MTN countdown

I am no longer going to be precious about my blog. You can expect one a week. I have no problem writing. I do have a problem editing, having accidentally rewritten the entire blog several times during the editing process. At that point, I’m no longer editing one blog, but I am tying together three. If you reflect on the last blog I wrote, you can probably see that very clearly. I was genuinely pissed off for days over that blog, because it sucked. I couldn’t even bear to look at it anymore, so I posted it, and sat angrily in the shower thinking about it. I fell asleep mad at myself over the fucking blog, like, you’ll never be shit Kelley, this blog is your legacy. So as rude as it was for me to advertise that you should read it, I was equally, if not more rude to myself, for writing it. Obviously the answer here is to try less and care less. I think it will make the blogs better. Also maybe shorter, for those of you who actually value your time. I kind of forgot that not everyone dedicates hours a day to my ramblings. My bad.

So I’m happy now, and my life is moving. Anything negative will be me describing life last week. It all happened very quickly, my life becoming wonderful, and I think it’s because I decided to move to the mountains. If I say even one negative thing during my time living in the mountains, don’t quote me on that. But from my vantage point, this is the best possible decision for me. And there will be ups and downs there as much as here, I’m sure, but I am hoping more ups, and skiing and snowboarding is a good way to cope with the downs.

When I left my corporate job, I wanted things to start happening in October. “Things happening” was undefined. I imagined that I would have done a lot of formal book-writing during the months of August and September, but I did a lot more painting and trips with friends. Not a bad trade off, even though the logic that convinced my parents that quitting corporate was a good idea was based on the fact I wanted to write a book. And I do. But these things can’t be done in two months. I’d like to write something quality. And first, I want to put out a handful of proper blogs. To right my wrongs. And of course to manage expectations, I spoke to a few people in the industry. All of the information I got pointed to the fact that I needed time. And patience.

So I am impatient, and I have no concept of time. But I hate feeling unproductive. I have been really intense about my to-do-list, which involves journaling, painting, drawing, writing, and tiktoking. I wanted to do a little bit of all of this, every day. That, and planning for October. The whatever-will-happen in October. I have been in all the sublet Facebook groups in NYC for a few months now, and I keep my eye on those listings with literally no intention of moving out. I did imagine myself living with a few girls, but in my minds-eye, we weren’t going to vibe. So it never happened. I also took notice that my parents hadn’t said anything yet, and I hadn’t written anything yet, so I might as way stay home and be spoon fed while I wait for something to happen. I really wanted my own space to feel like an adult again, but I needed time and patience, and that could happen anywhere! Especially at my parents, actually. Mind you, I have felt very incubated lately. Like I am not able to function in the world, and I am just an undercooked premie adult. My life plot was reflecting this. Nothing was happening. I was fine with this: no news is good news. But it was pretty dull and boring, is my point.

Then all of a sudden this week my parents sit me down. They don’t ask me to get a job, but they do ask that I be less self deprecating and to stop trauma dumping all over the internet. Are you fucking kidding me? Seeing that these are my two favorite ways to spend time, I got really defensive. And honesty? I had a bit of a melt down. Like, my sense of self collapsed. Who would I be if I wasn’t weird and embarrassing on the internet. OH: weird and embarrassing to my family. I guess that’s the name of the game when you’re…….. I’m not going to be self deprecating right now actually. I love myself (said in an empty, ritualistic way, to train my brain to go there naturally. God I’m smart. I love myself).

So the conversation taking a magnifying glass to me and my behavior began, which led to me feeling a little sui. I have had a pretty bad show, given the bipolar and the alcoholic drinking, so there’s alot that can be mentioned, if we want to bring up the way s I suck. I have always had pretty bad Sui-ideation, which is super annoying, and weirdly comforting (making it even more annoying). It got less annoying when my therapist was like: oh, that’s valid. Sui ideation is actually a coping mechanism. Like, the easiest way to escape yourself/ escape reality. I share that now because I figure it would actually help people to know that. A lot of the reason I share about my life and my moods all day every day is to make other people feel less alone. Which is what I try to tell my parents. Obviously some of it is like, raging narcissism, self promotion, and entertainment for myself. I’ve always done the whole capturing and sharing bit, albiet privately. But obnoxiously around the house, enough that my parents knew it was my thing. I feel like I have always kept a large part of my personality/my humor a secret from my parents, because they just wouldn’t get it. They would see bits and pieces, and rarely catch my absurd, ironic, deadpan jokes. I just never thought they were funny enough to get it. They are very normal people. Like, my mom was a highschool cheerleader, and my dad played football, and they’re very easy to like because they look like barbie and ken and smile a lot. So now they are spoon feeding each other my content, which is definitely nice, I guess, but they definitely don’t really get the humor of it. They like the inspirational stuff, obviously.

