On YOLO

Do you know what's tired? No, not me (although that, too). Facebook, Twitter. Tired.

Granted this is mostly my fault because I'm following/subscribed to the wrong people apparently. It's very possible I'm also one of those "wrong people."

I'm not tired of you. I like you, because if I didn't, I wouldn't associate myself with you or put up with the amusing, sometimes inane, YouTube videos you post on a daily basis. Or read emo, plagiarized Tumblr posts.

Nope, nothing annoys me more than the fortune cookie tweet/status.* I really don't need you to tell me "it is what it is" or to "carpe diem" and "YOLO" the daylights out of my life with circadian, brainwashing regularity. I already know that you're "werkin" or "swaggin" because we're friends, and I love your swag. Or at the very least I know because you tweeted that last week. You don't need to tell the virtual world to treat others the way you would want to be treated because no one's going to openly admit to being a narcissistic despot. Also, my Sunday school teacher taught me that adage when I was two. And you definitely do not need to be posting "don't judge me" because you just updated your status on a different social network ranting about how you got no patience for fake-ass b*tches #karma. I don't know about you, but I am definitely someone else's fake-ass b*tch.

I don't need my twenty-something friends to sound like deranged eighty-year-olds. I don't need you to know everything, because I know everything. Right? Right.

The irony of growing up getting older: year by year, I realize how much I do think this and how much that minor egotistical oversight unfailingly fails me. I think I know everything. I thought I knew everything when I was five. My progress is a little disheartening.

But the progress: it's okay to not know. In fact, it's great to not know. Because when you don't know, there are no other "don't"s or "can't"s or "no"s. When you don't know if something won't work out for you or if you aren't going to make it, it means there's a possibility that it can, that you will. 

No one expects you to know anything about anything when you're twenty-something. They might expect you to know something about something when you become thirty-something. But you won't, or at least I won't, not at the rate I'm going.

And I refuse. I refuse for the rest of my life to be certain about things that don't require certainty, because I've lived a year segmented by boundaries of finances and responsibilities and "no you can't"s. I can't do that anymore.

There's no reason to jump the gun, to put up a front as a Confucian proverb dispenser. There will be a time to spout out aphorisms that carry zero practicality.

So, all of that to say, let's dial down the fortune cookie tweets. #hadtogetitoffmychest #PSnoonereadsthesehashtags



*Often disguising a Humblebrag

"It was love when" the Blog

I just solved a coding crisis I've been trying to figure out for weeks. I feel pretty effing sexy. And yes, I actually did just say that.

Finally...

Launching on Monday!

xxxx

P.S. If anyone ever needs help creating two dynamic pages (aka the impossible on Wordpress), I'm pretty sure I just owned the interface.

I'm not passive aggressive

Okay, maybe I am a little, but you can't blame me. Blame the times; it's the way of our generation, the zeitgeist, l'air du temps. Blame the Internet -- now I can call you out on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Google+ and my twenty-plus blogs without ever writing your name thanks to this handy hashtag: #youknowwhoyouare. Like, totally, right? Or I can always fall back on the fact that I'm Asian, and if that's not good enough for you either, there's the classic excuse of my female birth. Passive aggressiveness is practically social survival.

I'm not self-absorbed either. And if I am, well, it isn't my fault. See, I chose to be in a line of work that sells little more than glorified personal opinions for $15 a pop. And I ended up there because I was born with a soft voice and people just assumed I had nothing to say (unless I resorted to yelling) because they had to work harder to hear me and I had no choice but to express my ignored sentiments turned to pent up judgments because there was no other way for people to listen to (not hear) me and I need people to listen to me because I was born the oldest and everyone knows the oldest always ends up with some kind of self-important, vainglorious neurosis. So, you see, it isn't my fault at all.

I'm not short-tempered, am I? Getting mad at you for choosing him over me isn't silly, is it? Well, if it is, I can tell you I'm probably going to be moody for the remainder of this week and possibly into the next because I'm on the rag. And I know it isn't an excuse, blah, blah, blah, but actually it is because did you know my hormones are raging inside of me and the imbalance is causing me to produce legions of little red armies all over my forehead not to mention I crave (and eat) like I'm pregnant? In fact, every time I read a period-related article in one of the six women's magazines I'm subscribed to (which averages out to one period story a month), I swear I have PMDD and should go see my gyno soon, but then I don't because I forget, and I also swear I have some sort of ADD because this spiel started out with why it isn't my fault that I'm short-tempered, and actually, it ends my argument nicely because I obviously can't remember that life is actually good and much worse things have happened, which makes me think that something silly like you choosing him over me is actually one of the worst things that ever could've happened.

