Let me preface this post by saying - I am exhausted. I haven’t had a full night’s sleep since Wednesday and a three day weekend of walking until my calves ached and my trunk threatened to evict any and all of the junk is finally starting to catch up to me.
That probably means I should leave this post in a draft somewhere.
But I’ve left too much in the unspoken and unread folder lately, and the resulting cluserfuck inside my head is getting to be too much.
This weekend was good. And bad. It was, at times, the pinnacle of perfection - filled with new sights and new people in a city that I adore. It was laughter and old friends, holding hands and breathing deeply. And it was also, at other times, nothing short of awful. It was tears and sleepless nights and angry words I still cannot reconcile with beliefs that I hold dear.
For the first time in my life, I find myself completely confused by the extremes.
I live my life at one end of a spectrum. As the tattoo on my back reminds me, the world is either comedic or tragic. The existence of one extreme has always served to enhance, rather than negate, the experience of another.
I am not afraid to cry because I know the joy of a deep, soulful laugh is just around the corner.
Perhaps I am getting too old for the pendulum swing.
I want to tell you about Jared and I playing tourist with Poppy, Dawg, Robin and Rachel. I want to tell you about having my face airbrushed and accidentally groping myself during the Hot Blogger photo session. I want to tell you about how you should never walk the stupid fucking bridge. I want to share with you the highlights of the more than 1300 pictures I took this weekend.
And I will. I will.
But I also need to take a moment to pull apart the good memories from the painful ones. I need to find a way to be honest with myself about everything that happened this weekend. I need to figure out how to take the good and the bad at face value, without letting one bleed all over the other.
How can a relationship be so good in one breath, and crushing in the next? How can an embrace be sincere and genuine, and the flash of disgust in the eyes vibrant and cutting?
How can both sides of the coin be accurate?
It seems there gets to be a point when the swing is so wide, the canon between two cliffs so wide, that it is impossible to cling to both sides. Failure to choose leaves you free falling in the abyss in between, nothing to believe in or stand firm on. And yet choosing a side, a perspective to focus your eyes on, requires an exercise in delusion. You can’t fully invest yourself in the one without pretending the other is the lie.
And so, instead of choosing, I’m free falling.
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In many states, you must be registered to vote by tomorrow - October 4th.
If you’re already registered because you care, help someone you know who isn’t registered. You’d be amazed how many people don’t vote because they don’t register ahead of time - because they just don’t know.
*Pack suitcases for two kids
*Pack backpack for one child with everything he needs for a field trip
*Pack MY OWN suitcase
*Clean my motherfucking hole of a house
*Print airline and hotel confirmations
*Take kids to friends’ house where they are spending the weekend
*Find spare house key. Shit.
*Write reviews, articles, etc. that are due while I’m gone this weekend
At least one of these things will probably not get done. Anyone want to take bets on which one?
(P.S. For anyone who cares, I’m wearing skinny jeans today. I KNOW!)
Well, OK, he isn’t having a baby. His wife is having a C-section today.
This will be their second child, first son, and reading his blog over the last few months has been an interesting walk down the proverbial memory lane. He is terrified. Excited, of course, but also dealing with that unique sense of terror that can only come after you have had one child and know exactly what the hell you’re getting yourself into.
And then there are the doubts that every parent confronts when they stand at the threshold of my daughter/son whose name we use when talking about her/him and THE KIDS.
Will there be enough? Enough time? Enough money? Enough love and affection? Will this second child inevitably be second class because there is just no way you could ever love another human being the way you loved your first? Will you, as parents, be enough?
And yes, of course, there will be. Those of us who have already walked through that door know. We know about the heart’s ability to instantly expand. We know about the time and space continuum that seems to open up and allow you to manage super human levels of multi-tasking. We know that yes, you will be enough.
And we know that there isn’t a damn thing we can tell you that can reassure you until you’ve walked through that door yourself.
Congratulations MTM and SciFiDad, I’m looking forward to seeing the four of you on the other side!
——————————————————————————— Tonight (Wednesday at 9pm EST) is another chance for you to listen to Clearly, You’re Retarded live!
In honor of SciFiDad’s new baby boy*, we’ll be discussing circumcision. To snip, or not to snip? Visit the Talkshoe show page to schedule a reminder, download past episodes, and listen live tonight in the chatroom.
*OK, not really. I just happen to know he’s keeping his skin. Although I can’t find the post to link to now for the freaking life of me.
It will be the first time I’ve been there with my husband, and only the second time I’ve been there at all. By the end of the weekend I will have logged a grand total of six days in Manhattan in my lifetime.
And yet, in so many ways, going there means going home.
I went to highschool in Parkersburg, Iowa. I graduated with a class of 69 people whose first, middle and last names I knew. I also knew where everyone lived, where their grandparents lived, and who gave them their first kiss in so and so’s backyard.
It was the kind of place that parents love and teenage girls vow to escape.
I started planning my own escape my freshman year. I was 14 years old and determined to Get Out and See The World. I began making lists of colleges on the east coast, because it doesn’t get any more Out than the east coast.
