So, in my next life...

I made the move to wordpress... although I am still trying to decide how much I like it.. but nothing beats having all your blogs in one place..

Follow me here: http://soinmynextlife.com/

More than a month...I've been busy, in between work, cleaning, conferences, friends, gardening, life, and a new member to the household, or it could have been the enormous amount of beers we have been consuming.. either way, blogging was not really that high in my priority list…

But, I'm back, and I have pictures to prove that this whole time, while I felt like selling my belongings and moving to a deserted beach, there were fun times involved...

Let's begin:

Channe's Birthday.. @ El Coyote

Sunset at CDM beach... God I am so lucky to live here
Sophie Woffy...

another lovely afternoon..

Ok, more pics to come in a bit... gotta get back to work!

1. I drink way too much. And so does everyone else I know. (well, menos lauri.)

2. Every morning I have a quad-soy latte, 2 Splendas, and a Prozac.

3. I could never live far from the beach, although I still don’t know how to swim

4. I frequently host homeless friends in my house.

5. My job involves cleaning oil, designing experiments, traveling a lot, and dealing with random Persians.

6. I believe that sometimes, people change and then forget to tell each other…

7. My dog Sophie is from Compton… I rescued her from a shelter after a car had hit her. She has THE most amazing eyes…

8. If I wake up in the middle of the night, I have to get up and brush my teeth…

9. I hate pickles, or anything pickled…

10. I believe that everything happens for a reason. People change so that you can learn to let go. Things go wrong so that you appreciate them when they go right. You believe lies so you eventually learn to trust no one but yourself, and sometimes, good things fall apart, so that better things can fall together.

11. I love, love snowboarding… I look forward to the snow season all year long.

12. I think exercise is such a dirty word, every time I say it, I wash my mouth with a Martini.

13. I mistrust establishments that don’t have Splenda

14. I don’t worry about identity theft since thieves probably have better spending habits than me.

15. I love learning languages… I’ve taken French, Hebrew and Farsi lessons, and this year: Arabic…

16. For the past 4 years, almost every Friday, I meet the girls for happy hour, at a little French place called Monsieur Marcel… there is nothing like sharing wine and stories with them.

17. I haven’t had a TV for over two years, and unless someone brings it up I don’t miss it at all… I’d rather spend my time reading.

18. I don’t use sunscreen because my lifestyle makes it far more likely my liver, lungs, or heart will deteriorate before my skin.

19. I make the best organic no sugar pumpkin pie.

20. I love taking pictures. The best thing about them is that they never change, even if the people in them do.

21. I can’t settle down because I am interested in too many things.

22. I have come to realize that there comes a time in life where you have to let go of all the pointless drama and all the people that create it. You have to surround yourself with people that make you laugh so hard that you forget the bad and begin cherishing the good.

23. I’m outdoorsy in that I like getting drunk in patios.

24. I am more concerned with my character than my reputation, because my character is what I really am, my reputation is merely what everyone else thinks I am.

25. And maybe, you don’t go to hell for the things you do. Maybe you go to hell for the things you don’t do.

I just read about this.. Arts Cow is giving away 1200 free prints! go here
to get them!

After almost killing myself working during Christmas, the time to leave for the trip came... I found myself running around like crazy, forgetting a million things (including the usb drives), barely sleeping, living in two time zones once again, tired, stressed, wishing I had two more days to finish things and concerned that I was going to miss my flight...

But the day came, and because I am lucky to have the best friends, Channe came over to help me pack, clean my house, give me support, share some wine, and drive me to LAX...

And a few days later, I was in Dubai...







I was hoping to find more desert, a more "Arabic" experience... Instead I found myself surrounded by the tallest buildings, one way "freeways", lack of parking space, shopping malls bigger than my city, tourist "tours", random workers that only spoke english, or Urdu, Tagalog, and Punjabi... The Emiratis were a rare group, rarely seen out on the streets... They wore the traditional Desert clothes, and could be found carrying their kids, while their wives spent a fortune on clothes meant to be seen only by them... They were warm and friendly, and surprisingly accessible, even to me as a single women.... and not only them, but all the muslims I encountered... It is almost like they shared the same relaxed attitude of someone that is on vacation... they went on with their lives, thankful to be there, happy about the diversity, curious about our upbringing, but, more importantly, eager to tell me about where they came from...

I know, I know, it is already January 4th... I guess you could blame it on the fact that my trip is three days away, or that I have been working like a madman to get things done, or that I had to find these pics in 4 different drives... oh well, here it is..

March

April

May


June


July


August


September

October


November


December

I was just reading my blog.. Looking back, I should pay more attention to what I write... This two weeks have been hard, but tonight was especially rough.. Sometimes, when I least expect it, I say something that comes across as rude, or mean, or disrespectful. I wish I could understand the limits, that I could see when to stop, when I am crossing the line. I have gotten a lot better, yes, but it still happens. It happened tonight. With someone that I have already disappointed a few times. Someone that, on one side, I love to spend time with, but on the other, I am scared because I know I've done things that he is not completely happy with... and it is a weird feeling, because I, for the first time in a long time, feel some sort of real connection, like we will be friends for a long time...

I have been working non-stop all week... my plan of focusing on myself has once again become how can I make the people around me see me for what I am, how can I make them appreciate the effort I am making to be better... but how can I do this, if I don't really know who I am? How can I ask people to trust me, when I rarely trust myself? How can let go of the anger and pain inside of me without getting other people involved?

