I finally went to the Citadel today.

And it was pretty but I didn't get out of the car, as it was 100+ degrees and I wasn't driving. It's very pristene and there are people around in uniforms. It's a different world. The "barracks" were the neatest part. I wish the weather was better.

I have about as much anxiety about leaving Charleston as I did moving here in the first place. I didn’t think that would happen.

I’m going to miss the friends that I was able to make. I’m going to miss participating in my ideal work environment. I’m going to miss Harris Teeter, the best supermarket ever. I’m going to miss being 15 minutes from three different beaches. I’m going to miss the slight tan I was able to achieve and that I’m certain won’t last very long. I’m going to miss that every place I went to I was going to for the first time, and all the places I won’t get to go to for the first time. I’m going to miss being near bodies of water and the breezes that came with them. I’m going to miss the farmer’s market and its $1 hand-cut pasta. I’m going to miss never having to pay $4 a gallon for gas.

I’m not going to miss living alone. I’m not going to miss seeing cockroaches in my kitchen at least a couple times a week, and sometimes in my bathroom. I’m not going to miss fickle bootleg internet. I’m not going to miss working at Cinebarre and all the bull shit that came with it (though I will miss a lot of the people that work there). I’m not going to miss how expensive everything is and how everyone else here seems so well off. I’m not going to miss trying to find my way around poorly marked streets that don’t work on a grid system and are really too thin to be two-way.

I am very glad I came here. While I don’t think this city completely matches my personality, it was a wonderful place to live for three months. I got to be in buildings that George Washington was in. I got to stand on the ground where the Civil War started. I got to be around people that say y’all unabashedly and without irony. And I think that if for some reason I was staying here permanently, I would have found my place in this strange society.

And I miss Florida. I miss my town and my friends and my house and my room and my porch and my hobbies. But I didn’t miss the bull shit and drama that occurs when you‘re involved in such a small social crowd. I didn’t miss the lack of newness that occurs when you’ve lived in a small town for three years.

This summer went by faster than I wanted to believe.

It’s over.

Ghost cats!

This entry will be short. My parents will be arriving in Charleston soon and I want to get in an episode of Freaks and Geeks before then.

This past weekend, Meg and Stephanie and myself met up in Savannah. I think my personality is more suited towards a city like that compared to the one I’ve spent my summer in. The neighborhoods there are beautiful and I love how there are squares everywhere. I like that there’s an art school. We exhausted ourselves from too much walking, so we didn’t do much but we did go on a disappointing ghost tour and bought forties and mixed them with lemonade. They came up to Charleston on Sunday and we went to brunch, explored a little bit of King Street, went to Sullivan’s Island and almost got caught trespassing at a mystery building, ate dinner on Shem’s Creek and saw a movie at my workplace. Wall-E is too freaking adorable. It was a fun, exhausting weekend. I’m so looking forward to going home to my friends.

Like I mentioned earlier, my parents will be spending a week with me and I look forward to being un-partially employed and getting to be a tourist. And not having to cook.

It feels like my leaving is so far off, but it’s so close. I have so much I want and need to do before then. I don’t know what to think about it all. What worries me most is leaving people. It didn’t matter leaving Gainesville because I would see everyone again in a few months. But I’m leaving here and may never come back.

This townhouse was built on top of a graveyard. No joke.

I hate people who go to the movies. I especially hate people who go to see a movie on its opening weekend. I especially hate everyone that has gone to see The Dark Knight or Mamma Mia at Cinebarre. I really need my Savannah trip on Saturday. I need a therapeutic break.

This past Saturday, at the redneck luau, I ate a Luther. A Luther is a burger that is on a Krispy Kreme doughnut instead of a regular bun. It was named after Luther Vandross, who wanted a burger but didn’t have any buns. It may sound disgusting, but it is actually one of the most amazing things I have ever eaten. Seriously. Incredible. Then today I had a Grand Marnier burger that was also unbelievable, except for its $11 price tag (but I split it with one of my bosses). A part of me feels guilty, because I’ve been trying to make the move in my life towards eating (or at least not personally purchasing) less meat (besides fish). The plan is not working. But I think that food is a big part of experiencing a culture or place and when am I really ever again going to eat a burger on a Krispy Kreme doughnut?

