I'M BACK!

I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.
I'm back.

I'm back!



And news - I'm going to HONG KONG!
25th of September for 2 weeks and it's like MADNESS in my mouth to even say it!

To make this official, I gave myself a new desktop background - HK skyline.

So far, I haven't left Europe.
I've travelled a lot in Europe, but never got outside this continent.

I cannot even begin to slightly comprehend what this will be like.
It will shift something, something necessary.
I've got 5 weeks till we go, and plenty I want to do before.

This summer again has been fairly strange.
And again, when I blog little, it means stuff's a mess.
But what is mess for?
Mess is for working through it.
Which is what I'm doing.

I've got loads of pictures from the past few weeks, which I'll post soon.
Most of my time I've spent with the Spanish one.
I've decided to stay with her for a bit - it seems to be good for both of us.

Plenty will be done.

I've developed a thing for being a little chicken, again.
I'm not entirely sure where this came from.
10 years ago, at the special age of 14, if someone would've asked me: Hey, Maria, how would you describe yourself in 10 years?
I mean, cowardly would not have been one of the chosen words.

And it bores me, truly.

So, no more.
Whatever.

Here's to travelling, here's to marvel and exploring and friends.

Yours truly.
And now I'm back.
M.

before

Usually I don't like these lists, but this one is quite fun.
And quite a lot of this is true.
Really is.
Really, really is.

Before.
M.

25 Things To Do Before You Turn 25

1. Make peace with your parents. Whether you finally recognize that they actually have your best interests in mind or you forgive them for being flawed human beings, you can’t happily enter adulthood with that familial brand of resentment.

2. Kiss someone you think is out of your league; kiss models and med students and entrepreneurs with part-time lives in Dubai and don’t worry about if they’re going to call you afterward.

3. Minimize your passivity.

4. Work a service job to gain some understanding of how tipping works, how to keep your cool around assholes, how a few kind words can change someone’s day.

5. Recognize freedom as a 5:30 a.m. trip to the diner with a bunch of strangers you’ve just met.

6. Try not to beat yourself up over having obtained a ‘useless’ Bachelor’s Degree. Debt is hell, and things didn’t pan out quite like you expected, but you did get to go to college, and having a degree isn’t the worst thing in the world to have. We will figure this mess out, I think, probably; the point is you’re not worth less just because there hasn’t been an immediate pay off for going to school. Be patient, work with what you have, and remember that a lot of us are in this together.

7. If you’re employed in any capacity, open a savings account. You never know when you might be unemployed or in desperate need of getting away for a few days. Even $10 a week is $520 more a year than you would’ve had otherwise.

8. Make a habit of going outside, enjoying the light, relearning your friends, forgetting the internet.

9. Go on a 4-day, brunch-fueled bender.

10. Start a relationship with your crush by telling them that you want them. Directly. Like, look them in the face and say it to them. Say, I want you. I want to be with you.

11. Learn to say ‘no’ — to yourself. Don’t keep wearing high heels if you hate them; don’t keep smoking if you’re disgusted by the way you smell the morning after; stop wasting entire days on your couch if you’re going to complain about missing the sun.

12. Take time to revisit the places that made you who you are: the apartment you grew up in, your middle school, your hometown. These places may or may not be here forever; you definitely won’t be.

13. Find a hobby that makes being alone feel lovely and empowering and like something to look forward to.

14. Think you know yourself until you meet someone better than you.

15. Forget who you are, what your priorities are, and how a person should be.

16. Identify your fears and instead of letting them dictate your every move, find and talk to people who have overcome them. Don’t settle for experiencing .000002% of what the world has to offer because you’re afraid of getting on a plane.

17. Make a habit of cleaning up and letting go. Just because it fit at one point doesn’t mean you need to keep it forever — whether ‘it’ is your favorite pair of pants or your ex.

18. Stop hating yourself.

19. Go out and watch that movie, read that book, listen to that band you already lied about watching, reading, listening to.

20. Take advantage of health insurance while you have it.

21. Make a habit of telling people how you feel, whether it means writing a gushing fan-girl email to someone whose work you love or telling your boss why you deserve a raise.

22. Date someone who says, “I love you” first.

23. Leave the country under the premise of “finding yourself.” This will be unsuccessful. Places do not change people. Instead, do a lot of solo drinking, read a lot of books, have sex in dirty hostels, and come home when you start to miss it.

24. Suck it up and buy a Macbook Pro.

25. Quit that job that’s making you miserable, end the relationship that makes you act like a lunatic, lose the friend whose sole purpose in life is making you feel like you’re perpetually on the verge of vomiting. You’re young, you’re resilient, there are other jobs and relationships and friends if you’re patient and open.

http://thoughtcatalog.com/2012/25-things-to-do-before-you-turn-25/

alone

Over the past few years, I've started doing things by myself.
I guess I've always been cool with playing on my own, but I've started doing it consciously.

I told A. last autumn that I'm scared of being alone and all this crap.
And I think that because of this I've started doing more and more things by myself.
The little things.