And I'm not ruthless. Maybe you'll consider this online reality check ruthless, but I can tell you to blame yourself and my ex-boyfriends and frenemies because I've done the nice thing, and again and again you people take advantage of me and I swear to you I'm the victim in all of this and I know everyone says that but I'm telling you that's just how it is 'cause I didn't ask to be, and it's not like I've ever hurt anyone like that in my life. And sure, maybe I can be a little more empathetic to people, like when a girlfriend is going through heartache, but it's so hard for me to remember what that's like! Refer back to previous ADD mention.

Maybe I am all of these things, but I don't think I should have to change myself because well, that's just me. I'm not always sure how I ended up that way, but I did and that's who I am. And frankly, I just don't feel like it. And everyone knows the key to happiness is to be accepted as your true self, right? Isn't that what we're told? Just be yourself.

And maybe, I am a little passive aggressive.

Did you buy my excuses? Yeah, I don't buy yours either.

It was love when...

I knew it was love when even during the hard times (which are few), it still felt so easy.

--E

Postscript: To celebrate the easy 18 months we've been together, we're going on a date tonight. And it feels like the first.

----

Have your own story?

It can be as specific as you want it to be, and it'll be completely anonymous.

Submit a short, 100-word story to http://itwaslovewhen.com/share/ in the above format.
 Or send it to me  (dearestherhan at gmail),

Note: Submission is also consent for the story to be published on the website and, if chosen, the final book. You can share more than one story and spread the word! It’s a chance to immortalize your story in a book.

Chivalry, An Obituary

A conversation with a friend led to:

"I get slightly annoyed at chivalry is dead comments, when girls talk about the past like it was some golden age where men treated women awesome cause they held the car door open or w/e."

And I'm a girl, a girl that's had more than her fair share of chival-less boys, and I get it. I get that girls want to feel special, to feel valued. (I hope you guys are taking notes. No, really. I think you should.) We want to feel like priceless treasure because that's certainly how we feel about you (forgive our pride and forget what we say out loud). Why else would we feel heartbroken when we end up feeling as valuable as dirt instead?

I digress. The point of this post is to bring the "chivalry is dead" vs. "chivalry is dying" vs. "the deterioration of chivalry is emitting noxious fumes that will turn us all into monkeys" debate to an end. Because what's really going on is the "chivalry" in that clause is no longer relevant. What these "girls" think of chivalry is men in suits and pocket squares, red lips, hands that help wasp-waisted women out of the back of 1960 Ford Falcons. Yes, ladies proceeded first and men removed their fedoras in a woman's presence, but it was also this:

Chivalry came at a price, and if you ask me to choose between a pulled out chair and the choice to be 27 and unmarried without being considered an old maid or suspected of marrying my soul to the devil -- or the choice to be anything you can imagine for yourself -- well, need I say more? Look beyond the surface folks. Because if what I get for a little tip of the hat is a grouchy despot in the morning expecting a four-course breakfast, then no thank you, sir. I wouldn't trade the present for anything.

I'm not saying that we have to pay that price now if we want the same kind of civility, but I believe this is the new question: Do you still want it? Is a pandering smile and him walking on the street side of the sidewalk because his mother "told him so" enough to satisfy you? 

Because for me, chivalry is a man who will give me his coat during the sub-zero Chicago winter because he wants to show he cares for me, and he's the same man that will be there when I impatiently switch career paths four, five, thirty times. Isn't this what we want? Not a habitual creature who is programmed to carry a woman's bags, but someone who does so because he cares. The chivalry I seek today is beyond the superficial. This is the heart of the matter. (Note: Actions speak louder than words.)

He will view me as his equal, not his baby-making coffee-maker. I want to make coffee (delicious or disgusting, I can't promise anything) for him in the mornings to show him my own brand of chivalry because I love him, not because he's a parading tyrannical oaf.

A chivalrous man will listen when I speak, digest what I say and value my opinion. And more importantly, a good man will do all of that with a complete stranger, too. Opening doors does not a good man make. Don't get it twisted.

And at the end of the day, that is who I want to come home to: the good man. The man who is chivalrous in character, not by default.