I have this anxiety about “growing up” and moving past college life that involves my fear of not being able to relate to people who are significantly older than me. I’m not going to be able to meet kids through school or part-time job environments anymore. Even now, except for the other interns and the editorial assistant and a few others, I am surrounded by people who are married and have had entirely other lives before coming to this paper. But after the party on Saturday, I really see that I am capable of having serious conversations with this kind of people. And they are mostly devoid of awkwardness. This is a good feeling. I feel less like a kid.

I found out that those suspicious noises that I heard in the street (that I mentioned last week) were actually a kid getting robbed at gunpoint. My landlords sleep with a police radio on and they told me about it.

Jesus Christ. If I wasn’t leaving so soon, with most of that time spent with other people in the house, I would be in a very neurotic place right now.

They're having a Batman costume contest at my work on Friday.

My mind is officially in “moving back to Florida mode”. I can’t help it. Here is how my life over the next few weeks breaks down:

This Saturday: a “redneck luau” City Paper party. A whole roasted pig will be on hand.
Next Saturday: a trip to Savannah to meet with lovely Gainesville friends.
Next next Saturday: my parents will be here.
Next next next Saturday: I drive back to Gainesville and this experience is over.

I can’t imagine it going by slowly. I like it here but I miss the world I’ve created for myself in Gainesville. I miss going to shows! But I get to see Best Friends Forever before I head off to Miami for a week. And I absolutely hate living alone. I am almost at a breaking point. I am paranoid every time I go to sleep and it didn’t help that last night I was woken up at 2:30 in the morning, maybe only an hour after I was finally able to get to sleep, by shouting and running and mysterious activities in the street below my window. I need to be in a house with people again.

I’ve been going to the beach at least once a week, which is so weird to me. But it’s nice to sit and read and hear wind and water and it’s always cooler than it is inland. I went to Folly Beach, one of the more touristy beaches, and it had more of an at-the-end-of-the-world feeling than the beach I usually go to, where you can see boats and an outline of the city in the distance. And I found a beautiful waterfront park yesterday that I somehow missed every time I walked by. It was at the perfect spot on the Cooper River, close enough to see Fort Sumter, and had two fountains and benches. There was a puppy and I couldn’t resist it and then I ended up talking to two really nice girls that were from Florida. One is having a big art show Saturday but between work and the luau, I probably won’t be able to go.

I’m going to another art show in a little bit. I’ve been itching to get creative lately and I’ve been thinking a lot about the zine I want to make. I was going to try to block print a design for the covers but now I think I might do collages instead. I’ll probably make 10, keep one, give one to my friend/roommate Brian as promised, and then sell the rest at Wayward Council. I’m going to write a few essays and maybe do a few illustrations (I already have two in mind, but I’m worried they won’t turn out because I have no real artistic skills to speak of). And I want to have all of this done by the time school starts or pretty soon thereafter, maybe a September deadline.

Greenville wasn’t what I was hoping. It was nice to be in a place with varying elevation (the picture above was at a beautiful park with a lot of rocks and cliffs and falls, even though it was in the middle of the downtown area and surrounded by hotels and parking garages), but I had a lot of disappointments. The vegetarian restaurant I wanted to go to didn’t exist. The vintage stores I wanted to go to didn’t exist and I got my ear talked off by some girl that’s starting a DIY art collective, which is cool but she ignored everything I was saying as she went on and on about how she’s giving up on the city. The record store I went to was really overpriced - fuck spending $20 on the new Les Savy Fav LP.

The downtown was cute and historical, but it felt really different from Charleston. It was a way more metropolitan city, as there were actual modern “skyscrapers.” It felt younger and more middle class than here, where everyone here lives in $1 million houses that have been passed down for generations. But I drove through a residential street and the houses were brick and beautiful and the streets were rolling. I have to live in a hilly or mountainy place when I get out of Gainesville.

Speaking of getting out of Gainesville, I applied on a whim to a job at the Willamette Week in Portland. My dream employer. They’re hiring now for a music editor, so I sent an inquiry e-mail and the hiring editor told me I should send in my stuff because they might be hiring an assistant music editor later in the summer, which I would be better for. I’m not going to think about it, but if I were to be so lucky, I wonder if I would quit school if an opportunity came up. I’ve grown out of Gainesville, but not out of my friends. The degrees will always be just two semesters away.

