On my flight to Denver last week, I accidentally spilled half of my Caesar salad on the woman sitting in the middle seat. She was in her 80s, traveling home with her husband, and turbulence got the best of my salad and the worst of her velour jumpsuit.

Can you believe they still make velour jumpsuits?

She was nice about it though. I gave her some of my homemade dark chocolate and sea salt truffles as an apology, and we both spent the rest of the flight pretending that she didn’t smell like garlic and that I wasn’t horrifyingly embarrassed.

Over the past few months, I’ve been traveling so much that I’m constantly in a state of transition – packing and unpacking, repacking and unpacking again – bouncing between San Francisco, Chicago, Phoenix, Miami, and Denver, with upcoming trips to NYC, Seattle, Phoenix and maybe Denver again before the end of the year.

It’s not that I haven’t been enjoying it. It’s not that I haven’t been having an incredible time. It’s just that perpetually being the girl gone nomad is exhausting, and truly, I’m starting to realize that it’s not as fulfilling as I always think it’s going to be. The apartment that I’m living in now, in San Francisco, is the 19th apartment/house I’ve lived in over the past 25 years. That’s just too many places. Too many moves. Too many renditions of, “If I give this away, I won’t have to pack it.”

Virtually everything I own can fit into my Honda Civic. All I’d have to do is ditch my bed and I could leave town, for good, tomorrow. That constant one-foot-out-the-door-ness used to be enormously comforting for me, but now it just feels pathetic. What’s wrong with me that I can’t just pick a place and live there?

With Jamie moving out of our apartment at the end of November and leaving for Europe in January, I’ve been thinking a lot about my next move. Am I done being a city slut? Which city do I love enough to actually commit to? I’ve even been taking quizzes online to determine the list of cities that the internet thinks are the best fit for me. I’ve received results for Denver and Austin, Paris and San Francisco, Honolulu and New York City, which makes me think that the quizzes are completely arbitrary and not at all related to my answers, but it’s fun to play along anyway and imagine my life in each new place.

One quiz picked where I should live based on my favorite foods. It wanted to know if I preferred pizza to steak, if I had any interest in trying ostrich meatballs, and if access to anzac biscuits was important in my decision making process. What kinds of questions are those? Or, more accurately, why would I ever want to live in a place where it’s pizza or steak. It’s always pizza and steak. Also, no, I don’t want ostrich meatballs. Ever. And what the fuck is anzac?

Do you know what I do want? I want an apartment with a view. I want rental prices that aren’t high enough to force the decision between food and shelter. I want nightlife that isn’t douchey and pretentious, weather that let’s me go outside most of the year, public transportation that actually transports the public in an effective way, and a diverse culture of people who aren’t locked into one mindset. I want my perfect city to just materialize. I want someone else to decide for me. I want to finally learn that I am who I am and that living in a different city isn’t going to make me a different person.

This would be a whole lot easier if my decision was solely based on ostrich meatballs and anzac biscuits. Clearly it’s time to Google “anzac biscuits.”

So, here’s my deal. I like to schedule Brazilian waxing appointments right before really stressful events.

It all started in college, mid-hyperventilation over my Food Microbiology and Sanitation final, when I suddenly had the God-like idea to schedule a Brazilian wax two hours before the test. The logic here, clearly, was that after getting all the hair ripped from my vagina, how bad could the damn test really be?

At first, I worried that this plan was a serious contender for the folder of “things that seemed like a good idea at the time.” Like trucker hats. And fat-free cheese. And being a prostitute for Halloween.

Except that actually? I’m a prodigy because this waxing thing worked. Anytime I got to a really challenging question on the exam I’d be all, “Relax. Remember how you had hair down there and now you don’t? YOU’VE GOT THIS.”

So it became my thing. Moving across the country? Get waxed before getting on the plane! Emotional holiday shenanigans with the family? Wax before Thanksgiving dinner! And on and on.

Brazilian waxing for anxiety management. I should totally be on Dr. Phil.

Anyway, I have my appointment all set up for 2pm tomorrow, because at 4pm? I have a phone interview for a job that I OH MY GOD WANT SO BADLY.

Like… CAPS LOCK CAPS LOCK CAPS LOCK.

And I’m nervous for the damn interview. Which is superb for people who, at their calmest, talk at least sixteen times the speed of everybody else. But I’m thinking a solid “lift your legs and hold your skin tight!” will chill me the hell out. Plus, it’s a phone interview. Which means I don’t have to wear pants. It means, actually, that I don’t even have to wear panties, and that I can basically go full frontal landing strip on this woman while still maintaining my wonderfully charming and professional demeanor on the phone.

