It's Just a Couch. This Isn't Life. It's Just Stuff. (The Story of Dixon the A**hat)

What a whirlwind! Longest move ever -- and at last, oh, hi, here, here ... my & Natalie's new West Harlumbia apartment is a mess but sooner or later it will be a home where our habits can have a habitat. Natalie already knows how annoying I am, so there won't be any surprises.

I've got bruises and cuts everywhere, 'cause I can barely walk straight when I'm not carrying heavy objects, let alone when I am. So I'm behind on everything, which seems to be a perpetual problem, which seems to suggest that maybe there's just too much everything, you know?

[Quick announcement: On Tuesday, if Obama loses, I'm gonna kill myself. I'd move to Canada, but I don't have a passport. I just want to put that out there so we're all on the same [web]page.]

If Obama wins, and I think he will, then I can fully devote myself to all the other exciting things coming up, like Obama winning, the release of the Hot Blogger Calendar (Click here to view more details and to pre-order using my affiliate link therefore supporting me which is what we're all here for right, ME?!?!) and Sex Blogger Calendar, my Mom's birthday, National Novel Writing Month and maybe finishing unpacking.

So I have a story to tell you about hope and Dixon the Douchebag of the Week, who wasted 5 hours of the best most beautiful years of our lives on Saturday. I keep trying to edit this story 'cause it's so long, but every time I edit it I seem to make it longer. So welcome to long story time.

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Me and Natalie, the last time we lived together -- Willard '03-'04.
Look at that couch in the background! It looks so comfy!

I've got a long well-documented fondness for craigslist and I recognise its fallibleness. So I guess ultimately this is a story about what we expect from people, what "good faith" really means, and how petrifying it is when someone refuses to abide by the arbitrary rules of human morality you thought were implicit. I make this mistake often. Then I ask myself: why do I continue to expect?

At one point in this story, I will be suggesting for the fifth time a certain angle at which to push the couch from our hallway into the living room and A;ex will say, "why do you keep trying the same thing over and over again." And I will say, A;ex, as a sane person, you do not understand this, but your team in this endeavor -- me, Natalie, and Caitlin -- we do the same things over and over again expecting different results. Natalie will point out that it's the definition of insanity. We'll all laugh, knowingly, and push, and the only thing different about this time is that the bottom of the couch cuts right through my palm, an injury I don't notice 'til hours later, but which doesn't actually matter, obviously.

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Natalie and I, proud underemployed U-Mich alums, operate on a steady budget of broke-to-almost-broke and so we planned to get most of our furniture from craigslist or the street corner (coincidentally, this is also where we get our blow jobs).

Nata's developed a severe craigslist addiction over the past two weeks;' hauling Caitlin to at least five house/yard sales. Nata even enchanted a (obvs gay) woman on the Upper West who asked them to stay for dinner and sold Nata a teevee that didn't work. (Sidenote: howevs, when we informed her the teevee didn't work, she ripped up Nata's check. 'Cause that's what PEOPLE DO.)

The sofa is the most important thing we've been seeking. A;ex's grandfather is ill and her family keeps changing their mind about what's best for him, and so his old sofa has been offered and then taken back several times. It's like what my ex used to do to me with her bank card when she was in the mental hospital, except not evil.

A final take-back was initiated last week, so we made other arrangements. On Sunday morning A;ex is given the go-ahead again. Too late; we've already promised Dixon we'll buy his couch for $125 'cause it looks like something we could fall asleep on. Here's the ad:

So it's Saturday morning and the Team is in action. We've all been in overdrive supporting Natalie's yard sale addiction and complementary willingness to traverse crosstown for a deal on a stack of paper plates as well as my general mishap-hood and Saturday is no exception.

Caitlin's bringing me a dresser from the goodwill in New Jersey, A;ex is picking up the ebay teevee from Queens and she's got a coffee table and a bookshelf for Nata already in her car, and eventually Caitlin & Natalie rendez-vous @ the W.Harlumbia Palace to go get the couch and then Natalie realizes she's broke. Together, Caitlin & Natalie have got about $65, so there's no sofa-getting until A;ex unloads the furniture in Harlumbia, then goes back to get me & my stuff & my cash in Midtown and then takes me uptown.

Being poor takes a lot of time, we can't just call Ethan Allen and be like, what's up Ethan, I need a couch and some chairs, and he'll be like, okay, cool. Instead we must deal with Dixon.

So, a few hours behind schedule, A;ex gets me in midtown, we go uptown to W.Harlumbia where Cait & Nata are waiting. A;ex double-parks, we dash inside, have a five second Team Meeting and when we emerge, Alex has got a $115 parking ticket. Caitlin & Natalie get in Caitlin's car, we get in A;ex's car, A;ex yells at the ticket, and we then we hear a sharp plunking noise.

What was that, I ask.

A;ex gets out of the car, fully raging, and discovers someone's thrown a nail at us. A nail. I don't know why people do what they do, I'm not God.

I tell her nice optimistic things, which's an attitude I only pull out in times of crisis.

We arrive at Dixon's apartment on 72nd street with our two-car caravan. He's moving to California with his boyfriend, probs so they can tan year-round while sucking the fruits of their mad twatwaffledom and smoking meth from each others assholes.

Nata and I go upstairs, check out the couch.

Dixon admits he's not sure how they got it in there in the first place. Problem #1.

I don't like him, Natalie says. He seems a bit slow.

We'd expected to like him, because of the Instant Homosexual Bond.

The couch isn't as promised. It's falling apart at the edges, the lining's frayed, the skirt's threatening to abandon ship altogether. It smells a little and is impossible to move. Problem #2. But we've not come this far for failure.

I sub out, put Caitlin in, 'cause she's stronger. It's tight quarters up there, we need geometry and manpower, and I've got no idea how the fuck they ever got that couch in there, possibly it was airlifted.

So while they struggle, I walk down 72nd to get a fountain soda. The weather's cool crisp autumn (my favorite) and I'm thinking about how well everything's going considering how terrible everything was, about how people can make up for concrete things but the heart-hurt takes more time, thinking about all the stories I do not and wouldn't tell, and the ones I don't understand yet, of how maybe not everything happens for a reason but things have a way of working themselves out. How nice it is to have people who try to do what they can without expecting absolution, not now or even soon, but just 'cause they can, and we all do what we can, like everyone who did what they can the first time around, too, and all the others after that.

I'm thinking about how strange and silly crazy we all are, and how we go on, and how much better Coke tastes from the fountain than it does from the bottle.

I'm thinking about curling up on the sofa with Natalie and making animal noises all winter. I'm thinking about all the things I miss and the things I'm looking forward to, how to follow your gut and still retain dignity, and then I return to find Nata curled up in Caitlin's front seat saying she thinks she's made a big mistake.

Nata always takes full responsibility for things going wrong if she's even remotely involved. Caitlin takes full responsibility for things going wrong when it's clearly not her fault or within her control at all, like a plane landing late. A;ex always takes responsibility when she thinks it's probs her Mom's fault.

I don't know what I do. Maybe I avoid taking responsibility for situations and logistics but do accept full responsibility for emotional damages, or maybe I don't. Maybe I try not to be involved, or when I say it, I'm just saying it.

It's falling apart, Natalie says, back to the couch now.

We're not paying 125 for it, I say. We'll bargain.

There's this Cuban woman up there yelling at us in Spanish, she says.

You speak Spanish, I say.

She's not helping, Natalie says.

I call Caitlin. Are you okay, do you need help. She's in one of those moods: This crazy woman is mouthing off to us and she just said we need more strong men and there's no way we're getting it out of here. So obviously now it IS ON AND WE ARE GETTING THIS MOTHERFUCKER OUT OF HERE.

The first time Haviland met Cait she said to me afterwards; "Cait's my kind of lesbian," 'cause Cait looked like she'd get really competitive about moving heavy objects and always offer a ride like she did that day they met -- offering the ride.

Caitlin says there's nothing I can do so I just pat Natalie's hair and we eat chips.

15 minutes later, A;ex & Caitlin & Dixon emerge triumphant with the couch, having squeezed it through so many narrow impossible spaces. Dixon almost dies but A;ex saves him from getting crushed. A;ex is feisty and secretly strong, tired but determined, she's a good one. I'm probs driving her bat-shit insane but til I do, I can't seem to cease the sky-high investment of labour and time on her part. Her sanity is a heavy object, too, the kind that carries itself.

I don't really know if I deserve friends like this, I'd never move a heavy couch for any of them. Obvs as I could not move my own.

"She's my hero," Dixon says about Caitlin. Everyone is very friendly, there's no signs here that anyone will magically transform into an evil bastard. You can never tell with these things.

"I feel like the couch is kinda damaged in parts -- "I begin to tell Dixon.

"Seventy-five," he says.

And Natalie and I are relieved. So finally we get the couch strapped inside Caitlin's SUV. A;ex and I end up running into her friends on the street and driving them crosstown, Nata & Cait are getting Starbucks and Pinkberry for everyone and so about an hour later we're all back in West Harlumbia.

This is November 1st, the night of Carly's Tabloid Trainwreck Party. Natalie keeps sticking things under her shirt to see if anyone thinks she looks pregnant, so that she can be Juno and Peter can be the boy from Juno. Peter's her boyfriend, he just flew in from London and is sleeping in Nata's old apartment down the street -- the apartment she would've moved out of already today but then this couch thing has taken forever. Nata's younger brother is moving in here on the 4th and Nata's going to South Africa to save the world on the 8th and her company is two weeks late with her paycheck so she's had to borrow and so I'm just telling you, this is what's going on.

And as for me, well, you know. Me me me and more of that.

So it's dark and we take the couch out of the car and into the building.

But.

It won't go through our door.

It just won't.

And we huff and puff and move and lift and twist and when it finally enters, it's shot back into the room across the hall. Here's a diagram I've drawn for you about the impossible situation we've set up for ourselves:

We try several tricks to get it out of Nata's room and fully into the hallway, where we anticipate smooth sailing and are sorely mistaken. We've scraped up the walls real good and employed various to total body weights for the cause. There's been a lot of laughing and screaming and roaring. We've been at it for about an hour.

Natalie's new job is standing in the hallway and growling like she's about to give birth, which makes Caitlin laugh so hard she's distracted from her task of being the strongest person. When we make progress we cheer, when we lose we scream and growl and kick. It's getting into slapstick territory, that special space where life's ridiculous logistics wedge themselves between the ceiling and the floor, refuse to budge ... and then start getting a little rank.

