What 2011 means to me
08 Jan 2011 8 Comments
in me
I turn thirty this year. Thirty.
Sometimes I’m okay with it — thirty seems cool, seems like adult-ish, seems like I’m WOMANly, seems like a new adventure, a new page, a new decade.
But then sometimes it seems … terrifying.
I mean, I’m still amazed that I have a drivers license. I still feel nervous when I order drinks at bars and restaurants. I still can’t believe that I’m married. I am so not ready to be thirty! That’s a whole other level of adulthood that I’m don’t feel prepared for.
I don’t know, this is something to focus on during this year so that I don’t have a full-on breakdown, like I did on my 29th birthday. On the day I turned twenty-nine I realized that I hadn’t yet accomplished my ONE goal that I had set for myself. (And yes, I only had one goal, I like to keep it simple and achievable.) I just wanted to travel out of the country one more time before I was thirty. And there was: twenty-nine and not enough money in my bank account to cover even half of what an international ticket costs, let alone be able to afford a place to stay once I got … wherever it was that I went. And it crushed my heart. Staring at my poor husband across the table from me, across the table from me at a restaurant that I had been DYING to check out, of which he remembered and made a surprise reservation for me, and he was looking back at me, crestfallen, because I was crying and hopelessly unhappy.
It looked like I wasn’t going to accomplish the one stupid thing that I wanted to accomplish before I turned thirty.
And then wouldn’t you know it … I got offered a free trip to Fiji! Mission accomplished, as the say.
And I have accomplished so many other goals that make me feel good about turning thirty this year. But that’s a whole ‘nother blog post, that I don’t feel like writing right now. Blaiohfhvhweahfe8yrr98tu49jrifjdhih <— that's what this blog post is. Just sort of shaking out all the shit that's rattling in my brain about this number that's looming over me in the future.
Shake it off Finley!
I'm thinking about celebrating my thirtieth birthday in Maui. I'll call it "saying aloha to 30." But then again, wouldn't I rather spend that day getting wasted out of my mind with all my close friends … who can't afford to fly to Maui for me AGAIN?
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I'll figure it out … I have seven months to figure it out.
Anyone else out there wrestled with the big three oh and came out a champion? I’d love to hear from ya.
It’s been a rough week
18 Jun 2010 1 Comment
in me
So if you haven’t been able to guess from my recent twitter bitchings, I’m having a rough time. I won’t go into too many details, but I will say, I’m overwhelmed with what I’ve taken on with my photography gigs, I’m having some major issues with self esteem mostly because of the photography gigs but mostly from just being a human being on planet Earth, my family is undergoing some MASSIVE changes that all will come to a head and then never be the same again by the end of the month, and I’m having some personal problems on top of all of this. Needless to say, if I’ve been distant, if I’ve been unavailable, if I’ve seemed “off” or moody or just downright sad, it’s because of a culmination of bad days upon bad days upon even WORSE days and the shit stream goes on for miles in either direction. What I mean to say is, this badness doesn’t seem to have an end.
Wow. I sound really depresso. This is not a cry for help by any means, it’s just a… head’s up, I guess. A head’s up that if I seem not myself, it’s because I’m NOT. And I guess this is also a request to please bare with me and my mood swings while I try to sort all this shit out.
Also, I wrote this at 5am after being awake ALL night except for the hour I slept and was awoken by the sounds of a woman screaming as if she were being attacked, only to have her laugh it off after scream number 3. It scared the shit out of me and I wasn’t able to go back to sleep. I blame the Lakers.
Change your name, change your life
11 Jun 2010 3 Comments
The other night, Aaron and I watched Dances with Wolves. (It was my first time seeing the film. SO SAD! ARG! They killed the wolf AND the horse. WTF!? But anyway, I digress…) In the movie, Kevin Costner’s character John Dunbar says,
“I had never really known who John Dunbar was. Perhaps because the name itself had no meaning. But as I heard my Sioux name being called over and over, I knew for the first time who I really was.”
And that quote sums up exactly how I feel about my name change. Megan Tharpe never really knew who she was, and “Megan Tharpe” never really felt like my name. It’s like I just knew it wasn’t me from the beginning. And then there was Megan Finley! That name just sounded like me. It sounds happy and spirited and it ends with a smile when you say it. And from the moment I took that name, I finally became who I was supposed to be. It’s like it enabled me to succeed. And it’s just a name! But it changed everything.
Ariel shared a Broke Ass Bride article recently entitled Your wedding can be a launch pad for your life and before I read the article itself, just the title really resonated with me. My wedding really was a launch pad for my life. Because of our wedding…
- I signed that paper that changed my name to something that felt more “me.”
- I wouldn’t have applied for the Offbeat Bride internship that
- I discovered Offbeat Bride and all the awesome freaky, nerdy, weirdos that made me feel like I didn’t have to be a freaky, nerdy, weirdo all alone.
