one by one

people in brooklyn have been walking single file the last few days. snow is piled high, streets still aren't plowed, and going to work feels like playing dig dug as people weave through the little paths that shop and home owners have made. it's orderly, polite, and really fun.

everyone has stories of how many hours it took them to get home from work the night of the storm. we one up each other with how many stuck buses we've seen. and if you live anywhere near coney island, it takes travel ingenuity usually seen only in amazonian peoples to figure out how to get, well, anywhere.

amidst all of this, i'm packing to go home! wrapping presents, doing last minute (past minute) shopping. in less than 24 hours i'll be braving the thruway with my upstairs housemate. i can't wait.

while i'm at home resting, the blog will be resting, too. i've got big plans for the new year though, so check back in shortly after. i'm working on the second "ending the shoulds" video, which has resulted in a lot of extra footage that i know you'll enjoy as well. also in store, more hip hop (oh boy), and bi-lingual author videos (oh no).

thank you everyone for all the support in helping me kick off this blog. 2011 is going to be phenomenal. i can't wait to experience it with all of you!

mucho besos until then.

holiday revisited

i stayed in brooklyn for christmas this year.

i missed my family. period. everytime i heard a christmas carol, i felt that buffalo tug. but also? wow! what a fun few days that was. below is my pictoral review.

EVE OF CHRISTMAS EVE

usually i spend it hanging out with my dad and sisters, which leads to a big sleep over and presents in the morning. totally fun. this year i spent it...christmas shopping! which i actually enjoyed. the trick for me (see previous complainy blog on the subject) is to stay away from big box stores and not to start too early. with this in mind i spent a good productive hour at the Fort Green indoor fleamarket/craft fair. i also had luck at a few smaller shops in my neighborhood, where i bought this for my dad:

which could be, no is, the most useless present ever. but i kept laughing in the store while i flipped through it, mainly because of pictures like this:

and this:

who doesn't love a good penis cake joke? over all, i bought some pretty special gifts. which is maybe what people find so appealing about this whole gift giving thing. oh! i also finished up my star present.

my friend Carla saw it and said, "cool, you could hang that in the bathroom." i said, "um or somewhere else."


CHRISTMAS EVE

red-haired sis and i brunched at a place where they served a tiny, curly hair with the silverware. then we saw the new harry potter. afterwards i ran around the city for a few more gifts. i bought this for my brother-in-law:

because who doesn't want a tiny bowl for pickles? maybe i was still thinking about that funny cake book. either way, it wins second prize for most useless present this year.

in the evening, my friend Carla (above mentioned) and I took the subway to Dyker Heights, which this time of year is affectionately renamed Dyker Lights. here's why:

that's Carla!

that's the largest, creepiest santa in the world.

ditto nutcracker men.

ditto that guy.

a few home owners cheated. they actually paid people to come and decorate their houses. but i guess it draws the attention they wanted since a tour bus pulled up while we were there.


CHRISTMAS

i thought it'd be sad opening presents alone, but i made coffee, went at my own pace, and didn't have to make over-exaggerated happy faces everytime i opened something. also, i called my mom so we could open everything "together." best part? no over-exaggerated happy faces were even needed. i loved everything. especially the ipod touch she got me (yes!) which lets me do video and photos, not to mention twitter and all the other things it's recommended that the newbie author does, but i don't because they're annoying and i own the commodore computer of cell phones.

also, she got me this:

a shower curtain map! which a friend at work has and who on repeated occassions has made me jealous with his knowledge of african countries. boo-yah, kev. now i can name mauritania too.

later in the day, after five more phone calls to mom, i went to a friend's house for dinner. i made an apple, cranberry crumble pie, sweetpotato pie and fresh whipped cream. there was a ton of food, everyone was merry, and i met two people who work for/at Martha Stewart. they said it's mandatory when not in NYC for someone to smell the drivers they hire to take Martha places, due to her heightened olfactory senses and all. the poor dear.

