Every so often, life hands me a perfect moment.
Yesterday evening, after Grr had finished inhaling his dinner as if he had never been fed in his life, he grabbed his chewtoy and hoisted himself up on the couch. With his belly full, he gave his toy a couple of half-hearted gnaws before putting his head on the armrest, surrendering to sleepiness. I had just finished dinner as well, and while Sam was cleaning the last of the dishes, I, too, hoisted myself up on the couch. With my belly full, I gave Grr a couple of half-hearted pats on the leg before putting my head on the opposite armrest and surrendering to sleepiness.
It had been a beautiful day, an even more beautiful evening, one of those rare and fogless San Francisco evenings. It smelled like summer, swirling with heat and moisture and smoldering charcoal. After work, Sam and I drove Grr to two new dog parks, figuring it was good to expose him to new places. Sam's verdict for Park #1: too many lesbian soccer moms who paid us no attention; Park #2: no fun dogs who paid Grr any attention. I don't think Grr minded either way as he is currently wading through an antisocial phase when it comes to other pups.
But after a late afternoon of smelling grass and eating dirt, Grr was now twitching and kicking in his sleep. I was just about to nod off as well when Sam walked by with a fresh cocktail, sat in a chair across from the couch, and kicked his feet up, prodding me with them in the ribs until I started rubbing them.
The noise of traffic outside our window was constant and white, though I could still hear the faint music playing from my iPod across the room. It was doing its best to embarrass me: Paula Abdul's "Rush Rush," Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl," and Lindsay Lohan's "Rumors" played in succession. Thank God Sam had his cocktail. It kept him quiet and occupied, oblivious to the music.
Right when I was ready to get up and actually find a song I wanted to hear, "Rumors" ended, and the piano remix of the early 2000s dance reboot of the mid-80s Bryan Adams' rock ballad, "Heaven," came on.
And then it was perfect.
Everything in life should come with a soundtrack. Even with cheesy lyrics, music shades everything with more meaning, lends more weight. Sam was staring off into space, no doubt pondering something about cars, something about home improvement, something about something else completely unrelated, and Grr was sound asleep. With the song punctuating the relative quiet, I was able to really take stock of what I have around me: a loving, albeit annoying, dog dreaming and flicking his paws to my right; and a loving, albeit oblivious, boyfriend blissfully nursing his drink to my left.
Oh, once in your life, you find someone who will turn your world around, pick you up when you're feeling down. . .
And right when I wondered how long this could last, Sam emptied his glass, got up and asked, "Are there any shows on?" as he walked over to the dishwasher. Grr, who recently discovered the pleasures of licking our used silverware, heard the dishwasher door open and found it impossible to resist. Seeing them both gone, I reached over the side of the couch and grabbed by iPad.
And just like that, it was over. I was out of perfection; it had lasted no more than a few seconds. The music soon went off, and the TV came on. I responded to some e-mails, suffered through yet another episode of Bones (is that show on every night?). Grr trotted around the room, his nails tapping out a jaunty little rhythm against the hardwood, his tags jingling along, while I thought, "Tomorrow, I will write about music, love, and something of perfection."
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
3/30/2011 - hardly an impulse tat. . .
I woke up the other morning with the liberating realization that I think I am finally ready to get a tattoo.
I've been wanting one for a long time, even know what I want it to be, but convenient excuses always dissuaded me. Below are my top three, along with respective rebuttals:
So really, this leaves me with the only logical option:
In case you are not familiar with one of the greatest cartoons ever in existence for a gay boy to discover in his early childhood, this is Cringer, from the classic 80s rendition of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. He-Man certainly was the master of mine (though in recent years, I've determined that Skeletor was actually hotter if you can look past the blue smurfness and butterface). I watched this cartoon religiously--2:30 in the afternoons every weekday. I would get out of kindrgarten at noon, come home, and essentially do nothing more than wait for the synth-pop theme song to play on my TV, heralding the arrival of my loincloth-and-chest-harness-clad hero.
(You're probably thinking that this sounds like a tragic display of buyer's remorse just begging to happen.
But wait. There's more.)
Cringer is He-Man's pet tiger, and he normally just lounges around the palace, cowering at anything from a loud noise in the courtyard to his own shadow. You would never see Cringer take any risk or initiative. He follows the safe and established routes, hides when trouble comes. He is perfectly content with his cushy, uneventful, and ultimately empty life.
As Battle Cat, however, he is He-Man's trusty steed, leaping into danger, fighting off bad guys, and proving to himself, and others, that he, too, can be the hero, capable of anything when the need calls for it. He never lets people down, is reliable and fearless. There is no hesitation, no cowering in the shadows hoping to be left alone. Battle Cat instinctively knows right from wrong, makes the best decisions, is trusted.
They are, of course, the same tiger. The picture above shows him at the moment of transformation, midpoint between Cringer and Battle Cat, balancing precariously between his two halves, on the cusp of becoming great.
I've been wanting one for a long time, even know what I want it to be, but convenient excuses always dissuaded me. Below are my top three, along with respective rebuttals:
- My college boyfriend thought tattoos were trashy. (He was a Republican, so this one's a wash).
- I didn't want to mar my clean-cut image. (Nobody's buying this anymore.)
- What if I get one and then have buyer's remorse? (This one's a little trickier. After all, once I get one, I will never be someone who has never had one. But then again, what's the worst that could happen? I get it done, which I plan to have on my chest, hate it, and then just have to keep my shirt on all the time, which I do anyway. And I've known what I want for over a decade, so this is hardly an impulse tat. See? I'm already using the lingo. I'm totally ready.)
So really, this leaves me with the only logical option:
(You're probably thinking that this sounds like a tragic display of buyer's remorse just begging to happen.
But wait. There's more.)
Cringer is He-Man's pet tiger, and he normally just lounges around the palace, cowering at anything from a loud noise in the courtyard to his own shadow. You would never see Cringer take any risk or initiative. He follows the safe and established routes, hides when trouble comes. He is perfectly content with his cushy, uneventful, and ultimately empty life.
As Battle Cat, however, he is He-Man's trusty steed, leaping into danger, fighting off bad guys, and proving to himself, and others, that he, too, can be the hero, capable of anything when the need calls for it. He never lets people down, is reliable and fearless. There is no hesitation, no cowering in the shadows hoping to be left alone. Battle Cat instinctively knows right from wrong, makes the best decisions, is trusted.
They are, of course, the same tiger. The picture above shows him at the moment of transformation, midpoint between Cringer and Battle Cat, balancing precariously between his two halves, on the cusp of becoming great.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
3/29/2011 - a violent place. . .
The whole thing happened and was over within a matter of seconds.
Grr was playing with a couple of French bulldogs at the dog park yesterday, wrestling and nipping at each other to entice the other to games of tag. A shiba inu repeatedly defied his mom to sneak off to a corner of the grass where a patch of melted ice cream called out for him. I was keeping one eye on Grr and another on my bike, which I was too lazy to lock up and just parked in the middle of the field. Sam was keeping both eyes on a woman in a red blouse and matching beret:
"No dog, no kids, but she's hanging around the dog park and chumming it up with everyone? She's either a freak or homeless, probably both, but either way, you two keep your distance."
Friendliness was apparently out of Sam's realm of possibility.
The weather had turned decidedly gorgeous, especially when compared to the clouds and rain just over the weekend. The sun was bright at 5:30, still warm when the wind was calm. When I reached down to pet Grr, his back was all wet, presumably from rolling around in the grass, though I suspect some of it was probably another dog's spittle.
Sam and I were in the midst of discussing Grr's little poop mishap at the house earlier today (if you haven't picked up on it, more conversations between us than I'd like to admit center around Grr's scatological behaviors lately). Then I heard the barking.
It was not the playful kind, the come-chase-me-before-I-chase-you kind. This was dark, menacing and immediate.
Then I heard shouting. From across the field, I saw two dogs intertwined, all sinewy muscles and bared teeth. Apparently, it was over a bouncing rubber toy. One wanted it, the other wanted it more, and one was willing to take things to a violent place before giving it up.
(Which, if you think about it, happens to people all the time. How many news stories out there chronicle the events leading up to someone getting shot or stabbed over the stupidest thing, some slight indiscretion on the road, a misinterpreted glance?)
It took three people to separate the two, an American bulldog and a pitbull. The pitbull's mom had to wrestle him to the ground while his dad took a bite to the leg (from the pitbull, for the record). The American bulldog's mom ran over to him and screamed, and I thought of that sound all evening, the terror and heartbreak in her voice when she saw blood smeared across her dog's face.
I whipped around to find Grr. He was oblivious to the whole thing, milling about aimlessly behind me, finding dandelions to uproot and pieces of bark to hide in his cheeks for me to dig out later.
My heart was still in my throat.
Grr was playing with a couple of French bulldogs at the dog park yesterday, wrestling and nipping at each other to entice the other to games of tag. A shiba inu repeatedly defied his mom to sneak off to a corner of the grass where a patch of melted ice cream called out for him. I was keeping one eye on Grr and another on my bike, which I was too lazy to lock up and just parked in the middle of the field. Sam was keeping both eyes on a woman in a red blouse and matching beret:
"No dog, no kids, but she's hanging around the dog park and chumming it up with everyone? She's either a freak or homeless, probably both, but either way, you two keep your distance."
Friendliness was apparently out of Sam's realm of possibility.
The weather had turned decidedly gorgeous, especially when compared to the clouds and rain just over the weekend. The sun was bright at 5:30, still warm when the wind was calm. When I reached down to pet Grr, his back was all wet, presumably from rolling around in the grass, though I suspect some of it was probably another dog's spittle.
Sam and I were in the midst of discussing Grr's little poop mishap at the house earlier today (if you haven't picked up on it, more conversations between us than I'd like to admit center around Grr's scatological behaviors lately). Then I heard the barking.
It was not the playful kind, the come-chase-me-before-I-chase-you kind. This was dark, menacing and immediate.
Then I heard shouting. From across the field, I saw two dogs intertwined, all sinewy muscles and bared teeth. Apparently, it was over a bouncing rubber toy. One wanted it, the other wanted it more, and one was willing to take things to a violent place before giving it up.
(Which, if you think about it, happens to people all the time. How many news stories out there chronicle the events leading up to someone getting shot or stabbed over the stupidest thing, some slight indiscretion on the road, a misinterpreted glance?)
It took three people to separate the two, an American bulldog and a pitbull. The pitbull's mom had to wrestle him to the ground while his dad took a bite to the leg (from the pitbull, for the record). The American bulldog's mom ran over to him and screamed, and I thought of that sound all evening, the terror and heartbreak in her voice when she saw blood smeared across her dog's face.
I whipped around to find Grr. He was oblivious to the whole thing, milling about aimlessly behind me, finding dandelions to uproot and pieces of bark to hide in his cheeks for me to dig out later.
