Murphy’s Law seems to have omnipotence over every factor of my life recently, and not in a “Wah, wah, life is so cruel to me” kind of way.
My mom was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. Not only that, but they found her malignant lump as they scanned her for LUNG cancer, because she had collapsed in the hallway of our house from being unable to breathe. My dad found her and carried her out the door and to the emergency room, where they told her she had 60% lung capacity, that she would be confined to an oxygen tank, be required to quit smoking and lose weight, all at age 60. Fifty years of smoking caught up, and thankfully she managed to give bronchial cancer the slip, but breast cancer had managed to sneak in.
So on top of being confined to a Darth Vader-like oxygen tank, she has to do nebulizer face mask treatments twice a day and take massive amounts of inhalers and go to pulmonary and cardiac therapy.
The malignant lump in her breast, the doctors claimed, was very small and they were lucky they had caught it so early. Determining whether chemotherapy was necessary came down to the lumpectomy, to see if the cancer had spread to the lymph system circulating the area. Chances seemed small that chemotherapy would not be needed.
I managed to call my dad right after the doctors came out of the operating room to tell him, “Oops! Guess we didn’t catch it so early, get ready for chemo on top of that oxygen tank” and tossed a couple of wig catalogs at him.
Hearing your dad cry is like watching the twin towers fall. The devastation of such a powerful entity crumbling before you makes your heart feel weak and your stomach turn to lead and your blood freeze. It’s something you can’t prepare yourself for. It’s too sad.
I feel so bad for my dad. His girls are grown up and he’s there alone with my mother. And, on top of my mother’s poor health, over the last few years his parents have grown frail from old age. Numerous hospital visits and health scares made them move closer to their children, in case they needed extra help getting around.
After graduating in December my father made a trip down here with my Grandma. Dad had to watch as Grandma collapsed from a “mini-stroke” at the airport. He was held back as she laid in a pile on the ground in line at security. He later expressed to me with tears in his eyes how shocking it was to see the Mother-Who-Never-Faltered laying unconscious in front of him. Grandma recovered, and as they visited it was uncomfortable hearing her open references to Grandpa’s obviously imminent demise. My father winced each time Grandma suggested that Grandpa did not have much time left.
He must feel so helpless.
I’m not helpless.
I know there is something I can do, but it’s something that scares me so much.
Go home.
Go home to the place I didn’t fit in, the place that bored me to death, and the place that I felt I was turning gray from mediocrity and overcast skies. I’ve been away for much too long, I feel like things back home are starting to need glue to hold them together. Maybe I’m made of glue.
And I’m not doing anything here. I just (barely) graduated and I know this place isn’t suiting me. I have a boyfriend, he’s awesome. I have a job, I love it. But I don’t have a home, a mission, or a purpose.
It must be Hot-Girl Dog-Walkin’ Day. In front of me on the sidewalk is a mini-dress with patterned tights and some high heeled ankle boots holding onto a leash with three big-toe-sized foofy dogs. Across the street a blonde pony-tail, tennis shorts, and a sports bra are bouncing behind a golden retriever. I move my Boxer across the street when I see Frisbee sized ear plugs, torn up fishnets, and a choke collar being tugged towards me behind two pit bulls. They bark and growl at my tank top, blue jeans, and paisley hoodie anyway.
I have always been really shy and tend to make the best of friends with outspoken girls. They seem to have the confidence and courage to do and say exactly what they want without thinking twice about who’s listening. They are usually very instinctual and don’t spend a lot of time planning, reflecting, or thinking about their actions. That’s what draws me to them.
In high school, one of my better friends was a girl named Kelly. She was a hot mess. Her dad was a cop and her mother was overbearing, which equated to her doing everything in her power to defy all of the rules they set for her. She’d leave her house in a turtleneck and pants, with a miniskirt and halter-top stowed in her purse.
She was a party girl. She loved attention from men, and with an ass like J.Lo, she got it. She was one of those girls with talon-like fake nails, glittery lip gloss, and a weakness for pink. Almost the complete opposite of myself. She was 100% confident. She had an amazing voice and would sing without provocation, she liked to turn on music when everyone was sitting around and try to start a dance party. I envied her girlishness. I felt stupid dancing alone to music with people watching, but she looked sexy.
