Monday, August 25, 2014
My Montana, Week 1
I had arrived. And it was just like I had remembered it to be three years ago. It was beautiful. With mountains in the distance that created a surprising and unexpected skyline for a small unknown town in a valley with rivers and a dam twenty minutes away where it got its name "Great Falls" from. I had traveled for three days and two nights to get here. And, I was 10 days earlier than I had planned on coming.
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I heaved a sigh of relief when I arrived at the local Wal-Mart. I had had 200 dollars when I first walked in and walked out with a 110. There was no sales tax here Thank God! I thought. I had been without cell phone service for the last 7 hours of the drive. My phone cut off halfway through North Dakota while I was on the phone with my mother. It had taken me two hours to get a new phone and new service at the cheapest rate without a contract and to find the local Wal-Mart where i got lost twice and had to stop at the Hilton Garden Inn ten blocks away from it. I got a nice little introduction to the town as no one knew I had arrived for two hours. After a long wait at the cash register in "Electronics" I finally had activated a phone. I called my friend David, my Montana friend who had offered me to stay at his place and make Montana my new home. He and I had been friends for eight years. We were platonic for the first five but then after my last trip to Montana in 2011, things got romantic and then quickly died out. He simply didn't know how to truly love and had a hardened heart when it came to love relationships. He was a little better at being a friend. He knew when to be there when he was needed, or so I thought. Either way, he was there for me this time and I had faith he would help me out.
While messing with my new phone outside leaning against the Wal-Mart, I looked up to see David pull up in his white 1999 Ford Explorer. Our eyes connected as if it were our first time seeing each other again. He was just as handsome as I remembered him from three years prior. I smiled and hugged him and said "Thank you." David smiled back. We then headed over to Miss Liz's house. She was the lady he had told me about that needed help with her business. And i was excited to help her. When we got there, I met Miss Liz. She had a kind smile and quiet demeanor about her. But, she seemed frail and sickly by how slowly she was moving. Her feet shuffled across the floor and she was cooking my welcome dinner hunched over the stove. She had short natural hair and was about my height with glasses and pretty sparkling eyes. She must have been about late 50s.
Meanwhile, David and I were talking with Mr. Harold. He was a Haitian man in his 60s who still spoke French and Creole fluently.
"So, you and David have been friends for 8 years? How come you aren't married?"
I immediately blushed. I never expected someone to be so forthright within ten minutes of meeting.
"Are there qualities you like about David that you would like in a mate?"
"Yes, there are many qualities I like about David." I revealed.
David paused and then looked ahead at what he was doing-- snacking on something. He didn't respond. Instead, he froze.
Miss Liz finally came into the dining room where we were sitting and served dinner. She had missed the whole conversation.
"So Kristen, how was your drive in?"
She and I continued to have conversation about everything from my journey, to personal training, spirituality, God, etc. After dinner, David went to the couch and laid there and fell asleep. He was such a mama's boy. By the time Miss Liz and I were done talking on the couch, David and I gathered our things and headed over to his place. It was 3 minutes down the street. He helped me carry some of my things in and he gave me his room while he slept on the couch. For then and the rest of the week I spent there it felt like we were roommates. He didn't speak to me or really acknowledge me, meanwhile I made attempts for us to hang together like old times and to be chummy. It was David's birthday the previous week so I wanted us to go out, but with every attempt it would be met with a "No" or "no thanks". We would go to the gym together and workout on opposite sides. We would go to Miss Liz's house and not speak. He ignored me and I started to wonder why he had ever invited me to Montana in the first place. Every day of the week I had spent helping Miss Liz with her business as she was going in to surgery in ten days. So, I helped her put some of her things in storage and watched her put together floral arrangements. I had thought I would be paid for helping her business during her recovery but the more Miss Liz spoke the more she sounded kinda selfish.
"See Kristen, this is a technique I call 'hiding the booty'." She said as she motioned to me to watch her put together a floral arrangement that was worth $150.
"So you do massage therapy, floral arrangements and you teach massage class. You are doing alot! Don't you ever hire anyone to help you out?" I asked wondering how she did it all successfully.
"I used to do that but i realized that I was giving my money away when I could be keeping that to myself. If its 10 dollars an hour times 40 hours a week, thats 400 dollars!"
I started to see that I probably wouldn't be getting paid to help out with this lady and that I'd be helping her out with her business just to stay at her house for free. David's mom and two niece and nephew were coming at the end of the week and that would conclude my time at his place. I felt somewhat relieved as it felt he didn't want me there. He was cold and distant and stayed up late on the phone sometimes until 3 or 4am in the morning where the sound of his voice murmuring kept me from sleeping. I would toss and turn and try to dream but only extreme fatigue carried me to sleep. By the time Friday rolled around it had been a week that i had arrived, David had had one of his friends stop by, Terry. He had left Terry waiting on him for about an hour after he reassured him he'd be just 5 minutes. I was starting to see more of the side of David that I had remembered I first experienced. That night, after chatting with Terry and him complaining about waiting I took myself out for a celebratory dinner for having been there a week and went out alone.
