One of "Those People" Part II

So here I am. It's a Saturday, and I am at home with plenty -- and I mean PLENTY -- to keep me occupied. My house is stuffed beyond belief with crap I don't need or want anymore. I have laundry to do. Summer clothes to store (and trash) and fall clothes to wash and hang up (and trash), a bed to assemble, a bedroom to rearrange, a litterbox to clean out, a dishwasher to empty, a floor to vacuum, groceries to buy, bills to pay...the list is endless.

But it's Saturday. And I could have gone to a movie tonight. But I rescheduled for tomorrow because I'm stressed over how much I want to get done. And I'm paralyzed.

And while I would feel oh-so-much better digging in and getting it done -- or at least make some decent progress, I feel like I'm going to jump out of my skin.

Because I am here. In my gilded cage. Alone.

I remember being in my 20s -- even in my early 30s -- looking forward to spending time alone, getting stuff done. I'd revel in spending an entire weekend rearranging my living room, moving pictures around, painting, whatever. I didn't need to go out very much. One or two nights a month was plenty. My home was my haven.

Now it feels more like a prison. For the past, say, four years, any period of time at home that exceeds two hours (unless I'm sleeping) leaves me feeling anxious and cut off from the rest of the world. I feel as if life is passing me by if I'm not out and about doing something with someone.

I don't know what my problem is. I was at my reunion last weekend. I'm going to a cabin in the mountains with friends next weekend. Just last night, I attended my first-ever NASCAR race. Life is definitely not passing me by. Skipping out on a movie with a friend won't kill me. But I swear, I feel like it will.

And it doesn't help that I miss Mr. G. I can't even call him because he doesn't have a phone yet. He doesn't have an Internet connection yet, at least one that's reliable. He is sometimes able to hop onto a free wifi connection from one of his neighbors and call me that way.

I just like having someone around. I remember looking down on people who were like that...who were rendered virtually useless if they were forced to spend any time with their own company.

Yet again, I have become one of "those people." And I hate it.

OB

One of "Those People"

In 10 minutes, one of my all-time favorite artists is set to walk on the stage in a small venue no more than four miles from me. She's Shawn Colvin, who I discovered in 1994 at the Kentucky Theatre while I was volunteering for the Troubador Concert Series. Since then, I have learned just about every word of every song on Steady On, Fat City, and A Few Small Repairs.

I haven't kept up with her much lately, and I haven't seen her live since she came to the area in 1997. That's almost 10 years. So why am I sitting here instead of in an orchestra seat at the McGlohon Theatre?

I have no one to go with.

I have become one of "those people" I have always pitied...the ones who never go anywhere or do anything unless they're tagging along with someone else. I made it my mission never to become one of "those people." You know the type. The ones who say nothing is fun if there's no one to share it with. Hogwash, I say! I went to London alone. Twice. I went to Dublin alone. And San Diego. And New York City. But those were all at least three years ago.

Honestly, the thought of going to that show alone has practically no appeal for me whatsoever. And I hate myself for becoming one of "those people." What has happened to me?

When I saw Shawn in '97, I went alone. Unencumbered by the demands of someone else whining to go home because it was a work night, I was able to linger by her tour bus and get my picture taken with her. Unfortunately, it's not very flattering. I wouldn't mind getting another one taken.

Well, I can't feel too badly...she doesn't look so hot, either. But who cares...it's Shawn frickin' Colvin!

Alma Mater Part 2 (Let's Talk Property)

It is a small, small, small world. It truly is. I can hardly go anywhere without bumping into someone I know. Even when I went to San Francisco in June, as I was walking on to the tram on my way to pick up my rental car, a voice greeted me with, "You know, OB, you run into the STRANGEST people in San Francisco!" I looked up to see someone I knew from where I live now and immediately replied, with eyes rolling, "Can I not go ANYWHERE without bumping into someone I freakin' know?! Sheesh!"

Back in February, Mr. G. and I began attending a new church I found about through a postcard in the mail. It's an upstart, part of the "emergent church" movement. It meets at a small reporatory theatre every Sunday morning, and it's co-pastored by two 30-something guys who met doing mission work in India and who now spend most of their days planning sermons in nearby cofffeehouses. I bump into them so often they probably think I'm stalking them.

At one of the first services we attended, Matt, one of the co-pastors, mentioned that he was born and raised in the same state I was. So I approached him after the service and asked him what town he was from. When he found out where I grew up, he asked me what year I graduated and what school I attended. After telling him, his eyes grew big and he said, "Oh wow ...do you know Jay X? He's my best friend and was the best man at my wedding!" Know him? I only went to school with him from first grade all the way through 12th. Too trippy.

Word has it that Jay is now a city councilman running for a second term. So I knew he was going to be shaking a lot of hands at our high school reunion last weekend.

Sure enough, Jay was there. I went up to him, and he immediately recognized me. I told him that Matt said hello, and proceeded to weave the tale of how I knew him. He quickly grabbed his cell phone, called Matt, and left an ascenine message about how I was standing right next to him and what a small world it was and blah blah blah.

Without warning, Jay launched an assault of 20 questions on me about my parents' house, saying he's mentioned my name probably 20 times in the past month because he drives by there just about every day. Just how many acres is it? Isn't there a barn in the back? Have developers come around making offers?

When my family was looking for a new house back in 1974, we came upon a "for sale" sign along a rural road rimmed completely by horse farms. The property was completely hidden by a tall line of trees and hedges. We turned in to find a long driveway that was a tunnel of trees. At the end of the long drive stood a modest limestone house sitting on seven acres of land. The front yard was as big -- if not bigger -- than a football field. Before even getting out of the car, Mom said, "That's our house." And that's where I grew up.

View from the front porch

The back yard and barn

You see, in the 32 years since my parents bought that house, it has become a haven practically in the middle of town. The city has grown it around like silt surrounds a cypress. My parents and our next door neighbor are the only ones who haven't sold our land. We're the last men standing.

