Light 'em up.

It's been a minute since I posted a blog.  This blog will be penned (typed) at sea-level, not up in the air like the last one.  And that's okay.  It's a pretty grounding blog for me.

In case you haven't heard, I've landed a job at Halloween Horror Nights this year.  That should be a blog post in and of itself, but alas.  It's a pretty huge, awesome thing.  And it sets into motion a lot of new things, like moving out.  Haha, anyone who has spent five minutes with me the last few years KNOWS that's kind of been an overarching goal for me.  And here it is finally coming to fruition.

It made me realize, wow, guys, we are all growing up.

As I stand on this precipice, I realize that many of my great friends are standing on their own precipices. Or, have already jumped headlong into a great change.  And it makes me immensely proud and immensely strengthened.

My pal Heathery made a huge transition earlier this year, as she got married and moved an hour away from her home.  And I couldn't be happier or more proud for her/of her.  To successfully maneuver a change like this, you've got to want to do it.  And you've got to be willing to work for it.  She's got both of those down.  Similarly, my Scaroline has been hired as a Spanish teacher and will be ringing wedding bells of her own next year.

I have a couple of super dear friends that are on the cusp of finally graduating from their respective programs.  There's Kailee Bug who is finishing up her last class for her Bachelor's degree and then heading into a teaching career.  And James Beattie who is finishing up his law enforcement program and becoming a cop, like he's wanted to do for a while now.  I love these two.  And I'm so glad that all of their dreaming, ambition, and hours are finally paying off.  I also know, that for both of these great people, this is NOT the end of a road, it's just another stop on the ultimate journey.  I know they'll continue to move forward.  And be awesome at what they do.

I remember during my senior year how petrified I was of graduating. I was worried that I wouldn't get into a college, that I wouldn't survive in a college, that I wouldn't pick the right major, that my major would be a life sentence and all of these things.  Fearing the unknown has always been an issue for me, obviously.  But now, I feel more ready to do these things.  I feel more confident and armed to keep moving forward.  I'm also ready to go to new places and explore new things that may not be comfortable.

Is this what growing up is?  Does this make one grown up?  Or are you "grown up" when you get to this place?  What place? This place:  The place where you're trying to light different things on fire and examining how they burn? How is this different than the last?  Is this better than the other? Did you enjoy that experience? Is this good for you now?  I think so.  And I feel like Fate just handed me a brand new matchbook.  Time to light 'em up.

Until "Turn Off All Electronic Devices"

I find that I always write things thousands of feet in the air.  I don’t know why.  I guess it is more serene here.  Or that there are no other, outside, pesky things to distract me.  But, yeah, airplanes at night make for good writings.  

I may not have had the best trip to New York this weekend, but I definitely learned something:  I need to be there.  Need.  And being there is not an impossible feat, I learned that too.  In the course of four days, I heard so many stories from so many different people that “just needed a change” or “wanted something different” and had migrated to the City.  From Sacramento.  From North Carolina.  Why should it be any more difficult for Florida? For me? It will not be.  I mean, it will BE, but it will not be difficult.  I sat on the red stairs and listened to a guy talk about how he loved living in the City and listening to people’s stories.  I love stories.  That place is made of stories.

You know, when I first visited to New York, I thought it was magical.  I just didn’t know what to make of such an awesome place.  And now, I don’t know that I believe it has the same magic, maybe it’s because I understand it better.. or maybe I don’t understand it at all.  I do know that it is a fascinating, but it isn’t mythological. Or even mystical.  Maybe it’s just that it’s become a real place, and not just a vacation hot spot.  Maybe I respect it more than I did.  Maybe I’ve lost respect for it.  Maybe I just haven’t touched the places that make it so interesting in so long.

I said “maybe” too many times in that paragraph.  Maybe I should stop?

I need to change.  I need to be more decisive.  I need to be more confident.  More sure.  And I don’t think I can do that in Florida, Baker County, Macclenny, My parents‘ house.  I can’t do it there.  I need to go away and start doing for me. And learning my story.  Because, how can I bring a story to New York if I haven’t penned one? Is that mythologizing? Yeah, probably.

God damn it, girl. Be decisive. Yes. That’s fucking mythologizing. But I don’t care.