So, we partied together often. I made her laugh and she fascinated me. Her overt sexuality usually put us in a lot of crazy situations, especially since we dated guys in pairs. And, it was because she verbalized whatever popped into her head that I had my first experience kissing a girl.
We were dating some faceless and nameless pair of guys who were driving us to a party one night, and I was sitting in the back of the car with Kelly. She was singing along to the radio when she suddenly stopped, leaned over to me, and whispered in my ear, “Have you ever thought about kissing a girl?”
The hair on the back of my neck stood up. Oh my God. Had I just done something really gay? Why was she asking me this? My mind started racing through every move I had made around her for the last day, week, then year. I’d suspected that I was at least partially gay for a long time- I had always been so infatuated with girls. Most of them were totally foreign to me: my mother had never been a fantastic role model of femininity. She liked to play Zelda and wasn’t the least bit sensual. I had never seen her wear a dress, make up, or jewelry. And, when I was little, my interpretation of “girly” was an erratic combination of puffy sleeves, ribbons and lace, paired with hiking boots and totally unkempt hair. I had no clear instincts in the matter, and thus found myself hypnotized by women who naturally demonstrated every little pink, glittery detail.
But there was no way in hell I would ever have just volunteered that information to anybody. I became hot and prickly all over, fearing it was some sort of set-up. I felt like if I said “Yes!” Kelly would scream “Haha! Lesbian!” and boot me out of the car. So, my voice box frozen, I just barely nodded my head.
She leaned back, looked at me, smiled, then moved in and kissed me. When she pulled away I had pink, sparkly, sticky lip gloss all over my lips and my head was spinning.
I melted.
After that, she found an excuse to announce to EVERY guy we partied with that she was bi-sexual, and I was her girlfriend.
For a while, I let it happen. I was so excited by the new world which had opened up to me that I didn’t particularly mind the boner-fied audience of guys who got to watch me make out with her. But, unlike Kelly, my aim wasn’t to turn on the boys; it was to be able to kiss her. I had the biggest crush ever on her. I would sometimes call her on the phone and have her sing me to sleep. She cooked breakfast the mornings after she stayed the night. I thought she was pretty much perfect.
But for her, making out with me was like foreplay with whatever guy she happened to be with. Because, after we’d kiss and play for a while, she’d get up and grab her man by the hand and lead him off to go fuck somewhere. And I’d be sitting there, not wanting to hook up with the leftover guy, making really awkward conversation.
Kelly wasn’t bi-sexual. She was attention-sexual. And, I got tired of it after a while.
I remember one time when we drunkenly made it back to my house after a wild night of partying ,we had just crawled into my bed, and I found the courage to ask her:
“You always say you are bi-sexual. Does that mean you, like, ever want to hook-up with girls when there aren’t boys watching?”
“Yeah, I think girls are soo hot..”
“Really?” My heart fluttered.
“Mmm hmmm…”
I took that as a cue to move in closer, and as I did, I heard her start snoring.
Drove around with Mom & Dad all day today. Their aging is obvious. Since I have been gone the last 4 years my dad has progressed from mildly forgetful to ridiculously senile. I was entertaining them with a couple of different stories about my life in Arizona, a lot of which involved Guinness and whiskey. I had to explain to him 4 times what an Irish Car Bomb shot was, because he would forget within minutes. Every time I mentioned an Irish Car Bomb he would ask me, “What’s that?”
Then, a few moments later when Irish Car Bombs were mentioned again, he leaned forward between the seats and asked my mother “B, has Squink explained to you what an Irish Car Bomb is yet??”
She laughed and replied, “Holy Shit, David! No, but I was present for the 4 different times she had to repeat it to you.”
He just said, “Oh.” And sat back into his seat.
A few minutes later, Dad was commenting on the objects littering the backseat of my mom’s car. He was ragging at her about how many different half-full water bottles there were on the floor.
