Category Archives: Life Lessons

On 9/11

Like most Americans, I’ve been spending the anniversary of September 11, 2001 as a way to soak in as much information as possible about the events that happened that fateful Tuesday morning and to recount my own “Where were you…” experiences from loved ones. This was rather upsetting to members of my family, particularly my parents, who simply couldn’t bare to go to through the emotions of that day once again. That whole idea enraged me to a certain degree and left me thinking to myself “How could they NOT want to watch this? To understand it?”  Why is it that they fully understood the extent to which our nation was affected by the 9/11 terror attacks and I didn’t?

I didn’t do any deep-diving investigating prior to this year mostly out of blissful ignorance, but I work in New York now so the attacks suddenly seemed more personal to me than ever before. Finally, after the hours of documentaries, news specials, op-eds, and columns came to a close, I finally had some time to reflect on the reasonings behind my almost fanatic style weekend researching. It dawned on me that I was only a precocious 13 years old eighth grader at the time of the attacks. To be able to fully emotionally synthesize all of those events was difficult for everyone, especially children, and I had blocked that day out of my memory for so many years. An intense rush of guilt and remorse hit me like a tidal wave – why had I been living for 10 years not wondering?

Then came the memories that I tried to block out from my brain all this time. Flashes of my entire eighth grade class taken down to our school auditorium to hear about what happened and the confused look on my young friends faces. Then there were quick glimpses of the utter bewilderment experienced by the adult figures as they themselves tried to piece things together and console their young charges. Most of us left the auditorium and were picked up by parents or other guardians, only to go home and watch the footage. It would be days before many of those young students would return to their classes.

My little Connecticut town being in such close proximity to New York meant that there were students whose parents worked in Manhattan. What haunts my 13 year old mind most is seeing the faces of the kids whose parents worked in Manhattan turn to absolute white – stricken with terror over the thought of their family life changing forever. The memory fragments are still difficult to piece into one complete story.

(There were 26 people with ties to my town who perished that day.)

The path on Memory Lane came to an abrupt end when by 1 am, my original question remained unanswered. My parents fully understood the events because they not only experienced it wholly in real-time, but they’ve seen the affects in the years prior without rose colored glasses. Everyone talks about how my generation has a somewhat jaded perception of reality and I had until that time considered myself an outlier in that sweeping generalization until yesterday.

The only thing I can say to that affect is that we all need to wake up. We’re the ones who elected a president under the pretense of “Yes We Can” and “Change” but what have we done under those ideals to honor the lives lost on 9/11 and our country?

My hours of researching brought me to AOL’s “New York Says Thank You” movie about the New York Says Thank You Foundation, an organization that sends hundreds of volunteers from New York to help communities around our own country who are recovering from disaster. AOL is now partaking in a joint effort among corporations, individuals, and non-profits with the ActionAmerica movement. With this, we can all answer my final question by working together to turn September 11th into a day of positive action. Check out their site and figure out a way that you can help make some change.

@MerriamWebster’s #WOTD

My beloved Merriam’s word for August 17th is:

toplofty \TAHP-lawf-tee\ adjective
: very superior in air or attitude

Example:
My blind date seemed rather interesting but was a tad toplofty as he recounted his mediocre rise to stardom. My blind date was with Wilmer Valderama.

The Ultimate Test

Facebook, Twitter, Perez Hilton, People.com, Gawker, E! Online…

These are all names of websites, among a few others, that I tear through for information on a daily basis. Starting October 1st, I will be separating myself from these sites. No longer will I peruse gossip sites to find out the latest on what kind of mess Lindsay Lohan has gotten herself into, or if Justin Bieber’s hair has miraculously flipped over to the right side of his face. Gone will be the days of extending witty remarks on all of my friend’s status’, giving my two cents on my friend’s DAR pilgrimage or an unflattering photo.

I just feel oversaturated, overwhelmed and unimpressed by the pointless knowledge which clouds my mind. In the duration, I plan on only using my computer to read hard news, skipping over the gossipy sections a la Page 6, instead opting for world, national, and local news. If anything gossip related comes on a news program, I will begrudgingly change the channel.

One catch – I’m only allowed to use social networking sites to update you all on when my blog or other writing endeavors go live. I’ll be documenting my dwindling knowledge of pop culture/my friend’s and stranger’s e-lives.

In the meantime, I have 9 days to live it up… so If I’m commenting on your life more than normal – you know why. After that point you can catch me on the e-mail and mobile scene.

It’s Been…

Over ten days since I posted anything, and 24 hours since I wrote anything worth posting so I think I’ll just go with a flow of consciousness entry as I’ve promised myself to add items to this blog with increased frequency given that I’m unemployed and welcome all forms of distraction.

