I got up, did my little ‘blood flowing’ work out routine, popped the lid off a 5hr. energy, turned up the stereo, and put on a pretty dress.
I hit the florist before work, and brought a ton of fresh flowers into my beautiful office. I greeted my new employees with Nerd Coffee from next door and cinnamon rolls.
Work work work. Work work work. The cohesion in this office is scary beautiful. Never in my life have I seen such a well-oiled crack team of people with happy hearts, good intentions, and content attitudes. Methinks this will wear off at some point, but for now, I’m enjoying it to the max.
Lunch time came with an impromptu office dance party in business casual, busting it out to Pocketful of Sunshine. Retarded, but effective for morale.
Work, work, work. Work work work.
Come up for air when Dane texted me to let me know he misses me. He’s in New York for the remainder of the weekend to tie up loose ends as he is the executor of his father’s will.
Break at the Comic shop next door, coffee with nerds. Back to work.
Work work work. BLOG.
In a little while, I’ll be leaving this office. I’ll be the last one to go, I’ll be the one to turn off the lights and lock the door. I’ll probably get stuck in some traffic on my way out of town, and I’ll probably be tempted to stop at the store and pick up a nice bottle of wine for myself.
I hate getting off the freeway, but sometimes when you have a stop to make, it breaks up the monotony of shitty rush hour traffic.
I’ll probably walk into the grocery store, surrounded by others who just got off work, and head over to the wine section, and take my time choosing. And then I’ll stand in line and check out, and let a lot of things pass through my tired mind, like watching items go by in front of me on a conveyor belt. Images will go through my mind like;
Louie’s smiling face and wagging tail I’ll be greeted with when I get home.
The mental checklist of what fresh produce I have at home to cook with.
The menu on my DVR list and what goodies it has in store for me tonight.
My closet and what outfit I’ll be picking out for tomorrow.
Dane’s text messages, and probably his face, and the sound of his laugh that I admittedly do find myself missing lately.
What this weekend will hold for me as far as friends, or entertainment, or maybe a complete lack of any of it, opting to stay in and out of the rain, and cuddle with my dog and watch movies and read books I’ve been meaning to get to. Or maybe, if I’m lucky, hanging out with my parents a bit.
The emails I need to catch up on and reply to.
The bills I need to pay.
The homework I need to finish…
and then…somewhere way, way, way in the back of my mind, buried in a box, under other boxes, behind all of these other images, cataloged thoughts, reminders and needs and responsibilities, somewhere behind my current life and feelings and adorations and hopes… he’ll make a very, very slight appearance. Just for a second. almost not even long enough to recognize him. Like some nasty, scary childhood toy I could never stand and wanted nothing but to hide it away in the darkest of crevices of the basement, some uninvited jack-in-the-box that pops out unpredictably and always unwanted in my mind… Peter will.
But I’ll shove his nasty presence and memory back into the box, wrap it in chains, and bury it like Jumangi in the recesses of my mind and consciousness.
And then it’ll be my turn to pay for my lovely bottle of wine that I will feel as if I’ve earned. And then I’ll get in my car, and listen to the music I love on the way home, and I’ll be greeted by my lovely dog who is so happy to see me, and I will call a man who I believe is falling in love with me too, and I will tell him I miss him…. and I will mean it.
If I’ve been reminded of anything in the last couple weeks, it’s that life is precious and Hearts fail unpredictably all the time. however, if you don’t trust your own heart or take care of it, it may just quit on you instead of failing.
I am back on speaking terms with my own heart. We’ve got an open dialogue between the two of us, and we’ve agreed that whether or not this is a sound move, we’ll be there for each other regardless.
”Hey Jorah. I’m a long time reader and I love your style. I don’t want to seem like a jerk, but it kind of seems like you never get rejected by anyone, ever. It seems like you are sort of desired by everyone. I was wondering if you’ve ever had to deal with rejection, and if you did/have, how did you handle it?
Maybe a blog idea?
Thanks!
T.D.”
Well, let’s start with the complete obvious: OF COURSE I’VE BEEN REJECTED. I’m not sure what you call Peter leaving me other than being ‘rejected’ in a huge, nasty, 9.0 magnitude kind of way. And if you’d like to know how I ‘handled’ that, you can start reading the process in November, up to present.
But perhaps it’s a story you’re after? I think I can provide that.
