Life goal: happiness

One of my my college roommates (and favorite people in life), Norah, is in NYC for the weekend. We were doing the whole catching up thing and just talking about life in general. Somehow, just before she fell asleep, we got to a point in the conversation where I said something along the lines of, "All I really want in life is to be happy." I think I was talking about how I don't really know exactly what I want in life. Part of it is just a lifestyle I'm seeking, or staying away from a certain kind of lifestyle. Because I have figured out some things that I'm fairly certain will NOT make me happy, so I'd like to avoid them. But I don't really know what my life is going to look like, and I'm okay with that. I don't really have any specific goals as of yet. I'm still trying to figure a lot of things out (which I think is partly just how life goes and I'll always be doing that) and to a large extent I'm just taking everything one day at a time right now. All I know for sure is that I would like to, at any point in my life, be able to look back and say that I have led an overall happy life. It may seem like a simple idea, but I feel like it's one that people can easily lose sight of and I hope to never lose sight of it.

(There are a couple of related ideas that I may touch on later, but that's all I really want to say at the moment.)

I suck at blogging

I think I forgot for a day or two that this even existed. Oops. I had this internal conversation the other day about the blog. I struggle with wanting to be as open as possible (because I think there are wonderful benefits to doing so) and being conscious that this is the internet and anything that gets posted is out there forever. So I don't know what to post and what not to post. Not that this has really been a big deal yet. But it's a thing in my head. An issue.

In other news, I went to Alice's Daily Practice gig tonight (technically yesterday because it's 2:25am as I'm typing this). There were not a lot of people there and we were at a table right up front. It was awesome, as usual. We had a special treat because all three members of Ripley the band were there (Alice on vocals/guitar, Shannon on drums, Chris on piano). They played "Beautiful Eyes" together, which is one of my favorite Ripley songs ever. Then Alice and Shannon did "I Wish I Was My Brother" together, which was fucking epic. I've never seen that live before. Okay, that's really all I wanted to say about that, really. Oh, and Lily, our friend from Canada was there tonight, so that was special as well. We hadn't seen her since n2n closing in Toronto.

(I am realizing that this entry, as well as the blog itself, is sort of a disjointed jumble of randomness. This is not surprising to me. It's kind of how I roll, I guess. *shrug*)

*EDIT*
After I published this I realized it would be remiss not to mention that it has been a year since n2n closed on Broadway. A very fast year. It was nice to be with people I love and to be in Alice's audience on the one year anniversary of closing. And she did "I've Been" so it was just a wonderful way to spend the evening.

Jan Maxwell is a perfect human.

Earlier tonight I went to Seth Rudetsky's Broadway Chatterbox at Don't Tell Mama. It's basically just him interviewing Broadway people. The guest tonight was Jan Maxwell, who is currently playing Phyllis in Follies. She is my favorite part of Follies. The interview was perfect. Seth is hilarious and it turns out that she is too. They discussed her life and career. She was full of great stories. She is the Meryl Streep of Broadway in that she's so modest and is just like I don't know, I just do things. She didn't graduate from college. She has no acting method. She said she respects everyone (in the business) and reveres no one. It's sort of hard to coherently explain how awesome that interview was and how fucking great she is. Going to that was definitely an excellent life choice.

City Stories: Stoops to Nuts

Tonight I went to an event at Cornelia Street Cafe. It was an event that included storytelling and music. I went because my friend Nicole was one of the storytellers. I have been to two of her storytelling events before, one at Cornelia Street Cafe. I always enjoy them. To me, they are such a uniquely New York experience. This was held in the basement of this little cafe downtown. Nicole was fantastic, as always. She really is an excellent writer, and so damn funny. Most of the stories were really great. There was a songwriter who performed named Julia Joseph. She was beautiful. I loved her voice and her songs. If it weren't for Nicole being part of these, I would probably never go, or even hear about them for that matter. I love that I live in a city where things like this take place on a regular basis. I wish I could better express what I'm feeling about this but just know that nights like this remind me (not that I really need the reminder) that I live in the greatest city in the world. I love you, New York.

A brief introduction

This is my blog. About my life. I don't really want to limit myself in any way so this will just be a place that I record my thoughts about anything and everything. I think it's a good time in my life to start doing this. I intend for 2012 to be my first full year living in New York City and all I really want out of the year is to continue to learn and grow and move forward in whatever way that I can. This is mostly a personal thing but I encourage anyone who's interested to come along on my journey and be a part of it. Feel free to comment and be as open as you wish. I have no idea how often I will post--I've always found it hard to keep things like this going. But it's here. It's an outlet and a chronicle. Welcome.

(For anyone curious, the title of my blog is a shortened version of a quote by Little Edie in the documentary Grey Gardens. She said, "It's very hard to live nowadays. Living is very difficult.")