So people are allowed to have their negative opinions about my online persona, JAR JAR BINKS. If it weren’t literally me doing it, IDK what I would think about it. But my friends support me wholeheartedly, so they keep me grounded from the self-loathing high-dive that it’s really easy to do, as a content creator. I often look to my friends and family for support in things, because I know I push myself past some boundaries. I don’t look to my parents as much, though, because they’re my parents. And who is going to have the strongest opinion about my content? My parents. Especially because my content reflects on our upper-middle class family, who would come off as entirely perfect to the general public, if I didn’t go around opening my big mouth online. And I’m like: ugh, don’t you see: it’s good to show the internet that hot rich people have problems too. And my parents are like: yeah, ok fine. We will give up our dreams of perceived perfection for your big online dreams (secretly they really like it when I get recognized in front of them). But they’re really adamant when they sit me down: you should be showing how you have OVERCOME these problems, not bragging about your rock bottom like you have been doing. Like, share some happy stuff. Inspire people. Because everyone has been whispering about XYZ, and it’s like, just move on! Post about your reality now! And I’m like, OMG, low blow…the moms in town are whispering about me. I wonder if they have boring loser daughters who wish they were me. But I’m also like, melting inside, because how fucking embarrassing, I am a sinking ship, and I’m taking my family down with me. But basically my parents are like: Kelley, why are you being a sacrificial lamb right now, just move on from your problems and enjoy being hot and rich! So then of course then the conversation turns to my self loathing, and I’m defending it, and my mom is like: what the fuck is wrong with me for not seeing how gorg you are! And I’m like - did you not read my fucking blog, ugly beautiful girl!?!? (Only my dad reads some of my blogs, because my mom prefers to watch MAHA TikTok). And while we were on the topic of looks, we got into dating, which we all know I’m not doing. I hated how right my mom was when she said: I can’t imagine what kind of guy would see what you put on the internet and would want to take that all on. I was like, OMG, well the good news is: I don’t need anyone to “take on” my stuff, I am carrying it just fine. And I’m also working with a therapist, cos I am pretty lazy, and I’d prefer to carry nothing at all actually, so we’re working on it! But truly, I was super ashamed of myself, because my parents really clocked me, and they didn’t get my mojo, and they resented me deep down, for more reasons than just my TikTok. Like, they were living through the IRL experience of all the rock bottoms I dance to and talk about so easily. And I did apologize for it, I hate myself for it, and since I can’t escape it then i’ll just KMS over it! (I wish this was a dramatized retelling, but this is how my brain defaults to thinking. I’m not serious when I say it, it’s just ideation. I love myself).

So words were flying and I was like, weeping, and cursing my family name and thinking: you fools want me to write a memoir and you won’t even let me trauma dump on IG?!?!? Don’t you see how hypocritical you sound??? But then I took some time to reflect, and unfortunately, I realized my family was kinda right. Though I will never be Alix Earle, no matter how desperately my mom wants me to be, I don’t actually have to let my memories of my worst-of-times overshadow everything else in my life. Like, it is a bit more inspiring to watch someone who moves on with their life and is triumphant. And I don’t want to live in my darkest moments more than I have to. Like, I got through them for a reason. And I want other people to get through their dark times, but I don’t need to spend all day every day reflecting on it. So that was some helpful feedback, though I had to do a lot of synthesizing to make it feel helpful and not accusatory. And candidly, I didn’t have anything happening with my plot before. This situation lit a fire under my ass. Probably an everything-happens-for-a-reason type thing.

So despite the fact that I actually came around to see from my parents perspective, I did not appreciate their delivery. So I escaped to my Nana’s beach house for some separation, while my nana laid up in her resting home. Nice. I barely get alone time anymore.