This little story is set in a bar because, you know, people in their twenties hook up with other people in that tumor of an age range of twenties and thirties at bars…apparently.
I was feeling particularly brave that night. By brave, I mean ‘buzzed.’ And in this very instance, I think my very expensive therapist was wrong. He said I never pursue anyone- well HA.
I was sitting at a table with my guy friends wearing a sexy combination of jeans with holes in the knees, converse, a Wonder Woman T-shirt, my nerd glasses, and a flannel shirt over the top of it all. I oozed sex appeal. Plus, my Wonder Woman T-shirt was ironically kind of small around the boobs. I mean, every detail begged for attention, from my rain dampened brown hair, clinging to my shoulders, to my Tri-Force earrings, it was the perfect combination of chic, modern, classy, and sexy. (sarcasm)
He’d been standing up at the bar with his friends talking. I thought he was pretty adorable. My friends called me out on the fact I’d been staring at him.
“Hey, J! See something you like or just browsing?” my friend asked.
“Um, I’m kind of digging that cutie up there with the blond hair and the tie,” I said.
Immediately the boys unified. “Go say hi! Go talk to him! Go GET HIM!” They encouraged me, but I couldn’t help but feel like they were shoving me into a trap.
“Come on guys, I’m not hot today AT ALL. I mean, I’m in my nerd disguise and i know that guys like that don’t like girls when they look like his. I know how to do hot. This isn’t it.”
“We think you’re totally hot right now!” they argued. After another shot of Jameson, I some how made my way up to Blonde Boy and looked up at him with a shy smile. He looked down at me with what I can now look back at with certainty- it was pity.
“Hi,” I said, pushing my glasses up on my nose.
“Hi there,” he said.
“So, I’m Jorah.” I nervously held my hand out for a hand shake. That’s how you hit on guys right? You…shake their hand?
He laughed and shook it. “Joel,” he said.
“Hi Joel.”
“Hi Jorah,” he said again.
We stood there awkwardly and I looked around nervously.
“Can I help you?” he asked, kind of confused.
“Well Joel, here’s the deal,” I said, leaning on the bar, trying to look totally nonchalant. I ordered another shot of Jameson and a pint of amber.
“I saw you from over there,” I motioned to my table full of guys laughing hysterically, watching me try to make this happen, “and I thought you were really cute. So I kind of watched you,-”
“-like a stalker or something?” he cut in. I stopped, but then tried to recover.
“Like a SEXY stalker,” I corrected. “It’s rude to interrupt Joel, let me finish my story. So I watched you and then I was instructed by my friends to come over and say hello. and now I’m doing that. Hello.”
He laughed nervously and took another sip of his beer.
“And,” I started again. “I was just wondering if maybe you’d like to go out sometime?”
He tried so hard to be polite and contain his laughter. I knew what he thought of me. I knew that looking the way I did, he had no desire to do so. I knew he had no idea how capable I was of cleaning up and getting hot, he had no clue what kind of intelligence hid behind my scrappy looks that day. But he did make it clear he was not interested.
“Hey Jorah, it’s nice to meet you, but I really don’t think-”
I went into instant Jorah Defense Mode. I cut him off and loudly proclaimed “NO, I don’t think so. You’re not my type. But thanks for asking anyway. That’s really sweet, I’m flattered!”
I made sure I said it loud enough so people could hear it over the music.
“What?” Joel was confused now. The bartender came back with my shot of Jameson and my beer.
“I mean, you’re cute and everything Joel, but really, I just don’t think you’re my type. I don’t think it’d work out. But thanks for asking! Have a great night!”
I slammed the Jameson shot, shook his hand, patted his shoulder, grabbed my beer, and got the hell out of there.
I made my way back to my Nerd table with my dignity barely in tact. The lot of them burst out in uncontrollable laughter, and I reached across the table and slapped them across their faces, and then drowned my embarrassment in that pint of Pike Kilt Lifter Amber.
Listen up, reader folk. Emily from Love Woke Me Up This Morning has a special message from the heart. Have you ever considered that maybe some of us were made to love? I think it’s an epic conclusion- and most of the time I have a hard time comprehending how a heart the size of her’s fits into that little body. The reality is, though, it doesn’t. It just kind of spills out all over the world and internet. Today, it landed on my blog.
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“Emily, you have the biggest heart. It’s bigger than anyone else in that classroom. That’s why you’re going to be so great at this.”
