new year and upcoming changes

idk what to title this it's just some random thoughts

on this new years eve i feel a bit depressed. i slept in till noon, and now it is 5:45pm, and i feel i have wasted my day. there wasn’t much i really wanted to do, besides maybe go to the park and read (which i didn’t end up doing). i don’t know. i feel tired and cold and slow. i have to leave tomorrow— for the past 4 nights i’ve been staying alone in san francisco. i love it very much here. i think maybe i subconsciously wasted my day today and didn’t go out at all because it was my last day and i didn’t want to confront that fact. normally it is not such a big deal to come or leave the city— i come here very often, usually alone, usually just for an evening to go to a film or concert, but i’ve spent extended time staying here too. it’s only an hour-long drive from home. but after january i won’t be able to just ‘come back’. of course i will be experiencing another amazing city. but a part of me will miss this one. i think i have learned during this visit just how much i love san francisco— initially i always thought i didn’t want to live here solely because it is so close to “home” and “my family”— i’ve always felt a great need to move to a city that is very far away from them/that— sort of an opportunity for complete reinvention, and an opportunity for opportunity in general: a world entirely unexplored, a world alien to me, a world with potential to discover anything, a world where i am not attached to anyone or anything. but i think i’ve found san francisco to exist for me as sort of an extension of my self. when i’ve felt home to be dull and isolating, i’ve been able to come here and peak into communities, mainly centered on film/music/art/leftism, that i could see myself joining so clearly. or even when i am just walking down the street or sitting in a cafe, i’ll find every person around me endearing. (note: as i wrote this just now i watched/heard a woman cycling down the street blasting and singing along to criminal by fiona apple— how iconic i wish her the best). i love the streets, the murals, the old restaurants, the elderly people on the busses, the names of bookstore workers on the “employee recommendations” wall who i do not know but desperately wish i could befriend so that i could have someone to talk with about the amazing yet often slightly obscure authors sitting on the shelf. i love the areas of the northwest side that are slow and quiet at night. i love the places exploding with energy like the mission and castro. i just love the history, everywhere. i wish i could live here and explore every single bit of it, the smallest bits, the dim late night cafes, the secret groves in the parks. san francisco feels more like one big neighborhood than a “city”— minus “downtown” which i rarely go to and just don’t really care for. i wonder if it is possible to explore and know a city in its entirety? i want to explore fully and deeply every city in the world. although— and maybe because i have just experienced san francisco more, and so i know it better, can feel more deeply it’s beauty and charm— and, i do feel certain that i could find what i love in any city— i just do think that not every city is for me, specifically in a long term sense, (for example i love los angeles but for many reasons could never see myself living there permanently, the biggest of which being that i greatly value the walking/public transport culture of SF, compared to LA which, although has some public transport, is still just so much more widespread of a city and inaccessible— SF is beautifully compact— in a way, i do not want my own space!)

i think what i was getting at is that i just relish so much stepping into these worlds where i can find myself belonging, where i see my people, and where endless exploration of a city means endless exploration of myself.

now, it is 6:30. it feels kind of lame that i have nothing to do. if i was 21 and knew more people here i would at least have some options. i know there is an all ages lcd soundsystem concert happening which sounds cool but also it is all the way downtown and i’m not sure i’m up for that. i have some pasta in the fridge i might make or i might get pizza but i will probably just stay inside and read and/or watch a film— i have to get up early and clean tomorrow anyway. also it does not feel right to celebrate— i haven’t really celebrated anything these past few months— given what is happening in palestine. if i were to do something it would be more about just being with people, i think… or the fact that it’s a night where there are special things to do. honestly, it was only after thinking about it just now that i remembered the reality of The New Year— as in 2023 is ending and 2024 is beginning. this doesn’t feel real given that time is just a construct, i guess. also, while i can understand using the closing year as a time for personal reflection— as a world what are we celebrating given that so much horror came of 2023 and 2024 is most likely just going to be more? additionally i have always felt uninterested in new year’s resolutions— most of the “resolutions” i’d make are just things i’d want to work on in general, but not something specific to the new year. i guess that’s how it is for anyone’s new year’s resolutions, but what i mean is that, as with birthdays, i’ve never really felt the “newness” and therefore don’t feel stuck to it as a time to Begin something. i like to be honest with myself and i just know that i wouldn’t achieve any large scale changes if i wasn’t working on them already.

however… starting tomorrow i will make myself get up strictly at 7 or 8am, and i will begin a routine of spending at least 15 minutes a day learning italian— but these aren’t new year’s resolutions, they are just things that i need to begin doing tomorrow because tomorrow is almost exactly a month before i need to leave for italy, and i am a procrastinator. the learning italian thing is obvious, i think exactly one month is enough time to learn exactly enough basic italian. and the waking up earlier thing is just because i need to already be in a habit of it before i arrive in italy and i think that, again, one month is probably exactly long enough to build that habit. (i’ve been sleeping in a lot since the end of the semester and i want to become more of a morning person, i get depressed when i wake up late and so much of the day has already gone by.)

this has been quite a mundane post. mainly i just had some thoughts i wanted to get out and a keyboard felt oddly easier than my pen and journal. i think tomorrow i may do a yearly book/film wrap-up…. mayyyybe. i need to talk about the books i read more, i think. sometimes i consider starting a youtube channel because i know that my opinions/recommendations would get out there more, but at the same time, i think i am much better at writing my thoughts, having the opportunity to make them precise, as opposed to talking… impromptu… to a Camera… which also brings in the appearance thing. but hey! i’ll let you guys know if i do it.

lastly i am just curious if any of you have any new year’s resolutions, or even just thoughts. i wanna clarify i was not hating on new year’s resolutions lol, i was just expressing what does and doesn’t work for me!