INTROSPECTION

I'm in love with cities I've never been to and people I've never met.

[cheyennenielsen]

Essay 1/29/18 | home

"One of the mixed blessings in the conviction that nothing like this has every happened to anyone before."

I’m not sure how many of you are at all interested in my new blog, but I’ve had a Wix site for a hot minute, and would like to share my most recent post with you! I love it, bottom line, so if you have a minute to read some self-reflection, I’d be very appreciative!  (also you can now sign up for emails when I post if you’re THAT intrigued)

[cheyennenielsen]

Happiness Lives In All of Us; Moving Forward.

After 4 years of blogging on Tumblr, I took a step forward and moved to another website, in hopes I’d be able to take myself and my writing a little more serious. Thank you, for those of you that have read here up to this point, and I would love it if you followed me over to the next stage. I’m sharing this as my last post here, and my first post with my new site. I want it to be viewed as less of a transition for me and more of a reminder to spread as much love and happiness as you possibly can for the rest of your days. It might not be unconditional, but it lives in all of us. As when most tragic events happen, we've found ourselves coming (somewhat) closer together as not only a nation, but a world, in light of the recent events in Manchester. When it hits such a full interest like music, however, these events bring attention to a whole new meaning of "togetherness."

I'm honored and proud to be a part of something not only larger than myself, but something that, when situations like this arise, is unconditionally understanding, supportive, and wanting to help alleviate pain or stress or heartache in any way possible. The common denominator is obviously music and the peace it creates simply by being, so I've seen plenty of covers, live tributes, and moments of silence mid-show for those lost and those grieving.

Upon listening to a cover of "Let It Be" by The Beatles, done by the ever so lovely Alex Aiono, I stumbled into the comments section to see if I could find any comments of substance. Without reading through too many "NOTIF SQUAD" and "OOOOMG THIS IS SO GOOD" comments, I found one comment that really made me uncertain. I'd love to use the word upset, but I can't fault this person for how they view the situation.

As a preface, I must say, I tend to make things far more emotional than they need to be. It is something you'll learn about me more as I go about sharing my inner most thoughts and feelings here. I think too much, and I pick the simplest things apart for the sake of finding some bubbling over of emotional nonsense. This was one of those comments that sparked that... or maybe it's the hippie/flower child/peace craving inner 8 year old in me. 

The comment simply read "Everyone reading this, I love you all! We are all gonna win!"

This isn't the first comment I've seen similar to this one, since the incident in Manchester happened, and thinking further back, I've seen a variation of this comment more times than I could count. The uncertainty of it, or the part that made me upset, is the idea that happiness and basic comfort in our own environment is something we have to battle for. It's something we're in competition for. It's something we have to fight for. I get it's called "the war on terror," but when did happiness seemingly stop being a basic human right?

Everyone knows the opposite of "win" is "lose," and unfortunately, in this situation, those people losing are the ones dealing with loss. I've been stewing over comments like that for a few days, and I can't seem to reach a decent conclusion on why we either deal with loss or we have to compete over who gets to be happy, and under what circumstances. I know the phrase "you have to work for what you want" shouldn't feel applicable here, but why are we idling in a position where happiness doesn't seem to be guaranteed.Happiness no longer feels unconditional, although I'm sure it never really was, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be kept from being some sort of available source to everyone. I'm talking about it like it's a common good, but why does it actually feel like we're buying, trading, and selling delight for what it is, and what it could be, vs enjoying it for how we have it and find it already? What are we trading it for? Everyone has happiness in them, so why don't we act like it?

We have love, we have compassion, we have caring, it's all a basic human right, yet we're fighting wars and battling to keep our lives from people who don't seem to have it or have never been shown it. That doesn't mean it should have to be "won."

You win games. Happiness isn't a game, happiness is enlightenment. It's livelihood. Why do we feel like it's something that's not already in us, it's something we have to fight for? As a side note, I want to express my deepest sorrows to those dealing with loss, following the bombing in Manchester, at this time. I want everyone to love, and love hard, for the rest of their days.

[cheyennenielsen]

One Post A Day Keeps Simplicity At Play.

I've been trying my hand at this "one a day" thing in many ways. Not in ways like vitamins and more than 8 glasses of water, like I should be, but rather in ways I had hoped would fuel my creativity and push me to think a little more outside the box.

One of the two ways is "journaling" each day. For 2 months straight, I've written something about every single day up until this point. Not only am I looking at it as an opportunity to force me to brush up on my writing skills (as you can tell, it isn't doing too much), but writing every day is giving me a window to look back through in a few years, or a couple of weeks, and remember what it is I did that day. My grandmother journaled almost every day for God only knows how long, and those journals now sit in my Aunt Heather's basement, aging information and important dates in my Grandmother's life that I feel, at this point, I should be paying more attention to.

Not only did she write that often for herself, but she also wrote for and to others. When she passed, she had multiple pen pals who wrote in the comments of the online version of her obituary about how dearly she loved her grand kids and how writing with her was something to look forward to. I, in no way, am discrediting what I'm doing here, just to be clear. However, I do have those doubts of "who am I writing to?" and "who am I writing for?" if not only for myself. This whole "self sufficient" thing doesn't work well when you put most of your life on the internet.

The second permanent mark on my daily agenda is posting on Instagram. I just realized how millennial I sounded.

However, as someone who once genuinely wanted to be a photographer in her life, no matter how difficult said task would be, whatever photos I take, I do enjoy sharing. I did not, by any means, think this would be an easy task, but I did think it would be easier than it has turned out to be. My initial idea was to post every day, for a year. Now I may be second guessing myself.

As I racked the depths of my brain to figure out what to share today, I became discouraged pretty quickly at the lack of "fun" things I had to share. Share another picture from Las Vegas? No. You hit your quota at the end of January. Selfie? Although it may garner quite the attention, I don't like my face that much. Maybe there's an old Boomerang you can post? How many throwbacks can I share in a week?

I absolutely fall victim to seeing how many people liked my photo and who exactly gave it enough attention to double tap. It's a terrible habit. I also wonder what encourages my followers to like certain pictures, but not others. Why do you engage with my content only on Tuesdays? Did you actually read my caption or did you just like the picture to like the picture? Hint: IT DOESN'T MATTER, NOR SHOULD IT.

I snapped the picture I posted today, then thought to myself "what's the point of this? Nobody cares about the shit I do anyways," and that's when it hit me: the issue lies in how unhappy I get when I realize people who follow me would rather pay attention to my face than the content I create. No matter what I write, what I draw, what I snap, what I video tape, nothing will garner as much attention as my face.... and that's SUPER disappointing. Here we go, again, with the millennial nonsense. Guys, my face isn't even that impressive, but it makes so much sense when you go on someone's instagram and it's ONLY PICTURES OF THEM. THEIR FACES. THEIR BODIES. THEIR BOOBS. (I'm thinking about one person in particular and getting angry all over again, but we'll keep that on the DL.)

Sex really does sell, and in a time of getting high off weed AND instant gratification, it's no wonder the people I consistently unfollow DESERVE that unfollow, because I didn't come here to see your cleavage, ma'am. You're going cool places. You're meeting cool people. You're eating instagram-worthy food. I don't care if it makes you look like a "basic bitch," I WANT TO SEE THAT SHIT MORE THAN I WANT TO SEE WHAT YOUR NEW UNDERWEAR LOOKS LIKE.

...okay I'm back.

I'm only down on myself because I know 90% of the people who follow me and I know what they like to give their attention to. Yes I'm aware that I've gotten better looking, but it's more of a compliment to me when a guy likes a teaser of the new YouTube video I posted vs. when he calls me attractive, and likes my selfies, combined. That is in no way meant to be a bragging situation, it's real life, baby.