My heart was still in my throat.
---
This morning, I awoke to a dream where Sam, Grr, and I, as well as some other people I "knew" but didn't really know, were vacationing or something in a casino/hotel/convention center/mall. As dreams go, it was all of those things, and none. Grr had wandered off, and nobody seemed to care or worry that he might be in danger. I looked from hall to hall, room to room, but I could not find him. I panicked, started running throughout the suddenly-cavernous facility, scanning every aisle, every nook. I found a security guard who was uncooperative, and I told him that I will turn this whole fucking place inside out until I find him. I even felt my voice go raw from yelling this ultimatum.
But then I did find him. He was playing with two little bunnies in a corner by the women's bathroom. I ran over to him, ready to swoop him up, ecstatic and relieved to find him happy and unharmed.
Monday, March 28, 2011
3/28/2011 - lover lips. . .
I work in a very corporate office building. Nothing but cubicles, bath and conference rooms. The air is recycled, and the only consistent sounds I hear are the rat-tat-tatting of fingers on keyboards, the atonal zips of the scroll wheel on our mice, and the rustling of papers. No watercooler talk (not even a watercooler to talk at, actually), no music save the sweet rhythms of endless work.
Still, I typically stay at my desk for the duration of my day for the duration of my work week. Sometimes, it is because I am busy, running from meeting to meeting with just enough time in between to run back to my desk and see the e-mails that I will helplessly ignore and neglect. Other times, that is: most of the time, I just find it easier to not leave, even on boring days, days when I would rather be at home (like today). I have my phone, my computer, often my lunch. If I got me a chamber pot and a water purifier, I could reasonably see nothing but the four walls of my cubicle all day long.
Sam calls me throughout the day, and depending on my busyness, I will either pick up at my desk or take my phone upstairs to the cafeteria. He'll give his various updates, what neighborhood he's currently in, the rampant ineptitude of all other drivers on the road, and, more recently, Grr's bowel movements:
"Was kinda soft today."
"Kinda gelatinous with an iridescent sheen to it."
"Hard, but there were, like, four logs and they blasted out of him like rockets."
On the calls where I pick up at my desk, I limit myself to largely monosyllabic responses and try to keep my voice down without seeming like I am hiding something. I just figure that the last thing my cube neighbor needs to hear is banter centered around the consistency of dog poop.
And Sam has picked up on when I have more liberties to respond to his shenanigans and when I have less. When I'm in the cafeteria, invariably there will be a gaggle of Asian women sitting at a table laughing and whooping it up like it was Sunday brunch, which does good in masking my conversations. When he calls during the latter, the background will be very quiet, my voice very low, and he will take this opportunity to use ridiculous terms of endearment and expect me to respond in kind: "Talk to you later, lover lips, heart of my heart, sweet lumps! Muah muah muah!!"
Typically, this earns him a quick, "Bye," which prompts the following exchange:
Him: Say it back! Say it!
Me: No!
Him: Muah muah muah!
Me: I'm hanging up now.
Him: You had better say it or I will go crazy ape!
Me: No! I'm really hanging up now. <click>
One minute later:
Him (via text message): Crazy ape!!
All of this, really, is probably worse than just calling him 'muffin cup' within everyone's earshot and putting an end to it.
Today, I ate lunch around 11:00 and decided to implement a new routine into my workday. I took my slice of pizza up to the cafeteria, sat by the window, and ate while I worked on blog posts. The cafeteria was still empty, and the only sound was a faint Kelly Clarkson singing about waiting a lifetime for moments like these.
No sooner had I written three words, Sam called. Hearing that it was quiet, he figured that I was sitting at my desk and whipped out his, "sugar lamb chop of my loins" nonsense, which I shamelessly repeated right back.
"Argh, foiled! I thought you were at your desk!"
And right there, he gave me the first, and only, laugh of my workday (as well as another day's post--just 278 more to go!).
Some Mondays can be like this.
Still, I typically stay at my desk for the duration of my day for the duration of my work week. Sometimes, it is because I am busy, running from meeting to meeting with just enough time in between to run back to my desk and see the e-mails that I will helplessly ignore and neglect. Other times, that is: most of the time, I just find it easier to not leave, even on boring days, days when I would rather be at home (like today). I have my phone, my computer, often my lunch. If I got me a chamber pot and a water purifier, I could reasonably see nothing but the four walls of my cubicle all day long.
Sam calls me throughout the day, and depending on my busyness, I will either pick up at my desk or take my phone upstairs to the cafeteria. He'll give his various updates, what neighborhood he's currently in, the rampant ineptitude of all other drivers on the road, and, more recently, Grr's bowel movements:
"Was kinda soft today."
"Kinda gelatinous with an iridescent sheen to it."
"Hard, but there were, like, four logs and they blasted out of him like rockets."
On the calls where I pick up at my desk, I limit myself to largely monosyllabic responses and try to keep my voice down without seeming like I am hiding something. I just figure that the last thing my cube neighbor needs to hear is banter centered around the consistency of dog poop.
And Sam has picked up on when I have more liberties to respond to his shenanigans and when I have less. When I'm in the cafeteria, invariably there will be a gaggle of Asian women sitting at a table laughing and whooping it up like it was Sunday brunch, which does good in masking my conversations. When he calls during the latter, the background will be very quiet, my voice very low, and he will take this opportunity to use ridiculous terms of endearment and expect me to respond in kind: "Talk to you later, lover lips, heart of my heart, sweet lumps! Muah muah muah!!"
Typically, this earns him a quick, "Bye," which prompts the following exchange:
Him: Say it back! Say it!
Me: No!
Him: Muah muah muah!
Me: I'm hanging up now.
Him: You had better say it or I will go crazy ape!
Me: No! I'm really hanging up now. <click>
One minute later:
Him (via text message): Crazy ape!!
All of this, really, is probably worse than just calling him 'muffin cup' within everyone's earshot and putting an end to it.
Today, I ate lunch around 11:00 and decided to implement a new routine into my workday. I took my slice of pizza up to the cafeteria, sat by the window, and ate while I worked on blog posts. The cafeteria was still empty, and the only sound was a faint Kelly Clarkson singing about waiting a lifetime for moments like these.
No sooner had I written three words, Sam called. Hearing that it was quiet, he figured that I was sitting at my desk and whipped out his, "sugar lamb chop of my loins" nonsense, which I shamelessly repeated right back.
"Argh, foiled! I thought you were at your desk!"
And right there, he gave me the first, and only, laugh of my workday (as well as another day's post--just 278 more to go!).
Some Mondays can be like this.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
3/27/2011 - for a few hours a year. . .
Last night, my family and I went to the annual spaghetti dinner and auction for Lea's Christian School in Hayward, an intimate private school my sister and I attended between preschool and fourth grade. In other words, I went to a fundraiser for a school I matriculated through over 20 years ago with my mom and dad on a Saturday night. And I'm 30.
Anyway, this dinner has become an annual tradition for us. Though tickets to the dinner only cost $10, the auction typically proves itself to be one of the most profitable fundraisers for the school. All items auctioned were donated either by parents or local businesses, and the live auction of class-specific memorabilia (painted handprints on a bench, silkscreened photos sewn onto a quilt, etc.) appeals to every parent with a child in that class. These pieces can go for anywhere between $300 to over $1,000. Pretty significant change for a small private school of about 70 students.
Most of my teachers are still there, and they offer me and my family hugs when we arrive. I was, and usually am, one of the oldest alumni present. In a way, this makes me feel extremely old. I could very reasonably have a child there if my life had taken a few different turns. In fact, some of my old classmates, ones I still remember as 10-year-olds, now have 10-year-olds themselves and attend the spaghetti dinner as a parent.
As for the rest of the event, everything is the same; only the kids and their parents have changed. While parents mill about in the cavernous auditorium, bidding and socializing, their kids run outside, kick a soccer ball around, chase each other around the barren trees of the courtyard. I still remember what it felt like to be one of those kids, can still see myself in them, those sweet (yes, I was sweet once) but sheltered kids who are taught every day the importance of Christian values.
In this way, the spaghetti dinner makes me feel quite young still. Nothing has changed about the spaghetti dinner from how I remember it year after year, and seeing how the teachers handle the students and the respectful way the students react to the teachers, I suspect nothing has changed about the school itself either. The same aroma of spaghetti from years before greeted me last night as I walked into the auditorium. The same magician performed what is likely the same act (though I did not watch to confirm this) in the same hallway off of the main room for the kids, while the same auctioneer called out the live auction in the same way he always had in the other room. Same. It is rather comforting, actually, to step into a world, if only for a few hours a year, and know that everything will match up to the portrait in my memory.
My fourth grade teacher is still there teaching fourth grade, and she still enjoys it. If I ever needed to present an example of somebody who truly loves her job, she would be the one. Years ago, I remember her saying that she would like to retire after that school year. But then that year ended, and she didn't. And then a number of other school years came and went, and she is still there; I'd like to think that it's because she can't imagine how life would be if she did not have these students to teach and mentor. To love.
At the end of the night, all the students, from preschool to fourth grade, would get up in front of camera-ready parents and sing three songs, the same three songs I sang when I stood up there some 25 years ago. I've sung and heard these songs countless times, something about having love like the ocean in my soul and another about a meatball on the lam after a sneeze. Familiar, overdone perhaps, but when it feels like everything else in the world changes in the blink of an eye, how can I find fault with having something to count on, year after year?
Anyway, this dinner has become an annual tradition for us. Though tickets to the dinner only cost $10, the auction typically proves itself to be one of the most profitable fundraisers for the school. All items auctioned were donated either by parents or local businesses, and the live auction of class-specific memorabilia (painted handprints on a bench, silkscreened photos sewn onto a quilt, etc.) appeals to every parent with a child in that class. These pieces can go for anywhere between $300 to over $1,000. Pretty significant change for a small private school of about 70 students.
Most of my teachers are still there, and they offer me and my family hugs when we arrive. I was, and usually am, one of the oldest alumni present. In a way, this makes me feel extremely old. I could very reasonably have a child there if my life had taken a few different turns. In fact, some of my old classmates, ones I still remember as 10-year-olds, now have 10-year-olds themselves and attend the spaghetti dinner as a parent.
As for the rest of the event, everything is the same; only the kids and their parents have changed. While parents mill about in the cavernous auditorium, bidding and socializing, their kids run outside, kick a soccer ball around, chase each other around the barren trees of the courtyard. I still remember what it felt like to be one of those kids, can still see myself in them, those sweet (yes, I was sweet once) but sheltered kids who are taught every day the importance of Christian values.
