll have a Lemon Drop, please.

I took a Sociology class that had an entire chapter dedicated to "corner boys", men in urban areas that stood on street corners and talked about high school victories. Man, of course this stuff is important..."Glory Days" "The Boys Are Back In Town", John Hughes movies? What would the movie and music industry do without cashing in on this obvious truth? Ridiculous? Youbecha, but important to our overall sense of self concept? Absolutely. People in general are designed to be ridiculous. That's why a good sense of humor can get you through anything.

A small disclaimer here...everyone remembers things in their own way, so I might be way off in what I say. Please remember, this was just my memory of my experience in my blog. I think it is complete foolishness to hold grudges over things that children said or did, or to feel guilt over dumb stuff we said or did as children. I am so curious to see what people are up to now. My curiosity is a lot bigger than my ego. I think it this journey presents a wonderful opportunity for me to reconsider some of the less than happy experiences of people and days past, and put an adult perspective into the memories...perhaps even do some re-filing. I don't really get that whole "people don't change" thing. God, I hope people change. I know I did. In High School I was a melodramatic mess. Let me leave it at that. I was almost always nice to people, I think. However, if I didn't win any popularity contests. I'd hate to think what people would expect of me if no growth happened since High School. What a thought. Robert Smith, from the Cure, would probably have a restraining order against me, and you all would have seen me on "What Not To Wear". People do change. Not always, but almost always.

That said, I always had a very positive impression of Dan. I was confused whenever he said he was not the same person. Like I said, I didn't know him all that well, so maybe he was a closet mime, or donated his allowance to the Young Republicans Foundation, but I knew nothing of these things. I still don't know what embarrassing thing to which he was referring. I don't think it is all that important, as long as you can be honest about it and laugh. If you can look back at yourself and laugh, then you can extend the same comic amnesty for the stuff everyone else did too.

I had so much fun with Dan during my stay; and, with limited recall of hanging out with him while I knew him 20 odd years ago, it was like skipping a million steps with a friend you just met and jumping right to the fun parts. It was the best of both worlds...we had the trust of knowing each other from way back, and the newness of having no idea who we were now. It was a great time, and it was exactly the type of experience I hoped to have when this project was just an idea. Thanks, Dan. You rock.... and I love the hand-made t-shirt and hoody. Your silk-screening genius is not wasted on me.

Cliff Hanger

So...I wake up crinkled, and sweaty at ten in the morning in my car and needing coffee quite badly. I stumble into Dunkin' Donuts to buy some and, as always, I am not able to walk out of Dunkin' Donuts without donuts. In California, I can satisfy my coffee itch with any of the Starbucks located on one of four corners on about any given street. On the east coast, the only widely available good coffee comes with the Satan Intensity tempatation of having to say no to one or two delicious donuts. Dunkin' Donuts is on a very short list of happy childhood memories, so...damn if I can say no to a Chocolate Glazed donut, or a Boston Creme...I think not. I better get off this coast before I explode. I need a map of every Starbucks within a 20 mile radius of wherever I am to avoid these stupid problems.

Anyway, after talking to the nice Dunkin Donut lady, feeling like a crazy street person and scampering off with my donuts and coffee, I arrive at Dan Verenka's house around 1PM. It is so hot, and George was still in a pissy mood. I wasn't doing much better, but we both show up at Dan's in our states and hope for the best.

Dan looked just the same as he always did. He always struck me as a warm, sincere and genuine. The look, and the hug confirmed this was still Dan...I was in good hands. It is funny...we were in the same clique in High School and did lots of group things together, but we never hung out one on one...and here I am about to hang out with him for two days and nights. I bring myself inside, and George onto his porch, and accept that it is weird, but I have learned to grin and bear it...most of the time anyway.

I was welcomed into Dan's kitchen and introduced to his two kids Halley and Henry, and promptly offered a veggie roll. It is sad and interesting the way I always notice the stuff I am not so good at when I meet someone and see their lifestyle. Within ten minutes I am thinking, ughhh...he is a great cook and I am a girl who's idea of gourmet is grinding my own coffee beans...Dan doesn't even drink coffee, how ironic. Anyway, I am messy and bad at keeping up with and track of things...I could tell Dan had a great way of making sure things in his house got done, and that chaos in his life was minimal. I always worry I will accidentally piss people like that off with my constant losing of things, and my bursts of chaos that go hand and hand with where my life is at the moment. Oh well...I took note and tried to forget.

Dan and I were struggling at first to try to think of what to say after 20 years of not seeing each other. Literally, the last time I saw him was at the prom and my date was Tim. Ohhh, this is quite a trip of memory refreshers. So...we both just laughed nervously in his kitchen for a bit until the weirdness of it all sank in. There is more to say, but I must sleep and finish tomorrow...Wow! A two parter...

Getting down with upstate New York

I have slipped on my blogging,...let me fill in the days. I left the Northampton eatery and drove towards Rochester, New York to see Dan around 9pm. It is a bit exciting and stressful to not know where I am sleeping or what I will be doing. I have always had a lousy ability to follow maps and I get lost way too easily. So, I am pathetically reliant on my console navigation system which runs on Cd'sthat are five years old. So, occasionally, I will get the 2004 directions someplace, and my journey takes twice as long. Some would call it laziness to not buy a map or visit AAA for trip tix...I call it "old school" travel. It's like a time machine. I got to drive on US RT-66 and Highway 20, and drive through Albany. I got to remember how I applied to and got accepted to transfer to SUNY Albany and SUNY Binghamton and NYU. and wonder how much differently my life would have been if I lived in Albany or Binghamton.