My parents told me that they have their will arranged to split the house evenly among us three kids. Given that my brother lives in China and will probably stay there the rest of his life, and that my sister has nothing -- not even a job, I stand a fair chance of buying my siblings out and keeping the house. I've actually considered moving back home when my parents pass.

Now that Mom and Dad are 65 and 75, respectively, this is something I must think about, which terrifies me to no end.

And here's Jay, pitching himself as the benefactor to the place I grew up, where I climbed trees, made mud-cakes topped with poke berries and holly leaves, and created long passages among the treeline from one end of our property to the other.

As if I didn't feel enough like I was being stalked by a vulture, he signed my yearbook with this:
Yeah, I really feel the love, Jay....

Alma Mater

I attended my (gulp) 20th high school reunion last weekend. A reunion is a quagmire of unresolved feelings. I'd venture to guess that most folks attend reunions in the spirit of seeing old friends and recalling more carefree days: before jobs, kids, marriage, divorce, ill parents, and just plain old life started nipping at our heels.

Some people go to show off. Like my friend Ashley. He's a professional actor and has transformed himself from a chubby kid to a pretty hot gay man,if I say so myself. But I've kept in touch with him for years, so I've been acquainted His Royal Gay Hotness for many years. Something I found telling, though, was as he was driving me back to my parents' house at 4am after the "main event" on Saturday night. He said, "I bet this is the highlight of most of those people's year. I have something to go home to." I confess, I found that to be extremely arrogant. Which leads me to think that inside His Royal Gay Hotness lies a sexually confused chubby kid who just wants to be liked by the popular kids. Goodness knows he got his wish. He flitted around the room, senior yearbook in hand, asking anyone and everyone to sign it. By night's end, there was hardly a spot to write.

So, someone voted me least changed since high school. And someone else wrote in my yearbook that I'm the same crazy girl I was when I was a teenager. Very cool.

I voted myself most eligible bachelorette. Goodness knows no one else did.

While everyone (but me) is married, has kids, and is making a ton of money in fantastic careers, some things never change. Despite the most popular girls being married and moms, all the guys still follow them with hopeful attention. Not a one stopped to chat me up. Hmph...

Anyway, on to the dirt. Here are my awards:

Looks Most Like She's Been Ridden Hard Over The Years


Most Interesting Career
Strip club owner (met his wife when she gave him a lap dance. I think she's 12 years old.)

And...(drum roll please)

Most Changed Since High School
Ladies and gentleman, meet the former Mr. Jody, now Ms. Natalie.

A trannie at the 20th. It can't get any better.

The Big Chill

There's this song by the Eurythmics that's been playing on heavy rotation in my brain this past week. "You Have Placed a Chill in my Heart." I suppose it's fitting, because over the past seven days I've given more thought to northern climes than I have since my mother, brother, and foster brother set off for a two-month excursion to Canada and Alaska, leaving my sister and me behind to entertain ourselves in our old Kentucky home when I was around 9 or 10.

But I digress....

It's fitting that the weather is changing here in the South, from the muggy, oppressive blanket of summer to the crisp, silvery chill of fall. The weather has taken this turn just in the past week or so, which is fitting as well. Because it is within the past seven days that my sweet (and slightly impulsive) Mr. G., whilst perusing the Internet for jobs in Texas, randomly came upon a link to job opportunities in Alaska. Specifically, a small town called Bethel.

In this brief time, he has broken his lease, canceled his phone, Internet, and utility accounts, quit his job, applied for an Alaskan nursing license, gotten fingerprinted and background-checked, interviewed via telephone, sold his washer and dryer, and made arrangements to sell his car. He'll be gone inside a couple of weeks, I believe.

I've told him several times before, in different contexts, that I can't decide whether he is breathtakingly brave or just plain crazy. I think that even he would admit that he's running away rather than toward something. And, in most cases, I'd say that wasn't healthy.

Even when you're running helter-skelter from yourself, toward something you think will solve all your problems, any objective person watches and thinks, "Nothing good can come from this." But life is funny. Sometimes the runnings brings you exactly where you wanted, but it doesn't provide the solutions you were looking for. Nevertheless, in God's endless grace and seemingly random logic, He brings you answers anyway....just not from where you expected.

Mr. G. and I discussed this very topic tonight. I told him that when we met, I felt he was looking to me to be the magic pill to solve his problems, which freaked me out all along because there's no way I (or anyone else) could ever live up to those expectations. But he said to me, "I think you are an answer, just not in the way I expected." And I think he's right. There's a reason our lives intersected. And I think his life is richer for it. As for me...well, the richness is more subtle, and I'm still trying to find it. After all, I can't say I'm that happy with my life right now or where it's going.

I suppose none of this really matters. At least as it pertains to me. Before I know it, the ride will end. And I'll be here. And he'll be there. Could be two months. Could be two years. Could be for the rest of our lives. We are both entering the Frozen North of the Great Unknown. But I guess we've always been there. There's just a wicked windchill involved now.

I Need A Roommate

I am tired of living alone. I have, for all intents and purposes, lived alone ever since I was, say, 19 or 20 years old. I'm tired of it.

My threshhold for aloneness grows lower as each year passes. And, of course, having a taste of living with someone for the past year, the sting of solitude is a bit more intense these days. It's nice simply having someone around. I like seeing how other people live their daily lives. How often they clean. How often they cook. I'm a sponge and would probably learn new habits from them.

Maybe I should rent out my condo and room with someone. I think I'd be a lot happier, even if I didn't see them very much.

Think of the discretionary income we single, 30-something women are missing out on because we have decided that we must be fully independent adults, buy houses, buy furniture, buy gourmet cookware and appliances. That's all fine and good, but so many of the ones I know seem to be living alone because they're making room for the male suitor that might never come. And even if he does, would it not be easier to wrangle out of a rental arrangement with a roommate than to get out of a mortgage?

Personally, I think the day will come when all us singletons, when we are in our 50s and have made peace with the fact that we won't ever marry or have our own families, will band together and live in some sort of community....be it a condo building or a group of houses. We'll share meals, share common responsibilities.

Because years upon years of doing it all yourself gets old eventually.