My junior year, I was accepted for early decision to NYU and Georgetown - the two schools I applied to days after getting my ACT scores back. I ultimately chose NYU and New York City, and began building my life in my head.
The scholarships were set up. The housing assignments mailed out. Deposits, transcripts, official this and that was in place as my senior year flew by. My friends and I would laugh and hug and cry over a bottle of Boone’s on the weekends about how fabulous my life was going to be next year, and how much we would all miss each other. I was Getting Out, just like I’d always planned.
And then, a few weeks before graduation, I…
I don’t know what. I choked? Panicked, maybe. To this day I can’t tell you exactly what the hell was going through my defiant little 18 year old brain. I looked around at my friends and my on again off again boyfriend and decided… screw it. I made a few phone calls and informed my mom I’d be attending the local state university my freshman year.
What about New York?
I’m not ready. I can always go next year.
I was 18 and had plenty of time. I was reveling in my friendships with the people who really get me. I had forever to get to New York City. I would still grow up to be a raging success in the big city - but I was miles away from Real Life.
Two months after my 19th birthday I found out I was pregnant. The on again off again boyfriend was the father, and the friends who really got me had scattered like rats on a sinking ship.
I do not regret my son. Or my husband. I don’t regret who I am or what I’ve spent the last ten years doing. But I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t always feel like some part of me was… off. It was more than wondering “what if”. It was knowing that part of me was always missing.
I know that sounds crazy. I know it makes no sense. I know it sounds like good old fashion, run of the mill, approaching 30 and wondering where her youth went regret. And I know that it was more, she was more. She - that me - was still out there, somewhere.
I found her in June when I stepped into New York City for the first time.
I couldn’t explain it, but I breathed more easily than I had in a decade. I wasn’t overwhelmed by crowds or disoriented by row after row of unfamiliar street. I was comforted by an eerie familiarity that made no sense.
And then I stood in front of the buildings that NYU uses for dorms.
In that instant I understood the phrase “walking over my own grave”. My blood ran cold, my breathing suddenly shallow. The City became silent - the whole world stood still as I came face to face with the tangible What If.
It took me a few minutes to physically steady myself. I thought I should be fighting back tears, but it was more complicated than that. I forced the air back into my lungs, closed my eyes, and let it wash over me.
And in that moment I made peace with it. With all of it. With everything I’d sworn I didn’t miss and secretly been longing for. With the fantasy I’d built up in my mind, the reality I’d been living, and a knew confidence in my soul that I was meant for this place. Neither time nor new circumstances could change what I had known all along.
Of course, I live in Florida now. Ironically, it’s the place I chose once I realized that my family and I could live anywhere. I picked beaches and climate control over skyscrapers and urban insomnia. And I continue to choose, every day, to stay here. Because right now this is where I - where we - need to be.
But it is a testament to where I am in my life that I am going back to New York City. The fact that she can be a part of my life, a part of this life, is a reminder that dreams do not die. They change, they adjust, they grow up. But they are always there, waiting to be put to use.
No. Really. I’m totally serious. I am that shallow and superficial.
This weekend alone I purchased three pairs of tights and yet another pair of menswear inspired shoes. I also tried on eight sweater dresses, five cardigans and one trench coat.
This may be a good time to remind you that I live in Florida. And also am clearly crazy.
Do you know who wears tights in Florida in October? Crazy people. Do you know why? Because it is damn near 90 degrees in October in Florida. With humidity. Florida doesn’t understand the meaning of the terms Fall or Fall Fashion.
But! Purple tights! So cute! And totally In right now!
*sigh*
I am never going to survive this fucking photo shoot.
Thank you for the emails and the comments waiting to find out how last night’s Obama event went for me. Here’s the recap:
I didn’t have to phone bank.
You can only call until 8:30 at night, and by the time everyone got there and got introduced and fed, it was pretty close to the cut off. So we watched the debate without phone banking.
I met two campaign staffers there that were amazing. We joked about how the two political science graduates were living my life - especially the blonde Miranda who had left her apartment in Manhattan to work for the campaign. *swoon*
I met one of the men in charge of Voter Protection in this county - a huge responsibility in the State of The Hanging Chad. He poured me several glasses of white wine.
I met the most adorable woman who was hosting the event in her gorgeous home, along with her husband. She was so sweet and seemingly docile - until McCain spoke on TV and then she would mutter “you’re such a piece of shit!” It was hard not to giggle at her.
I also met several people who have been volunteering, some who were new to the idea, and more people who wanted to talk politics. In other words, it was a perfect way for someone like me to spend a Friday night. Because I am a dork.
I’m planning to head down to the campaign office soon, and I’ll be sure to tell you how that goes once I do.
I’m going to do something tonight that scares the hell out of me.
Tonight, instead of a happy hour after work or a movie night with the family, I will be packing up a store bought pot luck offering and heading to the home of a complete stranger. I will sit with other strangers and pick up the phone to call even more strangers.