I never visited before, but it is beautiful. Upstate New York is always a place I was interested in, but never had a reason to visit. Upstate New York used to have a booming industry and strong infra-structure...now it's mostly a place where Long Island kids go to college....all the SUNYs are there (state University of New York).. I almost did. I had crappy grades in High School and I was sure I was community college bound, but I couldn't handle the stigma of Nassau Community College...our local JC. Port Washington had lots of benefits, but it was a snobby, elitist, cut-throat place. If you were not headed for the right college, then you had to accept that, at worst... people would openly look down on you, or at best, people would condescend to you, and make sure their kids didn't socialize with your kids if you stayed local and pro-created. The pressure to be successful was paramount. I was scared to go to Jr. High School because High School was next, and the pressure of college and what I would ultimately do with my life scared the hell out of me. I was so scared to not make the grade. I was amazed to learn that in other parts of the country kids actually thought about school dances and cheerleading in High School. I just worried about getting crappy grades and having to go to Nassau Community College. So, when I got crappy grades in High School I went to community college in Southern California instead...kind of like when an unwanted teen pregnancy occurs and the wayward teen is sent to "boarding school in Europe" or far away, later to return to their normal life...I went to Grossmont Community College in San Diego to avoid the stigma of Nassau Community College, and returned 18 months later when I realized that it was just entirely stupid to run from judgemental jerks. I swore that I would not let what others think and judge run my life anymore, but the pressure to succeed is not something that can be brushed off so lightly...either you meet the expectations, or don't... and feel ashamed, or you don't and you beef up whatever you've done to make it sound impressive, or you openly defy elitism and make an identity out of not caring what society thinks by being outspokenly blue collar or counter-culture. Whatever... no wonder so many people bailed on our High School reunion. I am surprised I made it there.

I drove through Albany, and marveled at all the Cathedrals, and wondered what the hell that town must have been like back in the day with all of those Catholics. I mean, they had more jaw-dropping, amazing Cathedrals than bars...what are they doing with those Cathedrals now? While I was in Albany, I wanted to connect with Alison Brew, but she was out of town that weekend. For whatever reason, I missed her at the reunion. I am tempted to go back to see her .I am not sure about my rules for this journey. I want to see everyone that is willing to meet with me after two attempts to contact them on my end...Alison was willing to meet, so should I detour back when she's around? I dunno...so many details, so many moving parts, so few organizational skills.

I drove all night, the moon was red and gorgeous,. The weird little roads my navigation system sent me on were fascinating. The only problem was there were no official rest stops on US RT-66 and 20, and the police had a lot of time to make sure I was "OK" whenever I pulled over to check emails or to take a driving break at a highway parking area, so I was too nervous to try to catch a nap. I slept in my car one time in 1996 when driving cross-country with Kayanne (who I will see in a few days) and we were rudely awakened by police pounding on the windows. I promised myself I would never wake up to the cops pounding on the windows again, and I wasn't going back on that promise, it was made in earnest. So, when the sun came up, I got a few hours of sleep in a parking lot a few hours outside of Rochester. I woke up around ten o'clock, went to Dunkin' Donuts for coffee and 5,000 calories of donut matter, and drove on to see my High School friend, Dan Verenka in Rochester.

About two hours outside of Rochester, I came across a beautiful little diner "McBride's Diner"...the mobile home style diner that was all the rage in the 1940s. I took some photos of the diner, and of the dormant suspension bridge in the middle of a gorgeous park next door. The owner saw me taking photos of the diner and invited me in to get a closer look. The owner, Jim McBride (in first photo), took the time to explain to me that the diner was a certified "Sterling Diner". Back in the day, Sterling manufactured the best known quality of mobile diners and numbered them all...that diner was number 397. Jim said he is only the third owner since the diner was delivered in 1937, and he proudly showed me around. Apparently, I wasn't the only person to take notice, as his diner was part of the set for General Hospital in 1993 for a six month period. Jim showed me the signed photos of Luke and Laura, highly cool stuff. It is a great piece of Americana, and diner culture has always appealed to me. I used to drive all night with friends to have a cup of coffee at a new diner out in another county of Long Island or Queens, one night I drove to the Hamptons in search of the perfect 24 hour diner with Mary. It was great fun. I was pretty disappointed to have to settle for Denny's when I moved back to San Diego...but they sure have nice weather. Ahhh, off to bed...must tell about my fantastic visit with Dan on tomorrow's blog.

Thanks for the memories... catching up with Steve, and getting to know Diana.

I am in Northampton, MA at the moment realizing how all this time on the road is affecting me. Surreal takes on an entirely new meaning when 90% of your experiences are surreal. I am starting to look forward to doing stuff that has absolutely no "OH MY GOD!" factor, like deleting duplicate songs on my itunes, or doing laundry. TV doesn't do it for me at the moment. The more exciting my life gets, the more boring TV gets...and life has never been more exciting. For example..no idea where I am sleeping tonight. I am thinking a rest stop, who knows. I have been on the road long enough where I have to be really careful about money, and if I really want to finish this, then I am going to have to change my approach. I am in an Internet Cafe at the moment. It is so nice to sit in a normal frou frou eatery and get a regular meal and dessert while I catch up on my blogging, emails, journaling, and staying in touch with people. I had a great visit with Steve, and I have a new role-model meeting his wife, Diana. She is one of those people that excels in just about every area that impresses me the most these days. She has it more "together" than 99% of the people I know, yet she is very interesting. How do people do that? I always thought a certain level of flakiness was a necessary side effect, and price, for being creative...then there was Diana.

I am really craving normalcy after having a month long version of "This is your life", and this cafe really hits the spot. I need to pick between two things that costs money that makes me feel like a "normal" person. So, tonight it is either get whatever you want at the creme puff cafe, or get a motel. Oh, the adventures of being me right now. Today, I chose the crepes and cheesecake. Dan is putting me up tomorrow and Sunday in Rochester, NY...then I am off to see Pete for a night or perhaps two. Then, I am headed back to NY to see Kayanne and Marissa and hopefully many other people that I haven't been able to see quite yet. It is so hard to coordinate all of this stuff. There are too many people and moving parts for me to get all the details planned "just right", but I like to think that it is working out just right. I can keep saying that as long as I don't run out of money!! Ha, ha, ha. I think as long as I eventually finish this, then I did it just right. For someone who can't even keep track of her phone or her pants, it is a tall order for me to keep track of all the people, cities, emails, phone calls, blogs, journals, oil changes and financial details. So, I gotta just learn to laugh and trust a little more because perfection just isn't going to happen.

Oh yes, my visit with Steve and Diana. I haven't seen Steve since hmmm...18 years ago? Our friendship was very important to me in High School. I was cliqueless until I met Steve in my freshman or Sophomore year. Who knows how cliques form exactly, but he remembers me being one of the first girls to hang out with his gang of guy friends...and the gender mix stirred the clique stick... and before long, we had an official artsy/geeky/punk/hippy/freak social scene going on. Who knows how that played out exactly...the last thing you have in High School is perspective...but I was definitely there in the beginning of our strange dynasty. I had no social equity to speak of, but I had timing. That clique went on for grades and grades and broke off into sub-cliques of varying prestige.

