| ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- cinderella ditches the ball and takes the carriage out for a spin and the weekend quietly slips away...the house is dark right now except for this little light on my desk. GB is asleep in the next room. One cat is asleep on top of the computer - her cute little orange chin pointed down towards me. The other cat is nestled in Her Chair -- the one no one can sit in but her... I don't know why I am writing right now. I just finished reading a bunch of my favorite diaries and was once again struck by the beauty, honesty, wit and intelligence of these portrayals of lives of people I honestly do not know and the thought crossed my mind for the millionth time...just give it up honey. I can't really explain it in a way that does not make me sound like a peevish, whining narcissist ... but ..oh, never mind. A weekend of shows and too many drinks. No head-splitting hangovers just the realization that a drink or two or three turns me into that giddy, charming and flirtatious girl that I secretly wish to be. It is like one of those magic glasses with the picture of the girl on the outside - pour liquid into the glass and watch the clothes disappear! Yes, indeed, it is exactly like that. Although for the record, the only person I derobe for these days is - despite any thoughts or crushes to the contrary - my husband. But I think you know what I mean...I sit at the bar or stand in front of the band and sip my rum-and-diet (or jack-and-diet if the Rock God is buying - as he seems to do more and more these days - and not just for me...where does an aspiring, often-out-of-work rock star get his money?) and it's as if my inner Janeane Garafolo is suddenly pushed aside by my inner Drew Barrymore and goodbye Sarcasm Girl hello Miss Sunshine. I don't think this is about drinking too much. I never have more than three drinks, i don't really get hangovers and I honestly don't do anything stupid or something that I will regret...I just become this other person- this person that I wish I could be like more often...like I said: giddy, charming, flirtatious - fun to be around. But then in the morning I feel deceitful because that girl really isn't me. Maybe I'm too hard on myself. Maybe she is me and I need to coax her out more often and more naturally. But I can't. Can I? I honestly don't think I can. Friday night I ran into this guy with whom I went to high school. Or rather, he approached me at the jukebox. We were pretty good friends in high school - hung out with the same people, and I've seen him semi-regularly over the years. It's been about 2 years since the last time I saw him and Friday he told me that 'usually I almost don't recognize you when I see you out'. Why? I asked. Because you've really changed since high school, he said. How? I asked I don't know, he shrugged. You're taller, more skinny, but it's not just that, you are just different. I laughed and showed him my boots with the three-inch heels and yes I've lost 20 pounds since high school but the different part, I suspect is something else entirely. I only wish I knew what it is. The only thing I can say is that my life has changed so radically since I was in high school. Not radically in a way that is obvious to others though, those radical changes are only obvious to me and the very few people who have known me that long and that intimately. It is about dividing my life between Then and Now. Without going into all the details here it started when I was 27 - the year I left D. It all changed then and as strange as this will sound, I do believe that was when I was formed. That was when my personality started to solidify. My personality - not the bits and pieces of interests and thoughts and aspirations that I'd cobbled together from those around me. Someday I will reread the diaries of my early twenties and I will see if this is really true or not, but for now, this is how it feels. It feels as if I were not alive until Jan. 15 of that year and then I was very suddenly and wonderfully and scarily alive and like a baby, I am still growing and that is why, sometimes at the rock shows I drink three drinks and flirt with men who are not my husband. But honestly, I am strong enough to pretend that his more overt flirtations go right over my head. I am strong enough yet still young enough to soak up the compliment and use it to fortify my self-esteem. Part of me thinks this is wrong but the other part of me knows -especially now, that at least in this time and place I am not going to compromise what I have with my husband just for the chance to boost my self-confidence. Part of the balancing act, I suppose, comes from the fact that very rarely is GB not close at hand when this happens. And I don't mean this in a his-presence-stops-me-from-doing-something-I-might-do-if-he-weren't-around sort of way. Rather it's this sense of comfort I get when I look over and he smiles at me or the small joy of having him put his arm around the waist or the strength I find in all of our little shared secrets and code words and history.... Still, why why *why* do I feel like this is just but one chapter and another one is waiting to unfold and who knows what it will bring? 7:09 pm - 11.18.01
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money can't buy happiness but it does buy small pieces of of serenity - 15.07.12 - 4:29 pm sh)t's about to get real, y'all - 31.05.12 - 9:46 am why the hell not? - 29.04.12 - 8:38 pm Hear that lonesome whistle blow... - 02.04.12 - 5:18 pm a faith in something I can't see - 30.03.12 - 3:33 pm |
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