My grown-in wisdom tooth is causing me problems.

I love that Target is using Dolly Parton in their commercials.

Tomorrow, I am going to Greenville for the day. Because that will make for a much more interesting post than I am sure I would write tonight, I am going to be a day off this week.

I got lemonade at a real-life lemonade stand today.

How is it already July? When did that happen? I was driving home from the beach yesterday and I remembered how much I was dreading coming up here, but now I don’t think I could possibly have made a better decision. I’ve even finally managed to create a small social life for myself. Who knew that would ever happen? I got visited by a few friends this past weekend and it was nice going out with them, even though I wish I could have been more available. But I got out of work pretty early the whole weekend and we went to a bar, a weird hippie art and music show and even a house party.

I really need to make a list of places I need to go to. I still haven’t seen the Citadel and I really hope I’ll get to go to Fort Sumter with my parents. And I think my next solid day off - the movie theater is seriously giving me hours upon hours, at least five days a week - I want to drive to the mountains. I think. That means Greenville, which is a little more than three hours away. I definitely want to do a day trip somewhere.

I’m doing an art gallery guide for the City Paper. This afternoon I went into the galleries on Broad Street and they were all almost exactly the same. So many galleries here just exhibit “Low country scenes” of the old streets or the marsh. It is so redundant. I’m also going to be doing at least one book review, maybe three (I am currently in possession of the new Chuck Klosterman book that doesn’t come out until September. Fucking sweet.), but I’m nervous about it. I don’t really think I’m cut out to review things necessarily. I never know what to say and I think I’m incapable of finding a middle ground between loving or hating something I’m supposed to be critical of.

I wish I could be going to Gainesville this weekend but I have to work. Basically all I do now is work. I worked 20 hours in only three days. Nuts.

Saturday is Carolina Day.

1. I've been to North Charleston and it is a terrilbe, terrible place. A haven of the trashiest strip malls amongst sketchy residential areas. Except for the one cute hipster street with a gourmet pizza place that I would go back to.

2. On my way back from North Charleston, I discovered why this city smells: There is a paper mill on the Cooper River. It is big and unsettlingly industrial. Passing it as I drove by on a bridge, I couldn't help but feel almost as if I was in Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. Though it may be extreme to compare a paper mill to slaughterhouses and other factories. Charleston constantly smells like minty diapers and it is disgusting. It ruins the charm.

3. Onion bagels do not exist here. Seriously. Not at the Harris Teeter I've been frequenting. Not in its bread section. Not in its frozen section. Not even in the store's fresh-baked bagel section. What the fuck. I had to get everything bagels instead.

4. It has been raining terribly lately. The streets are like driving through Venice.





Reminds me of Florida summer.

Today is the one-year anniversary of the deaths of nine firefighters in Charleston.

Last weekend was first genuinely fun weekend I’ve had in the 30+ days I have been in Charleston. I got to see Rilo Kiley last Thursday (a weekend day by Gainesville standards) and it was a much better show than I thought it would be. I always assumed they would be unenthused assholes but they weren’t and Jenny Lewis was so charming. I wrote a review for my paper’s blog that you can read here: http://music.ccpblogs.com/2008/06/13/live-review-rilo-kiley-music-farm-612/.

On Saturday night I went out with some people from work and had the best time. I went to a show (my semi-boss’ boyfriend’s friends were playing at a weird bar on James Island) and then I got my first taste of downtown nightlife. I went to a bar, practically the first bar I’ve ever been to, and I drank more than I’ve drank since the one time I was ever drunk more than two years ago. And it was only three drinks and I wasn’t drunk (though I probably could have been there with one more). I had good conversations with good people.

The Music Farm, where the Rilo Kiley played, and the crowd that was there was so different from Gainesville, by which I mean it was almost completely unpretentious. By which I mean it was hardly “scene” at all. I was not surrounded by an intimidating and immaculately styled crowd of kids that I know or sort of know or just see out all the time like I would at Common Grounds. Gainesville has this strange accumulation of cool kids, whether punks or hipsters or whatever, that don’t exist in Charleston. It’s nice, but at the same time, it’s lonely. I feel dissimilar from kids here. Now, instead of feeling underdressed wherever I go, I feel overdressed.