It's funny to think there was ever a catch-all alternative clique. I would imagine cliques are a lot more specialized now that "alternative culture" is so mainstream. We thought we were the sh** back then...go " non conformity". The only common denominator was that we all wanted an identity that rejected mainstream culture. So, we had it all.... new wave people, geeky people, hipster people, artist people, skater people, punk rock people, gay people, political people, vegetarian people, hippy people, uptight people, slutty people, and many crossovers. We were like the hometown buffet of alternative 80s culture in suburban New York.

It was so interesting to talk to Steve about our impressions of all that, now that we are adults. It was quite uncomfortable and fascinating to revisit those awkward teenage years. I only stayed with Steve for two nights. Yet, I was able to identify the exact moment I developed several neurotic behaviors that haunt me to this very day. I toyed with the idea of going to a local Analyst and bringing Steve into my sessions to help with all the traumatic details of my High School experience. Oh, the possibilities....for now, I have my journals and my cat who is an outstanding listener, and talks only a little bit more than an actual therapist. Self actualization, here I come.

George and I were at the movies

I knew I would have some life changing experiences on this trip, but I didn't expect my new low of yesterday. I drove to a town, let me call it town X in the state of X, and it was all very innocent...didn't mean to tear apart the Christian Science Reading Room with my bare hands...sometimes you just find yourselves in situations. You know, we've all been there...right? Maybe not. So, there are a lot of self righteous people out there that claim to never have defaced a Christian Science Reading Room...come on goody two shoes, let me take you for a walk in my world.

Where do I start? Well, George was really mad at me for putting him back in the car after a few nights in a motel. He protested by propping himself up right behind my head and meowing directly into my ear for a few hours. He wanted to be very clear that he was not happy that I removed him his respite at the Red Roof Inn. So, eventually, he wore me down...and I took mercy on George and pulled over to let him stretch his legs. Unfortunately, his leash and harness were lost in NY along with my phone and my cool pants. It's like The Gaez Boys told me.... "You lose a lot of stuff on road trips".

My cat is not part of the "stuff" I am OK with losing. Within a minute of letting George out of the car, it thundered...and George got spooked, and ran down the block to the Christian Science Reading room. I was right behind him until he disappeared under the crawl space in the porch. Naturally, it starts to downpour the moment George got away from me. I couldn't go anywhere, in case George came out again, so I just sat in the rain...like an ass, trying in vane to get George to come to me. In the meantime, passerbys were having a good laugh at me bent over tyring to negotiate with a porch. It didn't take me long to realize this was funny because it was a really stupid to think that any cat would leave a dry comfortable little "spot" to come to their furious owner in the middle of a storm. Still, I gave it my best shot until I was completely soaked. Then, I looked for another way to get to him.

I circled the house, and saw the crawl space was isolated to the area under the porch...and there was no access. I knocked on the front door...nobody was home. I was starting to panic because it was so dark I couldn't see him anymore, and the more I looked for a loose board, or a latch, or entry way of any kind...the more I realized this situation really sucked. I didn't want to spend the night in the rain waiting for George to come out, and I was not leaving without my baby. I was getting a little desperate, and it was getting a little dark. Finally, it occured to me that my only option was to literally tear enough boards off this beautiful building so I could slip through the porch and retrieve my cat.

I looked around for "witnesses" and noticed the police station was right across the street. Seriously...the police station. I took my chances, and began to furiously pull boards off the side of The Christian Science Reading Room until there was enough space for me to squeeze in and get George. It is a good thing I was so mad and focused on getting him, because it was scary under there! It smelled like many things crawled, or were dragged in there, to die. I really didn't want to die under the porch of The Christian Science Reading room...call me picky, but I can think of better venues.

I finally found George and got him out of there and back into the car...what an ordeal. I was drenched, dirty, and really crazy looking by the time I was finished with this situation. I don't even think there is a moral to the story...except that morality and laws are more of a guideline than an absolute. Yes, there are extenuating circumstances sometimes. So, the police didn't see me, but what would God think about me tearing apart The Christian Science Reading Room? Hmmm. They aren't Catholic, so no penance or confession would get me out of the penalty box. It would just be too goofy to be sent to hell over it, so I have quite the theological dilemma on my hands. I tried to prop the boards up in relatively the same direction they were hanging before I yanked them off, but I don't think that would help me much. I am probably looking at 5,000 hours of detention in The Big Christian Science Reading Room in the sky for this. Oh well. At least I got my cat.

*By the way, this story is based on errrrr....pure fiction. Any similarities to actual event are purely coincidental. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. I have an alibi too. George and I were at the movies.

Catching up, catching my breath and trying not to forget my own name.

I am at a Starbucks in Enson, Connecticut. It has been a ridiculously long time since I blogged. It has been a pretty intense past few days. I run into the problem of posting my experiences honestly, and respecting everyone's privacy, and having anything left to write about that anyone wants to read. It isn't easy to balance everything. For the purposes of this blog, I will probably not get the balance right all the time...but I do the best I can.

I didn't have an Internet connection Friday through Sunday, and I just got my phone replaced...so, for whoever called and got the hobo message that I wasn't taking calls at the moment...I am back on the grid. There are certain things in this life that keep us grounded, and separate the normal people from the strange ones. Well...I crossed that line a while back someplace. I don't know if it was when I didn't have an address anymore, or an answer to the question "where are you from?", or a phone, or social interaction that wasn't a mind blowing experience with someone I hadn't seen in decades. I don't know when it happened. I have been on this trip for over a month now, and it happened...I am "strange". What was it Jim Morrison said about people like us? No one remembers your name? Well...interesting story about that....

On Friday I left Northampton, Massachusetts after a brief visit with my High School friend, Steve. I will head back there to see him again soon. We have a lot more catching up to do, but I needed to head out Friday morning to see another High School friend, Ben who lived a few hours away in Norfolk, Connecticut. I met Ben in High School. He was a few grades younger than me, and I remember him as brilliant, passionate, highly energetic, and not afraid to piss anyone off in the pursuit of expressing himself. I am happy to report that nothing changed there.