Sigh....I'll write more later. Got lots on the brain.

Anniversary 2

Charleston, South Carolina is a city where I was transformed. It was to Charleston that I fled the confines of my hometown to start a new life. In many ways, that experience was as traumatic as birth itself. But it was, ultimately, redeeming. I consider it to be the damn smartest, bravest thing I ever did.

The 14 months I spent there in 1995 were mostly in solitude, but I refused to allow that to keep me from enjoying it to the best of my ability. The great thing about Charleston is that even if you're flat-ass broke (which I was), you can still find something to do on the cheap. I'd stop at a roadside stand on my way to Folly Beach to grab a $2 bag of boiled peanuts and feed the seagulls. I'd go to the Market and buy a bag of warm pralines. I'd leash up Sparky (my cocker spaniel) and we'd spend hours upon hours mindlessly ambling along the streets of the historic area or the Battery, watching the tourists, the locals, the lovers. Charleston is, basically, the Paris of the South.

I'd go to Palmetto Islands County Park and walk on wooden pathways over tidal marshes and watch the crabs scramble in the marsh grass as I approached. I'd watch the great blue herons circle and land on sun-bleached tree branches. I'd drive along Sam Rittenberg toward I-26 and stick my head out the window to inhale that distinctive mix of fishy low-tide, the Westvaco paper mill downstream on the banks of the Cooper River, and pluff mud.

I remember on one particularly bad night, I went to the end of the pier at Waterfront Park, sat on a big square footing, and felt about as lonely and forgotten as a deathrow inmate, when suddenly I heard a "pppppffffffftttt." It was a dolphin breaking the surface of Charleston Harbor, swimming so close I could almost touch him. And I felt as if he were reassuring me, somehow, that this, too, shall pass.

That part of Charleston -- the part that simultaneously hurts and heals in my memories -- isn't something I share with everyone. Only special people. And it was here that, a year ago this weekend, I shared Charleston with Mr. G.

We had a marvelous dinner at Garibali: flash-fried flounder that, to this day, remains the most unforgettable meal I've ever had. We stayed at a beautiful bed and breakfast, in the nicest room in the house (thanks to my old friend who knows the owners). The room, decked out in Asian-inspired antiques, had a hot tub in the bathroom, which we used, but we made better use of the hot tub outside in the courtyard, where we talked. And talked. And talked. For three hours.

It was in that hot tub where Mr. G was somehow able to finally convince my stubborn, stubborn heart that I was "she," and I realized my life would be different. I could hardly wrap my mind around it.

That weekend, we kayaked the tidal creeks in a tandem, jokingly referred to as "divorce boats," as couples passed us by -- the men looking at us with scorn and the women with jealousy -- as Mr. G paddled happily, and as I lay back, feet up on the deck, inhaling, inhaling, inhaling.

Sigh...what a happy memory.

A Hand to Hold

I didn't sleep well last night. I haven't managed to get in bed before midnight for a month. I had sad dreams last night of Mr. G and me at some restaurant making the acquaintance of other couples at a large picnic table. He held my hand the whole time and I remember thinking, "It's so nice to have his hand to hold."

Then, he got up and sidled up next to another woman and started holding her hand like it's the most natural thing in the world. And, in true OB fashion, yours truly slinked away silently, unnoticed, forgotten.

A friend of mine said the opposite of love isn't hate; it's apathy. I have experienced the shock and sting of apathy before, the awareness that someone has no interest whatsoever in how you are and does a fine job of going forth in the world without missing you at all. I don't think that's the case here, which comforts me sometimes.

In the year that I was with Mr. G, our relationship had gradually become the most important thing in my life, and I orchestrated most everything around it. Even when I took a weeklong trip to California without him -- a decision I struggled with for a long time before I finally decided at the last minute to go -- it was wholly based on the state of our relationship at that point, and I felt I shouldn't deny myself a good opportunity just because he wasn't going.

If I were a good Christian woman, Christ would be the most important thing. And if there was ever a good time for me to make Him #1, it's now.

But who am I fooling. My sadness has become the most important thing. That unruly child (see "Playlist" entry) runs the show. And she gets all my time and attention these days. I'm tired of her, but it feels like she's the only link to the emotional security I once felt that I have remaining.

On his myspace profile, Mr. G tells the world he's been married before and that he's been in several heart-breaking long-term relationships, but has changed and grown since then. Was I one of those relationships? And how can one change and grow in a month? I can say unequivocably that, while I know change and growth are taking place, I'm no different than I was a month ago. Faced with the same choices I had then, or a year ago, I'd probably do the same thing and make the same mistakes (provided they were mistakes, which I'm not sure they were. I understand that life involves risk and sometimes shit just happens).

So what lessons has he learned? Never to date someone whose feelings don't match his pace? Never to date someone who struggles sometimes to communicate? I really want to know what it is he's learned. Perhaps he's been too kind to tell me what a fuckup he thinks I am.

God, I wish someone would comment on this blog. Is anyone reading this?

I can't let Brat (the unruly child) run the show anymore. She isn't helping me. She's a glutton for punishment and she's a big ball of fear, anxiety and self-blame. And she has an all-or-nothing way of thinking, insisting that there are only one or two people on this planet who could tolerate her nail-biting, smoking and snoring (not that those who tolerated them liked them, but they had enough depth and compassion not to make them deal-breakers).

I want Mr. G to be happy. No question. I want him to have a hand to hold.

But I want to be the first one to find mine.

STOP! In the Name of Love!

I have been so insanely, inexcusably lazy for the last, say, two months that it's out-and-out depressing. With a 20-year reunion coming up in only five weeks, I need to get my arse in gear. Inspired by one of those "I need to do something good for myself" moments that follow a period of emotional duress, I decided to take the plunge and purchase something I've wanted for years: a treadmill.

So off I traipse over to Dick's on my lunch hour to look at what's out there, and there are several on clearance for as low as $400. I wrote down the models and checked them out online only to discover they aren't rated that high. Sigh....

Undeterred, I went to Dick's again today, determined to purchase a new treadmill. I went in for this....


