Back to blogging

Well, almost 8 months have passed since the last time I blogged. Life really got hectic over the summer last year. I ended up working near Montauk during the second half of July and all of August. It was a great surprise to see the beach; definitely something I didn't think I was going to get to experience here in New York after moving from Florida. I broke up with my boyfriend in the beginning of August. Distance and too much work made all the uncertainties I had about dating him real. It seems pointless to work at something you don't really want. I continued back at the same restaurant that I was working at before I moved over the summer. I also kept my apt in the Bronx, so the transition was easy once summer ended. I did start dating someone new in October and we're still dating but don't live in the same town but this time, the distance actually works. We spend a few days together and then he goes back to his town and I stay here, work and couch surf several nights a week at friends' apartments. I think the arrangement is ideal right now because we're both trying to find a footing in the culinary world. I'm at a new restaurant now, in Chinatown. The area is so great. I love all of the markets with their dehydrated....everything! Oysters, scallops, mushrooms...everything dehydrated. I put my two weeks in at my other job and the chef fired me the next day. Money is as tight right now as it was when I first moved to New York. My sister sent me money, my boyfriend gave me money. My credit card balance is increasing every week as I need to put money on my Metro card. I let myself go crazy over it for a couple of weeks and now that I've began working again, I'm starting to feel better and a little more at ease. I get my first paycheck in two days and hopefully in a month, I'll be in a better financial state. I feel like everything that is happening to me here is still teaching me lessons that I never learned. The pure lack of control of money is proving to be a massive lesson that I'm learning. I was brought up in a household to be proud of money earned because both of my parents came from Brazil and valued every penny they earned but for some reason I put a lot of focus on money. After graduating from college, I had so many thoughts of earning $50,000...$60,000...etc etc and I did reach a point where I did well and I felt so proud and confident and then I went to culinary school and became a cook. Now I'm back at the bottom financially but I'm trying to learn that money can't be tied to my happiness. I need to be happy and feel fulfilled without money in my bank account. That has been the hardest lesson for me to learn but its one that is being forced upon me every day and I'm determined to learn this lesson.