The lesson? (Anything I say, take it or leave it. We're two-cent creatures by nature.) Girls, no more romanticizing! This was the 1960s (see the above videos), and we have got it way, way better. Present-day chivalry -- there's nothing like it. And appreciate it! Nothing kills chivalry faster than ungrateful presumptions.

And guys, it's pretty simple -- show you care. I'm pretty sure that's the most valuable piece of advice an insider could ever give to you. And if you don't know how to show, ASK.

It's kind of a lame ending, but sometimes, I just have to let those slide.

In Paris with You

Don't talk to me of love. I've had an earful
And I get tearful when I've downed a drink or two.
I'm one of your talking wounded.
I'm a hostage. I'm maroonded.
But I'm in Paris with you.

Yes I'm angry at the way I've been bamboozled
And resentful at the mess I've been through.
I admit I'm on the rebound
And I don't care where are we bound.
I'm in Paris with you.

Do you mind if we do not go to the Louvre
If we say sod off to sodding Notre Dame,
If we skip the Champs Elysées
And remain here in this sleazy

Old hotel room
Doing this and that
To what and whom
Learning who you are,
Learning what I am.

Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris,
The little bit of Paris in our view.
There's that crack across the ceiling
And the hotel walls are peeling
And I'm in Paris with you.

Don't talk to me of love. Let's talk of Paris.
I'm in Paris with the slightest thing you do.
I'm in Paris with your eyes, your mouth,
I'm in Paris with... all points south.
Am I embarrassing you?
I'm in Paris with you.
-James Fenton (1993)


No fluff, no sentimentality. And still, in love with love.
Everywhere is Paris with you.

Staryh

People often ask if you feel older on birthdays, and as those years add up and friends get married, we rhetorically ask each other, "Don't you feel old?" And to those I answer no and no. Sure, the numbers always look higher each time, but it never fits right (am I the only one that feels like my brain is four years behind, older and none the wiser?); and all weddings seem to do is emphasize how not old I am. In all sobriety and no means of morbidity, nothing makes me feel older than funerals.

For those of you who are confused, I went home (San Francisco) last week. And trust me, I'm just as confused as you are, which is probably why I told barely anyone where I went and why. (Frankly, most people probably didn't know I was gone. Welcome to the self-absorption of working life.) What can be said in thoughtless conversations with interval friends?
"Hi, how have you been?"
"Oh, actually my aunt died yesterday from something that had to do with a stroke and the leukemia she found out about two weeks ago and I found out two days ago. I'm going to California tomorrow to attend her funeral."
I don't mean to be cavalier about it, but I don't think (don't think) I realized I was talking about a dead body. And not a dead body, a dead person. And not a dead person, a dead aunt. A dead sister, mother, grandmother. My aunt. Dead.
It wasn't until the wake that it sunk (maybe that's why they call it that -- a wake): she's not going to be there anymore.
"Were you close to her?" is the inevitable question. Does it matter? She was there for as long as I existed, but she wasn't a part of my day-to-day life.
And now, she isn't. Won't be. Now, her powdered remains lie there in the open casket with glued lips. All I think is, open caskets are stupid. (I know what they symbolize, but symbolism isn't immediate in the minds of those in bereavement.) My grandpa and my dad's sister also had open caskets. The made-up cadavers look strange and foreign, a mockery of our loved ones, a sad imitation of the living, the real person. Like a sick joke. Like they're simply hiding in the closed part of the casket, waiting to spring out at you, laughing. Surprise! It's the laughs you miss the most and remember the longest. So laugh a lot.

When we arrived at the burial site, my family noticed she was being buried right next to my grandfather. We took time to say a prayer after the service, me, my brother, my parents, the pastor; and afterward, I stayed behind with my dad for a minute.
"Dad, I miss Grandpa." And I did. I think it was the first time since his passing that I really felt that ache: the I-haven't-seen-him-in-a-year-now kind of missing, and slowly, the I'm-not-going-to-see-him-here-again kind of missing. Does that make me inhuman? Or more so? I cried at my aunt's funeral in surprise, for my mom and her sisters, for my cousin and uncle. I love her and my family will never be what it was without her, but certain kinds of mourning turns out to take its bitter time.

I've never felt older because death has never felt closer, or more visible. Twenty-two is not old by any measurement of life or death, but I no longer have delusions of this body's immortality. I know it is inevitable, unpredictable, and its clammy claws take with no consideration of our plans. I see it and it exists.
When we passed by my grandfather's stone, my parents and their close friends stood around me and pointed to their plots down the row: "Look, this is where I'm going to be buried!" Yes, in exclamation. I can't say I've accepted it to that extent, but my recognition of the Styx is the marker: I'm not a little girl anymore. Twenty-two is not eternal. Twenty-two is twenty-two.
Everything feels a little more trivial and bigger at the same time -- the paradox of growing up.