Mom shot back, “Ya, well you have no idea how many empty beer cans I find stuffed under the seat after you drive the car.”
“At least I finished them.”
“Okay, well the other day a FULL one rolled out from underneath the seat and got stuck underneath the brake pedal!”
Dad replied, “I’ll bet that was thrilling.” Smiled, and took a pull on his beer.
I pulled an all-nighter last night to cram for a test, and after my superpowers from the third energy drink wore off and I came plummeting back down through the atmosphere and crashed and burned into the earth, I lost my focus and distracted myself by making lists. Making lists is something I have always done habitually and I often find myself making lists without even realizing I’m doing it.
I have all of the regular lists. Like lists of people I’ve made out with, lists of people I’ve dated, lists of people I’ve hooked up with, lists of places I’ve been, lists of places I want to go..
But I also have some pretty weird ones. I remember in high school after I broke up with my first long term boyfriend I sat down and made a list of 50 Reasons He Was a Gigantic Moron. I used brightly colored markers and drew happy little pictures all along the borders of it and left it on the dining room table without thinking. When my parents found it the next morning they laughed so hard they had tears streaming down their cheeks. They made fun of me for dating the guy for two years, and insisted on saving the list. It’s still in a drawer full of memories somewhere in their house. They like to pull it out and use it against me to remind me how quickly I can change my mind about people:
Me: “I always have so much fun with Natalie and she’s so sweet and is like, my best friend, ever!”
Them: “Oh yeah? How long until you have a list of 50 Reasons Natalie Sucks Ass?”
About a year and a half after that first list was found, I made another one that apparently tickled my parents. I had a habit of making a To-Do List of things I needed to get done the next day. They were ranked in order of importance of the task. At the time I had been dating this guy for about 6 months and he had suddenly turned a little weird on me, and I had decided I would break up with him. When my parents found my To-Do List on the table the morning after I made my decision, I was rudely awakened in my room across the house from them by their loud, hysterical laughter. “Break up with my boyfriend” had been ranked #8 on my To-Do List below “Find my favorite dance leotard” and “Clip nails.” That one went into the drawer with the other list, and to this day they still tease me for being a heartless bitch.
So, anyway, last night I made some lists. One list I found particularly interesting was a list of common characteristics in the people I have dated and what percentage of them had each characteristic. After I examined it I started to legitimately wonder what the fuck is wrong with me.
Boys:
Have metal plates in their heads holding their skulls together after getting an object thrown at their face in a bar fight (25% : 1 baseball bat, 1 rock, 1 bar stool, 2 beer bottles)
Enjoy death metal (50%)
Play drums (25%)
Have spent a large part of their life tripping their balls off (40%)
Interested in film (15%)
Get their jollies from fast cars and motorcycles (45%)
Snowboard (35%)
Got kicked out of highschool their senior year (20%)
Atheists (45%) and Agnostic (55%)
Went on to have homosexual experiences (10%)
Were tall, dark, and handsome (50%)
My perfect man. Apparently.
Girls:
Crazy (98%)
Hot (100%)
I definitely need to reevaluate my standards for dating. Shit.
For the longest time, I worked at a bar called the Tilted Kilt, wearing a tiny whore outfit while serving booze to creepy old men. I really despised the job- feigning interest in nasty guys who had daughters my age who hit on me anyway- but I tolerated it because a) it was a job and b) I made a lot of money.
One of the few perks of working in this sort of seedy, sexually charged establishment was the caliber of women that came in. Oh sure, there were miserable girlfriends who didn’t disguise their disdain for our whore-ish-ness when their boyfriends dragged them in, but there were also a lot of bi-curious girls who felt comfortable in revealing their appreciation for the female form. They quite often assumed that because the servers were okay with being half naked, that we were open to girl-to-girl flirtation. And, I have always dated both men and women, so I guess they must have assumed correctly.
Me as a Scottish Whore
So, though I dealt with steaming piles of nasty shit from old men, I also got to hit on a lot of girls, and I loved it. But one chick in particular taught me a valuable life lesson: women are manipulative and emotional and out of their Goddamn minds.