We met up at one of the two bars in the entire town around 5pm. Ben gave me a warm welcome. He sat down, ordered a coffee, and just as we started to catch up, half the town came to the bar and came up to chat with him. I think Ben knows everyone within a 20 mile radius, but I stole him away, and we went back to his house. I got George settled, myself unpacked, and ready to see the first attraction...a raging river Ben's backyard. I have never seen anyone with an actual, full river in their yard, so active, that it is too dangerous to swim in.

Ben had a giddy smile and said there was a lot left to see. He was right. It wasn't a long walk to find more stunning natural treasures all over town. We walked across the street to a waterfall...(again, I ask...who has a waterfall across the street from their house???....Ben does). We marveled, we took pictures, and we moved on to see the dam, the lake, swamplands, forests and the most serene natural beauty I have seen in years.

Ben and I laughed, told stories, bonded and headed out to the bar for a few drinks and conversation with his friends. Ben knew quite a few people I already mentioned on my blog, so we had a lot of memories to share over our beers. It was great to go over old times in Port Washington, and old friends almost seemed like they were there with us as we reminisced. Then, Ben asks "did you know Marjorie?".

OK...errrr...Hold the phones! What? I just looked at Ben to see if he was kidding. For anyone who doesn't know this...my first name is Marjorie, I switched to my middle name "Julia" after I graduated from High School and moved to California. My last name has stayed the same, even through marriage and divorce, but I did switch to my middle name in 1989. So...I had just spent a great day with someone who opened their home to me, and ultimately had no idea who I was, except that I was blogging about people he remembered and liked from High School.

It is funny. I came on this trip, partly to find myself again in my old friends and long-term relationships...I am looking for continuity in my life. I want to see what I am about in the eyes of other people who have known me from different times of my life and from different perspectives. Maybe I am having a bit of an identity crisis, but this surely was not helping. I didn't know what to say, or how to break the news of who I was. It was more than awkward. I didn't know how to handle the situation. I went out for some air, and when I got back...I still didn't know what to say. It was kind of a bummer to be forgotten, but on the bright side...Ben, who is a few years younger than I am, thought I was a few grades younger than he is. So, snaps to me for lookin' young. (Got to find the silver lining when life throws you some curves). I told Ben the next morning, and he was annoyed at me for not clearing it up right when I realized it, and I was annoyed with him for not telling me from the outset that he didn't remember who I was. We worked it out fairly quickly. It's not like those things happen very often where you have a prepared response or reaction...sometimes you just have to laugh and move on.

We had a great day driving around his town and checking out the phenomenal architecture...we walked down one street and I had to stop and gape, and pull my jaw off the ground. It just happened to be his parents house...it is one of the oldest buildings in Norfolk, it used to be owned by a founding father, Reverend...ummm, someone or other. It is a stunning house. OK, on behalf of my four librarian friends, I had to marvel at the most impressive small town library I have ever seen and wonder what your reaction to it would have been. OMG. I still feel like I imagined the damned library....it was phenomenal. Ben and I topped off the night in Berkshire, MA. It looks like a little European community. I got caught up in the moment, and got dinner at an adorable restaurant, and enjoyed every second of it. We ate and laughed, and danced around to some kick-ass street performers singing Russian folk songs.

One thing that has changed a lot about Ben is his religious devotion to Judaism. It was fascinating to hear him tell of his move to Israel, being drafted, and how his faith continues to define his life, and get him through the various health and personal challenges he has faced. It was oddly inspiring. Religious faith is something I have struggled with since my divorce. When my identity changed on so many levels, the way I saw myself in every aspect shifted, and that is one adjustment I haven't quite worked through yet. I am just not there yet...but after talking this over with Ben a bit...I ran into a group of "at risk" teenage Jewish boys on a month-long road trip. They saw my license plate said California and they chatted with me and showed off their decked out vans. They were sponsored by their synagogue, they called their group Gaez Boyz (God's boys). They told me about their inspiration to pray, and living in the moment, and I wondered if I would ever get aways from the Universe's prodding at me to get my spiritualism worked out. At least God has a sense of humor about it.

After saying goodbye to Ben, I thought I would take a few days to journal on my experiences. My visit with Ben was so thought-provoking on so many levels, I wanted a few days to write about my experiences and to think about how it all ties into the bigger picture of who I am and where I am going, and you know...what it all means. I'm not sure I have that all sorted out just yet, but I am a little closer. I'm still "strange", yes...and it's OK if no one remembers my name...it didn't really pose too much of a problem with Ben.

Day 24 Visiting Matt and Kristin (your true friends are the ones who will share their bomb shelter with you)

George and I headed to Nashua, New Hampshire yesterday to visit Matt and Kristen. I am absolutely in love with their home. It is the perfect New England Victorian... enormous, cavernous, and charming. It is even renovated with modern conveniences. Ooops, there is the real estate agent in me blabbing away. OK, I do have a thing for homes...that's why I went into that occupation...but theirs really stole my heart. It even has a bomb shelter in the basement. That was a surprise they found after they bought the place. It was built during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and it's stocked with jugs of water from the early 1960s. This photo was actually taken in their bomb shelter just as I was teasing them for being the happy survivalist couple.

I knew Matt and Kristen from 1998 when I lived in Phoenix, Arizona. At the time I was living in the Paradise Lakes apartment complex with Kevin before we married. Funny, that was the apartment complex where I was living when I met George too. George was a stray that was left behind by one of the renters. This turned out to be my luck, because George adopted me and we have been a happy couple ever since.

The local bar was the Back Nine, and I used to hang out there with Kevin, or my friend Catherine, quite often. We had a little bit of a bar clique at the Back Nine, but I lost touch with everyone except for Matt and Kristen. Matt was on a four month work-visa from the UK, and joked about not wanting to return home and wanting to get "hitched". Well, a few months after, Matt met Kristen. After maintaining a two year long distance romance via letters and emails, and visits, they were married. Oh... remember letters? It is so romantic...no wonder they are such a happy couple after ten years. I think they shared milkshakes too.

