On the Importance of Passion

Earlier this week, I got together with an old friend whom I'm sure I haven't seen in at least three years. She and I did theater together when we were both in high school (a pursuit that I chose over my competitive figure skating career, when my coach sat me down and made me pick), and she recently graduated from Roosevelt University with a degree in Musical Theater. She's since been in two different productions in the Chicagoland area, has 8 points toward her Equity membership (which is a huge deal, y'all), and she just seems generally extremely happy.

She and I got together and went to see the Marriott Lincolnshire's production of Spring Awakening, in which two of our mutual acquaintances (neither of whom I've seen in six years, at least) and two of her friends were performing. The production was good, and as we made our way to the stage door, I quipped to her that it would be interesting to see if either one of the people I knew in the show recognized me.

"Of course they will!"
"I'm telling you, it happens all the time. They won't be able to place me right away."
"If you say so..."

Not believing me, she and I waited for the first of our friends to emerge. He came out, instantly recognized and hugged her, asked her how she was, then turned to me and said "Hi, I'm B--". I cut him off and said "Actually, we've met--", upon which I was cut off by my friend, who said "Surely you remember--", and she was then cut off by him, quickly exclaiming "OH MY GOD you look so different! I didn't recognize you! How are you?!?!"

We got to talking, he asked me what I was up to (asking whether I went to "ee" Berkelee or "ey" Berkeley, which is a valid question in the Midwestern musical theater scene), and we chatted nicely, and my friend and I eventually left. As we were walking to my car, she stated that she couldn't believe that our friend didn't recognize me. I joked, as I've often done in this situation, that "I moved to California and everyone forgot about me!"

Driving home, after dropping her off, I started crying. I couldn't help but feel like something was missing, like my friends had somehow accomplished something that I had not. And they all have- all three of them are successful within the musical theater world, doing productions, some haven't quit their day jobs, seem busy, get to perform every day with incredible people, and are probably flat broke. I, on the other hand, don't get to feed my creative beast in quite the same way, but I love what I do and upon graduating and starting my full time job, will be making probably four times what they are. I have no reason to complain: I opened an IRA this week, I'm going to be making enough to live comfortably in the most expensive city, rent-wise, in the world, I'm working my financial plan out to own real estate before I'm 30 (I have a financial plan), and I will probably never need to rely on financial support from my parents again, once college tuition is paid off.

And yet.

You may notice that I describe my situation in monetary terms and theirs in emotional terms. Which is absolutely true. I left that show, and those people, with a sense that I had sold out. I had elected not to follow my absurd dream and instead, found something I didn't mind doing that made substantially more money, had greater job security, but ultimately, left me less fulfilled. I'm not claiming I would have been as successful as they are now, I probably wouldn't be. I'm claiming that when I made the decision to go to college for something other than musical theater, I robbed myself of the possibility of being extremely, extremely happy doing something I had a slim shot at ever being the best at.

My relationship with my parents, especially my mom, has been strained about this very fact over the years, which I'm just realizing now. In fact, earlier this week, before I saw the show, I offhandedly said to her "I wonder if I would be happier if I had gone to theater school." She dismissed the comment, claiming that I probably wouldn't be. Tonight during dinner, I brought up something related to money and she said to me "you're making a decent salary. You're making a good starting salary, but you won't have money to [buy a vacation timeshare to a place we go to a lot, a timeshare which she herself bought about 30 years ago]." In what was far from my finest moment, I acidly shot back at her "oh yeah? What did you make your last year of teaching?" knowing full-well the number was just about on-par with my starting salary.

I shouldn't have been offended when she said that. My relationship with my mother and money is too complex to go into right now, but the reason I'm bringing this specific instance up is because all day today, I stupidly tried to tell myself that I had given up my passion for theater for money. And when she threatened my money situation, it felt like an attack also on my decision. Which makes no sense, but emotions are strange sometimes.

I sat with the notion for a while, then looked at vocal coaches in the area. I tried to reason that I could do it all- I could do some workshops, lose some weight, get professional headshots again, and audition for local theater while maintaining my full time job. I could do it all, there was no reason why I couldn't. I could be good at my job AND good in the theater world. My day job would just be a little more 9-5-ey than the cliche restaurant gig that theater actors have.