In this way, the spaghetti dinner makes me feel quite young still. Nothing has changed about the spaghetti dinner from how I remember it year after year, and seeing how the teachers handle the students and the respectful way the students react to the teachers, I suspect nothing has changed about the school itself either. The same aroma of spaghetti from years before greeted me last night as I walked into the auditorium. The same magician performed what is likely the same act (though I did not watch to confirm this) in the same hallway off of the main room for the kids, while the same auctioneer called out the live auction in the same way he always had in the other room. Same. It is rather comforting, actually, to step into a world, if only for a few hours a year, and know that everything will match up to the portrait in my memory.
My fourth grade teacher is still there teaching fourth grade, and she still enjoys it. If I ever needed to present an example of somebody who truly loves her job, she would be the one. Years ago, I remember her saying that she would like to retire after that school year. But then that year ended, and she didn't. And then a number of other school years came and went, and she is still there; I'd like to think that it's because she can't imagine how life would be if she did not have these students to teach and mentor. To love.
At the end of the night, all the students, from preschool to fourth grade, would get up in front of camera-ready parents and sing three songs, the same three songs I sang when I stood up there some 25 years ago. I've sung and heard these songs countless times, something about having love like the ocean in my soul and another about a meatball on the lam after a sneeze. Familiar, overdone perhaps, but when it feels like everything else in the world changes in the blink of an eye, how can I find fault with having something to count on, year after year?
Saturday, March 26, 2011
3/26/2011 - our story. . .
"So who actually asked who out?" Kevin asked over a remixed version of a Journey song. We were crammed in a booth that seemed to sit right underneath a blaring speaker. The bar/lounge/restaurant was largely empty on a Friday night. Gordon said that he would give the place until the end of the year. It felt very corporate, like a place for white-collar types or convention-goers to let loose and make hazy, regretful memories. I looked over to Sam, who maintained his silence and held a blank stare in his eyes. Steve Perry wailed, "Doin' anything to roll the dice, just one. . . more. . . tiiiiiiiime. . ."
I guess it was up to me, then, to tell our story.
"Well, we had seen each other at the gym a few times before we actually met. We nodded to each other at first, then we smiled, and eventually, we met at the water fountain and introduced ourselves. He said that if I wanted, we can work out together. At this point, I still thought he might be straight, but hey, a hot, straight workout partner is still nothing sneeze at.
Somehow, I don't remember how, we saw each other in the locker room later, and he gave me his business card. I still have it somewhere, I think. I called him that night, to hell with playing hard-to-get, and we ended up talking for about half an hour, which I thought was odd given how I barely knew this guy, and I'm not good on the phone to begin with, much less with a stranger.
But we did end up working out a couple of times, and then he asked me out to dinner. I met up with him at his house after work, and we had a few drinks. . ."
"That was when he was still falsely advertising the fact that he drank," Sam interjected. Which was true, since I really don't like to drink, but just did it as the price of admission into his house.
". . . before walking to a restaurant down in the Financial District. Afterwards, we cabbed it back to his house, and I was very proud of myself--I did not sleep with him."
That came out wrong. Kevin, or Gordon, or likely both, made snide comments.
"And so we dated for a few months or so before I realized that I just wasn't ready to date. . ."
"So he dumped me," Sam said, always quick with the drama. It's amazing I ever thought he was straight.
"So we stopped dating, became friends. And again, I was very proud of myself because we actually did stay friends. We talked often, had dinner sometimes, and kept up with each others' lives. I ended up dating a loser who told me everything I wanted to hear, everything that Sam wouldn't, or couldn't, say. But there was no chemistry, no attraction there, so I stopped that as well and stayed single.
Months, and a trip to Montreal, later, I decided that I wanted to be with Sam, so I resolved to ask him out again after getting back from Canada. But as luck would have it, another guy at the gym asked me out when I got back, and not knowing how to say 'no,' we dated for about three weeks."
Gordon said, "You tend to like dating guys from the gym, huh?"
"Well, since I don't go to the bars," I explained, "where else would I meet boys? But that, obviously, didn't work out either, and I stayed single for a couple of months before asking him out." I jutted a thumb in Sam's direction. "And here we are."
"I don't know how I feel about this story," Sam said.
"Well, there's no other version of it for you to prefer," I replied.
. . .Hold on to that feeeeeel-iiiiiiiin'. . .
"And it ends well, right?"
I guess it was up to me, then, to tell our story.
"Well, we had seen each other at the gym a few times before we actually met. We nodded to each other at first, then we smiled, and eventually, we met at the water fountain and introduced ourselves. He said that if I wanted, we can work out together. At this point, I still thought he might be straight, but hey, a hot, straight workout partner is still nothing sneeze at.
Somehow, I don't remember how, we saw each other in the locker room later, and he gave me his business card. I still have it somewhere, I think. I called him that night, to hell with playing hard-to-get, and we ended up talking for about half an hour, which I thought was odd given how I barely knew this guy, and I'm not good on the phone to begin with, much less with a stranger.
But we did end up working out a couple of times, and then he asked me out to dinner. I met up with him at his house after work, and we had a few drinks. . ."
"That was when he was still falsely advertising the fact that he drank," Sam interjected. Which was true, since I really don't like to drink, but just did it as the price of admission into his house.
". . . before walking to a restaurant down in the Financial District. Afterwards, we cabbed it back to his house, and I was very proud of myself--I did not sleep with him."
That came out wrong. Kevin, or Gordon, or likely both, made snide comments.
"And so we dated for a few months or so before I realized that I just wasn't ready to date. . ."
"So he dumped me," Sam said, always quick with the drama. It's amazing I ever thought he was straight.
"So we stopped dating, became friends. And again, I was very proud of myself because we actually did stay friends. We talked often, had dinner sometimes, and kept up with each others' lives. I ended up dating a loser who told me everything I wanted to hear, everything that Sam wouldn't, or couldn't, say. But there was no chemistry, no attraction there, so I stopped that as well and stayed single.
Months, and a trip to Montreal, later, I decided that I wanted to be with Sam, so I resolved to ask him out again after getting back from Canada. But as luck would have it, another guy at the gym asked me out when I got back, and not knowing how to say 'no,' we dated for about three weeks."
Gordon said, "You tend to like dating guys from the gym, huh?"
"Well, since I don't go to the bars," I explained, "where else would I meet boys? But that, obviously, didn't work out either, and I stayed single for a couple of months before asking him out." I jutted a thumb in Sam's direction. "And here we are."
"I don't know how I feel about this story," Sam said.
"Well, there's no other version of it for you to prefer," I replied.
. . .Hold on to that feeeeeel-iiiiiiiin'. . .
"And it ends well, right?"
Friday, March 25, 2011
3/25/2011 - all my dreams coming true. . .
Since I made the decision to skip out on the gym this week, my mornings, which start at 7:15 instead of the usual 5:30, have been much more pleasant and relaxing, even if I am beginning to feel a growing softness in my belly.
I also have not felt any of the anxiety, self-induced as it may be, in the evenings, when I would rush off to bed in an effort to get as much sleep as possible before getting up the next morning just to go exert myself in a vain attempt to look like Chris Evans. Instead, I worked on posts for the blog, ate dinner late, practiced my a cappella doom-bah-dooms, all without the pall of a 10 PM bedtime, again self-imposed, looming over my head.
The sleep is still broken, however, as Sam and I are ever-subject to Grr's circadian rhythm. Since Sunday night/Monday morning's debacle, Sam decided to just let Grr sleep in the bed with us. Though I was not thrilled with the idea, I would have tried anything to not repeat that epic night of cage-rattling and cries.
Surprisingly (for me, at least), Grr behaved himself spectacularly. On the first night, as we prepared for bed, he ran onto the couch with this incredulous gleam in his eye: You're not going to send me to my crate? And I get to sleep upstairs? In bed?? With you guys??? Are all my dreams coming true at once? I fell asleep to the sounds of his chomping on his smelly chewtoy and the shifting weight of his head on my leg.
Still, the happiness of our little threesome (probably the closest I'll get to one) does not preclude Grr's biological need to wake up halfway through the night. So he does, typically around 3:00 or 4:00, and Sam, tireless in his patience with Grr (while I simultaneously learned why bad mothers sometimes drown their babies), would get up, say soft words to him, and carry him down the stairs and out to the garage. I would lay in bed, knowing I should have at least offered to be the one to take Grr out, but really, I think I've already effectively shown that I'm not that good of a person.
Being woken up once at 4:00 is a marked improvement over how things have been, even if it means Sam and I may never get the bed to ourselves again.
As this week went on, Grr got more and more comfortable with his new sleeping arrangement. And really, why wouldn't he? He got everything he wanted. Last night, he walked up the stairs himself without any provocation from us. He took his chewtoy, nestled into the same spot as all the previous nights (middle of the bed by our knees), and went to work chipping away at the compressed rawhide. Knowing he would not cry, coupled with his rhythmic nom-nom-noms, I quickly fell asleep. It was no later than 10:30.
I had various dreams throughout the night, some pleasant, some strange, most forgotten by now. When I stirred, the room was still dark; Grr was quiet, and Sam was softly snoring beside me. I figured that at any moment, Grr would roll over, jingling his collar tags like sleighbells, and Sam would wake up and take him downstairs to pee. Just as well, I thought, since I kind of had to myself.
I waited, tried to fall back asleep so I wouldn't have to focus on the mounting pressures building up within. Eventually, Grr stretched, yawned with an accompanying high-pitched whine he has taken to doing, and stood up. At last! I thought. We can now both get to our respective businesses.
I turned over and grabbed my phone. It was a few minutes to 7:00. He had slept through the night.
I also have not felt any of the anxiety, self-induced as it may be, in the evenings, when I would rush off to bed in an effort to get as much sleep as possible before getting up the next morning just to go exert myself in a vain attempt to look like Chris Evans. Instead, I worked on posts for the blog, ate dinner late, practiced my a cappella doom-bah-dooms, all without the pall of a 10 PM bedtime, again self-imposed, looming over my head.
The sleep is still broken, however, as Sam and I are ever-subject to Grr's circadian rhythm. Since Sunday night/Monday morning's debacle, Sam decided to just let Grr sleep in the bed with us. Though I was not thrilled with the idea, I would have tried anything to not repeat that epic night of cage-rattling and cries.
Surprisingly (for me, at least), Grr behaved himself spectacularly. On the first night, as we prepared for bed, he ran onto the couch with this incredulous gleam in his eye: You're not going to send me to my crate? And I get to sleep upstairs? In bed?? With you guys??? Are all my dreams coming true at once? I fell asleep to the sounds of his chomping on his smelly chewtoy and the shifting weight of his head on my leg.