I always liked Matt very much, but our friendship was always a casual one.. It is kind of amazing that we have stayed in touch for all these years. We only knew each other for a period of a few months back in 1998. Yet, after all this time...there I was... in their home, meeting their children, eating pizza, and spending the night. I was so touched by the hospitality and generosity they showed me. It is encouraging to see this kind of openness in people that are in my age group. It seems to me that a lot of people shut down to new experiences as they get older. It does take some guts to open your home to a casual friend you haven't seen in ten years. I have always been quite a bit more outgoing than most people I know, but the older I get, the wider the gap seems to get. From my point of view, shutting down to new people is one of the most common and unfortunate things that tends to happen to people with age. You can Botox, tuck and lift all you want, but I believe an open heart is the gateway to eternal youth.

Day 23 Banging up Bangor

OK, I don't know anyone here in Bangor, but what's wrong with taking a little detour just for me? I have always been so interested in this place. When I used to work for ING, I would take any free moments in my stupid cubicle searching Realtor.com for cool little towns I could escape to and Bangor was high on my list. After reading On Writing, by Stephen King, and hearing his stories about Bangor, I was intrigued. From that moment on, I knew I had to visit.

Bangor actually exceeds all of the crazy expectations I had for it. I am amazed how almost every house and business is circa 1930 or older. They don't have the one "cute" part of town with strategically placed banners and farmer's markets that everyone visits on Sundays to buy their tomatoes. No, all of Bangor is cute. Well, parts of it are pretty f'd up like everyplace else, but it all takes such a lovely photograph. The city itself is highly liberal. All politics aside, liberal cities are just a lot funner to live in. The art community is alive and thriving here. The downtown area is filled with posters about fun community events, like free movie festivals in the park, CD release parties, art festivals and auctions, and overall fun, cheap and interesting things to do. The cost of living in Bangor is very reasonable. Besides the killer winters, year-round rain and completely awful roads, this is the most appealing place I have seen in quite a long time. I want to live here. It is such a hip and interesting little place without being full of itself. Also, the local economy isn't post-apocalyptic like a lot of other places in the country at the moment.

I have been sick for the past few days and I have not been in the greatest of moods. I mentioned how annoyed I was watching all of those happy people doing happy outdoorsy things on the drive over. I was not one of the happy people, and naturally I wanted all of them to fall off their bicycles and tip their little kayaks over. I was feverish and my nose was running like a faucet and my nose was raw. I literally had to stuff tissues into my nostrils because I couldn't drive with the drama happening in my sinuses. I was a complete scary, ugly mess, and the bumpy roads just made everything worse. While I was fantasizing about shaking my fist at the happy people in my state of crazy old-man passion, George actually got car sick. Poor baby. It is the first and only time he has ever gotten car sick. I was pretty done with the whole allergy/anti-depressant commercial happening all around me too, but I didn't take it to the level George did. I told you he was a drama queen.

The people walking around downtown Bangor all looked so happy as well. The blue sky, and sunshine and adorable Norman Rockwell setting really made me think I might be in the Twilight Zone. Yesterday I heard someone say how nice it was to have the good weather...two sunny days, wow! Since we were on the second day of perfect weather, I tried to clarify...so when were the last sunny days? The woman looked at me like I was an idiot and told me the two days of sunshine were the only sunny days all year. No wonder everyone was so happy. I had some time to rest and I feel a lot better now. I am sad to be headed out of here tomorrow. I sort of want to apply for a job and stay a few months.

I had a great day today exploring Bangor on foot with my camera and visiting the museum, which is free every day in 2009. This place has so much charm and charactor, it almost isn't fair to other cities. It has a way of drawing interesting people. Most people are locals, but a fair amount found themselves here. When I asked Daphne, the woman who works at the hotel front desk, what brought her to Bangor she gave a polite answer that didn't really answer the question. With a little more prodding, she told me she and her husband wanted to move to New England and they threw darts at a map, and that brought them to Bangor.

There are a lot of interesting people here, interesting in a good way and interesting in the not-good way. To me, interesting is so much better than boring, that I will take a bit of the bad-interesting to get to the good stuff. I had a strange night at the bar the other night. I wanted to get some food to take to my room, but it was Sunday night, so everything was closed. The only place I could find that was still serving food was a bar where I had quite a lively night drinking shots with Stephen King's former "wrong crowd" friends from the early 1970s that claimed to have done various drugs with Stephen when he first got married and was student teaching. Those were pretty interesting stories, but I made sure to avoid that pub for the rest of my stay in Bangor. It didn't really help me with the whole, sensation overload thing. Oh, and the beautiful girl who was hitting on me all night at that pub didn't help with the whole mind overwhelm thing either. I was flattered, I was just too overwhelmed to comprehend the rednecks who were telling me horrifying Stephen King stories on one side of my barstool, and the beautiful girl trying to pick me up on the other side of my bar stool. Too much going on there....I was truly dumbfounded. I really felt like the Universe was playing a big trick on me.

I am off to New Hampshire to see my friend Matt, then Massachusetts to see Steve and then to New York to see another Mat, but with one "t". Then upstate New York then Connecticut. I am having serious challenges with organizing all of these people and appointments and documenting and planning where to stay, and keeping George happy and comfortable. I am always worried I am going to run out of money before I can finish. It is so hard to ask people for help with finding places to stay. For this portion of the trip, (with the exception of the one person I knew in NY who I had the awful falling out with), most of the people on the east coast are people I haven't seen in so long that it just seems weird to ask to spend the night, especially with a cat. So much worry! So much rejection! So much drama! So little stability and no predictability. It kind of got to me a few days ago, but I am rested and feeling better and ready for to dive back into my journey. My God.... I didn't know what I was in for. I knew I wouldn't know, but I didn't know it would be like this. I know this sounds a bit corny, but it really helps to see the "followers" (thank you #19, whoever became a follower today) and it helps a lot to see the comments from everyone. I really appreciate the support. It is a bit of a lonely experience, and really appreciate everyone that has reached out to me. Thank you!

Day 21 - Power to the kitties!