This is what people told me my first semester in college as I begun my training to go into youth ministry.
Through the rest of the year I remember how 1 John chapters 3 and 4 kept on being thrust onto me. Phrases of Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth or Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who has been born of God and knows God. I remember talking with a friend about it and how these phrases were constantly coming up. I’m talking every single day. In class, in conversations, in chapel, everywhere and every single day. She then told me:
“Maybe God is trying to tell you something.”
I believe my calling in life is to love. Yes, I do think that everyone needs to love – but for some reason I really feel as though that is my specific calling in life.
Great- some people might say. That’s awesome – you know your mission in life.
Well… yes and no.
Being called to love doesn’t tell you what job you should have so you can pay your bills. Being called to love doesn’t give you many specifics.
Through the rest of my college career this seemed to be the theme. Just love, that’s what God wants you to do. This is why you’ll be an awesome youth minister. When professors were concerned with how well I would do, it was because of my physical disability and they were afraid I wouldn’t be able to handle that. Everything else, everyone always told me it was my heart that would be my greatest strength and is what would make me good at my job.
I was always told that I had the gift of loving the unlovable. The people I spent time with were the ones who were on the outskirts in life. They weren’t the “perfect Christians” that seemed to make up most of the population at my small university. Some people would raise their eyebrows at me and mention “You sat with ____ today? I didn’t know you hung out with them.”
It was my strength. It was my gift. It was my calling.
What they didn’t tell me is that it would also be my greatest weakness.
What I wasn’t told was how it wouldn’t be some jerk faced guy that would make me cry all of the time (even though some have) – it would be a group of teenagers.
They told me that this job would have it’s ups and downs and it was going to be hard.
What they didn’t tell me was I would probably go for months of heartbreak, tears, and anger because my big heart was hurting too much.
They didn’t tell me that the very same who were welcomed with open arms would use my heart against me.
They didn’t tell me about the nights when I’m intending to go to Starbucks to calm down and relax would turn into sessions of crying and venting on the phone in the parking lot to a friend about how I can’t handle it anymore. That I’m tired of pouring my heart and soul into these teenagers just to have it all backfire.
I was talking with someone earlier this week and we discussed our struggles. He asked me, “Excuse me if this is too crude. But, do you ever feel like you’re peeing into a fan?”
I want you to picture that in your mind. Get that whole image ingrained and all that it entails.
I nodded my head, yes. I do feel like I’m peeing into a fan. No matter what I do. No matter how hard I try. No matter
Mother Theresa once said “I have found the paradox. If you love until it hurts, there is no more hurt, only love.” This is the quote I use to help describe my blog.
You have to go through the hurt to find the love I think. You have to get over your own inadequacies and you “I’m to fix everyone and everything” attitude to find the love through the hurt.
Watching them make some of the biggest mistakes in their lives is not fun.
Having them think you are a terrible person because they don’t realize love doesn’t always mean you let them do whatever they want, really hurts.
Knowing that you can’t fix everyone’s problems no matter how hard you try is not easy.
But if you are caring about other people because YOU want to fix their problems, because YOU want to feel good, and YOU want to be the hero, isn’t real love, now is it?
That’s something I’ve been having to learn over and over and over again. The hard ways.
Let them make their mistakes, but be there for them through it. Yes, there are times they will hate you and use your heart against you. Love them anyways.
I have no idea if I am good at my job. For the past year and a half I have had more down in the pit moments than high on the mountain moments where I feel like I’m the biggest failure in the world. There have been several times when I’ve thought about quitting and walking away from it all. I have no idea if the seeds that have been planted have even gotten a chance to take root.
Isn’t that how it is for most of us? We love, we plant things, we meet people, we help others – but we have no idea of the good it really will do? We put ourselves out there just to be crushed?
That doesn’t mean we stop. Sometime we need to change our attitudes or how we do things. That’s a good thing.
Love is messy. It’s not going to be in some little heart shaped box with chocolates inside that make us happy. Love really hurts sometimes.
But we keep going. We keep loving. At least that’s my plan. I’m not perfect at loving people – but I’m going to do it the best that I can.
I have found the paradox. If you love until it hurts there is no more hurt, only love. – Mother Theresa
Hey guys. My Guest Blogger today is the wonderful and graceful Jessica from her blog “Faith Permeating Life.” If you’re seeking a steady soul, and someone with the God given gift of Perspective, Jessica is your gal. Today she wants to talk to you a little bit about advice. Not dispensing it, but rethinking your stance on taking it.