[cheyennenielsen]

Emotionally Available. Mentally Unmanageable.

There's so much good in the world that I feel I don't hold in my heart. I actively do my best to be an understanding and, for lack of a better term, decent human being, but it's days like today that lend a hand in my further understanding that there are far better people walking the planet, and how much I strive to be at that level of empathy.

This realization could have something to do with the fact that my senses and emotions are unbelievably heightened today. Beyond my control, the smallest things make me upset or angry, and once I get a handle on it, the next emotion is more likely to be some extent of appreciation to the point of wanting to cry. In starting to write all of this out, the best way I can describe it is a mix of hyper awareness and sensory overload.

When I woke up this morning, I had a strange feeling about the day, and here we are at 2pm and it has yet to waiver. I've been in public most of the morning and I've been beyond aware of things going on around me and how people are going about their day. Not saying that I haven't always been observant, but for someone who has finally calmed down on the things she notices in public, it seems like observing the general public has been turned up a notch. This morning I noticed at the gas station that a guy had parked his car at the pump, then walked inside without his keys.

"That's a bold move," I thought to myself, although for most of my childhood, my mom left her keys in the van overnight sometimes. Then I noticed upon walking out of the gas station, the same man had left the nozzle to the gas pump in his car, as well as his driver side door WIDE open. Nothing I should be concerned about, I don't think, but here I was... concerned. Since, situation upon situation has led me to some sort of curiosity, or even anxiety, and I can't seem to shake it. Where I do have issues with anxiety, I don't deal with the effects consistently. Except again, here we are, before 2:30, and I've had two minor attacks. What gives?

Maybe it's just be not being trusting of the general public as much anymore, not that I really did in the first place, but it's like I'm habitually watching over my shoulder. I'm almost on guard, with nothing except my being to protect. It's throwing me off a little bit. What I still don't understand, however, is how watching a younger kid in a wheelchair donate to a local shelter for kids (or something of that nature) almost moved me ENTIRELY to tears. Usually I'm not this openly vulnerable, but this is a wave of unmistakable emotions that I cannot let go of today.

So begs the question, how could I possibly be more emotionally available to anybody when the emotions I have readily available now are already too much to bear?

[cheyennenielsen]

Don’t Live Your Life Color Blind.

Race wasn't an influence for me, as a child.

Growing up in the midwest from the time I was born to a few months before I turned 13, I was surrounded by 99.9% white. It wasn't until I moved to North Carolina that I realized, and acknowledged, the range of diversity living outside my walls. Even now, I'm still finding that North Carolina has a large population of people of color, varying on where in the state you are. Even so, I never understood racism or judging people by their skin color until I got a little older. I never understood completely ruling out someone for being different in any way, shape, or form, for that matter.

I found myself in a race exhibit in Raleigh yesterday where, for the first time, I was among the minority in the room. I don't think I've ever felt a more unique feeling in a situation pertaining to the color of my skin. I looked at all of the people around me, of all different skin types, and backgrounds, and walks of life, and felt more inspired than anything. Many had already written down their struggles with racism, but I found myself wanting to go to each and every person and talk to them about what brought them to the exhibit and why. I felt hyper aware, almost like a sensory overload, wanting to take everything in, as well as wanting to be observant of conversations and body language.

The exhibit itself wasn't too large, but the energy was massive. For a while, quite a few people scurried through the rooms, looking at pictures, stopping for a minute to snap a few for themselves, and viewing the compilations playing on a TV set up right before the exit. One particular story caught my eye, where a man was talking about his childhood and growing up identifying as mixed, rather than one race or the other, and he opened his segment with the thought: "I often hear people say that they can't wait for the day they live in a color-blind world, but I think blindness is the issue," which I immediately wrote down, mainly because I've had this thought myself before.

I understand the sentiment of it, and it means well. However, why imagine a film being put over your eyes in order to see everyone as equal, when you could just blatantly look at everyone as an equal already? I am, by no means, anyone who has any sort of complex thought to express about race, and I also don't understand why it's so hard to accept someone for who they are, not what they look like, so it's hard for me to form a complex and coherent thought in order to conjure up a discussion question other than "why?"

Why is it okay, no matter your sexual orientation, religion, race; whether you identify as female, male, or non-binary; or what your income is, to be discriminated against? Disclaimer: it's not. Why has it become such a simultaneously hushed topic, as well as being a hard-hitting one, to not accept someone who is different from you? Why feel threatened? Why feel like it's okay to undermine someone who may not have as much privilage as you? Just WHY.

The amount of information held in that 3 room exhibit was far more than I could process in 2 hours time. Yes, I would go back, and yes I urge you to do the same if you find yourself in that area at any point before it closes.

Don't live your life in color-blindness. Unless you're actually color blind, then by all means. Nonetheless, I still value you.

[cheyennenielsen]

There’s People Falling Over Their Own Shoes.

Written February 25th.   "Today the high was a whopping 52 degrees in the lovely city of Nashville, accompanied by a nice wind. Not breeze, wind. Despite the sun being out, the cold held on with no avail, and with another cold front coming in tonight, providing us with a freeze warning, I don't expect tomorrow to be much better. We're planning to leave fairly early, but we'll see how well that works out. Today we didn't get going as quickly as I had wanted, but I had no complaints. The 4 hours we sat doing nothing may have been the most relaxing 4 hours of this entire trip. We finally got up and going and found ourselves at the Cheekwood Botanical Gardens, that I can only imagine are absolutely breathtaking in the spring. The empty trees stood proud, bearing the tags that read the type of tree & tree name, while an array of Pansies and Tulips dotted the ground, trying to sprout as much as they could in the sunlight the morning brought in. I can't help but feel like the progress they made today will be completely thrown in reverse thanks to the freeze warning I had previously mentioned. A section of the park, typically closed off by gates on either side, was the stage that was set for this particular thought that sprang to mind. I took a look through the trees, at the sunlight shining directly in my bare face, and was simultaneously hit with a gust of wind that sent a chill through my entire body. I started thinking "if someone was sitting inside all day, just staring at the sun, they wouldn't have the slightest clue that it feels like it's 40 degrees outside today." Long story short, my brain immediately connected that to meeting someone and getting to know their base line; what they tolerate, how they treat others, how they view the world, and the sort of energy they emit. More often than not, unless given a reason to think otherwise, I paint the people I meet in this bright yellow light, but I realized just because I see the sun shining through someone doesn't mean they've got the warmth to compliment it, despite whatever hopes I may have. This afternoon I met Nina Nesbitt. We stood in the cold as the sun went down and the wind continued to blow, filled with pasta and cheesecake, and listened as she played a few songs I've had running through my speakers a time or two. As we first walked up, she had already hugged everyone else surrounding her, and she wouldn't let us slide by without an embrace as well. At the end, we all moved into a line to get a picture with her, and as Holly made her way to someone she's admired for years, the tiny blonde headed Irish girl exclaimed "I LOVE your hair! Can I touch it?" And in between sentences already being said, Holly managed out a "thank you!" and "yes!" then continued her sentiment. "I wanted to let you know that I brought my friends with me, I've been saying for years that when you come to America, I HAD to find you." Words were exchanged, it was mentioned we drove 6 & a half hours, Nina got SO excited, and we went on our merry way after snapping a few pictures. My hands were frozen to a hue of red, none of us could move our faces, and the meal we had just eaten 45 minutes ago now felt like we hadn't eaten in quite a few hours, due to the shaking and trying to stay warm. Holly turned on Noserings and Shoestrings and I started to think about this person I had decorated into being a ball of light, despite her own struggles and demons, and wondered if it was possible that she was 100% genuine, and was just cold when speaking with us. I feel like this notion is going to serve as a catalyst for me being more aware when I look at people like they're the world."

