Oh The Pressure!

So I wrote my first blog, and I think overall it went pretty well, but trying to come up with something else to write about that interests my many followers is a tremendous amount of pressure! Though, if I am honest, this blog is not really for anyone else except me... so I should feel free to write whatever I want right? I suppose I should start with what thoughts are swarming around my brain right now.

So it has been a busy few days. I totaled my car this week. In an unfortunate series of events, I was gliding through a prominently green light, and then hit a reckless woman (who claims she had the flu) as she careened through the red. I responded to this event with tears and hysterics in front of a crowd of strangers. Collapsed at the side of the road, clutching my purple cell phone and crying over my busted fender seemed a completely rational way to deal with my frustration over my forth accident in two years. So desperately sad over my crunched up car, I actually became so vulnerable that I actually asked a stranger if I could please give her a hug. She took pity on me and my mascara-stained face and indulged the sad girl with the ridiculously broken car. It is a humble moment, when you ask a stranger for a hug, but it felt right, and it helped.

Next came the news that my lovely car had $10,000 dollars damage, and had been sent to the "total loss" department of State Farm's claims department. What a sad dipiction of the events of the last five days... my car, a total loss. I guess I should be glad that I am safe, and relatively unharmed, but the notion that my car and I will never cruise Baltimore together again, is a tough blow. Granted, Torres (my car) was never what I had envisioned myself driving, the sporty little red hatchback has been nothing short of a gift from God, but when Jiffy Lube classified it as a "wagon" part of me died inside. Now, at the prospect of getting a new car, I am paralyzed with fear that I will kill this car too - and since my last little red car (Ruby) also died a tragic death as a result of another careless Baltimore driver, who can blame me? It has been suggested by several that I should choose another color for my mode of transportation... but is there really a better color for a car than red? I think not!

So now I need to empty out Torres, and grab her little teddy-bear mascot, (O'Malley) and say goodbye to my second car. I am totally not ready - but the insurance company certainly is... Now, if I could only figure out how to pay for the next one, get something cheap and of course, red!

~L

The Finish Line

So here is my first "Blog." It is a very exciting venture indeed, since I have never before had my own blog, and it is very fashionable these days to spend hours sharing your random musings on life with a bunch of strangers. I am glad to be a part of the movement.

I have not yet decided what I would like my blog to be about, but since I like writing, and typing comes easy for me, it seems like I can work out the details of what to actually focus my efforts on later.

I think "The Finish Line" makes perfect sense for a brand new blog about my life. What becomes painfully obvious to me when I think about a finish line, is that I am knowhere near one right now.

I am 28, single, and living in an apartment with two cats (more on them later). I still have a roommate (who I love, but that is not my point), my parents pay for my car, and I am under the constant thumb of my credit and student loan debt. I am not ready to finish. Not by a long shot.

After recently breaking up with my first REAL boyfriend, it occurs to me that though he was not a great man, and often treated me poorly, it sure was nice to have someone (even if he did live four hours away.) Being single in a sea of married chicks kinda sucks, (they have reached a finish line I very much want to reach myself) and I felt more like I fit in when I had a boyfriend - someone I might marry - someone who might get me to a much sought-after finish line.

Ah, the finish line - a beautiful spot indeed. I believe I have hit the finish line three times. When I graduated high school, again in college and then graduating with my master's in social work. Three marvelous finish lines in a long line of un-finshed lines. The finish line is intoxicating! No wonder freaks of nature run 26.2 miles in the rain just to get to it - once you do, there is a party at the end (and very often, alcohol.) Life's finish lines seem to be followed by parties - weddings, the impending birth of a child, the aforementioned graduations - heck, even funerals. Unfortunately there is no party when you don't manage to cross. No one gives you a Target Gift Card when you "almost" graduate. No, you have to finish to be successful and enjoy that desired party. What is glaringly obvious of course, is that it is not really about the finish line at all, it is about the journey itself, (blah, blah, blah...) but it does not feel like that from where I sit today. The journey stinks - I want my party.

Today I am at a starting line again, so I am pouting. I am complaining about still being single with a roommate and cats. Maybe that is more than some people have, and maybe the spot in life where I am right now, is the envy of someone else (I am pretty sure it's not, but I guess anything is possible.) Maybe my pouty moment is someone else's finish line. (Gosh I hope not!) Maybe there are healing properties to lamenting over not being able to pay my BGE bill and MasterCard on the same paycheck.

I am regrouping. I am healing after a crummy break-up, trying to work out my financial issues, advance in my career and re-invite contentment into my life. Don't make the mistake of thinking that I am not hopeful - I am endlessly optimistic (even when I am pouting.) It is my deepest, most personal hope, that while I am doing these things, a finish line starts to present itself on the horizon.

Today it is a blog - an unexpected finish line which I hope will mark a renewed starting line.

~L