There was a girl who was absolutely stunning- smoking-fucking-hot. She had legs for days and a very sexy, dark European look. Her name was Katia and she came in to see me fairly often. She would come in and the male bartenders would get boners underneath their kilts looking at her, never missing an opportunity to throw about lewd comments about how bad they wanted to bang her.
Katia always sat in my section. She would strut in, sit down at one of my tables, and flirt with me for hours. I really enjoyed when she came in- this girl was confident and fun loving. We were always super fliratious and animated when we talked with each other. But, she had a boyfriend, who she would sometimes bring with her, who would linger awkwardly on the side-lines as me and Katia talked. My instincts told me they were probably interested in a threesome, so I never really pursued her, and kept the relationship at a friendly, interested, but unobtainable level. Katia eventually got my number, I had given it to her not ever expecting her to really call or try to hang out.
A few weeks later, on a Tuesday night, I was getting off of work around midnight when Katia started blowing up my phone. I ignored the first call, but after she sent a text message that said “Please answer me, I need your help!” and another phone call, I picked up- warily.
Me: Hey, Katia! How are you girly.. what’s going on?
Katia: EVVVVVAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Ah shitttttt… Katia was bawling. I had been hoping that her persistant phone calls and text message for assistance would be to help her solve a lighthearted dispute about some trivial question that she knew I’d have the answer to. But no. She was wailing on the other end of the line, and I had no idea how to react.
Me: Katia, are you okay?
Katia (in hysterics): Noooooooooooooooo…. Eva! Eva my boyfriend and I are fighting and he’s threatening me and he just kicked me out of the house and I have nothing, no keys, no money, nothing and none of my fucking friends are answering their phones.. (sniff.. sniff.. sniff..) Oh my GODDDDDDD, I don’t know what to do. I can’t be by myself right now, I can’t, I want to go run into traffic. I don’t want to be alive right now.. Oh my GOOODDDDDDDDDDD.
Me (barely knowing this girl, and only knowing her as a fun flirt, not wanting to get involved): Umm.. well.. what do you want me to do Katia?
Katia: I only live a block away from your work, please, please just come and pick me up and sit with me until I can get a hold of SOMEBODY, ANYBODY! Eva, I feel so bad doing this to you, I know we don’t know each other very well I just don’t know what to dooooooo….”
Me: Okay.. okay.. I can come pick you up and we can go hang out for a while.. I have to get up at 5 a.m. and go do a promotion for work though- so I obviously want to help you but I really need you to try and figure out some kind of plan okay hon?”
Katia: (sniff.. sniff..) “Okaaaay. Thank you Eva! This means a lot to me, you are such a nice girl..”
So, she gave me directions to her house and I drove to go get her. When I pulled into her apartment complex, I was stunned. This girl was rolling around on the cement ground of the parking lot, wailing and screaming. I slowly pulled up next to her and got out of my car..
“Evvaaaaa I’m so glad you’re here I can’t stand him, he is evil and he’s in my house and I don’t know what to dooooo…” she cried.
I leaned down and pulled her up from the ground…
“We’ll figure it out Katia.. You need pull yourself together, gorgeous. We’ll figure something out,” I tried consoling her.
I packed her flailing, lithe body into my car and hopped back into the driver’s seat. Even though it was now apparent that Katia was mildly intoxicated, we decided we would go to the bar down the street until she figured out where she was going to stay and what she was going to do and if she could get a hold of anybody.
As I drove, she explained what had happened between her and her boyfriend that night, and I absorbed what I could through the sniffs and sobs. I tried to avoid looking at her face because at this point I just felt embarrassed for her. Her make-up was smeared all over, her cheeks were tear stained, and she had to keep wiping her nose because it was running from crying too hard. The sexy, confident, woman who always looked so collected was crumbling before me. I reached a hand out and rubbed her back as I drove, anxious to sit this girl down, wipe her face off, get a beer, and help her get her shit together.