...and walked out with this...




Sigh...I just couldn't do it. Which really pisses me off because I've wanted one of these for years.

But hey, the trampoline was only $29. But I have visions of Kathy Bates as Evelyn Couch in "Fried Green Tomatoes" bouncing about on her trampoline singing, "Stop! In the name of love!"

Dude, I don't want to go to my high school reunion looking like this...



Hey, at least my hair is more fabulous than hers! :-)

OB

Anniversary

It's a Sunday ritual that started four years ago, back when it seemed everyone I knew was getting married, and my recent ex had found the love of his life within days of our breakup. Out of curiosity or, arguably, self-punishment, I would check out the "celebrations" section of the Sunday paper that announced weddings, engagements, anniversaries and births.

My now ex-ex-ex has yet to appear on those pages and I doubt he ever will. He's still with the same woman, and they have bought a house together. But when I saw her a few weeks back at a nearby lunch spot, I did the obligatory ring check and see nothing shiny. I think his "starter marriage" burned him too badly to ever go back again.

Seeing this announcement in this morning's paper made me smile. Look at how happy they are in both pictures. I wonder what they have gone through together. Have they weathered infidelity? Financial ruin? Substance abuse? Do their kids love them? How many times have then fallen out of love with each other? How often was one of them more in love with the other and vice-versa? Or were they among the lucky ones (like my grandparents) who were on the same page the entire 50+ years they were together?

Life throws bad crap at you from all directions, and it seems to be worse today than ever before. So I wonder....in 25 years, will there even BE couples like this, celebrating 50 years of their life together, complete with a family they created, clean of ex-spouses, step-parents, half-siblings and visitation battles?

Chop-Chop! Time's A-Wastin'

Turning 25 was hard on me. Two years prior and fresh out of college, I had set off on what was supposed to be the experience of a lifetime -- a yearlong adventure across Asia, starting in Taipei living with my brother and his girlfriend (soon to be ex-wife...let's just gloss over the marriage part since it didn't last very long), teaching in Bushi-bans (that taught "American" English) for a few months in order to earn enough cash for passage on the folklore-laden, Agatha Cristie-immortalised Siberian Express, which would take my brother, his girlfriend Echo, and me across China, up through Russia and through Eastern Europe until we wound up in London, the city I'd dreamt of since childhood and which, in 1991, was still humming with teddy-boys, punks, and drugged up "nuns" sauntering along Kings Road listening to the Sex Pistols, Brian Eno, Roxy Music, Duran Duran and Heaven 17 on boom boxes...heaven, indeed. Then we'd fly home to the States together, full of wonderful stories of jade-colored mountains, $1 noodle dishes from roadside stands, myriad languages we couldn't speak or understand, and eccentric, fascinating, tragic and joyful people we'd met along the way.

But I came back three weeks later because I'd somehow convinced myself that my spirit wasn't large enough to take the opportunity I had. I thought then that I was too old. That it was something you did while you were still in college. I seemed to think that I needed to grow up, get a job with the degree I had, get an apartment and start paying bills. What was the fucking hurry?, I ask myself now. I was fucking TWENTY-THREE!

So I greeted 25 with a profound sense of failure. By that time, I had done pretty much what I had set out to do: I got a steady job at a hotel doing reservations (not using my degree at all); I got an apartment with a lease. I was paying for my own tires, cooking my own meals, and being smug in my independence. Not so surprisingly, a co-worker discovered my very first gray hair on my 25th birthday. No joke.

So here I am, 13 years later. In that time, I have procured a mortgage, a master's degree, a reliable and distinctly UN-sexy car, and an effin' awesome credit score. I have also been away from my hometown for 11 years. In 2000 (perhaps the best year of my life), I accomplished dreams I'd had for years: mainly, finally going to London (I've been three times now), traveling to other places I thought I'd never see (though not as much as I'd hoped by this point), and meeting Duran Duran in person. I have the picture to prove it.



I was 32 when that picture was taken. Being able to give that gift to my teenage self -- a self who believed she would never see Westminster Abbey in person or shake Simon LeBon's hand -- was bolstered by confidence so much that the next year I dropped 15 pounds and felt like I could take on anything I wanted to do: full-time freelancing, marriage, worldwide travel, you name it. Check out this happy, hot mama...



Well, that isn't exactly what's happened in the six years since. It's been an interesting ride, and I suppose I've done a lot. I have a gazillion friends and acquaintances -- so many I can't even go across the country without bumping into someone I know. I feel like I've sucked the marrow out of the independence I have created for myself. Better than marrying right out of college, having babies, and suddenly realizing you don't know who you are because you never gave yourself the chance to explore it, I told myself.

But here I am, just like the frazzled wife and mother, in the reality I have created for myself. And despite always feeling older than I really was, with the barometer of "what have you accomplished by this time in your life" having nipped at my heels for years and people telling me, "For God's sake...you have plenty of time"...well, they aren't telling me that now. I am teetering at the precipice of (gasp) middle age. And I have come to realize that it doesn't matter whether you got married and had kids early on. The weight of the choices you made bear down on you like an anvil. It's not like I took advantage of my unfettered life the way the world expects of a single woman. I'm not burning up the corporate ladder or enjoying the job of my dreams that pays me so much money that I could retire tomorrow if I wanted to...if ever. I have a modest life, a modest income, virtually no relationships with my own siblings, much less my extended family, leaving me with a feeling of dwindling security.

Now that I find my dreams of youth fading before me, I want something to work on. Something to work toward that will have lasting value. Be it a marriage or a child or both. I don't care how hard it is. I don't care how tired it makes me. Anything's better than having nothing to work toward that's bigger than just little old me and my little existential crises.

As recently as five years ago, I had maintained the position that kids just weren't for me. I perceived them the same way my father did: they steal your youth, your energy, your dreams, and your money (which is exactly what my siblings have done). They don't ever give back what you gave them. As for marriage....well, that's different. I always wanted to be married. Always. But I was almost ashamed of it and never admitted it. I didn't have girlhood dreams of a big white dress to match the big white cake. I thought that was all stupid, and I pitied my friends whose dreams were so pedestrian.

