I was lost, but now I am found......

I was blind, but now I see.  See what?  I see the beauty in everyday life that I have never seen before.  What is this beauty you ask?  This beauty is discovered and seen through the eyes of the little girl inside.  When I was young, I felt as though being an adult would make everything better, I would be able to do whatever I wanted to.  As an adult, I think about the simplicity of being a child with hope and unlimited possibilities as to not get caught up in the hustle and bustle and the ups and downs of adult life.  This is the first Christmas in a long while I feel the spirit of the holiday inside of me. Life circumstances had gotten the better part of me. But this year, I feel joyful, contentment, and happiness all at once!  I feel the giddiness of a child as I think about this magical time of the year!! Over the past 10 years, I have really missed this part of me.  New York, thank you for helping me find me again!

Happy Holidays to Everyone.... Love and Blessings <3

8 years and counting....

 Eight years ago I was in the battle for my life.... I won that battle.  Eight years later, I live in NYC.  Eight years later there is little evidence of sickness, only scars from numerous surgeries remain.  Eight years later I am  the person I have always wanted to become.  It took my move to NYC to become that person and I am thankful to this great city for that.  I walk through the streets of Manhattan and smile at strangers and feel a sense of accomplishment when I get a smile back.  I have come to realize not to underestimate the power of making someone's day better with a smile.... it is very empowering!! Try it sometime, I dare you:-)  Imagine the hustle and bustle of NYC, people racing from place to place, bumping into anyone who gets in their way and all of a sudden you can transform a person with a smile.  Or as I call it..... NYC can use a little "Mid westernizing"

Great Expectations.....

I have been thinking a lot about expectations and what my expectations are of life.  I have come to realize that my expectations have been set extremely high ever since I can remember.  As I reflect back on the last 35 1/2 years, I can honestly say that having high expectations hasn't resulted in a completely satisfied life.  In fact, my expectations have left me being somewhat discontent with how my life has played out.  I lost my father at 9 years old... my high expectation of a family was deflated then and has left me disappointed for 26 years.  The expectation that I would be settled down at 35 years old with a family of my own has left me once again disappointed. The expectations I held for NYC were so high, it took me a year to overcome the immense feeling of intimidation I felt for the city.   I don't mean to come across depressed and unsatisfied with life, I am really happy and satisfied with the things I have overcome and achieved over the years and the friends/family I have.  In fact, I feel truly blessed in so many different ways.  However, what I do want to emphasize is that "expectations" may in fact, be over rated.  I find I am most satisfied with my life when I make the most of each moment each day.  If I strive to make the most of each opportunity and just live life, I will not be disappointed by what I expected, because the "anticipated expectation" will not longer exist!  So from here on forward, I here by excuse all future expectations.  I will live each moment of my life making the most of each minute of every day. 

Single and the City

I never imagined I would be living here for 2 years and still with the single tag hanging off my ear.  Not that I came here only to look for love, but it was part of the reason.  I thought that maybe I would meet someone more worldly with experiences that he could teach me about.  So far, I have come up empty handed.  I am not one of those romanticists who dreams of a prince riding up on a white horse to save me from my life.  Frankly, I like my life.  What I am is a realist.  A simple gesture like paying for a cab to take me home, drawing a bath for me after a tough day or planning a little surprise afternoon filled with coffee and a hike.  A good friend of mine text me yesterday telling me, "Don't Settle, You deserve the Best!"  I agree 100% with this, however, I am starting to doubt its existence.  Does the best exist?  Is someone strong enough to love me?  If this man does not exist in NYC, where on earth does he exist? 

I was speaking with one of my best east coast friends last night and we were talking about the ability of love to last.  Is is realistic to think about living with another person for the rest of your life in peace and harmony?  People change as they grow, therefore, is it realistic to think that one person can satisfy us for our entire lives? Is the simplicity of living the single life given up to quickly to live a life with someone else?  Let's face it, when you live your life with someone else, joint decisions have to be made and both parties will not agree on everything.  Being in a life partnership may mean giving up the power of choice, isn't that the definition of compromise?  Relationships aren't all that different in NYC, in fact, they are similar to relationships all over.  The bottom line question is.... is living with a partner worth giving up a single life full of doing whatever you want, whenever you want?  I think the answer to this question can definitely be answered in a different way living in NYC.....