I started to look up members of the original Broadway cast of Spring Awakening, which had faces such as Lea Michele and Skylar Astin (both of screen fame now), Jonathan Groff (currently working on Hamilton), and a host of other insanely talented young people. I'm older than a lot of them were when they got their Broadway debut, and it started to hit me that I can't have it all, I will never be able to do both, and I never will know what it would have been like if I'd made a different choice when I was eighteen.

And then I started to look up entrepreneurs and engineers. I started (and ended) with my future boss, Mr. Jack Dorsey, who studied briefly as a fashion designer, before going on to successfully found (and currently CEO at) both Square and Twitter. I poked around a bit, and realized that I would also probably never be as good at my job as Jack is at his.

One of my friends, a software engineer in his 30's, once told me that he has no interest in being in charge of anything, as a CEO or even a manager, because "I don't want to work that hard." And I think that I share the sentiment, and I've always known I didn't want to be like my peers that dropped out of college to co-found and run their own startups that, mostly, were just kids who wanted to strike it lucky and make it rich, many of whom had God-awful ideas for their companies. I've said before that I'm not willing to co-found or be in charge of anything unless I really believe in the idea. I had a front-row seat as a former friend of mine ran through four different fizzling startup ideas, constantly getting less pointed and more irritable, but not abandoning the idea of his own startup because he never wants to work for someone else in his lifetime. I vowed I would never put myself through a similar situation unless it was something I truly believed in and wanted to pursue. I never had a problem with working for other people. I'm fine being slightly in the background.

Which, oddly, is how I always was in theater as well. Never having the starring role, I played increasingly important background characters as my career progressed. And I was fine with it. I was content not carrying the burden of the entire show, and being allowed room to breathe, explore, and enjoy myself. I've never had a problem with the idea that I'll probably be in the 75th percentile of whatever I do, my entire life.

Until this evening. I somehow convinced myself that if I had just gone for it, if I had allowed myself to be vulnerable and passionate and committed to something, wholeheartedly and headfirst, that I would be in a different situation now. Or that if I was willing to work a little harder at what I do now, that I would somehow be better, be getting paid more, or be working at a flashier company.

Then I realized I was becoming every cliche all at once. Somehow, my mentality had descended into "I need to make more than all of my peers, just to feel validated", "I could do that if I just put my mind to it", "I'm happier here because I have job security", and a thousand others, embedded into both the musical theater world and the technology sphere. And I hated every bit of it. I don't want to tie my self-worth to my salary, and I don't want to feel like I could be doing what my theatrical friends are doing (because I was never that good and honestly, I probably would be terrible at it in the real world). I want to take my friend at face value when she told me that she was extremely passionate about her theater career and she was excited, but that she also wondered what would have happened had she chose something "safer", and she wondered what a world would be like when she didn't have to worry if her haircut was marketable, or her face was pretty enough. Because at the end of the day, I'm where I am, and I'm happy about that. I'm going to work hard, try to find a balance to feed my creative soul, and also further myself in my career, the career that I chose, that I love, and that I'm so excited to start this Fall.

Evan Williams, one of Twitter's co-founders, allegedly told Jack Dorsey "You can either be a dressmaker or the CEO or Twitter but not both."

Well, you can also be neither.

Overdose

I don't know why this loss, of all of them this far, is hitting me the hardest. I just know that since graduating from Naperville North High School in 2012, my graduating class has lost several individuals to drug overdose and suicide. That's not counting the others we knew and loved that were a class or two above or below us, lost to the same two terrible causes.

Life is fragile. We are not invincible. We are not immune from patterns of behavior, or patterns of thought, that end up harming us, or even killing us.

The names of those we loved and lost are tentative on our lips. We grieve together and separately, as we mourn a loss in a community that has become geographically stratified across the country and across the world. Most of us return for the holidays, or visit for the summer, but many of us spend months away from the place we once all called home. We are a divided community trying to collectively make sense of a devastating tragedy. 

The blows never get easier, the shock is always piercing, and the losses can not be justified, anticipated, or brushed aside. Nor should they be. This, losing those we love, should never cease to be a tragedy, temporarily rendering us gutted and speechless, trying to make sense of circumstances that can never add up.

We are a group of individuals so young, so bright, so full of potential, and each time one of us is wrenched so suddenly from this earth, the resulting cascade of emotion and sorrow is devastating. We are all inextricably linked and so we, collectively, lose a part of us. Holes, impossibly wide, appear in our identity and, though we try to show support, to band together, to bridge the gaps of miles and years that separate us, we fail to reassemble the pieces in a way that completes the puzzle. We are irreparably broken.