I do need a story.    But, I don’t need this story to be fragmented like all the actual stories that I’ve actually tried to write.  Those are comprised of important bits, but nothing to join them.  And they end up being just bits, and not a whole story.  I have random, typical plans for my life, sure, but how do they fit into the thing as a whole? Where does getting a degree, getting married, going to Italy, starting a family, getting away from Florida, etc where do they fit on the trajectory.. on the life course? .. well, Michael Hallett would be proud of that.  Or maybe fragments are good, like a mosaic or a scraphgan (scrap+afghan... I made a word). ...I’m going to start with the fucking “maybe”s again. God. Damn. Us. All.  But look, I made a word.

What could I do if I didn’t have anyone telling me what I couldn’t do? Shouldn’t do? What they would rather me do? ... What could I do if I didn’t have anyone to answer to?  It stops me here.  I can’t even imagine that kind of freedom.  I do imagine that I would learn a lot about who I am.  And I’d probably dye part of my hair bright red.  I think I’ve spent 22 years following someone else’s rules and I’m exhausted of it.  Yeah, that sounds overly dramatic, I accept that.  But, God! I want to be on my own.

Own. With James.  I love him.  I love him more than I ever imagined I could.  He is insanely special and our relationship is insanely special.  And he’s definitely given me so much and taught me so much that I can’t wait to learn more.  And it truly excites me to move on (out) with him.  He makes me feel safe and secure.  And how can one person do that?  Maybe, I’ll ask him. (Fuck these maybes...)

Wh

Fire Walker

What a week last week was!  Good lord!!  It was crazy.

I'm looking forward to calmer days for now and looking forward to a great holiday week.  Holiday week?  Yes!  We have Fat Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, and VALENTINE'S Day!

Fat Tuesday:  I've always been interested in Mardi Gras.  I've always wanted to go, so I always do something cutesy to acknowledge Fat Tuesday.  This year, I'm going as all out as you can without actually going to New Orleans (which would be ideal.. and was even seriously considered Friday evening).  I'm wearing some beads that were sent over to me by a friend of mine that lives in Louisiana.    But we're also making Cajun awesomeness happen here at my house.  We're making Creole and I'm going to make a homemade King Cake (SO EXCITED).  If it turns out well, I'll post photos and a recipe in my next blog!  But, I'll be watching Fat Tuesday parades also.  There's a nifty website that shows casts of it all day long.

Ash Wednesday:  Watching the Colbert Report and starting my Lent fast.  I just have to decide what I'm giving up for 40 days.... hmmm.  And this marks 40 days until my sixth anniversary.  Which is another blog entirely.

Valentine's Day: Hate or love it (like I do), Valentine's Day is but three days away.  I love this holiday. Not because I'm in a relationship, not because I'm materialistic.  Because it's always been fun.  I will never understand why some people get so bitter about this day, it's just a day on a calendar unless you ascribe another meaning to it.  You may say, "Yeah, the reason you like it is because you've never been single on Valentine's Day."   And to you I say, "FALSE!" Because that is true.  Haha.  I have most definitely been single and I liked it just as well then.  But, moving on:  This year has been great!  I've been working on a "Fourteen Days of Valentine's" thing for my boyfriend, and it's been so rewarding and great.  And I'm looking forward to the culmination on Thursday!

This week is going to be a great reprieve from last week, which was INSANE.  I feel refreshed and ready to go.  And, I feel like cleaning.

Watching the World Burn

I really hate blogs, as a general rule.  Usually, they start off really nice and fun, and that's great.  But eventually they devolve into someone incessantly espousing their complaints with ...oh, well, EVERYTHING.  And that's the reason I tend(ed?) to stay away from blogging, because eventually I'll become the one doing the bitching, instead of the innocent bystander.

But here I am.  Cue: Bitch Blog.

Haha.  I'm not actually going to complain about things going on in my personal life, mainly because there's nothing there to complain about.  The complaints that I want to address are general, and are simply the result of some of my observations (and conversations with friends) lately.