I wrote a few weeks ago about a recent trip to Barnes & Noble, or was it Borders… either way, a successful journey to a bookstore which yielded a self help book, a philosophy book, and the Jane Austen collections. Happy to report that I got through the philosophy book, still reading Ms. Austen, and have yet to crack the self-help; seemingly symbolic of my nature as I rarely seek out guidance but selected that specific guide for no other justifiable purpose than something deep inside told me I needed to.

There was also an entry discussing post-collegiate hobbies – mine being the guitar, and rather regrettably, karaoke bars. One lamenting on back to school over-indulgences, and about phoning my crush during a tequila driven fiasco… So maybe I’ll use this entry as an end of summer round up – hopefully as a means of deducing what I learned…

This was the first summer that was supposed to be filled with expectations, goals, and any other form of achievement based colloquialisms. I, however, wanted to get through the summer unscathed (read: sane) so I didn’t set out to define any sort of aspirations or what have you – it’s because of this that I kept myself susceptible to absorbing any sort of lesson thrown my way without being blinded by an auxiliary purpose.

I’m certain I’ll come back and add to this before the month’s over, but as for right now here’s the list of things I learned to do:

  • Communicate better with others – it’s one thing to get your ideas out through written word (which seems to be my knight when it comes down to the Verbal vs. Written battle), but it’s of the utmost importance to be able to verbally communicate your thoughts – which I apparently had no issue with until I started interning and letting my nerves get to me.
  • Err, err and err – if part of being human is to err, then why not go for it with gusto – just be sure to ‘fess up to your mistakes and learn from them. Being young is about testing the waters.
  • Take on new interests - I was apparently destined to become a musician – okay that’s a blatant lie – but I enjoy playing the guitar! Wouldn’t have known that had I not decided to pick one up. Try new things until you find something you love doing. You’ll turn out happier as a result. If your hobby makes you frustrated, pick another one.
  • Remain optimistic and be realistic – this more or less pertains to my lack of full-time employment but I won’t bore you with those extra details…

Okay, so one lesson per month – not too shabby. What are some of the things you learned this summer? – Feel free to post comments.

Regression

A particularly unfortunate event occurred in the wee hours this past Sunday. Before you wrestle with all the “most likely to occur in the late night hours” scenarios, let me simply cut to the chase. I, Tristen, engaged in absurd drunk dialing this past weekend; a total regression from where I currently am in my life’s journey.

I woke up completely embarrassed, slightly ashamed, and still drunk. My relationship with my cell phone has been particularly uneasy over the years and drunk dialing is something I threw out the window a few years ago, so to be revisiting it in my post-graduate life is a little unsettling personally.

The little tequila induced episode brought about somewhat of an epiphany for me as the day (read: hangover) progressed. The shame disappeared and the embarrassment continued to lurk around as I found myself incapable of contacting my victim to explain – “it was the tequila!” – or any other laundry list of excuses that my colorful mind could conjure up. Even as I write this now, I can’t help but cringe at the thought of my actions.

While I’m not the only person in the world who thinks receiving late night phone calls from your friends are hilarious, there are, in case you were unaware, an assembly of people whose opinions tend to lean far into the opposite direction.

While floating in all too familiar post-drunk dialing self-repudiation I willingly obliged when my girlfriend requested a companion for a brief shopping excursion to New Haven – partly because I was still a little tipsy when she asked, partly because I owed her big time, but mostly because she’s my bud.

My pal packed me a goody bag for the car ride that consisted of water, a nondescript ibuprofen, the latest edition of Glamour, and a pair of extra-large, extra-dark sunglasses – the perfect remedies for the state that I was in.

I read through the issue while fighting against the treacherous warriors who were seemingly engaged in a full-fledged battle royale in my stomach. I spent that car ride playing my best defense against the stomach creatures and luckily there were no issues in my friend’s new BMW.

There was a particular article that took my attention away from the war in my tummy – that of lessons which the author wished she had known about dating when she was 21. The advice was certainly pertinent given my current circumstances – single, 22, and fresh off harassing the object of my affection. I always tend to take counsel with a grain of salt, especially when it’s coming from a complete stranger who is getting paid-per-word but the author offered some sound advice given my situation – I have since misplaced that particular article so I’ll just continue on with the story.

My cousin had an ingenious idea that we should all go see, “Eat, Pray, Love” that night. Again, I submitted to another plan as I needn’t argue with the Missa.

Liz Gilbert’s life was all too familiar to my experiences. I took a similar journey not too long ago, albeit a shorter one and one which skipped over the “P” in the essential EPL acronym. Needless to say I felt a connection to her even though our stories are not complete replicas – a kindred spirit with an asterisk attached.

The movie left me with this unsettling emotion of complete and utter despondence given the state of my career and romantic life. I asked myself a number of questions about what I want out of my life, especially right now. This led to the epiphany I spoke about earlier which came to full bloom after my brief self-doubt.

