In These Shoes

Person: (n)-one who knows all of your secrets, skeletons, faults, bad things, sad things, self-absorbed things and self-concious things and still loves you; still has your back whenever and for whatever.

I do not care how independent or self-sufficient, loner-esque you think you are; get yourself a person. Maybe even two.  

-C

Welcome, 2010!

As of January 1 @ 12:00, my life and this blog by extension took a new turn. This year is all about preparation for the future with not so much as a glimpse to the past. The resolutions/mantras/affirmations are as follows:

No men in 2010-a cleansing that is long overdue will keep me focused and drama-free. “No emotional baggage, just big bags filled with Dior.”

2010, The Year I was Accepted to Yale University-The most important part of this year is taking the LSAT’s again, filling out the application and essay and getting my LORs in order. When that letter comes in April, it WILL announce that I am part of the Yale Law School Class of 2013.

Smaller calves-and an all-around healthier me. Purging myself of all things useless and harmful.

2010 is my year. It is a beautiful clean slate and I will take advantage of that every step of the way.

“No more happily never after. That just ain’t for me because finally I know I deserve better, afterall. I’ll never let another tear drop fall.”

-C

Even as an adult I still love Disney movies. There’s probably something very unhealthy about that but one can’t undo the damage the Walt Disney company has done. This evening my mom and I watched Beauty & the Beast–a classic and one of our favorites. For those of you who know the movie well you will recall a snippet in the movie where Mrs. Potts hushes little Chip by saying, “I’ll tell you when you’re older.” I remember somewhat vividly wanting so much to be older when I first saw that movie. Isn’t that the irony of it though? One always wants to be older when they’re a child and an innocent youth when they reach adulthood. I wish I could tell all of the Chips of the world that it isn’t all it’s cracked up to be; neither adulthood nor love. “When you’re older” means hard work and harder lessons. There is something precious in the freedom and naivete of childhood and there is nothing in the world good enough to want to rush through it. Nothing, I promise you. Certainly not love. Stay sweet and hold onto your hope and faith while you still can for they are most fleeting.

-C

There’s a fine, fine line
between a lover, and a friend.
There’s a fine, fine line
between reality, and pretend;
And you never know ’til you reach the top
if it was worth the uphill climb.

There’s a fine, fine line between love
and a waste of time.

…were never spoken. Some things just aren’t meant to be no matter how much, how desperately, or how long we have wanted them to. And that is the most difficult pill to swallow when you lay your head down on a pillow and not his chest at night.

–

It seems that I’ve been remiss about getting into the holiday spirit. I’ve found that while I have a great many things to be grateful for, I’ve been moping and irritable because of the one thing that isn’t perfect in my life. After being very disappointed in myself, it became clear that I needed to remember just what I do have and forget about what I don’t. Isn’t that part of the point of the holidays, afterall? Here goes–something.

I have a fantastic family. I want to kill them at times, I want to hole up and never speak to them again, and I want to move very far away from their prying questions and judgemental looks, but I have an amazing family. It’s come to my glaring attention that not so many children are fortunate to have parents who care about them, at least not as much as they should care and that has certainly never been my problem. My mother has given me the best of everything, including herself. My grandfather has helped mold me into who I am and has been my strength and support these many years and my uncle has protected me and tried to bring a caustic smile to my face whenever possible.

My friends are something to behold. They are the lights of my life and the smiles that never end. Without them I would be incomplete and lost in a sea of grief.

I have a job. Two, actually, and no matter how little one may pay or how long the other may work me until, I have an income. I have a way to support myself and help my family and can buy drinks and Louis Vuitton wallets for Christmas.

I live in a beautiful home that is comfortable and warm and amply stocked with food. I sleep in a princess bed at night and can curl up under a fleece blanket watching my DVR.

I am healthy. Bronchitis or not, I have no severe health problems to hold me back from life. I have working arms and legs, a sharp mind, and a strong, if icy heart.

If I go hungry at night it is in trying to stick to the Bronchitis diet and not because I have no food to eat.

I can see the smile on the face of A and hear the sounds of his laughter when we play.

I live in a country that elected Barack Obama to be our President. I am confident that he is leading us to the best of his abilities and is providing all the hope, opportunity and safety that has been missing these last 8 years.

I have a direction in my life. I will be a successful lawyer and someday move on to work with the United Nations. I have goals that will be attainable and a brain that will never let me down.

I have had a great education and some of the finest opportunities.

My family has rooted me in tradition and my heritage and that has become something that has grounded me and formed a big part of who I am

I have known love. I have been loved deeply and truly and although that part of my life is over, I am fortunate to have had it for as long as I did.

Despite heartbreak and fear and zero trust or faith, I can still feel. Though I may deny it and it may frustrate me and keep me up late, it is something to be grateful for. Even if Aladdin and Jasmine never get it together.

-C

“What is friendship? It is a single soul dwelling in two bodies.”

Or perhaps four. I’ve had a lot of friends in my day. Friends that have given me great memories, fun times and hard lessons. Some have been more memorable than others, and some have stuck it out when others fell away but each one has left an imprint. None more so than three in particular.

Twin. It was an instantaneous connection born out of a way to cope with misery at work, and has melded into a singular kind of friendship that makes the Sex and the City girls envious.

Streisand. The person I can always count on, who would pick me up, dust me off, and remind me what it feels like to smile and laugh. When your faith in humanity needs restoration, she’s who you turn to.

Elle. Who knows my deepest secrets, darkest thoughts, and rattling feelings better than you? We have that rare kind of unspoken communication, and we know eachother better than ourselves.  

There is nothing in this world I wouldn’t do for these girls and there is no way I could have survived much of the last 5 years without them. I look at these three remarkable women with admiration and joy that they are in my life. I think of them or wonder how they are and even after weeks or months of separation, it is with pure love.