Still, the happiness of our little threesome (probably the closest I'll get to one) does not preclude Grr's biological need to wake up halfway through the night. So he does, typically around 3:00 or 4:00, and Sam, tireless in his patience with Grr (while I simultaneously learned why bad mothers sometimes drown their babies), would get up, say soft words to him, and carry him down the stairs and out to the garage. I would lay in bed, knowing I should have at least offered to be the one to take Grr out, but really, I think I've already effectively shown that I'm not that good of a person.
Being woken up once at 4:00 is a marked improvement over how things have been, even if it means Sam and I may never get the bed to ourselves again.
As this week went on, Grr got more and more comfortable with his new sleeping arrangement. And really, why wouldn't he? He got everything he wanted. Last night, he walked up the stairs himself without any provocation from us. He took his chewtoy, nestled into the same spot as all the previous nights (middle of the bed by our knees), and went to work chipping away at the compressed rawhide. Knowing he would not cry, coupled with his rhythmic nom-nom-noms, I quickly fell asleep. It was no later than 10:30.
I had various dreams throughout the night, some pleasant, some strange, most forgotten by now. When I stirred, the room was still dark; Grr was quiet, and Sam was softly snoring beside me. I figured that at any moment, Grr would roll over, jingling his collar tags like sleighbells, and Sam would wake up and take him downstairs to pee. Just as well, I thought, since I kind of had to myself.
I waited, tried to fall back asleep so I wouldn't have to focus on the mounting pressures building up within. Eventually, Grr stretched, yawned with an accompanying high-pitched whine he has taken to doing, and stood up. At last! I thought. We can now both get to our respective businesses.
I turned over and grabbed my phone. It was a few minutes to 7:00. He had slept through the night.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
3/24/2011 - some charmed life. . .
Ever since I started biking to work last year, I've inadvertently joined an elite club of other cycling co-workers. These are the ones who come in to the office with one pant leg rolled up, a helmet dangling from their fingertips and a thin layer of sweat across the brow. Though my little folding bike is quite emasculating compared to their full-size, multi-speed, sideways-U-shaped-handlebar ones, when I see these people at the bike racks, we make small talk. When we run into each other in the building, we say hello.
Other co-workers, the ones who aren't a part of this club, ask me how it feels to bike to work, how far it is, how long it takes. Do you like it? (Generally.) Is it scary with all the traffic in the City? (Sometimes.) Must be nice to not have to pack into a bus like cattle at the end of the day. (Definitely not a fan of being herded.)
I've already talked about my general loathing for public transportation, but I shouldn't feel this way. Thousands of people use it every day to get to work; without it, the City would grind to a halt. Several forms of it are located within a very convenient distance from my house and office building. There is a BART station within a 10-minute walk from my house, five minutes from work, and a bus can pick me up or drop me off around the corner from either home or work. There is not much to complain about.
Especially so when it rains, as there is very little fun to be had while biking in the rain. Between the cold and the wet, the general slipperiness of the streets, I sometimes don't even notice how the rain feels like cooked spaghetti whipping against my face. And because I've been caught in the rain one too many times, my tires or gear or chain is now squeaking, presumably because the lube got washed way. Or some equivalent explanation that sounds all cyclist-like. . .
So this morning as I walked into work amidst a torrential downpour, I bumped into a woman emerging from the bike racks. She shook off some water from her poncho and nodded hello. Seeing how dry and comfortable I looked, she remarked that I made a smart decision to take the train in this morning.
"Nope," I told her. "My partner and my dog drive me to work when it rains, and they'll come and get me in the afternoon."
She rapidly blinked twice and feigned a double-take. "Wow, that's some charmed life you got there!"
"Yeah," I said. "I guess so, huh?"
Other co-workers, the ones who aren't a part of this club, ask me how it feels to bike to work, how far it is, how long it takes. Do you like it? (Generally.) Is it scary with all the traffic in the City? (Sometimes.) Must be nice to not have to pack into a bus like cattle at the end of the day. (Definitely not a fan of being herded.)
I've already talked about my general loathing for public transportation, but I shouldn't feel this way. Thousands of people use it every day to get to work; without it, the City would grind to a halt. Several forms of it are located within a very convenient distance from my house and office building. There is a BART station within a 10-minute walk from my house, five minutes from work, and a bus can pick me up or drop me off around the corner from either home or work. There is not much to complain about.
Especially so when it rains, as there is very little fun to be had while biking in the rain. Between the cold and the wet, the general slipperiness of the streets, I sometimes don't even notice how the rain feels like cooked spaghetti whipping against my face. And because I've been caught in the rain one too many times, my tires or gear or chain is now squeaking, presumably because the lube got washed way. Or some equivalent explanation that sounds all cyclist-like. . .
So this morning as I walked into work amidst a torrential downpour, I bumped into a woman emerging from the bike racks. She shook off some water from her poncho and nodded hello. Seeing how dry and comfortable I looked, she remarked that I made a smart decision to take the train in this morning.
"Nope," I told her. "My partner and my dog drive me to work when it rains, and they'll come and get me in the afternoon."
She rapidly blinked twice and feigned a double-take. "Wow, that's some charmed life you got there!"
"Yeah," I said. "I guess so, huh?"
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
3/23/2011 - the nerd parties. . .
A few days ago, the entire Marketing team was given the same assignment. Short of going into all the boring details (of which there are many), it basically involves the onerous task of double-checking thousands and thousands of lines of programming code. The importance of this task is high, and the execution can be mind-numbing.
I started yesterday and by the time mid-afternoon rolled around, I was zipping through my assigned portion at a steady clip. The work is not hard. Tedious as hell, but really quite simple, and I found that I could easily do it with my eyes closed (metaphorically) and my mind altogether somewhere else (literally). I actually enjoyed the banality. At last, a task at work where I don't have to think--score!
And because the entire department is embroiled in this time-sensitive chore, I felt a sense of solidarity between all of us that I have never felt before. Even though we are all in Marketing, we each work on such disparate things, encapsulated in such effective cubicle walls that I can go days without even seeing my cube neighbor, much less talk to her or know what she does at all. With this project, for once, all of our various job functions merged.
This morning, the head of the department called together a "Code Verification Party." It was a BYOL(aptop) kind of affair, and a good handful of us sat together in a conference room and verified code together on our respective laptops. It was unspeakably lame, yet so awesome. The room was filled with the gentle tapping of keyboards punctuated with a groan, a sigh, some side comment, all of which carried a palpable parallel; we each were working toward a shared and defined goal, suffering a shared misery to get there.
The whole thing, and my enjoyment of it, totally reminded me of the "Editing Parties" I went to back in high school. A small group of classmates and I would get together on the evenings before a big English paper was due, and we'd sit round-robin style and edit each other's essays. One girl usually hosted, and we'd sit silently in her living room for 10 or 15 minutes at a time, copy-editing another's essay and writing comments in the margins. Her mom would pop in every so often to refresh our snacks. After we were done with one essay, we'd switch, and switch again, and again, until all of us had read everyone else's papers.
Yes, I know that this, too, is unspeakably lame, and I am well aware that putting the word 'party' after something does not innately make it fun, but I seriously looked forward to these kinds of parties (both the Editing and Code Verification variety) without any shame or irony.
See, I have never been comfortable at regular parties, the kind with lots of people, most of whom I won't know, and beer and loud music, an overcrowded house and no agenda. I never know what to do at those. Should I just walk up to people and introduce myself? Should I wait against a wall for people to approach me? Since I don't drink or smoke, I don't have that immediate, easy connection, can't hold a drink and blend in or twiddle a cigarette between my fingers. Those props would help, as I don't know what to do with my hands. Shove them in my pocket and be aloof? Cross my arms against my chest and be standoffish? Let them dangle loosely to my sides, apelike and idiotic? As much as I want to be the kind of person who flits from person to person, group to group, ready with charm and a quip to leave everyone wanting to know more about me, I am terribly self-conscious and suck at finding common threads to weave myself into. Rarely do I feel like I fit in. At these parties, I usually stick to the people I know, wonder why I came in the first place, and count the minutes down before I feel like I've been there long enough to politely leave.
This leaves me, then, with those other kinds of parties, the nerd parties, the kind of parties that real party-goers would not dignify with the word "party." Also, sadly, the ones I feel most comfortable in. This afternoon at the Code Editing Party (I swear, the word "party" just sounds lamer each time I type it), I thought it was great fun, largely because of the commonality of those in attendance, including me, and how I felt like I fit in without even trying. Maybe if I drank, smoked, was more outgoing, liked the same kind of music, knew more about pop culture and what's hip and cool and happening at the time (wow, I have so far to go), I may feel this way at normal parties. As it stands, I guess the makeshift nerd ones are all I've got.
May not be much, but it's a start. And tomorrow, I'll have my iPod with me so I can verify code while showtunes and Adele vie for my attention. Then the real party begins.
I started yesterday and by the time mid-afternoon rolled around, I was zipping through my assigned portion at a steady clip. The work is not hard. Tedious as hell, but really quite simple, and I found that I could easily do it with my eyes closed (metaphorically) and my mind altogether somewhere else (literally). I actually enjoyed the banality. At last, a task at work where I don't have to think--score!
And because the entire department is embroiled in this time-sensitive chore, I felt a sense of solidarity between all of us that I have never felt before. Even though we are all in Marketing, we each work on such disparate things, encapsulated in such effective cubicle walls that I can go days without even seeing my cube neighbor, much less talk to her or know what she does at all. With this project, for once, all of our various job functions merged.
This morning, the head of the department called together a "Code Verification Party." It was a BYOL(aptop) kind of affair, and a good handful of us sat together in a conference room and verified code together on our respective laptops. It was unspeakably lame, yet so awesome. The room was filled with the gentle tapping of keyboards punctuated with a groan, a sigh, some side comment, all of which carried a palpable parallel; we each were working toward a shared and defined goal, suffering a shared misery to get there.
The whole thing, and my enjoyment of it, totally reminded me of the "Editing Parties" I went to back in high school. A small group of classmates and I would get together on the evenings before a big English paper was due, and we'd sit round-robin style and edit each other's essays. One girl usually hosted, and we'd sit silently in her living room for 10 or 15 minutes at a time, copy-editing another's essay and writing comments in the margins. Her mom would pop in every so often to refresh our snacks. After we were done with one essay, we'd switch, and switch again, and again, until all of us had read everyone else's papers.
Yes, I know that this, too, is unspeakably lame, and I am well aware that putting the word 'party' after something does not innately make it fun, but I seriously looked forward to these kinds of parties (both the Editing and Code Verification variety) without any shame or irony.