These are a few of my favorite things....

NYC is an intense place to inhabit, however, the city challenges me to push my limits to achieve things I have only dreamed of achieving, both personally and professionally.   As some of you know, I have a stubborn streak and when I want to get somewhere, I want to get to that somewhere NOW.  Well, in NYC, I have had to learn (and somedays relearn) that I am on NYC's time clock.  What is this NYC time clock?  Well, its the massive traffic jams when the UN is in session and all who are important in the world reside within 5 blocks of my office, the 6 subway train that is the "local" north/south train all of a sudden becomes express at Grand Central and the only way to know that is to listen to the kind and soothing female automated voice informing me "the next stop is 14th street".  I less than politely ask this automated voice, "Soooo what happened to the definition of local and the existence of the 33rd, 28th, and 23st stops??"  Of course I don't get an answer, so I leap off the train just shy of the closing doors and I feel myself looking back over my shoulder to give the subway train the look of death.   To sum it up, I am not getting anywhere in the time frame I wanted to.  I have also learned to push my "personal space" boundaries.  In NYC, there is no 3 feet courtesy rule.  Most days, I am happy if I don't have someone's backpack shoved into me or someone relieving himself on the train.  See... I am growing!!  This brings me to what I love most about this city.  This morning I was taking the 1st ferry back to Hoboken from NYC, so I walked to the ferry bus stop with my yummy Gingerbread Latte in hand.  There were a few tourists, which I find really enjoyable on a Sunday morning (to all who think I dislike all tourists... you are wrong!!), available taxis, enough room to walk on the sidewalk without challenging the oncoming sidewalk traffic, and a smile on my face.  I love the city on a Sunday morning.  I love the peace that ironically exists in the city that never sleeps.  For a moment, I fall in love with the city.  For a moment, I don't want to be anywhere else.  For a moment, I call NYC my home.

26 Years ago.....

this is the day my life changed forever.  A little girl lost her daddy.  That little girl was me.  I was just 9 years old and this was the day I grew up overnight.  As I reflect back on the 26 years without my dad, there isn't a day that goes by I don't think about him and what he would think about what I have done with my life.  Would he be able to imagine his little girl in NYC?  Or, more realistic, could I have left him for the Big City? I fear that living in the big city will erase my roots as a daddy's girl who grew up on a farm.  When this fear paralyzes me, I want to pack up and move back.  Then I ask myself, what would my daddy do?  There is a part of me that wants to live near his memory, in Wisconsin.  But, do memories travel with me?  Will living in the big city erase the "daddy's girl" that lives deep inside of me?  Each question is only answered with another question.  There isn't anything easy about losing a parent at that age, the emptiness does not go away with age or change in location.  I do believe that Jack Rosenbaum is proud of his little girl.... if only I could hear that from him.  My day of sadness will pass  as it does every year with the welcoming of October 31st, however I can't stop to wonder how different my life would be if he were still with me.  Would I be here in NYC?  Would I have fought so hard for all my dreams to come true?  Again, only questions and no answers.

A Bad Apple in the Big Apple??

On days like today, I must admit I really don't understand people and the motivation to have dislike towards another.  I have had people who would not prefer to have me as their best friends', but I have never experienced this intensity of "dislike" until I moved to NYC. Why do people wish bad on fellow human beings?  What motivates a person to put me down, to make me feel so crappy inside?  Is it jealously?  Is it insecurity?  Does this person feel threatened in some way?  I ask myself these questions everyday.  On the flip side, I also witness the greatest acts of good in this great city.  On my way home from work today, I was blessed to witness a stranger offering another stranger help in the middle of a busy bus terminal.  This made me smile deep inside.  Why is it the negative things that happen in my life seem so large?  Why does the bad shadow the good?   I would like to say that my perception only comes from the good that I experience in my new life here, however, my feelings tell me different.  Will I allow my perception of the Big Apple to be swayed by the Bad Apple or the Good Apple?