To all those whom we've lost in recent years, rest easy. You may never know how loved, valued, and irreplaceable you were, and still are, in this community.

To the NNHS class of 2012, as well as the families and friends of all affected, my heart goes out to you. 

My Response

I'm choosing not to engage in a discussion with you about this matter, but if I did, this is what I would say in response to your message, one line in particular in which you said "the fact that you insinuated you could claim I sexually assaulted you when you were blackout drunk has made me lose all trust in you and lose all respect for you whatsoever.":

The fact that you sexually assaulted me isn't a claim I "could" make. It's a claim I did, and still DO make. I made the claim to my therapist and we worked through your abuse for months. It's something that creeps up and haunts me when I least expect it. I tried bringing it up to you at the time it happened and you brushed it off because you had other things to deal with.

I wasn't blackout drunk, I was unconscious because I was concussed. Even if I was blackout drunk, I was still not conscious. But in either case, I was unable to give consent. In either case, I was not in a position to be consciously and consentually engaging in sexual behavior. I was in a vulnerable and unprotected position. And you did take advantage of me. You may not have meant to, and you may not have done it maliciously. But you did engage in sexual activity with someone who was unable to consent. That's sexual assault. The fact you had to tell me that we had hooked up the next day should have been a major red flag.

I don't give a shit if you don't trust or respect me anymore. When you sexually assaulted me, you broke my trust in you. And when you sent me this uninformed, and quite nasty, message, you completely obliterated any and all respect I had left for you. So honestly I don't care what your opinion of me is. Think what you want.

The fact is, I left that encounter feeling taken advantage of. I knew that if I had been in a mindset to make rational choices, I would not have chosen to hook up with you that night. The fact I have made different decisions on other nights does not invalidate the fact that on that night, I would have said no. That's the reason why I made that claim.

[Sexual Assault] Education is Key

How do you explain to the man who sexually assaulted you what consent means?

This isn't a rhetorical question: I'm in this position. This weekend, I saw a friend of mine who sexually assaulted me about a year and a half ago. We got into a drunken shouting match, one thing lead to another, and the incident got brought up. He told me then that I was the reason that all women in tech get a bad rep for calling 'rape'. He told me again, just now in a Facebook message, that I, by implying that making out wasn't consensual when I was unconscious, made him lose all trust in and respect for me.

So here's my conundrum: how do I inform this particular individual that the definition of consent includes a part where you have to be conscious to make a decision about what activities you engage in? That someone who is under the influence of alcohol, or concussed (like I was), does not have those mental capacities engaged at that point in time, therefore can't give affirmative consent? How do I tell him that I'm not just crying 'rape', that I put myself back in counseling because of his abuse, that it seriously fucked me up inside, and that it wasn't just a consequence of me being unconscious?

I can't. I'm not in the position to inform him of these things. Because it would be so difficult to even have the conversation with him, because it wouldn't be healthy for me, and because quite frankly, he wouldn't listen to me at this point.

I know so many women in my life who have been raped and sexually assaulted. Until this weekend, I didn't fully understand how difficult it is to navigate the waters of being a victim/survivor of sexual assault, especially around your assaulter. And I don't know where to go from here.

Why I Refuse to Diet for Spring Break

Hey y'all,

We're in the swing of the spring season all over again- every year that the temperatures threaten to warm up, social media whips into a frenzy of diets, cleanses, and detoxes to get your "Spring Break Beach Bod!" My roommate made it her New Year's resolution to work out every single day (to each her own, but the only things I do every day are wake up, brush my teeth, eat, and go to bed). Over the years of living with so many women, I've seen girls through the ups and the downs of juice cleanses, gluten-free periods, vegan trials, and in more extreme cases, disordered eating and full blown body image disorders.

I'm not at my skinniest right now, and I'm not at my most athletic. In less than three weeks, I'm going to be wearing a swimsuit for a week straight. Yet, I haven't changed my workout pattern or my diet at all. I'm still chugging along at normal pace, despite the fact that I'm going to have pictures taken of me, and quite a few of them at that.

"The horror! You're not worried about how you're going to look? Pictures are forever!" But honestly, I've gone through periods of disordered eating. I've had an unhealthy relationship with my body before, and that was a rough couple of years. I know now that I look back on those periods of my life, both figuratively and through pictures, and see myself having a good time. I don't look at my stomach, or my thighs, or my insecurities. I look at my smile and my friends and focus on my mentality. And there are some pictures that I absolutely hate. But, the pictures exist whether I love them or despise them, whether I notice my "problem areas" or not. So the thing I've learned to do is make peace with them.