whilst at the party i made the mistake of consuming eight different kinds of red wine. which meant i woke up at 4:30 in the morning. which i expected to happen. it also meant from 5 until 10:30 in the morning i was looking at this:

which i so not expected to happen. and vowed to do never again...until next time.

now brooklyn's buried under 3 feet of snow, i'm feeling a little less queasy, and over all, i have to say, that was a pretty awesome christmas. the best part? i get to go home and see my family for new years.

hope you all had a great holiday too...minus the yakking.

christmas cheer(ing up)

yesterday i helped in the grandest and sweetest scheme of cheering up i've ever witnessed.

no details, but suffice to say, a good friend's sister was in one of those rough patches. since words of comfort weren't having much of an effect, he thought he'd take things a little further and give her a tangible, mood brightening aid.

this is where me and the hip hop routine comes in.

he only took about a half hour to learn the dance (which makes me wonder what my problem is in class). i wish my teacher, Nicole, could have been there to see me explain her choreography. gone were all counts of 1 and 2. instead, my friend received instruction like: "swhoop to the side, open open" or "then it goes like this: uh uh uh. uh. uh. bright lights!"

regardless, after twenty minutes of practice, he had it.

i think my friend is onto something. on a bad day, nothing helps me more than being reminded that life isn't so damn serious. or at least, that it's only as serious as we make it. and if that's the case, why not intentionally insert a little more absurd fun into our day? i left his house in a fantastic mood and i didn't even need cheering up.

so below is a little absurd fun for your day. i haven't opened any presents yet, so this might be premature, but i'm going to go ahead and give jared the award for most thoughtful gift this season.

everytime i watch this video i laugh, and i can't help thinking, thank goodness for family.

fear and loathing, but mostly loathing, part 2

oh dear. it was as terrible as i thought it would be. my microphone crackled, i sang ahead of the words, and i ended the song abruptly, with a "haven't i suffered enough?" look to the mc who sympathetically shut off the music.

but now, having sang karaoke for the first time i can officially say: i don't get it!

why are all the songs people choose from some musty awful vault? if they came on your car radio you'd switch stations. ace of base? seriously? yet everyone ooooohed "that's a great karaoke pick."

it's like going to a family party and hearing the same childhood stories again and again. isn't it time we collectively moved past love shack? yes, i know it's a good song, but come on.

i get it that part of the fun of karaoke is everyone knowing the words and singing along. but it might also be fun not feeling stuck in a time warp. the best part of the night was the mc singing alejandro by lady gaga. a song from, gasp, last year!

i hear you. you're saying, as a culture our musical tastes are too varied nowadays. popular to one person will be unknown, and probably unliked, by another. so we must fall back on songs from the eighties. plus they're great to sing. plus, get over yourself, corrie. it's karaoke. you aren't supposed to think about it this much. it's supposed to be fun. plus plus plus, you picked a song from the nineties, so get off your high horse.

fine. so i'm a karaoke hater and a hypocrite and i didn't conquer my fear at all because without a doubt, i'll be 100 percent as mortified and nervous next time. if there is a next time.

i might be working that night.

apologies if this video is awful. i couldn't bear watching it more than a few times for a proper edit.

fear and loathing, but mostly fear

fear. i'm not plagued by it. anxiety, sure. but fear? i was lucky enough to realize early on that most of what prevents us from doing things isn't so terrible.

i might look foolish. and?

i might fail. is that all? who hasn't?

i've never done this before. well that won't be true for much longer.

i've never been there, i won't know where to go. get a map. or get used to the idea that you will always be slightly lost and discombobulated when you leave your house. i have.

i'm no adrenaline junky, but i do love the rush that comes from trying new things and being a little daring. in most cases, i'm almost too foolhardy. throwing myself out there and only thinking later, what did i just do?

having said all that, there is one exception. i am terrified of something. and it comes in one, slightly hard to spell first thing in the morning, word: karaoke.