When I came back, David sat next to me on the couch.
"So Kristen, I want to ask you, what is the reason you thought I asked you to come out here?"
I was blank. I didn't see this question being tossed at me randomly.
"Uhhh to help Miss Liz out with her business and for me to learn how to start my own from her?"
"Yeah so what have yall done? I mean I've been sitting back and observing yall. I went down to the college with you guys for you to look at spots to set up your personal training classes or programs underneath her, but what have yall done?"
"Look David, it takes longer than a week to start up a business. Further, i thought that part was coming later. Miss Liz is going into surgery next week. Doesn't she just need help with her business? Who is going to run that while she's recovering if Mr.Harold is going away for a month?" I responded.
"You guys were supposed to be piggy backing on one on another. You to help her with her health, her business and she to help you with your personal training and yall ain't done none of that."
"Excuse me? How can you be accurately observing anything when first you have not asked me how my day was, what I am doing daily and you are at work for longer than 8 hours a day to accurately assess what we have or have not done! Further, what difference does it make to you? What part do you have in our business?"
"Kristen, well I feel like I am in the middle. I'm Miss Liz's friend and I'm your friend and I was the middle man trying to merge you two together. Do you know how much money you will be paid?" David fired back.
"No. How would you feel if you were sick and you needed help with your business and someone would be staying at your house and you go up to them and ask them, 'Oh by the way, how much am i being paid?' I just think that is rather insensitive David."
"Well, you need to talk to her about that. Let me know when you do that. When are you going to do that?"
"Well, she goes into surgery on Wednesday so it will be before then." I asserted.
David got up.
"Wait just a second David, I feel uncomfortable about this conversation. You did ask me to come out here and stay with you with the opportunity with Miss Liz and I accepted. However, you and I live like roommates. We don't speak, you don't ask me anything about how i'm settling in or how things are going yet you assume and jump to conclusions about what isn't happening between Miss Liz and I. You think I drove 32 hours for a place to stay and an opportunity?! Part of the reason why I drove out here was to reconnect with you! My friend of 8 years. Everyone keeps reminding me of the length of our friendship but its starting to feel like we are strangers!"
It felt so good to get the truth out. I didn't like the way he was treating me. It was such a drastic difference from the last time I was here.
"Kristen, you're an introvert so I figured you wanted your space. So I do my thing and let you do your own thing."
I left the conversation alone. I had learned something new. David seemed emotionally unintelligent because he was. When it came to emotions, he was ignorant AND he didn't know how to treat people. I continued to distance myself from him and started to understand more fully why we were on-and-off friends and buddies for years.
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Why I Left Home
I tried everything. For the last six years in Northern Virginia I was a nanny, a resume writer, a personal trainer, a substitute teacher, a bartender, a cocktail waitress, a staffing coordinator, a college recruiter just to name the ones I can remember. But, best of all, I was me. I am me. I didn't compromise myself and did jobs where I was needed...where I was helping someone else. It would be an added bonus if where I worked I could get meals at or had odd hours so I could sleep somewhere more comfortably than my car. I was surviving. I was creative, resourceful, strategic with getting only the things I couldn't live without. I made it.
***When I was living at home with my mother, I had alot of time to be as complacent as I wanted to be. My biggest concern was how to make my life as easy as possible, without anything owning me and only doing jobs that were noble or of servitude to add to the solution to world problems, rather than adding to them. To me, that meant doing jobs that were organic, that added to life, that added to love and that made it possible for me to give as much love as I could. I thought all of that depended on where I was mentally. So, i avoided stressful jobs and stressful situations. I made it my mission to only do jobs I could be passionate about. It was here, in this mindset that life was actually sometimes the opposite of easy trying to live up to my own ideals. So, I didn't money-chase, I passion-chased and anything and everything that I felt I could add to, I did it. With passion.
This year, I had the chance to move to Cali with my best friend and I psyched myself out with the opportunity...told a bunch of people and then backed out when I realized I didn't have the money. Lol-- life is funny when reality hits you and money seems to be the reason why you can't do the things you desire to do. So I backed out on my word. But while backing out of my word, interesting things happened in the months that followed. First, I finally let go of having my own personal training business which was convenient because the few clients that I had acquired ran into family issues or money issues which cut me out as their trainer. Then, after being involved with someone that never professed his love back to me (or committed to me) I found out that he was dishonest, and I let him go completely. On top of that, after a year and some months of living with my mother and the emotional distress of my father leaving her for his mistress and moving to another state for his mistress, he randomly called my mother to move back in one random night after 32 years of constant infidelities. One day he was living with his mistress, the next, with his estranged wife as if none of it had happened.