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I’ve been told before that I give good advice, whether it’s career advice, romantic advice, or family advice. And I like being able to help other people out–that’s one of the main reasons I blog.
There’s just two problems with being a good advice-giver:
1. You have to deal with people who come to you for advice, tell you it’s good advice, and then proceed not to follow any of it.
2. You have a tendency to want to give advice to people who haven’t asked for it, and then you just make them angry.
I’ve had way too many moments in my life where I told someone that something was a bad idea and was going to blow up in their face, and they got mad and ignored me, and then it blew up in their face. Believe me, there’s not much satisfaction in saying, “I told you so” when the person hurting is someone you care about, which is generally my reason for wanting to help them out in the first place.
It’s easier to avoid giving unsolicited advice if the person is someone I don’t particularly care about. In that case, I recognize it’s more about me wanting to be right than genuinely caring how the situation turns out, and I need to keep my mouth shut.
But the paradox of building close relationships is that the closer you are the more you feel the other person’s pain. And when they’re making choices that you know will cause them pain, and nothing you say or do is going to change the decisions they’re making, it sucks.
So I want to suggest that there’s a trait to be admired even more than giving good advice. And that’s being good at taking advice.
I have a deep admiration for people who can receive feedback gracefully, evaluate its merit, and then act on it as appropriate.
Despite the fact that my full-time job involves compiling, summarizing, and delivering feedback to people, it’s still a struggle for me not to get defensive in the face of criticism. But it’s something I’m constantly working on because I know what an important skill it is to be able to take feedback well.
Because, let’s face it, it’s going to take a very long time to learn from all the mistakes we need to learn from if we have to make them all ourselves. Yes, every situation is unique, but that doesn’t mean someone else hasn’t had a similar experience or watched a loved one go through the same sort of thing.
I thought of this when Jorah asked for guest posters because she seems to be one of those rare individuals who doesn’t have a knee-jerk defensive reaction to being given advice. I see her seeking input and then truly listening and reflecting on whether it applies to her situation.
Even though all bloggers are putting their lives on display to some extent, I see many who seem to be solely seeking praise and support for their decisions. And certainly you want readers who are going to be encouraging and supportive most of the time instead of constantly tearing you down. But I most admire those who react with grace and thoughtfulness to having their decisions or their viewpoints challenged.
So my goal for myself is to be not just a good advice-giver but a good advice-taker. I challenge you to do the same.
When I kissed Jorah for the first time on our old playground, I asked her why, even though everything looked the same, it felt different. She told me “It’s because we’re no longer children. It happened while we weren’t looking.” That has stayed with me since she said it. It feels like it becomes more true every day.
The night my dad died, Jorah came home with me. She told me she hadn’t been back to the old block since she moved away. When we headed into the old neighborhood, she went quiet. It was a strange feeling because we had both grown up there, but we had never been down that road together. That night, though, we were definitely going down that road. Together.
When we got back to my dad’s, I showed her my old room. It was in the front of the house with the window that looked at the street. My old Lacrosse trophies were still on the shelves, all my back issues of Sports Illustrated were cataloged neatly on the book shelf, and my treasured Spelling Bee awards. As if the first impression wasn’t enough, I had a surprise for Jorah, the Astrophysicist. You should have heard the giggling that escaped her when I turned out the lights and she saw my glow in the dark stars everywhere.
I don’t know why, but when she came out with hysterical laughter at the dark galaxy we were standing in, I brought my finger to my lips and shushed her to a whisper. She didn’t argue. We got quiet, got into bed, and the reality began to set in. He was gone. But he didn’t feel gone. She was here, but she didn’t feel here.
I lay there in my old bed with my eyes wide open next to the girl from four doors down. Even though we took Valium, neither of us could seem to sleep. I could feel her next to me, stiff as a board, tense, uncomfortable, filled with thought. I tried to count the stars in my room, but it didn’t work. When I tried to focus on one little star directly, I couldn’t. If I wanted to see it, I had to look slightly to the right of it. Looking straight at it, for some reason, was impossible. It appeared to not be there at all. But if I relaxed my eyes and focused elsewhere, hundreds of the dim little stars would appear in my peripheral
When it was obvious we weren’t sleeping, I asked her if she wanted to take a walk. She agreed. We walked down to where her old house was. She didn’t want me to see how hard it was on her, but I could see it. But there we were, the two of us, standing where her home was. It was gone, but it didn’t feel gone. I watched Jorah stand there, surveying the new neighborhood in front of her. Her eyes searched the skyline back-lit by the city’s purple light pollution, miles away. Then she turned away and closed her eyes. She wasn’t seeing her home there, she was feeling it.