karaoke. if i were dared to stand naked in front of 100 people or sing karoki in front of them.... i'd choose the karaoki naturally. but man, i wouldn't be happy about it.

what is it about karaoke that so terrifies me? i don't mind talking in front of large groups. and i love to sing, even in front of others. at work i'm known to "sing up on people" (my quotation marks and dumb phrase stuck between) inserting peoples names into well known songs, or mostly just cecilia, by simon and garfunkel.

jaaaa-red.... you're printing that check...you're taking that check to the taaaa-ble. oh-ho jaaa-red. you get the idea.

but who cares? i can have one fear right? it's not like karaoking is mandatory in life. except that i'm invited to a karaoke birthday party tonight. i haven't replied in the affirmative, even though i'm 85 percent certain i'm going. i haven't replied in the affirmative even though i've missed this friend's past three karaoke birthday parties because i've been working. i haven't replied even though a few months back i even said, "hey! if your party was on a friday this year, i could come."

i am a dumb, dumb girl.

if i could go back and do things differently, there's one thing i'd change about how i lived my life.

in high school, i'd have spoken aloud in spanish class and i'd have gone on the costa rican trip. all that knowledge, set up in easy 45 minute a day lesson plans, and i was too shy to speak out loud thus ingraining the language because i liked the boy i sat next to and didn't want to sound like a moron. today, i have no idea what that boy's doing, and i regularly sound like a moron when i speak spanish. so what difference did that make?

i highly doubt that after tonight, i will look back and wish i had been singing karaoke all these years. (now is when i'll start taking song suggestions from you, my blog friends). i'm sure once i get up there, i'll even realize it's no big deal. i also highly doubt i'll become a karaokier. this will be a one time thing for me.

that is, if i go. 15 percent of me is still looking for a cop out. hey, it's my last big fear. i wouldn't mind hanging onto it for a while.

overstimulated, non-writing wednesday

had a magical New York day yesterday. fun from beginning to end. but now feeling far too over-stimulated to settle down and write. so off to the library i go. happy mid-week!

a campaign to end the shoulds...................... featuring Christine Howard Sandoval

living a life that's dedicated to a creative pursuit is often not one you outright choose. you fall into it and the next thing you know you've spent 10, 15, 20 years at it and you're defined by it.

after college, i took jobs that were fun and as stress free as possible. that paid the bills and left me with lots of mental and physical time to write. every time a serious job came up, i wasn't interested in it because it cut into my writing time. that seemed fine in my early twenties, but now, some days, it takes a bit of self-talking to convince me that this choice is still okay.

i’m not sure what the issue is. after all, i don’t want for anything, i have disposable income, and fantastic family and friends. but you know what? i do know what the issue is.

it’s the damn shoulds.

i’ll blame it on tv and movies and our entire culture, but regardless of where the imagery comes from, growing up i firmly believed that the adult life should look like this: boyfriend turns into husband, turns into family with kids, house, car, 401K.

now here i am. an adult. with none of those things. (i do have a Roth IRA, thank you very much). the weird of it is, though I would like all that eventually, i have no strong desire for any of it right now. i actually kinda like my life. still it requires constant work to convince myself that i’m okay because i’m not where i should be at.

living in Brooklyn helps. intentional or not, no one here is living according to the shoulds. i wish i'd known in high school or before how many perfectly acceptable ways there are to lead a non-should aligned life. maybe i would have had more adventures, taken a few more risks. at the very least, i might not have been so stressed about my future all the damn time.

so you know what? it’s time to change the shoulds.

what follows is the first in a series of mini documentaries i’m making about people living beyond the should. if a teenager ever does find his/her way to this blog, i hope it takes some of the pressure off. i hope it inspires them to pursue a career/lifestyle that is beyond their wildest dreams. because even if it doesn’t work out exactly as planned, even though it can be pretty freakin’ scary, and your life won't match up to any image that you'll find in a commercial, magazine or movie, you will make enough money to get by, you will meet interesting people, and best of all you will feel fulfilled, liberated, and pretty damn proud of yourself for trying. guaranteed.

we only get one little life. and that's what it should be, no, that's what life is about.

present-ing

i've been thinking about presents a lot in the past few weeks. on sunday i felt sick at work. at the end of the night, a friend, seeing i'd packed up some leftover mashed potatoes to take home, gave me a little leftover gravy to go with it.