See, I have never been comfortable at regular parties, the kind with lots of people, most of whom I won't know, and beer and loud music, an overcrowded house and no agenda. I never know what to do at those. Should I just walk up to people and introduce myself? Should I wait against a wall for people to approach me? Since I don't drink or smoke, I don't have that immediate, easy connection, can't hold a drink and blend in or twiddle a cigarette between my fingers. Those props would help, as I don't know what to do with my hands. Shove them in my pocket and be aloof? Cross my arms against my chest and be standoffish? Let them dangle loosely to my sides, apelike and idiotic? As much as I want to be the kind of person who flits from person to person, group to group, ready with charm and a quip to leave everyone wanting to know more about me, I am terribly self-conscious and suck at finding common threads to weave myself into. Rarely do I feel like I fit in. At these parties, I usually stick to the people I know, wonder why I came in the first place, and count the minutes down before I feel like I've been there long enough to politely leave.
This leaves me, then, with those other kinds of parties, the nerd parties, the kind of parties that real party-goers would not dignify with the word "party." Also, sadly, the ones I feel most comfortable in. This afternoon at the Code Editing Party (I swear, the word "party" just sounds lamer each time I type it), I thought it was great fun, largely because of the commonality of those in attendance, including me, and how I felt like I fit in without even trying. Maybe if I drank, smoked, was more outgoing, liked the same kind of music, knew more about pop culture and what's hip and cool and happening at the time (wow, I have so far to go), I may feel this way at normal parties. As it stands, I guess the makeshift nerd ones are all I've got.
May not be much, but it's a start. And tomorrow, I'll have my iPod with me so I can verify code while showtunes and Adele vie for my attention. Then the real party begins.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
3/22/2011 - the motto. . .
I made one singular decision this morning that I think has already alleviated much of the pressure I've been feeling. It's revolutionary. Are you ready?
I am going to take the rest of the week off from the gym.
I could have either made this decision or have the decision make itself because truthfully, there are only two ways that mornings this week could go:
- I set my alarm for 5:30 AM, and when it goes off, I snooze it a few times before ultimately deciding to skip the gym. I get up at 7:15.
- I get up at 7:15.
As much as I've enjoyed this consistent and quality run of gym-going I've experienced for the last three months, with the dog, a cappella rehearsals, crazy busyness at work, and the aforementioned lack of sleep, something had to give. Seems reasonable that the gym be the first.
Going with option number two also eliminates any guilt I will inevitably feel when I try and fail at getting to the gym. This way, if I never plan for it, I will never fail. That is the motto for the week.
Monday, March 21, 2011
3/21/2011 - the worst. . .
If I can't sleep the amount of time I need to sleep (i.e., eight hours), I can't function properly. I know this. All of my life, I have prized sleep above all other luxuries.
It is only now that I realize just how much of a luxury it actually is.
Sam is a sometimes-insomniac, and I never could understand his problem. What do you mean you can't just close your eyes and fall asleep? Here, let me show you. And though I would hardly classify myself as an insomniac now, I am finding it progressively harder to fall back asleep after Grr cries and barks some time in the night. Even if Sam takes him out and I just lay in bed, eyes closed and waiting for them to come back, I am most definitely awake.
Last night was the worst. Grr woke up and rattled his crate at 1:00, 3:30, and 5:30. We tried to ignore it, which only resulted in escalated pleas for attention. And we probably made the biggest mistake in the book, but we got up and took him out, which quieted him for some time. Still, it took me an inordinate amount of time to fall back asleep after each interruption because as tired as I was, I was also filled with anger. Why was he crying again? He has shown that he can hold his pee for much longer than two fucking hours! What are we doing wrong? Can the neighbors hear? I hate this fucking dog!! So I laid there and tried not to move, tried to regulate my breathing, sing songs to myself, recount an episode of Friends from years ago, anything to reroute my brain so it doesn't focus on how unhappy I am with my life.
See, when I'm tired, it's not just that I can't wake up to go to the gym, can't focus at work, can't help but think of the next time my head touches a pillow. When I'm tired, I can't defend myself against this constantly encroaching sadness, this darkness that reaches into my heart. And lately, there has been so much.
When I'm tired now, I don't have an answer to the question, "What am I grateful for?" I just spent an innumerable amount of time awake and begging for sleep to come, only to drive it away as soon as it approaches, so gratitude is not exactly top-of-mind. I've repeatedly thought about stopping this blog experiment; slowly, I have found it more and more difficult to find the time to keep at it, and the rewards of doing so diminish. But should I do that, should I fail at this blog, I would only be heaping it atop the growing pile of remnants I have discarded from my earlier, happier life. Just one more thing to add, one more thing I've lost. . .
When I'm tired now, this ever-swirling unhappiness invites darker thoughts: this dog has done absolutely nothing but subtract hours from my sleep each night and hundreds from our bank account each week; he has stripped away my desire to do even the things I once enjoyed; and finally, the genesis: I never wanted this dog in the first place, which makes me feel trapped, not only as a dog owner, but as a member of this family altogether.
Insomnia is lonely; I never realized it until last night. The suffering is real, but there is no one to witness it, no bruises to show for the struggle. All I could do was lay there, as still as possible while my thoughts race from idea to idea, my heart pounding at the sound of Grr's jingling collar tags, knowing that in a few seconds, a whimper will likely tear through the loft and into my head.
A few days ago, I woke up with a little tickle in the back of my throat, that old familiar feeling I usually recognize as the harbinger of a cold. And I wanted so much for that cold to come, that fever to set in and knock me off my feet. How else could I effectively demonstrate just how impaired I feel inside?
It is only now that I realize just how much of a luxury it actually is.
Sam is a sometimes-insomniac, and I never could understand his problem. What do you mean you can't just close your eyes and fall asleep? Here, let me show you. And though I would hardly classify myself as an insomniac now, I am finding it progressively harder to fall back asleep after Grr cries and barks some time in the night. Even if Sam takes him out and I just lay in bed, eyes closed and waiting for them to come back, I am most definitely awake.
Last night was the worst. Grr woke up and rattled his crate at 1:00, 3:30, and 5:30. We tried to ignore it, which only resulted in escalated pleas for attention. And we probably made the biggest mistake in the book, but we got up and took him out, which quieted him for some time. Still, it took me an inordinate amount of time to fall back asleep after each interruption because as tired as I was, I was also filled with anger. Why was he crying again? He has shown that he can hold his pee for much longer than two fucking hours! What are we doing wrong? Can the neighbors hear? I hate this fucking dog!! So I laid there and tried not to move, tried to regulate my breathing, sing songs to myself, recount an episode of Friends from years ago, anything to reroute my brain so it doesn't focus on how unhappy I am with my life.
See, when I'm tired, it's not just that I can't wake up to go to the gym, can't focus at work, can't help but think of the next time my head touches a pillow. When I'm tired, I can't defend myself against this constantly encroaching sadness, this darkness that reaches into my heart. And lately, there has been so much.
When I'm tired now, I don't have an answer to the question, "What am I grateful for?" I just spent an innumerable amount of time awake and begging for sleep to come, only to drive it away as soon as it approaches, so gratitude is not exactly top-of-mind. I've repeatedly thought about stopping this blog experiment; slowly, I have found it more and more difficult to find the time to keep at it, and the rewards of doing so diminish. But should I do that, should I fail at this blog, I would only be heaping it atop the growing pile of remnants I have discarded from my earlier, happier life. Just one more thing to add, one more thing I've lost. . .
When I'm tired now, this ever-swirling unhappiness invites darker thoughts: this dog has done absolutely nothing but subtract hours from my sleep each night and hundreds from our bank account each week; he has stripped away my desire to do even the things I once enjoyed; and finally, the genesis: I never wanted this dog in the first place, which makes me feel trapped, not only as a dog owner, but as a member of this family altogether.
---
Insomnia is lonely; I never realized it until last night. The suffering is real, but there is no one to witness it, no bruises to show for the struggle. All I could do was lay there, as still as possible while my thoughts race from idea to idea, my heart pounding at the sound of Grr's jingling collar tags, knowing that in a few seconds, a whimper will likely tear through the loft and into my head.
A few days ago, I woke up with a little tickle in the back of my throat, that old familiar feeling I usually recognize as the harbinger of a cold. And I wanted so much for that cold to come, that fever to set in and knock me off my feet. How else could I effectively demonstrate just how impaired I feel inside?
Sunday, March 20, 2011
3/20/2011 - tell yourself the right story. . .
My partner Sam doesn't read my blog.
On one hand, I want him to, not because I think this is some tome worthy of his attention, but because I want him to take part or show some interest in this endeavor I am undertaking. He says that he has been too busy to read this, or that he is waiting until I have written a few so he can dust them all out at once.
Well, I've managed to dust out 80 of these entries now, and he has logged enough hours on HGTV to be able to recognize episodes within the first five minutes, yet I don't think he's read any entry since the first week's. It is a little frustrating.
But on the other hand, as there always is one, I know that he does not like to read, and he wonders why he should have to read about what I would normally be telling him in person. I can't argue with that latter bit of logic, I guess, but then again, on the third hand, I don't always tell him about the things that I write on here. A lot of this stuff doesn't exactly work its way into conversation. Well, an interesting one, anyway.
With all those hands in the air, I find it easiest to just hold his lack of blog-attention against him, feel that he just can't be bothered to spare five minutes a day to see the fruits of this self-assignment. I feel that because he does not read this blog, he can't know what I've been doing for an hour every day while cooped up in the office upstairs.
And he should know, right? The more I asked myself that question, the more ire I accumulated.
And he should know, right? The more I asked myself that question, the more ire I accumulated.
Then, I found some materials the other day from a seminar I took at work called "Crucial Conversations" a few months ago. It was designed to help people communicate better at work, but truthfully, I have found it to be more useful in my personal life, especially in this instance with Sam. Though much of the seminar has already departed my memory, I do remember this: the first and most important step to successful communication, even if no other steps are taken, is to tell yourself the right story.
The easier story to tell myself is that Sam was just being inattentive and not wanting to make an effort; therefore, I have every right to be angry with him. And for a while, I told myself that story, intensifying his insensitivity with each retelling. But thinking about the tenets of my "Crucial Conversations" seminar, I knew that I had to change the story I was telling myself, find the more difficult story, if I wanted to resolve this issue. That story involves starting with the fact (and I do accept it as a fact) that Sam cares about me. And with this understanding, why, then, would he do something to deliberately cause a rift between us? He wouldn't, so his avoidance of this blog is not meant as a personal affront, but because of something else.
That 'something else,' however, is difficult to ascertain; if I ask him, he won't say, but will revert to the same excuses he's used before. Sam does not do "crucial conversations." But I don't need to know what that reason is, I guess. That reason can be his secret, and for the time being, this blog will be mine. The mutual exclusivity does not in any way have to be a statement on how he feels about me, or how I feel about him. I will continue to write; he will continue to watch HGTV reruns, and we can still live without any hard feelings or ones of obligation between us. After all, a blog is just a blog, but a kiss is still a kiss.