I had told her that I would leave the house if she took him back as she had been dreaming out loud about. All of us had told her this. My brother said he wouldn't go over to the house and my sister vowed to not speak to her-- and both kept their word, including me as I packed up my suitcase the next afternoon, threw it in my back trunk along with some random items, toiletries, seasonal clothes and my desire to find my place in this world. I left. My father was abusive, highly narcissistic and had greatly added to the dysfunction of the family and I was maxed out from the emotional instability and stress of their marriage. Their baggage became my baggage when I lived with them. And history would only repeat if I stayed. None of what was going on was acceptable. I departed to create something much greater, much healthier and much better quality of life beyond the one they had provided for me and my siblings.
Life had forced me to act after denying myself the opportunity to have moved to California with my best friend months prior. . And, I started to see that there was no reason to stay here as all the jobs I had held were dead end ones, and none were actual careers besides personal training which I had failed at continuing. I was broke, homeless, unemployed and struggling emotionally. My family had become broken and displaced than ever before and the love I had desired, I had lost. Here I was, back at a place of insecurity. But, I had not ever let it define me, only test me and sharpen me so I could learn and understand life as it is.
I then, stayed at my brother's house for as long as I was welcome, which was about a month. Everyday my niece, "Babens" would greet me with a smile or tote her iPad into my bed and we'd watch our favorite shows online and fall asleep together. I got a taste of what it would be like to have a child of my own the days I lived there. I'll never forget how easy unconditional love was to give and to receive in that environment with Baben's head laying next to mine or how emotionally aware she was towards me. "Adden, I don't want you to be alone in this room by yourself...allll day loooong. So I'm gonna snuggle with you." She always called me "Adden" (Kristen- Aunt = Adden). It will never cease to amaze me how someone so young could understand the feeling of empathy that much at a young age. After a month of hanging out with my brother's family, I had gotten the nudge to leave.
"In order to fly, you must jump first."
So thats what I did. I jumped into my car and slept there for six weeks. In-between it all, I would randomly sleep at a bartending friend's house (Lucy) with roommates that were kind, creative, sincere, eclectic and accepting. And in a way, they became my new family. We had sunday dinners also known as "Roommate Night" where we all took turns cooking and truth be told, not all of us were roommates, but when you were there regardless of where you stayed (inside or out of the house) you were a roommate. The acceptance I found there was simple and sweet and just what I needed - bucking up with the life I wanted but didn't have. Lucy was my friend from bartending school who had a firecracker attitude and a heart of gold. She gave to me with little expectation as if she knew I wouldn't take advantage of her. I don't know if she'll ever know how much I appreciated that. The beauty of her was in the small things (that were really big things) in the details. She juiced vegetables and fruits and shared her lunch, breakfast and dinner with me that were the very foods on my own diet. We would go to the gym together and I could go free of cost on Lucy's gym guest pass. And, there was a day or two that she gave up her bed in her room for me to sleep in...it was as though I were her years ago when she was orphaned and she cared for me the way she would have cared for herself. And we related, as our family stories were similar-- having to be self-sufficient at young ages, we learned how to fight for ourselves and survive and live with little or no support (mentally and emotionally especially). Lucy came at the right time for me and she helped to soften the blow of having any expectations for people that I had long neglected. Other days, I would sleep at my brother's clubhouse parking lot. And, if I were babysitting "Babens" I would spend the night at his house after doing my laundry.
My best friend and I would think up ways to get out of the same situations that we were constantly living in together on opposite coasts i.e. staying at people's houses, sleeping on couches, sleeping in our cars and whether or not to go back home to our families as much as we would love them seemed to hinder our growth, our truest potential and from following our greatest dreams. So, instead of complacency and safety (but not emotional safety) we chose to struggle so that we could do better than accept the lives that could be handed to us...through our overbearing emotionally unstable parents. So we jumped into a world of not knowing where we would be sleeping. All we knew was that we'd be sleeping in pursuit of our dreams.