Too bad it was 1 a.m. on a Tuesday. As I pulled into the parking lot of the nearest bar, the chances of the place being open looked dismal. The lights were off and there were no cars anywhere to be found. I slowed my car in front of the door and was about to ask Katia for any other ideas when she brightened up and declared, “It’s okay, I know the owners! I’m sure we can just go in there anyway!” and proceeded to hop out of the car and go and yank on the door as hard as she could.
The alarm started going off immediately. Looking like a scolded puppy, she ran back towards me..
“Oh my god, Oh my god, Oh my god.. I’m so sorry! I thought I’d be able to go in! I know the owner!”
I wasn’t aware if she realized that “knowing somebody” to get drinks at a bar was different than being given the divine power of opening the locked doors when the place was closed. Needless to say, I sped out of the parking lot to avoid any questioning by the cops who would be showing up shortly, who would have made the night all the more uncomfortable.
At this point, I was tired. Tired from working a double that day, emotionally exhausted from trying to console the disaster in my passenger seat, and not looking forward to waking up in T-minus 4 hours to go get my pictures taken for advertisements for the Tilted Kilt. We drove around for thirty more minutes as she continued to suck out all of my energy with her crying and blatant inability to regain composure. All I wanted was solace. I wanted to drop this girl off somewhere so I could crawl into my bed at home and burrow into my blankets and not have to worry about what I was going to do with her. I kept holding out hope that she would get in touch with somebody and find a place to stay. But, eventually I decided that if I had to continue to deal with an unstable, emotional Katia, I’d rather be doing it from the comfort of my home. So, I gave in.
“Katia.. I have a spare bedroom at my house. You can crash in it if you’d like, but I really just need to get home. I can give you a ride back to your place at 5 a.m. cuz that’s when I have to be at work.. is that okay?”
She whimpered and nodded. The rest of the twenty minute drive to my house was filled with her crying about her relationship and me silently nodding and inserting the concerned “Mmhmmm’s” when necessary. When we pulled into my apartment complex at 2 a.m., my ears were ringing from her sobbing. I was so happy to be home as we dragged our sorry asses up the stairs to my place. Then, as soon as I inserted my keys and jiggled my front door open, Katia was in my house and bee-lining towards the kitchen. Once there, she opened my refrigerator and pulled out a can of beer- which she then proceeded to stab a hole in the side of and shotgun. When she finished, she spiked the can onto the ground, and pulled out another. She repeated the process three times as I stood there watching, speechless.
“Oh my GODDDDD I needed that,” she said when beer number four was gone, and shrugged.
I decided not to comment, because all I wanted to do was sleep, so I showed her back to the spare bedroom and went to grab her pair of pajamas. As I walked into the spare room to hand her the clothes, Katia knocked them out of my hands, grabbed the collar of my shirt, threw me onto the extra bed, crawled on top of me, and started kissing me. The pathetic looking tear stained girl who I had been trying to piece together for the last 3 hours had suddenly transformed into a devious vixen. I was so tired, and confused, and completely clueless as to what this girl needed- I just went with it.
She wanted to be in control, and I let her be. She stopped and told me she had never been with a woman before but had always fantasized about it. I let her keep going. I was so defeated by how crazy this girl was, and so bewildered at how premeditated this entire night had been to get to this point. She kept going for a while, then she suddenly became unsure and awkward, and asked me to take over. I did, and after we finished I was drained of every ounce of energy in my body. I rolled onto my back and looked over at her, and as I did, she sat bolt upright, suddenly, like some kind of timer had just gone off.
She looked at me over her shoulder, now looking very perky and victorious, and said, “Okay! I’ll let myself out.. I’ll get a cab home.”
And she got up and walked out of my room, completely composed, as if nothing had just happened.
I didn’t know what to think and I was too tired to try and make any sense of what I had just been through. I just laid in my bed enjoying the coziness as she left.. and though I felt like I had lead blocks for feet, when I heard the door slam, I ran into the living room and locked the door behind her as fast as I could.
