A Six Month Hiatus...from Blogging

Six months have passed since my last entry in this blog. I have to reflect on why that is.

Could it be that my nomadic tendencies have begun to wane? When we made the move to Miami over a year ago, our son gave us an ultimatum: five years in one place so that he could get through middle school...or else. We decided to heed his wishes.

We've begun to settle in like proper rooters.  We've become part of a school community, have re-connected with some of our friends, but in truth have been so wrapped up in our own ambitious scheduling that we have not gotten to spend quality time with many of them.

My husband was on a crazy work schedule in which his nomadic tendencies were being fanned and fueled, as he went zigzagging east and west on a weekly basis...until he wasn't.

I've been on a pace one might not expect of someone trying to root: I was published in a journal http://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/Ss5fwBpxYcmCBHGCA2EW/full; have pursued a full-time school load and am now one class shy of my Masters; started a non-profit organization www.voicesunitedusa.com and was asked to join the Miami Country Day School as full-time faculty to oversee their Broadcasting Lab and studio and help start an Entrepreneurial program for kids.

So I guess it boils down to this: my nomadic tendencies really are those that propel me to act, to move, to work, to be. Even if I am rooted, I will remain peripatetic, engaged, busy, seeking opportunity and encouraging change. It's in my nature.

So onward Urban Nomads! (I'll try to fit in blogging more...)

Globe-trotting Nomads

         Re-connecting with so many high school friends following the Prep School Scandal article (see last two blog entries), I've been asked a couple of times how I was doing, what I was up to and what I've done since high school. 

         In a nutshell: I am an Urban Nomad. 

         My family and I are well and living in LA, where we've been for the past six years. My journey has been a crooked and globe-trotting one. I went from NY to Budapest to Miami, Mexico and Argentina, back to NY (upstate) and then onto Los Angeles. We should throw in a little bit of Greece there too, as my husband is from Athens and all his family is still there.

         Married 10 years ago, now I am surrounded by more male energy than I could even have imagined in high school. My stepson who just turned 24 is thankfully out of the house now and employed (yeah!), son 9 is in elementary school, husband Nick is also a peripatetic sort and two dogs (brother and sister) that go wherever we go.

         My career has been pretty successful in media and television, from beginning as a speechwriter for politicians back in the 80s to writing and producing music videos, behind-the-scenes videos, documentaries, on air promotions and lots of other things for so many I've lost count! 

         During the last decade my career took a more executive turn until the crash of 2009, when I, along with 200 others at our network, were "downsized." Spend a lot of time as community activist, particularly for education and kids and am turning that into something full-time, along with writing, which is my true passion.

         Have written a children's series, many screenplays, commercials, am working on a fact-based novel about the lives of two extraordinary families in the lower east side following them through all of last century…along with a kind of memoir, which funny enough, deals with a bunch of things that occurred during those HM days.

That's it in a nutshell…

Oh and we are moving to Miami over the summer!

An Infuriating Year

This has been one infuriating year.

Ten years past the fall of the Twin Towers, three years post-Lehman and the apocalypse of the financial system as we knew it, we stand hard-pressed to imagine anyone not touched in the last twelve months by some outlandish, ridiculous, mind-blowing, devastating, distressing, demoralizing, upending, brain-bending, off-putting, mouth-dropping, peculiar, uncharacteristic, wild, dramatic, off kilter shit. 

Certainly, Messrs. Gaddafi and Bin Laden would agree. Not a good year.

How about Arnold and Maria and his now-teenage Latino love-child? Chao bello!

How was that bed in a cage, Mr. Mubarak? I guess it might be better to sleep in your jammies through your trial than actually face it.  Gabrielle Giffords shot in the head.

SONY and so many in Japan—not a good time.

Arab spring, Muslim rage. Tahrir Square in Egypt. Syntagma Square in Athens.  

Wildfires in the South and E. Coli in our sprouts.

And even with her husband’s pants down, Madame Strauss-Kahn still can’t understand why the Americans are so provincial.

Elizabeth Taylor, Betty Ford, Steve Jobs, Andy Rooney, Amy Winehouse, Christopher Hitchens, my Mom, Nick’s Dad.  All renegades. All persuasively contrarian people. All gone this year.  Must be some party there with the Freshman Class of ’11.

