[00:00:00] Hello and welcome and as always, thank you for being here. So this solo episode is based on a few things. The first is that I have been hearing from people who have asked me to share more of my story based on little bits that they have heard in other episodes, and also it. Was triggered when I was going through some recordings on my phone and I found a recording that I did on a subway platform in New York City of a man who was always performing during that time, and I'll tell you when that is in a second.
And he was singing the slow version of Take On Me. He always. Had a acoustic guitar and had [00:01:00] an amazing voice, and it just made me think, okay, I will share part of my story after hearing this, and especially part of my story that involves New York City and my time in New York City and how much I love that place.
And the recording I will share at the very end of the episode. It, uh, was at the seventh Avenue g and f train stop in Brooklyn. I do not remember his name by the way. So if anyone does know who this is in the recording, please reach out and let me know. And I will put his name in the show notes and link to him if I can find him.
Anywhere. Also, the recording was done in on March 6th, 2020, which if you [00:02:00] remember, especially any of you who are living in New York City or you were living in New York City 2020, that is exactly 11 days before the COVID. Lockdown in New York City happened. So that was another thing that popped out to me is the fact that I recorded that right before everything changed and the lockdown changed a big trajectory of my life, and that was moving back to California in September of 2020.
So a lot of that just brought about a lot of. Memories for me, so I am going to go into my story and just a little tidbit of it.
Welcome to the average nineties GAL podcast. Join me as I share my own journeys through [00:03:00] life, how I got and continue to get through them, as well as real stories from real people in this crazy world. Let's get through it together.
Okay, so a big part of my life was moving to New York City, but leading up to that, I think I need to give a little extra background, and that is the fact that I transferred from community college to a four year college. It was Cal State Long Beach. When I, I think it was the year 2000. 2000, 2001, I was going to community college, just going for the GE requirements to transfer to a four year.
I started everything pretty late. I can get into that at some other time, [00:04:00] but I, uh, really after high school, just had zero direction and had no idea what I wanted to do, but I did not want to go to a four year college because I had no idea what I wanted to do. I knew that I would just be partying the whole time.
So I went to community college, messed around a little bit, but then I found acting. I found theater. I didn't do it in high school. I didn't do it at any other time. The only thing I did was danced, but I loved performing, but I found theater and found acting and I absolutely, at that time, especially. Felt like I found what I wanted to do with my life.
So I transferred to Cal State Long Beach to the theater department, emphasis on acting. And I will say up until now, really was [00:05:00] two of the very best years of my entire life because all I was doing was theater. I was not doing any. Math and science and English, even though I loved English and poetry, but I wasn't doing all the required classes because I got it all done in community college.
Anyone listening who is, who has children who are about to graduate or anything like that, or if you still wanna go back and go to school, I highly suggest doing that because. You will enjoy those two years or however long you are in college. So much more. And it really, no joke, the best time of my life anyway, while I was in the theater department, we took a trip to New York City.
We obviously watched a bunch of plays, did a bunch of things. I was in Manhattan the whole time doing [00:06:00] all the things with my friends. Going to the museums and going to all the tourist sites, doing all the things, but am amidst all of that. I felt like I needed to be there. It was a very surreal, strange, but exciting and just meant to be feeling.
I not once felt unsafe. This was in 2002, I believe. Maybe 2001, but I think it's 2002 that I was there. I'd never felt strange in that city. I just felt like I needed to be there. I even had a moment in Central Park where I was just sitting by one of the. Not the large reservoir area, but another body of water.
I was sitting on the grass near a body of water and just [00:07:00] staring out and thinking about life and all the things, probably journaling. I can't remember. I was eating a snack. I went and got something to eat and to drink, and just sat there by myself and I saw a man sitting by the water. He turned around and looked straight at me, and he looked exactly like the grandfather.