They all said it was a beautiful funeral and that they'd never seen so many attendees before. Maybe they were being appropriate, but there were nearly as many people standing, spilling outside of the chapel doors as there were sitting in the pews, a total of 300-something people. To have loved that much is all I could pray to do until I'm called Home.


Who knew I could be so Russian?

Comfort Zones

Pushing myself -- hm, actually it's more like impulsive flinging -- out of comfort zones is not unfamiliar territory for me. While it's true that in some respects, I cling onto the confines of my familiar construct, I also went to college in Chicago without knowing so much as the difference between Midwest and East Coast, let alone a person, and then continued to take my sorry, to-be-bed-bug-bitten tush over to Jerusalem (as in Israel) without knowing hivrit ("Hebrew" in Hebrew -- at least I learned something). I can look at pictures and think fondly of Northwestern and about how I'd like to visit Israel again, but the reality was it was painful and very, very lonely, especially in the beginning.

From Sloane Crosley's How Did You Get This Number?:

While the emotional sum total of my trip would eventually add up to happiness, while I would feel a protective bond with the few objects I acquired in Lisbon — a necklace from a street fair, a piece of cracked tile, a pack of Portuguese cigarettes called "Portuguese" — hidden between the cathedral and castle tours was the truth: I have never felt more alone than I did in Lisbon. A human being can spend only so much time outside her comfort zone before she realizes she is still tethered to it. Like a dog on one of those retractable leashes, I had made it all the way to Europe's curb when I began to feel a slight tug around my neck.

How does she say it so well?! I love writers that can bore into my soul.


And she makes me laugh.

Four Hours to Mason

It was late on the blackened stretch of road that led to his Ohio suburb, and my threshold had clearly been crossed, when he asked me, "But don't you love writing?"

I do. I love it. But let's face it -- my chances at success are...slim. Which is a euphemism. (And whatever chance I had I probably just imploded with that euphemism; real writers don't use euphemisms. So excuse me if I sound a little bleak in the upcoming grafs, because I really don't feel like that on most days. Most days I'm just happy to have a paycheck and a place with a roof to sit in with a magazine and a bowl of cereal.)

"So, what. You would stop writing?"

No. I'd never stop. I wouldn't know how to do anything else, at least not without it, and even if I did something else, it's my way of logic (or whatever twisted semblance of it). Life would make even less sense and I would become an eggplant; tough on the outside, mush on the inside, wholly useless and unappealing. It's a good thing you like eggplants, because at least I'd still have you. And I'd also be a really nice shade of purple.

"Then that's what you should be doing."

How can I keep putting all of my energy into that when there's no chance of success?

"Does that matter?"

I dont know, would you keep doing what you want to do if no one listened? Let's say you were a teacher, but no one showed up to class, ever. Are you teaching? It's the proverbial tree.

This is the truth -- and I'd hope the other writers out there would be honest enough to admit this to some extent -- it's really, really hard to continue to motivate yourself without getting published. Writing is as much about the sharing and the conversation as it is about creation.

"So, what are you going to do?"

I dont know. I'm just hoping my tree falls.


(photo via pinterest)

Modern Love

I figured it might as well get published somewhere.

(This version is edited slightly at the request of the NBN editors.)

(photo via pinterest)

What The Cool Kids Do

MY LIFE IS FINALLY BECOMING NORMAL AGAIN. Well, almost.

And yes, that's a vague quasi-excuse for my negligence.

I won't get into the details of what I've been busy with because it would bore you to tears, but I have a post coming up about post-college worries anyhow, so wait you will with bated breath. (Yes, I'm taking a poetry class and I am most definitely not a poet -- can you tell?) In the meantime, I've been the busy bee collector I always am, building up links and hoarding magazines, etc., and I've been feeling very literary lately --

E.B. White's Writings from The New Yorker 1927-1976

And while I was visiting the Religious Studies Department I found a "FREE BOOKS" bin. It kind of made my day cause I found these jewels:

Andre Dubu's Selected Stories

The Best American Spiritual Writing 2005

The Shack by William P. Young

(A jewel, maybe not so much, but a close friend recommended it to me.)

