full of great

I have spent the last year in the middle of one big Learning Experience.  I say this in the voice of my mother, who coined the phrase in our family to mean, basically, Crap That Sucks.  I suppose at one time or another it was her attempt to teach me that there was always something to learn, even out of — and maybe especially out of — experiences that were less than ideal.  Tough break-ups, rough rejections, parking tickets — all Learning Experiences.  At some point this transitioned into a joke, and when I’d come to her devastated about one thing or another she would pause, and smirk, and say, “Well maybe we could have done without this f—king Learning Experience.”  It always made me laugh and that laughter is often exactly what I needed.

So.  Yes.  Learning Experience.  This past year.  Mmhmm.  And here I am writing a gratitude blog, and if you saw me on the street I would likely greet you with smiles and cheer, and I have really in a very real way really really learned a whole lot in the last year that I often see as quite beautifully positive… But.  You know what’s slightly better than having a grounded, balanced, generally uplifting outlook on bad news? 

SOME FUCKING GREAT NEWS.

As of today, because the Universe tends to do this, I am officially both a contributing writer to The Owl Mag and the incoming Editor-in-Chief of Owning Pink.  For The Owl Mag, I’ll be musing on all things music — live reviews, album reviews, venue reviews, review reviews (in my very own column heyooo).  For Owning Pink, I’ll be writing and leading an amazing group of writers in the world of all things Pink — which is everything from women’s health to creativity to mojo and back again.  The sites are… different.  Totally ballsing different, in fact.  But they have this awesome thing in common, if I do say so myself, in that they both absolutely encourage me to be ME.  My respective application and interview processes were so fantastically refreshing — I didn’t sell myself, I didn’t make false promises, I was not insincerely enthusiastic… I was me.   And in the words of Sally Field,

“You like me!  You really like me!”

THANK YOU.  I am outrageously grateful for these Pink Owls taking a chance on me, and I am so excited to see what happens from here. 

Enough of the Learning Experiences for a wee bit, ok?  Ok.

And she’s not here to tell me herself, but I can feel it in every word, every breath, and every celebratory margarita: she would be so proud.

Free to be,

L