If you had asked me five years ago what one of my biggest fears was, I would have responded "being anything bigger than a size four on my 21st birthday" because, apparently in 16-year-old me's mind, my 21st birthday was some sort of milestone that I really didn't want to be "fat" for.

I have given 16-year-old me a lecture on what "fat" means and that apparently I wasn't designed to be a size four. This is okay, because I'm 5'8'' and not a small person. I have made peace with the fact that I'm not a small person, and now embrace the fact that I'm a strong, solid person that may never be thrown over someone's shoulder aimlessly, but could probably do some damage in a boxing ring. I've run two half marathons now, taken dozens of kickboxing classes, gone rock climbing in Yosemite, and I can leg press my dad. So what if I've got almost fifty pounds on my roommate? I also have seven inches on her, killer curves, and an athletic lifestyle. My body allows me to do so many things, and it takes care of me. So I take care of it.

Yes, the pictures that are taken on my coming vacation will last forever. But when I'm 40, I'm going to be showing them off proudly to my kids and mentally focusing on the fact that I was in Bonaire with my dad and one of my best friends, both of whom I love dearly. I'm going to be focusing on the fish and the wildlife and the laughter, on my goofy windbreaker and my horrible mask lines. I'm not going to be focusing on (or even remember) what size swimsuit I wore or how much I weighed (I honestly haven't stepped on a scale for months so I couldn't tell you if I wanted to).

And with that peace of mind, I can sleep soundly knowing that I ate a whole pizza today.

-AG

Wtf.

To add a little bit more horrible to my horrible ten days, this happened to me yesterday:

I had a sorority date function and instead of being set up, I took my best guy friend at school, arguably one of my best friends ever. We've always had a semi-flirty relationship (for the two years that I've known him) but have been strictly platonic. We had a fantastic night, we absolutely tore up the dance floor with swing dancing, goofy dancing, karaoke, and everything in between. I had an absolute ton of fun, and after we said goodbye, I found myself wishing that he had stayed, or I had taken someone else, or something. These date functions are hard because everyone around you is making out with random strangers and I just felt incredibly, incredibly alone. After he left I got kind-of sad, and I just told myself that it was because I was lonely, etc.

Roughly a minute after that, I realized that my date still had my phone. I texted him frantically from my computer and begged him to bring it back to me, and he did. When he came back and handed it to me, we hugged goodbye again except we both held on for way too long. I could tell something was on his mind so I asked him what was going on, and if he wanted to come in, and he replied that he wanted to do a lot of things and that we should go on a walk. I had to retrieve shoes and all that jazz, so I did, and then we walked around for a while.

He confronted the mutual attraction between us and claimed that he had a lot more fun at the date party than he expected to, that he was really glad I invited him, and that he really liked me. He then said that he was unsure where he was right now because he had just had a flirtation-gone-wrong with another girl and he's busy and I'm busy and he just rambled. I was sick of him talking in circles, so I kinda grabbed him and kissed him. He kissed me back, and pushed me up against a wall, and we made out for about five minutes before we started talking again. He admitted he wasn't really in a place right now where he wanted to risk our friendship and that he was terrified of commitment, and I told him I was scared of both commitment and vulnerability. It took him about half an hour to explain his feelings but I forced him to, because we're both mature adults and we needed to address our feelings now because I didn't want there to be any question going forward what was happening. He landed on the fact that he's very scared of anything happening and he's not in a place where he wants to risk anything because he doesn't want to hurt me, blah blah blah. He had a hard time talking because he said I kept staring at him with Bambi eyes, which wasn't my intention (oops). He's not a risk taker in any sense of the word and I told him that he was maybe being a little too cautious and he admitted that, but stood by his decision.

I'm not going to lie, I was bummed. Here was an attractive guy that said I was "straight bangin', in scientific terms", who I trusted, who trusted me, and who supported me. We're genuinely in each others' top five favorite people and it just stung to be rejected by him. I know it's for the best, and obviously I wouldn't ever pursue something he was uncomfortable with, but I wished for a bit that he would just let it kinda happen and see what was going on. He said he didn't want to do just like a super casual thing because we know each other so well and respect each other so much that it could never be just a casual thing, but he's not in a place to do super date-y things.

