final re-post

and there is all of the old stuff, just a few fleeting moments from a year and a half of highly emotional blogging. already i wish i'd saved more from the ashes, but the catharsis is worth ten million words.

here is the original introduction i wrote to celebrate the beginning of blogdom. i place it here, with no edits, in hopes of always moving forward from these self-reflections.

a special thanks to:

meg brearley--for living with me in that treehouse, cooking stir-fry and introducing me to quinoa, making living room yoga a staple in my life, encouraging me to write down my ramblings, and sitting on the tiny balcony with me, listening when i needed it the most. cheers, lovely!

[There is no graceful way to introduce myself.

I come here from Louisiana; not from the mossy, mysterious southern end but from the northeast edge. I sound like I'm from East Texas. I grew up on top of a very flat landscape, spotted with pine trees and disappearing cotton fields. There you'll find perhaps the world's best fried chicken and strawberry ice-box pies.

My mother started me on coffee when I was three; now I'm permanently jittery. When the strip malls started to outnumber the open spaces in Shreveport (coinciding directly with my adolescent years) and I lost my mother, I knew I wanted to leave. I have an undergraduate degree in history from Louisiana Tech University--where I met some of the most dedicated professors that I imagine exist. And now here I am, trying desperately each day to stuff enough knowledge in my head to feel adequate and go to sleep at night (usually around 2am).

I miss my father and my sister, Joan, who is absolutely my soul. I live in the converted attic of a house with a wonderful roommate who does improv yoga in the middle of our living room, wears oversized sweaters even though she is tiny and lovely, and always eats ice cream with me when I need it. We've adopted a pet acorn in anticipation of the autumn weather. I work every day in the basement of a building that is always buzzing with nervous academics. I'll leave you guessing as to how many pounds of ground coffee I make it through in a month.