(this was posted about 5 months ago, unposted, then I decided to stop being a puss and just leave it)
A while ago I met a local musician who had performed at a show I went to. He saw me dancing by myself with my eyes closed and shoes off and approached me. We talked a little, he gave me his name and we exchanged numbers. I went home, added him on MySpace, and looked up the bands he told me he was in. I found myself liking one of the band’s songs and charmed by the video that went with it:
I also found myself thinking that one of the fellows in this video was very, very cute. (not the musician, he wasn’t in it)
Musician and I went on our first date a few days later. It went fairly smoothly, interesting topics of conversation, we got a little drunk.. and I remember actually meeting the Music Video guy who I had thought was cute- he was a friend of the Musician. He was incredibly energetic and outgoing, and gave me a high-five or two in the short time he visited with the Musician and I. I didn’t take too much note, and the Musician remained my main focus for the night.
A week later I went out on a date with Musician again, and again we saw his friend, Video guy. I received more high-fives and enthusiastic greetings from the friend, but was still trying to figure out the potential for a relationship with the Musician. I started realizing that most of the connection I had built with Musician was based on camaraderie from silliness & drunken debauchery rather than real chemistry. When we weren’t drinking I was bored to shit with his conspiracy theories and viewpoint that the essence of life was magic mushrooms. I knew it wasn’t happening.
Another week went by and I was trying to get the point across that I’d prefer to just be friends, but I failed miserably when we went to a show together and I let him pay for all of my drinks. We had an alright time, and it just so happened that his Video friend happened to work at the venue we saw the show at. Video guy gave me a high-five once for a greeting, once as I passed him on the way to the ladies room, and once on the way back. But we still never had a conversation, and he barely interacted with the Musician. I was curious about Video guy, but wasn’t sure what his standing with the Musician was, and didn’t know if I’d ever run into him again after I called it quits with the Musician. I didn’t dwell on it, and at the end of the night I talked with the Musician and was pretty much certain I would never see him again.
A few days later I was at a local show with a friend when I turned around on the dance floor and saw Video guy. I figured three introductions and numerous enthusiastic hand-slaps justified a friendly hello. So I walked up and tapped him on the shin with my foot to get his attention. He turned to me and gave me a big smile, a hug, and (of course) a high-five. We talked for a while, flirted a little bit… and ended up dancing the night away together. At the end of the night I invited him to hang out with me and my friend at my house just down the block so he could sober up. He ended up coming over, my friend left before he did, we talked until 4 a.m. and ended up falling asleep next to each other- no kissing or cuddling, just snoozing.
At this point I thought I was golden. I had been worried that Video guy might have been good friends with my Musician, but I took the night of dancing and flirtation as solid proof that they were more acquaintances than friends since he obviously didn’t give a shit. I figured I was good to go without messing up a Bromance and I was happy.
So, Video guy and I hung out a few nights later. He ended up at my house, again, we were cuddling and talking when he turned to me and said:
“I have to admit… when you kicked me in the shin the other night, I knew I recognized you but I couldn’t remember from where?”
I sat up straight. Oh shit: “Umm… you don’t know where you have met me before?”
Video Guy: “No… I can’t remember exactly. Where have I seen you before?”
Me: “Are you serious?”
Video Guy: “Ya. I know I’ve met you but I don’t know where..”
Me (not knowing what to expect): “I saw you on Sunday at the Jessica Lea Mayfield show.. you gave me like 3 high-fives in 15 minutes.”
Video Guy (thinking): “On Sunday?…
At the show…
Oh FUCK!
You were on a date with my friend!”
Me: “..ya..”
Video Guy: “Oh SHIT, are you fucking kidding me? You were on like your 4th date with my friend 3 days ago!”
Me: “Ya.. I thought you knew.. I mean… you’d given me so many high-fives when I was with him and I thought you recognized who I was when I kicked you in the shin!!”
Music Video Guy: “Nooo… when a girl is with one of my guy friends I don’t look at her face or notice her or anything. If she’s with one of my friends I don’t pay attention! Oh my God, what the fuck, he is my friend!! This is wrong.”
Me (getting defensive ):“WHAT?! You high-five people you aren’t even paying attention too? Was I expected to know you were mentally blocking out my face when you so enthusiastically greeted me everytime I walked by you? Fucking control yourself!”
Video Guy: “My high-fives… you kicked me in the shin to get my attention! You knew who I was and you STILL kicked me!”
