...In which our heroine bids a fond farewell.

So, friends and readers, it's come to this: I'm thinking about killing Katydid in the City. Posting has gone from infrequent to pretty much non-existent, all the comments I get are spamalicious, and Chemguy, Achilles, and Calen are the only other blogger folks who seem to update with any regularity anymore.

I think this blog has served its purpose. Let's look back at some of the first post, shall we?

"So I've finally decided to give this blogging thing an honest go. I feel that its a good time to start as some things in my life are ending and a lot more are beginning. What's to know about our illustrious blog host? Well I graduate high school in less than a month, which is dually fantastic and horrible. In the fall, I'll be attending the only college I really wanted to go to, Columbia College, which is in Chicago. I am going to pursue my passion for film there--lately I've been thinking Cinematography for a concentration. So stick around if you'd like to read about the pratfalls and successes of my first year away from home, in a major city, as I try to swim with sharks. Should be fine. I hope."

The swimming with sharks has gone splendidly: This will be my third August in Chicago, and I'll be a junior/senior at Columbia, working on a BA in Film & Video: Screenwriting. I haven't been back to Cincinnati in almost four months, which is a new record. I live in a lovely 4th floor walk-up in the Lakeview neighborhood with Emily Krieger, who is the most unlikely BFF ever. I was helplessly in love with Paul Cocco when this blog began. After finally giving that up, I was helplessly in love with Ben Montgomery, who was my first real boyfriend. I survived freshman year in a haze of marijuana smoke, found out that the ectasy is aptly named but makes you feel like death in the afterglow, and that yes, magic mushrooms do in fact produce and I quote, "majestic crystal peacocks." Ben broke my heart, and I spent last summer taking some much needed time to wallow in the hurt that both he and Paul caused. From that hurt, I finally figured out that my own happiness was paramount, and I was pretty fucking tired of settling for guys who turned out to be not so swell.

HOWEVER...last summer was a turning point for me. Amazing things happen when you aren't stoned everyday! I found my passions revived with a little help from Don Draper, and in three weeks, I wrote my first screenplay, "Sharp as a Razor, Soft as a Prayer." On a whim, I applied for a job as a "teaching artist apprentice", whatever the fuck that was. Through that, I was introduced to Joanna Barrios and the wonderful folks at Columbia's Center for Community Arts Partnerships, where I've been working as an administrative assistant since January. Mentoring with kids from the lower income neighborhoods of Chicago and using art to help them with academics has made me realize that my bullshit is not so important, and they're are more important tasks at hand. I wrote another screenplay, "Of Tangled Roots," and found a writing partner in the divine Miss Leah Williams, a Bob Evans hostess of Cleveland, Ohio. I spent every day this fall and winter with Heidi and Telly, only to have Telly move back to Maine, and then have find out Heidi was the most dishonest person I've ever met. I moved out of the dorms in May, and love being in an actual neighborhood. I've had a great love affair with myself and all of my delightful weirdness, and save for a few classy as ever friends with benefits escapades, been totally happy without a boy.

I got rained on with Flaming Lips confetti, and just plain rained on at Fleet Foxes. I stood ten feet away from my love Jim James in Columbus, Ohio, with the two most decent males I've had the pleasure of being friends with since high school, Nathan Artrip and David Albertz. I belly danced with Cassandra Gallagher on night two of seeing my favorite band, the Pixies, at the Aragon. I even let my mother drag me to a Pearl Jam show, and even sang along. I got to eat real deep dish pizza on the floor of my new apartment with my dad, and a heavy metal cheeseburger with the best chemistry teacher in Ohio, or at least Cincinnati. I cried my eyes out at Up, The Wrestler, In the Mood for Love, found that my passion for cinema was greater than I even expected. I learned what mise-en-scene and eyeline match meant, and how to shoot a 16mm film on a Swedish camera from the 1960s. Being in a field that is 93% men, I figured out the best way to deal with their chauvinist vulgarity is to simply one up them. 

The future? Giving the real screenwriting business a go in Los Angeles? Grad school at DePaul? Becoming Mrs. Jim James? Who knows. I do know that now, this girl, on a bed in Chicago, Illinois is a happier, older, and much less green lass than the one who started this blog on a mattress in Cincinnati, Ohio. She's living the big city life she's always dreamed of, become with her broken hearts indeed, more adventurous, and still remembers where that Katydid can hop back to, the people and places that have brought me to right now, this moment: too hot, drinking blood orange soda, and waiting for True Blood to come on.

So, thanks for reading my ramblings, my confessions, my pop culture obsessions. Thanks for the comments and the support that has cheered me up on many a Sylvia Plath day. Tumblr has taken over, and I REALLY encourage you to come find me at Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon. If for some reason that isn't enough, there's "Faceplace," as my boss calls it, or that electronic mail all the kids are talking about.

Thanks for reading Katydid in the City, I've quite enjoyed the writing. It's kept me sane on many days. To you especially, Chemguy, Calen, Lakes, Emily GV. I hope you've gotten an insight into the crazy little space I call my brain.

I end with this, written the night before I left for college. It applies to me just the same as it did that day as it does now: I lived all the thrills and spills of a life coming into adulthood. And tomorrow, the adventure really begins. As Penny Lane would say, "It's all happening."

Love,

Katydid