So I get to LBI, quite desolate in October, and I start applying for jobs like a maniac. I went from lazily applying for restaurant jobs in Brooklyn over the past few weeks to a hard pivot. I wanted to get as far away from everyone as fckng possible!!!! I can't EMBARASS my family from the mountains! This will show them. I adjust my corporate resume to include food service, and fire it off to every open position with the mountain resort monopolizing the industry right now.

I’m even doing this thing where I journal and pray for the best case scenario to happen. I don’t know what that is, what the details look like, and I don’t know how to make it come to life, but I pray and write and trust that whatever happens will be for the best. I also throw a few sentences into the journal, telling god what the long-term-endgame-best-case scenario is. It’s being really rich and really respected in my craft. And being well traveled and having lots of material items, as well as peace, happiness, support, fulfillment. Just so God knows what we are working towards. But he doesn't have to tell me it’s happening, I know it is, because I asked really hard. And God will probably be able to grant me my wishes if I start my next chapter with a new cast, in a new setting, with no boundaries or belief systems in place.

Don’t get me wrong, I had tentative plans to go out west already. The pros and cons were actively being weighed with my best friends. Only now I was really gonna fckng do it! I had the stint in Park City, Utah under my belt already. I was always nostalgic about the stint I spent with my best friends on Main Street, waitressing and drinking schooners of beer with our new mountain boys. But the nostalgia felt like it was going to be permanent, because I wasn’t at the blow-my-brains-out level of corporate life yet. And then I was. And now I’m here.

Here is a good place to be, in my superficial heart-of-hearts. I got whiplash from the process. I locked in a job and a room in a 4-bedroom apartment in a matter of two days. I came home to my family when all was said and done, desperate for their validation that this was a good choice for me. That actually matters to me alot (their validation). At the end of the day, I am not very independent from my parents. Maybe it’s because I’m the oldest, and the only daughter, but it’s really hard for me to do anything my parent’s haven’t sign off on. That makes me feel like a big pussy (it’s weird for girls to call themselves pussies, I think, but I can’t help but think this is the best word). If I think something would make them mad, I think about that. I put on short-skirts and I hear my mom’s voice in my head. My parent’s need to accept me, and my parents were hungover in bed, spending 0 time missing me while I threw my isolation-fit at the big age of 27. I crawled in with them and told them the news, hoping they would take it well. I was hoping they wouldn’t get a vision in their minds eye about me being a petulant freak at my nana’s, weeping and applying and muttering like a legit psycho. Of course I wanted to live in the mountains, but I hadn’t been told I could be happy yet. Or I wasn’t yet told I was allowed to go. At the big age of 27, with all of my freedom and autonomy, I needed my parents to tell me its Ok, its a good idea, actually its the Greatest thing I could be doing. I rambled the details of my cool new job, and the proximity of my apartment to the mountain (a walk!!!!!), and my new health insurance, and I tell my parents I’m happy and excited before I believe it. They’re like, beaming. They’re literally acting like it’s the Greatest thing I could be doing, and I’m like, WTF yay!

My mom was like: New York is a place to do business. You can work in the service industry anywhere. and I was like omg bestie, true, that’s what I was thinking! And I get a Free Epic Pass with this job!!!! So we played giddy-volley and we go back and forth gushing about how they think I am making the right choice. My dad goes as far as to say: it seems like you’re running towards something, finally, after running away from things for so long. This struck me, because I was like, OMG, Lumineers love interest main character CODED, thanks for the compliment. XXX.

Here is a good place to be, and I’m not even there yet. As much as I enjoyed my time in the Utah mountains, I also liked the perception of moving to the mountains in general. Like, people were really nice and excited about that, even though my friends and I mostly went because it was Covid, and we weren’t going to be hired in corporate. So I am going off that, and talking about perception. Going to the mountains to be anti-corporate. I expect that all mountains are the same, with fun people who are content being in a location where they can do what they love. This rubs off on me. I have never been in an office setting where I’m like: the joy and appreciation for life here is really rubbing off on me! So I will definitely enjoy being in nature, and being around those kinds of people, and also getting to spectate the uber-rich on their ski vacations. A lot of mountain folk shit on those types, but I actually enjoy watching them, and I kind of enjoy hanging out with them, because a few of my friends actually dress and act like that. Like, those are the Partners at my old firm, guys, be nice!