[cheyennenielsen]

Be Like Ryan.

Over the 4 days I was in Las Vegas, I discovered an overwhelming feeling of having to write about everything I took in and every situation I encountered, resulting in some of my absolute favorite pieces of writing I think I have ever done. Each of these were an email I sent to some friends to be able to express it to more than just myself. This is part 4.

  This afternoon I wandered into a casino with Hayley, her brother, and her aunt Jackie. It was suspected that Hayley's parents and uncle would be in there post lunch, and sure enough that's where we found them. Planted at a table towards the end of the row was a very concentrated Lisa Mizelle, as well as her brother, who has swiftly learned the tricks of the trade when it comes to being seated at a roulette table. At the very end, towards where all of us strays ended up, was one lone guy, who was surrounded by our group of people. He seemed to be around my age, maybe a year or two older, and was 90 shades of FOCUSED on where he wanted to put his chips in. He decided he wanted to be part of the Hall/Mizelle family, although I filled that empty space years ago, as far as I'm concerned. He threw his hands out and said "LET'S ALL PLAY TOGETHER! Guys, pick some numbers for me." Hayley picked 9. Kevin picked 26. When he came to me, I had forgotten every number ever. "8, let's go with 8," I spit out, taking a look at the board. He proudly planted a chip in every single number we gave him. I eyed him up and down a little bit, naturally. Red and gray baseball cap, an Anaheim Ducks hockey hoodie (how did I know it was the Ducks without having to be told or look it up?), regular loose white boy jeans, and what seemed to be some new sneakers, which I've been very fond of myself. If they made them in women's, I'd actually consider buying them. He had a little bit of scruff on his face, a shade of red/brown that was borderline ginger red. With every sip of beer he took, he got a little more obnoxious. From the get go, he and Hayley conversed about sports because she's really good at that. I observed.... because I'm really good at that. He admitted he was a Green Bay fan, then tried to get Hayley to talk shit about Cam Newton. This boy was not very wise. Nonetheless, the game continued, and he continued to look at me, as if trying to get me to look at him and say something. The things you see out of your peripherals. I wasn't complaining, though, because despite the fact he was pretty loud and obnoxious, he was also very cute. Apparently cute boys here have lower standards. This is my official announcement that I'm moving to Las Vegas. Eventually Hayley's mom got tired of hearing his mouth, so she cashed out. Then her aunt. Then finally after bearing the beast longer than anyone else, her uncle cashed in, and left the whole table to a new group of people to deal with the 20 something gambler, who kept throwing chips (sometimes multiple) on #8 like he was clinging on to it for dear life. So we all walked. Mainly because there was no reason to be there anymore, but also because we had an 18 year old tagging along with us. Granted, Kevin won the guy money, and received a $20 from him for it, but we knew that someone would eventually suspect something. Off went me, Hayley, and Kevin. We had things to venture to get anyways, so it's not like we left like we had no plans. We started weaving in and out through people, around buildings, dropped our things off, then started back towards the strip. This guy was all I could think about. That, matched with this idea for this writing that had been floating in my head since I unofficially met the Packers fan, who, through sharp listening, I learned is named Ryan. We regrouped at the hotel once again, tried to determine where to eat, until Hayley and I set off on our own adventure for the last time in Vegas. We got food then headed back across the street to the Bellagio to watch the water show for the second night in a row. In between shows, I stood staring at the water, having conversation with Hayley about last night's email. The entire time, I had the phrase "life is only as exciting as YOU make it" floating in my head. The entire stay here, I've had a couple of the same thoughts floating around. - I really am not a fun person. - I want to BE a fun person. - For someone who wants an exciting life, I'm not doing jack shit to get it there. - I have negative reasons to not enjoy the life I've got. - I develop infatuations with people too easily. That last one was totally off topic and something you already know, it's just super ridiculous. Reflecting on the casino visit, Ryan may have been absurdly obnoxious and loud, but he was making his life as exciting as it was, as far as he could push it. He's trying to make the most of every minute, and if that means losing all of his life savings, then winning that, plus some, back in a game of chance, so be it. The game of chance isn't how I should be relying on my life to be fulfilled. MY life is only as exciting as /I/ make it. That's in my hands. Maybe I don't have the same resources of fun, maybe my fun isn't always plausible, and maybe I don't find things fun like other people find them fun. Today I stood on the top of a building, overlooking all of Las Vegas, and had fun. Today someone cleaned a hotel room for people who don't deserve their services, and had fun. So where do I take my definition of fun past a new place, back to an old place that I've experienced almost every inch of? I suppose that should be my on switch. Find new things that are fun. Make old things new fun. Push myself to go out and do fun things. Be like Ryan. Don't drink and get rowdy, perhaps, but find fun in the simplest thing, with strangers. Did I expect to find relatable thoughts in a Green Bay Packers fan? Not at all. That's what happens when you're friends with Hayley.

[cheyennenielsen]

Imitation is the Least Fascinating Version of Face Value.

Over the 4 days I was in Las Vegas, I discovered an overwhelming feeling of having to write about everything I took in and every situation I encountered, resulting in some of my absolute favorite pieces of writing I think I have ever done. Each of these were an email I sent to some friends to be able to express it to more than just myself. This is part 3.

For the past few days I've noticed striking resemblances between people I personally know and the thousands of strange faces I look at every day. There have been at least 10 guys that look exactly like the bassist for Six Stories Told. He's humored by it. I adore the guy, but I think one Adam Peters is enough. Beyond that, there are people in this city impersonating Elvis and Pikachu and Spider-Man around every corner you turn. Everyone feels like they can be the most advanced version of themselves because of how much you can get away with. I feel as though I'm becoming that version of myself, as well. I don't have as much freedom as other 21 year olds in Vegas have, but knowing I have the ability to leave the room, walk out on the strip, and go as far either direction as possible is a pretty great feeling. I've tried interacting with others, being more confident, and feeling okay with pushing myself to stop being such a quiet and introverted observant person over the course of this trip. Part of me finds it empowering, part of me feels like it's me not being me un-apologetically. However, the people I see in passing will only know the persona I share in the moment. The only consequence or mocking I could possibly face is that from myself and from Hayley/her family. Even then, I'm the worst of the two options. I felt like I was doing okay, I hadn't been put into any compromising situations where i'd have to decide what to share and what not to. Not that it should be a decision anyways, but since turning 21, I've been fixated on this idea of being a different person, especially in social settings. Tonight that desire was put to the test, and that was a test that I failed.... miserably. Hayley and I were eating ice cream to make up for our failed attempt at getting some last night. I had (half jokingly) suggested we go sit in front of a particular sports store because there was a cute employee in there and he seemed to be playing the same game I was. We were there for not too long when a guy walked up to us out of the blue, introduced himself as Snap, and started conversation. He said something, then proceeded with half way complimenting us, etc etc. He was completely sober, borderline cocky, and wanted to just sit and talk to us despite me saying we were about to get up and go (which was not a complete lie, I was about to tell Hayley that I wasn't feeling great and wanted to go back to the room when he walked up). We talked for 10 or 15 minutes, he asking us questions, us making jokes, and him continuously mentioning all these places he had performed. I didn't think much of it, just assuming he was probably a musician trying to get us to buy some music from him or something. We finally left and came back to the room, and I was riddled with anxiety the whole time, only really telling Hayley the extent of it by the time we got back. At least 5 minutes had passed and I was still trying to come down from it. Which is not something I've ever experienced, those lasting effects. He made a decent impression, so I looked up the basics I knew about him from our brief conversation. I expected to find a Facebook or Instagram for some sort of aspiring rapper. What I didn't expect to find was YouTube videos, write ups, and "where is he now?"s of a top 12 contestant from America's Got Talent season 6. Same exact guy, instead of promoting on a TV, hustling to two awkward white girls in front of a Ben and Jerry's. That was the part of his character he left out of his introduction. People will only give you their version of face value as long as you're willing to listen for a few minutes. If their face value is behind a Olaf mask, that's their right. If their version of face value is whatever will entice you the quickest, so be it. Why is my version of face value being a listener instead of a participant, and it doesn't feel good enough?