- I applied for the Offbeat Bride internship that gave me my most favorite job.
- I had to deal with the WORST wedding photographer which then inspired me to become a professional wedding photographer myself.
And all those things have changed my life so much! All of those things have changed Megan Tharpe into Megan Finley and created the the seedling that grew into my wonderful life now.
I’m not saying that marriage and a wedding is the key to happiness or anything. But what I’m saying is that I definitely believe that things come into your life to change it up and allow you to become what you need to become — like John Dunbar in Dances with Wolves. He would have never become the man he was destined to be if the Indians hadn’t adopted him, the same way that I wouldn’t be the woman I am becoming today if I hadn’t gotten married.
Infinite and awesome possibilities
05 Jun 2010 4 Comments
in me
When i get depressed I like to look at real estate. I know it’s strange, especially because we are no where close to being able to buy a home. And you would think that looking at homes that I can’t afford when I’m sad would just make me even more depressed. But it never ceases to cheer me up.
I think it’s because it reminds me of the awesome things to look forward to in life — owning our own place, having a yard for the dogs, getting out of an apartment, getting out of west hollywood or perhaps getting out of Los Angeles, or even California in general! We could go anywhere in our future and do anything. Perhaps one day we could even make enough money to afford a wonderful home somewhere that we love to live.
And i think that’s what my search for a make-believe home represents — infinite and awesome possibilities.
Call me “Cupcake”
23 Mar 2010 10 Comments
in me Tags: aaron, ariel, pink hair, seattle
So I finally did it! I bleached my hair and dyed it pink. I’ve been wanting to do this since I was fifteen-years-old but there was always a reason to not do it.
- I would have gotten my ass beat by my parents.
- My parents would have killed me.
- I wasn’t brave enough.
- Then there were work reasons.
- Then I had wanted long wavy hippie hair for the wedding.
- And then there was no reason.
No reason not to do it! Except for the fact that it might be weird since my boss also has pink hair (well, half pink hair). So I decided, I’ll take it step-by-step and just bleach my hair at first — you know, go for a white blonde look for a while and then eventually make the move towards pink.
More
750 words
17 Mar 2010 2 Comments
in me
So Ariel turned me on to this website called 750 words. All the site is good for is for you to type out 750 every morning, a la “morning pages” from The Artist’s Way. Aaron used to do this every morning for a few years and I… never did. I journaled in other ways that were more like blogging. Writing when there was something to write about. But this stream of consciousness writing is supposed to help artists and writers to “unlock their creativity and intuition” or some shit. But mostly I’ve found that it’s a way of purging my brain. It’s cathartic in a way! Plus at the end of your entry for the day, when you save it, it gives you all these cool stats that tell you what you’re mostly concerned about, if your mostly happy or sad, etc. etc. and I love the little graphs.
Anyway, today it helped me figure out the things I want to accomplish today…
- I need to write a blog about having pink hair and then keep up said blogs. Because I think it’s a really interesting thing to write about. Things have changed since I’ve had this hair. People smile at me more, people give me things or talk to me or reach out to me or trust me more. And i feel more like myself.
- I need to write more bride profiles for OBB.
- I need to teach Coco the new way of doing profiles that even I just perfected this morning.
- I need to finish editing the pics from Charles Phoenix’s tour.
- Once done, I need to post them on Flickr and then write a Megan Finley Photography blog post about it.
- I need to go to the grocery store (groan! there’s nothing that I hate more. okay, maybe going to the doctor).
- I need to do more laundry.
- I need to CLEAN! i mean like really clean. not like yesterday and days previous where I just did dishes and tidied up.
- I need to find and produce more content for My Maui Wedding.And that’s basically what I need to do for just today. Maybe I’ll copy and paste that and post a quick blog about that in my funk in deep freeze blog. YAY! 810 words!
So yeah, check out 750 words if you get the chance it’s pretty freaking amazing. And they even email you at a specific time every day to remind you to keep up on the writing!
“Proof of [no] Life” photos
17 Jan 2010 Leave a Comment
The other day I was “tagged” in a couple of photos from my childhood and I was amazed by the lack of memories that they inspired.
This first one is from a party that a “friend” had where the theme was “dress up like a grown-up/your mom.”
I’m the one in the front that looks like a crazy beauty queen.
The only thing that I thought about this photo was, “man I wish my mom still had that dress.” Other than that, I had no warm thoughts — nothing that inspired any sort of “aw” reaction. But I remember taking that picture and having to sit on that girl’s lap. At one point we were the best of friends. At this point we were not. And it was awkward.
The next picture, from some pool party that I have no real memory of, has been haunting me for the last few days….
I’m the one with the bangs on the far left.
