Try Not to Blink

Most posts like these hover closer to the turn of the calendar: heralding a New Year, pondering all it may portend while probing the experiences of the one so freshly left behind. Accomplishments are crowed and hopes are cooed, bearing the standards of our midwinter rebirths. The good is grasped tightly in writing so any bad beyond the horizon can't blot it out entirely when the world feels darker and colder. This post attempts these things, of course; however, it requires that I slide the scale a bit. My last and coming year are not framed by the beginnings of Januarys, but the ends. January 25 marks our anniversary of living in Seoul, where we've just signed on for another contract to end February, 2015. My year is therefore slightly shifted from the usual count, and my reflections are skewed accordingly.

'Expect the unexpected' is a trope of the traveler, and, as expected, the past year it has proven it true enough.

I've learned a new language - not enough to hold a conversation, but enough to form grammatically-correct sentences with a little struggle, and more than enough to survive. I learned to read and write a new alphabet in less than a week. I can navigate the subway and direct a taxi with the basics. I can peruse a menu and order the usuals, and while my vocabulary may not always suffice, I can at least amuse those patient enough with a decent accent.

I've tried to embrace the cultures that have welcomed me as a guest, even if there are times I've wanted to fold my arms and click my heels on the off-chance such a transplant doesn't require a tornado and a head wound.

I've visited three countries outside of Korea, four if you count a few steps beyond an invisible line into the negotiating territory of North Korea. Malaysia, Japan, and the Philippines have shown me glimpses of worlds to which I'd never previously given much thought beyond romanticized stories or fingers tracing a map. I've stared like a child at whale sharks and guarded my belongings from unscrupulous monkeys. I've sipped soju on rooftops and tasted corner store sake on my boyfriend's lips. I played darts with an audience of chirping geckos and learned how to shuffle cards like an adult. I've wandered through painted palaces built, burned, and rebuilt over thousands of lifetimes before mine, and I've spent several cumulative hours looking for a place to pee. I've collected prayer beads from cool-tiled mosques, shrines in caves, and temples on the edge of the sea. I've retraced countless steps and found my way before I even realized I was lost. I've confirmed an uncanny ability to know my way around by recognition of subtle landmarks, and I've thanked God for Adam's sense of direction in the face of my hopelessness (without a handy compass or the convenience of tree moss, I've accepted that I will never have those bearings - seriously, where the hell is North?).

My ability to endure spicy foods has grown to a point at which I am not filled with dread to try a bite of something new (and instead, every so often, I'm filled only with mild regret and temporary pain). I saw Basquiat's art and remembered to try to make some of my own, too. I nursed bruises and scrapes from a Spartan Race and hunted mosquitoes with vengeance. I explored with my parents when they came for a surreal visit. I climbed a mountain with terrifying, humbling views, afraid to reach the top, but more afraid not to. I was caught by the monsoon in the park when we lingered too long for the summer sun's liking. I cried under cherry blossoms and laughed in the glow of thousands of lanterns floating through crowded streets. I played in the mud, sang in sweaty bars, and fed neighborhood alley cats in the rain.

I've fallen in love with teaching and had my heart repeatedly broken by dozens of unfairly-adorable 6-year-olds. I encouraged sarcasm in a couple third graders, fanned infant flames of feminism in a few others, and asked "Why?" a million times.

I've forged new friendships while aching for the ones on the other side of the world. I've seized opportunities across oceans while missing milestones at home - weddings of dear friends, the birth of my nephew, my cat learning patience - and knowing there will be more. Technology helps to soothe the pangs of these particular casualties of my time here, but sometimes the sense of removal is strong and homesickness flairs when I can only celebrate these occasions via Skype. I also feel these things knowing that one day, I will feel the same for my life in Seoul. There is a certain peril with this brand of adventure: the heart-seam-ripping feeling of longing for home and longing for hazard abroad, as if one can be ignored or made dormant while the other is satisfied. This longing exists, dully, just under my ribs, with semi-frequent  bouts of acute immediacy. It has taught me that Home is not where, but with whom (which seems to make things infinitely more difficult), and it spurs a selfish desire to transplant everyone I love to wherever I happen to be.

I've been reminded over and over again of my luck, that I get to share all of this with someone I love in ways I never knew possible. He has taught me more about living - and about myself - than I'm sure he ever intended. I couldn't ask for a better partner (or a better travel buddy, to boot). I wouldn't be where I am without him, physically and otherwise, and I'm excited for our next year together, and the year after, and the years after that.

I've felt unsure more times than I thought tolerable. There were stretches when depression stole the throne, as it does from time to time. I've known discomfort as a constant shadow, and I've let fear drive discovery.