When I was younger, I was actually excited at the prospect of being on my own for the rest of my life, because I thought I'd be the woman everyone envied. I would embody the regrets those wives and mothers my age struggle with today. I'd be the woman with the cool job everyone would go "Wow" over. The woman whose life would resemble Justine's on Lonely Planet. The woman who, while fully immersed in the joy and simplicity of doing what she likes when she likes, would stumble upon a man so captivated by her radiance, happiness, lust for life and independence that he'd want to roam with her forever.

Who knows if this will ever happen? I try to keep hope alive that it will, or that if it doesn't, I will find a true passion in my life that gives it meaning beyond the confines of my own existence. But, dang it...with every failure I survive, the hope that some lesson will arise that will help me transcend this feeling of just frittering time away sometimes seems the furthest thing from me, leaving me to feel like a mouse on a wheel. Kinda like what Pink Floyd says, "Runnin' over the same old ground, but have we found the same old fear? Wish you were here."

After all, time REALLY is a-wastin'.

Mr. Nobodody

I don't know where it began, and, sadly, I don't know where it will end.

But back when I was, say, maybe 7 or 8 years old, I decided that I would be alone for the rest of my life. Marriage, kids, couplehood...it just didn't seem to fit into my reality for some mysterious reason. So in a fit of childhood depression, I went into my parents' bathroom and scribbled this little epithet on the bottom of a drawer.

Not so surpsingly, my parents still kept this cabinet in a quiet corner of my dad's basement hideaway. About two years ago, when I was undergoing my 2,468th existential crisis, I visited my parents, found that bathroom drawer, removed it, procured a rubber mallet, took it down to the barn, and proceeded to smash the hell out of it until I removed its bottom. I took it back home with the hope that one day, when I knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that what I wrote was an evil lie, I could burn it in a semi-ritualistic fashion with my beloved, Mr. Nobodody.

The self-professed Mr. Nobodody came a-knockin' a little over a year ago. So happy to have found someone who was both lover AND friend to him, he listened sympathetically as I exumed the sad, living artifact from my childhood that became a guidepost for my life, and I told him what it all meant and pontificated on where such a tragic assumption originated. He then proclaimed himself as my personal "Mr. Nobodody."

Mr. Nobodody left the belongings I had at his house in the front seat of my car about five hours ago, along with the set of keys to my house and car that I had hesitantly given him almost a year ago.

He says he needs a break.

And not only do I believe him; I have absolutely no choice but to agree with him.

I need one, too.

Maybe I am splitting hairs, here, but I guess I could use a definition of "break."

I knew, from the very beginning, that Mr. Nobodody -- while sincere at the time -- could not possibly deliver on the promises (both implicit and spoken) he delivered: that marriage, forever kind of love. Call me over-analytical if you will, but I have always been one who believes it's the small things that reveal a person's character, intentions, and truest self. And, well, the small stuff he did wasn't jiving with the big stuff he was saying. I'm not saying he was deliberately setting out to deceive me. Far from it. He just didn't think about what that all really meant. He wasn't thinking ahead. He wasn't thinking to himself, "Yeah, she seems great right now, but I don't know her well enough yet. She might be what I want, but what I'm telling her might not be what I want."

I don't know. I don't expect anyone to be a fortune-teller. I think that's asking way too much. But $#%^! ...I was so careful not to over-promise and under-deliver until I knew, KNEW, that the two were in harmony. They weren't. And they certainly weren't on his end.

It's not like I didn't see it coming.

So here I sit, staring at my drawer-bottom and knowing it ain't burnin' anytime soon, if ever.

OB

Childhood Tragedy & Redemption

For all my outgoing-ness and gregariousness, some of my friends are surprised that in grade school, I was a) shy and b) unpopular. I think it was more of a self-imposed role than anything else.
Mr. Ellison was my 5th grade teacher who liked us so much, he took all of us with him when he decided to teach 6th grade. His classroom was lined with cubicles - one for each student that we could decorate any way we wanted. I draped with a beaded curtain, and I've hung beaded curtains in every domicile I've occupied since.

As a class, our collective passion was kickball. And I sucked at it. I was the cliche of childhood tragedy...last one picked...kids fighting over who would suffer the indignity of having me on their team...the fast, athletic boys playing around me.

One day, I played exceptionally badly and it cost us the game. That was the final straw. When we returned from recess, and before "Mr. E." came back, I was surrounded by everyone, yelling at me, calling me names, and telling me what a loser I was. I was sobbing and trying to get away, but they grabbed my arm, pulling me back into the center of their insults.

The thing about Mr. E. was that he was the coolest, friendliest, funnest teacher in the school. EVERYONE wanted to be in his class, and we were the envy of the school, especially when he kept us another year. But that man had a wicked temper that, when ignited, put the fear of God into all of us. Seriously, I honestly think that, were he teaching today, he'd be reprimanded or fired. That man could yell and pound the desk so loudly it shook our eardrums and made our ears ring for hours afterward.

When he walked into the classroom and saw me surrounded by throngs of 5th-graders, spitting as they launched invective after invective toward me, his anger ignited.

He pulled me out of the group and took me outside the classroom. He very gently told me to wait there and not to return until he got me. Then we went back in, closed the door, and the screaming and pounding started. I was mortified, but I was also moved by his compassion. Fortunately, everyone made an effort to be nicer to me from that time on, because no matter how ugly Mr. E. got, his students loved him and, miraculously, they listened to him as well.

A few weeks later, I was in my usual position on the kickball field: back left. The kicker lauched a cannonball straight up in the air, coming right toward me. Instead, however, the ball landed right in a huge oak tree in left field. I stood under it, and I watched it travel like a pinball between the branched. I held my arms out. And I caught it. And I was the class hero.

Well, until I screwed up the next day at recess.

Nonetheless, it was a brilliant moment.