OK, my horrible attitude is officially over. I have them...everyone has them. I left mine back with the other soggy stuff I didn't want stinking up my car back at the campsite. Driving is such a great release. For whatever reason, movement is a very helpful thing when trying to get over stuff. Once, when I was 13 I walked from Port Washington to Queens. I was pissed. It was so anticlimactic to have to have my dad pick me up, but I felt better. He kept asking me why I was at a bowling alley in Queens...I never admitted that it took me until Queens on foot before I wasn't so mad, and I didn't have money for the train home. It was a mystery my dad took to his grave.

I drove across Maine today. Let me say, I have personally driven across the country five times in the past 13 months and I have never, ever, ever, ever seen a state with crappier roads than Maine. I even drove in Mexico a few times, and... while they had more abundant roadkill to dodge, the actual roads were better than the ones in Maine. That, and only that, is the bad thing I have to say about Maine. Besides the nauseating, wheel-misaligning roads, this place is amazing. Even George stood up to look out the window, aghast at the gleaming rivers and lakes. I have never seen George have that reaction to something beautiful. Until now, I have only seen him do that for trucks. It is actually quite cute. George, like most cats, is very interested in looking out the window, and the SUV has a lot of windows. Already, a lot of drivers have follwed too closely alongside us... pointing, and oohing ,and ahhhing at George in the window.

It isn't that big of a deal. When I was walking George on a leash in Central Park in Manhattan, everyone acted like I was Sigfreud and Roy or something. Cats are very smart and adaptable. It is quite a mistake to think they can't handle the same situations that dogs can. Cats can learn to do all the same stuff, they just have to poop in a box and have understanding owners. George likes the SUV so much, that on this camping trip... even with the doors of the SUV open for hours...he wouldn't leave the vehicle, except to chase a neighborhood cat out of our campsite perimeter. I left all the doors of the car open because the girls at the site next to me thought I was making him George stay there. My Lexus is George's small, mobile castle, and he reins. I am always very aware of the temperature, and I check on him regularly if I have to leave him. I have actually paid for a few nights in a hotel room in NJ because it was too hot to leave him in the car for my visits. If anyone is concerned... thank you for caring about animals, and George is doing fine.

I had a few open days before I will visit my three friends in New England, so I decided to drive the five hours to Bangor. I highly recommend almost any town in Maine for a vacation if you are with a new love. It is the most romantic place I can think of in the United States. I literally had to detour to the Interstate on my drive to Bangor because I just couldn't take it anymore. Seriously, when anyone is feeling a bit alone, the last thing they want to see is a bunch of happy families paddling down the the river, or a couple on bicycles pulling off to the side of the road for that perfect kiss. I was just following my GPS, I can only imagine what I would have found if I went off the beaten path. I thought the extra miles for the nondescript Interstate were well worth it. As much as I love George, and know he is smart and adaptable, I will not paddle down the river with him, or force him to kiss me on the roadside. For that, I will have to come back with someone special, who walks on two legs.

Day 20

This is a sunset picture from the Lake at my camping spot...so pretty. I am leaving tomorrow, and not sure where I am headed...but leaving tomorrow. I am having one hell of a time coordinating all of these appointments and giving an ETA and such. I have all of these floating meet-ups, and finding places to stay with a cat is really challenging. I was so discouraged today, it was pretty bad. I thought about not leaving the woods and being a peaceful version of the unibomber....the unihermit perhaps? Anyway, I am at that point of doing this where I am wondering why I am doing this. The optimism I had at the beginning has officially worn off, and I think I need some nice reunions to get over my funk.

Things are actually not that easy, and maybe I should give myself a break. I set a tent up by myself for the first time, and just as I was patting myself on the back about that, it rained three inches and all of my stuff got drenched. George is really not happy with the whole outdoors thing and he hasn't been eating much, and I haven't had quite the support I thought I would have from people I think of as family, and I haven't been eating much myself. I want to be honest...kinda thought about throwing in the towel on this project today. I won't just yet. It is hard to be public with this, but I can't find Pollyanna anywhere, so it's just me.

Days 17 and 18 and 19 - Rita Rocks My World

Wow! This is the 19th day of my trip. It is fun. It is horrible. It is wonderful. I am reflecting on everything now in my tent while it is raining outside. I feel like a kid that is in time out. It is probably good to have this time to think without feeling the pressure to run out and do stuff.

My electric lantern ran out of batteries last night and I am only able to touch type. Ha! That sounds really pathetic, but little do you know I am just bragging about my snazzy touch typing skills. I am so glad that I took some time to regroup and to get away from all the drama. I had a hard time deciding how much detail to go into with my horrible ordeal in New York with my old friend of 19 years. I try so hard to do the right thing, but oh how I love to tell a story; and oh,what an exciting,, juicy, and outrageous story it is.

Seriously, I have been fairly devestated since this happened. After all the friends I lost in my divorce, I do not take well to losing more staple friends. I wanted to recompose before I went out to meet the world again. So many challenges have come up so early in my trip and it has been pretty disheartening. I am not on a schtick, or pushing an angle...I actually want to make stronger connections with the people in my life, and it felt like I was running in the opposite direction to have the dramatic falling out that I had with an old friend right from the outset. I don't want to dwell, but I do want to be honest. I didn't plan to camp in New Hampshire for four nights, but alone time was just what I needed to recharge.

When I fled the scene of the drama, I left my phone, my best pair of jeans, and a bunch of other stuff I could really use right now. This camping trip was the best idea I've had in a while, and I am feeling a lot better. It is hard to know how forthcoming I should be in these blogs. Balancing the privacy of people I meet up with, and keeping negativity to a minimum is a tough call. It is interesting, I am about to be in my third week of traveling, and I am starting to feel so marginal. I know I have good reasons for all of this stuff, but not having an address and a phone at the moment, or a set time frame to complete this project does not bode well with mainstream society. I am finding myself making stuff up to give socially acceptable answers....no job? no home? are you crazy? Yes, yes, and no.

So, I won't blog without a filter on my friends, but I am going to blog the heck out of the fun group of senior ladies that is in the site next to mine. They don't even have email addresses and we definetely have no common friends, so no ethical dilemma there. They are a riot. I hung out with Rita last night. She is the funnest and most interesting of the crowd. Sadly, her friends seem to not take her that seriously because she is the oldest of the bunch. She is 89, but lies about her age...she says she is 84...who am I to argue with her? She gabbed for quite a while about the break up with her boyfriend of five years, and her philosophies on men and dating. Those types of observations are so different, depending on the generation that is observing. I believe in evolution! Men are improving.