I've been happy.

Altogether, 2013 delivered more than I could have imagined; I'm sure this year has much more in store. I'll look forward to good things - expected and unexpected - and try not to blink.

Better

Happy New Year! What did you fail to achieve last year?

That's my sour interpretation of the inevitable inquiry about my New Year's resolutions. While that may sound a bit cranky, it's just the way I've been conditioned to think. It's an implication that we must be failing at something or at least be needing improvement in some way; otherwise, why would we annually renew our vows to change? So every New Year, we're always trying to be Better. But what's Better, exactly? It's usually just a stab in the dark on a sliding scale, but I suppose as long as we're all trying, as long as we're all aware of the choices we make, well - that's Better right there. (See? I'm not always such a cynic.) But since I opened the door... here's a small obligatory sampling of my resolutions for the next 12 months.

Make more eye contact.

Really, this is just a symptom of the underlying illness: low self-esteem. My insecurities keep me navel-gazing or admiring the floor under false pretenses. You often need to get to the root of a problem to solve it, but I've found in many instances dealing with my awkward self that sometimes, treating the symptoms first as a reverse-approach does tricky wonders. Forcing a smile on a shit day feels disingenuous at first, but after a while, that grimace begets a real grin (I guess there's some truth to the oft-irritating, annoyingly-optimistic saying 'fake it till you make it'). I hate that my lack of eye contact probably makes friends feel dismissed and strangers uncomfortable or suspicious, so no more of the ol' shifty eyes. I'm going to hold the gazes of those I hold dear, and I'll raise my peepers to match the practiced confidence of my firm handshake. And who knows? Maybe my secret brown freckle in my eye won't be so secret anymore, and more importantly, maybe I'll learn there's less judgment staring back than I fear. So here's looking at you, kid - literally.

Floss more.

I'm sorry. I know it's terrible, and I'm ashamed. It's not like I don't floss EVER; I do it in fits and starts because I'm supposedly an adult and I know better. But in the end, I always slack because the act of flossing just freaks me out. The feeling of string sawing up into my gums sends the same shiver through my body as touching my eyeball once did. But I got over touching my eyeball out of the desire to wear contacts (or rather, the stronger desire to not wear glasses), so I know I can get over the flossy feeling, too. But seriously, eyeball-touching is still gross so please don't touch yours in front of me or you'll make me shudder like a freshly-slammed door. The feeling of clean teeth squeaking under my tongue is much better than the feeling I get when I watch pinkish-brown swirl into the drain (and I won't even get into the health problems I'm tempting), so regular, twice-daily flossing it is.

Stop trying to be perfect every day, 100% of the time forever.

Who am I kidding? Turns out the world won't end if I hork down that piece of chocolate I shouldn't have or skip a run in favor of a read - I'll leave doomsday to the Maya, Harold Camping, and Elvis Perkins. But seriously, life is messy and I realize I should stop trying to clean it up or slap a shiny Ikea veneer over the rough spots; that's not my job, and it's not a winning battle. We all can't be the best writer, artist, lion-tamer, etc. But we all just have to do our best, and that's enough. It's not settling; it's accepting. And although this won't be easy, it'll be worth the patience I'll test. Part of this means I'm going to stop trying so hard - it's exhausting. My standards for myself are impossibly high and my ambitions too lofty, so I need to start assigning the same understanding and forgiveness to my own mistakes that I do to my loved ones'. Being me should be plenty, and if not, oh well. So if I disagree with you, I'll say something instead of mumbling something neutral in fear of losing favor - hopefully you'll still like me anyway. If I don't accomplish everything I wanted to in a day, so be it; tomorrow will have a to do. If I love someone or something, I'm going to sing praises loudly and often. If I kicked ass at something, to hell with modesty in fear of offending: I'm going to let myself be proud of myself - and if I just sort of nudged ass with my toe, I'll still high-five myself for taking aim and wearing the proper footwear.



Sure, there are the other things, the same old stale promises of getting back into my skinny jeans and running/writing/laughing more and dusting of my guitar and tackling all the books on the bookshelf. These will get their turns in due time. But those are more selfish than what I'm after, at least in the first few months of 2012. Well, the flossing might be selfish except in the case of smooches, but the other two will help me be less selfish in the long run. They'll ultimately lead to worrying less about me and other trivialities and more worth-while worrying about what matters: my relationships, feeling good, and the little world around little me.

On the other hand, maybe I should quit while I'm ahead: on my suddenly-more-populated run on January 1st, I spotted a corgi at 12:20pm (Come on. A corgi at 12:20 the first day of 2012! What a sign!). So maybe I should just resolve to get a corgi. What could be Better than that?