In retrospect | circa '96 | Tokyo, Japan

Tokyo, Japan - 1996

My sister and I pulled up the shade from our window to see if it was finally daylight but it was pitch black out. We weren't sleeping or even close to tired. We were too excited.

My Korean grandmother lived in Tokyo, Japan. My mom took us to visit her and my uncle and later scheduled to visit Seoul, Korea to meet my grandfather.

I remember my grandmother's studio apartment. It was small. Very small. 

She had a bunk bed and an extremely deep bathtub. We took a bath every night. We snacked on peaches the entire trip.. me especially. I ate too many.

She owned a Korean BBQ restaurant in Tokyo. I remember the kitchen looking like something out of a Hayao Miyazaki movie. There were sliding walls that led you to different rooms. Naturally my sister and I spent most of our time hiding in the rooms and spying on the guests dining in to eat. One of the regulars at my grandmother's restaurant was the mayor of Kawaguchi. We were invited to his house for dinner where we sat on the floor while his servants waited on us hand and foot. Again, more sliding walls and doors.

We met my uncle for the first time. He was smiling ear-to-ear the entire time and took us shopping for toys in a skyscraper toy store. He let us buy whatever we wanted. I picked out a dollhouse and my sister got a toy fox. 

We ate burgers where the female employees had the same haircut, outfit and hats and all said the same thing at the exact same time.

We went to Disney Land.

We did it all.

On our last night in Tokyo, we all gathered at my grandmother's restaurant. As my uncle helped close up, my grandmother and I waited outside for everyone. She had a bicycle with a little basket sitting in between the handle bars. She told me to get in and we could ride around the street while we wait for everyone to come out.

We approached a hill and both decided it'd be fun to go down. And all I remember is being really scared of how fast we were going. We were flying. Eventually, my grandmother lost control of the bike, we crashed and basically smashed into the ground. I flew out of the basket and landed straight on my head and slid. The spokes of the bike took my grandmother and her face right across the street. 

I laughed. I cried. I laughed again. I fainted. I woke up. I fell over. I fell asleep.

I remember sitting in the bottom bunk of my grandmother's bed and throwing up nothing but peaches. So many peaches..

I was completely out of my mind.

We went to the hospital. Naturally.

I kicked the nurses and screamed out of confusion. I remember seeing my grandmother crying and reaching for me from her hospital bed. More peach vomit.

 Needless to say.. we were in bad shape.

My grandmother received plastic surgery on her face and she healed quite beautifully.

How I survived brain damage is beyond me...

Or did I?

After a few days, I remember escaping the hospital early. A Japanese family-friend scooped me up and out of my bed and carried me down several flights of stairs where a car was waiting for us outside. My family was inside. We flew back to the U.S.

I had a soft spot on the left side of my head for months. My memory of Japan and honestly my childhood is a seriously fuzzy mess. Add years of discovering ecstasy and cocaine on top of it and you have yourself a perfect cocktail of a horrible memory altogether. 

No, we did not make it to Seoul. I kind of messed that up. The last time I was in Seoul, I was a newborn and I'd give anything to go back.

As for my grandfather.. He died years later. We never got a chance to meet him. So there's that.

There is no moral to this story. It's just a story. I try to learn as much as I can now, make new and happy memories and hold on to them as long as I can. 

I eventually learned to love peaches again. I am a Georgia girl after all.

Yep. Happy hump day!

-BALANCE-

I'm starting to feel a sense of balance in my life.  My days are becoming easier. 

Sometimes I feel the need to constantly dissect my life and ascertain the reasons for daily stress.
Not necessarily a bad thing, right? 

But nothing is perfect, nor will it ever be. So trying to perfect one area of my life while ignoring the rest is a strenuous exercise.

For me, living this way is tiresome.  

Like all things worthy, patience is key and balance is a beautiful thing.

