Back to the Burbs: On Making Lemonade out of some very sour lemons

October and November have been a helluva transition. Last time I posted, I was still living in the city nearby the University I go to. Now, I'm living back at my parents house in the suburbs.

What happened?

Essentially life threw me some very sour lemons in my way.


 I was living with a friend from work who's dad owned the townhouse. Everything was going great between me and her and suddenly, at our second workplace she met this supervisor who was very charming and loud. He performs poetry in the area and I suspected in the workplace that we all were working at that she had a thing for him.  He was in a bind with the rent at his place so she let him move in to the spare room in the townhouse in July. She asked me if it was okay and I replied, yes (I sympathized because Denver rent is monstrously expensive).

What happens next is a weird part of the story. He states after I was living there for a month that he cannot move into August because some rent mix up. She obliges and lets him move in later, but I find him once I had moved into the townhouse crashing on our couch everyday for the next month until he moves in. I find it a bit scummy that he's basically already crashing at our place without paying for rent but I figure that this is some short term thing.

Once he moves in the house does a gradual 180 degree in life change. My roommate starts staying up later at night into the wee hours of 2am-3am to chat with this guy outside and drink- something that she wasn't really into in the first place. The house starts becoming dirtier and dirtier. I find myself having to take care of the house by myself.  He starts inviting his friends over who stay for days on end crashing at the place and are pretty entitled and rude themselves. I also notice that he also invites very young girls over to the house as well as part of his "mentoring" with poetry to youth. A close friend of mine discovers a police record on him of assaulting a young girl back in his hometown. We try to talk to my roommate about this negative spiral that has been going on since this guy has moved in as well as the large age gap between the two (she's 20, he's 28), his predator behavior and how he isn't paying rent or utilities on time and always bailing. Me and my boyfriend discover a mouse colony in the house and do a large clean up operation. It's at that point where I couldn't really handle this in the calmest way and I told off my roommate saying that she was getting taken advantage of and living in really filthy conditions.

In the end my friend decides to choose him over me and doesn't want me living at the place. I move out relatively quickly with a lot of feelings in my mind back to my parents house. I'm really grateful to my parents for letting me live with them before I decide to venture out again. Hopefully, I want to be able to live on my own even if it is just a tiny studio.

The situation overall left me with a lot of emotions- disgust, anger, sadness, disappointment, and most importantly grief. I lost a friend and a place. I initially was very angry. I placed my rage toward the poet deadbeat living there. It was all his fault, he ruined something that I had. Everything else was going well, my job, school, my relationship, etc. Why did it have to be this?!

                                    Me at Killgore bookstore; the last day I was living at the townhouse.
                                    I look like a f*cking wreck and you can see the unhappiness in my eyes. I still  struggle with this and I want to get better at not dwelling on the negative and despair.


But I took some time to analyze it and talked to my support network. My friends and my family. I realized something. Life throws you these curve balls all the time. I sincerely believe it is to test you and to teach you something . When I looked at the problem in this angle I saw a different perspective. My friend is an adult as well and it wasn't entirely all the poets fault- she complied with this behavior and living conditions, being complicit is an action in itself. All of us had differing personalities that was going to clash eventually. And I realized that I needed to move out just for the reason of finding myself even more. What I really wanted and who I really wanted to be around with and what I really want to do with myself in life.

At the end of the day I think I am making lemonade out of the situation, that's not to say that lemonade can be a bit bitter. I still hold a little bitterness about the situation. I am trying to add some sugar though to make the lemonade sweeter so to say.

I've been able to hang out with my younger brother more since moving in, save money, be with my family and explore parts of Denver and South Denver that I couldn't before. Overall, it's a work in progress that I'm going to work on day by day, making everyday sweeter at a time.

                                                             Me:  A little bit sweeter

Put the Pedal to the Metal

I guess I haven't posted in a long time, but to anyone out there reading this... thanks!

So What's Happened in the Last Few Months? 

Well, one of the more noticeable things is that I am no longer working for the long-standing tutoring program I did under the University. I was tired of the new administration and felt that the students, which many of them really just needed more materials and help in tutoring were not getting this and instead other projects were going on in the program. Also the pay sucked... it was almost what minimum wage is in my state. 