Saturday, March 19, 2011
3/19/2011 - same thing day after day. . .
At the Charles M. Schulz museum this afternoon, I saw a quote from the man himself: A cartoonist is someone who draws the same thing day after day without repeating himself.
I feel the same way about this blog, how I am often writing about the same thing and struggling with making it interesting. After all, my life is not exactly made up of one thrill-seeking adventure to another; so it was good to read this quote on the wall from Schulz, a hugely successful illustrator and writer. Sometimes, it's not so much about the subject as it is about the perspective.
Here is one panel that particularly spoke to me, especially in my recent, more sleepy, times:
I feel the same way about this blog, how I am often writing about the same thing and struggling with making it interesting. After all, my life is not exactly made up of one thrill-seeking adventure to another; so it was good to read this quote on the wall from Schulz, a hugely successful illustrator and writer. Sometimes, it's not so much about the subject as it is about the perspective.
Here is one panel that particularly spoke to me, especially in my recent, more sleepy, times:
Friday, March 18, 2011
3/18/2011 - love letters and horrifically embarrassing poems. . .
Since Grr has done a bang-up job of training me (who knew I was so trainable?), I have been getting up around 4:00 in the morning to take him out to go pee. Since 4:00 is close enough to 5:30, which is when I normally get up to go to the gym anyway, I try to spare myself the agony of having to wake up twice in one morning.
Today, I had grand endeavors to work on blog posts, brainstorm on ideas, and read (just started Dave Eggers' A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius--so far so good), but really, I just sat there, ate my cereal, and scrolled through Facebook. I have determined that Facebook is the ultimate time passer, an endless font of knowledge on childhood friends and people you otherwise would never remember, much less think about. Recently, I found someone on Facebook I had met over a summer in 1999. A few weeks ago, a girl I went to college with randomly found me. Because of Facebook, I have been able to keep in touch with people I would never have the discipline to do so otherwise (admittedly).
But what do you do when someone you want to find isn't on Facebook? If you were me, you wake up at four in the morning and e-stalk them.
And of all the people I would love to find out more about, it would be Marshall. Anyone who has known me for some amount of time will inevitably hear my stories about Marshall. And now you will too.
When I was 16, I met Marshall outside of the principal's office on my first day at a new high school in order to get my student ID card. Marshall came up next to me and asked if he was at the right place for schedule changes. I had no clue, could barely find any of the classrooms I needed to be in that day, but even if I did know, I probably couldn't have formed coherent words at the sight of him: threadbare T-shirt, equally tattered jeans with a wall of muscles underneath both, and a baseball cap with the words "WHITE BOY" scrawled in sloppy chalk across the front. White boy indeed. When he reached up to wipe his sweaty brow, his bicep flickered.
And so it began, the two-year long, obsessive, unhealthy "relationship" I held with Marshall in my head. Nights were spent thinking about him. Love letters and horrifically embarrassing poems were written, ones that included words like 'beloved' (with an accent on the second 'e' for dramatic effect) and 'forbade.'
To complicate things, we eventually, actually became friends, and I learned how to turn my (perceived) love for him into friendship, sublimate my lust into, well, I don't know what, but it wasn't lust. OK, it wasn't just lust.
Alright, fine, it was totally lust, the all-consuming, crazy kind where I dreamt about him regularly and would have given my left leg just to see him shirtless. And I did eventually see him shirtless, and I'm still bipedal, so I'll let you fill in the blanks on that one. (I promise it will be more exciting than what actually happened.)
So anyway, I became that gay kid in high school with the great (mis?)fortune of actually being friends with my impossible straight crush. Not to say that we were close or anything, but he did write more than "Keep in touch. Have a nice summer!" in my yearbook. That says something, right?
Truth is, Marshall and I kind of became this odd couple. He was a stoner who hung out with other slacker-types kicking a hacky-sack around during lunch while I was in as many AP classes as I could find and had two girls and a foreign exchange student from New Zealand as lunch companions to gab about magazine articles and boys with. Marshall and I rarely saw each other during the day, but met every afternoon in the library to walk home together.
People picked up on it, of course, and a few even approached me about it. One girl wanted me to pass a note to him, no doubt some love letter or horrifically embarrassing poem. I told her that he already had abutchish Chinese girlfriend. In my head, I was all, "Wow, desperate much?"
By the time we graduated, he and I had gone on numerous "man dates," from playing miniature golf together to dinners at the restaurant I worked at. He really did become a friend, but as things often go, we lost touch after a few years and I have not thought of him much since (honest!).
But of course, every now and again, I would see him in something Sam does (who, really, is like an older, gay version of Marshall), or something would happen and I would feel compelled to tell a story about him. I'm convinced that when I'm in my 60s, I'll be just like Rose from The Golden Girls.
Anyway, when I first joined Facebook, he was one of the first people I looked up. "No results found." And I let it go at that. But in the quiet of this morning, while Sam was at the gym and Grr napped on the couch, with nothing else to do (at least nothing that I could concentrate on as I mentally debated whether or not I should just go back to bed), I underwent a much more comprehensive search.
Turns out that Marshall is a teacher now with an advanced degree in pure mathematics, whatever that is. I even managed to find one picture of him (in all of the internet, I only managed to find one), and he is as I remember him.
So I'd say those were 45 minutes well-spent.
(The more I read this post, the more it seems like it was nothing but an excuse to talk about Marshall. Probably true.)
Today, I had grand endeavors to work on blog posts, brainstorm on ideas, and read (just started Dave Eggers' A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius--so far so good), but really, I just sat there, ate my cereal, and scrolled through Facebook. I have determined that Facebook is the ultimate time passer, an endless font of knowledge on childhood friends and people you otherwise would never remember, much less think about. Recently, I found someone on Facebook I had met over a summer in 1999. A few weeks ago, a girl I went to college with randomly found me. Because of Facebook, I have been able to keep in touch with people I would never have the discipline to do so otherwise (admittedly).
But what do you do when someone you want to find isn't on Facebook? If you were me, you wake up at four in the morning and e-stalk them.
And of all the people I would love to find out more about, it would be Marshall. Anyone who has known me for some amount of time will inevitably hear my stories about Marshall. And now you will too.
When I was 16, I met Marshall outside of the principal's office on my first day at a new high school in order to get my student ID card. Marshall came up next to me and asked if he was at the right place for schedule changes. I had no clue, could barely find any of the classrooms I needed to be in that day, but even if I did know, I probably couldn't have formed coherent words at the sight of him: threadbare T-shirt, equally tattered jeans with a wall of muscles underneath both, and a baseball cap with the words "WHITE BOY" scrawled in sloppy chalk across the front. White boy indeed. When he reached up to wipe his sweaty brow, his bicep flickered.
And so it began, the two-year long, obsessive, unhealthy "relationship" I held with Marshall in my head. Nights were spent thinking about him. Love letters and horrifically embarrassing poems were written, ones that included words like 'beloved' (with an accent on the second 'e' for dramatic effect) and 'forbade.'
To complicate things, we eventually, actually became friends, and I learned how to turn my (perceived) love for him into friendship, sublimate my lust into, well, I don't know what, but it wasn't lust. OK, it wasn't just lust.
Alright, fine, it was totally lust, the all-consuming, crazy kind where I dreamt about him regularly and would have given my left leg just to see him shirtless. And I did eventually see him shirtless, and I'm still bipedal, so I'll let you fill in the blanks on that one. (I promise it will be more exciting than what actually happened.)
So anyway, I became that gay kid in high school with the great (mis?)fortune of actually being friends with my impossible straight crush. Not to say that we were close or anything, but he did write more than "Keep in touch. Have a nice summer!" in my yearbook. That says something, right?
Truth is, Marshall and I kind of became this odd couple. He was a stoner who hung out with other slacker-types kicking a hacky-sack around during lunch while I was in as many AP classes as I could find and had two girls and a foreign exchange student from New Zealand as lunch companions to gab about magazine articles and boys with. Marshall and I rarely saw each other during the day, but met every afternoon in the library to walk home together.
People picked up on it, of course, and a few even approached me about it. One girl wanted me to pass a note to him, no doubt some love letter or horrifically embarrassing poem. I told her that he already had a
By the time we graduated, he and I had gone on numerous "man dates," from playing miniature golf together to dinners at the restaurant I worked at. He really did become a friend, but as things often go, we lost touch after a few years and I have not thought of him much since (honest!).
But of course, every now and again, I would see him in something Sam does (who, really, is like an older, gay version of Marshall), or something would happen and I would feel compelled to tell a story about him. I'm convinced that when I'm in my 60s, I'll be just like Rose from The Golden Girls.
Anyway, when I first joined Facebook, he was one of the first people I looked up. "No results found." And I let it go at that. But in the quiet of this morning, while Sam was at the gym and Grr napped on the couch, with nothing else to do (at least nothing that I could concentrate on as I mentally debated whether or not I should just go back to bed), I underwent a much more comprehensive search.
Turns out that Marshall is a teacher now with an advanced degree in pure mathematics, whatever that is. I even managed to find one picture of him (in all of the internet, I only managed to find one), and he is as I remember him.
So I'd say those were 45 minutes well-spent.
(The more I read this post, the more it seems like it was nothing but an excuse to talk about Marshall. Probably true.)
Thursday, March 17, 2011
3/17/2011 - let's focus on the arms. . .
In high school, I managed to get my hands on a copy of Anne Rice's Exit to Eden, her ode to bondage, S&M, and various other kinky escapades (one of which involved carefully-applied butter and cinnamon, if I remember correctly). It's been a long time since I've read it, so my memory may be hazy, but I do recall that a major plot point was the main character's getting-spanked-with-a-hairbrush fetish, developed by the spankings he received from his mother as a child.
(And now, you're probably wondering, "Hmmm, I wonder where today is going. . .")
(Not there, thankfully.)
I have long been fascinated with how people's fetishes develop, why some people find leather to be an incredible turn-on, or how feet could become a focal point for lust. I'm convinced everyone has a few of these quirky attractions, from the commonplace to the exotic. I know I do, and while describing most of them in any detail would likely be quite embarassing for everyone, I have one that is pretty benign. Obviously, then, we are headed in that direction.
I have a serious weak spot for men with muscular arms (see, not embarassing at all). Oh, and nice personalities, but for the sake of brevity, let's focus on the arms. This "fetish" began in college with a lifeguard at the UC Davis recreational pool. Let's just say that he was a lifeguard in every way that soft-core porn for women would portray one to be. He had a certain way of climbing up to his lifeguard chair that called out to every single muscle in his arms: "Formation! Formation!" And they obeyed, bulging in classically sculpture-like ways and forming a V-shaped line of shadow to separate his shoulders from the rest of his arms.