Nata: "Marie, I feel like we're the weakest link."

Me: "Nata, it smells icky."

Natalie: "I know, it's the couch."

Me: "Really?"

Natalie: "Maybe it's me."

Me: "Is it the couch? It didn't smell bad before."

(Natalie sticks her nose in the cushions): "No, I don't know what it is. Maybe. It didn't smell when we got it. Did I mess up? It's probably me."

Me: "It's not you."

A;ex: "RIESE!"

Caitlin: "I feel upset."

Natalie: "I'm so sorry this is my fault, it was my idea to get the couch, now it'll never go in."

Caitlin and A;ex: "OH IT IS GOING IN."

Natalie: "My stomach is sad."

Riese: "Isn't it fun that we're all here together?"

[Natalie starts singing Missy Higgins at the top of her lungs, Caitlin and Alex sit.]

A;ex is doing this cute rage thing she does where every time I have an idea she goes "REALLY RIESE?" and forces me to go into detail revealing that a large section of my spatial relation-related plans involve desperate certain magic.

Eventually we determine we'll have to take the door to the living room off the hinges to provide an extra inch of space. Alex and Catilin do this, then we eat Pinkberry and laugh about the things that make us laugh and that make other people not like to hang out with us. Nata goes down the street to wake up jet-lagged Peter to help with stage three.

Me: "Does anyone else smell that smell?"

A;ex: "You always think you smell weird things."

Me: "Caitlin, you smell it, I know you do."

Caitlin: "I smell it."

Me: "It smells like a dead mouse, doesn't it?"

Caitlin: "Uh-huh. Ut-oh. Oh boy."

A;ex says she can't smell anything but then points out that I refuse to go into corner delis 'cause they smell like deli and I don't want my clothes to smell like deli and possibly I have an acute super-human sense of smell. But then Caitlin investigates, smells around the couch and then razors open the inside of the couch and the smell wafts out, engulfing the previously fresh air we'd so innocently been breathing.

It is FOUL. It is the unmistakable smell of DEAD MOUSE. We have been sold a couch with DEAD MOUSE IN IT.

Caitlin: "Oh boy."

Me: "Get it out of here! OMG! I don't want a couch that has a dead mouse in it."

A;ex: "I can't fucking believe this is happening right now. Like Really? Really Dixon?"

Caitlin, eyes watering, puts on her hoodie for emotional support, plugs her nose and says "oh no" while A;ex mutters to herself and I sit in the living room trying to be chipper, 'cause like I said before the only time I'm good at being chipper is when everyone else is upset or sad, 'cause I like to go against the grain.

I call Natalie who's mostly horrified that she thinks she's made a mistake and wants to take full responsibility.

We have purchased a sofa. It was overpriced and took the strength of two lesbians, one bisexual and one "I don't believe in labels" to get it into the apartment at all and will take quantum physics to push it in any further to its landing spot but needless to say, no, no, no, we are not getting this into the living room after all, we don't want this thing anymore! This is G-d saying do not take the couch.

This is A COUCH WITH A DEAD ANIMAL IN IT and it's making the whole apartment reek. Surely Dixon will be horrified to hear what's happened to us, and to Caitlin his alleged hero.

And it's getting late and we're tired. We've gotta get dressed for Carly's party and my room needs some attention, the bathroom is filth, Peter's tired, Caitlin aches and still has to drive back to New Jersey and I need to become Paris Hilton so but first we must call Dixon to make arrangements, we figure he'll be apologetic and maybe offer a partial refund, or else fess up to selling us a couch with a dead animal inside it.

I mean, THERE IS A DEAD ANIMAL INSIDE THIS SOFA! I mean, that's a bad thing, yes, that's not the kind of thing you sell, that's the kind of thing you pay someone to remove. We even are prepared to offer photographic evidence of said dead mouse.

Me: "I wish we could send him this smell on email or text. Like a picture message but scratch 'n sniff style."

Getting the sofa out of the apartment is slightly easier, 'cause there's a lot of rage fits happening, and I think we broke it in four spots trying to get it out. I couldn't get near it 'cause I knew if the dead mouse fell out onto me, I'd drop dead on the spot.

Let's fast forward to an hour later. Caitlin has called Dixon, 'cause she's his hero. He didn't return her call. So we've called again. This has been a nightmare.

But not a serious nightmare like DIXON. Himself.

Now mild-mannered Dixon is a menace. Why are we telling him this, he asks. It's out of his hands now.

Obvs he's on meth or coke or one of the other uppers that makes you super-irritable, 'cause he does that thing that people do when they're strung out on uppers where they respond to mild-mannered comments with batshit crazy responses. For example (actual transcript of dialogue, obvs Nata remembers it all word for word, as we do as well):

Natalie: I’m saddened by the fact that you don’t think we could make this a bit more fair for us.
Dixon: I’m a good person! I helped you carry it!
Natalie: You didn't have to -- you should've said something at the time.
Dixon: We made a good faith transaction and that's the vaguarities [his invented word, not ours] of craigslist! This conversation is over!
Natalie: I've done many transactions on craigslist myself and if something went wrong I always try to do the right thing.
Dixon: I'M NOT HITLER! I'M NOT A NAZI!

I believe Caitlin and Natalie are now taking turns trying to reason with Dear Dixon to no avail, and Natalie's about to cry, and the couch is outside and it's cold and we're tired and we are at that spot in life where we seriously cannot afford to lose ten dollars, let alone an entire afternoon and forty dollars each, and we're supposed to go to Carly's party but now Dixon is making Natalie cry. We bought a cover for A;ex's grandfather's sofa so it's not that we're saving money now by taking the free one, 'cause the free one is sort of hideous looking and the cover was $70.

What I'm saying is there is no silver lining here, unless you're talking about the silver lining left behind by the shedded fur of a dead mouse.

Dixon: "This conversation is over. If you wanna have a rational conversation we can talk about Gossip Girl if you'd like."
Natalie: "What's gossip girl?"
Dixon: "That's what you are, gossip girl, a bitchy whiny girl who wants to get her way."

I don't see the similarities, but maybe that's just me.

Dixon is on the phone with Caitlin when Natalie screams "I FIGHT FOR YOUR GAY RIGHTS!" which barely misses Dixon's sheltered ear as he's now hung up on us.

I don't know what we expected, really, I guess we just figured, you know, something.
Caitlin had offered to help me move, she said: "it's the least I can do."

Me: "We should call him back and ask him if his refrigerator is running."
A;ex: "You better go and catch it!"

Dixon's said we can "do whatever we'd like" with the couch. We'd like to throw it at his face, or leave it on his sidewalk, but the idea of getting it back into the car and spending more time on this project, going Itty Bitty Titty Committee on his flat ass, is just overwhelming.

So we leave it on the street and now (Monday) it is gone, at the landfill.

Me: "oo, let's call him and say I'm voting Yes on Prop 8 and then hang up!" [sidenote: obvs I'd never do that, NO ON PROP 8 KIDS! NO!]

What was the least Dixon could've done?

Is he just not a good person on the inside? Is he right? Is it the meth talking? I don't know.

Somewhere between here and the West Coast, Dixon's buying processed snack foods with our cash. I hope he gets a flat tire. I'm sitting on the pilfered cushions right now. It's comfortable. It's not perfect but it does the trick.

I Feel Like I Wouldn't Like Me if I Met Me

[I'll probably think more wisely about posting this post in the morning, we'll see, isn't the internet fun!]

Maybe you're just passing through and figure it couldn't hurt to ask, and so you do: "I know you don't like to leave your apartment, but I'm gonna be in town ... I'd love to buy you a drink" -- you're nice and friendly and I read these messages several times a month and what do I do? Nothing. Silence. I'd like to understand/explain why. 'Cause it's not that I'm trapped in agoraphobic paralysis, it's 'cause let's say we do meet and you don't like me, or maybe you do like me or one of my friends in a way we can't reciprocate or the ensuing social evolution isn't what you'd wanted and then meeting me kills the desire to read me. Then you'll stop commenting, and I rely on commenting and emailing to give me the cyber-community that reminds me why I love blogging and like that I can do it for free.

[I'll stress: big difference here between literally meeting people (me: this is me! you:this is me! handshake/hug/hi!) -- which usually works, and I love it -- and hanging out -- which doesn't always work. Usually it works better with other writers, and I'm also not referring to logical hang-out situations like: we're working together professionally/artistically, you're in a similar industry in the city, there's a reading, we're in a vacation situation/travel-spot together, you want to date Haviland, etc.]

So I grapple with this -- the balance between being polite/true, between good/self-aware ... is it inherently bad that I'm literally scared to meet anyone new from the blogosphere right now 'cause I think they'll never engage with my written words again -- whether it be via email, facebook, blog, twitter, whatever? I mean it's popular to hate on internet writers who need attention, but whatever, y'all can suck it, it makes sense.

Anyhow, then, when I write -- how personal is dirty laundry, how much honesty is just a bitch, and how much can I withhold while still protecting my friends' privacies? Should I be giving more? Do I overshare? Am I too illusive?

Am I just rude?

The invitations are flattering! I like them! They flatter me and make me happy, as all correspondences from readers do. But: unless we're in a perfect circumstance, it's likely you'll sooner or later dislike me, just like most of my normal friends do, except for the 2 or 3 I see a few times a week. At first you'll think that I don't seem awkward, like I said I would, and then you'll notice that I only have one leg, and then you'll wonder what I'm hiding after all and what happens after that ... I dunno. It's not that I think I'm too cool for you ... quite the contrary, almost everyone is better socially than me. I can carry on a conversation, sure, but I fail at social events, prolonged engagements.

And then I was reading Jessica Roy's piece in New York Magazine: Au Revior! to the New York Media Scene" (Radar's response: New York Media Scene Disappoints Young Girl). Roy, a 20-year old NYU student & aspiring member of the intellectual elite -- has been to a lot of media parties, met or observed many NYC bloggers, attended The Great Jezebel Event of '08, and has some feelings about it.