Rita met all the other ladies on the camping trip in a single's group...now they are all married and, according to Rita, dull. I don't know them very well, but based on what I've seen... I see her point. It's funny, whenever I am alone with any of them, they talk crap about their friends to me. If I were to comment, I would have to say that the others just don't shine nearly as brightly as Rita. I think it runs in the family. Her sister is 96, and "dances for exercise". She danced with Arthur Murray! At this very moment Rita's sister is on a dancing cruise ship. I am so square I didn't even know such things existed. Hmmm, I am going to hang with the ya ya's for a bit. That term never really did much for me..it kinda annoyed me, in fact...but last night when I was hangin' with the girls they mentioned ya ya is Greek for "grandma". I never knew....

I still will never watch the Ya Ya Sisterhood unless someone plays it while I am in a nursing home and I am too weak to move my wheelchair out of the room. Ya Ya!! Here I come, Rita!

Day 16 - Meeting Keith Ferrazzi - (Author of Who's got your back and Never Eat Alone)

For the most part, it is pretty unusual for me to be intimidated. There are a few notable exceptions when I am so star-struck that I act like a fourteen year old with a speech impediment. I am so glad I had the opportunity to meet with Keith Ferrazzi, but I am so impressed by him that I would probably have to meet with him four or five times for my brain to be included in our discussions. I have been a fan of Keith Ferrazzi for years. He wrote the single greatest book on networking, Never Eat Alone. It is pure genius. When I was a real estate agent in San Diego, it changed my entire outlook on how to build relationships. His books make the world a lot smaller and friendlier. It was the first and only book on networking that I have come across to incorporate integrity, respect and sincerity into building professional relationships.

I didn't plan to become a real estate agent; I definitely fell into it. I found it hard, at first, to join the business world. I was always in more academic and creative settings in my prior life experiences. Quite honestly, I thought the business world was filled with a bunch of greasy- handed phonies, and success in the business world would mean you had to promise to be a big jerk for the rest of your career. Well, there are those types, but Never Eat Alone drives home the point that the truly successful approach networking from a genuine and selfless place. This was finally something I could wrap myself around, and I started to have a lot more fun and success when I applied the principles outlined in his book. I have recommended Never Eat Alone so many times that I can almost hear the eye rolling when I am on the phone with my friends and colleagues, urging them to read it for the 40th time. This book is for everyone. I learned so much about how the world works, and how building a strong network is about living a rewarding life, not just for selling more widgets.

When I was driving from Atlanta to New York, I had the opportunity to listen to Keith's new book Who's Got Your Back. I gave up my career in real estate entirely, and I am now living the most bohemian existence that I have ever attempted to live, and I thought On the Road or almost anything else would be more in line with where I am right now. Old habits die hard. I was too curious not to see what Keith was up to with his new book. So, I listened to the book on CD version, and I was absolutely floored to see how in sync this book is with what I am doing. Try as you might to mix things up, life is a linear journey and unless you are seven years old or crazy, it is foolishness to say your past didn't lead you to exactly to where you are now, no matter how much you try to change course.


To my surprise, Who's Got Your Back addressed a lot of the same things I want to address in my journey. It brought so much more meaning and continuity to what I was about to take on. I couldn't help but see Who's Got Your Back as confirmation that I was doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing at exactly the right time. From my perspective, this book is about bringing your most authentic self to the table before you go on a networking binge. Keith talks about the power of embracing a few key people in your life that "got your back", people who will tell you the truth, good or bad, because they are committed to your happiness, growth and success. I have never read a business book that so aptly merged personal growth with professional development. It really takes an author willing to be vulnerable to advocate the importance of vulnerability and honesty within your inner circle of support. I had to question in my own life who, if anyone, "has my back". It is so important to have people who are trustworthy and committed to not letting you fail and will tell you what you need to hear even if it is uncomfortable.



It was so interesting to hear so many of the same ideas that inspired my own journey in Keith Ferrazzi's talk... "families and communities have disintegrated". I agree, while communities and face to face contact are dropping, our "friends" lists are growing exponentially and alienation is growing. I am trying to bring community back to my life and the lives of other people I know in a small way by bringing a face to face contact within my community of friends, and by taking the time to actually meet up with my virtual friends in person. I am so encouraged by the reconnections people have made by reading my blog, and reaching out to people I have met on my journey. My goal is to bring a higher level of authenticity to my relationships, and to help people connect with each other. Of course, bridging the gap between virtual relationships and face to face relationships is a big goal that will obviously take more than a road trip and a blog to accomplish, but if it gets people thinking, then I would be so happy to know I made a difference.

Keith Ferrazzi's message of generosity was extended to me, and the GreenLight Community, by a hosted networking event with local Bostonians who attended the talk. I strongly encourage any person who wants to grow in the spirit of embracing like-minded individuals to join Keith Ferrazzi's Greenlight Network. Check it out on www.ferrazzigreenlight.com. (The only requirement to join is that you are committed to the success of the other members.) After the Greenlight event, I was truly honored to be invited to join the dessert portion of one of Keith Ferrazzi's famed dinner parties. It was a night I won't forget.

Quite honestly, after my ordeal in New York, I wasn't feeling highly social. The road trip was getting to me, and I didn't look or feel my best when I noticed the book tour event and made the decision to go. It was the hottest day in New York so far this year. I felt slightly hobo-ish living so much out of my car, and I didn't have the proper business attire, all perfect excuses to avoid the event. That said, I drove five hours to Boston and had one of my best experiences in years because I reached out to my network. After all, that's what my journey is all about. Reaching out isn't always easy, but it is worth it.

Day 15 - A walk in the park

Sunday was so peaceful, at least from my perspective. I spent the day with my BFF (or at least for a grade or two back in the day) and her husband and kids. I don't think it was quite as relaxing for my friends. For parents that don't have a perpetual nanny and a bottle of Valium, I think relaxing days with a toddler in the terrible two's, three's and fours is more of a concept than a reality. I absolutely love children, and I spend lots of time with my friends that have them, but at some point, all of my friends confess that they wonder if they can pull it off, and they all think they are the only ones who worry about losing their patience. So, for everyone out there, yes...you are just like every other parent. Outside of Stepford, it is perfectly normal to not feel a glowing love and adoration for your child when they are throwing a temper tantrum or trying to test boundaries by horrifying you in some way or other. It surprises me that more parents don't talk to each other about that. I am glad I don't have the pressure to be a 24/7 smiling parent on my shoulders. Hang in there, guys and if you ever want to vent or complain...shoot me an email. I don't have kids, but I think I get it.