[cheyennenielsen]

The Illusion.

Over the 4 days I was in Las Vegas, I discovered an overwhelming feeling of having to write about everything I took in and every situation I encountered, resulting in some of my absolute favorite pieces of writing I think I have ever done. Each of these were an email I sent to some friends to be able to express it to more than just myself. This is part 2.

  Today we walked close to 9 miles total, after our entire adventure was over. I managed to talk myself out of being irresponsible and spending my money on things I still absolutely do not need. I’ve not eaten a whole lot, which is finally catching up to me, but the Auntie Anne’s downstairs is for sure whispering my name from afar. For the past two days, I’ve seen a lot of people walking around with yellow banded passes hanging around their necks, allegedly branching from some sort of electronic convention happening at one of the many convention centers sitting hidden within the hotels of the boulevard. Lots of people from different backgrounds, different walks of life, and different stories lined the strip today and it made a conversation I had with Hayley last night seem more important. I had just sent the first email to you and was sitting in this extension of the room, overlooking right down the center of everything when I looked at the lines of brake lights sitting in perfect view and began to wonder what everyone’s purpose here was. Not existential crisis type, just my unwavering curiosity. You hear of people venturing to LA to become actresses and actors, some are drawn to New York for fashion, others to Nashville to follow a music career, most jump from place to place, just trying to follow their melting pot of a heart to whatever it is will fulfill them. What do people come to Vegas for? There are so many cars and no final destination. So many street blocks to be walked, and no one (except maybe me, because I’m like a child looking at Christmas lights when I weave through these sidewalks) seems to be looking with wide-eyed wonder and a look on their face of “I’m meant to be here.” It feels like this is one of those places you just end up. Maybe you visited once and knew you had to keep coming back. Maybe you got stranded and figured as long as it pays the bills, working a bellhop job for a ritzy hotel would be okay for now. Even so, I’m still glancing at the same cars stopped at the red light that I glanced at two paragraphs ago. What if you’re going nowhere? Hell, Zedd is dj-ing a block from us tonight and I STILL don’t think he planned to be playing a $100 ticket show on a Saturday night in Vegas when he started creating the music he started with. Maybe he did, maybe that was his end goal. Maybe, he thought, “that’s it, I’ve peaked. After this, I’m done for.” but I don’t think he did. Or will, for that matter. I can see how people would be drawn here, though. The lights, the theatrics, the idea that as long as you don’t get out of hand, you can pretty much do whatever the fuck you want. Take some shots, blow some cash, wake up, pop asprin, and do it again. That’s the illusion, at least. That’s how you see it in the movies. It’s very easy to feel like you’re in a movie here, no doubt. As I walked to sit in the “porch” area, a jazz song poured from MTV. One of those modern songs that feel like they had to have been in an old film. If you walk just slow enough towards the edge of the extension, you can feel the lights catch your eyes in such a way, you can feel them shining, even if they aren’t. That illusion. I felt it. For a second I could imagine my hair curled and pinned to the side, dressed up with no place to go, planning to sit by the window, admire the stars you can’t see past the blinding lights from street level, and wait for some excuse to leave the room and walk around like you’re better than everyone, without actually thinking it. Then I took a seat in my jeans, sneakers, and $7 cardigan I bought from H&M today, listening to the same jazz song, and began to write this, as if I’m the one trying to make it in this city.

[cheyennenielsen]

Touristy and Choosy.

Over the 4 days I was in Las Vegas, I discovered an overwhelming feeling of having to write about everything I took in and every situation I encountered, resulting in some of my absolute favorite pieces of writing I think I have ever done. Each of these were an email I sent to some friends to be able to express it to more than just myself. This is part 1.

Funny enough the descent into DC was far worse than how it felt coming into Vegas. It's a metaphor, I think. I've been up since 3:30 am eastern time, and it's now 8:24 pm mountain time. 11:30 pm eastern time. Somehow I'm still trucking. After a day of travel, hours waiting to check in, lunch, puking lunch and the medicine I took to get rid of my migraine, probably falling in love with a boy wearing an Arctic Monkeys shirt and black old school brown rubber-soled vans, and a successful dinner, I'm sitting in the front room of this timeshare Hayley's aunt and uncle were so gracious to invite us to for her birthday, and literally taking everything in. This particular part of the tiny apartment sticks out a little further than the rest of it, directly in front of the Aria, caddy-corner from The Cosmopolitan, and has a clear view of the towering building in the distance with "Trump" written at the top. Beyond the buildings meeting me in the face are miles and miles and miles of lights. It's a shiny reminder that Las Vegas is more than just the strip. For someone who was initially not too keen on the idea of going to Vegas in the first place, all I can do is stare in awe. However, much like Paper Towns, everything seems worse up close. From up here, all you see is lights, traffic passing by, and the occasional billboard or flashing sign of *insert celebrity here* doing *insert event here*. Tonight The Chainsmokers are doing an event somewhere clearly in the vicinity and if I felt like sweating off 20 pounds of my body weight and fighting off my ever present desire to sleep for 3 weeks, I may have pushed harder to go. Sometimes you've got to pick your own techno battles. Back to my original point; upon looking down on this city I realized how glitz and glam it seems to be and how not so glitz and glam and more touristy and choosy it is. Now, this is just an observation after a few hours of being here. Anyone will do what they can for a good dollar. Which I suppose rings true everywhere. I've stumbled upon the realization that there's not a lot I like more than I like lights. Christmas lights, moreso, but the neon building signs and worn marquee lights are doing nothing short of grabbing my entire attention. The lights beyond the mess of buildings are mainly just house lights and smaller building lights, but even those hold my gaze, pulling out the desire in me to want to know what secrets and dreams are held beyond the strip and the open palm for a pretty penny. All I've got playing in my head is Vegas Skies by The Cab. The mood fits what I would assume driving out of the thick of the city would feel like. I'll keep you posted on that.

[cheyennenielsen]

A Conversation With Myself: YouTube.