God. It’s like the brilliant ideas just don’t stop.

So the job. I’m not going into detail about it because I’m pretty sure that would be bad juju and yes, I’m totally a juju person and you secretly are too so just stop right there with all the judging. What I will say is that the job is in the San Francisco area. And that the plan is to move up there sometime before the end of the year.

I KNOW RIGHT?! Decisions, they happen quickly in these parts.

When I told a friend about it yesterday she was all, “Why San Francisco?” and I was like, “Um, why NOT?” and then she was totally silent, which means I won. Or it means that my fucking iPhone dropped yet another call. But either way? I’m moving to San Francisco (and I got an A in that Microbiology class) so I’m pretty sure that I do, in fact, TOTALLY WIN.

Lately, particularly while traveling, I’ve been forcing myself to keep a pen-to-paper journal. Here’s a peek.

Friday 9/18: Phoenix, Denver, Minneapolis, Chicago

5:00am Hug my mother goodbye outside the Phoenix airport. Apologize for yelling at her about getting lost and almost making me miss my flight. Walk inside, check in, and take off on my unplanned adventure.

10:13am Meet up with Matt in the Denver airport. Think about how insanely cool he is for driving out to spend my 4 hour layover with me. Drink iced tea as he drinks beer. Discuss love and what it means to be in an adult relationship. Fly to Minneapolis. Change planes. Fly to Chicago. Pat myself on the back for hitting 4 states in 12 hours.

7:00pm Crash at Derek’s place. Eat, drink, and talk about the process of growing up. “It’s the hormones,” he says. “You’re just an entirely different person at 29 than at 24. It’s less about what you’re going to do and more about who you’re going to be. Things calm down.” I tell him that I’m relieved to hear that, because right now? It seems as though things might never calm down; in my life, in my head.

***
Sunday 9/27: New York City

4:00pm Wake up from a nap and realize I only have 2.5 hours left until the train taking me from Chicago to NYC pulls into Penn Station. Stare out the window. Drink hot chocolate. Listen to a lot of Sara Bareilles on repeat.

6:25pm Hug Becca in the middle of the train station, after a few rounds of, “Wait, where are you?” “Huh? I’m in front of the pretzel place, where are you?” Take the subway back to Park Slope. Watch her give a coughing woman a throat lozenge. Think about small, everyday kindness and how it’s much more rare than it should be. Feel appreciative to have her in my life.

***
Tuesday 10/13: New York City

7:35pm Rush to meet my godmother for dinner in Tribeca. Order mac & cheese. Catch up on our lives, her divorce, my what-the-fuck-am-I-doing-ness. Drink what feels like all of the wine in the restaurant.

***
Saturday 11/7: Washington, DC

7:01am Wake up to the sound of nine other women moving around our bedroom in the hostel on 11th street. Look at the time. Curse out loud once I realize that I only fell asleep two hours earlier. Think about insomnia. Wonder what it’s like to be a normal person who sleeps. Contemplate stabbing the girl in the bottom bunk who has the audacity to blow dry her hair at this ridiculous hour. Try to fall back asleep. Fail miserably. Go back to the original stabbing plan.

9:31am Walk downstairs to the common room for free breakfast. Pile my tray with blueberry muffins, orange juice, and a small bowl of cereal. Eat quietly, surrounded by groups of people who are chatting, but not in English. Wonder if any of them are talking about how many muffins I took. Have a bite of the first muffin and realize it’s delicious and that they can talk all the shit they want because I’m getting fat off of these muffins unless someone tackles me to the ground and pulls them away from me first.

10:45am Settle into a big leather chair in the hostel lobby. Pull out my laptop, hook into the free wifi, and email out a freelance writing assignment I finished the night before. Play online. Contemplate whether anyone has ever watched porn in this common room before. Think about giving it a shot. Remember I don’t have headphones with me. Read blogs instead.

12:00pm Receive a text message from an ex that was meant for his new girlfriend. Have an unavoidably dramatic phone conversation about it. Hang up. Take two minutes worth of deep breaths. Laugh. Move on.

So, during my three hour layover last night I thought it would be a good idea to have some pre-second-flight drinks at the airport bar. Or, more accurately, at one of the airport bars, because whoever designed the new jetBlue terminal at JFK is clearly a raging alcoholic and thought it would be killer to put liquor, like, EVERYWHERE.

With so many options, I just picked the closest bar, settled in with my laptop and free wifi, asked Twitter if getting loaded in an airport was a yay or a nay, laughed when a few too many people said “YAY!!” and then thought, “yeah alright,” and went for it.

