Homesick

Well I know I have been a bit lax on updating my blog, there is just so much I want to catch up on that I keep putting it off. Well no more! I have decided to just write, and intermittently post the missed experiences!

So what has been going on in the life of Kristen M. Neri?? Well alot and not so much at the same time. The past month has been a bit rough, I have been tossed around by my clients who orriginally promised ongoing work at great rates but whom I havent heard from in 3 weeks, am running short on cash, am no longer allowed to hang out with someone I thought was one of my closest friends, have been dealing with my crazy roommate who is driving me up a wall, and have been constantly questioning my decision to leave my somewhat coush and comfortable DC lifestyle for an unsettled and challenging adventure on the otherside of the planet. Yeah I know thats alot!

I guess its all impart due to the onset of autumn and cold weather, a VERY different May than I have ever experienced before. In the states the fall is filled with picking pumpkins and apples, the smell of cinnamon, holiday parties, and family. Each month has a holiday; Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas all help the population forget its getting cold and that summer is a thing of the past. Not here, it just gets cold, rainy and windy without anything to distract. Being surounded by beautiful beaches is a cruel reminder of the warmer weather and summer fun. So all of this has made me a bit homesick for DC, and what has not helped is the constant media reminder of my beloved former city. Every day DC is on the news, if not also on random TV programs. This past week Michelle and Barack went to dinner in Georgetown and the news featured a 5 minute segment on their date night in my former work neighborhood. I was going to a job interview the other day and there was a HUGE billboard for Sky News with a picture of the Capitol Building featured, 5 blocks from my former house and a daily sight on my bike ride home down the national mall. I had it all, a great job, good friends, a steady income, hand picked designer furniture, a life. And the thought of settling down scared me away to this foreign land, I know had I stayed I would always want to have moved here, and wouldnt have been happy with it anyways.

Well I figured I needed to get out of my funk, and what better way than just celebrating my american life. I had a HUGE craving for american pizza that could not be filled by new zealand pizza, as they like the wierdest kinds of pizza here, believe me I tried. So last night, as a last resort, I ordered Pizza Hut, got a big bottle of mountain dew, watched the E! channel and Mean Girls. I followed it up this morning with a dose of starbucks mocha coffee and spent an unusual sunny day walking around the lambton quay, the shopping district. I also decided to go to the place I knew I could find solice, the architecture section of Borders and had a brief calming moment when looking at an Eero Sarinen book and sipping my mocha brought me back to the National Building Muesum and docent training.

I also purchased the book "Eat, Pray, Love", a book about a woman who felt trapped in her former coush lifestyle and marrage then after many moments depressed in her bathroom staring at the grout gave it all up and traveled to Italy, India, and Bali finding what it was she didnt know she was looking for. Just reading the begining I started to be reminded of the book I started writing durring my travels to New Zealand last year, a trip that opened me back up to my exploring way, a huge side of my personality that had been pushed aside due to my comfy DC lifestyle. I only had writen about the pre-trip transformation and my first day, not being able to bring myself to write about the emotional Mahia experience, and subsequently the rest of my life transforming journey which innevitably brought me to this very point I am at today. (Anyways I think now might be the time to post that first chapter and will link it to this post; http://wanderlustneri.blogspot.com/2009/05/new-zealand-trip-2008-chapter-1.html ). So im going to start reading this book, and maybe It can help guide me through the next month, and bide sometime before the snowboarding season begins mid June (I did recently purchase my season pass for a discount $2oo US). Ok of to writing the next post!