Here's one of them:

"These people that I had admired my entire New York existence — they all disappointed me. I don't understand how people can exist in such a dishonest way and still call themselves writers. Isn't it the responsibility of a writer to be honest?"
(Jessica Roy)
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My initial response to this: OMG WTF? Media people let her down at a birthday party she wasn't invited to? Isn't a friend's b-day bash exactly the place to share inside jokes and common reference points w/your friends? What was Jessica expecting? Keith Gessen spooning oysters onto her tongue, Tracie & Moe violating her hips with feminist tattoos, Emily Gould shooting super-secret private b-berry messages to her iPhone? Were the media people rude or just -- well -- honest?

While working at nerve I learned something about silence. Yes! The silence! The endless silence, mediated by Bright Eyes or The Roots and occasional editorial meetings. We communicated via IM only, not talking. These witty, charismatic writers I'd so admired were just like US! Though they were in totally capable of pulling it together for tv appearances and media events -- w/r/t everyday social behavior, they'd just prefer to IM. They weren't rude or cliquey, they were just Writers.

Last week while cruising I observed Ross the Intern successfully charm all reader/meeters w/effortless accessibility, and Ross endears literally hundreds of commenters per post even though he calls vlogs "talkies" which grates me. Wired writes about Julia Allison creating her own stardom, I'm reading about how Sassy's insider-y hipsterdom attracted readers and alienated others and I'm planning a big project right now that explores these questions/walls ... so I've got all these questions?

Are writers supposed to be removed in some sense? And did I feel more comfortable writing about my life, the personal scathing parts of it, when I hadn't already seen so many of you eye-to-eye, and then felt you disappear, like the truth of my social performance betrayed the work? Did your secrets become my secrets? Did my secrets become broken records and you saw the band live already: loud, steady. But it doesn't make you dance anymore. It's those blank dumb eyes in the singer's sockets. Blink. Blink.

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I don't blog 'cause I wanna meet people in person, I blog instead of meeting people in person. I want community -- it's important to talk to people -- I'm so vigilant about comment responding 'cause I want everyone to know I'm compelled by their contributions. By "I never leave my apartment," maybe I mean; "Don't expect much when I do." 'Cause I'm ambivalent about the face-to-face thing. I've got no faith in it, I've always preferred writing & books for social behavior -- pen pals, 'zines, thinly veiled truthful novels, notes, letters, mailing lists, magazine, plays -- the internet's a convenient technological surprise. I've got a handful of people who I feel comfortable with socially and chances are if you've seen me out, you've seen me with them and that's why I'm there.

Or maybe we're talking and I'm often thinking: "How can I make up for what I'm doing in person via print over the next day/hour/week? How can written discourse fix my failures right now?" Can I write a blog for them and pretend it's for everyone?

Recently I met a woman who'd come into my life through my blog. We had dinner a few weeks ago, Caitlin and Alex came along. She later emailed me to ask: "Why is it that in writing (and perhaps even on the phone) your depth and substance implies a very well developed self reflexive quality, while in person you are almost alarmingly veiled — funny but massively shielded ... almost as if you've built a force-field of buffer personalities?"

Um. ?

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Me: "I don't want to meet anyone else from my blog anymore, 'cause the thing is that once they meet me, I end up letting them down in some way that i manage to let down everyone in my life aside from maybe 3-4 people, and then they like me less than they did before."
Stef: "I liked you way more before I met you in person."
Me: "I know you did. See. Case in point."
++ 

"I was afraid to be alone
but now I'm scared that's how I'd like to be all these faces and none the same
how can there be so many personalities?"
-Azure Ray, "November"

Now I'll speak of exceptions: Caitlin (my best friend in the tri-state area, responsible for Saving my Life), Alex (my babypop) and Crystal (my co-worker & dear friend who exchanged emails with me for a year without any expectation of ever being 3-D friends due to her Australian residency) -- they comment more or the same as they used to, despite already knowing everything I'm talking about. So do most people I've just met here and there but never spent many hours with, or people that attend events but never request reciprocity.

So I should tell y'all now that actually I am a monkey named Xavier, and it's better you know now than be disappointed the next time we bump paws at a Dani Campbell-hosted lesbian event. You know, like, I'm a monkey, this is me, eat my ear.

 *

Way back in '06, Lozo and I were both invited to a lot of "NYC Blogger Meet-ups" and though we didn't know each other then, we later bonded about our refusal to attend. Worst case scenario; they think I'm awkward and gay, never read or comment again. Best case scenario; my blog becomes a play-by-play of the inside jokes volleyed about during our gloriously clever and snarky Prospect Heights bar hop. Also best case scenario is I'm on Bloggorhea more often, but that's defunct now, so whatevs, hey-o!

But then I started shifting my policy when my life turned inward -- from the real world to the cyber-world when the real world had done gone -- and picked up some incredible people during that time. We all did, but it felt organic, too. Like if real life was more present than cyber-life, it could've happened there too. I'd still be friends with Carly, Crystal, Stef, Caitlin, Alex, et al.

I have such love & support from these tangible internet peoples; I'm so grateful.
And y'know, happy to see Alex's blue eyes, etc.

But what else can happen?

Maybe we'll hang out once or twice and then I'll start flaking like I do with most of my friends and then you'll lose patience and refuse to comment as a protest of my personality.

Maybe we'll fall in love, and then again, and then becomes now and now we can't communicate in any formats, most of all this one.

Maybe you'll respond to my open invitation to an ambitious social meetup and it'll be the first time I've been out in months and I'll be overwhelmed by everything about that night and then afterwards you'll stop commenting, forever, and I'll feel bad, like maybe I did something wrong when we met.

Maybe you'll email me and I'll write you back or not and freak you out or charm you or not but either way I've broken the fourth wall by responding and it's DOWN and what now?

Maybe you're Lozo and you're punishing me for something, like not providing you with the grapefruits you desired late at night.

People I meet always tell me I'm much less awkward in person than I claim to be in print, but something still breaks during that physical connection that can't be fixed, I think. Why? I dunno, maybe it's harder to compliment when you've put a name to a face, harder to criticize when you're not anonymous, either.

It's hard for me to know why 'cause as a writer I have specific rules to how I behave online regardless of who I know and don't know, so I don't know what it's like for those who follow instinct rather than gospel -- it'd be like how I feel about teevee-watching compared to someone who works in the industry.

My first reader ever is in New York City right now, this week, and we've never met though she's the first person I'd never met that I actually loved like a flesh-and-blood friend. (Crystal became the second) After we'd communicated so much in the personal electronic realm, she stopped commenting here.

And I'm scared to meet her 'cause I've got this feeling that when the fourth wall falls down, she'll see a monkey and not a real girl, and this monkey will do tricks and eat bananas on her pinkberry and make a lot of noise but no music. And that nothing I write down before or after will be enough. I'll do it anyhow, because my want overrides my fear in this situation. That's unusual for me.

So anyhow, the reason I never write back is 'cause I don't want to lose you as a reader or as a commenter. It's because if you were to meet me you might find me alarmingly veiled. You might find Haviland alluringly veiled, which's why I always joke you should meet her instead of meeting me. I guess that's what I want to know how to do: become alluringly veiled or compellingly open or something altogether new that'll transcend three dimensions, regardless of if it smashes in the fourth wall to get there or just shortcuts around it. Do you know what I mean? If so, please comment, I'm genuinely asking.

Also I have this uncanny tendency to read vibes pretty full on, so I'll delete the paragraph about how absurd it is of me to even claim to matter to anything and go on to what happened next -- an event I dreamt about a few days ago, actually.

++

Before publishing this i went to the kitchen to make a waffle and my roommate told me I have to move out by September 1st. They're totally sweet kids, my roommates, but I don't think I was what they were expecting (I do required cleaning, pay bills, etc., but other kinds of differences) and they have a friend who needs to move in. I've been expecting this for a while -- I actually had a dream on the rosie cruise about him asking me to move out, which's funny I'm clearly a psychic-- and sometimes too I've been plotting my own conversation announcing my intent to leave (always deferred by logistical concerns), but it's an interesting conclusion to this particular ramblerambleramble. You know, about people meeting me.

I've got a little over six weeks to get it together, I'm thinking about fly-fishing in Northern Michigan.

When You Get So Into your VLOG

I am 95% sure that today is my Mom's birthday. It is, right? Mom? Actually, 'cause you have dialup, by the time your computer finishes loading this page it might not be your birthday anymore. Anyhoo, watching this vlog might make you question your success as a parent -- I've been editing clips of myself for the last hour and I've subsequently discovered that I'm really irritating. Also: I say "you guys" and "like" way too often, the lighting in the Halloween blog was the most flattering for both of us, rock bottom is super-fly, gold pants save the day every time, and I nearly have a full body seizure every time I laugh. Also, I obvs need to lay off the smack, because crack is whack.

Looking back on my life so far I'd like to say that my mother has always been there. From day one, she's been around or relatively available via telephone. For that reason and many others, including love, warmth and caring, I'd like to say, Shalom! That means "hello," "peace," and "goodbye" in Hebrew, which is way more than any one English word means, which is why the Jews are the chosen people. My Mom is Jewish, coincidentally. If you're not Jewish, that's cool, we can still be friends, even more than friends if you're cute and I love you. That's not related to my Mom, this is a tangent now.

You guys, I love editing Vlogs. It's like, a bad habit. Almost like a drug, except I don't have to find a dealer that'll deliver to West Harlem, like I do when I want a pizza or a pretty girl or a bottle of Hypnotiq.

I wrote deep things the other day, now I am a monkey with feta cheese for brains. I wanted to clear out my hard drive from all the un-used random footage that's accumulated from unfulfilled "to be continued ..."s, so, this VLOG has got clips running the gamut from A to Z and beyond, all NEVER BEFORE SEEN ON TEEVEE OR THE WEB. We reference a lot of stuff from other Vlogs so you should probs watch them all again, just to be sure you're up on it. I find that re-watching my Vlogs is very soothing, like warm milk or a similarly temperated bath on a summer's day, in the poppies.