By the time I was handed drink number 3, I had already started to formulate a plan for what might be the coolest social media experiment ever: spending an entire day letting Twitter make all of my decisions for me. What to eat, what to wear, where to go- and because of the up-in-the-air-ness of my life right now, bigger things too, like which jobs to apply for, which two cities to consider moving to at the end of the year, all of it.

After that third drink, as I was paying my tab and heading to the gate, I decided that my idea was out of this galaxy and that I had to do it, even though my tiny budget could be a potentially large hindrance. I mean, here I was paying $30+ for drinks I probably wouldn’t have had without the Twitter encouragement and it made me all, “What next?!” Because if I’m going to do the damn thing, I’m going to do it full throttle. No backing down.

Which probably means there would need to be some sort of limits placed on my questions. Because, like, what if I’m all, “Where should I go today?” and Twitter’s like, “Bangladesh!” and I’m all, “I cannot fucking afford Bangladesh” and Twitter’s like, “Too bad! Next question please!” and I’m all, “Fine, what should I wear to the grocery store?” and Twitter says, “A kimono” and I’m like, “The fuck?!” and Twitter adds, “Oh, and one of those remote control vibrators,” which of course means I need to ask, “And who’s going to hold the remote control?” and then Twitter tells me that I can choose between George Clooney, a Trader Joe’s employee, and my mom, and I kick and scream about how those are RIDICULOUSLY UNREALISTIC options and Twitter’s all, “Sucks for you, bitch.”

So… yeah. I’m still considering the “Twitter Rules My Entire Life For One Day” plan, but need to work out the details. Thoughts?

So I thought about it, and I realized that seriously, seriously, I’ve eaten macaroni and cheese almost every single day for the past two weeks.

I tell people it’s because I’m on a legitimate journalistic quest to find the country’s best, which is maybe a little bit true, but I’m also pretty sure that that’s just a way to mask the fact that I’m not eating enough fruits or vegetables or anything else that isn’t entirely covered in cheese sauce and fat and yes I know I probably already have scurvy and am on my way to a life of horrible malnutrition but I’m just not sure that I care in the slightest because mac and cheese > every other food so shut the fuck up.

The best I’ve had recently (mac & cheese, that is) was late on Halloween night, reheated from a place called Bussaco and just perfect- a crisp top, loaded with ziti and bacon and cheese underneath.

I ate it at about 2:30am, thinking that if I would have had it only an hour earlier, it wouldn’t have counted. Because 1am-2am doesn’t count on the day you turn the clocks back, or at least that’s how we used to do it in college.

Every year, my friends and I would get together for a Daylight Savings Time party. Or, more accurately, an excuse-to-be-ridiculous-because-whatever-you-do-for-this-one-hour-totally-doesn’t-count-and-won’t-ever-be-talked-about-again-because-time-change-means-we-make-up-our-own-rules-and-we’re-in-college-so-it’s-morally-acceptable-because-we’re-fake-adults-and-the-clock-gets-set-back-and-you-get-a-redo party!

Things never got as crazy as they could have, a stolen kiss here, a dance on the bar for free shots there, but for the most part I think we were just drunk on the fantasy of an immediate second chance. The oh so coveted “hehe, just kidding!” that gave you the freedom to try something you wouldn’t normally do by eliminating the fear of regret.

But what’s so bad about regret, anyway? I’m fond of saying things like “I live a life of no regrets!” But really? That’s not true. I could fill a journal with the things I wish I would have said and done differently, the things I’d like to kick myself in the mouth for not trying when they were close enough to reach out and grab.

So I don’t think it’s about not having regrets, because that’s as impossible as being fearless. I think it’s about not letting the feeling of regret control your life, not letting yourself walk smack into a pole because your head is turned behind you, staring at the things that could have been.

Because we only get one life, and we can only make one choice at a time, live one reality at a time, follow one path at a time, and even if we’re making great choices and are more or less in love with our current reality, our life will always be surrounded by paths not taken. And we better start feeling okay with that, because the bigger our dreams and the better our lives, the shinier the opportunities we’re turning down will be. Which, really, is a pretty stellar thing, don’t you think?

A big part of what I’m doing by being a nomad is city shopping. As I slowly move across the country, I realize that I’m searching for my perfect fit, my next home, my real geographic love affair.

In 24 years, New York City is the only place that’s ever really gotten under my skin. In no small way, it’s the epicenter of the world. The air is different here, there’s something full about it, something that makes you believe that the very next moment could be the best or worst of your life.

But with that comes the fact that it’s extremes. It’s Monday and it’s deliciously crisp and pure autumn and you’re in Central Park, drinking apple cider, wearing your favorite brown suede boots, high off the energy of millions of other people- but then it’s Tuesday and it’s pouring and the subway never comes and you’re surrounded by strangers who stare through each other with dull eyes, who move with the pulse of the city, crashing into each other without ever touching, and you’re alone in a profound way.