2.9.15

It started with being extremely stressed out working at the butcher shop. I moved to the Bay Area and immediately starting working. It was a stressful time in my life where the balance of work, my life, family and peace of mind was all out of whack. I worked over 60 hours a week in a city I knew nothing about. My commute was two hours everyday in the worst traffic imaginable. I would get to work at 7:30am to open the butcher shop. We broke down cuts for the meat case and I made as much sausage and pate as time allowed. We were understaffed so I also ran food, bussed tables, took food orders and put away produce orders. We closed at 6pm where I would close down the butcher shop and then go help the kitchen close down. I worked in the kitchen too. I'd get home at 9pm, my fiance would be asleep and I'd sit on my kitchen counter and drink wine alone. Our furniture and everything we owned didn't arrive until March and we lived with an air mattress and iPad.

Some time in February, I had a day off alone and bought a $4 yoga mat while running some errands. I did a yoga routine from Hulu on my iPad in my bare living room. 

It made me feel invincible. 

The sound of my breath humming in the back of my throat was surprisingly comforting.
Stretching my aching muscles felt so sensual.

Every morning while driving to the butcher shop I'd start to tense up. The closer I got to the shop, the more stressed I became. I'd run through every scenario in my head of what I might face when I'd get there and how I'd deal with it. My chef was an arrogant and inappropriate asshole and it took everything in me to fake a smile. 

One morning traffic was particularly horrible and I was at a dead stop in the road. We weren't moving an inch. I turned off the radio and began to breathe like I did in yoga. I did it every morning to calm my nerves before work. Long story short, I quit that job.

3.9.15

I'm jobless.

My fiance couldn't have been more supportive. He believed in me and my decisions. He let me figure it out for two weeks and worked overtime to make up for the income lost.

I'm doing yoga every morning and writing every establishment under the California sun, looking for a job. I get a call from a law firm for an interview. I go in and get a job as a legal receptionist.

By this time, I am happy with the decision I made. I'm well-rested and feel healthy. I take a job that is the complete opposite of what I'm used to. 

3.18.15

I'm completely secluded from the world. I'm working in an office with no windows.
I'd say it's a vintage office.
It's old looking and smells like it. No one is under the age of 40. I have a Windows 7 Pro computer and a telephone to connect calls to attorneys and their secretaries..

But I go in with an open mind and positive attitude. Maybe I can learn to become a paralegal. Maybe I will work my way up. Maybe something will become of this.

4.23.15

I get called into my bosses office and he tells me I'm doing a great job. He tells me maybe I could work more hours and start working on some projects. He says maybe I can. Right now, business is slow but it could pick up. 

I walk out of his office happy to hear I'm doing good, but concerned that the longevity here isn't attainable. 

Out of curiosity, I start looking for another job online. I come across an ad on Craigslist for a Personal Assistant. 

Personal assistant must have a culinary degree, 
enjoy living a healthy lifestyle, experienced assistant and love dogs.

I have a culinary degree. I love fitness. I love dogs. I have three!

A fire was lit inside me. In my heart. In my soul. I felt like this ad was reaching out to me.

This is me!

I wrote an exciting cover letter and was so thankful to be able to put down Receptionist as my current job. Yeah, I worked as an assistant for barely over a month but who cares! It's on there... And my reason for leaving is because I am looking for a career with longevity. 

Am I going to retire as a personal assistant? Probably not.

But working as an assistant to a CEO of a successful company in San Francisco will look pretty damn good on my resume. 

The woman that interviewed me was his assistant a year ago and worked her way up through the company, learning the in and outs and is now head of HR. Hence, why he needs a new assistant.

Maybe to some people, jumping from job to job doesn't look so great. May I tell you? This is not like me at all. I don't normally do this. But sometimes you have to take a step back and reflect on what the hell it is you're doing with yourself. Your life. Your career. And thankfully I had the love and support from my fiance to be able to do so.

Experiences, pain, suffering, victories, successes and failures
are all building blocks to the next best you.
A better you.