"i noticed you weren't having the best night. i thought this might help."


and you know what? the pure out of nowhere sweetness of the gesture made me feel worlds better. right at that moment i felt like it was the best gift i'd ever been given. gravy.


in the last month i've caught the flu bug and the cold bug, but i still have yet to catch the christmas bug.

i’m tempted to say i don’t like Christmas. in fact, i have said this, many, many times already this month. a(male) friend gasped with horror at that very utterance. but it’s true, i'm not religious and i don't like buying or receiving gifts. but as i began writing this post, i realized i kinda do like Christmas.

i like the lights and decorations, the tv specials, the smell of pine, the advent calendars (though i don’t have one this year), the get together with family (though i’m staying in NYC this year). i even like the Christmas carols.

so it’s not that my shoes are two sizes two small. it’s just that i hate the whole gift thing. like, really, really hate it. for an incredibly indecisive person like myself even grocery shopping can be painful. which makes shopping for others pure agony.

if only i could buy presents with the assurance of my red haired sis.

“i got you something you’ll love!” she announced a few days ago, to which I responded, “super. i’m not buying gifts this year.”

if only i could receive gifts as sweetly as my little sis, who takes joy in the transaction start to finish. first she slowly, slowly unwraps it, then her whole face lights up. give her a stick of gum and she'd thank you with genuine gratitude, saying it was exactly the flavor she'd wanted. 

that just ain't me. the worst thing someone can do is give me a gift receipt. it’s like why i hate scrabble. the sole idea of a better option out there prevents me from embracing what's in front of me. one year my mom bought me a pretty bracelet from a free-trade gift shop. I returned it for this:

it's not that i'm picky. a friend sent me this recently and i love it!

i'm starting to think people should reverse psychology shop for me. if my mom had bought me that bird thing (seriously, what is that?) i probably would have returned it for the pretty bracelet.

most years i end up making gifts. one year I made my mom dolls of everyone in our family. another year I made quilts. this year, to pass the cold months, i’ve been sewing stars from fabric scraps. the original idea was to string them garland-style from the ceiling in my bedroom. 

i told my mom about it and she said, “there. have that be my christmas present. all i want is one of the stars you've made.”

but how exactly do you turn this into a gift?

or this

it's like the universe farted and out came my stars.

these are small problems to have. i'm lucky that i can complain about giving and receiving gifts. it's like the times at work we complain about staff meal, then hear ourselves, realize we're sitting with giant plates of perfectly acceptable food in front of us, food that other people would be thrilled to have, and feel crummy for our lack of gratitude.

but i've been thinking about presents a lot lately, wondering how i can make the giving and receiving process as meaningful as gravy. so far, i haven' t come up with anything.

sick

en espanol:

sick = enferma
(with an 'a' ending for me because i'm a girl).

that's what i am today. enferm. wishing i were in an enfermary.

ugh.

write back 'atcha

every YA writer seems to have a blog. which is funny considering we spend most of our time shut up in studies, basements, libraries, or (days you're really feeling like a socially unfit golem if you don't see sunlight and change out of your sweatpants right now) coffee shops. who knew we had so much to daily say?

we blog so that teens can find us, yet half of the comments on these blogs are clearly from other writers. if they’re anything like me, their blog was probably this year’s biggest blessing in disguise. yes, hours will still (always) be spent home alone, writing. but now there’s a place to express worries, ask questions, and write something that doesn’t need years of edits or approval of others to publish. (my agent is smacking her head as she reads this. no duh, corrie!). 