NY Mag's The Apartment issue -- read this one! And loved every minute of it.

NY Mag: Around the World in 50 Pages

I just found this quarterly which just launched (it's on its second issue), and I love the concept! Complete lack of writing, but hopefully they'll get that sorted cause a culture-based magazine needs good writing.

And I'm currently reading:

Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking

I could not wait to get started on this one so I'm working through it right now. And so far, it's everything I thought it would be and so, so, so much more. Which is what I say every time I read a piece by Didion. I'm telling you...this woman...she...okay I have to stop myself because if I don't, I 'm going to say something heretical, but you get it. She is that good. And this book is just -- UGH. It's grief on paper. And tell me, how in the world is that possible? Love and grief -- the two worldly phenomena that can't be explained, and she's done it all.

Some literary food on the internet:

+ How sweet are these wedding slideshows from NY Mag?

+ I need this. Like, now, immediately, maintenant, jikeum, (how do you say it in Chinese?).

+ I just found out about Denizen Kane. And where are all of these amazing lyrics/short stories?! (Not on the Internet)

Do I sound like a geek yet? Good.

In Black and White Print

I turned something into the NYT Modern Love contest yesterday. I turned it in at exactly 11:58 p.m. eastern time. The deadline was 11:59 p.m. And unfortunately, my chances aren't lookin' too hot. True, I only found out about the contest two days before the deadline, but I've cranked out personal essays with less time before, ones that I ended up loving. And this was supposed to be an essay on modern love, for crying out loud! I had a whole blog devoted to the topic! I should've been trotting all over that damn park.

I don't even know if I can call it a funk? Because I've had those -- where it's just a really ugly road block, one that's only there to make you take the longest possible detour, to your convenience, of course. But at least you got there. I wrote two completely different essays, settled on a third, and hated all of them. I would read them out loud to Norman (reading out loud is essential for me), and I wouldn't even finish before I said, "Is this boring? This is boring, isn't it? Ohmygod, it's boring and you know me."

I would write them, and yes, there would be moments of pretty prose, but at the end of it, I would just stop and say out loud, "What am I doing?" I had no idea what I was trying to say. What am I trying to say? What's the point? The "so what"?

It's something that's been really bothering me lately. My professor said writers should always have a point of view. It's best to know what you're trying to say before, but you should definitely be somewhere at the end of it. But what if I don't have anything to say at all? What if I'm a creamless cannoli?

I don't expect anything. (That's a lie: I expect the NYT editors to scratch their scalps with their valuable fingers. That's a lie, too. I want this. I want(ed) this badly because for the first time I felt like I really had a shot at it. Maybe I wanted it too much. Is that wrong? To want it too much? April is going to be a long month.) I did it for the sake of the opportunity because that's what I've learned I have to do, and if I'm better because of it, that's all I can ask for. (Okay, yes, another lie. I'm in a fragile state, and I just need some validation that this is what I'm supposed to be doing.) Now, does anyone have any Funk-B-Gone?

(photos via pinterest, vi.sualize.us, a glamorous little side project)

On Cowardice

I have a problem.

I'm scared of the blank page of MS Word, that large, white, relentless expanse that evaporates my words into dilapidation. And while this is a pretty common fear, it poses a particular problem when my entire college career (and future one, I hope) is dependent on writing.

You see, regardless of how I come off, I'm actually a huge coward. I'm scared of my own freaking shadow. And I think the reason I avoid the wordless .doc like the plague, more than anything, is that I'm afraid of what I'll end up with, or more specifically, that what I'll end up with won't be good enough or worse, good at all. If I don't try at all, then I can't be bad. Unfortunately, I can't be good either. I would be nothing at all.

I'm scared of the judgment. Your writing is a little convoluted, Esther. Your writing could do without that paragraph. You could do without that paragraph. You sound contrived. You sound archaic. You are unoriginal. You are just not good enough.

Where do I get my value from?


Time to buck up and write that essay.

(photos via pinterest)

The Entitlement of Pretty Girls

"The coldness overwhelmed us and forced us to move inside on the day my friends and I saw a very pretty girl in the Water Tower Place food court. She was pretty enough to cause all three of us to stare mid-cannoli as she walked out of the elevator, and she was pretty enough for me to remember three weeks from the sighting, but I’m not sure how vividly I’d remember her if it wasn’t for what happened next. We stared at first because she was stunning, and then we kept watching – frozen, affixed, like a bad horror film we couldn’t look away from – as she lifted her foot onto a chair at the table next to ours and continued to text as the boy who was with her bent down to tie her shoelaces. She didn’t even give a glance, not a trace of acknowledgment. In fact, I doubt she was even aware she was with anyone, except when her shoelaces needed tying, of course. Our eyes trailed the two as the girl walked out of the mezzanine with the boy faithfully following behind her, and then my two friends and I stared at each other, gaping, not knowing whether to laugh or, well, what else could we do?" 