Then it got really bad. We were hugging and he brought up me losing the sorority presidency and the sheer weight of everything fell on my shoulders and I just broke down. I started sobbing into his chest and he asked me if it was because he brought up the presidency and I nodded 'yes' into his chest. I told him how upset I was that an organization that I had given so much to just decided they didn't want me as their leader. I told him I hadn't even considered the possibility that I wasn't going to be doing something hugely important in the next year, and I didn't know what to do. I also confessed to him that this year hasn't been a successful one. I've done things, but I haven't thrived. I got into my major on an exception, my GPA is going to drop below a 3.0 this semester, I haven't been feeling connected with people, I haven't gotten internships, and then the events of the last two weeks have just not been ideal. He told me he was sorry that these things were happening to me and it wasn't fair that things weren't working out in my favor. I told him part of the problem is that I'm incredibly good with self-preservation and rarely put myself in situations where I can fail, which made these failures that much more magnified. He told me I was the best and that he was sorry. And I just let him hug me and kiss my forehead, and I cried.

After about five or ten minutes of this, we decided that it was time to go home. I looked up at him and he said "don't look at me like that" and I said "like what?" "You're giving me the 'come hither' look and you just need to stop" "what? That's just my face. I didn't even know I could do that, let me try again." "Yep that's it. You sell yourself short with guys sometimes I think" "Guys rarely ever get within a foot of me so there's that".  We started walking back, and I asked him if it was too soon to start making fun of the situation and he said no so I said some stupid shit as he was walking me back home. As he was walking me up the stairs, he said "if you ever have a debutante ball or anything of that nature, let me know because the crook of my arm is really a thing that's working out for you." Classic. We're so awkward combined that this was honestly one of the more normal and less confusing things said to me throughout the evening, so I was thankful.

As we stood on my porch, we said goodbye again, I thanked him again for coming, and apologized for crying. He said thank you for inviting me and no it's fine. Then it just was really awkward with whatever we tried to leave on, so I hugged him again and kissed him on the cheek. He kissed me back on the cheek and then went home.

It was the best conclusion that we could have come to, and I really do value him too much as a friend to fuck things up, and I'm not in the best place for a relationship right now, but it still stung. It wasn't a fun conversation to have, and on top of everything else, was pretty brutal.

What the fuck am I doing wrong?

Slump

It has been a rough couple of fucking weeks.

Last Monday, I ran for president of my sorority. I lost in the equivalent of the primaries. I also endured a particularly rough hour of therapy, where things from my past that I didn't particularly want to revisit were brought up.
Last Tuesday, I was flown halfway across the country to interview for a prestigious position, was asked two questions during the hour-long panel interview, and left with the feeling that they didn't get to know anything about me at all. They told us we would know results on Thursday.
Last Thursday, I was so anxious about the potential of finding out about the job that I completely fucked up a technical interview with a different company. I also couldn't focus at work, and watched our football team lose. I also didn't hear back from the job.
On Friday, after several hours of waiting, I found out that I didn't get the job, but miraculously got a second round interview for the company with whom I screwed up the Thursday interview with. A small glimmer of hope in an otherwise dull situation.
The weekend was a small reprieve, then came this week.
On Monday, I found out I had to re-do large chunks of paperwork in order to get reimbursed. Not fun. I also had a (somewhat) better second round technical.
On Tuesday, I faced the crippling realization that I had to clean my room desperately.
On Wednesday, I ran for president of the PanHellenic Council of my University and lost that as well. The reason? PHC bylaws state that there can only be two members of each chapter on the council, and two members of my chapter were incumbents running for relatively unpopular positions.

Twice in two weeks, I've felt like my leadership abilities were completely discarded. Twice in two weeks, I've lost an opportunity to make a lasting change in my community. Twice in two weeks, I felt like the organization and the community that I have poured countless hours of my life into has not trusted me, heard me, or considered me worthy of their support.

It's been a whirlwind of about ten days, and it's been an incredibly hard one. I don't understand how so many people can tell me, to my face, that I would be amazing in positions of leadership and then have things like this happen. I don't know what I'm missing- I'm a very hardworking and dedicated person, and I have endless devotion to the organizations I deem important to me.

I'm confused, I'm hurt, and I'm discouraged. I do not feel like I'm getting the opportunity to live up to the incredible potential I have, and that's disheartening.