Here's what was so cool about Mr. E. On Fridays, we'd stop whatever we were doing to watch "Happy Days" on TV. Mr. E. had a ritual. Five minutes before the show, he'd eat a Smoothie, a chocoloate-covered marshmallow cup. And as soon as he opened up, we'd sing "It's Happy Smoothie Time, It's Happy Smoothie Time, Oh what a great time, It's Happy Smoothie Time."

We had some politically incorrect songs we'd lauch into whenever the mood struck us"

My country 'tis of thee
Sweet land of Germany
My name is Shwartz
I love sweet saur kraut
It makes my ears pop out
From every mountain shout,
"Hotsi totsi I'm a Nazi!

Oops....

Mr. E. decided to declare one Friday in spring "Game Day," where we could bring our favorite board game and play it all day long. No homework. No lectures. Just games. I got an Operation game for my birthday and waited two weeks to open it until Game Day. I was so frickin' excited!

Game Day arrived, and I proudly displayed my Operation Game, which was THE shit among grade-school kids, even more than Mousetrap or Battleship. Suddenly, I was the most popular girl in the class. Everyone wanted to play my Operation game. I claimed a spot on the floor, removed the shrink wrap, and beamed as I set it up. It was beautiful.

I barely had time to think before the boot belonging to Laura Hammond landed squarely on my beloved game, my key to popularity once and for all. Laura, the snotty, popular girl, looked down at me and said, "I was going to the bathroom. Why'd you put the game there? I had nowhere else to walk!" Laura had brought an Operation game too.

I was, understandably, devastated. I should have kicked the daylights out of her; instead, I said, "It's OK. Accidents happen." And I wound up playing Old Maid with the unpopular kids the rest of the day.

This past Christmas, my boyfriend bought me an Operation Game for Christmas. I've only played it once so far, and I totally stink at it. But that's one of the sweetest things anyone's ever done for me.

I bet Laura doesn't have one now!

OB

Evite Etiquette: A Small Rant

I love Evite. I consider it the most ingenious invention on the World Wide Web since Badger Badger Badger. But being a heavy user of the service, I've discovered a persnickety habit of invitees that drives me bonkers, and, I think, is a little rude. So, for those of you reading this, let this be a small lesson in what I call "Evite Etiquette."

Here's a little tidbit of information you might find useful: The person who sends you an evite knows when you view it. Now, the host or hostess wouldn't have sent you the Evite if he or she didn't want you at their event. They think you're cool. They think you're peachy keen. They consider you someone they like spending time with.

What's so nifty about Evite is that you can kindly (and courteously) indicate whether you're coming, you aren't coming, or even if you're tentative because you don't know your schedule that far ahead. I won't be offended if you don't know.

It's a simple click of a mouse, people. But don't just look at it and do nothing. And for the love of God, don't start talking about the event to the host(ess) unless you've rsvp'd one way or another.

I don't think the folks who make it a habit of doing this mean any harm by it. I think technology, by its nature, lends itself to a sense of separation from the rest of the world, similar to the false sense of security our cars give us to be complete a-holes on the road. But I can't help but take it personally. I feel like these folks are saying, "Ooooo....I've been invited somewhere. But the host(ess) isn't cool enough. I'll wait to see who else is coming." Fine. You're entitled to that. Just rsvp as a "maybe" then.

A Soliloquy on Waffle House

Last weekend, some friends joined me for a kayaking and camping trip in the mountains of North Carolina. After breaking camp on Sunday morning, we were starving and wanted a good, old-fashioned, Southern greasy breakfast before hitting the road for home. Our preference was unanimous: it HAD to be Waffle House.

Despite being armed with a PDA equipped with GPS, we knew all we had to do was look for that friendly yellow sign...after all, we ARE in the South. Waffle Houses are more prolific than hog farms in the Carolinas. Imagine our shock and disappointment when we were forced to settle for a Waffle-House-esque imitation. Sure, it had hash browns with all the accoutrements and strong coffee, but it just wasn't the same.

Yesterday, on our way to a hike near Columbia, my boyfriend and I were elated to find a Waffle House on our way out of town. In spite of the fact we were cutting it close on time, we opted to take the chance. We were jonesing for the "Waffle House Experience." I'm sorry, but IHOP is for pussies.

Waffle House is as ingrained in my youth as sweet tea and Kentucky Homegrown. It's untelling how many late nights, in an alcohol- or oranically-induced stupor, my friends and I would converge on Waffle House at 3am, chowing down on greasy hash browns, trucker-issue coffee, and raisin toast with apple butter. But the food is only a fraction of the Waffle House Experience.

There's the pimply-faced line cook, grease-skating from one end of the grill to the other. There's the comical delineation between smoking and non-smoking sections (usually only a table's difference), the watery grits, and of course, the clientele itself, which ranges from late-night partygoers to truckers to prostitutes to regulars who keep the waitresses company in the wee hours.

People familiar with Waffle House make it their mission to create the most complicated order known to man, just so they can listen to the waitress bark it out the line cook:

"I need hashbrowns, scattered, smothered, covered, chunked and topped with two eggs over medium, a side of bacon and raisin toast with apple butter!"

The very best part, however, is the jukebox...full of old country songs from Hank Williams Jr. and Patsy Cline. Selection 100 on every single Waffle House jukebox in the country is "The Waffle House Family Part I," a catchy, jingly tune that's cheesier than the slice of half-melted American covering your hashbrowns. Here's a sample:

http://www.wafflehouse.com/musicmachine.htm

The waitresses at the Waffle House I frequented as a teenager constantly complained about that song, so on our way out the door, we'd pop in a few quarters and select that song five times. Then we'd sit in our car and wait for the waitresses to start looking around suspicously at the dirtbag who played the song they are convinced will play on the muzak in Hell.

I truly pity those on the West Coast who are deprived such a rich, wonderful, white trash experience that is...Waffle House.

A Walking Willendorf Statue

Hey, at least I'm walking. But as time drags on and I careen toward 40 at breakneck speed, I am stunned at the reflection that greets me when I get out of the shower each morning. Now, I was never thin. Those days ended when I went with my mom to pursue her graduate degree 80 miles away. I enrolled in 9th grade and Dad picked us up each weekend to go back to our hometown. Mom and I had a two-bedroom apartment within walking distance of her classes and my school. And we became "food buddies."