So, in essence, after graduating from bartending school In May, I got my first job as a bartender at this bowling alley that was a cigar bar, restaurant and main bar. The main bar was where I worked. I worked hard there picking up on everything that I felt I should have known as a bartender there. Meanwhile, I would begin to make money while in training. Paul, the other bartender there also had no family and explained to me how the restaurant industry gave him a life that no one else could give him when he was orphaned at 14 and then was adopted at about 15 or 16 by a lady who owned a kind of brothel or prostituting service. She was the one who pushed him to pursue his dreams and leave the area that he grew up in before his mother died (why he was orphaned). He too, couldn't handle living life in the past being reminded of his mother's death by extended family. So, he ran away. And like Lucy, who was also orphaned at 14 because her family was highly dysfunctional and had hurt her deeply, she became independent and lived on an Indian reservation years before she found other opportunities. What I learned from the both of them was how they continued to live and lived without being anchored to their pasts. They lived like it was a new day, everyday-- and like their lives were their own. They fully owned themselves despite being hurt by family situations. They were brand new "in the now" kind of people and were made brand new in the decisions they chose on how to live life for themselves and others. They lived in the moment. I started to see more that when one struggles, typically they have a deeper sense of what it means to survive and many times more of a respect for mankind because of the pain they lived through and how others helped them. They naturally experience what it means to have empathy. With Lucy and Paul, I started to see them more as reflections of myself.
Paul was the "live in the moment" part of me that just wanted to do anything that served others to get his mind off of feeling hurt and to continue to survive. Lucy was the part of me that gave and gave until it hurt and the only reason it hurt was because there was some level of expectations for a return. Though similar, I am highly conscious of my few expectations of others and realize that perhaps it could be less. But the greatest lesson from the both of them was survival. Despite what pain was left or felt deeply from their past, they still moved forward daily with a conscious effort to not live in the pain but to heal from it in simply making daily decisions on how to live. I think that's what they call living with "vitality". There was a hunger in Paul's eyes and a fire burning in Lucy's that I won't ever forget.
Meanwhile, I was working like I dog. After getting a job as a bartender where I met Paul and realized I had not made 100 dollars or even 80 dollars, but 40 on any 8-9 hour shift I had worked in two weeks and realized that it was a dead-end. I had told all the roomates and non-roommates this and we all decided that it was time for me to find another. Then, Lucy was working at an upscale hotel as a cocktail waitress and invited me to come over there. So after nights of hanging around her job at the bar and talking it up with guests I interviewed and was offered a position where Lucy and I worked for a night when she quit. She ranted and raved about how it was too much work for little money and that other servers were stealing her tables and how it was infringing on her personal life. In all the hoopla, I really enjoyed the passion that Lucy brought everywhere with her. She was a lively person, that was sweet and bombastic at the same time. I had not seen such a combo-- literally fire and ice. So, then, it was just me. Me and all the other "fob" speakers. We were ALL immigrants at this upscale hotel and it was there that i worked more like a dog. I was the hostess, the food runner, the bartender and the waitress and I had calculated after working there for two weeks that on average I was making 13.50 an hour including tips. We wore these butler's outfits where everything was long sleeved and long pants with closed-toe shoes. I vowed to Mrs. Mona that I would quit if it was ever as hot as it was the 2nd week. I had never been so physically uncomfortable in my life working anywhere. So, the next day I went online and searched for another job, not because I needed one, but because I wanted one. Through craigslist, I applied to four jobs and had gotten a callback for an interview within a few hours of going into work early as a waitress the same day. Sure enough, by chance, or luck, or God my waitress job that was a mile and a half away from this one, in Staffing, became my 2nd job down the street.
I will never forget that it was my best friend who had said to me when I complained about my waitress job, "Kristen, I think you could get another job as easily and as quickly as you got this one." And like magic, I did. And it paid several dollars more than the waitressing job. I was starting to see a trend, that we become or acquire what we think or believe. I had learned it before but more actively, through my struggles, I was living this daily. I was sailing on positive thoughts, instead of living in a place of need. And thats part of "the secret" that everyone is talking about. You can't live your life always in chasing desires and wants and needs, you have to just be available to letting it happen and simply expect it to happen freely....without being so bonded or attached to the outcome. With that said, I never complained about living in my car. A friend of mine who I had had from college called me up randomly after us not talking for 3 months or so. I explained to him honestly what was going on and he offered for me to move in with him in a totally different state in the middle of nature and away from the city in Montana. It would be a completely different pace of life that I was ready for. He passed my resume on to an old friend of his who has her own business in the Wellness industry. Something about how fluid this opportunity occurred felt right. First, I knew he would have my back if I were to begin struggling again and he would help me better than my family (no fault on them), second, there was more opportunity for me to do what I had wanted--- to start my own business doing some kind of wellness practice and healing people which was right up this friend's alley.
As soon as he extended the offer and volunteered to book hotel rooms for me my car battery died and I needed more maintenance performed on it than a new battery. So as easily as I made little money from my first job as a bartender it went into my car. But it happened at the right time...at the beginning of the journey, not on the road trip. So, as events began to happen I saw that they were in line with me moving out of the DC area and moving to some place alot different and that matched the kind of person I am --creative, artistic, interesting, free and spirited. So after a week and a half of working for the staffing company, I resigned/got fired.