I’ve had my head in a YouTube space for longer than I can remember. It was 2013 when I started to upload regularly, but I was clicking the upload button even before that. Somewhere on the internet lives videos of 15 year old Chey, sitting in her now ex-best friend’s room talking to a camera. Somewhere on the internet lives a montage I filmed, edited, and uploaded of January 2009 to July 2009. Somewhere on the internet, I’m sure, more parts of my life remain floating around and I have yet to re-discover them. When I started uploading 3 years ago, I was uploading just to upload. Still on the heels of graduating high school and having yet to figure out that I didn’t have to be that quiet and passive person anymore, I decided to take to the internet to display the (sort of) weirder, more creative side of me. Although I wasn’t pushing the envelope with what creativity was brewing in my mind, I was still able to use this relatively new outlet as a way to be creative. I uploaded once a week, then twice a week, then back to once a week, then eventually the schedule I had set for myself was thrown out the window. In an attempt to find time to film, edit, and upload in between the amount of hours I was working, real life took precedence and my YouTube, and creativity, was put on the back burner. I was still able to watch YouTube, in the off chance I had 3 minutes to myself, but it was creating those three minutes that I found to be the hardest. Off and on for over a year, I would: film with the intent to create something and never finish it, have the intent to film and never actually pick up the camera, or upload something I was really proud of and get no feedback on it whatsoever, thus making me not want to upload, which is not how you should view your work if you’re an artist in any form of the word. For most of 2015, I didn’t have a job, leading me to have more time to watch YouTube, and ultimately discover creative visionaries who have led me straight to wanting to push myself to make incredible content. Although filming their families, their lives, and their to do lists are the meat of what it is they film, they find ways to make each video visually pleasing, as well as making it feel like you’ve never seen anything like it before, even if they’re doing the same thing they have done the past four days in a row. At first, I was immersed in the desire to want to watch every moment they’d be willing to share. It became part of my routine. Then, the routine blossomed into a hunger for wanting to pick up my camera and do these things myself. These are the people who, in a world of challenge videos, make my constantly underlying passion to want to do something different video-wise, turn it into less of an idea and more of an action. I haven’t uploaded since this summer. Even then, it was a mess of a video made up of only a few random clips I had taken from Warped Tour and family vacation. There’s absolutely nothing different about that, compared to the content I’ve always edited and uploaded. This fall I started making a video, then scrapped it. Then started another, that eventually turned into my “This Is Not A Draft” post, because I couldn’t get my footing right. YouTube was the one area of my life, for the longest time, that I felt I could really shine, even if I was just letting my brother do my makeup. I’m stuck in a place now where I feel like I’m doing the same thing everyday, and when I’m not doing that, I want to sleep. I feel like I don’t have time, I feel like I don’t have the interest, and ultimately I feel like I don’t have the interesting life or concepts to make people realize they’re into it. However, in trying to find my path, I realized that you can’t make people care. You can’t force them to acknowledge any sort of product you’ve made, and you sure as hell can’t force them to be interested. So where do I go from here? Where do I find my passion for this outlet again? The one thing I could see myself doing consistently for the rest of the foreseeable future has become something I can’t find myself doing at all. I’m not okay with that. It’s the creators like Tyler Shelton and Sam Anderson who feed my desire to find a little corner of the world no one knows about, and visually display it like it is the world. How do I get out of the cycle of being swallowed by what is my world to see it in a different light? So many questions and very few answers. Welcome to how I see the world of YouTube... which is ironic, because you can find everything on YouTube.

[cheyennenielsen]

Someone Else’s Dream.

One of my favorite things about getting older is realizing how much of an asshole I was capable of being as a teenager. Most of it was self defense, keeping myself from falling into situations I wouldn’t know how to get out of without having an anxiety attack first. Another decent chunk was over-compensating for my generally quiet being with snarky and sarcastic comments any place I felt that was necessary. A majority of those snarky comments as a teenager have manifested into those moments, as an adult, that you look back on and cringe like there’s no tomorrow. I was definitely the definition of “cringe” ages 13 to.... yesterday....? Unfortunately a lot of those instances I look back on and wish I wouldn’t have opened my mouth was with a lot of people I looked up to and put my faith in to guide me in the right direction. I, myself, am still trying to figure out the most accurate description of my personality in that time period. I felt a range of emotions I didn’t know what to do with, as every kid does, but they felt amplified, because I hadn’t ever met anyone that expressed to me that these things could be relatively normal. I found my solace and my place of well-being in music that spoke how I was feeling, because I couldn’t speak it myself. A lot of that music just so happened to be from a band called Paradise Fears, and chances are, if you’re reading this, you have more than likely heard me mention them a time or two by now. I became a fan at 16/17 and rode the wave until there was seemingly no more wave to ride. Then high tide came in, and I was back in the water, still, 3 years later resonating with their music like they had peeked into my brain and said “Cheyenne can’t fathom this, let’s write it for her,” so became their album Life In Real Time. These were guys that, at 17, I was putting way too much faith and trust in, for people who were just doing their damn best, like we were (and are) all trying to do. They were my thing to hold on to, which I now feel terrible for. I didn’t know what to do with myself, so I trusted their best knowledge, which was just writing music that spoke to the kids who would listen. The cycle continues. At 21, I’m seeing the fault in all of that. Mainly in the things I did and said, and how I treated them as untouchable rather than just a couple of guys in a band who decided to write songs about things they were dealing with themselves to make a good tune. Recently, I’ve started to really distance myself from what I spent a lot of my teenage years immersing myself in. I’m seeing the fans I was friends with, who are my age, that never left that mentality. At first I was angry they weren’t seeing where the band was headed. I was convinced it was over, and I probably still am. Maybe it will end, maybe it won’t. Regardless, they released/re-released some music today, entitled “Someone Else’s Dream.” Which is more than they’ve done in a while. Which is more than I’ve acknowledged of them in a while. I was getting ready for work this morning and listening to it, because I felt obligated to, and started feeling like I owed this to the girl who held onto this band like it was the only reason she had to live. I put the pettiness and eye-rolling to the side and just listened for a second, and I could hear her saying “I am SO PROUD of you guys, this is so good,” and following it with “it’s different, but I do like it.” It is different, and I do like it. So what if this is the last thing they release in two years, or ever? What’s the point in growing up and away from things if you can’t acknowledge that almost everyone else around you is doing the same thing? The girl hanging onto Paradise Fears with every fiber of her being is the same girl that would be devastated with how little they’ve been doing, how little they’ve been active, and how little they’ve been interacting. Them staying together until they die is her dream. The reality now is if they’re happy and content with what they’re doing, I’m happy. I’m content. I’m a slave to the sentiment. I also hate myself for that last sentence. So props to the guys in Paradise Fears helping me through the toughest years of my life thus far, while trying to figure out their own lives. That time period has undoubtedly shaped me into who I am and how I function today. Today, from someone else’s dream, I realized growing up sucks a lot of the time, but acknowledging the changes with and around you makes it a little more bearable.

[cheyennenielsen]

Notions From The Other Side.

None of this is to start a debate or to fuel the heated discussion that could potentially come from those that think once you die, there’s nothing else. I’m torn on the topic myself, although I very much believe in the afterlife and ghosts and spirits and all that terminology that would fall in this sentence if I could think of it.

Prior to this year, I hadn’t ever really experienced any sort of signs from the afterlife. None that I can remember, anyways. The idea of constantly being surrounded by the spirits of my since deceased family members was always something I carried around with me, however. I just always HOPE they’re there and watching, rather than knowing, and this may make me sound like I’m all of the synonyms for crazy, but for the first time last month, I experience what it feels like to KNOW someone who isn’t physically there has your back.

I was trying to drive home from work, and during this particular closing shift, we were enduring crazy rain. I mean raining sideways, then raining straight down, then stopping for less than 30 seconds and picking up again with no avail. I didn’t realize just how bad it was until I actually left work. I pulled out of the parking lot at 9:30 and at 9:32, I was less than a mile from where I had just left, sitting in a CVS parking lot because I couldn’t see the road. It was pouring down rain and barely foggy, and no matter whether I was driving with low beams, high beams, (I know you’re not supposed to drive with high beams on in the rain or the fog but that goes to show how desperate I was and just how low visibility was), going the speed limit or going under, I couldn’t see a damn thing. So I pulled over to wait it out.

