salience

The weather's getting warmer (it was downright hot today in the city!), and yet my mind is still down. Why am I not breaking out of this winter sadness?

Tonight, once again, I'm reminded to take the emotion out of my everyday choices. I can't analyze every single decision, it's too exhausting and self-defeating. Every morning I remind myself:

You are taking the CFA I soon, are you ready?
You are working hard to get this side project off the ground, can you make it?
Family is going through transitions, can you be what they need?
Work is hectic, can you hack the pressure?
Alex - we are having an awkward time, to say the least.

I am looking at things from the wrong angle. I am preparing for the CFA, I have a month until exam time. I am going to a 3 day review seminar at NYSSA this Friday - Sunday. I've already finished my review of all of the material and practice questions. Now I must drill and memorize formulas and take practice exams. I will make it.

The project is coming together one piece at a time. Like anything, great things worth your time require a commitment to patience.

Familia is stronger than anything, we will get through this just like we have gotten through our many (often harder) transitions before.

I have to admit it, I have it together at work. I shouldn't doubt what I know I can do, what I've done great already.

And Alex. We are both under enormous pressure right now, and I'm ashamed to say I've let things slip. It's been a gradual realization, seeing just how much responsibility I've avoided. The kind where your heart drops and you become numb to everything else around you. I was so focused on him being unreachable during my normal schedule that I didn't even make an effort for the little things. I felt slighted, but I was really the one slighting him. I feel as if I've just taken a blow to the ribs, and I can't breathe. "Distance isn't making anything grow fonder." Is it any wonder?

Que Dios me ayude.

Year Zero, NIN's new album, was officially released today. As I've said before, I love it. If you aren't into pensive, creepy, rock electrica you probably won't be a fan. But it's a concept album a sober Reznor wrote on his laptop, so there you go. The first of two concept albums. "My Violent Heart", "Good Solder", and "In This Twilight" can be isolated tracks, if you're more of a track person. Personally, I think you all should buy it now and just loop all 16 tracks for a few hours, days, weeks, months, years.

I'm doing better. Once you hit the bottom again, there's nowhere to go but up. Watching the tragic news unfold of the VA Tech shootings yesterday put my life into perspective very quickly. What am I so worried about? Why should I be stressed? As down as I was, I'm still alive. I'm here, breathing. And I can only control myself. There's only so much I can hold in my hands at any one time. I am all I need, but I am not alone in this great city. Speaking of, Shell and Kelly are visiting this weekend, a mini mod 18A reunion, so it will be good to see them. We haven't been together since Halloween in Boston last year. And we might even have Spring like weather here by this weekend, yay. Winter has been such a long season this year. Yes, in more ways than one.

I'd say, I don't appreciate the feigned interest, if I could, to you. Or maybe mention the obvious lack of maturity in passing. If I could, those would be some of the words I'd hold awkwardly in my mouth. But my tongue is too heavy with anxiety for me to even part my lips.

Good mourning, heartache.

I am not happy. But we can't have it all. That fairytale does not exist. It has been a bit since I've been back here. Self-imposed stress, expectations I have set for myself that I am not sure I can even come close to meeting. I try to remember my senior year words, ninety nine percent of leadership is just showing up. After this year, there will not be much you haven't done before. From here on out, it's a chance to do things differently this time. Use what you've learned and go with what you know. But...

Darkness, my old friend. You, this corner here, I just can't get beyond your perpendicular. Acute fear and self-doubt have left me paralyzed.

Love I have for you, sure. But by no means am I in love. Quite the opposite. No racing heart beat, no erratic thoughts. Just a simple, familiar echo of you falling from that pedastal in my heart. Again. Things have not gotten better and I don't know what to do, so I do nothing.