As a person who constantly struggles to find the middle ground, NYC is a rough place for me. I believe the famous line, the idea that “if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere,” and I know that I could. Make it here, I mean. But I’d have to shut down to do so. I’d have to somehow learn to move my emotions deeper, to not let them scream quite so close to the surface, and I’m not willing to do that.

So I’m moving on later this week, heading to DC and Phoenix and San Francisco, and I’m doing so happily. I saw the people I came here to see, ate the things I came here to eat, and learned that ultimately, figuring out what you don’t want is just as important as finding what you do.

So, at the start of this whole let’s-travel-the-world-and-live-out-of-a-tiny-suitcase thing, I didn’t really give a lot of thought to what would actually go IN the damn suitcase. I figured I’d just throw some shit in there and it would be fine.

As the date of my indefinite nomadism approached, I started to think that maybe I should give it a little more thought. So I did, I thought about it. And as soon as I realized all the things I wouldn’t have room for, I started freaking the fuck out.

Mid-freak out, I called a friend of mine, an awesome chick who has done quite a lot of backpacking herself, and started yelling. And she was all trying to give me real suggestions, because she’s nice and helpful and normal, but I just kept screaming things like “BUT WHICH BRAS SHOULD I BRING?” and “HOW MANY TAMPONS ARE TOO MANY?” and “DO I OR DO I NOT BRING A VIBRATOR?”

My friend (or at least she used to be my friend- more on that in a second) paused thoughtfully and was all, “I’d say no. I mean, what if you wind up in some weirdly embarrassing airport security situation? Wouldn’t you rather just have room for another pair of pants?”

Looking back, this should have been the precise moment at which I stopped taking her seriously, or at least questioned the size of her vagina, because really? if her experience with vibrators is that they’re the SAME SIZE AS A ROLLED UP PAIR OF JEANS, maybe that’s something she should see someone about. But I didn’t question it. I accepted her advice as some sort of travel gospel and I took off on my trip, sans sex toys.

And now, 41 days into my adventure of sleeping on other people’s couches, I’ve come to the conclusion that my friend is a big slutty slut who slutted her way through all past backpacking adventures and therefore had no need for sex toys. Or she’s totally asexual. Or she’s boring and just uses her fingers all the time. Or she has done some very naughty things with other people’s shower heads. Or she has no problem being out at a bar in a new city and being all, “So… do you want to come back to my… couch?”

Either way, I’m pretty sure I can’t be her friend anymore for the sheer reason that she gives horrible advice. So my new plan is to post all important masturbation related questions on Twitter. Because maybe then I’ll get some REAL answers. And Babeland will ask me to write a column about my nomadic vagina and sex on the road. And everything will be right in the world.

PS- If you have agreed to let me sleep on your couch sometime in the next few months, please entirely ignore this post. Or tell me about your hot cousin.
PPS- I’m kidding!
PPPS- Mostly…

There’s something so old-fashioned about long train trips. Sipping hot chocolate, head resting against the window, watching the landscape change from lakes to farms to trees with sunset-colored leaves, silently, as your mind explores itself in a way that’s only possible when you’re in motion.

It took me 21 hours to get from Chicago to NYC last weekend. 21 hours. And the kind of thinking you can get done in 21 hours of silence is sort of incredible. Time slows down on a trip like that, you don’t have anywhere to go or anywhere to be. It’s no longer about the hours and the minutes. There’s the time before you fell asleep, and the time after. The time before you had the blueberry muffins, and the time after. The time a Swedish backpacker sat next to you, and the time after. You’re just traveling across the country, fading in and out of consciousness, wondering what’s going on in the darkness outside your window, imagining all the people whose everyday lives you’re passing by on the fuzzy edges of your adventure.

Somewhere in the middle of the trip, I started thinking about my life and the passage of time. I let the structure of months and years slip away. I focused on the big moments, the ones that leave you different on the other side.

There was the time before I lived in England, and the time after. There was the time before my parents filed for bankruptcy, and the time after. The time before I got into NYU, and the time after. The time before my mother walked out on my father, and the time after. The time before I was in debt, and the time after. The time before they got back together, and the time after. The time before I knew the power of my sexuality, and the time after. The time before I started blogging, and the time after. The time before I fell desperately in love, and the time after. The time I kept too many secrets, and the time after. The time before my heartbreak, and the time after.

The time before I made that bad decision (and that one, and that one), and the time after. Before I stood up for myself, and after. Before I quit my job to travel, and after. Before she died, and after. Before I made the list, and after.

