Feeling Good

I had always taken pride in the fact that I had never gotten seriously drunk. No real lapses in judgment, no wondering about what had happened the night before, and certainly no nights spent hugging the toilet...

until Friday.

I had taken a big, scary French exam that morning. I had met with two fun work contacts. I had seen my bff from high school for the first time in six months. With two very promising parties on the agenda, I was feeling pretty good. And it was going pretty good...

until we remember I'm a lightweight. One drink (any drink) usually gets me a bit silly. As was the case after my gin tonic at the first party. Silly and happy. At the second party, after a little bit of beer and a little bit of wine, A's coworker convinced me to take a shot. Of vodka. Which was bigger than it should've been. But I was feeling good! Down went the fiery stuff. I'm chatting, dancing, and then WHOOSH. Not feeling good. And he can tell.

Glass of water in one hand, arm around me, we're out the door. Apparently I mentioned to him that one of my friend's commented that we'd get married. We get to his house, more water. I sit on his bed and then I'm up, making my way for the bathroom. He sits on the edge of the tub throughout and gives me mouthwash when I'm done. Back in his room, he tucks me in, a trashcan on my side of the bed. In the morning, he lets me sleep in while he goes out to buy me bread. He makes me breakfast and naps with me on the couch.

I was humiliated, and he tried to make me laugh at myself. I apologized a dozen times, and he shook off each one.

He took care of me, and I love him for it.

"It's a romantic weather report."

The ordinary can be extraordinary.

Advice

Mid-20s, quasi adulthood, anxiety ridden future pondering. I know I am not the only one agonizing through the two, three, four (or more) year itch.

Talking to parents, friends, colleagues, well-wishers, and pessimists often helps. Sometimes, though, inspiration comes from the unlikeliest of places.

In 1995, Iggy Pop answered a 20 page fan letter from a 21 year old girl in Paris. His scribbled note has some of the most eloquent, heartfelt advice I've read anywhere.

Words to live by: "take a deep breath and do whatever you must to survive and find something to be that you can love."

Calm during the storm

My dad asked me to fill out the census.

Does this person sometimes live or stay somewhere else?

I let out a short laugh. Oh, the irony of it all.

I found out my mom and a suitcase had left our house during a work trip, specifically in a wine bar in New Orleans. I rejoined the group of Europeans and attempted to make small talk, while the tears welled in my eyes. Politely excusing myself, I made my way to the bathroom and called him (first, again). Stammering, sobbing, incoherent.

She has been with my grandma for a week, and I am now more frustrated than upset. Careless and haphazard are the two words I use to describe the situation. Still, my mind reels with questions ... what is my role in this mess? will she ever come back? what of my future? will we ever be "the same"? Yet, in spite of this black hole of uncertainty, one aspect of my life is stable.

When I come over for coffee before work, he has a latte and pain au chocolat waiting for me; when I wear long white socks under my boots, he teases me; and when he asks if I want to talk about it and I say no, he leaves me be. We discuss health care legislation, hang out with mutual friends, and make love. Ours is an island of peace.

One day not too long ago, I apologized for the black cloud over our very new relationship, for dragging him into my misery. Without hesitation he responded: "It's part of the deal, no?"

Why Not Me

This weekend I went to spend some time with my best friend. She was my very first best friend, the one who packed a bag full of books and stuffed animals and “ran away” with me when I got mad at my mom, the one whose house I ate dinner at almost as much as my own. She is the one who knew me from diapers to braces to crutches to heartbreak. There were times when we drifted, but then we grew up and drifted back together again. We only live three hours apart now but we don’t talk as much as we should. I drove up to Albany on Friday, mostly to visit her and catch up, but also to get to know her boyfriend, the one she tells me she’ll marry someday soon.

My last morning in Albany, over far too much breakfast meat, I regaled her with stories of the men in my life. It almost seemed trite. She’s been dating her boyfriend for almost two years, living with him for six months. And here I was, whining about a first date gone wrong or a crush I had on someone in another state.

