Waiting

It's good I'm not a waiter.
I am bad at waiting in both senses of the word. Via.

I've been feeling recently like my life is slightly on hold, while I wait for many things. Many, many, many things. Big things even, not just a new dress. I've just been going about my days, thinking a lot about how I'm...waiting.

I mentioned this, fairly flippantly, to an acquaintance today. She responded, also fairly flippantly*, that I had to be careful, that while I waited good things could be passing me by. That you can't spend your life waiting.

She had a point, of course. Life is not a dress rehearsal. Strike while the iron is hot. Just do it. Carpe diem. That said, some things you just have to wait for. You have no choice. No matter how hard you work and how pushy you are and how many lists you write, all you can do is wait.

Three Levels of Happiness

NYC is lucky to have this on its doorstep. Via

Good

Thinking about the Sandro dress winging its way to me right now makes my toes wriggle with excitement.

Better

I recently had my first piece published on The Billfold and that fact makes my head content.

Best

Ushering in autumn (or fall, if you must) in the country with friends, a fire, and red wine made my heart sing. Total happiness recalibration over the weekend. How was yours?

Why I Hate Small Town America

Via

When I arrived at camp, I didn't genuinely believe it was going to be like Sweet Valley High - thankfully, as I was by then a fully grown 22 year old. As to what it would be like, I had no idea. I was going to a state I knew nothing about, to do a job I had never done before, with a group of people I had never met before. Going to camp was probably the time in my life when I knew least about anything.

The camp I went to wasn't in the suburbs exactly, but it wasn't far from them. Or maybe that was the country. I'm still not sure. I used to run most days, leaving the camp and jogging a route that took me down past the other camps on our road, along a long, fairly flat road with evenly spaced houses, down a hill that turned violently to the left, and round a small loop that then led me up that same hill and back to camp. The even houses, with their neat lawns and smallish sections, to me said 'suburbs' but the lack of footpaths or traffic lights or crossings, or anything else at all really, said 'country'. It was kind of a confusing area.

Why I Love Small Town America

H1 and I kicked off our summer holiday (or vacation, if you must) by catching the train up to Boston. It was a sensible decision - Boston, like all the best cities, is far better without a car hindering your freedom - but, for me at least, kind of a sad one.

Usually, when we go away, we'll drive if it's within a reasonable driving distance. Connecticut, Hudson River Valley, the Catskills, Vermont, the Hamptons - we've done a lot of driving together over the years we've been here in New York (well, H1's done a lot of driving, and I've done a lot of sitting in the passenger seat controlling the music, being entertaining, and giving shoddy directions that lead us down the wrong roads). And despite my complete and total belief that most people should not own cars, and there shouldn't even be such a thing as 'suburbs', I really, really love those trips. 

Some of our best times have been in cars (ha! Not like that, you dirty-minded individual) and driving around the US (or the Northeastern states, at least) fulfills most of my childhood fantasies about what the perfect life would be like. I actually grew up in the suburbs, but they were the inferior suburbs of the North Shore of Auckland, New Zealand, which only have idyllic beaches, good schools, varied and architecturally interesting houses, and quiet streets to their name. My own suburb was particularly disappointing, with the two minute walk to the beach that apparently precluded our getting a pool, despite years of concentrated nagging from both me and my brothers. I wanted to live elsewhere, somewhere far, far away.

And Now Back to Business

A bit over a week ago I returned from a summer holiday (or vacation if you must) squeezed right in at the end of summer, designed to make the most of the last few drops of warmth and sunshine we're likely to get. The timing was smart, in that it encompassed Labor Day to make the most of a whole extra free day off, and really stupid, in that months of no proper break stretched my nerves to breaking point and my temper to boiling point. H1 and I agreed that mostly it was smart, and we may do the same next year. We also agreed that we'd get away earlier in the summer for a few days extra. Everybody wins.

So the holiday was amazing, of course, even if it wasn't quite what we intended. We did our favorite city/relax divide, spending a few days in Boston before moving onto the main business of a week in Cape Cod. We'd thought we'd be highly active, and planned on renting bikes, and kayaks, and playing tennis, and sailing...we did none of it. Well, we played tennis. Once. The rest of the time, we lay by the pool, lay on the beach, lay in bed catching up on our massive sleep debt, only reluctantly sitting up straight to eat and drink.

We stayed in amazing places in both locations, something I can't recommend enough if you're planning a lazy holiday (and even if you're planning a sporty holiday that could well turn into a lazy one).