But just as I am beginning to enjoy myself, my job is starting and is already becoming overwhelming. I am scheduled every day for the next six days. I have a number of friends coming to visit me next week and I’m worried that I won’t be able to spend any sort of time with them. I always go into the summer wanting to be horribly busy all the time with work and I always get overwhelmed by my wish. Two years ago, there were points where I was going from seven in the morning to midnight between my internship at the Coral Gables Gazette and my part-time job at Express. Last summer, even with setting my own hours at “Copytalk,” I had so few weekday hours to myself that it made me miserable. I just don’t want to leave parts of this city untouched because I was stuck in a movie theater.

I luckily found my camera but I haven’t had a chance to go anywhere picturesque since doing so, so here instead is a picture of the bridge that I have to go over to get to work everyday:

It is very hot here.

I’m going to start by saying that I have misplaced my camera (hopefully only temporarily). So no picture this week. Or maybe any of the rest of the weeks I’m here. Which there are only eight more of. Crazy. Bananas. Where is the summer going?

Now I’m going to add that I don’t have much to add. No interesting developments this week. Maybe some interesting new emotions but nothing I feel like expressing so publicly. Fellow blogger and Coral Reef alumnus Justin Dainer-Best (http://www.justindb.com/life/) and I were just discussing our fears of leaving our summer locations without experiencing them as much as possible. That is a nagging feeling for me. I've also been thinking lately that I might miss out on developing relationships with people here, or leave new relationships underdeveloped. It is possible that I will meet a new friend that I will have to leave weeks later. This is something I am going to have to confront not only this summer, but in a year I will have to leave every friend, deep or casual or otherwise, behind.

I’ve been enjoying myself a little more. I went to the Charleston art walk on Friday. I might get to see Rilo Kiley for free tomorrow night and I’m going to a show on Saturday. I might get visited soon and if not, I’m going to go to Gainesville next weekend, I think. Matt + Kim is playing a show and I would like to see them and while I would like to spend Fourth of July weekend there, it might not work out.

Yesterday I went to a vineyard for an article I'm writing and got to try some sweet tea-infused vodka. Only in the South.

Broad Street is named so because it is the broadest street.

After two defeated weeks straining my hand to fill out the same employment history and the same reference numbers for countless job applications, I was finally hired by the 20+ company I contacted. I am going to be working at a movie theater/restaurant/bar aimed at adult audiences that want to eat while watching their film and not have to deal with kids. It seems to be the only decent place in town that is actively hiring, as it hasn’t opened yet. It has its pros (they wanted for “hip/alternative” employees, it won’t conflict with my internship, they actually hired me) and its cons (it’s in Mount Pleasant, which requires crossing a terrifying bridge, and it’s going to be a little while before they actually open). I also managed to get a bartending-at-events gig because of a co-intern. Just the idea of working and having something to do with my time is so invigorating to me.



I am embracing social solitude and have been doing a lot of things alone that I never have before. On Sunday, I went to the beach and sat by myself on an oddly empty stretch of sand and read and tanned for an hour. Yesterday I went to see the Sex and the City - which, by the way, I should have just rented - matinee by myself. I felt surprisingly comfortable being in the theater unaccompanied; I think that the theater was mostly empty helped. And I wasn’t the only “single gal” there, as I counted at least two others.

I want to take a day trip soon. Probably to Savannah, because it seems like the closest interesting place. After a few weeks of wasting my time here, I’ve decided that I need to start making plans for things to do and places to go. I want to explore this city as much as humanly possible because time is already ticking away.



Each day here I realize more and more how beautiful it is. I find it hard to comprehend that people live in these pretty houses with their pretty yards. That these lives are really led by people. But it’s sad that this beauty was built on such ugliness, that these massive houses are where the wealthy lived when it was too cold for the crops to grow, that the bottom floors of these massive houses are where the slaves made the food and did the other chores. I drove to the Citadel today and it has a beautiful park in front of it and I felt to weird to pass through the gates, but if I did it would be to see a place that only started to accept women midway through my lifetime and then harassed those women. Behind what is attractive is always something unattractive.