I never knew, and he looked at me for a moment and I looked at him, and then he got up and he walked away, and it was the strangest feeling, but yet at the same time, it was this sign, this wild sign that said yes. This is where you need to be. And that grandfather who I never knew he was born in Brooklyn, raised until he was a certain, he was young when they moved, but he was this interesting connection to [00:08:00] New York, which, and the reason I'm bringing this up is he comes up later in the story and he was also a cinematographer.
So he was in the, in the ca, the camera arts and did movies and everything. So. I had this weird connection to him without ever even knowing him as well. So of course I went back to Long Beach, finished, graduated, and I remember speaking to one of my acting teachers, uh, someone who is an amazing human being still to this day of course.
And he was saying, I think theater is your thing and, and I think you need to go to New York. I instantly said yes. I, I agree. So, fast forward a little bit, and I did, I moved to New York City in 2005. I just, I [00:09:00] saved up money. I worked, I lived with my parents and just saved, saved, saved, saved. A friend called me one day and said, I have a friend who lives in Brooklyn who is going to need a roommate in June.
Do you think by then you may be moving out there or able to move out there? And I said, yes. That's a great goal to have. I will do that. I did not know her. I of course, knew my friend, but I did not know this person at all. I did not know a single soul in New York City. I was called to do it. I was called to move.
So in June of 2005, I took a plane to New York City. I had only a suitcase to my name. My new roommate, who I had never met, picked me up at the airport, and I then was living in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. The strange thing about Greenpoint, Brooklyn, by the [00:10:00] way, is the street I lived on was two. Two streets away from the house that my grandfather lived in.
So I lived on Freeman Street and his house was on Java, and I think he also lived on India Street as well. So I did not plan that at all either. I had no idea about Greenpoint. I didn't even know that he lived there until my dad told me. You're moving to Greenpoint. That's exactly where your grandfather was.
So once again, it was this sign. This sign from the grandfather. I never knew. So I lived in New York City for 15 years total. I did pursue acting a little bit, but I have to say it isn't what kept me there. I pursued it and found out really quickly. That [00:11:00] I did not have the confidence to continue doing it, to try to really give it a hundred percent.
I wonder if one day I will go back into just, just acting, just trying out for local theater, but it really wasn't for me to try to do it as a living once again, I don't think I had the confidence to do it. I. Really needed more stability in my life in terms of my job and everything. That is just who I am as well.
I really love stability. I love knowing where the money's coming in and when it's coming in. I did not wanna be a server, which just meant to me that I just didn't wanna go for it enough, because if I really, really wanted it, I would've of course done all of that. I wouldn't have been scared about. The money or what job I had.[00:12:00]
So I lived in Greenpoint up until 2013 and then I moved to South Park Slope within the time that I was in New York City. I got married, I had a kid, I also got divorced. So big, big. Themes and changes and everything that happened to me from 2005 to 2020 all happened in New York City. I went through all of it.
I went through all the things, and yet at the same time, I did not move because I hated the city. I will forever love that place. I also met lifelong friends there. Former coworkers, people in my neighborhood, and it will forever be a place that has so much meaning to me and so [00:13:00] much in in my life, and it is a part of me.
I know too that because I went through all the hardships while living in a place that can be very hard to live in, I still. Just absolutely loved it. I, I hate being in humidity. I hated the summers, but I still loved the city and I do miss it as well. And I moved back to California in 2020 because my ex-husband also wanted to move as well.
We weren't going to move. Neither one of us was going to take our kid. Across the country from the other person. So we both agreed, you know, if we were going to do it, we both were going to do it. And my parents also moved back to California as well. That's another side sidebar to all of this, is that my [00:14:00] parents moved out in 2013 to New York.
They lived in. Not upstate, but they lived in Ulster County area in around, um, Kingston Hanson area. They lived in a stone house at one point. That was built in 1717, I believe. And it was this amazing old stone house that had a really old cemetery right by, and my parents experienced ghosts. That home as well.