I will sit in a room full of strangers and encourage other strangers to get registered to vote.
And then I will eat potluck food and watch two presidential candidates in a televised debate, all the while sitting on a stranger’s couch in a stranger’s home.
And everyone I know thinks I’m nuts.
My friend told me to “have fun with that! Ha!” My husband made sure that “you didn’t sign me up for that crap, did you?!” And I’m already hearing stories about how everyone “hangs up the phone as soon as I hear them on the line”.
I’m terrified.
I’ve done telemarketing before. I know enough to be anxious about what I’m in for. I know how hard it is not to take it personally when someone hangs up on you. I know how awkward it is to make yourself on inconvenience in someone else’s life. I know how much I hate, hate, hate making cold calls.
But I’m doing it anyway.
Last weekend I stood outside for 4 hours to hear Barack Obama speak for 20 minutes. What I saw in those 4 hours changed me more than anything anyone could have said at a podium.
It’s been estimated that 20,000 people stood with me in that park in downtown Jacksonville. Another 8,000 stood outside the gates after the sheriff determined the venue was at capacity. We stood, first in the wind and then in the hot sun, and we waited.
And we talked. We talked about why we were there and what we hoped for. We talked to each other about what we wanted to see for our country. We talked to the strangers around us about our own bitterness with the current administration.
I was in awe.
As I stood amidst 20,000 people, I was overcome with the tangible energy in the air - a current of hope I could actually feel running up and down my arms. Hours before Obama’s motorcade even entered the city, the reason I was there was solidified.
I was there because I cared. And more importantly, I was there because other people cared.
They cared and they got up off their asses and out of their houses and invested their own precious time to be there.
And that is what changes nations. That, my friend, is what changes an entire world.
Not a politician or a government or an emergency meeting in Washington. But people, citizens, deciding in droves to pay attention. To care. To do something.
To see that kind of passion first hand was life changing for me. As a 28 year old woman, I have lived my entire life in a country defined by it’s apathy. The idea that people could make a real difference in their lives was nothing more than an old idealistic notion passed on to us through old news reels and empty rhetoric.
I am not naive enough to believe that rallies alone will solve any of the nation’s major problems. Or any of our small ones. But I do know that apathy produces ignorance and inaction, while organized passion can create one hell of a Tea Party.
Nothing about last weekend was empty. Not only did those people care, they were informed. They made a point of being informed. And they weren’t elitists or economists or politicians. They were poor and middle class and working class and upper class people. (No, really, I swear. There was a rich white couple standing beside me. Not all Obama supporters are broke.) They were white and black and brown and sunburned. They were old and young.
They were just… people. People who I never in a million years would expect to see get excited about politics. And they cared.
Anyone who tells me that hope is empty rhetoric has never been enveloped by it.
Anyone who still believes that inspiration doesn’t make a difference has never seen a crowd of 20,000 people stand calmly in the hot Florida sun for hours.
Anyone who says that a politician who makes you believe in yourself, believe that Yes, We Can is meaningless in creating a real impact in policies… is not familiar with American History.
It’s ironic, really, that it is the Democratic nominee that keeps reminding voters that the government cannot fix your life, that it can only be a support system for people who take responsibility for their failure and success. And it is sad, truly, that more people have not been able to hear that message clearly.
But some have. Some have not only heard, but answered the call.
And for the first time in my life, I have a chance to be part of it. And more than the chance, I have the hope I need to believe that my contribution might matter - might mean something on a bigger scale.
And so… I’m doing something tonight I’ve never done.
Something that terrifies me.
Something that I could easily sit back and let someone else do.
Because what I want more than anything right now is for someone else - even just one other person - to experience the same thing I was given last Saturday. For someone else to know that other people care.
Of course, it also wiped out 84 previous posts in order to get done the way I wanted it done. But regardless, it’s finally up and running the way I want it to be.
I know what you’re thinking. I can see it in your eyes. You’re thinking:
Holy shit, this blog is sucking some major buttocks this week!
And, well, yes. I’m aware. But only because I am busting my ass behind the scenes to get some cool stuff going on. And apparently I am not a good multi-tasker. Well, and also because I haven’t turned on my computer at home in almost a week (which translates too busting my ass on my blog behind the scenes at work. I’m aware.)
ANYway, today’s mindless distractions designed to take you away from your more important things to do are a poll and a heated debate about the Hippocratic Oath.
First - a vote. Let’s say hypothetically that you and your husband and/or your girlfriends and/or your boyfriends and/or your cats were thinking about taking a weekend road trip somewhere. And let’s say hypothetically that you were going to rent a car in order to save the wear and tear on your vehicle and potentially play at a little Thelma and Louise sans the canyon.
Second on the Time Suck Agenda today - should a pharmacist or physician be able to deny you medication or treatment based on their personal moral or religious beliefs?
Wait! Don’t answer that! Come on over tonight to listen to Avitable and I hash it out and share your opinions on the line or in the chat room!
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