I think I am going to make a zine to commemorate my time here. It will give me something crafty to do and a way to express myself through words.

Every day I leave my internship, I leave happy. I am so satisfied at the City Paper. In my life, I’ve been surrounded by people who dislike what they do, and I’ve had jobs, some similar, that I’ve absolutely hated, but I feel good when I am there. I feel so lucky to only be 21, to still be in school, and to know exactly what I want to do and that that job will make me happy.

I’ve also already been published. I spent an entire summer at the Coral Gables Gazette two years ago and only once did they let me write. Here, after only a week and a half, I was published today in the City Paper ("Bear Baiting": http://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A45644, a CD review: http://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A46014). While the majority of what I am doing is basic and press release-based, it is still amazing to have physical proof of what I am doing and the experience I am getting.

This morning, Katy and Meg left me, having arrived to the city on Sunday night. It was beyond wonderful to have them here. It was also unreal to be with two people I’ve known for years in a place I’ve known for a week and that they don’t know at all. Exploring is better with friends. It’s also less terrifying to be lost when you have company. Having them here gave me the opportunity to find new places to go without being alone and uncomfortable. We went to a show at the Tin Roof, which was just a smaller version of Gainesville’s Common Grounds. We unearthed a quiet beach. We found a yummy vegetarian-friendly restaurant and the art house movie theater next door. I like that there’s all these different things and they’re only a little bit longer of a drive than things would be in Gainesville. Now I’ve been in every direction but north.

It was so nice to have them here. It was nice to have noise and other bodies asleep in the same house. Now it’s quiet and I have to find ways to occupy my (too much) time again. Tonight I’ll be the only person here when I sleep and it doesn’t help that last night I had a terrifying nightmare that involved me fighting off a serial killer. I hope that some of my other friends can come and that I can learn about this city with them even more.

I have had no success with finding a job. I’ve applied to so many that I can no longer keep count, but I know it is at least 20. I have applied to retail stores, some that I would never be able to afford to shop at even with a job there and a discount. I’ve applied to two different Starbucks and every local café or bakery that would let me. I applied to Whole Foods Market three different times for three different positions. My biggest hope is for a pizza place that I would have to drive to but that I think could be fun and the manager gave me positive feedback but I still haven’t heard from them. I feel so defeated by this it’s overwhelming sometimes.

I need to start plans. There are so many projects I want to do this summer and instead I’ve been spending my afternoons and evenings watching television. I need to start making lists.

To end, a photo essay:

I live about block away from a prison:



Not creepy at all.

And we decided to go explore it last night. We thought it was private property and decided to hop the fence. Meg was brave enough to go first when I said I’d spot here, only I’ve never spotted anyone before and was terrible at it:



She tried to show me how:



But we gave up and Katy did it instead:



Meg got over and I couldn't spot Katy either:



Katy was going to spot me, but I failed at that too.



We were upset:



But I decided “Fuck it” and walked a few yards to the hole in the fence and got in that way instead:



It wasn’t private at all. Other women showed up and they said there was a tour starting in a little bit:



I miss them already. I hope that one day we all move to a new city together and do all of this all over again, but for real.

When you drive into South Carolina, there is a brick gate at its entry, welcoming you. But really, it’s just like I drove in some weird circle and am in a different part of Florida. Their flatness are the same, their greenness is the same. It’s like Miami but smaller. Like Gainesville but bigger. Like both but older.

The air smells like flowers and horses - there are horses everywhere leading carriages swarming with tourists. I am already frustrated by tourists; they walk slow and it‘s hard to get around them. It’s hot but so far there is always a breeze. I like that I’m so close to water. Living in Gainesville has shown me that landlock has a feeling and I don’t feel that here.

The buildings are all so old that they don’t seem real to me. I’ve never been around buildings with such age and so therefore they can’t be real. It’s like living at a theme park; everything looks fabricated. Main Street USA.

This place suits me. I’m not sure why yet. I don’t feel overwhelmed or suffocated. I haven’t made friends yet but I’ve spotted road bikes. I’ve found a coffee shop that sells peach French sodas and where I plan on spending my unoccupied time. There is a good record store and a good used book store.

