The blank page

“We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year’s Day.” ~Edith Lovejoy Pierce

Some of you may remember this quote from the photos of my high-five-worthy New Year’s trip to Montreal. Some of you may be asking yourself, “Who the f#$k is Edith Lovejoy Pierce?” I did too—but regardless, I think she’s got a good point and here's why:

On my 24th birthday I threw a party—the “Turning 24 on June 24th, 24 hours-a-day” Party. Just once in my lifetime could I throw such a badly named party celebrating the numerology of my birth. What can I say? I'm sorta in love with myself.

Anywho, it was divine—there was bubbly, party crashers, roof-top guitar playing, reunions with out-of-town friends, cock teases, drunken meltdowns, the flash of cameras, ex-boyfriends, potential boyfriends, thundering music, strangers making out, people watching strangers making out, and a lot of laughter (at the strangers making out and otherwise).

June 24, 2005—the beginning of summer. I joined the ranks of the unemployed. I was very recently single. I turned 24. I was the blank page. I celebrated.

Around the time of my 24th birthday, I wrote a song with my brother entitled “8th Street Room” and the chorus repeats one lyric like a mantra: “I’ll learn to fly as I fall”. I committed to that belief and that hope--I knew it could no longer be a prayer, it had to be a conviction.

So with abundant, young, and a bit naive faith--I began to fill that blank page and here are some of the things I inscribed (cue: montage!): Nectar, NYU, Kumon Publishing, Tokyo, Barcelona, goodbye Williamsburg, hello Upper West Side, London, recording “Jump the Fence”, sky diving for my 25th birthday and the "If We Don't Die, We Should Party" Party, running the Central Park loop (thanks Jeff), camping (Saratoga!), Lake Shack, goodbye Upper West Side, hello Rockland?, surprise scholarship, Tokyo (again!), Montreal…

In the past year and a half, I've urgently filled that blank page with these hungry scribblings. And now it's time to turn to the next page--not to leave the past behind, as I had done before, but because I want to continue the story. Because I still have so much to write.

This chapter begins in Cape Town, South Africa. As most of you know, I’ll be studying for the next few months at the University of Cape Town in their Diversity Studies program, as well as volunteering with SHAWCO (http://www.uctrag.co.za/shawco.htm). SHAWCO (Students' Health and Welfare Centres Organization) is an organization that offers services to some of the communities in South Africa that continue to be affected by the legacy of apartheid. After my semester, I hope to do some travelling around the lower half of the continent but all of this is yet to be written-- and that's the best part.

It is all yet to be written and it's for me to write it. I swear, Edith Lovejoy Whatsherface and I are like sisters from another papa.

So until we meet again (and I know that we will) I hope you will check in at my blog from time to time and leave me messages, comments, questions, ideas for paper-mache projects, etcetera. I promise to make the blog as high-five-worthy as possible.

Totsien (Afrikaans for "See you later"!) and bisoux! nathalie