I sat for roughly 20 minutes until it calmed down a little, then again started the 20 minute trek to the interstate. Dealing with anxiety that day already, I was white-knuckle, teeth gritting, trying not to cry, driving down this winding road. I pulled over again, this time in a parking lot a mile from the interstate exit. Waited again. This time I’d say it was 30-45 minutes I sat. Somehow I worked up the courage to get on the interstate, and the entire 12 miles I was on the interstate, I followed people like me, with their hazard lights on, who I can only assume also had their teeth gritted and their hands imprinted on their steering wheels.

Doing the rational Chey thing, I started to talk myself through it. I couldn’t concentrate with the radio on, and it was far too dangerous, and late, to call someone and talk through it with them. “You’ll get off this exit and you’ll be in the clear.” “GREAT. You’re off the exit! Now get to this stoplight and you’ll be on your way home.” “Past the gas station you always pass. Now you’re in familiar territory.”

That’s when I smelled my grandma’s perfume, which isn’t a completely unusual thing, but not something I was expecting. Usually it’s just a second I smell it. Here and gone. This time, it lingered for a little longer. So I started talking again. Mainly to myself, but also acknowledging there was a possibility that someone or something else was listening too.

“Okay, I know I’m just crazy, I know I’m imagining this, but I can smell your perfume, so…. Grandma, if you are actually here, in the car with me, will you do something to show me?”

Without skipping a beat, lightning shot across the sky in front of me. I looked to my left, then to my right, just for a second, sure I was crazy. Chills shot up and down my body, paired with a mixture of wanting to cry and complete disbelief. Then, for the first time that night, I had the feeling (through all of my anxiety) that everything would be fine. It's that kind of feeling you realize as an adult that you had as a kid. No fear, feeling invincible, feeling like you could do anything, and not knowing any better because you haven't been TAUGHT to fear anything. I felt present, not in my own head. 

I got home around 11 o'clock, and didn't bother saying anything to my dad, sure I was still crazy, but I felt like I was going to explode. Especially if I didn't tell anyone. So I texted a few people, knowing I wouldn't get a response until morning, if I got one at all. To my surprise, I got a text back. 

"Oh my god, I have chills just reading that. She was definitely with you."

Then another, this time from my brother who I was sure was asleep.

"I've got gooseybumps now too. That's fuckin awesome. She was definitely looking over you."

Then it felt real, and it's been hanging with me since, but moreso in the days leading up to her death date. She died when I was 13, almost 14. I vivdly remember talking to her on the phone the night before. She cried, like she did since we had moved. I wanted to get off the phone, because I just didn't want to BE on the phone. It made me anxious, like everything did at that age, so I rushed conversation, or stayed quiet and waited for her to fill the silence. Which must have been terrible for her.

I've had a couple moments since then that her absence has really influenced my mood, but they didn't really start until this year. The first time was a few months after my brother's graduation, where I know she would have been if she had it her way. I broke down to a friend via text one night, talking about all the things she'd miss, not physically here seeing us grow up. Even today, the day before the 7 year anniversary of her death, I was speaking with a customer about how Christmas is hard for her, because it was her dad's absolute favorite time of year. Then the flashbacks started of the endless Christmas tins full of sugary snacks. The flashes of Christmas presents scattered in every corner of her house, the Christmas tree with a million lights and ornaments on it, and the red shirt I always picture her in. 

It's hard not to get emotional, thinking of all the things she's missing, and all of the things I'm missing doing with her. Through the tears welling in my eyes, though, I know she's here, and in times where I know I need her, and she knows I need her soul, she'll be there. Although judging my desire to get tattoos, or making questionable decisions, she's in the background. Making me feel invincible, fearless, and like I can do anything, like she did when I was a kid.... even if I bothered her to the ends of the earth to get me beef jerky everytime she went to the grocery store.

[cheyennenielsen]

This Is Not A Draft.

It wasn't until I found myself 4 months waist deep in a job asking the same questions and receiving the same answers that I realized I had taken the safe route in finding another job again. By safe route I mean going back to what I already knew and loved more than hated, but started finding everything I thought I was moving forward with turned out to be negated.

The days that I work consist of the following: driving 45 minutes to work, getting there and doing the damn thing, driving 45 minutes home, often in either post-9 to 5 mid-construction traffic, or at night after the sun has gone down, when the glare of headlights in my already blurry contacts makes me want to pull over and take a 10 minute power nap before I get on the interstate.The days I don't work, I can't usually get my head on straight. The piles of clothes in the corner of my room beg to be put in the laundry or hung in my closet, and my external hard drive continues to hum as it stays connected to my computer, hoping I'll finally put together some sort of cinematic product that's worthy enough to share with the outside world. Most of all, I do a lot of thinking. It can often be misconstrued as worrying or panic, and although sometimes it is, it's mainly me trying to get my life on track.

Some days I work, usually preceding that 45 minute drive, I fall into a void of frustration and switch on auto-pilot, wondering if talking to people who think I'm lower than them on the salary food chain because I work a retail job is worth the paycheck. Usually the answer is yes. I like buying things of monetary value. However, it wasn't until recently when I was in one of these spacey places that something I had heard before manifested into a mental thought that, for once, was more calming than alarming.

"Your being is a draft; constantly under revision."

Honestly it probably came out more like "you're a draft that continues to be revised," but I write far better than I speak.

As someone who has been creating for longer than she can remember, I can assure you that drafting a project has never been my strong suit. It's either all or nothing when it comes to what I'm doing, so naturally when my real adult life has fallen more towards the 'nothing' category, I've found myself in a constant state of hazy mental frustration and buying concealer I swore I'd never buy, to cover the bags under my eyes.

Daily I'm reminded that my draft is being re-written. Something is being erased and re-worded or the story line has changed in someone's mind and the future I thought I was working towards has now been completely discarded in a wastebasket full of paper in the corner of some higher being's office space. It's not a very settling feeling, not knowing where any of this is going, but I can only hold out hope that this story board will be drawn out better and better with every pencil stroke.

It's tough, and cliche, to convince yourself it's okay to think in these ways, but there's something simultaneously irritating and comforting in knowing I've got time to figure all of this out, whatever 'this' is or what it's meant to be. There's a constant focus on the irritation, and almost everyday I ask myself the same question: "what am I doing with my life?" Only to find my reasoning seems like a pocket full of excuses. I can't see myself doing this for the rest of my life My talent only goes so far in this field You have to be mentally stable to work like this or my personal favorite I want to do all of it and don't know where to start So I don't start at all... but I suppose like a draft, starting it with the intent to finish later is better than not beginning at all. We're all drafts constantly being revised; as long as you've got the means to make your end product worthwhile, I’d say you're already off to a great start.

[cheyennenielsen]

Nothing Is Permanent.

I have a terrible habit of sometimes living my life like a movie. Maybe that’s why I’m so interested in creating videos. We may never know.