It is almost refreshing to know that I have been here before, full of questions and doubts, and that, somehow, I got out of it.. and I got out of it learning a lesson... But lately I have been wondering what I am doing wrong... It is almost like I try so hard for people to like me, that I forgot why I like myself....and I let my ego super inflate itself, because of fears or insecurities, or god knows what, and then it happens again, I mess up.. I act like a spoiled little kid.. and honestly, who will take that seriously... All my accomplishments, the effort, the phone calls, don't mean a lot when they know I can blow up and suddenly act like I'm five...

In many ways, I am the cause of this mess... I should know that when I am not comfortable with a situation, the only thing I can control, and in turn I am responsible for, is my reaction to it.. What I feel, how I react, what I learn...

This year has been full of ups and downs, more than any other one... Maybe because I am more aware of what is wrong, maybe because I am becoming an adult, but no matter what life throws my way, I must not lose perspective... There is a reason, a lesson, a purpose in EVERYTHING we experience.. and the best way to overcome bad karma is to learn from them and come out being better... because if not, the universe will continue putting us in the same situation, until we learn, until we understand...

So here is for a new year, full of moments and lessons, and experiences, and tears, hope, and inspiration, and for new relationships, and old ones, and the 4 babies that are joining our family, and snow days, and my island, and reason, and compassion, and morning coffee, and far away phone calls and living a life split between my reality and my perception... May we all learn the lesson the universe is trying to teach us...

Christmas is in two days. My favorite time of the year..For the first time in a long time, I don’t have any vacation time left to celebrate.. True, I’ve taken like 7 trips so far, and I will be leaving in two weeks for Dubai… But no real holiday time off.. For a million reasons, the whole Christmas season I was waiting for all year just didn’t happen… and I am ok with it.. This year has been one full of last minute rescheduling, of unexpected good news, of airports, and weddings, and babies, and foreign storytellers whose only purpose was to steal little pieces of my heart as they got into another airplane. In between the ever changing and the constant, in between my island and this city, in between the uncertain, the magic and the reality of my moments, I have come to a place where I am, as much as I have ever been, calm…
Yes, I still have crazy days, days where I question if this is the right decision, staying here, in this job, living this life, away from my island and everything else that happens there… where all I want to do is stay in bed, or leave everything and join the circus… But those days are less frequent; they have diminished from lasting until the day was over and I couldn’t fall back asleep at the end of the day, to fleeting moments of desperate anxiety that I am desperately trying to learn to ignore…

Maybe the Prozac I started taking a few months ago is finally having an effect, or maybe I am finally growing up and it is somehow easier to focus my energy on the important moments, the intense feelings, the essential lessons. But, after all the uncertainty I’ve been through my whole life, for the first time, I see the world from a different perspective… I am trying to “seize the day” rather than let the days pass me by in a flurry of anxious remarks and incomplete projects. Because, sometimes in a misguided attempt to hide my fears and my insecurities, I disconnect the part of myself that craves silence and poems, and I let out all the pain and anger hidden inside of me in very destructive ways… and this became almost like the way I thought things were supposed to happen, dysfunctional has always felt familiar, and we usually gravitate towards the familiar… and being aware of it has only made the process harder, because you keep wondering if there is something seriously fucked up with yourself when you keep doing things that hurt you and those around you. But moments like these, when you are wondering what the hell am I really doing here, force you to take a hard look at yourself, they are the difference between losing yourself to depression or coming out stronger. The choices I make and the way I let things determine my reactions in those moments of self doubt will determine the final outcome.

I need to remind myself to have more weekends like last one, the kind that involve Happy Hour at our usual French Restaurant, some of my favorite girls, a few hours off work Friday afternoon, 3 bottles of wine with a certain guy, cold winter mornings, coffee, smart conversations, beers, the best pizza from a box I’ve EVER had, half a movie, moving boxes, Sophie sleeping all day, and a few pictures. Those are the kind of vacations I really need. Often. Because I get to relax, and then, I can re-connect with myself, I can analyze my behavior, control my reactions, slow down my impulsiveness. Because when I can synchronize my breathing to the pace of the movements around me, I can let all the good in me shine through.

Oh.. and Happy Whatever it is that you celebrate during winter...

My boss had a party at his house. It is always nice to go because I know all their family, and they ADORE me... Sophie came along...

And as usual, the persians went crazy dancing... Thank god they are cool with me not taking part in the madness.. and Nima's cousins? So cute, it was cool to see them...
I just had a little wine, and I was home by 2am... but Sunday, I could BARELY wake up... and I had already made plans to go to Laury's Christmas party... So I took a shower, picked up some desserts at the persian market, grabbed some vodka and cranberry juice, and I got there 3 hours late, as usual... And too many drinks, tons of food, and a few deserts later...
As you can see, I had a GREAT time.. After this we had the not so brilliant idea to go out to a bar IN LA, in the rain... yeah, we never made it, so back to Laury's it was...

Today we woke up to rain... It took me 1.5 hours to get to the office! Rainy days should be holidays here, seriously, people have NO CLUE how to drive in the rain :0 it has been raining non stop since last night, and it is FREEZING!!! and with my not so fun hangover, I came home early today..and now I'm hanging by the fireplace with Sophie... and freaking out because my trip is in about 2.5 weeks... and I still need to find some winter clothes!! ok, gotta go.