Like, Saturday evening I went to see this awesome theatre company, their piece called "Rave", and it was awesome.
And I think it was even more awesome because I was there on my own.
It's just liberating, you know.
You no longer look at yourself through the aspect and lense of your friends, and all that's familiar, but I felt quite free to just Be.

Obviously, there are so many things that need to be shared and should be shared.
Eating for example is one of the things that is only magnified if shared.
Share a meal and it transforms from just putting fuel into your body to a ritual, of people sharing nothing short of love.

But yes.
Doing things on my own.
It just offers up surprising things and new people and twists and turns.
Sometimes it's scary, but it's so worth it.

Expand and explore.
M.

kaleidoscope

Yesterday I suddenly remembered how much I loved my kaleidoscope.
Something about it just made everything COOL, and awesome and I don't even know.
For the 5-year-old me it was such a mind-bending view-altering thing, more than a toy.

No, honestly, my love for that thing is boundless.
So now I've decided to find one. And buy one.
And look into it, every, single, day.

It's a tube and some stuff and that's it.
It's so plain and nothing special.
And then BOOYA - mind. blown.

And that's what life is like.
I need to buy one.
Pronto.

Kaleidoscope eyes.
M.

to my dear london

As I was walking from the plane through the Heathrow terminal towards the baggage reclaim, on the 11th of January 2013, I realised this was the last time I would be landing in London, for some time.
And then I got to thinking of reasons. Not that I need to, but it just happened. Reasons, and past times spent in London, and what I've gained here, and how this place has shaped me.

I arrived in London on the 2nd of September 2006. Spent 2 days in town and the quite literally headed for the unknown in Chigwell School which was the beginning of my road to independence.
I was always an independent young person growing up but there is only so much independence you can get whilst still living with your parents.
The school wasn't opened so it must have been a weekend. No, actually, I think we all arrived 3 weeks before the start of term, to get settled in.
I remember loving the house, seeing the house cat and struggling to sleep the first night. I used to be really very scared of darkness and therefore sleeping in unfamiliar places was a huge task. One which I didn't manage that night.

This was the beginning of two of the absolute best years of my life. I worked so hard, got so many friends, gained so so much ..everything. Just life experience.
Also, did a lot of less deep and meaningful things like, lots of football, eating cake, latenight chats with the boarding house girls who became my sisters, especially one of them, free long-distance phone calls, trampolining, playing polo in the swimming pool, watching sports in the big boarding house for boys, having 2 great house parties - and I mean great - and wearing suits and ties to school.

This was also the beginning of a process through which I would actually get to know myself. I was used to performing by this point so handling pressure was not the problem.
(Ps, I would usually apologise about how 'tacky' this is, but not tonight. I'm sat in my empty room, in a house full of my friends, who happen to be asleep. It's 1:23am and I'm blogging because this seems to be the best idea of how to say goodbye.)
However, living abroad, away from my family and friends at 17 was quite something, and something I am intensely proud of. For some people similar experience might be easy, easier than getting up and singing in front of a lot people, for example, but for me this was hard.

6,5 years on and I realised something standing on the escalator at Heathrow terminal.
I've racked up some serious air miles. I've flown back and forth between London and Tallinn for roughly 55 times and somewhere in between all this I've found me.

Feel free to sigh and roll your eyes a little, but honestly, I can't explain this any other way. It's like I landed here, already a grown human, having worked and having had responsibilities for so long. But in retrospective it feels like, I came here and I grew up, I grew down and then I re-grew. I literally at some point must have decided - hey this is not you, now change. Take all these things that are broken, or misplaced, or wrong, or make you sad, and face them, do something about them. Take the bits and re-work yourself.
Because it's not like I don't have the time.
We all have the time.

And now, 6,5 years on I am sentimental at the thought of what I've gained here, and what I'm leaving here.
Somewhere on the football pitches in Chigwell I got a bit closer.
Somewhere in a dark corner of the Studio Theatre at Royal Holloway, I found something.
And somewhere in the cracks of the Covent Garden pavements.
Somehow in the freeing air of the big city atmosphere I realised in order to grow up I need to grow down.
Somehow I was lucky and blessed enough to find people in this city who inspire me, again and again and again, people who change me and challenge me.
People who would sit up till early morning hours to look after me, and people to look out for me.
People who for some reason really care about whether I will get to places in this life, and would help me get there.
So I'm sat here, very happy and very sad, and as excited as I am anxious. And proud and grateful and blessed.
I am so thankful for the steps that lead me here and for the ones that will lead me home.

I love you, London. And for being my Adventure Land you will forever have my respect.


I think I'm ready to go for the next step now.
And oh holy heavens, it's as exciting as it is scary.


And that, is truly magnifique.

I'm going home.
With love.
M.

adventure

What would be greater
than the adventure
of really letting yourself be
whatever it is you want to be?

Letting yourself grow
into whatever it is
you shall grow into?

DON'T BE A PUSSY
AND TAKE THE LEAP