One instance that presents itself as an example of this habit is how often I think about the house I grew up in. I spoke about this in a video I made a few months ago entitled “My Hometown,” where I touched on the basics of the place I spent the first 12 years of my life. In addition to that, I also spoke about the strange feeling I had while thinking about my grandmothers house, which was right across the street from where I filmed the video. Since we moved almost 9 years ago, I’ve always had this idea of wanting to go back and visit the house I grew up in. I’m able to, from the outside, which is better than nothing, I suppose. It’s refreshing (and also slightly alarming) to know the old red barn in the backyard is still standing, and the siding is still a strange shade of a yellowed white. It’s the same instance with my grandma’s old house. I may not be able to see the inside, but they’ve still got the same porch, and that door at the top of the house that leads directly outside from one of the bedrooms upstairs. I hope they have since sealed that shut. What a hazard. I only get to see that once a year, though. Although the curiosity sticks with me, I can still drive by and see it when we go back to visit. I’ve always had that desire to live this instance like a movie. I come back after so many years and walk through the house, painting the memories that I have in every room in colored stills in my head, but until tonight, I never had the thought that all of that could change someday. Everything could be torn down and destroyed and all that’s left standing there are the visuals I do have of it in my head, and the memories that surround those places. I may be 1800 miles away from my old home, but tonight I imagined that same feeling while standing and looking at a house I had only been in a few times. It was a smaller house, surrounded by churches, a dance studio, and now a travel agency. It’s planted right on a highway that cuts down the middle of town, usually bustling during the day from semi’s and cars from different places in North Carolina, as it’s the easiest way, sans interstate, to get near the coast. It seemed like an older house, held up on worn brick, but it was one of the nicer ones, in my opinion. We had spoken previously about it being torn down, and discussed the more efficient, non-money driven ways it could have been put to good use... but who are we to say anything? Tonight I was able to see the mid-process result of it being torn down. Now, like I said, I had only been to that house a few times, but knowing how surreal it was for Holly, made it seem surreal to me. We walked around the perimeter of the property, where I’m sure we probably weren’t supposed to be, and I listened as Holly repeated things like “this was my parents’ bedroom” and “there’s still stuff in the basement that we left there.” We got a little closer to the torn down back end of the house and I stood among the brick, dust, dirt, and old pieces of wood that rested where Holly lived for a major part of her life. I saw old light fixtures hanging from where they used to be installed, sliding doors from closets hanging off the hinges, and eventually a light switch stuck to a piece of wall caught my eye. It was just laying there on top of all the rubble. I debated saying it, for fear of sounding too weird or potentially making the air between us awkward, but eventually let my existential-ness get the best of me and said “see, I’m looking at that light switch, and this may sound REALLY weird, but I’m looking at that light switch, and the first thing I thought was ‘how many times have you touched that part of the wall?’” Naturally, she looked at me and said “I was thinking the same exact thing.” We kept walking, inspecting the front steps and the front of the house, which was still pretty much standing. We eventually found ourselves standing on the side of the house where their living room used to be, and one of those thoughts came back. This time, I didn’t hesitate. “It’s so weird thinking that right here is where we took that picture in front of your Christmas tree that one year.” I stood and stared at a still standing piece of foundation, where the TV, couch, and Christmas Tree during the holidays used to be constructed. Even though I was looking from a different angle, I could still see the picture in my head. The tall brown boots I had on, the not great photo quality, and Holly’s white sweater she was wearing. All I could do was shake my head. I know nothing’s permanent. That’s all that kept running through my head. “Nothing’s permanent.” That’s when I realized how ridiculous it is to be down on myself for taking pictures. A strange jump, I know. Just hang with me. I’ve beat myself up for YEARS when it comes to living in the moment, and taking a picture instead. It’s always an internal debate of “do I want to remember this moment? Or live in it and hope my memory doesn’t fail me too terribly?” I still have yet to find a balance. There’s nothing wrong with taking pictures to remember a moment, and the phrase “I’d rather live in the moment than remember it” shouldn’t beat me up as much as it does. In this case, however, I can promise I wouldn’t remember much about that afternoon I sat in Holly’s living room with a cup of peppermint hot chocolate, had we not taken that picture. Same goes for concerts, or random days spent with friends where nothing EXCEPTIONAL happens, but I take a picture and can remember that we were sitting at my kitchen table at 9 o’clock at night playing Cards Against Humanity. Especially with my ever failing memory, which I wholeheartedly blame on letting myself stress to a point of not remembering anything except what’s in front of me, it’s worth taking two seconds out of a moment to remember it. Our memories, our pictures, our houses, our non-cheesy movie lives, it’s all going to be gone eventually. So, why not take an extra moment to appreciate something while you can? Even if it does live in the form of a picture that looks like it was taken on a potato. That line keeps repeating in my head “nothing is permanent.”

[cheyennenielsen]

Summer 2016: An Emotional Fluctuation.

Entitling this "The Best Summer Ever" would undoubtedly be too high-school-essay for my liking. In a world of cliche blog posts, swimming through seas of open letters, I'm going to do my best to keep this from being one of those, but if I'm being honest, I can't promise anything.

The idea was for me to write about my summer and write about the adventures I had embarked on, whether good or bad. Now, as someone who firmly believes that if you're not creating something naturally, it's not worth stressing over; but I also do not like writing rough drafts, so opening document after document after document and writing nothing that made me feel good, I decided to scrap that idea. One good thing that did come from that was the overall theme, and something I kept coming back to: the word ‘vulnerability.’

I mentioned in an earlier blog post from the beginning of June, post Christina Grimmie murder, that my vulnerability was at an all time high due to how emotional I was and the lack of control I had on my emotions and feelings. That lasted for a few weeks and slowly dissipated, but the fear and paranoia I wrote about also, remained. What a way to start the summer.

I consider the beginning of my summer being the day of Warped Tour, because of it, but we'll get back to that in a second. After my brother's graduation, my calendar is filled with my work schedule, proudly flashing various mid-day shifts (that always made me feel like I was looking at a clock that continuously ticked at 12pm with every new hour), as well as miscellaneous arrival and departure dates for various occasions mixed in for good measure. The 21st of June was the show of the Grow Wild Tour I went to (what a time to be alive, huh? Again, we'll talk about that in a second), then the week following is when Ciara arrived, to go to Warped Tour which was the week after that.

Now, keep in mind that there was a chance I wouldn't have been able to go to Warped Tour. Dates clashed, a concert ticket wasn't the best thing for me to spend my money on, and eventually I became comfortable with the idea of not being able to go. Rule #1: never find comfort in something you should otherwise be pushing for.

Warped wasn't something I had planned on going to this year, if I'm completely honest. After paying $40 to see one band and stand in the heat for 6 hours last year, Hayley and I both agreed: never again. Then, as the new year unfolded, and With Confidence announced they signed with Hopeless Records, the possibility of them being on Warped became very apparent in mine and Ciara's minds, despite the reservations we had about it, even though it wasn't our place to have them. It was announced on my 21st birthday that they'd be jumping on the tour, and as expected, the tour was still coming to Charlotte. There was no doubt that I had to go, as I had been waiting for the opportunity to see this band for two and a half years.

Using a little sweet talking and some switching of dates, I managed to not only go, but go with the person I found With Confidence with. So many with's. We got there early, and decided to walk around in the sweltering heat and humidity for three hours until our first set, met 3 out of 4 confidences upon arrival, I was shaking profusely as the drummer tried to put a wristband on my wrist (sorry Josh), then waited for their set to start. Pre-set I felt like I was going to pass out, mid-set I almost did pass out screaming the word "HEY" from every corner of my lungs during their song Keeper, and post-set Ciara and I legitimately almost did pass out, and I knew we were close because she looked at me with a bright red face and said "do I have any color in my face?" Yikes. Following that, we ventured back to the tent to get some pictures (which turned out inCREDIBLE?) and also gave them a little gift bag we put together, and continued on with our day. One set we missed WithCon's signing for was interrupted due to a rain and lightning delay, but following that the heat had subsided and we were left sitting in the amphitheater until 8:30, enjoying various bands from afar and watching people dance in the grass as they walked by. Even though I needed to be up less than 5 hours later to get on the road to drive back to my home state for family vacation, I went to bed that night the happiest I had been since the Grow Wild show, and possibly even before that.

