Spontaneity

I can be immature when it comes to many things, and one of those things is definitely work. I have a very nice, low-stress, part-time day job, where I work with nice people, listen to nice music, and get a nice discount on lots of excellent stuff. The only problem is that I detest going to work. And I mean a lot. I get bored, and folding T-shirts isn't exactly creatively stimulating work.

What it comes down to is this: I'm spoiled. And lazy.

But no matter how I try to convince myself that this job is just a support for what I'm really working on (budget-free amateur youth theater, a very lucrative field), working at The Store has been simply amazing.

Here's something to understand about most of my life: I live in an extremely stressful place (New York), go to an extremely stressful school (Playwrights Horizons Theater School, which is a branch of the Drama Department, which is a branch of Tisch School of the Arts, which is a branch of New York University), and spend approximately 75% of my waking time in classes, rehearsals, and meetings where I try to learn how to create theater and try to understand why it is important. Consequentially, the rest of my time is spent in artistic breakdown mode. The city is loud, filthy, and fast. The food is greasy. The people are scary. If it weren't for the fact of the brilliant education I'm getting as a result of all of this, I probably would have thrown myself off of the Brooklyn Bridge by now.

So, after each year of working to near exhaustion at school, shutting me up in a relentlessly chill establishment like The Store is about the kindest thing you could do to me.

Where in New York do I get a chance to stare at dream catchers and listen to Pink Floyd - 20 minutes of it - without being interrupted by a siren or an explosion or a subway train?

Where in New York do I get to talk to people - lots of people, lots of very strange people - without having to rush off to whatever very important thing I'm late for?

Where in New York do I get to smell something that isn't repulsive? Seriously, the aromatherapy alone in The Store is reason enough to work there.

And these are just the easy paralleled reasons. The social, moral, and intellectual benefits are far more complicated. As someone who could easily have qualified for the Most Sheltered Child in California pageant, working here has helped me to realize (duh) that all people are just people - no matter what they wear, how many piercings or tattoos they have, or what substance they just smoked in the parking lot. It has also given me a good combination of street smarts and balls - enough savvy to know what that thing is, and the strength to politely decline to inhale through it, all while maintaining a perfectly present and zen attitude. I've also become infinitely more chill than I've ever been before. When the manager let me leave work an hour early today, I went for a swim in the river. In my clothes.

A year ago, I never would have done anything so impulsive.
Two years ago, I was so freaked out about college that I don't remember quite what I was up to.

I love remembering that I live in a small town, and I love the more complex and more recent revelation that we are all just people living our lives on the planet - I may be here for now, but soon, I'll be 3,000 miles away in a place that (surprisingly!) is also full of people living their lives.

I'm all hippied out for now, and my sister made cookies, so I'm going to go watch a Miyazaki film.

And I've finally uncovered my hair. Feels good to let it breathe again.

Awkward conversation of the day:
Customer: 'All of these products are for tobacco use only.' Is that a joke?
Me: No, ma'am. It's the law.