4668 APN

It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power.’

- On a card from the UPS Team at Hewitt.

An After Note : When I first got my car tag number in the spring of 2003 - I was sooo excited - It was a sign ..all even numbers ..meaning there was nothing "odd" about what I was doing ..and the tag was "APN" ..which in my prompt ever dependable filmi way - I thought was the heavens way of a slang for "APNA"

Ha !

DNR

I heard a story on TV ..a long long time ago ..on a bright beautiful day when I was so taken in by the sunshine that I yearned to believe ..in anything..story not with standing.
There was on old couple in south Florida that was going on a cruise to the Bahamas.
They has met each other in college and over the years made a habit of saving pennies and nickles and dimes that they accrued from the cups of coffee,drinks and odd trips to trader Joe's and Walgreen's. One day they took all this loose money and bought cruise tickets with it.
I looovvee cruises.
(I've never been on a cruise - what I am saying is that if I ever went on one..I would loovve it.
Kinda like ..I've never met Mark Darcy too - but if I did .. *did anyone hear bells* )

So years ago I decided - that I would follow suit.
The problem is that I never stay in the same place.
I don't like change.
Not even when it comes from a vending machine.
It makes my purse and my heart heavy and I'm always falling short of it.

So many poetic and fitting things have been said about change. Sheryl Crow even made a touching song about it.About how it its good and phenomenal and does a world of good.

Contrary to popular belief - I dont think that all Change is good. Not all change is a step forward.
I know for a fact that one poor personal decision ..one minuscule moment of erroneous judgement, one moment of hesitation is similar to hitting the rewind button on the old whirring VCR of my life.. where things can go so askew ..that not even the little SOS button can help track ..

So just here ..just in this moment ..I am allowed to completely lose control and have a nervous breakdown.
To sit in the middle of my almost empty room on an over inflated air bed with half deflated spirits.
Just in this small moment - I am allowed to be miserable, cranky, teary, weak, confused and throw all kinds of rhetoric's out to the cosmos.

I guess whats hard for me to grasp sometimes is that pennies add up...slowly and steadily. One small cent at a time. They rattle and make noise until one day ..magically they get transformed ..into something brighter,crisper and bigger.

Tomorrow I take all my pennies to Coinstar.

So as the years pass... the earth continues to do what she has been doing for millions of years .. while the world as I know it ...slowly alters and all I can do ..in the interim ..is hope and pray that my change adds up to be worth a lot more than a few bucks.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

There are times when our hearts feel so heavy - that we cannot even move a step forward.
When systolic heartbeats are so loud - that they drown out the very voice of reason .
This is not one of those times.
These days - especially on days like today when looks like god is definitely in Georgia while we soak in the sunlight, these days I am floating.
Floating over the seas of change. Unable to decide what my true north is. Wandering. A stranger in the book of my own life.
I feel like when I am 80 years old and look back on my life - I will view these days with more than just a cursory eye. Something life defining is happening -even as I write this blog. No one knows - not even me what the next few days are going to hold.
Its like the windmills of the gods are spinning away and blowing winds of change my way.
But I know now more than ever before - that the die has already been cast.
It was cast several years back...When I did not even know what I now know as my life, my story.
What is left to unfold - is the twists and turns in this script that will lead me to the exact moment when I find out.
And so I wait - in patience, in solitude and in strength - with the unbearable lightness of being.

Video Killed the Radio Star

I moved to Atlanta on a brutally cold sunny day in 2003.
It was the kind of day that Shantaram would have described aptly as a day when the sun was cold and the shadows - colder.
I rented an apartment a day after I moved here - I knew no one in the city and no one knew me.
Free to choose a different past and a build a different future.
My first friend was a 25 inch Sharp TV that I bought from Best Buy - a chunk of my first pay check.
I lugged this heavy TV from best buy into my car only unable to carry it to my apartment.
Frustrated, helpless and psyched out of my mind - I asked the most random person to help me carry it to my place and when we were done - I sat on the carpet with aching muscles and carpet burn looking at this TV. ..feeling a sense of accomplishment that I hadnt felt in a long time.

Then I got the runaround from the cable company to hook up this machine. On a saturday morning weeks later when the cable guy came over to fix the TV- I was so excited.
Before he left - he said something that I'll never forget in my life. He said " You live alone - You need to get a deadbolt- Dont take any chances. Life is too short" .

I had never considered the possibility. I got a deadbolt.
Then it was calm - for months together - it was the TV , me and the deadbolt.

I used to come in from work those first 6 months.Those were days when everything seemed like an uphill struggle - where everyday I gave myself points for just breathing in and out. I look at my apartment - completely empty and unfurnished except for this TV that spoke to me when there was no one else I could talk to. That sang songs and told me stories of hope , love and everything else that I thought was overrated at a time when much was murky for me.

So this TV and me ..we have history.

When Hurricane Ivan stormed and raged chaos outside - I sat at home with the blinds open looking at the lightening and falling branches - watching the news. When cobb county had its first flash flood warning , I saw it on the TV and thought to myself that there better not be a freaking flood because I didnt know what the heck to do.

The ice storm that raged across the south east in early 2004 when the entire city was covered in snow and forced to stay indoors - I had the TV on for 72 hours - I was so scared with the falling trees and accumulating snow and the howling winds - I ended up sleeping on the couch with the bloody TV on. ..and I thought to myself ..thank god I have this TV. ..and I remember feeling so utterly laughable because my sense of security came not from within or from some other person but from a TV. That couldnt be right couldnt it...then agin ..whatever works I guess.This is no method to the maddness is there ?

When I was packing to move to Guragon - The TV was on the entire time I was disintegrating and packing my life into boxes - some of which I never wanted to open again.
Then I came back - and there it was again. Silent while I was studying and boisterous when I was ready for some chit chat.

As the years passed - I spent lesser and lesser time at home with it.
I fell in love with life all over again and Atlanta . The hand that life was dealing out had cards - that said it was time to play and not pack.

Now 4 years down the lane - the tarots read that its time to pack before play.
And even though I am excited about change and the changing times - I cant help but feel a shred of doubt and sadness at letting go of what has constituted as home. A home that I never thought possible - not even at my optimistic best.

Today - I sold my TV.
This is the beginning of the end...officially.
And so the madness begins and while the sun shines down on the south - I can only hope that I can keep the sunshine in my heart for all of this year and like someone once said hold on tightly to the beads of hope on the thread of possibility in my life.