Sugar Spell it Out Like, like O, like O in your Vlog

This is the second part of the video. I think there's good parts in this. A few short days & hours ago, I declared this video my 'ars poetica' if you will, declared vlogging my format of choice, my true calling, the medium through which I'll really be able to unleash my persistently crass but nevertheless beautiful ambition/passion. I felt vlogs would hurl me significantly faster towards my endless pursuit of literary excellence against all odds. Who can blame me for such lofty assumptions? Reader; I LOL'ed. At myself. I'm usually not the one to find myself quite so funny, but I did. In retrospect, which, like hindsight, is 20-20, I realise that this video is not my opus. It is not poetry. Perhaps it is actually boring to anyone not endlessly amused by the apostrophe/sign situation. People like that are the only people here. Maybe it won't make you fall in love with me. BUT! For a moment? It was like Snow White, when all the flowers and animals and other wildlife flocked all around her, and there were so many colors it was like the day color got invented, just to see it. Everything was new, like language. So we said nothings, they turned into mangoes, we bit, they filled us up, we made a video. There's no telling where this could take us. Pakistan, South Africa, Far Rockaway, West Hollywood, or Tasti-D. There were flying lesbians but then they flew away, just like Lassie.

This vlog is for everyone, but it's also a love poem to alex vega. If she can hear the many colors of the wind. Also, this vlog is for the daughter of Mr. Redacted, who I've decided to give a codename, Olive. If anyone knows what that references, then you win the Genius Award of the year. The award is a Tegan & Sara ticket. No for real. Bid away. You can stand next to Haviland Stillwell, she doesn't know any of the words. It's a contest. Whoever offers the most money wins. JK. Send naked pictures to Lozo and he'll decide. JK. I love all peoples. I should be asleep. Seriously I just tried to make this blog sound less insane, but instead I think I've just made matters worse. The way that "This is Everything" builds up in the start makes me wish I knew how to write about music.

I Feel You in my VLOG and I Don't Even Know You

This Vlog is in two installments. The first installment doesn't involve lions, tigers, SE/30s, or flying lesbians, BUT it does cover the comment contest, judged by a Mystery Judge I cannot reveal otherwise this message will self-destruct. Get it? He was in the custard? It doesn't cover our discussion of comment contest awards, or our special guest appearance this week by my roommate, Ryan Murray. The second installment will include many exclusives you cannot find in stores. Other things you cannot find in stores include Pepsi-One, crack rock, and your mom, unless she works at the store, or happens to be in the store at the same time, in which case you should've carpooled, global warming, hello.

When was the last time my opening paragraph was related to any of the following things: 1)the ensuing post, 2)my blog, 3)reality? Anyone? Anyone? Waiting for a video to compress is like waiting for a pot to boil but like, for the rest of your life. Hell is not other people, hell is compressing videos for other people.

This week we wore costumes, for Halloween. I am a forest and Haviland is 'Get Physical.' I don't know what I am. I don't know what she is. She is gold pants. I am tree sprite. Also, I don't know whom I am.

UPDATE: Also, I spelled "judgment" wrong in the title sequence. What does that prove? I'll tell you: do not stay in school kids. Drop out now.

Thursday Top Eight: And I'm Not Proud That Nothing Will Seem Easy About Me

It's kinda funny that Sunday I chose to write on "Things that were harder than I expected," and I said I'd write about Easier Things later this week, and between then and now a lot of hard things have happened involving people I love and care about -- even just people I know about -- and I dunno, things feel kinda crap, the air's a bit apocalyptic lately ... while simultaneously containing hopeful violent wind. I'm fighting competing urges to be productive or do all of the following things at once: lie on my couch, drink sweet wine out of the bottle, read Raymond Carver [I love his poetry, why does everyone underestimate this man as a poet, why is his poetry overlooked? I love his poetry.] and watch Tegan & Sara. That's not a mistake, I mean that -- "watch," like concert videos or whathaveyou. I like to watch them play music. Not because I want to bone them, but because it's better than crack.

I once again destroyed my back at the gym: I couldn't get off the elliptical 'til I learned who still had a shot at love with Tila Tequilla -- just about the worst reason ever to stay on the elliptical trainer forever while neglecting form. As I predicted, Steffanie was given the boot, and dear Stef, if you google yourself and land here, I want you to know that everything happens for a reason, and you were probs eliminated so you and I could be together. Also, my first question for you, Steffanie, is why the fuck did you agree to be on this retarded show? Are you retarded, like Tila and the other contestants? Also, readers: Why does no one on this show have a real job [or brain cells]? I feel like they're all "dancers." [I can't tear myself away from this show! It's possible I'll watch lesbians do anything. Except talk about their feelings, I guess.]

Ryan gave me this blue ball I'm supposed to roll around on top of to fix my back. That's not how it sounds. I wonder what'd happen if I swallowed this large pink pill in my desk drawer. Shall we find out? Lets see. Took it. I think that may've been a Percocet. I should probably include "reckless with pills" in my banner. Pill's not working. Nothing works on me anymore, I should be a lab rat for really strong medications. I'm chewing Bubbilicious. This post is going to be weird. I'll fix it tomorrow, it's item 457 on my to-do list. Ow. Giving my tongue a workout. Blowing bubbles. If I knew how to make balloon animals, I would. All the time. For birthdays, Christmas, whatever.

Soooo ... easy things. I feel like everything is easier than I expected, because I don't expect much. I don't really expect anyone to like, love me or hire me or anything. Rejected ideas for this stellar list include [okay, I'm feeling it now. Sort of mushy. Like I feel a little bit like Jell-O but slightly nauseous, and still awake somehow, this is quite weird]: Getting laid, getting internships, getting a job, lesbian sex, getting published, getting a freelance job, making new friends, avoiding phone calls, avoiding life, maintaining perky breasts, getting good grades, graduating college, working out, not going out, not spending money, going out, building a cave, writing 10,000 emails a day, learning to read.

So, right, things that are easier than I expected:

8. Finding This Apartment:
I was informed of my impending ejection from my apartment on March 18th, my then-girlfriend's 30th birthday. Brill timing. I put an ad on craiglist. I was straightforward : "BEST ROOMMATE EVER." I'm a freelance writer, so I've got no pay stub or steady income and I work from home and therefore, I'm home a lot. I stay up late, get up early, play loud music, and often cook dinner at 2 A.M.. I'm not messy, but I'm not a super-neat-freak either, and I eat about 100 meals a day. I've got a girlfriend, and she'll probably be sleeping over a lot, but she doesn't live in the city so I'll never be sleeping at her place. Howevs, I'm super fun! And I won't judge you for anything."

I figured there was no point in sugarcoating the fact that I was a highly undesirable roommate on paper. I expected invitations from people hoping I might not judge their heroin habit or goth band practice -- but most of the people who emailed seemed fairly normal. Then there was all this stuff that happened with another apartment and then I got an email from Zoey. I came to meet Zoey & Ryan and see this place the day after being up all night with food poisoning, and my girlfriend was in the hospital and my article just'd been killed, and it was raining like hard like hard. The apartment is beautiful, we totes clicked, Zoey'd been a fan of my L-Word recaps and thus kinda knew "of" me [like that I was a writer, not a "writer"] and Ryan also had a gay Mom and I was just like, perfect, done and DONE.

Oddly enough, they're most well-behaved roommates I've ever had, like I'm defo the weirdo in the house. Well, except Heart, that little dog we had for a while [see photo], Heart was like, on the depressive side of manic depression for sure.

7. Surfing
It's just really rare that I'll show any kind of instinct at all whatsoever for any sort of athletic activity. I skiied for ten years and still couldn't parallel or ski a black diamond. I can barely even swim. It's a miracle I don't fall down the stairs every day and break my elbows. The reason I picked up surfing so fast? Significant quadriceps. JK, I could barely stand up, but I wasn't terrible, it wasn't a disaster like snowboarding had been.

6. Make My Room Look Better and More Like a Grown-up:
I have these new sheets, they've changed the whole feel of my room. See, before, my sheets had holes [resulting from being nailed into the mattress & a fire of some sort] and my duvet cover was stained with ink, wine, whatevs. I'd covered it with another sheet, just a grey sheet from Tommy Hilfiger I got with an amazon gift certificate earned for using my credit card too often. Haviland & Cait picked out these new sheets & duvet cover for me because I don't know anything about how to make things look not retarded. My room looks so much better now, like fo' real, if you came over, you might fall in love with me. Until I start talking. Howevs, Haviland was dropping stuff into my garbage like we were on a Home Makeover show or Queer Eye. Mostly, she wanted to pitch various objects I'd employed to perform new lives as candle holders. She wanted me to get rid of my little toys too, like the plastic hula girl and the wind-up Santa and the dolphin paperweight but I was like "Carly has toys! Carly has toys!" and so she let me keep my toys in my cave. La-di-da.

5. This
Blogging. Sometimes if I sit and think about it, I'm like, wow, I can't believe people actually read this. Although the way this post is going, you might be wondering exactly why you still are.

4. Coming Out
I totes avoided having to deal with any of the sexuality issues through three primary accidental strategies:
1) The Blog: Though I'd identified personally as bisexual and would always say so if anyone asked, I didn't really start dating girls until about two years ago. Some people had always known, some were close enough to just know ... but most people just read my blog. It's awesome. Also, how many times have you gone onto somoene's myspace profile and been like "OMG, they're gay now?" Probs quite often. So I'm not the only one who uses the internet to avoid confronting a series of emotional realities. Also, my grandparents don't know how to use the internet.
2) The potential impact of having my first "real" girlfriend was sort of overshadowed by all the other special circumstances. I didn't really have time to ponder how to present myself as a lesbian (no one ever assumes "bisexual" in these cases, obvs) 'cause there were far more pressing issues. I wasn't really thinking about the weight behind my formerly innocuous daily communications, like saying the word "girlfriend" instead of "boyfriend." People respond to that, they just do, it's a surprise, to them, they are surprised but trying not to be -- I still remember the tennis club manager (where I worked for a hot minute) insisting on calling her my "roommate," which was not only inaccurate, but retarded. I didn't really have time to think about boys vs. girls, I just fell, I surrendered, when you feel you've found the right person you just zoom in and the rest of it goes away.
3) Apparently, my extended family has somehow decided that I'm a "career woman" who is too focused on work to acquire a male companion. That is just like, I mean, wow. Career. What's a career? Hoo-ha.

3. Getting Tattooed
I was super-drunk, mega-stoned, and I think Stephanie and I'd consumed a great deal of candy. I mean that; actual candy. At first it hurt, but then it kinda leveled out, like just became sort of sharp and muted throbbing, which is more or less my specialty. My thigh's not a particularly sensitiive spot either. The only hard part was figuring out if it was being tattooed in the right direction, as it was Hebrew, which is right-to-left, and I was looking in a mirror, and I was drunk. Anyhow I decided today that I want to get another tattoo. Anyone wanna design something for me? It's L-O-Z-O. That's his real last name. No, I think I know what I'm gonna get, I think the ancient Hebrew script signal for "hand." On my wrist. Maybe. I dunno yet.