The energy from that day didn't leave me for weeks. I'm starting to buzz because of it now, just recalling and writing about everything. It was a mix of finally seeing With Confidence live, getting to meet them and have genuine conversation with them, and the general atmosphere of Warped Tour. Living in a state that has quickly become against basic human rights, being able to walk around and feel comfortable amongst a large scale group that felt the same, who looked the same, and was there for the same reasons, made me beyond ecstatic.

Now here we are, over a month later.

Upon trying to write all of this in some sort of coherent way I'd be proud to show the world, I realized my writer's block is like Usher. Ever present, even when nowhere in sight. Filtering through every technique possible, I decided to take a seat, close my eyes, and listen to one of my favorite songs on With Confidence's new album, called Archers. In listening to that, I realized what I had been trying to write about had been sitting in my mind this whole time, and I had been talking about it to my friends for weeks.

The night of the Grow Wild show, I felt like a different person, when looking back on it. I won't get into the details of it, because I know you REALLY don't care, but I decided to ask Ali if she noticed it, and if so, could she sum it up for me. She simply said "..something along the lines of more free or more carefree... Being present, I think, really is what it was." Partly, that's something I do agree with. Regardless of the lung collapsing anxiety I felt before the show, throughout the night I was enjoying my time and not rushing anything. I was talking to people I wouldn't normally converse with, in a manner I wouldn't normally have conversed. That's exactly how Warped Tour was, as well. Warped is a more normal place for me to just be. A show in a smaller venue, especially when things don't go as planned, not as much.

At this point, I have no doubt that my heightened state of vulnerability and my consistent irrational fear of dying too young at the beginning of the summer served as a catalyst for me now, at the end of the summer, to start being the person I’ve wanted to be since high school. I suppose in that sense, a thank you is in order. I've expressed appreciation and pride many times, but for creating songs and content that makes my 21 year old self feel the teen angst that I never felt AS a teenager, thanks, With Confidence. Your songs continue to bring out some sort of energy that I don't feel listening to anything else, and that's exactly what Archers did both the first time I listened to it, and today, in desperate need of help to write this nonsense. For a song I wanted to be living at the beginning of the summer, I guess I'm already on my way there.... and I've got no complaints. Except for how damn humid it is, what fresh branch of hell am I living in? This summer goes to show that maybe being vulnerable isn’t always the worst, especially when it comes to creating something you didn’t realize you had brewing within you all along.

[cheyennenielsen]

Being Introverted and “On.”

I had a conversation with Holly a few weeks ago about our differentiating personality types and how, in some interesting way, the phrase "opposites attract," rings too true when it comes to our friendship.

"I'm extroverted in the way I get my energy from being around other people; it's draining for me to sit alone all day. You're the other way around."

I've thought a lot about that statement the past few weeks, although it is something I already knew about myself, and have for a while. I do enjoy being in groups of people, but even then, I find myself staying in my own head or simply just listening to the conversation happening around me. However, it's times like the past two weeks that I've had to be "on" and sociable, rather than sit in the contentment of my own company, amongst others or not.

Being "on" is something I find to be a burden more often than something progressive. It's my way of pushing myself out of my box of solitude and learning how to productively interact with others. It's almost like a switch that turns on when I'm with someone. I feel like I have to be a hostess, or like we have to constantly be doing something, and despite the attempts from the people who know how much being "on" takes energy out of me, their best efforts being "I wouldn't be here if I didn't want to hang out, no matter what we're doing," never prove enough to my brain that it's okay to not always have to be "on."

More often than not, that's what leads me to feel like a nuisance to the people I want to spend time with. Also knowing I'm going to keep to myself in public situations is what keeps me from initially spending an extensive amount of time with someone I'm just meeting...... not how a 21 year old should act. Too often I find myself passing on otherwise incredible opportunities to socialize because I know I'm not the fun friend, I'm not the one who will sit and get drunk with you at the bar, or want to go out and have a good time, I see myself as the wet blanket of the group, no matter what group, and don't want to keep others from having the best possible time they can.

I didn't realize the extent of my introverted-ness until I found myself waist deep in a 2 week run of having to be talkative and sociable. Ciara was here the first week, and although she's one of the top people to constantly say "I enjoy hanging out even if we're just sitting around doing nothing," I didn't want her to be wasting her time. It's not like we see each other that often anyways, so it's always top priority for me, when she's here, to make sure she's having at LEAST a decent time. Tuesday we went to Warped Tour, which is a place where I can easily forget everything else, because I'm constantly worried about passing out from heat exhaustion (we got dangerously close this year, friends. 0 out of 10 would recommend), but considering the special circumstances of this year’s Warped adventures, this was no time to sit back and let everyone else take the reigns.

At the second most important part of the day, which was finally getting to meet the guys in With Confidence after two and a half years, there was an involuntary weird malfunction that happened in my brain. My body reacted like an introvert, and my mind was pumping out words and thoughts like all I do all day is stand and talk to people. When I say my body reacted like an introvert, I mean while I was internally: "YOU GET A GIFT AND YOU GET A GIFT AND YOU GET A GIFT OH MY GOD THIS IS HAPPENING I MIGHT PASS OUT IS IT THE HEAT OR IS IT THE EXCITEMENT WHO KNOWS BUT I KEEP FORMULATING COHERENT THOUGHTS SO SOMETHING MUST BE GOING RIGHT," physically, I was shaking. Legitimately shaking. It's a miracle none of them saw it, or if they did, they were too kind in not mentioning it. Following that, I definitely felt the drain.

It could have been a mix of the heat, and essentially blacking out while on my feet, with actually being tired, as I had been "on" for a week prior, and worked three days straight before that, but looking back at it now, I'm sure it had something to do with the random burst of energy that surged through my body, again, tricking my brain into thinking this was something I did consistently, and as if that wasn't enough, the harder part of that two weeks hadn't even started yet.

Following that week, we left for our yearly trip back to where I lived the first 12 years of my life. We usually go back to see family and friends, so I can sort of prepare myself for lots of interaction. I wasn't prepared, however, for the amount of time I'd have to spend around people CONSISTENTLY. Yes, I spend a lot of time in my house, and around my family, but I've never been so frustrated with having to constantly be around my siblings. I love them to the ends of the earth but JESUS LET A GIRL THINK. Between not really having any time to gather my own thoughts, and having to talk to people to keep from making it seem like something was wrong, I think I went on autopilot.

We've been home for just over a full day now, and I've gone back and worked my first shift since before Warped, and I am absolutely feeling the after effects. Driving 45 minutes to work, and driving 45 minutes from work, and sitting here writing this, it all seems like it would be a normal time to wind down and just be with myself, but spending so much time with my brain on, my eyes open, and my vocal chords moving, has left me in such a weird state of not being able to even out my balance. As a result of that, I feel very drained, and tired, and like I'm over everything, and after being back on the sales floor for only 4 hours today, I started feeling a weird sense of hopelessness and confusion that I haven't felt in a while, and I think it’s all because I haven't had time to "recharge."

I compare these kinds of situations to a sugar crash. You ingest as much sugar as humanly possible without thinking about anything except wanting to feel awake or energized, then it all settles in and you're left feeling exhausted and disgusting because holy shit that was a lot of sugar. How do you bounce back from it? Do you have more sugar or do you sit back, buckle in, and hope for the best? That's what I'm trying to figure out now. Do I immerse myself in more social interaction until my brain levels itself out or do I take a back seat and let this whole "introverted" thing even everything out in due time?

All I know for sure is I could probably sleep for three weeks straight right now if you'd let me.