The American Dream

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It has been three months since Jim and I moved into our house. I would like to think that our lives have changed drastically. That somehow we are older, wiser, more experienced, more mature adults – but that’s not really true. I would have thought that owning a home would somehow cast us into the pot of people who seem to have “it” all together. Maybe we’d be qualified as a part of society who “knows what they’re doing.” Maybe somewhere, hidden in the legal jargon of the closing documents, there might have been invisible ink explaining how to own a home and somehow it would soak into our minds as we read through the papers and we’d suddenly know exactly what to do.

That didn’t happen. We are still the same people, we just have more space. We have the same stuff, except now it’s all in boxes that I’m afraid to unpack. We have the same furniture, except now it looks sad and old next to the pretty hardwood floors and bay window. We have the same jobs, but now we have a longer commute.

We are the same people we were before we moved, and we have no idea what we’re doing. Continue reading →

Why I’m Not Telling You About My Wedding

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save the date

My wedding is 123 days away.

Recently, I’ve been thinking about how I could possibly describe in words the experience that is wedding planning.

I love planning my wedding. I have been officially planning my wedding for 339 days and unofficially planning it my whole life. I couldn’t wait to do all the wedding things and then write about it. I thought that I would document every little detail and write witty stories about how going to the bridal salon was actually exactly like Kleinfeld’s on TLC’s Say Yes to the Dress. I thought I would do all the research on wedding photographers, meet with a bunch of them, ask them all the questions, and then write up a list of everything I learned about how to hire the best one. I thought I would give the step by step instructions for my DIY centerpieces complete with pictures and asides about the mistakes I made so that you don’t make them when it’s your turn. Yes, I actually thought this hard about it.

But then the real wedding planning began. And you know what? I didn’t want to tell everyone all the details.  Continue reading →

Looking Back on 2015

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Yes, it is February 8th and yes, I am about to write my recap of 2015.

It has been so long since I last blogged that WordPress has changed the interface in my absence and I’m not even sure I know how to blog anymore.

But the only way to begin is to just sit down and do it.

It’s not that I haven’t been writing. I just haven’t been sharing my writing. So it’s time to start.

Despite the fact that I spent the first day of 2016 with with a killer hangover and the second and third days with a terrible cold, it was a good start to the year. I realized that I am in a much better place beginning this year than I was a year ago.

I went through some of the past year’s writing and I realized that I was just so miserable at the beginning of 2015. I was in such a rut with my job, and I was struggling in a big way. I was mentally and emotionally drained from having to deal with work drama. Going into 2015, I was desperate for a new job, I was watching many of my friends leave the company, I was putting on a fake smile every day, and I was dreading driving in to work each morning. Granted, I had great things going on with Jim and my friends were cool and I was exercising, but when work is such a big part of life it’s hard to not let that cross over into everything else, even a little bit.

So here’s to 2016. Cheers to a new year – but also cheers to the majority of 2015, which turned out to be literally the best year of my life, so far. Highlights being: I got a new job, I got engaged and I bought a house. This was a HUGE year for me. Most of the year was just so incredible, and it was so crazy and chaotic and stressful and fast-paced that I barely had time or energy left to breathe. But it was amazing.

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Just a random picture of Pittsburgh that I took from the Gateway Clipper.

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Words to My 20-Year-Old Self

Posted in Lessons Learned by

Recently, I was reading through some of my old writing and journals because Jim and I couldn’t remember what we were doing this time last year. I don’t know if we were talking about a specific date or just life in general, but I pulled out the archives of my life and started reading.

Out of curiosity, and boredom, I opened up some files from 2010 and 2011 and got hooked on reading through my college years. Some people may never want to look back on those years ever again, some people may not be able to remember college or may only remember hazy, inebriated moments, and others prefer to only remember the good stuff. I, however, wrote it all down. The good, the bad, and the ugly. I wanted to be able to look back on my years of swimming and parties and friends and classes and studying and working and really know what it was like to go through it all.  Continue reading →

My Mom’s Wedding Video

Posted in Wedding by

momanddadweddingA couple weeks after Jim and I got engaged, I went to my parents’ house and asked my mom about her wedding.