It is so interesting to see my childhood friend as a parent. We were complete sci-fi geeks before we knew what that meant. She idolized Spock and his emotional discipline, and I idolized Mya from Space 1999 because she was glimmery and gorgeous. I also idolized Mr. Roarke from Fantasy Island. Even though I knew that show was pretend, I still hoped it was based on a true story and I might get a job there someday. I am still holding out for that job, actually. If anyone has any leads, please send them my way juliaorpheus@yahoo.com.

Day 14 - remembering good people and good puppies

I finally came out of the hole that I crawled into to get away from human-kind for a few days. It is so ironic to be on a trip designed to open myself up to people and to want nothing more than to never see another person again. There is a big button that gets pushed when you realize that someone closest to you (be it a friend, family member, spouse) doesn't necessary want what is best for you. This is a fairly common thing, and I believe it is why so many relationships do not stand the test of time. When growth is part of the equation for one or both of the people in the relationship, it takes some role adjusting and ego overlooking for the relationship to survive. Sadly, as much as some people love us, they don't think they will have enough to offer if we grow and our needs change.

It is tough, a parent's job is ultimately to make the child strong enough to not be dependent on the parent, a teacher's job is to pave the way for intellectual autonomy in the student. Apart from the functional roles of parenting and teaching, there is a relationship that can be enhanced by the growth of the child or student. Still, there are far too many sabotaging parents, and ego-focused teachers who worry that they will become obsolete if their counterpart grows. On that note, there are far too many spouses who are less than joyful when their partner gets a career accolade, and there are far too many friends who are less than happy to watch their friends overcome obstacles. There are so many bad movies about this subject, and yes, it is cliche, but it still hurts a lot to realize that someone you love wants to keep you in your "place", or keep you down. Yeah, yeah, yeah, fear of abandonment, whatever...there is no excuse for it. Growth can be lonely at times.

Well...off of my soap box for me. Time to move on to happier subjects. I had a great time hanging out with Debbie a few days ago. I met Debbie in High School, she was a friend of our mutual friend, Mary, more than she was my friend, but I always liked Debbie. Her big, warm eyes and friendly smile were always so welcoming. It is funny, but among the normal kids, I don't remember many people smiling in High School. Then again, I hung out with the artsy crowd...unless you were making an ironic joke, smiling was largely social suicide in my circles. That's probably why I didn't hang out with Debbie much in High School...I was way too serious.

I was so happy to see Debbie still had that brightness to her. Debbie always stood out to me because she was clearly a nice person, and I was glad to see that she still was. It is funny, she is always someone I wanted to hang out with in High School and never did...and here I was, twenty years later, hanging out with her in her home for about five hours. We were having a great time talking about everything from hilarious bad dates back in the day, to the challenges we are dealing with in our lives right now. Debbie has a refreshing and uncommon ability to instill a feeling of trust, respect and acceptance, and it made my guard go down in record time. She was a teacher for a while, but is looking to do something else after her own kids get a little older and she returns to work or school. All I know is she is uniquely qualified to do something completely amazing. I can't wait to see where she goes.

It was great timing for me to meet with Debbie on Thursday, because Thursday night was quite a challenge. The upside to being so sensitive about friendships going south is that I am also very sensitive and upwardly inspired by friendship and kindness that comes unexpectedly. Thanks Debbie....xoxo By the way, if anyone in the New York area wants an adorable puppy...Deb's dog just had an unplanned litter and these pups are 100% irresistablely cute...post a comment, or send me an email if you want more information.

Day 13 The Roller Coaster Ride

I am having a very difficult time with this part of the blogging experience. I am committed to being truthful, but I am more committed to respecting the privacy and dignity of the people I mention in my blog. So...that leaves me with the dilemma...what do I say when I have a truly awful experience with someone? Most of the people I have reunited with have been pleasant surprises, but it would be naive to think that all of my experiences would be good ones. I had a bad experience a few nights ago. In fact, I had a really, really bad experience a few nights ago. My reunion with a friend that I have had for a few decades turned to complete disaster. This is a friend that I have been in touch with by phone and visits every few years, but we haven't actually lived in the same city since I moved out of New York about fifteen years ago. I was ready for a terrible encounter with meeting up with a virtual stranger from facebook or MySpace, but I wasn't ready for this. It would be tacky and wrong to go into detail, so I won't. All I will say is that some relationships stay together only because they are far enough apart in geography to allow their differences to let it go on beyond its natural life.

After this incident I needed some time to decompress, and I didn't know how to blog about it. It would be fake to leave it out altogether. After all, this falling out left me and my cat without a place to stay in the middle of the night in NYC. In the chaos, I lost my phone and George's litterbox. That was particularly problematic because I was too tired to drive and we had to sleep in the car. I woke up a few hours later to a stench and a $70 parking ticket. Life is kind of hard sometimes.

I have been told pretty regularly that I should be more selective with people. I will be the first to admit...there is a certain un-cool lame straightforwardness to this entire endeavor. The definition of cool is not trying too hard. You know, cool is when you just don't have enough time or interest for all of the people that are vying for your attention. Cool people have the whole supply and demand thing working so people basically have to audition to get into their life. Cool people sit back and let people come to them, and complain about what a nuisance it is to have to turn down so many social invitations. The problem is never the time. The problem is always that the other person isn't cool enough. You would never hear this person say "Yeah, I keep telling Sting to stop calling me to go out to the movies, but he just doesn't get it. I don't want to be rude. I just don't have the time. I have a family. I have a career, and I have enough friends. Get a life, Sting...for God's sake".

So, queen of uncool that I am, I am taking all of my time and money to meet up personally with anyone who friended me on MySpace or Facebook. It is so unselective and filterless, that I can only imagine what my cool friends think. Oh, the anxiety I would have if I cared. It is a good thing I am so naturally cool that I can get away with the crap I do. ;-)