Here's how bad it got: We go to the grocery store and pick up a frozen pizza. If that wasn't bad enough, we'd buy extra sauce, cheese and pepperoni to go on TOP of it. Or, we would pick up a box of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese...the kind where the cheese came in the skinny round can. We'd pick up a block of Cracker Barrel Extra-Sharp Cheddar, sour cream and bacon bits and ADD it to the mac & cheese and chow down. I packed on 40 pounds that year and it never left me.

Granted, my weight has remained semi-steady ever since then, give or take 10 or 15 pounds, usually in the "up" direction. I give myself kudos for eventually learning that I can't eat like that anymore and lay around like a sack of potatos all day. By the time I reached 30, I was walking regularly and watching what I eat. But that change in behavior kept steady pace with my increasingly sluggish metabolism, so even though I'm far more active than I was at 15, and despite being more conscientious about my diet, I'm still heavy. And it has, and probably always will be, the single biggest bane of my existence.

I don't need to be skinny. Or "thin," even. Just comfortable in my own skin. Today, my legs don't cross comfortably. I have a freakishly large paunch beneath my belly button that enters a room before I do. I haven't tucked my shirt in in over 20 years.

When I was 32, I somehow was able to shed 15 pounds. I was still considered overweight, but I didn't have to shop at plus-size stores. I shopped to show off, not hide. Frankly, despite not being all trim and buff, I was nevertheless thrilled with my size-12 body. At the time, I didn't have much of a social life, nor did I have a lot of money to go out. So my free time was spent counting calories, taking long, brisk walks and going to the gym. There were few social gatherings with food and drink to tempt me.

Then I met a guy. I put on about half of what I lost. Then we broke up, and it threw me in a deep depression that stole my appetite for almost a year. Despite ingesting fewer than 1,000 calories a day for almost a year, I only lost what I had gained in that relationship. Once my heart recovered, I made new friends and sculpted a busy, robust social life. That's where things went downhill weight-wise.

Five years, and too many vain attempts later, I'm back to where I started, plus about five pounds. And it consumes my every waking moment. I think about it in the shower, at work when I try crossing my legs and my knees get sore from the effort required to keep them together, when I bend over to tie my shoes and it steals my breath.

My boyfriend tells me at least 10 times a day how beautiful I am...how he knew the first time he set eyes on me that I embody what he's looked for his entire life: a woman he will never grow tired of looking at. We'll be talking about something as mundane as tax deductions, and he will interrupt me and say, "God, you're so beautiful."

I believe him, in that I believe that HE believes it. But I don't. And it steals the joy - not to mention the appreciation - of being what every woman wants to be: beautiful, graceful and desired. It isn't fair to him, and I feel so guilty sometimes when he tells me that. He deserves a woman to blush and be thrilled over such kindness.

This is no way to live, and I'm losing hope that it will get any better. I'm not sure I have it in me anymore to even try.

Monkey-Roped

Back in grad school, I took a high ropes course with my fellow residence life staffers. I was a residence director for a co-ed, upperclassmen hall. All the RDs and RAs were participating. For those of you who don't know, high ropes is an obstacle course that's about 40 feet in the air. It's a teambuilding exercise, designed to instill trust and closeness in a team. It usually starts with you climbing an unsteady rope ladder onto a slim beam of wood suspended between two trees. That's the easy part. There are obstacles that require partners to get you through it (thus the trust-building), and other areas where you're on your own and must draw on the encouragement of others to get through.

One part, which they called the "Monkey Ropes," requires you to slide your feet along nothing more than a rope while you grab another rope hanging vertically in front of you with both hands. As you stand there, your legs shaking and praying you don't lose your balance, you must release one hand, lean over, and grab the next rope for stability. Only then can you release your other hand from the first rope and move forward. Think of a monkey swinging from vine to vine in a jungle and maybe you'll get the picture.

I was talking to a friend last night, and I think I might have coined a new phrase for a relationship strategy so common it's practically universal. I call it "Monkey-Roping," where you won't let go of one relationship until you're fairly confident you have another one to go to. It happens all the time.

Certainly I can't be so original! Convinced I wasn't the first person to conjure this metaphor, I googled the phrase and came up with nothing. Excellent!

This is the strategy we've come to use in our professional lives, where we change careers five to ten times in our lifetimes. The preferred method is to have the next job lined up before we leave the one we have. And I think we've allowed ourselves to carry that principle into our personal lives, where, just like our jobs, nothing is permanent and loyalty can be both fickle and fleeting.

If you've been the victim of monkey-roping...where your significant other breaks it off with you because he/she has another relationship lined up, you've been "monkey-roped."

I must say, this is perhaps the cruellest of relationship strategies for the hapless victim. You can be dating the biggest loser known to man, but guaranteed, he or she will have someone waiting in the wings the second the relationship ends. While out with friends the next night trying to forget the jerk who made your life miserable, in the happy couple walks, giddy and acting as if they finally met "The One."

What is so genius about this strategy is that it's usually you, the victim, who chose to end it. The "monkey-roper," as it were, makes life intolerable by checking out of the relationship, breaking dates or not showing up at all, or just being the biggest asshole or bitch known to mankind -- which, if whoever is waiting behind door #2 even knows about you, only serves to give your soon-to-be ex-lover an alliance against you. You're the bitch...or the asshole, as it were, when it's THEM who has put you in his/her back pocket until someone better comes along.

The monkey-ropers are different from cheaters. They don't officially start the relationship until they've made you miserable enough to dump them. But they've been laying the groundwork for months. You suspect something's up. Your partner has "mentionitis," where your soon-to-be replacement crops up in the most innocent of conversations.

You: "You know, I just don't get why cereal has to be so sweet!"
Him: "Megan only eats cereal where sugar isn't listed in the first five ingredients."

You: "That movie really sucked."
Him: "Megan only eats cereal where sugar isn't listed in the first five ingredients."

