Bits & Pieces

Love
I packed a bag for another trip to NYC Friday, without knowing if I would actually go. Ben still didn't know Thursday night if he'd have to work through the weekend, so he asked me to bring a bag to work on the chance that he might have free time to spend with me.

I didn't necessarily want to go, and he knew it. I was crabby last week -- a shortage of sleep from the elections and a more stressful than usual work environment. I dreaded the long bus ride to NYC and the 5:30 a.m. train ride back to Washington. On Friday I just wanted to go home and go to bed. By noon, though, Ben told me to get my bus ticket. I bought it.

Around 5 p.m. -- I regularly work 10 until 7 -- my colleague told me to leave for New York. I hadn't told him that I was going, and he hadn't seen my bag parked at my desk. I asked him how he knew. His reply: "I know what love is."

I'm happy I get to know what love is, even if it means taking long, boring and uncomfortable bus rides every other weekend to New York City, waking up in the middle of the night to talk in a groggy haze to Ben and doing his laundry.


Work
At 5 a.m. on Monday, a cab driver helped renew my spirit.

During a five-minute span, I had told him that I was commuting between Washington and New York City on weekends to see my fiance, that we were getting married in the summer but didn't know whether we'd stay put on the East Coast or go back to Minneapolis, and that I was nervous about picking up the job search.

He said staying in New York City would be good for us. Ben would have his pick of the top investment firms there, and I could work at the New York Times. I said I wouldn't work there anytime soon. I'm young and inexperienced. But he told me not to underestimate myself. Friends and family tell me that all of the time. I try to believe them, but deep down know the truth: I'm a rookie who doesn't know squat. Somehow I believed this stranger. I don't necessarily think you'll find my byline in the top paper in the country a year from now, but the confidence I've been missing lately has slowly started to return. I had been stuck in a valley -- disappointed in my performance at work. He helped me to start crawling out of it.

I thought about our conversation on the train ride to Washington. I usually sleep, but the small coffee I drank actually worked. This morning, for some reason, I wasn't immune to caffiene. It probably was a combination of the java and those three words the cab driver said, "Don't underestimate yourself."

I'm still thinking about it. I hustled at work yesterday like nobody's business. I have another story lined up for the end of the week. And I'm feeling like my normal positive self.

I'm not out of the valley yet, but I'm getting there.