Yup, 2011.

Started for us with a great adventure: the prospect of a move to Prague…again.  Michael was accepted at the International School. Toyota gladly took back our leased car. We hired movers. We found a lovely home in the heart of the old city. We gave up our home in South Pasadena. Then, just two weeks shy of packing, our move was abruptly cancelled. Seemed they needed Nick in the US more than in Europe.  “Would it be a hardship for you to stay?” they asked him.  No house, no car, no school…but “no hardship” we said. “SCCREEEEEEEECH” went our proverbial wheels.

With only weeks to find a house before the start of school, we landed in yet another area in Los Angeles—this time in Sherman Oaks. It’s our third California neighborhood in the five years we’ve been here. Beautiful home; least favorite community.

What a year.

And yet…the need to remember that the sun will set, the moon will rise and there will be a new tomorrow has never seemed more important. Oooohhhhmmmmmmm.

We need to think about those memorable moments that made us smile.  Two Royal weddings inspired us this year with ceremonial pomp and circumstance almost as much as the ubiquitous Kardashians repulsed us with their unnecessary opulence.

My husband celebrated his one-year anniversary with Kit Digital, which  (since so many of you ask) defines itself as a global company providing end-to-end software and service solutions to manage video assets for its clients. “What?” you ask.  Just suffice it to say it’s a “next generation” company using old generation software, media, sales and computer geeks to sell software programs and services to companies that want to get their videos on all those many, many different platforms people use today.

Quite a year.

I finished a screenplay that no one’s bought. Counted over 1000 rejections from companies that never even called back yet claim to need people with exactly my skill-set and experience.  And took the GRE test for entry into graduate school after studying from “Math for Morons” and the “Idiot’s Guide to Acing Exams” to little avail.  Do I feel depleted? Yes. Defeated, no way.

Celebrating the twentieth anniversary of the launch of HBO in Hungary this year, along with nearly one hundred others, was a personal highlight. 

Now it's onward to a new beginning: this year I plan on entering a Master’s Program on the path to getting my PhD in Education. I’ve been spending more and more time in the classroom with Michael, guest lecturing at colleges in Multicultural Marketing and participating in various parent advocacy and activist groups.  I have not gotten so much out of anything in years as I do the gratification of teaching.

So what else is in store? Nick and I will celebrate 10 blissful (and at times not entirely blissful!) years on January 1. My son turns nine and we’re sure will continue getting the hang of piano and tennis. Logic and experience point to a move on the horizon. What can we say? We are, after all, Urban Nomads. Peripatetic entrepreneurs seeking our next game-changing opportunity, our next challenge.

With that in mind, we wish you a successful 2012 in which your dreams become your realities.  Don’t forget to smile and “Stay foolish!” (Thanks Steve Jobs …)

What is an Urban Nomad?

I bet you've heard things like "50 is the new 30," "the world is flat" " you can never be too thin" and other catchy phrases that have become cliche. Well I am here to introduce a new concept soon to qualify in cliche terms: the rise of the Urban Nomad as a permanent state. No, I'm not talking about those bereft souls who wander the streets, otherwise known as "bums." Nor am I referring to that small but diverse segment of society that goes to work in urban areas but can't rent, own or otherwise reside there. I am speaking of the new and growing segment of international citizens who are in a constant state of transplanting themselves in search of the next big career opportunity. Well, the next career move, at any rate. Not necessarily even a big one. A sustainable one. One that puts food on the table. One that clothes your kids. One that helps pay the car insurance and, if you're lucky, a big chunk of health insurance too. One that keeps you under a roof.

My own crooked nomadic path has taken me from New York to Budapest to Miami to Mexico to Argentina to the woods of Upstate New York to Los Angeles and, I soon feel, to ports yet unknown.

I am starting this blog to share ideas, doubts, humor, insights, feelings raised in this crazy world of impermanence, from child-rearing to employment searching. From being a good spouse amid turmoil to finding the right words to express all of this in new languages of your new homelands.

I hope you'll follow along and share your thoughts, wisdom, and humor with me.

Karen, the Urban Nomad in LA