What the movie eventually made me re-realize (if that even counts as a legitimate word) is that life is about taking chances – not sitting around waiting for change or accepting the status quo. Liz made a ballsy choice, a risk even, by picking up and leaving for a year to rediscover herself – personifying the question”Why take a leap when you can jump?”

In the greater scheme of things, my tequila fueled phone escapade will only go down as a blip on my life’s radar. I’m 22 years old and my training wheels on the bicycle that is life are only starting to loosen (read: I’m young and make silly mistakes). So I guess the overall message that I want to convey is that no, I don’t feel entirely remorseful for my actions, embarrassed? – totally. While I definitely said unintelligible, ridiculous things, at least I made the jump.

A New Scale

Life after college is one filled with these immense, powerful, overly potent questions. The majority of them more or less pertain to having this sort of post-educational existential crisis of some sorts. All of them, though, seem to metastasize like some disease and consume your thoughts – at least that’s what happens for me.

Some of the questions my friends and I discuss are based off of where we’re going in life, finding a purpose, finding jobs, transitioning from a full-time student to a full-time employee and so forth. All these questions, though, are based around trying to find a new resolve all while not compromising ourselves and trying to mature/advance or what have you.

I have created a rather black and white scale for how I will measure my success in for the next few months – it’s called the Regression/Progression scale and I’m starting to push it into my friends’ subconscious like the movie Inception.

The premise behind Regression/Progression is simple. When you’re thinking about making a decision, it is important to envision whether or not this is a choice you would make as an 18 year old, recently released from the confines of your parents, doing stupid crap every day, college freshman, or a 22 year old goal oriented, learning from your mistakes, looking for more in life, college graduate.

This new system works for both social matters as well as professional ones. A slide show of examples are flowing through my head, however, the majority of them would call me and my friends out on the debauchery that occurred in the four plus years (eek!!) prior to this mid-grade enlightenment and I’m not at the phase in life where burning bridges is my top priority.

What do you see yourself doing in your post-graduate life? What kind of career do you see yourself in? Are you looking towards going back to school and finding a new career path? What are your thoughts! Holla at me!

Life Lessons From an Unsuspecting Fellow

That fellow happens to be John Mayer.

People who don’t read his blog should re-evaluate their lives and try and catch a glimpse of his writing every now and then. I lost touch a few months ago with John Mayer the writer and became too involved with John Mayer the lyricist (his jams help me calm down). And other than dishing out sweet beats he also happens to be a pretty funny guy (look his videos up on FunnyOrDie.com).

The John Mayer who I like is the one who wrote this blog entry, of which I add an excerpt:

I wish that when I was younger I could have met my current self. We would have sat down at a coffee shop so that I could explain life to young me in terms that only we would understand. It would have saved me a lot of hardship.

…

I used to think that life was an intricate series of levers and pulleys, buttons and switches, Mexican standoffs and hostage negotiations. As I get older I realize that life is more Netherlands minimalist than Jackson Pollock. The problems don’t get fewer, and in fact they grow in number, but the way I index them in the database is different. More problems get filed under fewer category headers.

He was able to put 22 years of thoughts going on in my head into 3 simple paragraphs. The guy is about 30 though so he’s had enough time and experience to figure out that the levers and pulleys don’t really exist.

My favorite part of the entire excerpt lay in the last two sentences. That particular section was most poignant to me after experiencing a weekend filled with young dramatic 20 somethings. I think this more or less categorizes under “Pick Your Battles,” something which we should all learn to do as we get older. I don’t believe that means to bite your tongue and not speak up or stand for yourself, but to know how to properly communicate your feelings without creating more chaos for someone whose problem database is far more complex than any sane, mature human could imagine. They’re the kind of people who simply just don’t get it.

If you could have dinner with your 7 year old self, would you? I probably would like to just for the overall experience but I wouldn’t “Mommy” myself so to speak and attempt to instill life lessons in the young freckle faced tom-boy. The point of having life lessons is that they are earned (and learned for that matter) which is exactly what I think Mayer is talking about here. There’s a reason we aren’t born with so much knowledge and wisdom – it’s so that we realize things like how putting your hand on a hot oven SUCKS and the scars you get from it will teach you to ask for an elder before attempting to fuck around with that thing again (rough memories!)

As we go through life, yes, things get more difficult, but what’s the use in complaining? Life’s a beautiful thing. If you read that excerpt I added and didn’t really understand it, then I recommend you take another look, and then another and maybe one last look and attempt to realize how it may or may not correlate with things you’re currently experiencing. Looking at this from a post-graduate perspective really made the message seem more clear to me. Now’s the time to grow up and for people to put their petty shit aside. Now’s the time to attain lay-enlightenment. Put all of your experiences into a bubble and to figure out what that means to you.

Other than hobbies, what kind of changes are you making/trying to make since graduating?