I write to you, darling, from my quaint fluorescently lit and wood paneled cubicle at the PR Company where I’m currently freelancing. It was a little drab at first, what with the pound of dirt in my keyboard and push pin holes everywhere. But I spruced it up with some Clorox wipes and a vine plant which has grown exponentially in the last week. Non stop florescent lighting may make me pasty and irritable, but for our green chlorophyll-ed friends, it’s just the thing. I think. Also I write from Microsoft XP operating system, with its signature inane *help* messages and loud, clackety keyboard. In fact many of you within a mile of the Upper East Side are probably hearing me type right now. The floors are carpeted with that familiar thin blue speckled woven pattern. When I ran out of staples yesterday, I filled out and turned in a legthy form to get a new box.

In short, I’m at an office job. It’s been awhile since I’ve done this. And honestly I’ve never been at an office job as office-job-like as this one. I graduated into the Internet bubble. Remember free Snapple, foos ball, continuous loop of The Big Lebowski on in the lounge? Remember having a lounge? At one place I had a “Thinking Beanbag” next to my regular Aeron chair (ordered of course from beanbag.com – remarkably still in business). I’ve always been on a Mac. And somehow, by the grace of god, I’ve always had a window in my sights. But it’s a new day, in the new new economy, and a girl takes what she can get, and is damn happy about it also. I’m damn happy about it. Did I say that yet? Damn fucking happy.

Along with my office-job, is an office-job paycheck. It’s been awhile since I saw one of those. When a girl rounds out about a year pinching pennies, she starts to prioritize. While walking 10 blocks out of my way to avoid an ATM surcharge, or taking the bus home instead of the train so my metrocard would only get charged once, I had plenty of time to think what is really important to me if ever had spending money again. 1. New sneakers. That was sort of a given. My old ones were three years old with holes, and smelled kinda of worse than any shoes I had ever smelt before. Check. I went with Reebok classics, rockin it Eve-style. 2. IPod. Lord lord lord, do I want one of those things. I’ve been drooling over it for a year. I dream about it at night sometimes – okay a lot of times. Anyway, as soon as my Visa card starts another cycle (May 22), that baby’s mine. And 3. Therapy. That’s right, the old sit on the couch and whine about your parents thing. But like I told my mom, my childhood was fine, it’s my adulthood that’s the real problem. Jami warns me that there’s a lot of crying involved, but since I cry like 8 times a day anyway, I figure doing it in the presence of a trained professional might make it productive. So anyway, it’s been a rough few months for me, and I have these romantic notions of therapy and figuring shit out, and whatever. Whatever.

In any case, I need a strategy of coping with the new office job so I can pay some bills, while not completely losing sight of my greater goals. And greater goals, fuck - I need some of those too. Let the crying begin.