She is sitting on my couch with her dog, working on some sort of astrophysics equations. I would try to describe what she’s working on, but I have no fucking clue.
My father left me his house. I moved in yesterday and am living out of it now. However, I don’t have the heart to really move anything. I don’t want to mess with anything because I feel like I don’t want to get in his way. These are his things. This is his house, and even when I am completely alone in it, I still feel him here. Sometimes, I feel him standing in the doorway. When I leave the game on in the other room, I expect to hear him yelling at it. His shoes are still by the front door and his car is in the driveway. By all means, he should be home. Maybe if I relax my eyes and focus them elsewhere, he’ll appear in my peripheral .
When I look directly Jorah, I don’t really feel like I see her there. She doesn’t want me to see her. She has told me so. When she looks at me, I feel like I’ve been accused of something I’ve done wrong. I feel like she is searching me for answers or data or analyzing me and trying to predict what I will do next based on her calculations of numbers, other experiments, and men before me. She never touches me when I look at her. She never makes eye contact. She always waits until I’m not paying attention to surprise me with her hand on my shoulder, or if I’m very luck, fingertips through my hair.
I am two months away from being 29 years old. In 1992 I moved from Long Island to semi-rural Washington state with my dad and my second younger sister and met the girl down the street, yet it would be twenty years before I actually ever really saw her and said hello. The day before yesterday I pulled a casket out of a hearse with my two younger brothers and put my father in the ground, but it still feels like he’s here and it will be quite some time before I actually say goodbye.
Like the girl on my father’s sofa, I too am trying to figure out the mysteries of the Universe, but feel like I can’t really focus on a steady answer. Maybe it isn’t there at all, gone, deceased, expired. Perhaps it is there but doesn’t want to be seen at all. And perhaps, if in the meantime I learn to relax and not to focus directly on what I want to see, I will feel it.
This is probably due to the fucking epic nap I took earlier today, when I got home from Dane’s father’s reception. Pardon the pun, but I slept like the dead through the afternoon. And notwithstanding my normal sarcastic and somewhat playful tone here, regarding the recent happenings involving loss, an overwhelming sense of nostalgia, and emotional confusion…I will let you know that tonight, my tone is a little more serious.
When I finally made it home, big surprise, no one was here. No one is ever here anymore. And when I’m here, I’m not here.
I stumbled into my room after getting home, dropped my things on the floor, pulled my dress down, kicked it across the room, stood in my underwear and heels, and poured myself a giant glass of Jameson. I needed time in the quiet to process everything that has happened the last few days, which have felt like one day that never ended.
I forgot to put deodorant on today. I forgot to grab some with my dress when I left the house this morning. I forgot to grab nylons too. I wasn’t all there, and it didn’t matter. I wanted to crawl out of my skin. I wanted to erupt. I was surrounded by a plethora of mourning people I didn’t know, grieving someone I didn’t know, greeted by someone I was just getting to know, but now with this loss, would be forever changed. I was so anxious, I ended up stealing Dane’s phone so he wouldn’t see the Twitter equivalent to verbal diarrhea that was about to leave my thumbs and hit the internet. I was hiding in my car, parked around the corner, desperately tweeting friends to find out about their lives, to be anywhere else but there.
In his recent attempts to try to know me, to try to learn me, impress me, earn me, it backfired on him repeatedly. Dane tried to show me interest, and I yelled at him Then I actually felt bad and invited him over for dinner, and he fell violently ill. I took care of him because how could I not? I may be hesitant when it comes to love, but I don’t fall short on compassion. The next day I came down with the same thing. He showed up almost immediately and cared for me, even though I screamed at him, called him names, and refused almost any help he offered me because honestly, I didn’t want to owe him a damn thing. He publicly proclaimed his interest and intentions, and I crucified him. His affections remained steadfast, and he took me out to dinner for one of the most beautiful nights I’ve ever experienced with anyone. I was proud to be on the arm of this handsome, witty, brilliant man. At points in the evening I had a hard time looking at him, I’ve never been so physically attracted to anyone.