Before I realized that time moves just as quickly whether you’re living the kind of life you want to live or not, and now.

The big moments. The sign posts on my life path that I can look at over my shoulder, knowing that I wouldn’t be where I am if I had made a right back there instead of a left.

The train ride though, the motion- the lakes and leaves and hot chocolate- it all made me realize that while the big moments are how I keep time in my life, it’s the little moments that make all the difference.

Feeling the first perfectly crisp breeze of the season. Making buttercream frosting and letting my niece lick the spoon. Laughing when he catches me chewing on the wire of my headphones, blushing when he shakes his head and tells me I’m adorable.

In the past five days, I’ve woken up in three different places. A bed in Wicker Park, a pull out couch at The Standard Club, and a big leather sofa in Lakeview.

My eyes open every morning and I’m all, “what time is it?” and “where the fuck am I?” Because being a couch-hoping nomad takes some getting used to. I scan the room. I do the “am I in bed alone?” thing. I high-five myself for not being a big slut. And then I proceed with a mental recap of the night before to get my bearings. I remember what I did, who I’m staying with, and where I am. I decide that it would probably be easier to just leave myself a little note each night that tells me all of that information, so it’s clear right when I wake up and I don’t have to panic. I share this plan with the lovely girl I’m staying with, and she’s all, “Careful, people might try to mess with you by putting a ‘Vegas’ note on the table and slipping a ring on your finger.”

I laugh. I call my mother and repeat both my new plan and the possible twist. She tells me that she thinks I’m neither cute nor funny, and that if I randomly get married in Vegas I had best enjoy the hell out of my wedding night because the next day? She’s going to kill me.

I scrap the note plan. And the Vegas plan.

She asks me how my adventure is going so far. I tell her that it’s incredible. She asks if I’ve met any cute boys. I tell her that I know lots of cute boys. She mentions that I am probably going to be living the sailor’s life very shortly. “The sailor’s life?” I ask. “You know, with a different love in each city,” she answers.

I think about this. I tell her that I’m not really the type. She insists that in fact, I am the type, and that I had best not get herpes along the way. I laugh. She doesn’t.

“I’m a child of the 60s,” she says. I wait for her to make her point. She doesn’t. I assume she means to reference something about free love, or drugs, or the fact that she used to burn her bras.

I ask if she’s been wearing bras lately. She hisses at me.

My father pipes up in the background, asks if my vagabond life has lead to my liking ketchup yet. My mother puts him on the phone. I tell him that no, I still don’t like ketchup. He points out that this absolutely makes me a communist, and that I should be embarrassed. I, in turn, make a big fuss about tomatoes not even being a native US food, having been brought over from Italy and all. As I say it, I’m not even sure if it’s true, but I like the way it sounds and press on.

He clears his throat and says “Italy, huh?” and reminds me about Mussolini. I start into the communist vs. fascist thing. He changes the subject.

I have a bright pink duffle bag that I use when I go on weekend trips. It’s the perfect bag really, big enough for all my shit, but small enough to still be considered a carry-on item and save me the fucking ridiculous minimum-$15-per-checked-bag fee.

So this bag? it’s a good thing I’m such a fan of it, seeing as how I’m going to be living out of it come September and all. Yeah, you heard me. LIVING OUT OF A SMALL PINK DUFFLE BAG.

Because here’s the thing: tomorrow is my 24th birthday and I’ve finally realized that life moves fucking quickly, and that it moves just as fucking quickly whether you’re doing what you want to do or not.

And what I want to do is travel. I want less stuff and more freedom. Freedom to move slowly across the country and live in the present, freedom to eat new foods, see new sights, drink new wines, hear new stories, touch new lives. I want to write. I want to check things off my Life List. I want to volunteer, to expand HandsIn and really make a huge nationwide push for 20-something activism. I want to sleep on couches, in tents, on buses, in hostels- maybe even out in an open field somewhere. I want to push my limits, leap the fuck outside my comfort zone, and meet as many people as I can.

Which brings me to the eleventy thousand dollar question: would you like to host one very spunky, very hug-able, very crazy-in-a-good-way Nicole Antoinette on your couch for a few nights this fall? I’m planning my entire route around the spare couches of the blogosphere and am going to be traveling from September until, well, until I run out of couches!

I guess you could say that this decision is spontaneous, but really? it’s been a long time coming.  And there you have it, my birthday wish: to meet as many lovely bloggers as possible before I turn 25. So, if you and your couch (or floor!) are interested, let me know what city you’re in and what your schedule is like this fall!

Because as far as I’m concerned, more of all of you in my life is DEFINITELY better.