But then I remembered why she is my best friend, why I tell her any of this in the first place, and why I will continue to seek her advice long after our own kids are packing their stuffed animals and heading for the next block.

“It’s weird,” I said. “Even though you know the relationship wasn’t right, you know you weren’t meant to be together, you still watch him with someone new and you think, ‘Why not me?’”
“But then you meet the right person,” she said calmly. “And you’ll be completely over everything that happened to you in the past, and you’ll be happy again, and then that Ex will look at you and think, ‘Why not me?’”

First

I got rejected from a grad school yesterday, and without thinking, I called him first. He didn't answer, so I sent him a text.

Then I waited.

Three hours later, he called. I was already upset about so many other things.

"I called you first."
"Are you upset with me?"
"I don't know."
"Can I tell you where I was and then you can tell me if you're still upset?"

He helps low income families with their taxes one night a week in a basement of a library. The thought had vaguely crossed my mind, but in my disheartened state, it was quickly ignored.

"I called you as soon as I got out. Are you still upset?"
"No ..."
"Good."

"... I still think it's fucking huge that I called you first."

Like clockwork

On Saturday I woke up knowing it wasn't coming for another day or two. I happily went about my life. Studying a bit for finals, hanging out with a friend who was visiting, drinks and jazz in the evening.

On Sunday I spent the day at home studying away like a good little child. In the back of my mind the countdown ticked on, but I typed away in a studious blaze.

On Monday I got a prick of anticipation. Any time now, I thought.

On Tuesday I waited and waited and waited. That prick turned to a stab.

I know this happens every month, but every month worry away. I start imagining the horrid scenarios. I start looking up options. I once even worked out in detail the amount of money I would need just in case. In case. Because I know the choice that I've already made. But it isn't one I want to have to put into practice. I check every couple of hours and come away with my heart heavy. I wear a morose look on my face, convinced that this is it. This is the month I've been dreading, the month I'll have to go buy a test. I've read the literature online enough times, I know it's not cause for concern this early on. I'm good about sticking to the schedule. Never more than three hours late. Like clockwork each day I reach for that little pack. And yet every last week, like clockwork again, I turn the thought over and over and over in my head.

I mention it to D, just to get him to worry. I can't be alone in this insane process. He knows I do this. He tries to comfort me. And strangely, it works. Not his words or his hugs. But the fact that I see a little doubt where there was none before. Is that wrong of me? Shouldn't I keep my neuroses to myself? But it feels better having company, doesn't it?

Wednesday morning: hallelujah! Here it is. I shake my head. Of course. Why wouldn't it be? Don't I take my precautions? Don't I know the pattern? And yet inside my head the little voice says: but you know what you'll do next month. And I know. Saturday I'll go about happy as a bee. And Tuesday I'll be Googling the closest clinics.

Invitation...?

"Hey, I'm getting married on this date. You're in the wedding. You'll be around, right?"

Those aren't her exact words, but I've captured the gist of them exactly. Just remove the capitals, insert the date, and a few abbreviations that only she and I would ever understand.

I stared at the screen, feeling like I was in Grey's Anatomy: seriously? seriously! seriously?! I varied the tones, I emphasized first one syllable, then another. I lowered my voice at the beginning, then at the end. I raised an eyebrow, then let it fall. But all I was left with was that one word, in its many permutations: seriously.

And it stabbed me as it has so many times over the years. This assumption that I would always do what she asked - no, demanded, commanded - me to do. This flighty dismissal of my life and the possibility that I could have anything else going on that was of equal or (gasp! impossible!) more importance. This flippant question which asked, requested, nothing, but managed to imply a wealth of assumption that I would be available, of course I would be available, for what else could there possibly be for me to do, at the twitch of her little finger. Presumption.

An hour later I realize I have been staring at my computer screen flitting from one website to another, yet seeing nothing, always returning to her open email.

She didn't even sign it "Love" I thought. Such a silly thought. We never sign our emails with "Love" not ever. She didn't even say hi. We never say hi. She didn't even...
She didn't even actually ask.