Me: “Ya but I thought you knew who I was! I wasn’t going to flirt with you until you flirted with me! But giving like 10 high-fives to someone doesn’t get them a place holder in your memory bank! You can just pretend to be that excited to see everybody!! Do you even know how many times you high-five someone in a day?!?!?!”
Video Guy: “ME?! Do you just go around kicking everyone you want to flirt with in the leg?! What did you kick me in the leg for if you didn’t want me to flirt with you?”
Me: “Okay- I DID want to talk to you, so I kicked you, but ONLY because you’d given me so many fucking high-fives!!!!! And you started flirting with me because apparently high-fives mean nothing to you!!”
And then I kicked him really Goddamn hard in the shin.
The next day I woke up with my sister telling me that Mom and Dad were freaking out because Shannon had disappeared. I heard my parents talking in the other room and it didn’t sound good.
I felt as guilty as an 8 year old can feel- basically; it was the end of the world. I had known Shannon was going to leave, but I had promised my best friends I wouldn’t tell on them, and now I felt like I was the reason my parents were upset. As Chloe and I listened through the door to their conversation I could tell how devastated they were and I was feeling more and more crushed. I didn’t tell Chloe that I had known; because I was afraid she would tell Mom and I would be cast out of our family forever.
Eventually, the conversation quieted and Mom and Dad came to our bedroom door and knocked. Chloe and I ran to our bed and jumped in, wanting to seem as if we had been sleeping. Mom and Dad came in and told us, very matter-of-factly, “Wake up. You two need to come with us to Grandma’s house. Your sister has left, no one knows where she is, and apparently destroyed the house. We need to go clean it up.”
We played ignorant and got up, quickly put on our clothes, and endured the intensely silent car ride to Grandma’s house.
The whole ride I was in a state of utter panic. Destroyed? Grandma’s house was DESTROYED? Like.. burnt to the ground? Did Shannon take a sledge hammer to the walls before she left? Why hadn’t Jake and Leah told me they were going to DESTROY Grandma’s house.. Because then I would have told Mom and Dad. Why hadn’t I told Mom and Dad in the first place? Were they going to find out I knew and I was going to be homeless forever?
I felt so responsible for how shitty everything felt.
We pulled into the driveway at Grandma’s , and it was then we figured out what my parents had meant by “destroyed”.
Shit was everywhere. The contents of the house were spilling out the doors and windows. It looked like the house had thrown up it’s contents onto the lawn. Tables and chairs had been thrown haphazardly into the lawn, papers and trinkets littered the stairs leading to the door. We walked through the crunchy broken glass, fearfully, knowing that the inside of the house was going to be much worse than the outside. And we were right. The screen door was hanging by one hinge as my parents carefully opened it and we got a glimpse into the pit of despair. All of the filth and scum that I usually associated with Shannon’s dwellings seemed to have reproduced exponentially overnight. Like a fungus that had spread from the basement of the house up. Stains that had never been there before had suddenly appeared. Everything was broken. Literally just.. EVERYTHING. Memorabilia from my Mother’s childhood were crushed into dust on the floor and ripped in half and more than likely spit on. My sister had really gone to town. And we didn’t know why. This was the house that a few weeks earlier, my grandparents had lived in. Now they were dead and my sister had desecrated their memory.
I looked at my parents faces. On my Dad’s face I saw utter horror, shock, and disgust. He had always been the emotional one. Then, I looked to my Mom. I expected her to be crying but what I saw instead was a pale white stone wall where her face should have been. There was no color or emotion, instead there was just a void, sucking in everything that she was seeing. And there was so much to take in.
We continued down into the basement, which had been Shannon’s lair. The dark gloomy basement she had inhabited because that was the kind of nest she had preferred. Musty, dark, damp and gloomy. We got down there and saw the rest of the wreckage. But what sucked even worse was the pristine table set up in the middle of all of the chaos. It was waiting there for us. A light was turned on above it, the table was clean, and sitting perfectly in the middle of it was a note, typewritten, by Shannon, addressed to my mother.
