Yesterday’s 12-hour day marked the end of my first week at my new job. I am the new press and marketing coordinator for a major university music, theater, and dance presenter. It has been a while since I’ve been engulfed in the performing arts (a while as in high school), and I know next to nothing about classical music, but I keep reminding myself that I’ve done this in unframiliar territory before. I knew next to nothing about contemporary art before I worked at the MCA, aside from the fact that I liked it and frequented the museum every chance I got. I definately didn’t know anything about design or Scotland for that matter when the Scottish government somehow allowed me to market their inagural, nation-wide design festival. But I am interested, curious, and enthsiastic. I am a good writer, have solid common sense, work hard, and I know how to sell. I am good at forging relationships in the community and I’m a friendly, helpful insitutional ambassador. I’m not afraid of doing well or of failing; I just do my best every day and see where that takes me. Nine times out of ten, it takes me and the organization I work for somewhere good.

I like marketing cultural events because I get to learn a lot about many cultural happenings and audiences that my daily life would otherwise never bring me in contact with. Last night, I attended my first mariachi performance. I may have stumbled upon the arts marketing sector by chance, but I really like it most days. Getting free tickets to things dosn’t hurt, either.

Shaun is working from home; he was a contractor for a creative content company in Chicago and has been able to keep that position in our new life here in Ann Arbor. He’s also still freelancing a ton as an entertainment journalist; this week he was flown to Austin to play a new video game all week long and review it. Recently, he had to write a piece invovling Star Trek, a show he never really followed. He was terrified because “Treky” is a way of life for some very special people and getting Star Trek factioids wrong on any level could mean piles of hate for Shaun. I have the same fear while I compile press releases and write copy in my new job for classical and chamber music performances. Those people know their music and don’t suffer fools gladly. Luckily, I am fasidious about fact checking and have the internet at hand. Luckily, I do get relief as we also present lots of theater, dance and other types of music that I feel more at home in.I’m also tasked with acting as insitutional leiason to a few student groups, which will be fun.

Lila is hard at work being a 14-month old, learning to walk, talk, and be her awesome self. Right now she is sitting on my lap, her fuzzy head under my chin. Her hands are busied playing with clipped coupons, sorting through each while saying, “yes, yes, yes. No no. Yeah!” Better go before that becomes boring.

xo, dear readers!

I mentioned in the last post that we’ve recently relocated to Ann Arbor. Many factors lead to the decision, most of them financial. While Ann Arbor doesn’t even come close to Chicago in scope or scale (size-wise, culturally, and in terms of diversity), it has it’s own unique identity. It is a very livable place and there are a few factors that make this especially so for me.

1.) Trees. Ann Arbor has lots of them. More than 50,000, to be exact. Lush trees arch over every street, branches reaching to touch each other from opposite sides of the road. Autumn has taken a hold of each leaf by now, yielding reds and yellows, browns and tans.  

2.) We’ve lived in a lot of places where the smell is bad. Really bad. Like the time in NYC that the Manhattan sewer line overflowed into the Hudson River. Or when I slipped on dewy, congealed vomit on a Saturday morning run in Glasgow. Or that reeking Chicago factory near North & Elston that smells like sulfur, dog food, and boiled carrots. None of these things smelled very good. It smells so fresh here. Like trees and cider and split wood and wind. I like inhaling all of a sudden; it feels so damn clean.

3.) The commute. You know your city is tiny when you’ve lived in it a total of 2.5 weeks and already have so many aquaintences that you’ve never had a bus ride without running into one and having a chat. The commute is a miniscule ten minute bus ride into town. Unlike any public transit experince I’ve ever had, the bus comes on time, when it is supposed to, reliably, according to schedule. I also love it because I ride for free, one of the many perks of my job.

Those are my top three at the moment. I also like how this is a pedestrian-friendly town. People walk & bike to get around. There is stuff to do. The farmers’ market is the most incredible thing, comparable to the Union Square green market in NYC but with prices I can actually afford. The prices in general here are a huge relief from big city life. I actually see a chunk of my paycheck for the first time in ages. My new colleagues are nice; my job is so new that I feel odd to assess it in any official capacity yet (this is only my first week), but the benefits are incredible and I was very engaged in my first actual tasks today.

In total: I like it here. As Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros sing:

“Moats and boats and waterfalls,
Alley-ways and pay phone calls,
I’ve been everywhere with you.

We laugh until we think we’ll die,
Barefoot on a summer night
Nothin’ new is sweeter than with you

And in the streets you run afree,
Like it’s only you and me,
Geeze, you’re something to see.

Ahh Home. Let me go home.
Home is wherever I’m with you.
Ahh Home. Let me go ho-oh-ome.
Home is wherever I’m with you.”