They say that friends are the family you get to choose. If that’s true then I just need to look at them to find the three best decisions of my life.

-C

I have never been a person strongly tied to or centered by their faith. I must have things proven to me. I need to see to believe and I believe that actions speak louder than words. I take things at face value and sometimes less. And then I woke up this morning.

Sometime around 2 AM I had a terrifying thought (after, of course, watching an episode of Sex and the City) about Aladdin. I felt that I should prepare to say adieu and I texted him a request for 10 minutes today. I then changed my plan sometime around 2 PM and left a voicemail. And another text. At 4:24, I have heard nothing. This is around the time that I would normally be in panic mode, that the knot in my stomach would be so hard and so all-consuming that I would have to drown it in wine or vodka or go for a walk to our park. Instead, I have busied myself in the kitchen listened to endless love songs that keep playing at random on iTunes and I feel no dread. I have no knot, no uneasy nausea.

I (naturally) have analyzed this and come to two conclusions: 1.) There is nothing to worry about. There is a logical explanation for this lapse in communication and we are both a we and a fine one at that. I have every reason to be secure and confident in us and no one has changed their mind about anything. 2.) Since I’d been preparing for this subconciously since the ball started rolling, now that the final moment is here the pain/shock/disappointment is dulled, as was the desired effect. Obviously the former is preferred to be the case but only time will tell. If that is indeed the answer, then something rather miraculous will have happened. I, who have never counted on any thing or any one for any length of time will finally have found someone to put some faith in. I will have found my faith after many years and not in a church. Alas, only time will tell; but here’s hoping.

-C

“You’re always sorry / you’re always grateful / you’re always wondering what might have been / then he walks in.”

More like sweep, actually. A girl never knows what to do in these situations: keep that annoying glass-half-full-everything-will-work-out attitude or just say to hell with him and all the good times with him. I’ve done it before, it wouldn’t be hard. But…I haven’t wanted something to work this badly in a long time.

When I agreed to take this gargantuan leap of faith, I told myself that however it turned out (and I was always expecting the shoe to drop), I wouldn’t berate myself for trying. Or rather, letting him try. Tonight though, I’m laying in my bed, the same one I remember him sleeping in with me, sore and sick, holding on to a single momento and a prayer that he’ll call to explain precisely what could possibly have changed since Sunday night and I feel like a thorough fool and helpless to boot.

I want to shout and scream and kick that this is not just about him, that I have a say. That whatever he could possibly have to mad about is not sufficient reason to ignore me. I want to go back to Saturday night when things were perfect. I want to kiss him again and I want him to touch me again. I want to look forward to Thursdays and have him look at me the way he does. But all I can do is hope that these are just lyrics to a song:

“You’re always sorry / you’re always grateful / and still you wonder, and still you doubt / then he walks out.”

-C

The thing about first dates and all subsequent ones is that you always have this great hope, buried deep sometimes - but still there - about the possibilities that lay before you with this other, exciting person. When you have a first date with an old flame, you still have that hope except  that it burns deeper. You know what can be and you want that back with a passion. This also means that when those hopes are dashed or even just deflated, you take it harder; the disappointment goes deeper.

On one such excellent date, I came across a book tearing apart the idea of monogamy and the unrealistic ability of the human race to rise above their baser instincts and give in to fidelity. This, coupled with a rough few days has made me all the more curious as to whether or not any stories, but this one in particular, can have a happy ending. At first glance you’ve got the basic requiements: the independent heroine and disarming prince charming who make an excellent match, modern-day romantic settings, and a family to make a mess of it all. You’ve also got the classic odds stacked against a successful relationship: bad history, lack of trust, and failure.

Right now, Prince Charming and I aren’t speaking. Why that is exactly, I’m not sure but the only thing I want to do is ask for our happily ever after. When he rides off on his steed (or Sonata), then what do I do?

-C

Greetings from the corner of I’m Too Busy and Exhaustion. It’s been a crazy couple of weeks and I am long overdue for a head-clearing blog.

Let’s start with the good news: the Yankees are World Champions again! Number 27 has been sweet indeed unlike the last 4 hours of the 27 consecutive hours of celebration. A has been amazing. His parents kept him home a couple of days this week and I never thought I’d miss a kid as much as I missed him. The cuddles and ‘love you, love yous’ before nap, however, made up for it.

And then there was Jafar and the date I agreed to. Naturally, after fighting with my mother for 2 days over this choice, convincing myself that I shouldn’t cancel and that maybe there was a shot in hell that the 39th time would be different, something came up on his end and I cancelled much to his pleasure.  Between him and Vin Diesel and all of the bad first dates in between it has been nothing but work and excuses for the past 9 months and I am tired beyond expression of  work and excuses. I want simple, easy. I want to enjoy being single. I don’t want to look or hunt or be looked or hunted for. I want peace; and just when I got it in one part of my life, another civil war breaks out.

I should be furious with him or maybe I shouldn’t be rushing to judgement but the only thing I can feel is anger at myself. I know it’s deja vu all over again and has been too many times before. I know I’m a stubborn girl but for God’s sake, when am I going to learn my lesson? What’s with this emotional Russian Roulette?

 ”Get out of my mouth / Get out of my head / Get out of my mind, stop putting words in my head. / You’re nothing but trouble. / Get out of my life, get out of me, lie.”

I tell everyone that no one is going to make you happy but yourself but the same goes for self-preservation. No one is going to protect you but yourself. No one is going to care for you but yourself. So get out of me, lie. Get out of me, hope. Get out of me second, third, and 20th chances. Get out of me blindness. Get out of me carelessness.

-C