Obviously I have this crazy bit of superficiality about me still. Like, you thought I could just do something cool and fun for the sake of it being cool and fun? No. It also has to be part of this larger narrative about being a beat-to-my-own-drum type, but also fun, calculated, smart, organized. A real go-getter, who winds up in places that people care about, because she knows places, and she knows people. As soon as I got back from Utah, I mostly loved telling ~boys that my friends and I made that Utah move. Obviously as a cool girl brag. Like: I am a cool girl. I am so spontaneous and unique for doing this, type brag. A girl who knows how to live life, she’s doing so well, you should let her parents know they did such a good job on her. Either the baggage she raves about is not that heavy, or it’s so valuable, the luggage and the bags are color-coordinated, and she is so so strong for lugging it all around with her, to all of these amazing places!

Truly I don’t think that’s why I chose food service in the mountains instead of in LA or Chicago or Austin or any of the other cities recommended to me. I thought about it for a little, because that would totally be for the wrong reasons, and not worth doing (whereas going to an Ivy league or working for the best bank for the superficial reasons IS worth doing). Truth is, I want to be outside in nature, I think the west coast is gorgeous, I want to snowboard and ski and hike as much as possible. This is the best way to do that. I expect the mountains will be healing. I literally cannot wait to be there. Plus, iit makes me feel a lot more valid to leave corporate and go off the beaten path. Like if I am going to go off, I’m going to go really far off. Brooklyn is not far enough. I need an entirely new life, unrecognizably different from what it was before. I am extreme like that.

A lot of my life, my location and my job and most of the important things have been shaped by what me or my family thought of perception. As if shared perception determines value. Villanova said something about me, and it brought something out in me. It made people treat me differently, and it made my parents feel good. My move to Utah did the same thing in how it said something about me, especially because it prefaced a move to Silicon Valley. Both very different, but anything off-beat can be explained-away by a sense of adventure. My move back to the east coast showed what an east coast girl I am at heart (with an eyebrow raise from my mom that suggests something political). New York City said something about me to my parent’s friends in the suburbs, and anyone in my life who didn’t live in the New York. It felt like an inner-circle, being in Manhattan (Brooklyn too, which is why I was also considering a move there). My Villanova friends had their east-coast friends who also earned their way to NYC (with money or grit), and it was easy to meet more and more people, who I could impress with my resume of where I lived, where I worked, where I went to school. Except their accolades were equal or better, so it was such a chummy ha-ha-ha we’re so great fest. It was really fun to feel that way in a group. For a little bit, until I got sick of it, and got to know everyone, and was like: none of us are that great. We have good qualities and shit qualities and were just like everyone else in any major city. When you start being genuinely cynical like this, it’s probably time for a change of pace. At least that’s how I aim to become more fulfilled and satisfied with life . You’ll know if it actually works. Just give me a few months.

Honestly, I thought my parents would be ashamed of me, because I was hanging onto the comments about me being embarrassing and depressing. People say things they don’t mean, or say things they do mean in a really extreme way, and it’s not that deep. I can’t be that embarrassing, because I got a Villanova degree, which lended me a great network and a few jobs with good titles at good companies. All very Not-Embarrassing things. Plus I am writing, which will be super Not-Embarassing if I am able to become an accomplished and published writer, as long as the book does well and doesn’t humiliate my family too bad. I guess my biggest concern was being in the Mountains, which doesn’t seem very academic, or accomplished. Unless we think about American Romanticism. But did they make money? Or have prestige or notoriety? What does it mean to be accomplished? I guess that’s the overarching question in life, and I’m not going to tell you the answer. Similar to the end of my last blog, the answer to these Very Deep, Sexy-Ponderer questions are very Every man for himself. To me, accomplished will be creating a social life in the mountains, making progress writing a book, staying active with the blog and the YouTube and the social media, decorating my room well, curating a good mountain wardrobe and being the best version of myself in life, at home, and at work.

Nice, right? I am very enlightened like that. And I am not all talk! I am action too. Isn’t that great? Isn’t that exactly why I am worth tuning in to? Aren’t I accomplished, which balances out anything depressing or embarrassing? I love myself :)

Mountain Count Down - 3 weeks

XXXXXX