2. Getting Health Insurance
The hardest part of this process, besides the 1.5 years before it happened and the six month post-application waiting period, was that I had to go to fucking Inwood to do the paperwork. Oh wait, did I say Inwood? I didn't mean Inwood. I meant basically I was in Alaska, that's how far I had to travel for this appointment, like, I should've called Rachel. It was on like 345th street or something. I showed her my bank statements, which reflected an income of approximately less than zero per month, because I was paid in cash then, and as a super-savvy anti-government radical neo-leftist feminazi super-warrior (not at all), I paid my bills w/money orders and everything else in cash, holla, and there wasn't that much of it, anyhow, so I filled out this form saying I only made $100/week [just following instructions] and then I got approved, which I wasn't expecting at all. I think everyone should have free health insurance in this country, so I was at peace with the whole thing. When I got the acceptance package in the mail, I started crying with joy, literally, crying, with joy, yes. Crying .. with joy.

1. Meet People
When did this happen? I don't know. I used to not even write as regularly as I should have for The Michigan Daily in college because I was afraid to attend meetings -- I hated the five minutes before and afterwards, when friends spoke to friends and I stood alone & awkward, projecting the air of a stuck up bitch who thought she was better than everyone, which was kinda true, as all anyone ever wanted to talk about was Weezer. This was before texting, there wasn't much to do on your cell phone besides stare at it. I don't know when I stopped being so shy and self conscious. When I moved here in 2004 I decided to start testing myself, challenging myself to overcome this -- I started facing my fears by compulsively meeting strangers. I'd meet boys or girls online and then arrange to meet them in real life and see what happened. Usually nothing good happened [though, Stephanie, my aforementioned tattooing companion, was one of the people I met this way], but I found it compelling, I started realising, maybe, how there's not really much difference between the people you're afraid of, and the people you talk to, sometimes for hours, or lifetimes.

Sunday Top Ten: Apropos of Nothing

I gotta catch some shut-eye/beauty rest/sleep. You know? You should be sleeping too. Unless you're in Australia, then you should um, have tea.

10. Sunday Bloody Sunday
Of all nights of the week: I loathed Sundays the most. Well, actually -- when Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman aired Sunday nights, my Mom (now gay) and I (now dubious) crushed on Dean Cain, and so we had our viewership rituals together and that was nice. Now, Lois is on that annoying show about the housewives with the ad campaigns that make my corneas hurt. Honestly, there's so much American media that hurts my retinas, corneas, and epidermis, that it's a wonder I'm still alive. [She says from her emo-cave] I actually intended to improve the quality of Sunday nights via the introduction of the Sunday Top Ten--Ryan and I'd always declared Sunday nights the most depressing of all nights, thus the "you cannot make definitive statements about your life on Sunday nights" rule. AND THEN Angela Chase said there's something about Sunday nights that makes you want to like, kill yourself, and thus, it was written. Oh, but during L Word season, Sunday nights are alright for me 'cause I get to see all my friends w/o leaving my laptop or my apartment. I have absolutely no point whatsoever, and I'm not just saying that this time. The topic of this paragraph is "lame?" The topic of this Top Ten is: run on sentences.

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9. Lying's the Most Fun a Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off, But It's Better If You Do
This week's Sunday Top Ten is a bit of a smorgasboard. Speaking of smorgas, this Sunday night I am going to a dancing establishment with Lozo, whom, despite spicy rumors to the contrary, I've never met. There'll also be some random homos there. And Stef. I'm a bit nervous about the strippers, as I'm historically unable to have fun in environments designed to appeal to the heterosexual male libido, e.g., college, faux-dive bars on the Upper East Side, football games, "bar & grill"s, parties, TGI Fridays, Spring Break, professional wrestling. HOWEVER, then I started thinking about how these ladies are probably aspiring artists or writers of some sort, perhaps not so different from myself (except with larger breasts, longer hair, better dancing skills, etc.), just girls in the big city chasing their dreams. You know? Yeah, that's probably it. Also, as I am wont to mention, Alice Ayers in Closer, one of my favorite characters [better in the original play, Alice, but also hot in the movie, Natalie Portman, ow], as quoted above. Below we have Gina Gershon, she's an actress from a bad movie about Strippers. A lot of people wish she was a homosexual, so, in lieu of that, she's a homosexual icon. And bi, holla!

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8. An Update on the 59th Annual Kings County Whathaveyous. (picture reprinted, see right, to refresh your memory)

[Scene: Riese is sitting on the couch, knitting scarves for cold hungry children in freezing cold countries, Zoey enters]

Zoey: Soooo .... Riese. You've uh, got a problem with my King's County sign?
Riese: Excuse me, I have a 5,000 mile walkathon to run in for charity, to cure RABIE'S. JK. FOR RABIES. No, it's for babies. GTG.

I told her I'd clear this misapplication of stupidity points. As Jaime pointed out, "TONY" is actually four letters that stand for other words, and therefore the apostrophe is POSSIBLY appropriate, but, the point is: this sign, which does in fact display a great deal of artistic prowess if you can avert your eyes away from the grammatical catastrophe and towards the cute & tender children illustrated below it, was created for some hooha Putnam County Spelling Bee play thingie oh man, I already forgot. Well, whatever it was, it was for something where a kid was supposed to've made the sign, and kids make grammatical errors all the time, get it? Like how the "8" is just drawn over with a "9." I suggested to Zoey that a better choice to demonstrate the fake artist's age woulda been the classic inversion of the letter "S," often used to indicate childlike scrawls. So, that's that.

Zoey is very smart and very beautiful, she's the best roommate ever, I heart her. Today, in fact, she carried out all the glass bottles for recycling, which was 95% alcohol consumed by yours truly (and Carly, actually, to be fair/honest).

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7. Gossip Girl

As I've mentioned, I read the whole Gossip Girl series. I'll tell you why, totes serious: excellent storytelling. I select most of my reading material with intentions to: get smart, enjoy literary talent, be a better writer. But books like Shopaholic or Gossip Girl aren't about the quality writing, they're quality storytellers. I'm glued to the page, wondering what'll happen next, etc. Cecily Von Whatevs is like, mistress of Plot. Actually I read them initially 'cause I wanted to be a ghostwriter for a book packager but then Don talked me out of it, anyhow, the point is that I kinda like this show. I actually sat down and watched it with undivided attention, which is more than I can say for any other teevee show I've watched in the last like, ten thousand years. Until about three weeks ago, I was consistently insanely out of my mind busy with 500 imperative activities involving other humans; I never sat down, never relaxed, never let my brain take a natural course. It's weird. Suddenly: this. I've still got no time or resources ever, it'd seem, but all at once I'm only answering to myself. Like, "Hi, me. What's up?" Eek.

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6. One Less Duty for my Hypothetical Unpaid Intern

On Friday I went to the dentist. I know, I could hardly believe it myself. I was lying in the chair like, wow, I'm actually at the dentist. The feeling was not unlike the feeling I felt upon finding an anthology with my story in it at Barnes & Noble for the first time. Like: is this really happening? Am I really here, at this point -- this glorious crossroads -- in the rocky road of my smokin' hot life?

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5. Do You Think I'll Make It to the Morning If It's Written

I had this friend, Alina, we met in seventh grade at my private school for weirdos. That's us in the photo doing a lip-sync to "Material Girl," in drag. Alina was Seventh Day Adventist, we were best friends, we laughed so hard we'd collapse all the time, just from a quickly exchanged private joke or biting Ace Ventura imitation or, occasionally, something we'd made up ourselves and then died over. Her Mom, like mine, was super strict and, thus, her and I were often prohibited to attend the same events and I was the only person outside of church she was allowed to have sleepovers with. So we both had overprotective mothers but Alina was also constrained by her ardent observance of the Sabbath. Her Sabbath was sundown Friday night 'til sundown Saturday, like the Jewish Sabbath, I liked that, like we'd read the same book.

Anyhow, the summer of 2001 I was living in New York and my Mom kept telling me; Alina called you, call her [this was back when your Mom could actually be getting phone calls intended for you, before cell phones took over], but I thought Alina was in California or Michigan or Boston or something, I didn't realise all summer she'd been calling me 'cause she was living in the city too.

At the end of the summer after our lease was up, I was staying in Westchester with Becky at her big house with her Kashi and big swirling staircase, high ceilings and jungle pool out back, and I finally called Alina and we made plans for me to stay the night with her at her apartment in Warlem before my flight back to Michigan and so I did. We had dinner at Cafe Mozart, she was always a weird eater, I feel like she had chocolate cake for dinner or something -- in middle school she wouldn't eat in public 'cause she was intensely paranoid she'd get food on the face, wow, she had so many weird "things" like that, it was part of what made her so ridic awesome -- all these randomized quirks she'd already developed even at the age of 12 .

So, back at her place, before bed I asked her to set the alarm for me to catch my flight.

"Oh, I just tell G-d when to wake me up."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, that's what I've always done. My whole life."

"And it works?"

"Yeah, He always wakes me up when I want Him to."

"Wow--just. Wow, that's amazing. Has it ever not worked?"

"Just once, I was supposed to go to this Church Retreat and I told G-d when to wake me up, and he didn't, I slept through it and missed the departure time for the trip. So I just knew, for whatever reason, G-d didn't want me to go on that trip. I trust that."

"That's so cool."

"So do you want to set an alarm, still? We can, if it'll make you feel better."

"No, I trust you. 5 A.M."

And what do you know, she woke me up at 5 A.M. I got my plane, and got back to Michigan. That was, I guess, thinking about it now, like, end of August, 2001. I flew out of New York City, didn't fly back again 'til October.

Anyhow, I was thinking of that 'cause I stopped setting my alarm this week, to try to get my body back to normal and not have so much fibro flare-ups as I'd been having back during Writeathon Mania '07. I've been waking up early anyhow, 8 or 9 every day, so I guess I don't need that much sleep really after all. I don't know, sometimes my days lately feel like so much fog.

