Hey Baby, What's Your Sign?

I know a lot of people are skeptical about astrology, but I am not one of them. I am the kind of person who will say, "oh, you're a Libra? I should have guessed," and be completely serious about it. That might be because I see a lot of myself reflected in my own sign. Whatever. I don't think everyone has to take it seriously, I just think its an interesting topic that speaks strongly to me personally. For example -

I am a Leo. Not just a Leo, but a LEO. Bossy, stubborn, and unyielding. Also loyal, generous, and enthusiastic. I tend to succeed. (Please don't let that be a phase.) I will do just about anything to help my friends. I need to be needed, and it hurts when I'm not, but I don't want to talk about it. I will never say no to attention or being admired, and I have big dreams. Those are all Leo traits. Would I still be this way if I was born in December? Maybe, maybe not. Who can really know? I cant. Let's go with it.

Once you see yourself in your sign, it's easy to spot others acting out in stereotypical ways. My friend E is a Cancer. She loves to cook, values her home and family, and she can get moody and emotional. (I love you E!) Some people would say, 'slow down girl, anyone could be like that! It doesn't matter that she's a Cancer!' but that's the fun part - the maybes, the ifs, the coincidences.

I have another friend who is a Capricorn. She is so ambitious. So steady. She works, and works, and works, and has a very clear path from where she is to where she's going. She has anywhere between two and four jobs at any given time and saves money like whoa. She is rational and a deep, deep thinker, but she also lives at extremes - work hard, play hard. Create hard. Think hard.

I could probably give an example for every sign of the zodiac. Aquarius, individualistic and free-spirited, yet unyielding when they think they are right. Pisces, sensitive and mysterious (sometimes for no reason) but the most understanding and giving of friends. Sagittarius, blunt to the point of brutality but also creative, and a lot of fun to be around. If anyone is recognizing themselves...yeah.

Another thing that strikes me is this: I tend to be attracted to the same signs over and over. A lot of my close friends share signs. Every guy I've loved has been a Taurus. Granted, that's not very many people (one and a half) but still. Pattern? I hope not because Leo + Taurus = possibly the most stubborn couple imaginable, who will stay together out of stubbornness for way too long. That sounds familiar. Awkward.

Anyway, the point of this rambling post is that I'm really interested in the zodiac. I think its cool when people characterize their signs. I will admit I know people who are nothing like their sign (at least at first), but nothing is for everyone. As for this Leo, I think I know where I stand.

76 Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs

This was my address when I lived in my favorite city in the world - Paris. Right at the bottom of the 6th arrondissement, between the Boulevard Montparnasse and the Jardin de Luxembourg, a five-minute walk from the formidable, if not exactly beautiful, Tour Montparnasse. Closest to the Vavin metro stop, but also convenient to Edgar Quinet. With a view of the roof of the Sorbonne from my eighth-floor one-room garret apartment. Bliss.

For the four and a half months I lived in Paris, I was completely euphoric. When we first arrived I learned that our semi-psychotic housing 'director' had taken my request to live a) with a family, b) within walking distance of our school, and c) in the middle of the city and thrown it out like last weeks compost. I was with a single, middle aged woman, on the outskirts of the city, a 30-minute metro ride to class. The only friend I had on the program? On the complete opposite side of the city. We could not have been farther apart. So, I took matters into my own hands. I found an ad for a room for rent, called the woman, met her, and rented it.

My new host mother, Francoise, was an English teacher with two children around my age, both off at college. She lived in an absolutely beautiful apartment that had been in her family for years, and came complete with maids quarters on the top floor. This is where I was in luck - her son had been living in the maids quarters, but was going off to school, therefore she was looking to rent it out. She showed me the room. rectangular, not very large, with a built in shower stall, sink, and mirror. (The toilet, shared by the 10 or so people that lived there, was in the hall. No worries, it was spotlessly clean.) There was a door/window that opened onto a sweet little balcony. A desk, dresser, nightstand, and hot plate completed the ensemble, and the price was right. I moved in the next day.

