Future Feminism

"We have created our society in man's image. But now the ecology is collapsing. We have abused the bodies of women and the body of the earth in the same ways. We are reaching the end of His story. Our old methods of survival as a species are becoming the cause of our downfall.

Men must find the humility to retreat. Women must step forward and start to forge a new way forward for our species and for all of nature. If there is to be a future on earth that includes us, it will be feminine."

Don't resist it just because it's subversive. Do think for a moment about how much we need characteristics like cooperation and emotional expressiveness that are most often associated with femininity and most valued in women. And remember that true insight can come from fashion blogs...

What happened in 2012

I started the year at a party in Chelsea with my friend Isaline, who I met in Peru in 2009.

I visited Patagonia, AZ with Milad just before the start of the spring semester.

I was chosen as the manager of my Master's program workshop group, which incidentally, was working on a project in Patagonia, Chile.

I stressed out majorly about all the stressful and challenging things that came along with managing this project, but I learned so many things and never for a second wished I didn't have this responsibility.

Xandi, Alice, and Alison came to visit me in NYC. There was a particularly emotional moment before Alice left because it was the end of spring break and I was so overwhelmed at all the work left to do, and I didn't want her to leave!

My team completed our workshop project and briefings with incredible success, without missing major deadlines or majorly screwing up in any way.

I completed all my classes. I spent a crazy last few days of the spring semester working for 14 hours straight in the library...actually, that only seems crazy now. I regularly spent my days like this during the program. No job that ends at 6pm can ever be as hard as this program was.

My whole family and Milad came to NYC in May for my graduation.

I moved home on the last day of May, and went straight to LA where Milad was working for the summer. I spent most of the summer there, coming home to take state employment tests and go to interviews.

The job that I started working to get in March finally interviewed me in July, made an offer, and then it was two months of agonizing delays and uncertainties. This purgatory was the original reason I quit posting here...I couldn't stand to dwell upon the situation and I kept hoping I would have good news. Until suddenly one day I was hired. I got that glorious email while I was at the Biosphere in AZ, where my Master's program was founded. (My program was 12 months long because they stayed at the Biosphere the whole time that first year.)

I went to the Grand Canyon all by myself.

I came home from AZ on a Saturday and started work Monday, September 17.

I got the exact job that I always wanted, that I was perfectly prepared for, where I do things that I want to do and care about. I still can't believe it.

I have started running. Get some motivation over Thanksgiving weekend, add in cute running equipment and before the year's end apparently you'll complete a 3.7 miler in 45 minutes.

My mom's cancer came back.

Milad and I took a weekend trip to Seattle for my birthday.

I moved into my first apartment alone. It has been two weeks and I have moved in completely. It is 6 blocks from my work. I am very happy to be at that stage where the things on my want list are cloth napkin sets and picture frames.

I am getting to spend a week with Milad, including New Years. I wonder what 2013 will bring.

There's only one thing on this list that does not make me happy to think of. There's no way to know what the future holds; give thanks for the items on your list that are blessings, and accept that there will always be a few curses. Though the curses can dim the entire rest of your life, remember: That which you focus on, expands.

IF you are at work

Then you are allowed to not watch this video right now. Otherwise, no excuse.

Interesting how all these people are AT SXSW, witnessing exuberant live music, and are nearly motionless electronic-recording-device zombies....they are grooving out so much less than I would have been, had I been there, indeed much less than I actually am while listening to this song. Although I guess it's thanks to the zombies that I can groove out to it at all.

The joyful job search

I've been thinking about this job search of mine - and although it's really only been 5 weeks since I graduated, and three weeks of full-time job searching, I feel very positive about it. I am going to try to keep this feeling as long as possible-- as long as it takes. (I started writing this post a week and a half ago, and feel it bottled up inside me!)

Yeah, I'm unemployed with lots of debt. But actually, this job search is the luckiest situation I've ever gotten myself into. I have literally been working to get to this point since I was in high school and decided I wanted to do something about climate change for my career. And now I'm actually allowed and permitted and qualified to go searching for that one place that is just right for me. I believe I can find a job making our biggest problems less bad, and there are many job postings, not stars, in my eyes. Being able to go after what you want is a blessing.

How can a job search be joyful?

• Reiterating my qualifications in endless permutations is actually a positive experience. In the process I become extremely convinced of my suitability for the particular position. It feels good. The job search is joyful because the marketer in me comes out and has fun selling the product.
  