And thus began my love affair with that part of a man's body. And because being gay for me is stupidly synonymous with the struggle between wanting to sleep with men and wanting to look like the men I want to sleep with, I have always tried to make my arms look that way.
To no avail, of course, no matter how hard I (think I) work at the gym, how many protein shakes I inhale, how many magazines I read promising a harder, leaner, better body in 30 days or less. I just don't think my body is genetically built to look like Lifeguard's (for lack of a name).
Until this morning.
I was sleepily getting dressed when I noticed, out of the corner of my eye in the full-length mirror, the vaguest definition beneath my left shoulder. I paused, looked out of the closet door to make sure that Sam was still settled on the couch downstairs. After all, no guy wants to get caught looking at himself in the mirror. Actually, correction: no pale, skinny guy wants to get caughtlooking at trying to find his muscles in the mirror. If I had the body of the guy playing Thor in the upcoming movie of the same name, I would never be without a mirror, but unfortunately, I do not. (And by the way, if you haven't seen the trailer for Thor, you owe it to yourself. It contains about two seconds of absolute marketing genius. You'll know it when you see it. I'll even include a link to it. Thank me in the comments.)
Anyway, with some assurances of privacy, I took my shirt back off and searched. Nothing. Hmm. . . I walked over to the bathroom with better lighting, turned to the side, looked at my shoulder, and still nothing. Then back to the closet under the fluorescent light where I had stood previously, and still: nothing! And as I started to put my shirt back on, there it was, a faint shadow right under where my shoulders ended and my arms began. At last, I have found you. . .
So apparently, I have my ideal body (well, arms anyway) if I stay under direct overhead lighting after a night-long fast and I am constantly in the middle of putting on a button-down shirt.
I'll take it.
(And now, you're probably wondering, "Hmmm, I wonder where today is going. . .")
(Not there, thankfully.)
I have long been fascinated with how people's fetishes develop, why some people find leather to be an incredible turn-on, or how feet could become a focal point for lust. I'm convinced everyone has a few of these quirky attractions, from the commonplace to the exotic. I know I do, and while describing most of them in any detail would likely be quite embarassing for everyone, I have one that is pretty benign. Obviously, then, we are headed in that direction.
I have a serious weak spot for men with muscular arms (see, not embarassing at all). Oh, and nice personalities, but for the sake of brevity, let's focus on the arms. This "fetish" began in college with a lifeguard at the UC Davis recreational pool. Let's just say that he was a lifeguard in every way that soft-core porn for women would portray one to be. He had a certain way of climbing up to his lifeguard chair that called out to every single muscle in his arms: "Formation! Formation!" And they obeyed, bulging in classically sculpture-like ways and forming a V-shaped line of shadow to separate his shoulders from the rest of his arms.
And thus began my love affair with that part of a man's body. And because being gay for me is stupidly synonymous with the struggle between wanting to sleep with men and wanting to look like the men I want to sleep with, I have always tried to make my arms look that way.
To no avail, of course, no matter how hard I (think I) work at the gym, how many protein shakes I inhale, how many magazines I read promising a harder, leaner, better body in 30 days or less. I just don't think my body is genetically built to look like Lifeguard's (for lack of a name).
Until this morning.
I was sleepily getting dressed when I noticed, out of the corner of my eye in the full-length mirror, the vaguest definition beneath my left shoulder. I paused, looked out of the closet door to make sure that Sam was still settled on the couch downstairs. After all, no guy wants to get caught looking at himself in the mirror. Actually, correction: no pale, skinny guy wants to get caught
Anyway, with some assurances of privacy, I took my shirt back off and searched. Nothing. Hmm. . . I walked over to the bathroom with better lighting, turned to the side, looked at my shoulder, and still nothing. Then back to the closet under the fluorescent light where I had stood previously, and still: nothing! And as I started to put my shirt back on, there it was, a faint shadow right under where my shoulders ended and my arms began. At last, I have found you. . .
So apparently, I have my ideal body (well, arms anyway) if I stay under direct overhead lighting after a night-long fast and I am constantly in the middle of putting on a button-down shirt.
I'll take it.
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
3/16/2011 - dining with my partner. . .
"Wanna have lunch?"
Sam called around noon with his invitation, saying that he was downtown and starving. I immediately said yes, but then backtracked when I remembered that he would still have to go home to tend to Grr.
"Nope," he said. "I put him in preschool today."
'Preschool,' I learned, was basically four hours of puppy play time in a warehouse a few blocks from my office. Sam felt like Grr had been cooped up for the last few days with the rainy weather, so it would be good for him to stretch his legs and take out his cabin fever on somebody else for a change.
With Grr out of the way, we decided to meet in Union Square for Thai food. I had not been to Union Square in a couple of months. More importantly, I had not had the what-is-now-a luxury of actually dining with my partner in weeks.
Sure, we eat together, and sometimes, even do it when we don't have to keep one eye on Grr (such as dinners or brunches out with friends). But just the two of us? Last time that happened was three and a half weeks ago when we grabbed a quick lunch at Red Lobster before hurrying back to the adoption agency to get Grr and irrevocably change our lives forever. For the better, of course. Yeah. . .
As I walked toward our meeting place, I got more and more excited with each passing block. I could hardly believe that we would have this time together. I thought of all the things we could talk about now that we were distraction-free: from my anxieties about my impending a cappella stint to how this blog is going, from his fallout with our friend Allen to my friends out in Japan (who, thankfully, have only experienced minor damage from the earthquake/tsunami). We finally can have a meal where we eat leisurely, focus on each other, and not have to worry about what trouble Grr is finding for himself.
And in an ideal world, maybe all of that would have happened. We would have shared our feelings with each other over a leisurely meal, full of lingering glances and stolen moments. We'd leave not only with sated appetites, but a deeper understanding of each other as lovers. If time permitted, maybe we would even get to braiding each other's hair.
But this is reality, one where we were both starving and couldn't wolf down our food fast enough, and one where our lives are so enveloped by Grr, from the moment we wake up (which these days is four in the morning) to the moment all lights are off and we go to sleep, we really couldn't think of anything to talk about that wasn't about Grr, nor did we necessarily want to. We covered his development, his favorite toys, his squirreliness, his pooping habits, even (six times in a 24 hour period, the latest record he set yesterday).
Sam described how Grr was feeling when he got dropped off earlier, how his tail gradually loosened from between his legs as he found compatible playmates among the 20 other puppies. The women working there fell absolutely in love, fawning all over him and exclaiming how adorable he was:
During lunch, Sam suggested that we call the facility and check up on him, make sure he was doing OK with all the other pups. I immediately flashed back to my grade school years when I would be embarassed by my parents just by their presence and caring (horrific, I know), so I tried to dissuade him by asking if he wants to do that to Grr (as if he, or any of the other puppies, care). I thought I succeeded until I got back to my desk and found an e-mail from him saying that he just called (mere minutes after we parted ways) and Grr was fine, playing with both the staff and the other 'preschoolers.'
So lunch didn't go exactly as I had envisioned, and I think I see now just how entrenched we are in terms of "parenthood." Still, I can't say that I would have wanted lunch to be any different, and parenthood, tiring and trying as it may be, does come with its own rewards. I told Sam that I ran into an old friend at the gym who did not know we adopted a puppy. She was overjoyed, saying that having a dog has been the most rewarding thing for her, to have him run to the front door every evening to greet her, full of love and excitement. And she was right. Grr does routinely act as though we are reuniting every afternoon when I come home from work, sometimes even if I just go upstairs for a few minutes. Couple that with a partner who wants to have lunch with me during the day, even if all we talk about is the aforementioned pup, well, life can't be too bad.
Sam called around noon with his invitation, saying that he was downtown and starving. I immediately said yes, but then backtracked when I remembered that he would still have to go home to tend to Grr.
"Nope," he said. "I put him in preschool today."
'Preschool,' I learned, was basically four hours of puppy play time in a warehouse a few blocks from my office. Sam felt like Grr had been cooped up for the last few days with the rainy weather, so it would be good for him to stretch his legs and take out his cabin fever on somebody else for a change.
With Grr out of the way, we decided to meet in Union Square for Thai food. I had not been to Union Square in a couple of months. More importantly, I had not had the what-is-now-a luxury of actually dining with my partner in weeks.
Sure, we eat together, and sometimes, even do it when we don't have to keep one eye on Grr (such as dinners or brunches out with friends). But just the two of us? Last time that happened was three and a half weeks ago when we grabbed a quick lunch at Red Lobster before hurrying back to the adoption agency to get Grr and irrevocably change our lives forever. For the better, of course. Yeah. . .
As I walked toward our meeting place, I got more and more excited with each passing block. I could hardly believe that we would have this time together. I thought of all the things we could talk about now that we were distraction-free: from my anxieties about my impending a cappella stint to how this blog is going, from his fallout with our friend Allen to my friends out in Japan (who, thankfully, have only experienced minor damage from the earthquake/tsunami). We finally can have a meal where we eat leisurely, focus on each other, and not have to worry about what trouble Grr is finding for himself.
And in an ideal world, maybe all of that would have happened. We would have shared our feelings with each other over a leisurely meal, full of lingering glances and stolen moments. We'd leave not only with sated appetites, but a deeper understanding of each other as lovers. If time permitted, maybe we would even get to braiding each other's hair.
But this is reality, one where we were both starving and couldn't wolf down our food fast enough, and one where our lives are so enveloped by Grr, from the moment we wake up (which these days is four in the morning) to the moment all lights are off and we go to sleep, we really couldn't think of anything to talk about that wasn't about Grr, nor did we necessarily want to. We covered his development, his favorite toys, his squirreliness, his pooping habits, even (six times in a 24 hour period, the latest record he set yesterday).
Sam described how Grr was feeling when he got dropped off earlier, how his tail gradually loosened from between his legs as he found compatible playmates among the 20 other puppies. The women working there fell absolutely in love, fawning all over him and exclaiming how adorable he was:
During lunch, Sam suggested that we call the facility and check up on him, make sure he was doing OK with all the other pups. I immediately flashed back to my grade school years when I would be embarassed by my parents just by their presence and caring (horrific, I know), so I tried to dissuade him by asking if he wants to do that to Grr (as if he, or any of the other puppies, care). I thought I succeeded until I got back to my desk and found an e-mail from him saying that he just called (mere minutes after we parted ways) and Grr was fine, playing with both the staff and the other 'preschoolers.'
So lunch didn't go exactly as I had envisioned, and I think I see now just how entrenched we are in terms of "parenthood." Still, I can't say that I would have wanted lunch to be any different, and parenthood, tiring and trying as it may be, does come with its own rewards. I told Sam that I ran into an old friend at the gym who did not know we adopted a puppy. She was overjoyed, saying that having a dog has been the most rewarding thing for her, to have him run to the front door every evening to greet her, full of love and excitement. And she was right. Grr does routinely act as though we are reuniting every afternoon when I come home from work, sometimes even if I just go upstairs for a few minutes. Couple that with a partner who wants to have lunch with me during the day, even if all we talk about is the aforementioned pup, well, life can't be too bad.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
3/15/2011 - the newest baritone. . .