It’s almost like I’m waiting for him to realize I’m not as beautiful as he says I am. I’m waiting for when the jig is up, and he realizes he can have one of those girls who you would find printed in color on the glossy pages of Maxim. One of those girls with the perfect teeth, white as the population of Idaho and blinding in contrast to her perfectly tanned flesh.
Yet he pursues me. Steadily. Respectfully. He’s still here. No shame, no pride. And still… my mind goes back to Peter and how he pursued me. He pushed. He was impressive. He was light years from Dane in terms of physical attractiveness, but he was good at being impressive and coming across as sincere. And so as Dane courts me, strives to impress me, win me over, gain my trust… I can’t help but feel the stings of the last one who won me over.
Try as he might, Dane can’t seem to do anything right. And it’s because I’ve set the standards to ‘impossible.’ I won’t let him do anything right. If he tries too hard, I push him away. If he doesn’t try enough, I walk away. And if he does nothing, I do nothing. I am punishing him for mistakes someone else made. I know this, and I do feel bad.
His attempts at affection came across as obsession. His effort to understand my life by getting his own Twitter account and tweeting me constantly, and reporting my every move was received as irritating, almost infuriating at times. And while it may have been entertaining for my followers at moments, in reality it was pushing me away from him instead of bringing me closer. And yet, while I am pushing him away emotionally, the circumstances keep becoming such that I am forced to be there for him, that I am made to see someone else’s tragedies repeatedly. In a time when he is trying to show me his strength and stability, the Universe is hitting him with challenges that change your life.
I find it hard to think it’s a total coincidence that I’ve been seeing this guy for just a matter of weeks really, and I have seen him in two positions which strip a man down to his core, and leave his soul bare and vulnerable. Horrible illness, and losing his father.
Silly me… here I’ve been feeling sorry for myself, expecting someone to run away from me because of my own tragedies, and it is being illustrated for me very clearly that I am not the only one who needs support, love, compassion, or companionship in the face of fear, vulnerability, and loss. Everyone is just as mortal as I.
The evening he took me out to dinner, the night he was so handsome it was hard to look at him, the night where he said I was so beautiful it was difficult for him to respect my space… I let him kiss me. He kissed me good night, and it was… well… it was.
When I finally let Peter kiss me for the first time, his hand met my breast before his lips met mine, and he took advantage of the opportunity offered. I knew the second Peter’s hands wandered anywhere they wanted with the tact and immediacy of a jackal on crack, harsh and rough like how someone handles sports equipment- not a woman- I knew this was not a man who respected me. He was just a man who was attracted to me as an object, not a person. I allowed it because I thought that was all I was worth or good for.
In stark contrast, Dane walked me to the door. “So…I’ve been thinking about it all night, but I won’t if you don’t want me to,” he said. I didn’t answer verbally, and in a twist that even I’m surprised with, I was the one who leaned in for it. He smiled, and adjusted slightly, reached up and touched my face, and kissed me. Very, very softly. Just once. I went for another and he stepped back and smiled with his eyes closed. After a moment of soaking it in, he cleared his throat. “Thank you. You have a good night, beautiful.” He tucked my hair behind my ear and walked away.
I stood there for a minute or two, wondering what had just happened. My calendar flipped back over a decade. I was not a 27 year old woman. I was sweet sixteen, kissing the boy from four houses down. And for the first time in a long time, I felt the blood rush to my cheeks, and the feeling I can only sadly call …. butterflies. I texted him to come back and he declined. He said “Let’s leave this night perfect. I’m quitting while I’m ahead.”
What the hell was happening? Why this sudden reset in my life? After I’ve walked so many paths, after I’ve been so many places and done so many things- very few of which are innocent. If you could snort it, I’ve snorted it, or smoked it, or popped it. I’ve traveled the world, I’ve woke up in vans belonging to people I didn’t know the names of. I’ve flown across the country so hung over I didn’t remember catching the flight from JFK to LAX. I’ve had my slut phase, international flings with expensive champagne, designer gowns, fucking rich boys in opera boxes like haughty little perfume ads, getting off on our own youth and invincibility.
