sunset // easing

tonight I sat and watched the sunset—for probably the first time since moving to Kansas City. I’ve seen lots of sunsets obviously, but as far as I can remember I had yet to just sit and watch one until tonight.

which feels significant.

I watched sunsets on a regular basis when I lived in Utah— at the Y parking lot, on the mountainside in Lindon, from the window of my house, at Slate Canyon eating fresh Pillsbury biscuits, sometimes with people, sometimes by myself.

since moving here, I think I’ve been hesitant to breathe. I spent those first summer months tense, a little on the defensive, because adjusting was hard and it always felt a little bit like the world was out to get me. during the fall it was better— I eased in more and started letting myself gradually crack open. and during these last couple winter months it’s been even better. but the whole process has been one of telling myself that this is home.

watching the sunset tonight, I thought about the life I’m carving out here. how it’s a good life, but also a life that isn’t a final destination, which makes it harder to rest in. but I think teaching myself to rest in it is what I really need right now. even if Missouri is a stepping stone, learning to go deep and be present with all that is good here feels needed. sometimes even when you’re in a really good place, easing in takes a lot of time and a lot of emotions, but I’m learning to be okay with that.

this first sunset tonight was a moment of easing, and breathing. hopefully there will be many more in the future.

 

the state of the union

^^^I put up curtains in my living room last night! I’m making a mental list of “adult” things, and buying a cordless drill is now on the list. also I basically destroyed my wall getting those curtains put up, so stay tuned to find out how much my apartment complex fines me when I move out lolol.

lately I’ve been feeling like I need to share. or at least that I have things to share. and it’s not even anything concrete—nothing that can be put into a list. but I feel like I need to talk about this stage of life— the “young professional, single, far away from anything that used to be familiar” stage of life. maybe not even because anyone needs to hear it (blogs are dead anyway, or something like that, right?), but maybe just because I need to write it for myself.

so this is the current state of life:

I graduated from college in April, majoring in Communications with an Advertising emphasis. I’m now working at an advertising agency in Kansas City, which is almost completely opposite from the city I expected to end up in. I love love love my job. I really like Kansas City. but it’s all been an adjustment. it’s been an interesting past (almost) 5 months navigating a completely new professional and geographic world, figuring out life on my own, and really figuring out who I am as an adult, single human.

it’s been 5 months of figuring out how the heck I’m going to get my sofa up the stairs, going to lots of things alone, wandering pretty city neighborhoods, taking so many wrong turns (where is my Utah grid system?), almost dying about 50 times with the tiny KC freeway onramps (and left onramps??? who do you think you are???), and discovering cool walls/buildings/rooftops/parking garages/hilltops/parks/towns.

it’s been 5 months of learning SO MUCH about everything, and I’m so grateful for all the opportunities and people that have been placed around me here.

so idk what I want to write, but I just want to document life these days. probably mostly for myself. I took this link off my instagram bio so I feel a little more free to write whatever instead of wondering what someone that randomly follows me and clicks the link thinks of all of this. maybe someday I’ll try to make more of it? but for now, it’s a creative outlet/journal/random online spot.

& also, a good quote I found the other day: “imagine what you could do if you started doing something about all you imagine. that’s all.” —Cleo Wade

happy Saturday!

some things!

things giving me life lately:

– Alison Faulkner’s podcast

– THIS BOOK. I found it in a used bookstore in Lawrence, Kansas and it is so cool visually and it hits so close to how I’m feeling lately (really, how I’ve been feeling for the last year of my life).

– herbal tea. is this adulthood??? I feel like herbal tea is the La Croix of the warm beverage world. it really doesn’t have much flavor, but I’m into it??? or maybe it’s just that I feel so adult with a thermos and tea?

so if you, too, want to partake in some life goodness, try any of those three things! (do I sound like an infomercial yet?)

also, some words from the author of that book above: “belong to yourself.” I like that. so much of life these days is figuring out who I am, but even as I’m in the process along the way I want to belong to myself, and be all of myself, as much as I possibly can. I think that’s where you find contentment and resting, even in the middle of searching and change.

these days

^^^ Prospero’s bookstore the other night (a new favorite place in KC!)

things are interesting. it’s been weird not going back to school with everyone else that’s back in Utah. not as weird as I thought it was going to be, but still weird. sometimes I get major FOMO for all the cool things I hear about going on back in Provo.

it’s also weird being in a phase that, for the first time in my life, doesn’t really have a concrete end date. I don’t have an end date for living in Kansas City, I don’t have an end date for being an unmarried person, I don’t have an end date for…really anything. life feels different knowing that at this point any serious progression or movement is really up to me.

but! overwhelmingly, life is a good place to be. I really, really love it here. there are so many things for me to learn in every single section of my life, and I’m excited to see how everything plays out.

june

(written a couple weeks ago, when it was actually June)

Do you ever have a 5-second moment where you have a memory of a period of life that’s so vivid and sensory? Where you feel all that time of life was?

I keep having flashbacks to months ago, when I had no idea what life in June would feel like. Zero. I had some thoughts, and some hopes for what it would feel like, but really no idea.

I remember getting a fresh order of contacts back in the winter. I wear daily disposable contacts, so I got (I think) a 9-month supply. I also have a different prescription for each eye, so when I get a new order I like to open up all the little boxes and pair the right eye with the left so I can just grab a set when I need them. I distinctly remember sitting cross-legged on my bed at my house back in Provo, pairing my contacts together, and thinking about how some of these contacts were going to be experiencing life on my eyes in June, and how I had no idea what the life with those June contacts would be like.

And now it’s June. Almost July, actually.

I also vividly remember the morning of my interview with the agency that I’m at right now. (Lol, if any of my coworkers ever end up reading this, YES, this is a sentimental human you get to work with hahaha.) I skipped my stats class so I could take the call at my house, without anyone around, since all my roommates would be gone for the day by then.

My confident interview outfit consisted of my green Tweety bird sweatshirt and black leggings, with curled hair (RIP my all-over platinum blonde…give me 2 more weeks and you’ll be back!) and multiple rings on my fingers (because rings make me feel legit, idk why???). [blessings of a phone interview: being able to wear leggings and a sweatshirt. Also being able to talk with my hands as much as I possibly wanted to because no one could see me.]

And even back then, in February, I had no idea what June would feel like. Would June be in Kansas City? Or New York? Or LA? Or somewhere else entirely?

And then in March, Kansas City became a reality. So that’s what June would feel like.

It’s surreal now, sitting in June, almost in July, to think back on those days in the winter that were characterized by a lot of poignant emotions—uncertainty, hope, restlessness, the feeling of being on the edge of something mysterious that you know is going to define you in a way that nothing else ever has.

Being here was nowhere on my list of options 6 months ago. Nowhere on my radar at all. But I’m so grateful for the series of events and doors opening that led me here, because this place and this situation is perfect for me in a way that I would have never anticipated.

Life in June is really, really good. Also hard, and a learning process, but still really, really good.