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4. Go to the Edge and Barely There
I did a lot of randomised reorganising today. I built a shelf over my desk using things that probably shouldn't be shelves, and sometimes I think; that shelf might fall, maybe I shouldn't've loaded it with burning candles. Also, I got another filing thingie, because there's too much paper around and I'm always digging through it like a manic rabbit and that's no good for anyone, and I had to go through all this stuff today, all these papers, and the words written on the papers. So much recent history, so much not really history at all, but words-in-hands-right-now present tense action. Drawings, too. Things I wrote to myself not so long ago, automatic writing.

There are so many things still on my mind about so many things, so many unanswered questions. So many perceptions I'd like to verify, breaths and instincts and awarenesses and suspensions of belief in irrationalities held inside to best facilitate holding hands into the clear where one could speak clearly if such a time would ever come. So many people with the appropriate degrees who didn't do what should've been done, so many times nearing people who couldn't see what I saw when all I needed was for someone else to see what I saw. So many questions, so much sadness, so much anger, so much retro-frustration, confusion, so much ... what if. So much paper, so many things to file.

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3. New Ice Cream Flavor Idea: Hipster Heaven
Also, the other night, Stef described Williamsburg as "hipster heaven, where hipsters go to die" and Haviland told me to write that down and then put it on my blog. You know what though, I lived there once, and my hips were actually wider than per ush, though I blame, primarily, Lo, because she liked to eat chocolate kisses and mini candy bars out of the bag, like straight out of the bag, and I'd often partake, and also our freezer didn't work so we had to finish the ice cream before it melted. Like, we'd buy a pint of Ben & Jerry's, watch Pretty Persuasion or Grey Gardens for the 40th time, and have to finish the B&J before it melted because our freezer wouldn't freeze it. See, these are the problems that people like me face every single day, out there, in the world. Every day.

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2. The Girl and the Dragon
So, I was "talking" to Crystal about how today I downloaded this audiobook that I thought was gonna be about this girl who is drunk for ten years but then, in the prologue, she's all like "drinking is very bad and all girls drink because they are unhappy and it'll ruin their lives even if they aren't alcoholics" and I was like, whoa, tell me about that time you got drunk, please! Then I was annoyed that I'd used my one monthly audible.com credit on that book, and then I told Crystal about how at first, I'd joined audible to listen to "The Bible Experience"; this group of esteemed African-American actors who do live-recorded readings of books of the bible on audio. It's hosted by Levar Burton. My ex'd wanted me to read Revelation and was unimpressed I'd cheated by listening to a recording with these incredible sound effects, like you could hear all the people dying in the apocalypse and killing each other, and the white horse, sharp double-edged sword and the beholding and coming as a thief and stuff, and I was like, that's semi hilarious in retrospect, like me getting my nails done while in my ears Levar Burton's like: "The one-hundred and forty-four-thousand ... " Haha. Oh, that. Crystal said I should do a top ten of "things I've done to win the hearts of others." It would start in 1992, when my boyfriend and I both quit choir so we could go hang out alone. Luckily, we were both bad singers anyhow.

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1. The Feeling That I'm Here Again
I feel like there's crack in Tegan & Sara. I cannot stop listening to these girls sing songs, sometimes I miss it or need it like crack. And my favorite songs've continued to change, too, from "So Jealous" to "Frozen" & "Underwater" to "Soil Soil" & "Dark Come Soon" to "Nineteen" & "City Girl" & "Back in Your Head" to "Where Did the Good Go?" & "You Wouldn't Like Me" to "More for Me" & "The Con" to "Fix You Up" & "Are You Ten Years Ago" ... it just doesn't stop being exactly the only thing I can even think about hearing, it's just like my life is an elevator and this is my music, and the elevator is stuck. If only Dean Cain, as his character "Superman" from the show Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman could come and rescue us. See that? See how I brought that back around? Yeah you did.

Sunday Top Ten: I Saved Up All My Sunshine Just To See You More Clear

Clearly, there are a lot of things about life that I don't understand. That's right, M[redacted] V[redacted], my English 125 professor who drilled that we shouldn't ever open an essay with a trite & broad generalized statement: There Are A Lot of Things About Life I Do Not Understand! Also: the world is composed of many different kinds of people, since the beginning of time human beings have grappled to comprehend the meaning of life, literature explores topics that expand our views of the universe, and the personal is often political.

[One thing I don't understand is why M.V. was such a cunt ... but English 125's how I met Natalie! I should probs adjust that name in case M[redacted] V[redacted] googles herself. Done and Done. She seems like the kind of person that would. Let me google her right now, BRB.

Holy shit. "Rate my professors dot com"? Why didn't this exist when I was in school?!! Whoa. You can indicate if your teacher's HOT OR NOT. This is brill. Anyhow, she's got a 3.8/5 for her teaching skills. Hm. Oh wow, someone wrote that she accused them of using someone else's paper to write theirs. She totes did that to my friend Inga. Looks like she's still up to her same old tricks. Tsk tsk. Oh man. She won something. A Fulbright? Damn. I guess she wasn't that bad. I loved her class, actually, it's just that she accidentally caused my One and Only Actual Mental Breakdown. Did I have a point? Chances are good that I did not.]

OMG, someone's grilling cheeseburgers or something outside my window. It smells like childhood. Usually people're getting shot outside my window, so this's pretty effin exciting. Seriously last night someone got shot outside my window. Not kidding.

Sunday Top Ten: The Great Mysteries of Life That I Do Not Understand, PART ONE

(Items 10-5, Posted Early, For the Reason Why, See "9.")

10. Why's My Phone Bill So High?
My phone bill inspired this post. I've had this issue since 2000, when I got my first cell phone. Somehow I talk less than everyone I know, and yet I always have the highest bill. My total text messages sent/received number (837 in August) is higher than my minutes-spent-on-the-phone. My phone got shut off for like, 24 hours, earlier this week and though I found it slightly odd that I seemed to've lost communication with a few key players, I wasn't necessarily shocked by the silence echoing from the chambers of the Dash. I just thought "Oh, Haviland must be busy," etc. But um: totes shut off. Apparently I owed them $250. I don't understand this. Can someone explain this to me?

I want a no-phone Phone Plan. I just need email and texting, and the calender and calculator. The rest I could do without. I don't need voicemail or any kind of minutes--I'm equally uninterested in daytime, nighttime, weekends, and other T-Mobile customers. I mean; I got T-Mobile 'cause my girlfriend at the time had it, as does Haviland. I tend to pick my phone companies based on who I'm dating at the moment I need a new phone, that's how I got stuck with Sprint for three years, thanks Scot.

[This's what I've got: 600 Whenever minutes (I use about 200/month), unlimited text & picture messaging, unlimited nights and weekends, unlimited tmobile-to-tmobile, Total Internet Add-on, equipment protection, and er *cough* late fees. Also last month I sent a text to Australia, that cost 0.15. That's really the only place I see where I could possibly cut back, and I'd rather not. That's right Crystal, you're WORTH IT]

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9. Why Don't We Get Drunk and Blog?
I mean, you know? Why not? Really, I'd like to talk about something else. Why is Stef losing Lozo's join-my-top-25-blog contest by such a gigantic margin? That's why I'm posting this right now as opposed to three days late, per ush. Stef was kidding when she nominated herself and she doesn't want to win 'cause she doesn't really want people to read her blog, and I probs don't have enough readers to make her win anyhow, but she'd like to lose by a less significant margin. Please go here and vote for her, thanks, you have 'til Sunday night at 10 P.M. I can't relate to the not-wanting-readers thing, as I clearly want everyone to read my blog, obvs, esp. Ilene Chaiken, Shane and G.W. Bush, and, whenever I blog about doing something fabulous, I hope all my exes are reading it and feeling bad for cheating on me with 16-year-old synchronized swimmers.

Sidenote, 9a: Lozo and I were discussing our lovely inter-blog traffic flow, and how it's resulted in many new lady commenters for WDWGDB, but not necessarily vice versa, though Lozo brings me lots of traffic which's fabulous, mwah. Anyhow, Lozo said it's "intimidating" to comment on my blog because my commenters are so awesome. Is this true? Do you people feel this way? This is sort of a retarded question to ask, as probs if you do feel this way, you won't comment, which is totes fine. I think it's a Catch-22 or whatever. I mean, because srsly, say whatever. Long, short, true, false, funny, insightful, brief, beautiful, retarded, whatevs. I talk in abbreviations, have a compulsive urge to overshare, and I frequently live-blog my emotional breakdowns and I can't spell. Again: not complaining, I totally understand, there're lots of blogs I read & never comment, and I don't really know why, I just don't feel like I can. I love & appreciate all my present commenters and I would make love to all of them if I wasn't so busy being Emily Dickinson, or if I hadn't already, or they actually wanted me to, or whatevs.

Lozo: Commenting on your blog is intimidating.
Me: It's intimidating? Really? But I comment back! I'm so nice! You're like: "Alex: Fuck you. Gina: I'd only do you if you had a bag over your head. Matt: You are wrong about the Yankees."
Lozo: lol. Not in that sense. Your commenters write lots of deep stuff.
Me: I'm like "Alex: I love you!, Gina: You're so special!, Matt: Good point! I feel that way too sometimes!"
Lozo: But my commenters are one-sentence people. Yours are people who tell stories.
me: I know, but I like one-sentence people too.
Lozo: It's a fitting in thing. You know what would have made this conversation awesome?
me: If it had been live? In person?
Lozo: Naked girls and drinks.
me: In bikinis?
Lozo: I like that you have my setups to my jokes read already.

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8. Why Does Haviland Still Use AOL?
She's answered this question approximately 500 times, I forget the answer. I think it's got something to do with her career and keeping the same email address or something. But! AOL's just started doing this thing where they insert about 40 yards of white space to the end of all their emails. It's insufferable. I've communicated this. Here's what a quick gmail search turned up:

-August 17th, ME to HAVILAND: "Why does your email attach 30 pages of blank space to the bottom of every email? It's maddening and it must stop."

-August 20th, ME to HAVILAND: "The white space that follows every email is ruining our friendship."

-August 30th, ME to HAVILAND: "Dude that white space at the end of your emails is the most maddening thing on earth. Does anyone else tell you about this? It's going to make me into a crazy person. Oh wait, I already AM a crazy person!"

-September 12th, CARLY to ME: "I liked the unnecessary amount of white space at the end of your email, I thought of Haviland's emails when I saw that and then I laughed."

-September 13th: ME to HAVILAND: "1. Dude, you have to do something about this space Is there any way to fix it? Can I write someone at AOL? It's really maddening and unbearable."