And then one day I was back. And my life was shit. And it was boring. And it was over. My life was over. I was settled back in this town, and it was like my other life never happened. I was yet again pursuing a degree I didn’t want, to make someone else happy. I was working a job and making myself a business that was stable, and quaint, and cute, and all the things I never associated with myself. I was settling down. I was getting ready to die before I knew I would. And then I met Peter. The twice divorced father of two who works a cubicle job hourly with somewhat decent pay, who had a gut, but hey- he drove a new Sonata with personalized plates, and pretty blue eyes, and had nice hair product and dreams of having a pottery shed in his back yard one day. And he said he thought I was pretty. And he said he thought I was interesting. And I saw his Facebook and I saw pictures of what he looked like when he was younger, and he was somewhat attractive then, so if I closed my eyes I could just pretend he looked like that instead of what he actually looked like. And if the lights were off, I could convince myself of that. And if I blurred my vision or just avoided eye contact with him all together, I could live in perfect denial of the fact I was not attracted to him at all and it wouldn’t really matter because he was a good man, and I should be happy to have landed such a good man. Right? And I thought “Hey. This must be how the rest of America dies, right?” And so, I jumped in. And I was faithful as hell. And I was praising. And I was dutiful. …And I started dying.
So why was my life resetting now? Why, instead of getting older, taking the next step, and acknowledging my age and life education and jaded skepticism of how all this bullshit works with men and women, boys and girls…why was I not that, and instead this very young girl suddenly flushed and somewhat giddy about getting a very simple good-night kiss from a boy I knew from my childhood? The boy by my mail box.
The next day was Valentine’s day. And quite unexpectedly, the time we were spending together was finally was filled with mutual affection. And then the call came. Instantly, we went from the highest high, to the lowest low. I felt the familiar crashing feeling I knew well, usually experienced on return flights from some destination I’d partied far too hard at, and done many things I could learn to regret.
Dane had officially lost his father. And I was standing right there by his side as the words fell on him like a piano falling from the sky.
Before we knew it, we were no longer in a hospital waiting room, but rather both of us sitting in an emotional wasteland filled with landmines. Our minds were AWOL. Our hearts, souls, and bodies and lives were officially in a state of Marshall Law.
We went back to his dad’s house and we couldn’t sleep. We lay in his childhood bed in his old room. It felt like even though we were two adults in the house alone, we needed to be quiet. There was a girl in his room, and he didn’t want to wake up his dad and get in trouble.
He turned to me. “Hey,” he whispered. “You wanna take a walk?”
At two in the morning, we walked down our old road. The one we grew up on. We walked down to where my house used to be. The number of strides between the mailboxes to my old property felt exactly the same. My body naturally slowed me to the walking pace I’d used when I strode that path all those years. It was a perfectly familiar chunk of time mixed with gait that could only be explained by muscle memory.
I hadn’t been there since we lost it all and it got torn down. Where those big wrought iron gates stood once to bridge the giant wall that wrapped my property, there was now an open entrance to a shiny new neighborhood. I half way expected to see my little gap between the wall and the gates I used to squeeze through when I walked to and from the house. Just big enough to fit my body through without having to put the code in and open the noisy gates, or wait for them to open or close. But it wasn’t there. It was a gaping expanse of open suburbia. Seeing it wide and bare like that made me realize what a hole in someone’s heart might actually look like.
Lamp posts, sidewalks, houses instead of trees and stables. It was like my childhood never existed, and the looming estate that sat there once, that housed a lonely girl behind it’s walls, was just an imaginary thing. I wondered if my home didn’t exist, did I exist?
I stood there and looked at it from the top of the hill. Tears came, but quiet ones. It was all gone. And nearly twenty years later, that boy from down the street is still jumping the wall into my private Eden. Still sneaking in without permission to see what’s behind that giant blockade hidden behind trees, years of overgrowth, and rumors from people who didn’t know me that well.
Dane and I took that walk without uttering a single word. We walked quietly, with the occasional sniff or sigh. We were exhausted in every way a person could be.
The next morning, Dane woke me up by putting his arm around me. I rolled over and saw his face. His eyes were bloodshot. He had a five o’clock shadow that looked like it could sand down a ’57 chevy. And he had an aura the color of pavement.
I looked at his face. I reached over and ran my fingers through his hair. He closed his eyes and looked like he was facing the reality the day had to offer him. He took the hand I had in his hair and he kissed the back of it, keeping his eyes closed. He followed the kisses up my arm.