I sigh and shake my head, telling my heart to stop angrily hammering in my chest every time I glance at her words. Shouldn't I be used to this by now? Should I even be expecting anything more? My silly heart. My silly little heart. Always expecting more from people when you know from experience that they aren't like that. They never were, they never will be. Considerate. Thoughtful. Stop hammering, my silly heart, stop feeling woeful and glum. It isn't worth it you know. It never is. You make a ruckus in my chest and you make my rib cage hurt, but it doesn't change matters an ounce. You'll get over it, my silly little heart, you always do. And next time I'm sure you'll jump up once again, ready to welcome her in at the twitch of her little finger, as you always do.

I close the window. I don't trust myself to reply at once. And suddenly I cannot swallow. And suddenly my fingers don't want to type anymore.

Because this isn't how I'm supposed to react to my sister's wedding invitation.

Don't Hate

The Importance of Being

Somewhere between spending the weekend in a cabin with twenty of J.'s best, lifelong friends, meeting his mother, and spending 6 hours on a stretch of sunny New England highway, J. fell out of it. Or at least it seems that way. What happened to my afternoon texts and my immediate-response phone calls? Something is so wrong and I haven't a clue why. So tonight we have to "talk." Whatever the outcome, it can only get better from here.

And as my battle cry, I use these wise words from a beautiful soul:

"Be you. You are enough, and you are not too much." --JRenee

The Trials of Parenthood

I live two-thousand eight hundred ninety-seven miles away from my childhood home in California. I am five and a half years away from that life I lived. I have grown into the person I am today surrounded by recklessly driven taxis and hovering buildings and the boisterous noise of New York City. I have let my curiosity and my will lead me through new experiences—awkward, ridiculous, creepy at times, but nevertheless my own. I’ve lived the ‘New York experience’ without preconceptions to steer me down a clear cut path and, instead, have floated from one opportunity to the next.

As a sensible vagabond, leading her life in rational ridiculousness and optimism, I have not sought support and even have rejected it. Whether this rejection stems from a lack of need or a more ingrained desire to prove to myself that I can be my own person, I don’t know. But no matter my almost forceful disinterest in this comfort, I know that it is always there, silently enveloping me. Its effects are invisible and unfelt on an everyday, casual basis, but arises full-force at the most uncouth times to remind me that it will always haunt me in the nicest of possible ways.

I do not know what to make of the subject of love, of love on any level and in any semblance of the word. It is a foreign, curious object, a cipher without a key. And perhaps in this city, which we all call home, love and its effects are even more intense, disastrous, welcomed, cherished; love is also a bigger mystery, elusive and uncertain. However, wherever I go, whatever I choose to do with my life, and whatever happens to me, there is one constant upon which I can always rely, and that is the support of my dad.

My dad has only wished one thing for me: my complete and utter happiness. He wants me to fulfill my dreams, whatever they may be, and he demands that I am my own person, inhibiting nothing that I desire to accomplish. He puts no constrains on my life and my choices and refuses to criticize my being, doing perhaps the hardest thing a parent can do; he has let me go to be free and vulnerable to the dangers that plague society. His trust in my sound judgment resonates in every encouraging word and every happy exclamation over my travels and undertakings.

Through his sacrifice, he has given me a better life for which he could never hope or have himself. Constant reassurances that I need only to focus on my studies or to enjoy my time in New York and abroad because he can always work twelve instead of ten hours a day are a fixture in my mind. Unvoiced worries and concerns kept inside to assure that I lead a life of my own chosen are transformed into newspaper article clippings sent through the mail, giving helpful hints about jobs, home maintenance, and finances.

Is he a perfect parent? Far from it. But I don’t demand perfection from my dad. Instead, I will always be thankful for what he has done for me and as it may be more thankful for what he has not done for me. No, I do not need support to be successful nor to determine my own path in life, but I know my dad’s support for me is unconditional, and for that I will always appreciate, respect, and never abuse it. Perhaps, here in New York, I am not so far from California than I had initially thought I was.