Another question would be: Why do I repeat myself so often? Or, better yet: why does AOL make me repeat myself by sucking so hard?

8a. Why Does my Mom Still Use AOL?
Mom?

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7. Why Don't More People Read Books?
It's just that I get depressed when I feel like people don't read books, and then I use that as an excuse not to write mine. "It's not like people read books, anyhow," I'll say. But actually, the real mystery to me here is: who doesn't read books? Everyone I know reads books. You probably do. So why's publishing in such a dismal state? I don't know. It keeps me up at night, obvs. I also enjoy listening to books, like right now I'm listening to "Lucky" by Alice Sebold. I get really into it, I listen to it at the gym. Ppl are all like "what's up, gonna do a delt fly," and I'm like "She got raped in the tunnel!" It's like, serious.

I feel like books can be a lot better than movies or the teevee, cause there're books about everything. Books can offer special POVs and voices that you can't get from most movies or teevee, which first must receive "funding" and "distribution," which means that someone with money has to like the idea. It just becomes part of this big system. I mean, so is publishing, but you know what I mean, yeah? Here's some of my favorite books.

They're definitely better than doing nothing. E.g., on public transportation, while waiting in line, while walking (books-on-tape), while sitting on your ass, waiting in a doctor's office, waiting for your life to begin, waiting for your date to show up so you look smart, sitting at a bar alone not like I'd do that, etc. I dunno. I guess that's just my opinion. I also enjoy magazines.

---

6. Why Do People ADD Apostrophes to Plural Nouns?
There's this poster on our wall in the living room that makes me want to tear my hair out. It's a drawing and it reads: "The 59th Annual Kings County TONY'S." Probs it was drawn by some kid who's dead of a drive-by shooting now or something, and I'll feel really guilty when Zoey sees this and clues me in. Or maybe Zoey drew it herself, in which case I'll make fun of her about it. Starr's boyfriend was here last weekend and also got annoyed by it. He pointed out two additional errors, further fueling my fire. Sometimes, during Writeathons, Carly'd suggest we switch seats 'cause looking at that poster made me miserable and I commented on it often.

It's just that you have to ADD AN APOSTROPHE. WHY?!!! What goes through your head when you add that in?!! Like, what are you thinking?

This would be a good opp for y'all to inform me that I don't know the difference between "its" and "it's." I know. I'm working on it. (Kinda) I'm v.busy.

Sunday Top Ten: Twenty Six Years of Auto-Mechanics/Living

"Do you actually want to do nothing for your birthday, or do you just think that's clever?"
-Carly, re: my birthday wishes

Apparently, I turn 26 today. Perhaps Facebook, MySpace or Haviland told you about this. I'm being a weirdo about it this year; it's highly uncharacteristic. I mean, I write a blog, so clearly I enjoy heaps of unjustified attention lavished upon me at all times, and consequently I've always enjoyed birthday parties — though, falling as they do in mid-September [prime-time for "life-changing events" such as starting new schools, living situations, jobs, various phases of self-destructive behavior], my birthday celebrations often attract a haphazard assortment of celebrants AND I'm often blessed by having my birthday coincide with Yom Kippur. In the past, when I was a better Jew, this meant I spent the day in temple starving and atoning for my sins when I should've been eating ice cream cake.

I've always been that girl who writes her birthday in your planner in marker with circles and stars. But this year ... it just seems kinda overwhelming — I mean, it's awesome for people to call me and mail/send me things, OBVS . But the idea of having some sort of live in-person celebration is too much for me to handle ... feels inappropriate, feels like a lie ...

I've become a hermit, or the Bell Jar. Maybe it's just a phase. My therapist has suggested that I'm becoming agoraphobic like Emily Dickinson, my hero. I just wanna be alone. Like, maybe go somewhere and write my book or something.

See the thing is I'm supposed to be writing this book. And I've sort of let it fall to the wayside because it became a relatively significant aspect of my relationship and I needed to step back from it right afterwards, and now "right afterwards" is over, and I still haven't opened a single doc in the "Some of my Parts" folder (h/t Jenny Schecter) since June. And my agent is going to slaughter me with a machete.

So, are you ready for my thesis statement? Yeah you are! "This post attempts to do two things; one, reignite the author's interest in her own boring life and consequently fuel the fire of her "book," two, explore the 26 birthdays before this birthday in an effort to understand how we got here. Three, provide an easy reference point/timeline for readers to understand the ridiculous tangents that the author tends to go off on, often."

That's a trick thesis statement, because just "exploring" something doesn't count as an actual thesis. I need a point and then I need to prove it.

But luckily this is my blog so I can do whatever I want. Even rehash my entire life via birthday celebrations, much to your total amusement I'm sure. I actually have my entire life journaled, which is useful for the book. But I can't find all the journals right now and I think some of them are still in Michigan. So I'm working with limited tools here.

*

Birth: 1981. Fetus, Illinois- I think I spent the day crying, probs. Good start.

One: Baybay, Illinois- Again, no memory of this. Probs: cried, ate something pureed like smashed up apricots or applesauce, was likely dressed up in a wig and/or ridiculous party hat by my father and then subjected to multiple photographs.

Two: Baybay, Michigan-I'd imagine somewhat similar to "one," but perhaps by then we had acquired Wig #2, The Blonde Wig, to compliment Wig #1, the black-curly-haired wig, offering additional sources of baby dress-up amusement.

Three: Baby, Michigan- By this point, I was eating solid foods, right? I don't even know what three-year-olds look like. I hope when I have my own kids, they can give me a heads-up about these things so I don't have to look it up myself. "Mom, I'm ready for solid food now!"

Four: Toddler, Michigan- Definitely eating solid foods and reading. My brother would've been alive by this point, keeping the smushed-up foods economy thriving in our home.

Five: Eberwhite School, Michigan- I turned five in kindergarten 'cause I started kindergarten when I was four. So I could read pretty much anything. That's all I got. Perhaps I received some books. To read.

Six: Eberwhite School, Michigan

I GOT THIS ONE. I had a party, wore a cute Margot Tennenbaum dress I'd definitely wear right now if I still owned it, had a similar haircut to my present haircut, and participated in activities including bobbing for apples, making Mr. Potato Heads, and pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. At some point I acquired a necklace made out of organic Froot Loops. Looks like a hot party, honestly. Now that I know my Mom was stoned for most of my childhood, I can see these memories in an even brighter and more beautiful light, like she was probs like "Oh man ... lets have the kids BOB for APPLES!" and my Dad was like "DUDEEEE."

Seven: Eberwhite School, Michigan-Urm. I think this may've been when I got the Bangles cassette, 'Walk like an Egyptian'? Went to Bill Knapps maybe?

Eight: Emerson School, Michigan- THIS IS THE YEAR I GOT THE SAMANTHA DOLL!!!!!

Nine: Thoreau School, Concord, Massachusetts- Probs went to Walden Pond or something. I got Paula Abdul's "Shut Up and Dance" cassette, that was exciting. I didn't have very many friends yet.

Ten: Emerson School, Michigan- We went to Flint for the weekend... like, Roger & Me Flint. My three best friends and I. We stayed in a hotel and went to a restaurant with a big buffet, because I fucking LOVE BUFFETS, and then we went to museums the next day because I LOVE MUSEUMS and we got astronaut ice cream. It melted in our mouths.

Eleven: Emerson School, Michigan

Activities cited in my diary as occurring for birthday-related festivities include: Champion House ("It's a Japanese steakhouse, they cook the food right in front of you. I got shrimp."), a scavenger hunt, a round or two of Tabloid Teasers, and pizza. Gifts received include "letter-writing stuff" and trolls.

Twelve: Emerson School, Michigan

My Dad had just moved out, so we were doing that thing where we pretend like things are still normal. I remember a sleepover, and that we cried all night; my friends and I. That was the beginning of our sick habit — other girls were cutting or drinking, we were crying. It was a relief, I guess. It was something. You know. Kurt Cobain, etc.

Thirteen: Emerson School, Michigan

I'd just had my Bat Mitzvah so the b-day party itself was low-key since there was so much put into my Bat Mitzvah. In the photos I'm wearing overalls from The Gap, we're eating chocolate cake with our hands and there's green frosting. I feel like we went to Major Magics. God, I fucking LOVED THOSE OVERALLS.

Fourteen: Pioneer High School, MI- I was so sad this year, I hated my new school and my face and body and didn't have any friends. I invited five friends from middle school for a party my Dad was organizing but he wouldn't tell me what it was going to entail. I couldn't guess and it was driving me crazy. He knew I was sad at my new school and was trying really hard to help me be happy.

Before the advent of competition-style product tie-in reality television programs, it was still possible for someone to totally rock your socks simply by having a limousine parked outside your house on your birthday. Now we know that scene ("Oh my God! A PRIUS!"), but then it was perfect, and lovely. I was 14. He'd arranged an extravagant scavenger hunt and printed out instructions for us. We felt like little tiny queens.

My diary: "Daddy gave me the best birthday party ever. He rented a limousine and me and my friends rode around for a while and went on a scavenger hunt. Everyone wanted to get in."

He took photos. But when he died about seven weeks later they hadn't been developed yet, and we never figured out what happened to that film, like so many things we never found after that.

Fifteen: Community High School, MI

We went to Cedar Point, ROLLER COASTER CAPITAL of the Midwest. This was the age where having a party wasn't cool anymore if there were no drugs or liquor at it, so if your parents didn't allow that, you'd have a small thing like this thing.

*

Sixteen: Interlochen/boarding school- Diary, 9/23/97:

"Today was my b-day. At first it was kinda sad, but things picked up. Ryan switched into 8th hour, which rocks. Then, when I got back to my dorm, I had all these packages, including one from Magali and Becky. I got so much FOOD yum! Then me and this girl Carly went and filmed stuff, that was kewl. She just got a new camera. Then I got to talk to my friends on the phone. Ryan is having an emotional crisis."

*

Seventeen: Interlochen/boarding school- Ryan was my gay best friend — my "soulmate" — my everything. He'd just started college, I was starting my senior year at Interlochen. On the 22nd, I told Ryan about John and then Ryan yelled at me. I cried. He said scathing fatal things to me, stuff I never expected, but I guess I didn't really understand, yet, what he was going through.