To my knowledge, I've never been cheated on, but I've been monkey-roped more times than I care to count. Seemingly out of nowhere, attention is replaced by attrition. Closeness is replaced by withdrawal. You didn't see it coming, but there it is. He's unavailable. She's mentioning this person all the time. And the most infuriating part is that when you confront them with your suspicions, they become sanctimonious, indignant that you would dare question their fidelity or loyalty.

And while you're the one who chooses to end it, you're also the one left feeling as if your insecurity, irrationality, or suspcicious nature (which you never had before) drove them away and into the arms of another.

It's as if you were the one who was dumped. Because, with a monkey-roper, you always are.

Controlling

A friend of mine just called in tears because she was just dumped by a friend who told her she was oversensitive and controlling. He told her, "If you don't want to be friends with me anymore, I could care less." This came as a total shocker because you won't meet a quieter, seemingly docile, kind-natured man.

What precipitated this confrontation was a incident involving a volleyball team they are both on. She is the captain and she notified the team via e-mail to be at the courts 15 minutes before the game to warm up. He and another teammate was already there playing a game with some other people when she arrived and were just wrapping up a game. They started playing another game and she got upset because he didn't ask her to play with them....she was expecting he'd stop and come to another court to warm up with his team. When she let him know this, he said, "We're already warmed up." Knowing her, she probably was in captain mode and came across as ordering him to come warm up with them.

Apparently, she was cross and upset during the match and they lost, and, according to her, so was he. She called me that night saying how upset and pissed she was.

She couldn't take it any longer, so she called him and let him know that he had hurt her feelings by "excluding" her, and he was very blunt and angry, telling her that she always blows things out of proportion, she doesn't "own" him, and that he was sick of it. To my knowledge, it was their first fight, but he's heard her complain about other people who have, in her mind, mistreated her. I guess he was of the mindset I'm in: when will I be the target of her insecurity and sky-high expectations?

You know....I'm on the fence with this one. She IS an extremely sensitive person whose feelings are hurt quite easily. One by one, her friends and lovers are dropping away, put off by her confrontations that they have hurt her feelings. I'm about the only one left, and I feel the dependency growing. I can actually see it coming: she's going to expect me to do something or act a certain way in the interest of "friendship," and if I don't deliver, she will confront me and tell me that that isn't the way friends should act. She is a very high-maintenance friend.

Perhaps she and I are friends because I see much of myself in her. I'm sensitive as well, and when someone hurts my feelings, I have to let it be known eventually. Sometimes it's been met with compassion; other times it's been met with anger and defensiveness. What I have over her, hopefully, is that I try to see where the other person is coming from and change accordingly. Generally, my sensitivity is directed to lovers, whereas everyone in Beth's life may feel like they're walking on eggshells around her.

So, I suppose that my friendship with her is not necessarily for a season or a lifetime, but for a reason: I can see how her extreme sensitivity drives people away from her when what she wants is for them to draw closer. Where is the line drawn? I don't think her friend handled it well at all, to be honest, but I suppose that he felt it just wasn't worth the aggravation of being her emotional caretaker?

Just a thought,
OB

Packrats

Dad's "Office," where he displays his own unique way to manage utter chaos.

I spent the weekend at my parents' house. I hadn't visited them since Christmas. Each time I go home, I am flabbergasted at how much stuff keeps piling up in that house. They've been there since 1974, so it's to be expected that stuff would accumulate. But they don't throw ANYTHING away.

For example, when I was home for Christmas, my dad was going through boxes that were pulled from the attic to make room for a renovation. He comes downstairs with this pink taffeta prom dress I wore in 10th grade, as well as a black New Romantic-style jacket (same one Nick Rhodes is wearing on the cover of the second issue of Duran Duran's first album). Both are covered in mildew stains and God-knows-what-else....rat crap? Insulation?

Our three-stall barn, complete with hayloft, which used to board horses and now boards groundhogs and family relics.

Dad marches into the den holding the items up and says with a smile, "Look what I found in the basment? Do you want it?" I said, "Goodness no. They're out of style, stained, and I couldn't fit an ankle into them, much less my butt. Why would I want them?" He said, "I thought you might want them for the memories. I'll set them aside for a yard sale or for Goodwill." Ummm...what on earth makes him think anyone would pay money to have these items? I told him to throw them away, but the next day, I saw them tossed into a box in the basement.

The hallway in the "Hannibal Lector" basement

That's my Dad for you. Classic Depression era. He can't throw anything away, but he spends copious amounts of time moving it around from room to room in futile hope that the piles of junk will will somehow get smaller and more manageable. Every time I go home it's a true trip down memory lane. I'll find a coat I wore when I was six years old, back issues of Bop magazine with Duran Duran or on the cover or Fangoria magazine, pillowcases full of old notes I passed in class...it's always fun to navigate my memories when I go home, but the sheer volume of stuff in their house makes me claustrophobic and makes me wonder if my parents have that "pack-rat" disorder that's been making news lately.

Blessed Beyond Measure

Forgive me for waxing sentimental, but gimme a break. It's the holidays and there's so much going on, it can be hard to step back and look at what's making your life crazy to begin with.

Within 24 hours of being laid off from my full-time job of 4 1/2 years, I had enough freelance work to get me through the rest of the year. Within a week, I had hired another writer to pick up the slack!

I just had a Christmas party where around 30 people attended....almost all of whom I consider very close friends, and many of whom I've known for many, many years. One I met my junior year in high school in Kentucky. He moved to Charleston about two years before I did, and it was because of a visit there that I decided I could "make it" away from Kentucky. There were several friends who I met during grad school. All of them traveled anywhere from 1 1/2 to three hours to attend my party. And there were several new friends I've made within the past year who have become so close to me that it's difficult to imagine my life before they came into it.

While my life has its share of sticky moments (see "Inner Child Run Amuck" and "Family Drama" entries), I can't really say I have many complaints. I have a lovely home in a great city (not without its problems, but it could be MUCH worse), and a busy life full of activities, friends, and countless opportunities to grow and improve myself.

I am blessed beyond measure!
OB