HERE. Enjoy.

I still keep listening to this song on repeat, every so often picking up my own guitar to give Ace of Base a go. Right around the 2:20 mark is when I get especially obsessed.

Anyhow, I’ve never been to Chicago, but on my run yesterday, I swear I felt like I was there. The wind was doing a number on my ponytail’s sleek perfection and my untamed hair was relentlessly sticking to my Chapstick. Not my favorite running conditions, but thank God I didn’t leave the house in my usual running attire.

Eek.

I do have a friend that lives in Chicago, a few actually. I was helping one of them write copy for her Wedding Planning Web site and I needed another word for romantic. The thesaurus suggested “impractical”. Touché, thesaurus, touché.

In more workout news, I [finally, fatass] joined the gym on my block- decent weights, decent machines, decent eye candy. Pretty content. Now, if the mirror would feel so content…

Kidding, and of course my spandex already won me a quick friend. Luke is his name. When I say big guy, I mean BIG guy. I was using the foam roller and trying so hard for my facial expression not to communicate the pain, grief and misery the roller was causing my tight, beaten and under-stretched muscles. But my obvious sour face became the conversation piece as he shook my hand with pity, “You new around here?”

(PANIC, I refuse to be the New York Sports Club chump)

“Yes, just joined this week. You come here around 7 every day?”

“Most days.”

“Well then nice to meet you, trainer.”

L'Shana Tova

A few days ago was the Jewish New Year, and since I’m a New Year’s baby (born on January 1^st), a part of me considered a few days ago my birthday.

Regardless, I’ll use any excuse to reflect, but am happy to have Rosh Hashanah reinforcing the habit. The day is a large cultivator of introspection, with an emphasis on your most recent year.

So, here goes.

365 days ago, I was in my senior year of college. My sorority house was the center of my being- that or Gator City on Wednesday's Ladies Night. My face was painted every Saturday, I most looked forward to Pi Phi Taco Bar, I ran stadiums more than Tim Tebow, rode the Frat Row bus more than the frat row boys and studied more than, well, no one really (but school was free Dad, so no money wasted). Life was easy, other than the impending truth of its ease dwindling at the short semester's end.

225 days ago, I was pedaling the back roads of Cambodia, coming near death by monkey in Thailand and writing off 11-hour bus rides in Vietnam as a breeze. I met someone new every day, learned something new every day and loved something new every day. I saw the world as a revolving door- indefinitely open, so long as you push yourself through and closed only when you give up your strong arm. With might, my permanently inquisitive mind wandered to places, both physical and intangible. Experimental was my nature; nature was my eyes’ constant bliss; bliss was every step of my journey.

150 days ago, I moved to New York City, a dream turned to realization dangerously fast. I sleep along an exposed brick wall, my saunter to work is robotically second nature, my check book is dedicated to a heavy monthly tab, my closet screams for scarves and boots and my head can’t decide if this is, in fact, what it’s all about (the “real” world, not the hokey pokey). In the past few weeks, most of my Floridian (and also freezing) friends moved up to NYC. Combine that rambunctious round-up with the new friends I’ve made in the city (similar in unyielding energy), and it’s no wonder the lonely bone has yet to strike.

At the culmination of my year, set on three distinctly opposing stages, I feel wonderfully full (bursting at the seams), but insanely torn (bursting at my dreams).

I feel like this confused light, stay or go?

My lease ends in December, just saying.

I, I gotta new life. You would hardly recognize me, I'm so glad.

First off, I’m obsessed with acoustic covers of Ace of Base's I Saw The Sign. Second off, this post is not timely whatsoever, so when I say today, I actually mean like 8 days ago...and then I’ll write about the in between 8 days… probably in…3 days. But, no promises.

So, "today" was a beautiful day – relentlessly clear blue with a mesmerizing sunset raising curtain to a sharply-lit skyline. A few friends gathered on the Hudson after a long day at Central Park, as the sun tucked behind the chiseled outline of the city, and cotton candy became of the sky. No doubt a delicious-looking sunset. Coupled with a delicious order of garlic fries and hummus wrap, feeling full is not the word.

The girl I split the fries, wrap and horizon with was Leah, and since she moved up to NYC a few weekends ago, I feel like life has been go, go, go-with the very frequent over-analysis of where it is we are actually going?

My dad sends me e-mails pretty regularly, and usually the e-mails have links to articles that mostly detail how to save the money I barely make in the first place. His most recent e-mail spoke of no such broke-dom, and instead, spoke of a girl he'd seen on TV, who reminded him of me.

“It was a travel program with a dynamic young trekker, writer, travel enthusiast....I thought of all your skills and passions and how this was you!”

It's annoyingly weird that, as I approach the 6 month anniversary (I know, nuts) of my “permanent” move to New York, I'm so not that girl on this day. As beautiful as the day was, let's get some perspective. I've been ooh-ing and ahh-ing at a man-made skyline and sipping on a twice overpriced Corona. It was no pure-nature-warms-the-heart day, which inarguably, garlic fries in no contest, puts me at my fullest.

I’m a huge grass is always greener thinker-- torn between its value of creating inspiring thirst, and its plague of creating unsettling anxiety. My set up in this town is peachy k(gr)een and I'm working on accepting such color as is. I try not for the sentence to read “When I’m here, I wish I was there," and more so, for it to read “When I’m here, I wonder what is there."

Though I'm fully confident that I'll hit each wonder that I dream up, I need t0 make sure I don't colorblind myself from the green in the days leading.

Okay, so I said this post was so 8 days ago, and it was. I'll show you this in effect next time. Get excited.