I'm feeling the balance that I've been searching for. I feel the weight being evenly distributed throughout my mind, body and life.

I start in a few weeks and couldn't be more excited.
Here's to a better me.


Cheers.

Where do you see yourself in ten years?

What does that mean to you?

Is it something within reach or is it something that seems impossible to have?

Are you currently working towards it right now? Everyday, you're waking up, living it and every move you make is thought out with your dream job in mind? Is it a dream job?

In order to make it in this world you have to work, right?

Unless you're a trust fund kid or somehow your looks alone keep getting you from point A to point B.

What if you don't quite know what your dream job is yet? You thought you did but then life happens and obstacles stand in your way. Which way do you turn? Do you keep fighting off everyday demons in order to keep going down that same path?

Or do you decide to stop and turn down a different direction and see if that road is easier or makes more sense to take?

Sometimes you think you have it all figured out until one day you realize it just doesn't make sense anymore. You've been doing the same thing for so long that you thought it was who you were. And then one day you realize it's just all you've ever known.

In the past, I felt like I needed to know coming out of high school (aka dropping out of high school and getting my GED), what I wanted to do and go for it. A lot of young people do. At first I tried to get into culinary school on my own and realized I couldn't afford it. I didn't really have the guidance and knowledge of loans or grants at the time. I moved out of my parents house at 17 and thought I knew it all. 

My dad was a contractor and my mom was a realtor so I paid for real estate schooling. I got all the way through my state exam and then I pulled out. The dues and costs of an office scared me and I knew it wasn't what I really wanted to do.

Then I finally got my dad to go with me to culinary school and we took out loans that were too big and I received a few grants and graduated culinary school. 

I am glad I went to culinary school because I learned a lot and had a lot of fun but the amount of debt I have from those loans will be with me for the rest of my life.

I worked my way up through some successful restaurants throughout Atlanta. 

Living in Atlanta and Decatur, that worked for me. My fiance worked as a bartender and we worked and lived the industry life. At that time in our lives, it made sense.

Atlanta and Decatur's food scene is worth checking out if you ever get the chance.
Hands down amazing.

Moving to California was a decision we made together. The main reason we moved is because we simply love California. It's breathtaking here. Other than the very unfortunate drought that we're in, it is perfect weather everyday. 

The life lessons we're learning are very valuable to us. However, you can go out and find opportunities everywhere! It all depends on what exactly you're looking for.

Now that we know we can survive out here, we know we can survive anywhere!

We've learned to budget our money because we absolutely have to but also because we should.

We use mint.com 

It's great. 

We know how much we need to be bringing in to pay all of our bills and still be putting away a good amount into savings. The savings is for our wedding, our honeymoon, future babies, etc.

When we first moved out here, I didn't think we were going to make it. A lot of that is because I can easily lose confidence in myself at the drop of a hat. It's like a sickness. You get super hyped up and proud of yourself. You go out and get something you've really wanted, like a new job or gig. And the moment you get it and all the excitement starts to simmer down, the evil insecurities start to creep in.

Did you just oversell yourself? Do you think you can do all the things you said you can? Are you sure you can pull this off? 

That kind of doubt can eat you alive. It's done it to me so many times.

I just went out and got something I have always wanted. It is basically my dream job.. 

It's too early to talk about right now but I got it. It's mine. The second I got it and the excitement started to go down, I immediately started doubting everything I said I could do. But I know I can do everything I said I can. I do it all the time. It's my life. 

Being confident and open to the world keeps me going. I have to keep going.

Someone asked me the other day where I see myself in ten years.

How can one possibly answer that? One, it's impossible. And two, I don't want to put ONE idea in my head of what I am going to be doing in ten years. 

All I know is that if I keep going, keep pushing and striving to be the best to myself and my loved ones and never lose that confidence that is going to give me every opportunity in the world, in ten years I will be exactly where I want to be.