I quickly became one with my new neighborhood. I went to the bakery around the corner every day. "Bonjour madame!" I would greet her cheerfully. "Bonjour!" She would smile back. The deceptively small but delicious restaurant down the street began to recognize me, and at one point asked a classmate where I was when she came in without me. The discovery of a bagel shop that served different bagel sandwiches named after cities in the United States brought me closer to my adopted home. The surly waiters at the restaurant we went to for steak frites gradually loosened up and began to joke with us. We had cracked the snail's shell, and I melted into my Parisian life like Nutella in a curbside crepe.

Living in Paris had been my childhood dream - I started learning French in kindergarten and never looked back. The city calls to me, those four and a half months remain vivid in my memory in a way my trips to China and Brazil have not. A map of the City of Lights hangs above my bed, where I can almost see myself walking its streets. I can smell the air, feel the breeze, recall the exact hue of the sunlight on the Haussmannien buildings and luxurious boulevards. I'm not saying Paris is perfect, I'm just saying it's where I belong.

The More Things Change, The More Things Stay The Same

Before I can post about my impending move to St Louis, MO, I have to upload the pictures I took when I visited. And to upload the pictures, I have to put new batteries in my camera. Unfortunately, the batteries are on the living room table. The camera is on the floor next to my bed. Conundrummmm. In the meantime, I'll just talk about something that's been on my mind a lot lately - friendship.

I think I am extremely lucky in the friendship department. I have friends from elementary, middle, and high school that I love dearly, and friends from college that I couldn't imagine my life without. They cover the whole spectrum and they are my second family. Some are the kind that I can go for weeks or months without talking to, and then we sit down for coffee, or dinner, or whatever it is, and its like nothing has changed. We slide right back into our warm, comfortable friendships. Others I talk to often - we text, bbm, gchat, email, travel together, travel to each other, live together, work together, eat, drink, and play together. These are the friends that I will think of if I see something funny, or ridiculous. They are the ones I call if I am sad, lonely, happy, nervous, or bored.

High school friends know each other in a way that college friends cannot. High school friends have watched you grow from awkward fourteen year old to graceful adult. These are the friends that are in your first grade class picture. They are the ones who can tell you the exact moment you met on the first day of middle school. The ones who say, "I was walking past our old bus stop today, do you remember when..." and the ones who can communicate an inside joke with one sidelong glance.

College friends are the friends who watched, and helped, as you took control of your life. They watched you decide your future, they gave advice or they supported you silently. These friends shape you in a different way than childhood friends, but in a way that is just as important.

I am personally a pretty contact-oriented person. I have no problem hugging, kissing, cuddling, spooning, sharing beds with, piggybacking, being picked up by, or snuggling with my friends, male or female. Some people are not like that, and I respect that. But I wont think twice about throwing my arms around a friend I haven't seen in a year and a half. I'm pretty much the perfect size to curl up in someone's lap. Being picked up and carried off doesn't faze me. For me, its normal for people who love each other to want to be close to each other, and I love my friends.

This said, I am not great at keeping in touch with friends. I think about them often, even ones I haven't spoken to or seen in years. Once someone has taken up space in my heart, that space is open for them. (With very few exceptions.) Basically, I think my friends are critically important and a huge part of my life. Being apart from friends is probably the thing I worry about most. For example, I'm moving to St Louis in August, and I am sooo relieved that one of my college friends will be there with me. But I can already feel how much I'm going to miss my friends from home, my college friends, my roommate...everyone. One of my friends is going to Tokyo next week, for two years. Every time I see him, I feel like it might be the last time and I want to hug him forever.

But the great part about friendship is that it can be flexible. Maybe I wont see this friend for two years, but I will definitely see him again. My college roommates and I are committed to vacationing together at least once a year. There are high school and college reunions. And the internet! So, I guess the moral of the story is - keep your friends close.

April Showers Bring...

Law school decisions! And I made a big one last weekend. I'm officially moving to ST LOUIS, MISSOURI to attend Washington University in St. Louis for law school. Since I've lived in New York State my entire life (except one four-month stint in Paris), this decision is a huge one for me. More to come!