My mom told us to go upstairs and have Dad take us home.
People walk around with flashing neon lights and MySpace profile blurbs waiting in their voiceboxes to shove down someone elses throat. The meaning of their self-descriptions are meaningless. The summation of your personality in 50 words or less. If 50 words is all you’ve got, then you aren’t worth my time. Spending all day putting up your facade rather than expanding yourself means that when I meet you and hear all you have to say, that’s all there is. Spend less time putting up your billboard because you care what everyone thinks and more time experiencing things so you can talk about something else for a change. Get weird, feel uncomfortable, talk inappropriately, do something stupid, and live something new. Don’t let me hear you try to convince me how bad you are, how caring you are, how silly you are, how fucked up you are, how big your problems are.. let me see. Use my senses and shut up.
You are not hard because your middle finger is up. You are not a model because your pictures are overexposed and make your eyes look pretty. Put your clothes on and advertise your brain. Your ass should not be your selling point. Stop caring so fucking much what people think. Don’t cry about your life. Shut up and show me your disaster. So fly, so fresh.
Today, the dam broke and the emotions that I have been trying to suppress all came pouring out. I feel like I finally woke up.
After a month and a half of slowly realizing that I’m returning to the same state of loneliness that engulfed me when I first moved to ASU, I cried. I cried in my car, eating an Oreo Sonic Blast, listening to my melancholy indie chick music, choking on my tears and an occasional chunk of Oreo. Cars next to me at the red lights more than likely felt uncomfortable when they looked over and saw my silent portrayal of heartbreak. My shoulders shook with overdramatic sobs, tears rolled down my splotchy red face, and I let my head hang down as I tore through my ice cream. I didn’t care. These tears were overdue.
Moving to Arizona was a big deal, initially. I grew up in a tiny one stoplight town in rural Iowa, got a scholarship to ASU, moved here, and started going to lectures that had more students than my entire high school. It was fucking terrifying. The amount of self-exploration, growth, and maturation I went through was life changing. Adapting to a new culture combined with being broke and figuring out how to take care of myself made for the most important few years of my life. I was outside of my comfort zone for so long, and it wasn’t until this last year that I could confidently say I was comfortable in my own skin, and proud of where I came from, and who I have become.
And then all of those people who I grew to know and love and who went through those important years with me have all just completely disappeared. The ones who knew me best. The people that I bonded to for strength through difficult situations all seemed to have graduated on time and left me high and dry. And here I am, facing one more semester, looking around and wondering “Guys?… Guys, where are you?”
I still have friends, obviously. There are acquaintances that are friendly and fun and invite me to go out. And I have been enjoying the company of so many new people who are incredibly welcoming. But I’m just weary. Do I have to form a whole new circle of close friends only to graduate in 6 months and probably leave? Who can I call when I’m crying, and who is going to let me spoon them when I get too high and freak myself out? Who am I not scared to announce my stupid ideas to, knowing we will follow through with them no matter how deranged other people will think we are? These are the thoughts that have been plaguing me for the last month.
And today, my dog ran away. And now I feel totally, totally alone. The puppy that loved me no matter what and got excited every time I saw her is gone. So, after riding my bike around for hours searching nearby neighborhoods and bordering heat exhaustion, I felt my lips begin to tremble and hurried home for my car- my crying place. As my face scrunched up and I knew the water was coming, I got in and started driving. The sun was setting, some soulful Cat Power came on, and I filled up the car with self-pity as I let the sobs roll out. I’m about to go through another big life transition, I’m feeling unsure of myself again, and I hate it. The confidence that I fought so hard for has slowly slipped out of my body and I feel like a fragile shell of the person that I authoritatively claimed before. I have no idea where my life is taking me. But after a good cry, I feel ready. I’m just going to have to hold on tight and go along for the ride.
You would cry if you lost her, too.
Edit: I wrote this post on June 20th but forgot to post it. Since then I found my baby at the pound, got into contact with friends I grew away from, and have strengthened bonds of many of my new friendships. I just thought it was a good post & thought it would be good to put up, even if delayed.
My perfect man. Apparently.