that is, however, a lot of writing about writing.

yesterday, after i stumbled upon another writer's blog, i realized i hadn't written a single informative word, well, of any kind, but especially none having to do with my craft. it’s the same reason i never dated a writer. i love to geek out and read what people have to say about writing the same way i like to write -- alone. i don't want to freakin' talk about it. 

so then what do i blog about?


hip-hop class, naturally.

why is that important? muchas cosas:

A. veterans and newcomers alike will agree on this: NYC can be a hard place to live. it's noisy, crowded, and you live with the constant, sneaking suspicion that there’s thousands of things going on that are way better than the current thing you’re actually doing.

the first hip-hop class i took killed 90 percent of my anxiety in the first hour. since then, it's erased the other 7 percent. (i've come to terms with the fact that i'll always have at least 3 percent of anxiety coursing through my veins at any given moment).

B. as a writer, your story is only as good as your minor characters and settings. life’s the same way.

last week i brought a friend to class and she looked at me like i was crazy saying hello to everyone. but this is my community. i hip to the hop not only because of the endorphin rush, but because i feel the richness of life in the two minute conversations i have with the other regular attendees. my permanent friendships have made NYC livable, but it’s these smaller ones that make me feel like i not only can survive here, but like i belong here.

C. one of my favorite things about being an adult is that i'm no longer afraid of being bad at things. i can’t do the snake for the life of me. as you see in the video, my body doesn’t move that way. also, my feet are usually doing something different than everyone else’s, and that’s okay! most of what i love doing in my life started out as something I didn’t like and found really difficult.

 

D. my teacher, Nicole Holst (in the video she's the cutie with the curly hair ), creates a new hip-hop routine every freakin' week! what’s more inspiring than that?

E. hip-hop is fun and a lil’ fun is important to put out into the world, too.

in the future, hip-hop videos will probably make their way into this blog with greater frequency than sage writing advice. lo siento, but it’s better for all of us. if you’re a writer reading this, I’ll betcha your brain needs a break. and if you’re not, then this is way more fun than reading about writing.

now let’s dance!

meep

ah friday. the end of the normal person's work week, the start of mine. i've been at my job for almost three years. just long enough for some not so regular customers to begin saying, "oh my god, you're still here?!" when they walk in.

luckily, i like where i work. the shift starts with food and ends with laughter and wine. what could be better? (a book deal). but just because the boys i work with are like brothers -- ones who give great backrubs and make me giggle til i'm redfaced -- it doesn't mean i don't feel like meeping and beeping like a robot a few times per shift.

customer: "can you say those specials again from the beginning?"
me in a muppet/robot voice: "meee-eep, bee-iwouldbe-ep mehappy to beep."

how i long to do this tableside. sadly, i never will. odd thing about waiting tables, the tip money increases the nicer and more efficient you are (go figure, no beepers need apply), but it helps to do it in my head. anyone else have any tricks that get you through the workday? i'd love to hear.

as my agent would say, onward! this weekend i'll be creating mini video clips for my novel and perhaps will be trying to create an author video. here's what i have so far. be warned. there is mild swearing and light humiliation in the clip you're about to watch.

a writing wednesday

don't get too excited (yet). this is a fake book cover that my friend Rich Franconeri made for me. isn’t it beautiful?

it's cold and rainy in brooklyn today. there's no food in my fridge and my furnace only occasionally remembers what it's wintertime purpose is.

yesterday, i discovered that the title i was going to use for the  second book in my Parted series is already being used by an author who's currently writing the second book in her dystopian series. damn. goodbye Crossed.  now i need to find another word that is capable of these triple meanings – crossed a river, crossed as double crossed, crossed as genetically crossed. Traversed and Spanned just doesn't cut it. any ideas?

i gotta get back to writing now. and by back to writing we all realize i mean stare blissfully at my fake book cover for the next ten minutes? yes? good.