It started like this:

As you may know, I work as a teller at a small credit union.  The job is a story within itself, but the credit union as a whole has been under renovation for nearly a year now, since a new president was appointed.  The president of the credit union, basically serves as a figure-head for the employees and board members (as well as the members) and helps establish new policies and promotions.  Pretty fancy stuff.  In an effort to boost morale around the work place, as well as appear more open to the customers, the president has implemented a couple of contests.  The first one, was actually really rewarding.  For a month, tellers were encouraged to ask/mention the credit card services offered by the bank.  Anytime they did not mention credit cards to a member, the member could take a dollar from the slacking teller's jar.  At the end of the promotion, the teller could keep however much money was in their jar.  GEE WILIKERS!!! FREE MONEY?  Yeah, at the end of that promotion, guess who still had all $50... mostly everyone.  There were a couple of tellers who, by one member or another, had lost a dollar. (They were reimbursed said dollar by another member though, so, no worries).  This month, we began yet another contest. The intention: to make the bank seem like a more welcoming place.  For the month of February, if your teller does not call you by name, you get a candy bar. Because my work place is "Where Everybody Knows Your Name" .... Cheeeeeeeers.  Except that it isn't, because I don't know anyone's name (and for that matter, neither does any other teller).  And it shows, as I've lost two candy bars already.  Which is honestly fine, I don't say people's names, therefore, all of this is completely deserved on my part. I digress, I guess these promotions are fun, and cute, and may have taken some clever minds to construct, but as I reflect on them, I really can't help being repulsed by them.

They thrive on the egocentric nature of human beings.  Absolutely disgusting.  The idea that someone is going to appear to be affronted because someone else didn't call them by their name, to the point that they would need some sort of gratification to fill the void is sickening to me.  It sounds a lot like stepping on people for your own benefit, because that's what it's designed to do.  Credit Cards and Name Calling aren't something that these members (or tellers) usually care about, but setting up a reward system increases its intrinsic value; all of a sudden, now that one benefits from doing this new thing, it's more appealing to do it.  WE'RE LIKE RATS IN A DAMN SKINNER BOX.  Does anyone realize it?  I'm not sure.  I'm not sure they even know who Skinner is.  Again, I digress, I've gotten way off topic.  Feeding off of a person's tendency to better them self with no regard for anyone else, is like wanting to watch the world burn.

And who wants to watch the world burn? People like the Joker.  I'm not like the Joker.  I'm like Bruce Wayne, "I'm not afraid, I'm angry."

I'm frustrated at the back-handedness of people.  And the people who exploit such back-handedness.

I'll go ahead and apologize for this one.  This post is just a rant.

-J

This Girl Is On Fire

I recently posted a status claiming that I wanted to become a better writer.  I do.  I've always liked writing, in any context, so why not hone it into something useful?  There's no reason not to, really.  But how does one go about it?  By simply doing it, I would imagine.

At the behest of a couple of friends, I'm going to try to take up blogging.  It's the perfect way to practice writing and give myself an outlet to express my feelings.  So, thanks to Cameron and Kailee, here I am.

Or rather, here I am again.  See, I actually started this blog many months back, I just never posted anything.  The old blog title was "The Antithesis" which seemed like a badass title at the time, but looking back it seems a little more high-school-kid-trying-to-be-cool-by-being-against-something.  Which is exactly what it was.  Antithesis is still a really cool word, don't get me wrong, it just doesn't fit what I want this blog to be anymore.

Thus, "The Fire Rises" was born.  

Yes, you've heard this line before (If you've seen The Dark Knight Rises [fitting], anyway).  It's a great line.  But that's not why I chose it to head this blog.  That's only because it was on my shirt today.  Yeah, it really doesn't get any simpler than that, I'm easily inspired, I guess.  But, as I've ruminated on the title throughout the afternoon, it really is fitting.  A fire is defined as "the phenomenon of combustion manifested in light, flame, and heat."  Phenomenon. Combustion. Light.  These are dynamic, positive words.  These words are powerful, they conjure strong imagery, and you can't help but feel the heat from them.  That's what I want my writing to be. Precisely that.

I'm not a bad writer, and I never have been.  I just want the fire to rise higher.  And maybe, if it catches in my writing, it will catch in other places also.  

And then, maybe we'll just burn the whole forest down. (Another Dark Knight reference, in case you were wondering).

So, there's my first blog, friends.

-Jamie Allyn