***Weekend Night Shift Staffer:
After working diligently for two weekend shifts including 4th of July weekend working over time and being promised time and a half for that Thursday and Friday I only saw half of what was promised to me in my paycheck (I worked 36 hours that weekend). Then doing extra work that involved commission and having the credit handed to the weekday staffers I was getting a bit peeved. I came in almost everyday for the first week and was told that I was welcome to come in during the week for extra hours or to help out so I decided to do extra. Then, the new supervisor telling me they had "issues" with me: open-toed shoes, eating at my desk, coming into work unannounced on a Monday, and that "no commission was EVER promised to you, Kristen". I started to see that what I thought I had signed up for was not being followed through and I was being penalized for acknowledging the broken promises made to me. After a call from a co-worker who thought we would be fired, I hastily went to pick up my check as this small company. The receptionist holding the checks and other Management seemed to be edgy after losing a contract the week prior. My head was starting to spin. I was tired of there always being some kind of conflict whenever I was trying to get ahead and thought about what this meant. Meanwhile, I became very upset by the way I was being treated after doing much more than what was required of me in a job I had only done for thirteen days. I later received a phone call from my new boss who chuckled after asking me if i was "okay" with everything the new supervisor had to tell me about what others "complained" about. I was still very upset and after I explained firmly that I wasn't okay with doing work that someone else was getting the credit for (i.e. commission) and how "eating at my desk" is "normal at companies bigger than this one" and no one has EVER had a problem with me eating at my desk and that it was more cost-efficient for employees to eat at their desk at lunch instead of going out to lunch for an hour," (like they all did). I was clearly offended. The conversation escalated when the VP tried to turn everything back around on me. It became apparent very quickly that they had other plans for me of letting me go and were building up ridiculous little things to accuse me of based off of rumors of a "cross-country trip" they heard me talking about. I knew there was something deeper going on that had little to do with me. I realized that many people do things out of fear of losing. The Vice President was one of those people I realized as he continued to chat with me.
So he said "Kristen, I don't think we'll be needing you anymore. I'm the boss. So I can let you go."
"No. You're not firing me. I resign. Because you don't keep your promises and you always go back on your word. So, good luck!"
And just like that, I knew I was leaving the area. Every door I walked through closed before I made it past the foyer...so to speak. And just like David said, (my longtime friend), "What do you have to stay there for? Anything? Come out here to Montana and stay with me." There was nothing to stay for besides the new friends, "the roommates" I just acquired. I had struggled to pay my bills for the last 5 years doing personal training and everything else. I was tired. Montana was calling me louder and I felt I would be needed there for greater things. So the following week, I visited all family and friends, packed up my things and took off for Montana with only the money I had made the prior week and faith.
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I happily made my way towards the West Coast and would eventually meet up with my best friend so we could finally do what we had intended to do in January 2014. To collaborate on radio projects, non-profit projects and start a youtube channel based on empowering others who are struggling while pursuing their dreams.
One thing that I cannot overlook is how life gives you chances and it will continue to give you chances until you learn to do something different. The only way that I was going to act quickly to moving from the area and out of safety was if my mother took my father back and my brother needing me out of his place, and me being completely self-reliant night after night, sleeping in the back seat of my car, at the 24-hour World's Gym parking lot, showering there, brushing my teeth there and using the Wi-Fi connection across the street at Starbucks.
I know, many people would have thought I come from a privileged background, but with the way that I have grown up, I realize that being self-reliant is key. And to need or want as little as possible and just live on love. And let that be enough. Perhaps the truest privilege lies in how we handle the things that happen for us and realize that its happening so that something better can happen inside of us so that we can do something greater outside of us for others. Thats what I intend to do in following my dreams. Going hungry and being homeless has given me more of a passion to try to end the battle of people not having what they need despite working one or two jobs. I spent a number of days and hours being upset with not having enough food or money for more food while I worked those two jobs because of having to wait to get paid in the interim between jobs. I had empathy before for those that struggle, but now, I have a deeper understanding of the feelings and the anger and frustration that may come with it. Sometimes hard work doesn't pay off, but eventually I know determination will.
"Life doesn't happen to you, it happens for you." -K. Alicia
I don't ever want to live my life and think back about all of the things I didn't do. - Unknown
***When I was living at home with my mother, I had alot of time to be as complacent as I wanted to be. My biggest concern was how to make my life as easy as possible, without anything owning me and only doing jobs that were noble or of servitude to add to the solution to world problems, rather than adding to them. To me, that meant doing jobs that were organic, that added to life, that added to love and that made it possible for me to give as much love as I could. I thought all of that depended on where I was mentally. So, i avoided stressful jobs and stressful situations. I made it my mission to only do jobs I could be passionate about. It was here, in this mindset that life was actually sometimes the opposite of easy trying to live up to my own ideals. So, I didn't money-chase, I passion-chased and anything and everything that I felt I could add to, I did it. With passion.
