When your brain hasn't caught up to rapid-fire mega changes that you make to your life, it's interesting to note the signs that your body gets it more than your head does. Being the newbie somewhere is always an adventure, and this transition does not come without its own huge highs, reality-distorting fears, stress-inducing holes where my LA friends were standing next to me just a sec ago it seems, and an amount of hope that I physically experience that takes over all the previous sentiments several times a day. All are from God in some healthy form. The last one is my favorite.
Strange things happening to me as I run to catch up with the concept that I live in a new place:
- My appetite changes. I will suddenly become very hungry, and simultaneously experience an active stubbornness to not eat. It makes me sick to my stomach to try to swallow food at those times.
- I have gotten sick with stomach issues, no matter what food I eat or not, every day for about 3 weeks (since finals began to wrap up).
- I have a strange but compelling desire to take a warm bath every time I pass a bathtub, even if I just got out of it.
- I have trouble sleeping some nights. Had a nightmare on the night before last where Mom and Nelli D were with me. Mom was driving across an overpass kind of road when there was suddenly a huge earthquake. She remained fairly calm, but then an airplane crashed right beside us and it became an increasingly stressful dream from there.
BUT there's something funny about all that stuff, as grim as it can seem. Because it's just my body being weirded out. It's just my head spinning a bit from fast and big changes. It'll pass.
FUN things happening as a newbie in a new place:
-There have already been numerous times that I have been in a foul humor (not usual for me, as friends reading this would know). I have been feeling particularly weak, exhausted, confused, and/or frustrated. Generally unable to handle this transition. And then something will happen that is utterly out of my control, something circumstantial, that literally makes me laugh or smile or derive hope when I was in a mood not heading me in the hopeful direction.
For instance, and this is one of several instances of a similar nature: Last night I went jogging in my parents' neighborhood. Toward the end of the jog, as I was getting stressed out due to random thoughts running through my head, several deer appeared. A couple just watched me. Three or four begun running alongside me (I think they meant to run from me but weren't anticipating well which way I was going.) Then they'd sort of stop and watch me, and I them, and then they'd run with me a little again. They were so close. And so quiet. It was late at night and it was just me and the deer on the road. Incredible. Thanks be to God.
DIFFERENCES:
-Usually, I would say that noticing significant cultural differences would take a while. But just a little more than a week in, it is already undeniably obvious that the culture in Austin is outrageously more friendly to strangers than LA. It's funny that this used to involve no-brainer behaviors for me, that I am now observing as something I am no longer used to. HOWEVER, I am sooo happy to re-adjust, as this has been one of the toughest things about LA to me. No hellos? No hugs? No chatting with strangers? That was 3 years of no fun in that regard.
-On the other hand, almost everyone I have talked to has already seemed to make a bigger deal out of gender differences through the assumptions that appear to underlie some of their statements. This might involve assumptions that any Bible study would split up by gender, or that guys and gals should not live together, or that when someone says "They had difficulty with that because they are a male or female," that I should understand why that is and what they mean. Like there's a universal understanding of gender tendencies and roles there. But I haven't lived in a place that does that sort of thing in a while. And I did like the LA version of that.
So it appears that on superficial cultural differences, LA and Austin and tied for now. Ha.
And one more thing, Stacey and I made Regina Spektor's new album, FAR, our newbie soundtrack when she was still here with me. So many great artists seem to have JUST released albums, which I cannot afford to keep up with all at once, so Regina of course takes front seat for the time being! I have been enjoying listening to it almost non-stop. No surprise there that I love her stuff. There are some difference between this album and the last one that are interesting, but it's not necessarily bad, and so much of her personality comes through in it. My favorites so far are very typical of my own taste: Machine, Calculation, Dance Anthem of the 80's. Eet and Two Birds are probably future favs. I also really like Laughing With - the content is so biting and ironic, yet reassuring and distinctive not in that it provokes thought, but for the
types of thought (and conversation) it can provoke.
Alright, I'm out. I'd love to write more prontito about some of the fun newbie interactions I am having (with people instead of deer. but the deer were just so amazing)! Road trip stories with Stacey are probably also in order. For now, suffice to say, she's such a precious friend whose prayers for me have already begun to be answered in miarculous ways before my eyes.
Bye bye.