I have no memory of this day except for the fact that I was terrified that I would be one of the unfortunate nerds to get pushed in the pool by one of the popular kids.
As it was posted on Facebook most all of the kids in the picture have been “tagged” and, as you can imagine, there have been a lot of comments. My favorite one was from a guy that I actually remember very well as being a nice kid, (in fact, he’s the only non-white or asian kid in this photo) he said, “this looks like we got kidnapped and this is a “proof of life” picture. all of us except nicole, megan and jackie look like POWs.” Which is was dead-balls-on hilariously true.
The thing that’s been bugging me is that there is now a continuous dialog, in the comments of this photo, about memories from this particular 4th grade class. Schoolmate after schoolmate are posting funny memories and good times of which I have either NO memory of or I had totally forgotten about them until they mentioned it. How do they remember all these things when I can’t even remember even being in this particular class!???
I honestly think I’ve purposely blocked those memories. Going to this school was awful for me. I cried every morning as I put on that itchy uniform. I had been pulled out of a school that I was happy attending and put into this school in the 3rd grade. I think my parents thought that I would have no trouble adapting as all the neighborhood kids went to this school — instant friends! When in fact, becoming friends with me was equal to committing social suicide as, once we were all in a school setting together, it was easy to see that I was VERY different from all of them. So all the neighborhood girls that I used to be friends completely ignored me as a schoolmate. And that was how my life as a nerd became solidified.
So, all because I had been “tagged” in these damn photos just made me realize that I can’t think of ONE good memory from these times. And although that really bugs me, I’m just glad I survived to become the girl I am today. And let me just say that being an adult nerd is a MILLION times better than being a young nerd.
My thoughts on getting pregnant…
04 Sep 2009 9 Comments
in kids, me Tags: kids, pregnancy
Here’s the deal — I don’t want kids. I never have and I don’t think I ever will. And for years now I’ve had person after person tell me “oh that’ll change.” But it hasn’t. In fact, the older I get the more I realize that I really don’t want kids. The only thing that has changed is that I’ve started to feel my biological clock ticking. And I’m wondering if that’s what people mean by, “one day you’ll want kids.” Have all those people confused the feeling of their bodies becoming ready to get pregnant with the feeling of actually wanting a kid? I don’t know. I have a feeling that’s part of it.
But even with my body telling me that it’s time, my logical mind is telling me NO FREAKING WAY! I’m not responsible enough, I’m not patient enough, I’m not tolerant enough, I’m not maternal enough, I’m not stable enough and I’m not employed enough to have a kid. Plus I have this weird “bellybutton thing” — amongst several other general fears of the human body — all those weird pregnancy changes would just freak me out WAAAAY to much.
But besides all the obvious reasons that we shouldn’t have kids there’s one major reason why I never want to produce offspring. And though what I’m about to say may sound funny, I assure you, I am in no way kidding…
One time, I saw a pile of babies.
I was at a family event when it happened, there were grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins and friends in attendance. Most all of the cousins and friends there had just had babies and someone had the brilliant idea to take a group photo of all the newest additions. So they all placed their babies on a blanket one by one. About 5 or 6 half-naked, sticky, drooling babies squirming around and crawling over one another.
I was witness to a pile of small humans. And that my friends is now one of the main reasons I don’t want kids. I really would rather not contribute to the small pile of babies that my family is creating.
I’ll tell you something that I’ve just recently admitted to myself though — I almost wish that I wanted to have kids. Things would actually be easier on us in some ways to just know that was what we wanted instead of never really being 100% sure. It would also make our families super happy. I’d love to see my dad become a grandpa. I’d love to see what a combination of both Aaron and me would look like. (Probably so goofy that it’d be the ugliest/cutest thing I ever saw.) And I bet being pregnant feels freaking amazing and it’s all very romantic. But as it stands I’m just not ready for that and Aaron’s not ready for that, nor do I think we’ll ever be.
So that’s that. Babies are still a no-go even though I can feel that pesky biological clock. I just keep hitting the snooze button in hopes that the damn clock will just run out of batteries and shut itself off soon.
my saturday nights are rockin’
19 Jul 2009 1 Comment
in me Tags: conversations-with-friends
This excerpt from a gchat with my friend Ben pretty much sums up a typical Saturday night for me…
Me thinks Ben was just being a good friend when he told me that I was sexy.
my thoughts on blogging…
12 Jul 2009 4 Comments
in me
I realize that I don’t blog enough. I have a tendency to shut down when times are tough and I get depressed. But those are the time when I should be writing the most! My whole life is changing and even if it’s a rough time in some areas, some exciting things are still happening in others.
Aloha there, I'm Megan Finley. I'm a 30-something girl, living in Los Angeles with that guy I married and our rescued pets. I work online (a LOT) for the 