This year, I had the chance to move to Cali with my best friend and I psyched myself out with the opportunity...told a bunch of people and then backed out when I realized I didn't have the money. Lol-- life is funny when reality hits you and money seems to be the reason why you can't do the things you desire to do. So I backed out on my word. But while backing out of my word, interesting things happened in the months that followed. First, I finally let go of having my own personal training business which was convenient because the few clients that I had acquired ran into family issues or money issues which cut me out as their trainer. Then, after being involved with someone that never professed his love back to me (or committed to me) I found out that he was dishonest, and I let him go completely. On top of that, after a year and some months of living with my mother and the emotional distress of my father leaving her for his mistress and moving to another state for his mistress, he randomly called my mother to move back in one random night after 32 years of constant infidelities. One day he was living with his mistress, the next, with his estranged wife as if none of it had happened.
I had told her that I would leave the house if she took him back as she had been dreaming out loud about. All of us had told her this. My brother said he wouldn't go over to the house and my sister vowed to not speak to her-- and both kept their word, including me as I packed up my suitcase the next afternoon, threw it in my back trunk along with some random items, toiletries, seasonal clothes and my desire to find my place in this world. I left. My father was abusive, highly narcissistic and had greatly added to the dysfunction of the family and I was maxed out from the emotional instability and stress of their marriage. Their baggage became my baggage when I lived with them. And history would only repeat if I stayed. None of what was going on was acceptable. I departed to create something much greater, much healthier and much better quality of life beyond the one they had provided for me and my siblings.
Life had forced me to act after denying myself the opportunity to have moved to California with my best friend months prior. . And, I started to see that there was no reason to stay here as all the jobs I had held were dead end ones, and none were actual careers besides personal training which I had failed at continuing. I was broke, homeless, unemployed and struggling emotionally. My family had become broken and displaced than ever before and the love I had desired, I had lost. Here I was, back at a place of insecurity. But, I had not ever let it define me, only test me and sharpen me so I could learn and understand life as it is.
I then, stayed at my brother's house for as long as I was welcome, which was about a month. Everyday my niece, "Babens" would greet me with a smile or tote her iPad into my bed and we'd watch our favorite shows online and fall asleep together. I got a taste of what it would be like to have a child of my own the days I lived there. I'll never forget how easy unconditional love was to give and to receive in that environment with Baben's head laying next to mine or how emotionally aware she was towards me. "Adden, I don't want you to be alone in this room by yourself...allll day loooong. So I'm gonna snuggle with you." She always called me "Adden" (Kristen- Aunt = Adden). It will never cease to amaze me how someone so young could understand the feeling of empathy that much at a young age. After a month of hanging out with my brother's family, I had gotten the nudge to leave.
"In order to fly, you must jump first."
So thats what I did. I jumped into my car and slept there for six weeks. In-between it all, I would randomly sleep at a bartending friend's house (Lucy) with roommates that were kind, creative, sincere, eclectic and accepting. And in a way, they became my new family. We had sunday dinners also known as "Roommate Night" where we all took turns cooking and truth be told, not all of us were roommates, but when you were there regardless of where you stayed (inside or out of the house) you were a roommate. The acceptance I found there was simple and sweet and just what I needed - bucking up with the life I wanted but didn't have. Lucy was my friend from bartending school who had a firecracker attitude and a heart of gold. She gave to me with little expectation as if she knew I wouldn't take advantage of her. I don't know if she'll ever know how much I appreciated that. The beauty of her was in the small things (that were really big things) in the details. She juiced vegetables and fruits and shared her lunch, breakfast and dinner with me that were the very foods on my own diet. We would go to the gym together and I could go free of cost on Lucy's gym guest pass. And, there was a day or two that she gave up her bed in her room for me to sleep in...it was as though I were her years ago when she was orphaned and she cared for me the way she would have cared for herself. And we related, as our family stories were similar-- having to be self-sufficient at young ages, we learned how to fight for ourselves and survive and live with little or no support (mentally and emotionally especially). Lucy came at the right time for me and she helped to soften the blow of having any expectations for people that I had long neglected. Other days, I would sleep at my brother's clubhouse parking lot. And, if I were babysitting "Babens" I would spend the night at his house after doing my laundry.
My best friend and I would think up ways to get out of the same situations that we were constantly living in together on opposite coasts i.e. staying at people's houses, sleeping on couches, sleeping in our cars and whether or not to go back home to our families as much as we would love them seemed to hinder our growth, our truest potential and from following our greatest dreams. So, instead of complacency and safety (but not emotional safety) we chose to struggle so that we could do better than accept the lives that could be handed to us...through our overbearing emotionally unstable parents. So we jumped into a world of not knowing where we would be sleeping. All we knew was that we'd be sleeping in pursuit of our dreams.