I’ve heard the story, I’ve seen the video, I’ve even tried on the dress. But I hadn’t ever really asked about the wedding. Naturally, now that I’m engaged, I wanted to know all the details. I was curious about the planning process. I wanted to know what it was like for her to to get ready on the big day. I wanted to know who her bridesmaids were and how she picked their dresses and whether her mom helped her plan everything.

We put in the video she had of the wedding. It was video from a time when having a videographer at a wedding was new and exciting, albeit bulky and slightly intrusive. My mom had the old VHS tape made into a DVD, seeing as VCR’s are going extinct. Maybe it will last another year before we need to convert it again to some new technology, but it works for now. Continue reading →

Love. A True Story.

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Bonita Beach Sunset

The beach was beautiful as the sun set. The sand was mostly broken, crushed shells that sparkled in the pale orange light of the sun. Small waves rolled lazily, quietly onto the sand at low tide. Just a few clouds were spread in the darkening sky, dissipated from the storm clouds that had threatened rain just an hour ago.

I pulled my camera out and tried to capture the beautiful night. As if on cue, dolphins broke the surface of the water. We had been watching for them all day and suddenly there was a group of them, right as the sun was sinking below the horizon.

We had walked off down the beach a little bit, to a stretch where there were fewer people, umbrellas and chairs. Better view of the sunset this way.

I was busy trying to snap photos and get the dolphins in the shot, and then before I knew it the sun was gone and the sky was just quickly fading pink. I turned to put my camera’s lens cap on and put it back in my bag. Jim had a big book in his hand and was telling me he had to give it to me. My first thought was that it was his mom’s or Lauren’s book. It had been in Lauren’s bag, and I was wondering why they needed to bring this big book down to the beach and now why Jim had it.

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The Phantom

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Lot 666 then – a chandelier in pieces. Some of you may recall the strange affair of the Phantom of the Opera, a mystery never fully explained…”

I have been listening to the soundtrack of The Phantom of the Opera for as long as I can remember. I made copies of my parents’ CDs, then when I got a computer, I put the discs on my iTunes. I used to listen to the music while I did my homework in high school and while I studied in college. It was soothing (except for the sudden blast of the full orchestra at the beginning of the Overture and the sudden organ at the end of The Music of the Night), and it was perfect background noise. I didn’t realize, however, that while I was studying biology or theories of mass media, I was also memorizing the entire musical.  Continue reading →

Snowy Weekend in Cleveland

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The night before a big February snowstorm blanketed Ohio and Pennsylvania and other parts of the Northeast with about six inches of snow, Jim and I drove to Cleveland, Ohio to visit his cousin, Matt, and his fiancé and get a little taste of the city.

Despite having family in Ohio and taking the turnpike west multiple times a year throughout my entire life, Cleveland was one city I hadn’t been to. I was surprised that it’s only a 2-hour drive away, so we were able to spend all of Saturday and a good part of Sunday visiting the touristy areas, museums and restaurants.

Cleveland Arcade

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Super Bowl Sunday: Who Are Your Champions?

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Who Are Your Champions

It’s Super Bowl Sunday and the grocery store was packed. I mean packed. I don’t know why I didn’t think to get my weekly stash of life-sustaining food yesterday, but I didn’t. So I drove over there today, in a blizzard, parked on the lower level of the garage after driving through every row of the first level, and managed to push my way down the aisles for an hour without having a breakdown. Huge success, considering it was so crowded that they’d run out of hot sauce, and almost everyone in the store was packed into the condiments aisle waiting to see if it would be restocked.

As I was patiently waiting in the checkout line and handing over my coupons, it occurred to me that this is crazy. Continue reading →

A Year in the Gym

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A Year in the Gym

One year ago, I joined a local gym a little less than a mile from my apartment. One of my goals for the new year had been to start getting back into shape, so I found a gym that I liked that included fitness classes and I signed myself up. I figured if there was $40 being taken out of my bank account every month, I would force myself to go.

One year later, I’m proud to say that I’m still going.

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