Brooklyn, I'm Trying

A JOURNAL.

i have become my own experiment. here i chronicle the weeks and how i will navigate this new life, in the most honest way possible.

I read a quote recently that said “anywhere can be a prison if you make it one” and the honesty of those words pissed me off but also stuck with me. so often we create boundaries, walls, gates, limitations, in so many areas of our lives. we do this emotionally, professionally, creatively. we are capable of so somuch more than we allow ourselves to be. anytime I doubt that I watch this and feel alive and invigorated and deliberate and afraid of nothing.

last week I quit my job. I found myself on my first day of “freedom” feeling completely unhinged, trying not to panic. I tried to write but the words wouldn’t come. I tried to workoutbut it didn’t feel productive enough. I wrote a to-do list and accomplished nothing on it but “buy TP”. I found myself at the grocery store standing on the meat aisle, thinking that we need different meats. none of these felt right. there must be others? have we thought of others?? i just stood there, ironically paralyzed among the once living and now sterilely packaged products, not knowing what to do next.

the very freedom I’d been craving became debilitating, and I found myself somehow imprisoned again, by fear.
with all of the preachy “follow your dreams!” “live your best life!” posts that i shove down your throats, I have finally followed my own advice. I am now my own experiment. so stick with me and follow along, I guarantee this will get interesting.

Brooklyn, I’m trying…
to break free of these walls
to live without fear
to be so much more.

week one

felt weak. My first day on my own I expected the energy I had and felt and embodied the days I’d lied about being sick, running around with a rambunctious fever, feeling and seeing and doing ferociously. instead i found myself in a rare hungover state, standing immobile on the meet aisle, wondering why we hadn’t come up with different meats by now. none of these met my expectations or could even meet me where I was, directionless and hungry.

I was unhinged.

I stopped making to-do lists that only made me feel incompetent and unnacomplished

I realized I was breaking habits and staryijng new ones.

I gave myself a break.

I slept more.

I prioritized meditation.

I made my space better and more inspiring but left when I found myself allowing organization to bleed into satisfaction.

I left the house.

I came back and cleaned the backyard.

I planted herbs.

I unpacked boxes.

I did my laundry, I spoke Spanish with everyone in the laundromat.

I threw myself into the family in the laundromat.

I came out displaced and rinsed clean.

I inhaled. I slowed down.

i went to the doctor’s office on my last day of insurance. under “occupation // employer” i started writing “digital strategist // justin alexander” but i’m not. i scratched through it and started to write “bartender…” but that is not me either. i drew a line through it and proudly wrote “writer // self-employed.” wiht a strong period at the end. i stared at it. that’s what i am, that’s why i’m here. i walked my papers up to the desk and sat back down, satisfied and swimming in the — that permission gives you when i was called back up. “ma’am, your position and employer don’t match what we have on file with your insurance.”

sonofabitch.

i was told i’m healthy and don’t look close to 30, which means that 30 is old.

i recognized that my time is my own, ever single minute.

i stopped working at the wine bar and was accepted beautifully and unexpectedly into a restaurant family that will become my own.

i accepted a tequila shot in celebration of my first shift.

i felt warm.

I’ve been drinking less because a day of incompetence is now unacceptable.

I’m deliberate.

I’m deliberate and afraid of nothing.

And this is week one.

This Is Week One.

<3L.

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<3L.

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