amsterdam

Arrived in Amsterdam tonight. I'm very excited for when I am back in New York and this blog will just be me in New York, talking about being me in New York, and so on. And you can only make so many blogposts with "I miss my friends" as the final word before people get bored.

I spoke to Natasha from the airport in London as I waited for my flight and we talked about her shoots in LA, which went well and about feeling ready to get back to NYC, and about feeling settled yet also ready to, like, get going life-wise or something. I feel very settled, and for this reason eager to get back to life in NYC. Even though I know I have to go to wherever for whatever, it doesn't feel like it used to, where the time home also felt like a visit. It also probably has to do with feeling more "self-possessed," but I'm not sure that is the exact right word for the feeling. I keep describing it to myself and others as feeling, for a while, like I was watching myself live my life from a few steps away, a little bit indifferently. Now, I just feel like me–standing in the same place as my body, moving with it–like I'm making choices, and like I want things as badly as I always wanted them, instead of placing a strange shroud over those desires. Like many things, this sounds far sadder than it was. Or maybe not; maybe no one thinks it's that sad. It's a bit confusing because it's not like I didn't want and I didn't do–the sad part is really the feigned disinterest.

Anyway, D and I parted ways at the airport and I flew to Amsterdam and he went back to NYC. In retrospect, maybe we should have made a bigger deal about going our separate ways; but I think it's okay. I don't think anything was done wrong; I'm just making the feeling of missing him mean that I should have done something differently. Very silly.

This nice guy from the institution who I'd given a very hard time over email about flights collected me at the airport and took me to my hotel. He was very easy to talk to and I felt good that I hadn't lost my touch for the peculiar forced intimacy of a long ride with a stranger who isn't an uber driver. I secretly really enjoy when they send someone from the institution to get me, because more often than not oversharing with each other wins out over 45 minutes of awkward silence (why are airports always so far away from the rest of the city they serve?). I like this because I like people but I'm not outgoing enough to strike up intimate conversations at random day-to-day. I also like this because then I arrive at the institution with an ally of sorts for all of the forced socializing ahead of me.

I read both Sally Rooney novels while we were in London and really enjoyed them. I think I've successfully opened myself up to fiction again after a multi-year hiatus.

It was nice to hear Natasha's voice over the phone, and it made me wonder if I played myself by not calling friends more often from the road. Obviously, I didn't and it's just made me miss them more. I'm very excited to get back to 547, and just very excited about Things over all–except for being in Amsterdam; honestly, I do not care.

I'm too tired to continue writing, and nothing interesting has happened to me between the airport and the hotel really. My head hurts from the weight of my braids, so I'm going to lie down. It's late anyway.