So... I went looking for another job and lucked out and got a job as a legal assistant at a law firm- exactly what I wanted being a paralegal student. The pay is really nice, the team is small but great for the most part, and the firm is really nice and pretty. 

I work three days a week the usual 9-5, two days I go to school from sun up to sun down and then I have the weekends to myself. It's a busy schedule- but doable. 

I work specifically in bike law. It's a niche but growing field with more and more people, especially millennials using bikes as their main mode of transportation. Most of my job involves calling up insurance companies, calling up medical providers, taking notes of clients and looking at accident footage and records. It's not what I want to do permanently, but it's a pretty nice gig I could see myself doing for some years or so and gives me a lot of experience. 

I want to get myself a bicycle. I learned how to ride a bike when I was thirteen years old. When I was around eight or nine my father tried to teach me how to ride a bike- but I fell down near a curb with a drainage hole and bruised myself pretty badly. I got scared and didn't want to learn until I was much older. After I learned how to ride a bike, my dad, my younger brother and I would go bicycling from the sleepy suburbs to the city and do these 20-40 mile day long trips. I wasn't really good at it, but it was pretty neat to bicycle the whole area in a day. 

The bike I got when I was a teenager got stolen one day during my senior year of high school. Someone left the garage door open in my parents house and one day it was gone. My dad still thinks to this day that I had pawned the bike or sold it to someone for extra cash, but the bike really wasn't worth much and I am personally too lazy to want to do that.  

When I moved to my recent place my friend and roommate left her bike in the patio outside unlocked. I told her it wasn't a good idea. One day her bike broke down, as she came inside to have dinner with me someone that same night stole the broken bike. 

My dad told me when he was in his 20's he used to have a really nice bike. He lived in an apartment on the second floor and kept it on his patio. One day when he came home from work he saw a man climb up the patio and steal his bike. 

I guess a lot of people in my life, including myself have had their bike stolen. To me it is like a metaphor for a piece of you that can be quickly and without warning being taken away- like a freak illness or injury. 

Always savor the moments that you have in health and well-being and always, always guard and protect yourself as much as you can- use a "bike lock" in your life. 

Livin' In the City - Come Join me!

I've been living in Metro Denver for about over a year and half now. Before that, I was living in a suburb about an hour or so away for five years. Lemme just say right now that I really didn't like living there one bit.
       
When I decided that I wanted to go to university in Denver, I ended up moving out of the suburbs and into the city. I've always been in love with urban landscapes and the freedom and fluidity aspect of cities. Denver is unique in that it has this feeling of a big city and has lots to do and a lot of attitude, but is pretty mid-range in population and size.

The city has lots of charm and enough spots that are hidden and special to get lost in. Almost everyday I find myself being part of a new adventure or experience here in the city. I took this picture one day last Summer in this half empty parking lot. Seeing the pigeons and hearing all of them collectively coo made me happy. 

Both of these pictures are of the Capitol during 4th of July last year. The festivities were awesome. Both the Capitol building (not pictured) and the City Hall building (directly in front of both photos) lit up to celebrate the 4th of July. Fireworks were shot directly above the Capitol. It was a nice night. 

There's free mini golf in the central hub of downtown. They've got the iconic Blue Bear figurine miniaturized. I would usually come down here with my boyfriend when I didn't have work and wanted to do something fun.

The clock tower at night always shines beautifully, especially on a warm summer night. Every day I spend here in Denver is another opportunity for making new memories and finding something magical about the city. I find the city also pretty accepting and diverse as a whole. Recently, I've been seeing all these high-rises being built around the city which has driven rent up substantially (boo!) but I don't see this as a long-term thing hopefully since most of those aren't even filled up yet after several years of this quick construction.

Well there's the rundown of the city I live in. The beauty of the city both the industrial and the natural pieces make me happy even in the most stressful and scary of days.

