Happy Thanksgiving Ya'll

This Thanksgiving my mother and I decided to stray away from the traditional menu of gigantic turkey, sopping 'tatos with gravy and delicious rolls and try something... A little more classy.
But now that the day has arrived and I am stuffing tiny cornish game hens with wild rice and pomegranate seeds, I think, "Why the hell am I doing this? I LOVE GRAVY."
It's going to be good, you'll see. The only thing I'm hanging on to at this point in my life is my job and the fact that I'm losing weight like a mofo.
So Thanksgiving (aka The Eating Holiday) does not hold very much joy for me at the moment.
Don't get me wrong, the whole spending time with family thing is wonderful and I love them dearly...
But Thanksgiving and Christmas were always very couple-y holidays for me. I was shopping for my boyfriend like, months before Christmas. Collecting socks and dress shirts and fun novelty gifts to stow away in our closet (But down below where he wouldn't see). And this year...
Well this year I'm going to be spending a lot less money.
So that's nice.
SEEING THE SILVER LINING.
Ugh. I am so tired of being cheerful. (I know, you're like, when were you being cheerful? I missed this.) I just want to wallow in my little pond of depression and discontent over here. But my mom is making rolls and telling me how much she missed me, and my dog is next to me on the couch (Occasionally leaning over and licking my keyboard) and I just feel like a Grinch.
I guess the reason why we're making a new menu, new everything, is because everything is different this year.
My grandma is gone, my cousins are married, my sister and her family never come over for thanksgiving (She goes to her mom's; half sister you know.) and so it's just us. Mom, Dad, Katie and Brother. And Brother's Girlfriend. Who is incredibly silent, but very nice. Probably. Also include the random orphan assortment of neighbors that come over, awkwardly bringing boardgames without knowing that our family has almost NEVER played games involving boards (or tiny metal dogs, or wrenches or games involving apples). It's a good old time.
I don't sleep very well anymore. I had a dream the other night that I was in the house of my childhood, running door to door trying to lock them against the wolves and SHARKS that were gathered outside. According to a dream dictionary (Ugh, I know) that I was reading, wolves represent financial ruin, sharks represent an adversary and closed doors represent a missed opportunity. Though since I was closing the doors against the wolves and sharks, am I avoiding these things?
Or am I having crazy dreams that just mean I watch too much animal planet?

At the beginning of the summer when I was incredibly depressed and tired (I know, I've made such a leap forward!) I wrote a list of things that would make my life better.
1. Job
2. My own place
3. Boyfriend

Now I'm here, 2/3 and I feel ten times better then I did this summer, but I still don't feel great. I don't think those things are the things that will make me happy. (No comment on #3) I don't think changing the Thanksgiving menu will change my life (Except for the lack of weight gain).
I think I need a different list.

1. A Sense Of Purpose

I'm really hoping this is going to be our "end result" photo...

Right now they look like tiny, naked, baby heads and 

they're making me question my mortality. 

Graduation To Shame

Seattle is a beautiful city, it’s true. Full of trendy coffee shops, amazing vintage stores and neighborhoods; it calls to hipsters and young people like a gigantic ipad projected into the sky. I know it well, even calling myself a Seattle-ite when it comes right down to it.

But I must confess, I can’t give a Seattle zip for my address.

I was born there, later moving to Gig Harbor when my parents got tired of raising two kids in the city. I moved away to college in Ellensburg like a good girl, and upon graduating moved home (An area just a ferry ride across from Seattle) like any self respecting graduate with no money. 

So here I am. Waking up every morning to my Dad making me coffee, my mom getting ready for work and my dogs just making a general racket.

And that’s okay.

It’s quite a leap for me to be writing those words: It’s okay.

Because for quite some time now (And possibly once a week on a particulary rainy day) I was in the dark place. The I’ve-graduated-and-have-no-plan-and-I-live-with-my-parents place.

This is a reality for graduates in their twenties. It shouldn’t be a thing of shame; according to a study conducted by Twentysomething Inc., a consultant firm specializing in young adults, 85% of graduates in 2011 will be moving back home after graduation.

Ouch.

There is a social expectation today that we should be accomplishing things right out of the chute. Big things, things our parents passed on to us! Like taking up the good fight against whale hunting or painting signs to protest against healthcare, or the tea party!

But we are an apathetic bunch: a tweeting, facebooking bunch. We like to connect to each other on the internet, rather then holding hands at the picket line.

And that goes for dating too.

I’m not sure if you’ve seen the television ads, or been on any of the multitude of dating websites that are available to us today, but basically they offer the following things:

A myriad of available singles to choose from

An “easy, fun” way to meet people

A way to “find someone uniquely right for you!

If they were really being truthful they might say:

A total time sucker

Lonely guys in their thirties

A way to falsify and embellish the only good things about you!

And okay, that is not to say that I have not had anything good come of dating websites. Mr. Polite (whom I shall speak of further at a later date) continues to be a good time, and not a serial rapist! In fact, a large majority of relationships today begin on the internet.

So this also should not be a source of great shame. But for some reason, it still rings of desperation and sadness.

Why is that?

In any case, I have a job interview on Tuesday at a theatre, so here's hoping. My potential roommate (Another single 20 something) and I are also meeting next week to discuss rent and possible areas we'd like to move to. I'm thinking Queen Ann; I like the area, the people are friendly and not so Cap-Hill-in-your-face-hipster. Which can be scary sometimes. Capital Hill's hipsters have a passionate apathy that is something to be admired and feared. 

Or perhaps Fremont. Or West Seattle. Although West Seattle was where I was going to live with the X. And that, my friends, is a much longer story.