So, in essence, after graduating from bartending school In May, I got my first job as a bartender at this bowling alley that was a cigar bar, restaurant and main bar. The main bar was where I worked. I worked hard there picking up on everything that I felt I should have known as a bartender there. Meanwhile, I would begin to make money while in training. Paul, the other bartender there also had no family and explained to me how the restaurant industry gave him a life that no one else could give him when he was orphaned at 14 and then was adopted at about 15 or 16 by a lady who owned a kind of brothel or prostituting service. She was the one who pushed him to pursue his dreams and leave the area that he grew up in before his mother died (why he was orphaned). He too, couldn't handle living life in the past being reminded of his mother's death by extended family. So, he ran away. And like Lucy, who was also orphaned at 14 because her family was highly dysfunctional and had hurt her deeply, she became independent and lived on an Indian reservation years before she found other opportunities. What I learned from the both of them was how they continued to live and lived without being anchored to their pasts. They lived like it was a new day, everyday-- and like their lives were their own. They fully owned themselves despite being hurt by family situations. They were brand new "in the now" kind of people and were made brand new in the decisions they chose on how to live life for themselves and others. They lived in the moment. I started to see more that when one struggles, typically they have a deeper sense of what it means to survive and many times more of a respect for mankind because of the pain they lived through and how others helped them. They naturally experience what it means to have empathy. With Lucy and Paul, I started to see them more as reflections of myself.
Paul was the "live in the moment" part of me that just wanted to do anything that served others to get his mind off of feeling hurt and to continue to survive. Lucy was the part of me that gave and gave until it hurt and the only reason it hurt was because there was some level of expectations for a return. Though similar, I am highly conscious of my few expectations of others and realize that perhaps it could be less. But the greatest lesson from the both of them was survival. Despite what pain was left or felt deeply from their past, they still moved forward daily with a conscious effort to not live in the pain but to heal from it in simply making daily decisions on how to live. I think that's what they call living with "vitality". There was a hunger in Paul's eyes and a fire burning in Lucy's that I won't ever forget.
Meanwhile, I was working like I dog. After getting a job as a bartender where I met Paul and realized I had not made 100 dollars or even 80 dollars, but 40 on any 8-9 hour shift I had worked in two weeks and realized that it was a dead-end. I had told all the roomates and non-roommates this and we all decided that it was time for me to find another. Then, Lucy was working at an upscale hotel as a cocktail waitress and invited me to come over there. So after nights of hanging around her job at the bar and talking it up with guests I interviewed and was offered a position where Lucy and I worked for a night when she quit. She ranted and raved about how it was too much work for little money and that other servers were stealing her tables and how it was infringing on her personal life. In all the hoopla, I really enjoyed the passion that Lucy brought everywhere with her. She was a lively person, that was sweet and bombastic at the same time. I had not seen such a combo-- literally fire and ice. So, then, it was just me. Me and all the other "fob" speakers. We were ALL immigrants at this upscale hotel and it was there that i worked more like a dog. I was the hostess, the food runner, the bartender and the waitress and I had calculated after working there for two weeks that on average I was making 13.50 an hour including tips. We wore these butler's outfits where everything was long sleeved and long pants with closed-toe shoes. I vowed to Mrs. Mona that I would quit if it was ever as hot as it was the 2nd week. I had never been so physically uncomfortable in my life working anywhere. So, the next day I went online and searched for another job, not because I needed one, but because I wanted one. Through craigslist, I applied to four jobs and had gotten a callback for an interview within a few hours of going into work early as a waitress the same day. Sure enough, by chance, or luck, or God my waitress job that was a mile and a half away from this one, in Staffing, became my 2nd job down the street.
I will never forget that it was my best friend who had said to me when I complained about my waitress job, "Kristen, I think you could get another job as easily and as quickly as you got this one." And like magic, I did. And it paid several dollars more than the waitressing job. I was starting to see a trend, that we become or acquire what we think or believe. I had learned it before but more actively, through my struggles, I was living this daily. I was sailing on positive thoughts, instead of living in a place of need. And thats part of "the secret" that everyone is talking about. You can't live your life always in chasing desires and wants and needs, you have to just be available to letting it happen and simply expect it to happen freely....without being so bonded or attached to the outcome. With that said, I never complained about living in my car. A friend of mine who I had had from college called me up randomly after us not talking for 3 months or so. I explained to him honestly what was going on and he offered for me to move in with him in a totally different state in the middle of nature and away from the city in Montana. It would be a completely different pace of life that I was ready for. He passed my resume on to an old friend of his who has her own business in the Wellness industry. Something about how fluid this opportunity occurred felt right. First, I knew he would have my back if I were to begin struggling again and he would help me better than my family (no fault on them), second, there was more opportunity for me to do what I had wanted--- to start my own business doing some kind of wellness practice and healing people which was right up this friend's alley.