• This positivity is ego-boosting because upon reflection I think that my situation is a result of choices and resolutions that I made. I am well-qualified for the jobs I actually want; I have a well-rounded skill set, and this is thanks to my own decisions. I passed the exam for a technical position (that I now have an interview for)-- because the only Master's program I considered taking was the one that was half science. I knew it would be necessary. I was thinking ahead. The job search is joyful because it is intrinsically validating.
  
• I am constantly thinking about the opportunities that other people gave to me. My dad had worked with someone at New America, so I got an interview. My mentors and colleagues at New America handed me golden opportunity after golden opportunity-- to write, research, give presentations, manage projects...The list stretches all the way back, and I could never thank everyone who helped me (and they are still going to bat for me) enough. So the job search is joyful because it makes me feel gratitude.

The most joyful part about this search will of course be the end of it. Because:

1. I'm not always able to stay so positive-- uncertainty and financial insecurity is fuel for fears at those moments when I'm alone in my car, burning CO2, or awake at night, or checking my balances, and 
2. The selection of temptations at Urban Outfitters is truly heartbreaking in the summertime.

Lo mejor está por venir.

So now

Now I am in LA. I've been here since the 31st, when I left Manhattan and arrived at LAX with my precisely 100 pounds of checked luggage (and at least another 75 pounds in my sneaky 3 carry-ons).

What have I been doing so far? Applying for jobs (1 so far this week, another slated for tomorrow), jumping and straining around in the boyfriend's studio apartment with the boyfriend to the accompaniment of P90X workout tapes (today will be day 6), taking lots (well, some) of pictures of the studio and neighborhood (and playing with Instagram, obviously). I read an excellent book about love, set in New York, that I found in a free books pile at 3am. Networking is big on the list, and I'm making good progress. But it's hard to not feel aimless when you're a recent grad without a job.

While I was in New York, I often felt like all I really wanted was to be able to live in the same place as the boyfriend, live together, have a job and normal lives with each other in them every day. I still want that, and obviously staying at home in this studio alone all day doesn't really qualify as having a normal life-- what's missing is the job for me. The fulfillment of working for a cause. But since I've come back I've been very aware of just how HUMAN it is to always feel as though something else, and it is always something, and it doesn't matter what it is, is that missing puzzle piece. This doesn't mean I'm not happy now. It just means that I think it's a little sad that we always feel something is missing. When do we ever feel happy with our lives exactly the way they are? I feel like as soon as the boyfriend and I are living in the same place, AND we both have jobs, AND we're healthy and can pay our bills, and so can the people we care about, AND we can get a puppy, AND I can travel again...then I'll be happy with my life exactly the way it is. ...until then, what? (And when that does happen, will something else become the puzzle piece? Probably.) And why shouldn't I be completely happy with a short vacation here with him?...

Always feeling "only if..." is no way to live.

So now I am going to vacuum, and work on my resume, and finish laundry, and get myself through the 'hood to the grocery store. The pizza plan for tonight is out due to oven-non-working-ness, so we need another option. I'm thinking fish tacos.

That moment you've been waiting for

Or series of moments.

That's what the Dean of SIPA said when the speeches were over and the hundreds of graduates were next up to walk across the stage. This was last Thursday, more than a week ago already. I have been thinking of all kinds of things that I should write about graduating.

Walking across the stage was exciting. I guess it's not surprising- the rest of the whole graduation thing is pretty much taken in stride except that solitary stride-handshake-and-pose. The various speakers did say things that resonated with me and that I remember still: that we didn't attend this school because we want to get rich and famous. That we are trained problem solvers, policy analysts, and managers... if I look back at the reason I attended the program, I know that was the goal. 

I've been comparing this program to how I've heard childbirth is-- it's painful, but as soon as it's over you just think about what the result was, and the bad parts fade. It's worth it. But I don't think I'll have another baby.

After graduation, we went for a picnic in Central Park:

The last two weeks have been filled with fun and family and friends. And New York. I've been to museums and memorials:

9/11 memorial

WTC 1

South Street Seaport

The Cloisters

 and plays:

4000 Miles. (I also saw War Horse tonight by myself)

 and sat in the park...watched Netflix...and eaten oh so much food. 

What's next for me? I go to LA next Thursday when my lease here in NYC is up. The boyfriend has an internship there for the summer, so I'll be applying for jobs there...From New York to New Work. It's probably going to be a weird and challenging transition. I need to create more wildest dreams.

Climate change research at the Earth Institute...and me!

Jeff Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute, giving an introduction to the Research Showcase:

If you want to skip to my section, it starts at 8:38.

Dream=Reality