Hit the ground running

         This Summer has been pretty intense so far and it's barely just begun. I left Beijing about three weeks ago to come back to Denver and found myself plunging right back into my old job, moving into my friend's townhouse and three paralegal classes all at once. I had a little under a week to transition from being the foreign student in Beijing to a responsible student worker in Denver. I remember before I left for Beijing when I was explaining this to my friends and family I got a collective response of "Whoa, I don't think you can do that- that's insane,"

And in retrospect now, It was a little bit insane. When I was packing up all my things in Beijing, trying to squeeze every last t-shirt and souvenir I had anxiety building up in me and my mind telling me, "are you really ready to do this?". At that point in time I remember thinking back,

"Y'know. I don't know. But I'm going to find out,"

Finding out was what led me to fall back into the Denver rhythm of things. Slowly, but successfully so far. I took things one step at a time while at the same time keeping an eye on the whole plan for the summer. One of the first things I remember after leaving the airport was seeing all the English everywhere. It was overwhelming to me just that small thing of being able to read everything I saw 100% fluently- while in Beijing it was more of a 40-50% comprehension with billboards and stuff usually.  When my boyfriend drove me back to my folks house I remember immediately even though I felt nauseous, tired, and just overwhelmed with being back in the States I already started planning in my mind what I had to do. I needed to get ready to move out of my parents house and to my friends, catch up on the classes I had missed while in Beijing, and get ready to go to work on Thursday. And of course I could not do this in one day. I needed to do this one step at a time.

All of this can sound pretty overwhelming. I sure you have all experienced a situation like this where you need to get all of this stuff done and it must be executed in a specific way in order to succeed. It's crazy and can really get you upset and spiral even into a panic attack.

That's why I say, when life hands you these situations there's three things I find that have been the key to my success.

1. Breathe - This is so cliche but it is true. Take a moment to pause and reflect quietly of what is going on and what you need to do at that moment. Collecting yourself is key. Don't listen to the background noise in your brain or the "impending doom" that your brain likes to give to you, especially if you're an anxious person like me.  I think nobody sums it up better than Steven Universe's "Here Comes a Thought". It's one of my favorite shows and in this case beautiful shows the power of calming down and letting those noisy, intrusive and unnecessary thoughts go.

2. 1st is 1st- Essentially pick the first thing that is the most dire and urgent in what you need to do. If that is all you can do in a day- that's absolutely okay. You don't have to beat yourself up for only being able to do one thing. When I came back from Beijing I remember the only thing I was able to do in that evening was lightly unpack clothes for the six days I would be at my folks house and give my presents to my folks and boyfriend. That was on my most urgent list. Once I got that done then I could move on to the bigger, badder, more complex stuff. 

3. Call in the Troops- I say it's never embarrassing or weak to call in for help. The more help and support you have from your friends and family, especially in transitional situations like this, the more smoothly and easier it will go for you. Don't feel ashamed to call up your bestie or your partner to help with the little things. This also goes back to number one. Having support from your friends and family can make things calmer and help you get in a frame of mind to tackle these big tasks. 

Rest easy friends, It's a rainy and calm day today in Denver. I hope wherever you are it's a calm and mellow day for you too. 

- Nutella 

I don't even like Nutella

Why the F*ck is this even called Incredible Nutella?

I don't like Nutella one bit. I've tried it more than I can count and each time it makes me nauseous. The hazelnut mixture is too sweet for my taste. I'd rather have crunchy peanut butter. But if it were a competition between the unholy Sun Butter versus Nutella, I'd take the latter. 

So why is this called Incredible Nutella? Is this a cooking blog based on a spread I don't particularly like? 

Nah.

Essentially, Nutella is a play on my name- Natalia. Back in high school, I had many friends and acquaintances call me this. It was a sort of ironic nickname that has since stuck with me over the years. 

But the title Incredible Nutella also has a deeper meaning than just a name I'm referred to. Nutella is a spread that is versatile. It makes things sweeter that would otherwise be dry, flaky, or just plain dull. Nutella is also perceived as kind of foreign. It's originally from Italy but since it's widespread popularity most people immediately don't see it as a foreign item that you would have to get at the "ethnic" section at the supermarket. 

Likewise, I find myself similar to Nutella. At least I'd like to think I am like Nutella and aim to be more like a hazelnut spread. When I was younger, I used to approach life with an extremely pessimistic and cynical outlook. A lot of things happened in-between that time and now that opened my eyes to being more positive and well, sweeter. 

The irony of a name.