I didn’t know what to feel. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t stop him. He didn’t stop him. And it happened. All of it.
Marshall law.
Neither one of us has said anything about it. It hasn’t been mentioned or acknowledged. Perhaps it’s like the house I grew up in… maybe it just never happened.
The next couple days were drowned in planning and formalities. His family came into town. The lawyer’s office. the Funeral home. the arrangements. The Temple. The rabbi. The cemetery. The wake. The details.
The night his family arrived, I was the designated driver for he and his brothers, who got appropriately lit. I was invisible. The next day, yesterday, I got up in just a couple hours to finish putting together the wake. And by 9:00 that morning, I was so emotionally detached from Dane, it felt like he may as well have been the one who went in the ground. I didn’t know why. I didn’t understand it. I was too tired to try. It felt like we had practically moved in together. And i was wanting nothing more than to get away and be by myself.
I finally got home, gave myself a good whiskey rush, and passed the fuck out to a dreamless sleep. When I woke up, it was dark.
And so, finally, we’re back to now. To tonight. Or this morning. Or whatever. Are you tired? Feel as if you’ve been reading for a while? That’s just the footnotes.
But as I stood at the bar in my room and downed the Jameson, I looked at my bed and my remote. I turned on the TV and flipped it to Dr. Who. I lay on my bed and spread out, soaking up all the space I had to myself in my sheets. My freedom. My sanctuary. My phone started ringing and I turned it off without looking at it, and powering it down.
I was so happy to be alone.
I’d never felt that before. Not like this. Not this ecstatic sort of feeling to be in my own presence with no other distractions or buffers. Me, soon to be naked, faced with the reality of my body and situation. In the quiet. After the storm. Yes. I was fucking THRILLED to be on my own.
I stood up to take off my heels and caught sight of myself in the mirror. My body has changed. My God. I felt like I was looking at a stranger. A grown up woman who lost the baby fat. Who finally shed her childhood. I saw ribs. I saw the delicate contours that define a woman’s body to me. A collar bone, dainty wrists. I saw long legs and all parts of my body flowing into one another as if they were happy in harmony instead of fighting with one another. I finally saw me.
After Peter broke my heart, after my life had reset… I finally really saw it. I looked at myself for a while. I didn’t hate what I saw. I am a beautiful woman, in a gorgeous body, and it’s mine. It’s all mine. I fucking earned it. I made it happen, I took control and changed it into what I wanted, and fuck if I’m not going to love every inch of it. And fuck anyone else who dare tell me it’s not good enough in any way. I know now there isn’t a man out there now that can take it from me as he pleases. I will share it with someone whom I deem worthy, but I will never give it to anyone again. I made a pact with myself then that even when the world is unbearably cruel to me, I will be kind to myself. If I possess the power to be my own worst enemy, then I have the power to be my greatest ally.
And most importantly, I don’t just tolerate being alone… I love it. I look forward to the time I get to spend alone with the enthusiasm most girls reserve for shoe shopping and dates with rich boys who are sarcastic and charming. I am good company. I am not just enough, I am happy. I am happy with me. I am good alone
I am whole.
I am …. everything I need and want.
I am not the one who keeps getting into relationships. I don’t dump someone through a fucking email and run into someone else’s arms. I am not looking for someone to complete me. I don’t feel like I’m missing a fucking thing. I don’t need someone to praise me. I don’t get left and settle for the next bullshit that wants me. I don’t think I’m worth what someone will give me. I don’t need to be validated by a man telling me what he thinks. I don’t need to be in a relationship to feel alive.
I don’t need anyone.
I had wondered where the strength to hold Dane up came from. How could I manage to support someone so completely? Why didn’t I run away and let him deal with it? Why didn’t I just let it be his problem? Because I am my own strength and when that fails, God is there, holding strong but not taking any of the credit.
I am able to stand strong and provide for someone who needs me, even if they are new in my life. I am able to be there for someone who didn’t even ask for my help. I am happy to show compassion and empathy and grace and not ask for or expect anything in return. I am ableto endure the deepest of losses, and the sweetest of rewards with someone and not need them to make me real. I am able to love someone more than myself, and still love me enough to be what we both need. Because I have Faith, I understand what unconditional love is…and if I can be loved unconditionally by someone else, why the fuck can’t I do it for myself? … I can. I will.