My friends here tell me to rest awhile in their company. I have so much going on: work, CFA studying, my entrepreneurial spirit. My waking hours are simply not enough and all three follow me into my dreams. A diversion, any distraction will help, they say. Just smile. And for awhile, everything is okay. But when I come home, all that greets me is this vast silence. It's so loud I almost forget I can't see too well in this dark, but I make it back to my corner quickly. Habits - they just don't let go once the claws are in.

Nevermind stumbling slowly as I sit back down here; I miss the euphoria of spring. This mirror affirms what I fear every morning, I am falling out of love with myself. Good Mourning. Morning, mourning, mourning monitone, yes. But it is by no means good.

"I am trying to believe."

Yesterday was Good Friday and I took a half day off of work to go to church in the afternoon. I went to St. Patrick's, the cathedral on Fifth Avenue, across from Rockefeller Center. They were holding an event with the Archbishop called, "Three Hours' Reflection on the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ." It was a reflection on the seven last words of Jesus, and for each word, the audience would participate in a call and response with the cantor, followed by a latin hymn from the amazing choir, followed by a reflection by the Archbishop. The three hours passed very quickly. Easter weekend two years ago was a very hard time for me, so I spent most of service reflecting on the past three years of my life.

My family has been religious in its own right, but we never were your typical Sunday service socialites. We kept to ourselves: faith is a private thing we never really shared amongst ourselves or with anyone else. At BC I could never check into the Catholic Lite of the Jesuits: an amended mass to appeal to more students, priests showing tattoos they got on immersion trips, and then there was the time Father Don (the band's priest) stripped off his collar to reveal a SuperFan shirt before a home game. That image resonated with me, and I never could take him seriously as a religious leader after that. Sure, it was in good fun. But throwing down a collar? It would be like an Army officer ripping off the American Flag she wears on her right shoulder. Some things should remain sacred, if for no other reason than fudamental respect.

I've been listening to Year Zero constantly, the new Nine Inch Nails album, even though it hasn't officially been released yet (not until 17 April). The campaign behind getting the word out on this work has been nothing short of inspiring. It's the kind of guerrilla marketing that makes me believe in artists today: inclusion of the fans, and beginning the album's experience with the very first USB drive placed in Lisbon. The first "leak" of new material. We all need something to be excited for, something to anticipate and look forward to. Even if Reznor has created an album, in his words, "a movie soundtrack for a movie that hasn't been made yet," about a sci-fi concept, a message to be wary of a totalitarian government we could experience in the early future, the end of the world, it is addicting. One of the images on a teaser trailer loaded onto the Year Zero website is a blurry, blue road sign with the words, "I am trying to believe." It is also a lyric from the album, on a track called The Good Soldier.

Exactly. It's just like Reznor sings, "I am trying to see, I am trying to believe, This is not where I should be, I am trying to believe." I am trying to work through everything I've gone through the past few years. At times, it's easy to let the good drop out. I don't mourn the time lost anymore, the senior year memories I didn't have the choice to make, the holidays and the now awkward, life milestones. But it is an intriguing duality, that this weekend of all weekends I find myself drawn to a church again. The last time I can really remember being at peace in a place of worship was at my abuela's funeral. In pain, sure, but there was a peace knowing she wasn't suffering anymore. It's been a long road since her death on February 1, 2004. This Easter weekend and the 25th of this month will be hard days for me to get through, no doubt. But it's been two years, and right now, I'm just trying to believe that as more time passes, this pain will begin to fade. Maybe one day I will be able to write about the Toni Morrison ghost that follows me. But for now, just know I am trying to believe.

In his words, "Leave it up, less work." So I'm not taking the prior post down. We both apologized. Me for things I said and him for things he just didn't do. But I now know his schedule, so let's see how this week works out. It simply has to be better than last yall. :) Nowhere to go but up, right?

"Vaquita, how do we fix this?"

Don't think him horrible, either. Please. This relationship thing is a challenge, but through those minutes on the phone and the relief in both of our voices by the end, you can hear the smiles returning.

Y adelante ya.