The next day — my birthday — I couldn't make it out of bed or to class and my friends took turns visiting me on their off-hours. "There's no way Ryan can live without you," Krista assured me. No one believed that Ryan was honestly going to cut me out, but he did, for six weeks. It was like having my heart removed.

My friends dragged me to the cafeteria that night — the tables were covered in construction paper, a gigantic birthday card for me, and they blared Puff Daddy on Sheetal's boom box and sang to me until the boob box was confiscated. Everyone was so sweet and so patient. The next day John asked me to be his girlfriend. I had to say yes — I'd just lost Ryan over him, after all — and I did. We were together all year.


*

Eighteen: Sarah Lawrence & NYC/living in Bronxville a house-dorm-thing, they're hippies, whatever

Everyone gave me cookies and cakes. Girls I'd just met made me sweet cards.

I wrote in my diary: "I can't believe they love me so much. Why?"

Ryan showered me with gifts, as was his way, including the stuffed dog named after him that I still sleep with, and he took me to Chez Es Saada in the East Village; it's underground, the descending stairwell's littered with rose petals, like a movie about a dangerous man and a sweet birthday. Afterwards, we met up with Meg at Madame X for drinks, and got served.

Then that weekend I hosted an 18th Birthday Cocktail Party. I needed all my high school friends in the same room. We missed each other so much and none of us liked college as much as we missed each other. We mailed invitations -- remember that? When you actually had to MAIL invitations? Formal dress required. Since all of us, including our bartender, were underage and living in dorms, I got a hotel suite on the Upper West for the night using my savings from working at GapKids that summer. Everyone came. It was perfect, except for when we went to McDonalds for McFlurries at 1am and they'd already turned off the machine, like nobody cared it was my 18th birthday!

Nineteen: U of Michigan/living in the dorms

I had a group dinner at Seva — vegetarian place — my typical mishmash assortment of residential college kids, future sorority girls, and hall-mates. September birthdays are a good test at a new school of who's interested in your life, as in; being a part of it. And later: how lucky that Becky, who I barely knew then but ended up becoming my best friend, had come along that night. Samara got me a Super-Soaker 3000. Later, in the dorms, Jessie and I tried to open a cheap bottle of red wine without a corkscrew and it exploded everywhere, crazy big eruption like champagne; Chianti all over her fresh white walls, like someone'd been killed and it'd been violent. She didn't wash it off for weeks.

*

Twenty: U of Michigan/living with friends — Fancy-pants brunch with my Mom and brother, Colliders [frozen yogurt & candy smash up delight] w/my boys. Mejiers [it's like Wal Mart] with Natalie: we stole handfuls of bulk candy and I listened to voice mails and waited for this boy to call. Eventually, he did, and we went out. I can't tell you what we did, it's too embarrassing.

Diary, 9.24.01:
a) My life is fun and games.
b) My life is in shambles.
Reading tonight, gym tonight, birthday, homework, sex blah blah blah. Meanwhile, America is declaring war and people are buried in rubble in New York. Fuckin' A. I do no work. I sicken myself.

*

Twenty-One: U of Michigan/living with boyfriend off-campus- I'll tell you how it ended; dark blue-ish light, Chris and I's bedroom. Screaming, crying. I told him, "I'm leaving!" I wasn't nearly drunk enough for my 21st, but my mind was everywhere and therefore crazy — it was with Another Boy I'd Just Met, it was with my friends who loved me, it was with my mother, it was with myself, and I'd lost myself by this point, so that was a really far-away place for my mind to be.

My Mom wanted to buy me my first drink [ha!], so I met her at The Earle. In the dark reddish light, she told me more about her divorce than I'd ever been privy to before ... how there comes a time ... and Chris, as if on cue, called cranky for directions to the restaurant we were meeting up w/my friends at.

I gave him just-barely-incorrect directions to Champion House; he used this as an excuse to show up in a rotten mood, pout all through dinner and refuse to speak to my friends: Natalie, Becky, Jessie, Bobby, Lauren. Also he'd done bad on a test or something, I don't remember. He clearly wasn't good at sucking it up.

We tried to let conversation fly around him. He responded to my friends' inquires about his state of being with "I've been better." His justification, later, for sulking through my entire birthday dinner: "You know not getting directions right is my pet peeve." Which isn't even the correct usage of "pet peeve" and literally I was one block off, he coulda seen the place from where I'd accidentally led him. It's not like, the Labyrinth. It's Ann Arbor. I was a quick phone call away, and I answered.

On our way to the car after dinner, he started in bitching about how he couldn't talk to my friends because they went to Michigan and he went to Eastern, he was poor and they were rich. I didn't understand this claim in all its complexities at the time. I did know that if he'd talked to my friends instead of ignoring them, he would've found out that not all of them were rich at all, and that even the ones better off than him had been through shit he could relate to. I wondered how he could know anything about them when he never listened to me talk, and, after nearly a year of us dating, still hadn't read a single piece of my writing.

We went to his frat house and once we got there, I ditched him to hang out with boys who were nice to me, and the Other Boy, who read poetry and wanted to be an actor. Then we got home and yelled at each other and I told him I would leave him. I told him I couldn't keep living with someone who expected me to cook him dinner every night and yelled at me for every misstep and, you know, like I said, hadn't read a single word I'd ever written. He said I was too drunk to drive.

He said we're so different, my friends and him.

I said, How's this for different? Let's sleep in different beds. Live in different apartments. Let me leave. Let me leave you. But he wouldn't let me leave. And we went on. I wanted to love him, was used to him — was dying, was dead. Four months later, I ran after my life.

*

Twenty-Two: U of Michigan/living with friends including Natalie

The night before, S begged to see me though I'd refused: "I don't want you to ruin my birthday."

He promised he wouldn't ruin my birthday, he just needed to deliver a letter. He asked me to meet him in the Law Quad. He gave me the letter. It was incredible, honestly, the letter. It was everything I'd ever wanted him to say to me.

But I confused him sharing his feelings with him sharing feelings he actually wanted to do something about. I was hopeful.

The next morning, I wrote in my diary: "There's this dream I keep having about SD where he comes to me and tells me everything -- how much he loves me, how much I mean to him, that he knows that he did an undefendable thing and that he's sorry and he knows he doesn't deserve my apology." [NAME THAT TELEVISION SHOW REFERENCE!!]

My Mom came over in the afternoon with presents, told me, about SD, "Marie, sometimes you've gotta just know when to cut your losses." I had dinner @ The Macaroni Grill (my place of employment) with my friends. They'd ripped out the USA Today Crossword puzzle and put it on my chair, and we all got drunk and ate heaping plates of gooey pasta. I felt very blessed to have all these wonderful people in my life when I felt I'd neglected them so recently to chase this true mean love.

Speakerboxx / The Love Below came out that day too, I remember that.

*

Twenty-Three: New York City/living with Krista in Sparlem- JH told me he was Really Good at Birthdays. I obvs did not believe him, but he was right. He took me, Krista and Ingrid to dinner at Atlantic Grill, got me a Tiffany's bracelet 'cause I'd joked to him that a Tiffany's bracelet is "Every Jewish girl's dream." "Rent" tickets, books — dreamboat. Obvs on his birthday I had to do even better: a weekend in D.C., tickets to see Steve Nash play there, a hotel. That weekend was almost foiled when they refused to rent me a car because of my "moving violations" and him "not having a drivers license" but then we found a FLIGHT that was super-cheap and fast, and that's when JH said one of my most favorite things he ever said:

I'd dropped a "fuck" in my language and he goes: "Marie, do not use foul language in the Reagan International Airport." Like how some people would shush you in church? Because Reagan was his favorite president!! Can you believe it?

*

Twenty-Four: New York City/living with Krista in Sparlem- The end of the summer of my sweet romance with drugs and general trashwhoriness. Everything felt unstable then, everything, except the brief momentary but overwhelming sensation of that particular inhalation, that particular hand darting into the darkness and underneath. Of girls, and what I took to handle that. Ryan emailed me that day after months of non-communication. I worked; I believe there was a cake and some ceremony of sorts at the lit agency. Krista and I went to Cafe Mozart and shared everything, ate sweet food and talked about Who I Was Before Ryan, and who I Was With Ryan — how crazy it is, how far we'd come since then, how long since I last saw him. For a moment the room was blurry as I almost cried, stabbed my salad. How far we'd come since then?

*

Twenty-Five: New York City/living on 106th

To: All my friends
From: Haviland Stillwell

Subject: And at the end of the day she'll be another day older ....

And that hot barely-there shirt on her back won't be keepin' out the HEAT...(10 points to whoever gets that reference)

SATURDAY IS THE 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRTH OF MARIE (AKA RIESE) LYN BERNARD!!!

which means.....

we are going to a girl on girl establishment and riese has one task and one task only!! --

******TO KISS 25 GIRLS ON HER 25TH BDAY BEFORE THE NIGHT IS OVER******

Of course, I'll be piggy backing off of the cause, when I feel it's warranted...

If you are available and up to having mind blowing amounts of ass-kicking fun, email me back and i'll coordinate the details.

I won't subject you to another recap. But if you so desire, I obvs blogged about it.

*

So — the theme of this — no matter who I am or where I am or what's going on or how I feel I've failed or exceeded expectations, I've been consistently blessed with generous and kind friends who always rally together to celebrate that somehow I've managed to defy death for one additional year.

I can tell you about the birthday parties of all my friends from those missing years but not my own. Because I suppose it was theirs I really anticipated, because it was a chance to direct my focus onto someone other than myself, because "myself" didn't seem to be a very productive place to focus.

One day, I will grow old. Until then, there are stars to ride, invitations to consider. Today, I guess, I'm 26. That's how old my Mom was at my 2nd birthday. Crazy, right? Crazy.

Tomorrow I'm going to go for some long strategic walks. I have a lot of thinking to do.

Peace.

When I feel like this/When I get so into myself
And lose track of where I'm going
and then lose track of how to get going again
feel myself slowing down/feel myself turning round
is this taken/when I feel like this
I get so sick/Tell myself, where are you going now
-Tegan and Sara

On the topic of having short hair that I play with all the time now--

Carly: You're like, worse than me.
Me: Hey what if I did like, 26 hairstyles for my 26th birthday? For my blog?
Carly: That would be AMAZING.

Right now I'm eating Chocolate Covered bananas from an Edible Creations Bouquet -o- Birthday Magic, so I can't really complain.