I really like the Charleston City Paper. The environment is exactly what I expected and exactly where I will want to be once I graduate: A place where people are young(ish), conscious of important issues and what good shows are coming up and who casually use the word “fuck” in an office setting. I’m already getting opportunities to be published, even though they’re small (record reviews and the like).

Being totally alone is strange. My landlords are lovely but elderly and I know I should be keeping in touch with them but my proclivity to awkwardness is taking over. I’m trying to keep myself occupied but mainly I just do things in my temporary bedroom. I’ve been looking for a job so wandering has been taking up much of my afternoons. I’ve applied at about seven different places and I hope that I hear back from even just one of them, and at this one there is someone who will be my friend.

Pre-Charleston - Two More Days

It hit me yesterday that yes, I am moving away for 12 weeks. I think it was the process of packing that did me in. While I was home in Miami and everyone asked what I thought about going to Charleston, I didn’t have much to say. It wasn’t anything I could see yet.. But trying to decide between what I will need or won’t need or won’t need but want to have makes me conscious of it all.

Leaving Miami was hard for me. It gets harder as I get older and I progress through school. Soon there won’t be any more winter breaks or spring breaks and I’ll just have two weeks of vacation time a year - if even that. Here’s hoping. And since now I’ll be 11 hours away instead of five and a half, I probably won’t see my parents for three months. And all my grandparents are getting sick.

And now Gainesville and saying goodbye to friends. Goodbyes never feel complete to me no matter who they are with. I never feel satisfied with them. I’m glad that I’m here for a few days and I’m trying to spend time with kids before I leave. I have this strange paranoia that Gainesville is at its best when I’m not in it, that many, many fun things happen and all this fun stops when I get back. I’m sure it only stops because school starts.

But I have things to look forward to. First, thanks to the creepy technology that is the “Facebook News Feed” telling me what "groups" my "friends" join, I found out Charleston has an infoshop!

Brand new! Just opened!

How is that for a good omen.

And now I am actually anxious to get up there and get involved in this thing. It will be a great way to meet some radical kids really quickly.

And there’s a good show the first (independent of my mom) weekend I am there and I don’t have to be scared of going to the show by myself because two of the loves of my life will be visiting me that very weekend and so hopefully I will transition into the Charleston scene-ry with their help.

I am finally getting antsy to be there.

Pre-Charleston: Two More Weeks

My name is Susan and in August, I will begin my fourth and final year as a student at the University of Florida, studying Journalism and History. My current post-graduate goal is to get a job at one of the many alternative weeklies scattered about the country. In an effort to have a resume and portfolio worthy enough to get me hired at one of these publications, I began in January to apply for internships and was hired at the Charleston City Paper, located (not surprisingly) in Charleston, South Carolina.


This is the first time in my life that I am diving in to the deep end with no safeguards to protect me (except possibly for a time in pre-school summer camp during a swimming lesson that I may or may not have just dreamed up). Charleston, being hundreds of years old and with its "Southern hospitality" – I’ve been told to expect to be offered sweet tea wherever I go – is a place completely different from the two cities I have lived previously: Miami, a sprawling smorgasbord of cultures, languages and lots of things I don’t like, and Gainesville, a progressive city whose size seems smaller and more suffocating with each month I spend there. I also do not personally know a single person in Charleston and will have to meet people and make friends entirely on my own, something I may be much too socially awkward to accomplish. (Needless to say, I am bringing many, many books with me to read on what I will expect to be many, many lonely nights).


The purpose of this blog is to document my experiences in this new old city, to keep my writing skills from degrading with summer laziness and, since I am completely useless with lengthy telephone conversations, to keep in touch with everyone I love and will miss in Florida or wherever summer may take them. I have created two rules for myself:


1. I must post once a week – most likely, this will be on Wednesday.
2. Each post must include a picture. Like so:





This is me at my parents' house in Miami. I am here for a bit longer before I head back to Gainesville to pack 12 weeks worth of living. It is already a baking summer in South Florida.


I am excited. I am terrified. I am ready.


But as my trip is still more than a week away, I have nothing really more to add.