A Day In the Life of Lydia......

My alarm awakened me at 5am this morning.  I checked the bus schedule and found out I needed to be on the 5:47am bus in order to make it to my 7am meeting at the hospital.  I found my way out of my apartment at 4:42am only to find out it was raining.  Good thing I always carry an umbrella in my work bag.  For those of you who do not live in NYC, there is a reason big bags (lovely big designer bags I might add) are carried.  The purpose of a big bag is to carry around a stock of things that one may need while being subjected to the elements on one's way to work. The 5:47am bus arrives right on time at 6:02am.  I flip out my monthly pass and board the bus and sit myself comfortably between 2 lovely people who seem to think the skinny people in this world do not deserve much seat cushion, however, I refuse to move so I hold my seat ground.  I arrive 15 minutes later at PABT and begin my trek into the subway system.  The 7 train is surrounded with extremist born again Christians preaching their heart out (screaming directly in my ear) and handing out tracks.    From the 7 train I make a mad dash for the 6 train where I can catch my breath for 3 stops.  Once I reach my stop, I proceed to walk 5 avenue blocks to arrive at the hospital at 6:30am.  All of this, BEFORE COFFEE!!!  After work, as I walk to PABT, I pass by Zara.... I have to go in.  In a matter of about 5 minutes, my arms of full of things I really think I need.  After the next half hour of pondering, I realize that will power needs to be exercised and I put the "needed" clothes back on the rack.  I leave and proceed to my bus.  At PABT, there is usually a line for the 126 of which one waits on average of 30 minutes to see anything resembling a bus. Most of the time I end up standing on the bus for my trip home.  You want to talk about a balancing act.... good thing I have finally gotten the hang of it as the first time on my feet in a moving vehicle was a bit of a disaster!  Ahhhhh..... I arrive home at 6pm.....

Based on my average day working in NYC I must: keep my love for shopping in check; fight for space on the bus and hold my ground once I get it; instead of developing "sea legs", I must develop 'bus legs"; realize a morning workout is not needed, all I have to do is make the trip into work; learn that patience is not a virtue in NYC, it is a weakness!

You Can't Take The Country Out Of The Girl......

October is always welcome with a contemplative  glow surrounding me.  For those who don't like a writer's figurative style, that means I spend the month of October pondering the past, present, and future.  As I work on my new and old paintings, I began to contemplate my choice of music this morning.  I am listening to Collin Raye, yes, ladies and gentlemen, Country Music.  I asked myself the question, why am I listening to this?  Why is this music creating a peace inside of me?  Why am I craving the feeling this music brings to me?  One answer, NYC has left this part of me untouched.  No matter how long I am in NYC, I will always be a country girl at heart.  I will always be that girl who grew up loving the smell of a horse and all the "droppings" that come with the scent of a horse.  I will always be that girl who had the best summers of her life spending every single day in the barn listening to country music, who lived for the county fair each year, and who will not ever be ashamed of where I came from!!  As I continue to adapt to this new culture of NYC by walking through the streets of Manhattan annoyed with mindless tourists and always in a hurry, I will always be the girl who loved growing up in Wisconsin.

NYC: The place to be? or The place not to be?

As I walk through the streets of Manhattan everyday pushing through layers of people covering the sidewalk and playing chicken with the oncoming pedestrian traffic, I have to ask myself, "Why do I live here"?  Right now I cannot answer that question with any bit of clarity.  The answer will depend on the day you ask.  Many men may say, "that's a women for ya".  Well, so be it.  I reserve the right to change my mind with the sunrise of each day.  With that said, I have moments of living here where I see myself as the luckiest girl.  Last weekend I boarded the 7 train at TS and for some reason I was the "information desk" of the train.  Everyone who walked through the open doors came right up to me and asked me if the train went here or there.... did I mention, I was asked in every different language except English.  Well, a man I will refer to as "Mr. Brooklyn" really got a kick out of this and began sending passengers my way.  It was actually quite hilarious and I had a good laugh with a stranger until GC, where I exited and went about my life.  This would only happen in NYC.  So the debate will continue.  Place your bets people, will I stay or will I leave???