It's just the intro to an essay I wrote for my creative nonfiction class this past quarter, "The Entitlement of Pretty Girls" (and don't worry -- it was more than just a bashing of the beauties). The point is this whole story that makes up my intro never happened. Well, it did happen, just not in that way. But I decided to write it like this (as if I was there rather than in the bathroom) because this is the way it had to be for me to get my later points across.

This issue of truth is something we dealt with a lot in both of my writing classes, fiction and nonfiction. I feel like every writer has their own stance on where the line is drawn between the genres, or if there's a line at all. My nonfiction professor probably sees it as a dotted line: if you would please, sirs and ma'ams, stay within the lines, but you won't get crucified if you cross. Or maybe you will.

Take James Frey, for example. Absolutely torn apart very publicly by America's de facto dictator, Oprah Winfrey. Because in these modern times, when we slap on the terms "memoir" or "nonfiction" it has to be that way, down to whether or not The Brady Bunch was actually on the television during the time of day that author claimed it was on. Um, hello? That wasn't the point! (This actually happened in one of my professor's other classes.) The point is whoever is enough of a lifeless, pompous windbag to point out something like that is completely missing the point. If the writer knows what he's doing (and if he doesn't, then just stop reading), then the choices were made knowingly.

And the mind is fickle. Especially if you're writing something like a memoir, literally "memory" or coming from the memory, the wrong-ness of the details is actually the truth isn't it? The memory and its lack of accuracy is just as real as the experience itself, and in fact, I'd argue it's more real because while that experience affects that person for just that amount of time, it's the memory that remains.

In the end, true, false, real, fake, the truth is that important to people. We spent a few discussions on this idea of truth and what it is, and I just found it really sad and affirming at the same time. God placed this desire, this hunger for what is true at the core of every person, and the intense yearning of the world is affirmation for me that God is in everything. There is truth; He's the truth. And so many people spend their lives determined and lost, when their answer is in the very question they ask.

(photo via pinterest)

Girl in the Afternoon

I've been personal blogging for as long as my digits have known how to type, and my wordpress is really my baby. It was there for me to listen, to sympathize, to be a blank page when I needed it most. It was there when I thought no one else would be that for me. And I've grown immeasurably from that, and I owe a lot to it, really. I know it sounds not...sane -- insane -- but I know it was God-given, to be there to help me find myself when I was hopeless, to remind me of what grounds me, who defines me, and what I love doing. It reminded me of how much I love to write and extract the beauty out of everything I see. And I've been caught up on reading all of my old posts. All of them.

That's the thing with me. It's near impossible for me to arbitrarily stop somewhere. If I find a new blog (which I can do pretty much everyday), I have to go back and back and back, and I want to go as far back as I can to see what I've missed during my time of ignorance, but at some point, I have to pull my head out of the virtual pages and say, "Enough. Live -- right now. Come back to the present, and look forward."

And I've been so stuck in the blogosphere and things like pinterest (I'm a woman possessed), that I'm in danger of losing my own point of view, not only on visual life, but on real life. I typed this to myself:

“You’re so busy looking at beauty through other people’s eyes, you’ve forgotten how to use your own.”

"love, esther" was a one-of-a-kind period of my life, but I'm in a different and equally exciting place now. All of these different reasons and circumstances have converged, and I can't think of a more appropriate time for the start of a new blog. This is my online little black book of notes, scribbles, photos, excerpts, half-baked ideas, sprinkles, and anything else that inspires me. I decided to title it "Girl in the Afternoon" because as I get older, I'm sleeping earlier and consequently waking up earlier (yes, I'm being completely serious), and my writing/inspiration time has been moved up to the early afternoon around one or two. Coupled with the fact that I've always tried to have the one cup of coffee I allow myself around that time, it's the prime writing situation.

It's a special part of the day, when the morning haze has worn off, the half-caff has kicked in, and there's a clarity unaffected by the tired dimness of evening. And haloed in the light of a just-waning sun, everything is beautiful.

(photo via pinterest)