As soon as he extended the offer and volunteered to book hotel rooms for me my car battery died and I needed more maintenance performed on it than a new battery. So as easily as I made little money from my first job as a bartender it went into my car. But it happened at the right time...at the beginning of the journey, not on the road trip. So, as events began to happen I saw that they were in line with me moving out of the DC area and moving to some place alot different and that matched the kind of person I am --creative, artistic, interesting, free and spirited. So after a week and a half of working for the staffing company, I resigned/got fired.
***Weekend Night Shift Staffer:
After working diligently for two weekend shifts including 4th of July weekend working over time and being promised time and a half for that Thursday and Friday I only saw half of what was promised to me in my paycheck (I worked 36 hours that weekend). Then doing extra work that involved commission and having the credit handed to the weekday staffers I was getting a bit peeved. I came in almost everyday for the first week and was told that I was welcome to come in during the week for extra hours or to help out so I decided to do extra. Then, the new supervisor telling me they had "issues" with me: open-toed shoes, eating at my desk, coming into work unannounced on a Monday, and that "no commission was EVER promised to you, Kristen". I started to see that what I thought I had signed up for was not being followed through and I was being penalized for acknowledging the broken promises made to me. After a call from a co-worker who thought we would be fired, I hastily went to pick up my check as this small company. The receptionist holding the checks and other Management seemed to be edgy after losing a contract the week prior. My head was starting to spin. I was tired of there always being some kind of conflict whenever I was trying to get ahead and thought about what this meant. Meanwhile, I became very upset by the way I was being treated after doing much more than what was required of me in a job I had only done for thirteen days. I later received a phone call from my new boss who chuckled after asking me if i was "okay" with everything the new supervisor had to tell me about what others "complained" about. I was still very upset and after I explained firmly that I wasn't okay with doing work that someone else was getting the credit for (i.e. commission) and how "eating at my desk" is "normal at companies bigger than this one" and no one has EVER had a problem with me eating at my desk and that it was more cost-efficient for employees to eat at their desk at lunch instead of going out to lunch for an hour," (like they all did). I was clearly offended. The conversation escalated when the VP tried to turn everything back around on me. It became apparent very quickly that they had other plans for me of letting me go and were building up ridiculous little things to accuse me of based off of rumors of a "cross-country trip" they heard me talking about. I knew there was something deeper going on that had little to do with me. I realized that many people do things out of fear of losing. The Vice President was one of those people I realized as he continued to chat with me.
So he said "Kristen, I don't think we'll be needing you anymore. I'm the boss. So I can let you go."
"No. You're not firing me. I resign. Because you don't keep your promises and you always go back on your word. So, good luck!"
And just like that, I knew I was leaving the area. Every door I walked through closed before I made it past the foyer...so to speak. And just like David said, (my longtime friend), "What do you have to stay there for? Anything? Come out here to Montana and stay with me." There was nothing to stay for besides the new friends, "the roommates" I just acquired. I had struggled to pay my bills for the last 5 years doing personal training and everything else. I was tired. Montana was calling me louder and I felt I would be needed there for greater things. So the following week, I visited all family and friends, packed up my things and took off for Montana with only the money I had made the prior week and faith.
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I happily made my way towards the West Coast and would eventually meet up with my best friend so we could finally do what we had intended to do in January 2014. To collaborate on radio projects, non-profit projects and start a youtube channel based on empowering others who are struggling while pursuing their dreams.
One thing that I cannot overlook is how life gives you chances and it will continue to give you chances until you learn to do something different. The only way that I was going to act quickly to moving from the area and out of safety was if my mother took my father back and my brother needing me out of his place, and me being completely self-reliant night after night, sleeping in the back seat of my car, at the 24-hour World's Gym parking lot, showering there, brushing my teeth there and using the Wi-Fi connection across the street at Starbucks.
I know, many people would have thought I come from a privileged background, but with the way that I have grown up, I realize that being self-reliant is key. And to need or want as little as possible and just live on love. And let that be enough. Perhaps the truest privilege lies in how we handle the things that happen for us and realize that its happening so that something better can happen inside of us so that we can do something greater outside of us for others. Thats what I intend to do in following my dreams. Going hungry and being homeless has given me more of a passion to try to end the battle of people not having what they need despite working one or two jobs. I spent a number of days and hours being upset with not having enough food or money for more food while I worked those two jobs because of having to wait to get paid in the interim between jobs. I had empathy before for those that struggle, but now, I have a deeper understanding of the feelings and the anger and frustration that may come with it. Sometimes hard work doesn't pay off, but eventually I know determination will.
"Life doesn't happen to you, it happens for you." -K. Alicia
I don't ever want to live my life and think back about all of the things I didn't do. - Unknown
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