So that was an amazing time and I will be forever grateful to my parents because they moved out, because they saw that I needed help. They saw that I was struggling. And if you wanna hear about that part of my story, it is in. One of the first episodes that I share, everything that I [00:15:00] went through, what they saw, they saw it.
So even though I wasn't sharing everything I was going through, they had no idea about any of the cheating, anything that I was thinking of and going through, and the depression and the postpartum issues. I didn't say it, but they saw it when they came to visit me and. They actually came out to help. And once again, I'll be forever grateful for that because wow, did I need it.
And I think I was so deep in darkness that I didn't realize how much I needed it because it was, it became so easy for me to hide it and to just keep going day by day and not ask for help. So the fact that they just did it, whether I asked or not, is something I will never forget as well. And my parents, so they would watch my son for me, we, my son and I would go on trips to visit [00:16:00] them because it wasn't difficult at all.
You just hopped on the train and they would pick us up at the train station, and then they would hop on the train and come to us in Brooklyn. So. It was an amazing way to escape every now and then to be in the country, to be in this old stone house and have a different experience. And my son was able to experience that when I really needed a break.
I could take him to their place for a weekend, a long weekend, anything, especially before he was in school. And so it was an amazing way to. Save me and to get me out of the funk that I was in. I also, once again, as I said before, made lifelong friends and it really helped me get out of the funk as well, is meeting people who brought me back to who I [00:17:00] was, and those were people in the neighborhood in Brooklyn that I made.
They probably don't even know it either, but the local bar across the street, American Cheese, and if you're listening to this and go to Park Slope, please go to American Cheese on seventh Avenue and 15th Street. It's an amazing spot and it's where I met all of these friends and people don't, they probably have no idea.
So if any of them are listening, thank you as well. 'cause everyone I met there. Helped me get out of my shell and helped bring me back to the person that I am today and the person I really, truly am, my authentic self. So thank you to all of you. If you're listening, I am so glad I did that. I am so glad that I followed my gut and moved there, and I'm very proud of myself for doing that.
People would tell me that. I was really brave, but I didn't feel brave because it [00:18:00] just felt right. I didn't think that I was doing anything scary until people later on said, I cannot believe you did that. I cannot believe you just up and left. You didn't know a soul. But now think of all of the things that I've done and been through, and all of the new souls that I know now, and I will know and probably until the day I die.
Because I made that choice. So even though the reason I went there was for acting, that's not the reason I stayed. And I left because I really wanted my son to have a better experience in school. He is going to an amazing school and in, in an amazing school district, it is all, all for him. It really was all for him.
And I do not regret it at all, and I am closer to other family members here as [00:19:00] well. My parents moved back and so I'm around my parents and I'm here for my parents who are getting older. And not that they need my help all the time, but I'm around and they are around their grandson. And so it, it's meant to be, it is all, it is all working out the way it should.
I have to say, I won't be surprised if I move back to New York City one day after my son graduates high school or whenever I feel called again. 'cause I moved, even though I was speaking to my ex about moving back, it also was something where I was following my gut and. My gut said yes, this is, this is the time.
And my ex said, if, if we are going to do this, this is the perfect time to do it because it was September of 2020. So I hope you enjoyed hearing a little bit more of my story, and if you feel called to do something and you aren't doing it, you can go [00:20:00] to my decision making episode as well. Or maybe this will help you.
Just say, Hey, yeah, this is giving me the extra push to go after something I've been wanting to go after. And just a reminder too, that just because the reason you do something may not be the outcome, you may have another outcome. There may be multiple outcomes just by making and following what it is that you really are feeling called to do.
And now I hope you stick around to the end to listen to the recording that I referenced at the beginning. And once again, this is from the Brooklyn seventh Avenue. Stop, uh, the g and the F on March 6th, 2020. Thank you so much for listening as always, [00:21:00] and I will see you in in the next one. Thanks so much.
[00:22:00] Bye.
