Errands

You failed me and I can NEVER forgive you!

As I eat my $3 slice of pizza I just picked up and sit down to write this post, I must address one thing that I think everyone should know about when entering the real world: ERRANDS.

Errands - something that makes me feel like I am becoming my mother and realize that I, in fact, am an actual adult. When you're little and your mom says that she has spent the day running errands, you roll your eyes and honestly can't believe it took that long. Well, now I can wholeheartedly admit that that was a very wrong thing to do.

Friday night, I got home to my apartment after what felt like an INSANELY long day. I went into my room only to find that my stand-alone hanging rod had completely broken and all my clothes were on the floor. WHAT A NIGHTMARE! And the entire weekend I didn't have time to run and get a new one. I had to deal with picking my clothes up OFF MY FLOOR when looking for a new outfit. Never in my life have I felt poorer than I did at that time.

Last night I was obviously busy swimming and developing my new extracurricular life plan, so I didn't have time to go get 2 new hanging rods then (yes, I got 2 this time since obviously one FAILED MISERABLY at the job it was supposed to do!). Tonight, my entire evening was dedicated to walking to Bed, Bath & Beyond and getting them. Yes, my entire night was dedicated to only running ONE errand!! How sad. Real life is hard all the time!

And let me tell you, if you think that carrying 2 packs of standing hanging rod kits for 15 blocks is easy, you thought WRONG!

So now that my new super-cool double hanging rod has been assembled and my room's order has been restored, I am off to get some much needed sleep! PHEW.

<3, Charlotte

I've officially decided to come out of swimming retirement!

Me and Ryan Lochte at Nationals my senior year of high school (I look completelyyy different now which is why I haven't blurred this photo). Yes, I swam at this meet. Yes, this was before he was famous and there was a show making fun of him.

Not sure if I've mentioned this before, but I was recruited to college for swimming. High school would not have been the same if I wasn't a swimmer. My days revolved around waking up at 4:45am to be in the water at 5:45, and ending my school day with practice from 3:30-6pm. Tack on 6 AP classes to that equation and you have quite a busy schedule! My teammates were my family. It was awesome.

There was a whole other side of swimming though. Never feeling like I was good enough was a continuous problem that I battled (I started swimming when I was in 6th grade, considerably later than the average swimmer who starts when they are in 1st, so I was playing catch-up from day 1). My coaches also made the situation worse. They told me to my face that I would never swim D1 (WHICH I did, seriously messed up right?!) and they always pitted the girls on my team against each other. I was never good enough and never appreciated any of my successes because I was always focused on what I wanted to achieve next. Getting second at club state championships didn't matter to me - I wanted to go to nationals. It was a sick mentality, but that was all I knew. I always wanted to be one of the best.

Why did I stay with that program? All my coaches did was put me down and I always felt like I wasn't good enough. Because the girls on the team were my favorite people in the entire world. We all spent so much time together and knew each other to the extent that it was scary. We were basically sisters. And on top of that, my coaches were actually good at their jobs. We didn't swim THAT many yards a day but were one of the best teams in the state. We weren't burnouts like a lot of swimmers at our level. My coaches did know what they were doing, I will give them credit. They were one of the reasons I was able to catch up and be one of the better girls my age.

And then when I got to college, my coach was AWFUL. I got so slow. It was a disaster. I hated every stroke I took, and being a distance swimmer, that was a lot of strokes to hate over the course of a practice. I did not get a single best time at my championship meet at the collegiate level. Which was terrible considering I was at a D1 program and you are supposed to get a lot faster. I was completely miserable.

So sophomore year, I
quitretired. I just couldn't do it anymore. I never wanted to get into a pool again, and college was amazing without swimming all the time. I have no regrets about retiring AT ALL. If I would have swam, I would have missed out on A LOT. I never missed swimming a day in my college life.

But now that I am a real person, I have been wanting to get my life together. Working out has obviously been a complete fail (if you've been reading my posts, need I say more about this?!). And I've been feeling like I want to do something other than work and going out. It's just so unfulfilling to have my days be so monotonous, and hangovers are THE WORST now that I am apparently an old lady! And I am bad at all sports. Except for swimming.

So, I am officially coming out of retirement! I just emailed a team here in NYC that is reasonably priced. I want to race again. I want to succeed at something again. And I want to appreciate it this time around and know that I am doing this for me, not my terrible high school coaches. I am doing this because I want to, not because I have to.

This is the most excited I've been about something in awhile :)

<3, Charlotte

UPDATE: I am OFFICIALLY a New Yorker!

I have arrived! Well, as of 2pm yesterday I have arrived, but I had so much to do when I first got here so this is my first post from NEW YORK CITY! So surreal, so cool, so legit.

I am a real person. Woah.

My stuff was already moved in to my apartment, so I just had to set everything up. Let me tell you, when you are by yourself and have to put a bed bug protector on a queen sized mattress ALONE, you get a whole new perspective on life. Man, I hope I don't have to do that again, IT WAS EXHAUSTING! Between that and assembling all of my pink crates and storage units, yesterday left me WIPED OUT! I feel lame because I didn't go out last night, but that was my last night to sleep and relax before the rest of my life starts, I have forgiven myself for my lameness already.

She makes putting on sheets by herself look easy. NEWSFLASH: It's not!

Things I still need to do today:

1. Eat something. I'm freeking STARVING! Going to venture out to get something after this post. It will probably just be a bagel because they are cheap #poorgirldiet


2. Figure out how to get some more storage pieces. I need a rack to hang more of my clothes and one of those things you put on a door to hold my shoes and a hamper and a few other things. I have looked up Bed, Bath & Beyonds in NYC and none are really close to my apartment. I may just take the lazy way out and order everything. Bummer it won't be here until later in the week but better than walking a ton of blocks carrying all that stuff!


3. Prep for tomorrow. My first real person job! Yeesh, I have been preparing for this my entire life, but I am still incredibly nervous. I once had a swim coach that said "if you're nervous about it, that's good because that means you care. It is just a matter of channeling those nerves effectively and using them in the right way. Then you will be great." I LOVE LOVE LOVE that quote and am going to be thinking about it a LOT tomorrow!


4. Go for a run. We have a family membership to the YMCA at home, and I found out that I can use it at any gym in the country. There are some Y's in NYC, so I will try to go to one tonight and see if that rule actually applies. If it does OMG that will be AMAZING because then I don't have to pay for a gym membership! Thanks, dad.

Welp, that's all I can think of right now. Wish me luck!

<3, Charlotte