Last night's callback audition was essentially a "hit the ground running" kind of experience. I was given sheet music for U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For", a few minutes to go over notes for the bass line (so a lot of dum-dum-di-dums, not a lot of the melody that I actually knew), and then off I went, singing with the group. It is really difficult to sing something when six other people are singing six other things.
Still, it was as fun as the first time, and when the audition ended, I didn't actually want it to.
I got an e-mail this morning from one of the girls in the group. Meet the newest baritone to join Rapid Transit A Cappella (and his dog, who will not be joining, but is in the picture anyway) as of March 15th, 2011:
Still, it was as fun as the first time, and when the audition ended, I didn't actually want it to.
I got an e-mail this morning from one of the girls in the group. Meet the newest baritone to join Rapid Transit A Cappella (and his dog, who will not be joining, but is in the picture anyway) as of March 15th, 2011:
Monday, March 14, 2011
3/14/2011 - not good enough to impress them the first time. . .
A few weeks ago, I went to an audition to join a local a cappella group. Since then, I had not heard from them, and I slowly made my peace with it. The audition experience alone was enough of a thrill to lessen the sting of not actually making it in. Sure, let's go with that. It's like that Who's the Boss? episode where Angela lost an advertising award to a fresh-faced newcomer, and she kept repeating, "Well, it was an honor just being nominated," as a mantra to soften the blow. But really, who remembers nominees?
But right when I had given up all hope, I got an e-mail today asking me to attend a callback audition tonight. When I got the news, I actually felt kind of deflated: what, was I not good enough to impress them the first time?
The last time I went to a callback, it was for Working, the full-blown Stephen Schwartz musical theater experience I participated in last year. The callback was a multi-part audition event of singing, dancing, and a cold-read from the script. Not to say that I was any good at the singing, but it was the only part of the evening where I didn't feel like a complete tool. I was admittedly stiff during the cold read, and the dance portion was very A Chorus Line, only instead of trying to make the directors notice me, I'm pretty sure I made them notice me, along with my two left feet and complete ignorance of dance terms. To this day, how to make a 'kick-ball-change' seem effortless remains a mystery. I can see it in my head, even describe what needs to happen, but somewhere between my head and my feet, the signal goes from 'kick and ball-change' to 'let's make an ass out of myself.'
Still, I made it into the show, and subsequently had 10 of the most thrilling, enlightening, and fun weeks ever.
On the first night of rehearsal, I met the rest of the cast, a group of amazingly talented and supportive people, and we began singing through some of the group numbers. That was the first of many, "How ever did I get here?" moments, ones I'd swear were dreams if only I sounded better. (In my dreams, of course, I'm pretty much flawless in every way.)
Through Working, appropriately enough, I learned what it meant to work hard at something I loved to, to reach the end of the day and not want to stop. On show nights, as I sat in a corner and tried to fully comprehend that in 30 minutes, I would be on stage with an actual audience, others would be warming up, stretching, doing push-ups. I felt like I was let into a secret world, the backstage world of performers that I have always wondered about. I loved watching the girls sit on the table by the mirrors and apply their makeup, the side conversations and absurd-sounding vocal warm-up exercises. I was certainly not dreaming, and I was right where I wanted to be.
Of course, the experience was not without its hiccups. Throughout the 10 weeks, I lost about 12 pounds because I didn't have time to eat on rehearsal nights. During the dance rehearsals, I strained something in my foot that still hasn't fully recovered. One night, I flubbed a line so bad that all I could do was stand there and stare out into an audience I couldn't even see past the blinding lights. Sam had the great fortune of being there that night, and he has yet to wear out the novelty of teasing me with that one. To make matters worse, I was monologuing, so the stage was empty save me, my clipboard prop, and the silence that threatened to swallow me whole. This singular moment is definitely on my list of top five most embarassing events.
Yet it does nothing to taint the memory of it all, particularly the final song of the first act on closing night and singing the line, "If my destiny had been up to me / I could've been somethin'. . ." with a quickly forming tear in my eye. That line could not have been more relevant to me, as I always wonder what I could've been had I made different choices, took a different path.
Through the Working experience, I also inadvertently learned something about myself. As much as I have loved Broadway and showtunes and everything theater, I am surprisingly not so interested in acting, even less so in dancing (or maybe I should say that dancing is less interested in me). What I really loved doing, night after night, was singing.
Which brings me back to Rapid Transit A Cappella. I said it when I first had my audition, but I'll say it again: singing in an a cappella group would be everything I've ever wanted and more. Only thing standing in the way is this callback audition. I can only hope that it goes better than my other callback experience and, ironically, that the result remains the same.
But right when I had given up all hope, I got an e-mail today asking me to attend a callback audition tonight. When I got the news, I actually felt kind of deflated: what, was I not good enough to impress them the first time?
The last time I went to a callback, it was for Working, the full-blown Stephen Schwartz musical theater experience I participated in last year. The callback was a multi-part audition event of singing, dancing, and a cold-read from the script. Not to say that I was any good at the singing, but it was the only part of the evening where I didn't feel like a complete tool. I was admittedly stiff during the cold read, and the dance portion was very A Chorus Line, only instead of trying to make the directors notice me, I'm pretty sure I made them notice me, along with my two left feet and complete ignorance of dance terms. To this day, how to make a 'kick-ball-change' seem effortless remains a mystery. I can see it in my head, even describe what needs to happen, but somewhere between my head and my feet, the signal goes from 'kick and ball-change' to 'let's make an ass out of myself.'
Still, I made it into the show, and subsequently had 10 of the most thrilling, enlightening, and fun weeks ever.
On the first night of rehearsal, I met the rest of the cast, a group of amazingly talented and supportive people, and we began singing through some of the group numbers. That was the first of many, "How ever did I get here?" moments, ones I'd swear were dreams if only I sounded better. (In my dreams, of course, I'm pretty much flawless in every way.)
Through Working, appropriately enough, I learned what it meant to work hard at something I loved to, to reach the end of the day and not want to stop. On show nights, as I sat in a corner and tried to fully comprehend that in 30 minutes, I would be on stage with an actual audience, others would be warming up, stretching, doing push-ups. I felt like I was let into a secret world, the backstage world of performers that I have always wondered about. I loved watching the girls sit on the table by the mirrors and apply their makeup, the side conversations and absurd-sounding vocal warm-up exercises. I was certainly not dreaming, and I was right where I wanted to be.
Of course, the experience was not without its hiccups. Throughout the 10 weeks, I lost about 12 pounds because I didn't have time to eat on rehearsal nights. During the dance rehearsals, I strained something in my foot that still hasn't fully recovered. One night, I flubbed a line so bad that all I could do was stand there and stare out into an audience I couldn't even see past the blinding lights. Sam had the great fortune of being there that night, and he has yet to wear out the novelty of teasing me with that one. To make matters worse, I was monologuing, so the stage was empty save me, my clipboard prop, and the silence that threatened to swallow me whole. This singular moment is definitely on my list of top five most embarassing events.
Yet it does nothing to taint the memory of it all, particularly the final song of the first act on closing night and singing the line, "If my destiny had been up to me / I could've been somethin'. . ." with a quickly forming tear in my eye. That line could not have been more relevant to me, as I always wonder what I could've been had I made different choices, took a different path.
Through the Working experience, I also inadvertently learned something about myself. As much as I have loved Broadway and showtunes and everything theater, I am surprisingly not so interested in acting, even less so in dancing (or maybe I should say that dancing is less interested in me). What I really loved doing, night after night, was singing.
Which brings me back to Rapid Transit A Cappella. I said it when I first had my audition, but I'll say it again: singing in an a cappella group would be everything I've ever wanted and more. Only thing standing in the way is this callback audition. I can only hope that it goes better than my other callback experience and, ironically, that the result remains the same.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
3/13/2011 - 20 hours. . .
In all, I think I have slept over 20 hours this weekend. Beginning on Friday night, when I fell asleep on the couch at 9:00 until just now, when I begrudgingly awoke from a two-hour nap, this weekend gave me the sleep I've been needing to recharge and better prepare myself to handle Grr's mishaps, such as the devil-may-care look on his face as he peed right by his crate Saturday morning, and the absolute refusal to poop today even though he hadn't done so for over 12 hours.
Each bout of sleep, though, ended with an awakening that felt no less difficult than any of the truncated nights of sleep I've gotten during the week. Yesterday morning, I found myself sleeping perpendicular to the bed with a crick in my neck after Sam got up, and woke with a wicked headache.
This afternoon, I had to drag my eyelids open. It felt like I was paralyzed on the couch. I could hear everything that was going on around me, from the commotion of Terminator 2 on TV to Grr's new favorite toy, a squeaky rubber chicken, but I couldn't react to anything. Every position I got in felt like the most comfortable position I could possibly find, and every minute sleeping felt like seconds. I started dozing off around 2:45 this afternoon, and before I knew it, it was after 4:30, and Sam had already taken Grr out to the garage once, repotted a plant, and made himself a cocktail.
I'm sure he felt really good about himself, having accomplished so much while I did nothing more than flip over and curl up in a fetal position. Still, I can't describe the amount of good it did me.
Each bout of sleep, though, ended with an awakening that felt no less difficult than any of the truncated nights of sleep I've gotten during the week. Yesterday morning, I found myself sleeping perpendicular to the bed with a crick in my neck after Sam got up, and woke with a wicked headache.
This afternoon, I had to drag my eyelids open. It felt like I was paralyzed on the couch. I could hear everything that was going on around me, from the commotion of Terminator 2 on TV to Grr's new favorite toy, a squeaky rubber chicken, but I couldn't react to anything. Every position I got in felt like the most comfortable position I could possibly find, and every minute sleeping felt like seconds. I started dozing off around 2:45 this afternoon, and before I knew it, it was after 4:30, and Sam had already taken Grr out to the garage once, repotted a plant, and made himself a cocktail.
I'm sure he felt really good about himself, having accomplished so much while I did nothing more than flip over and curl up in a fetal position. Still, I can't describe the amount of good it did me.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
3/12/2011 - a small-minded, shallow, bourgeois selection. . .
I'm not sure if there is anything I wouldn't do right now for a vacation. Seems like every other day, I am looking at other people's vacation photos on Facebook: Hawaii, New York, Thailand, all places I would love to be right now. Jealousy only begins to describe how I feel.
The other day, I got a little postcard from a hotel/casino in Vegas, offering me a couple of free nights and a show. I caught myself looking longingly at it as I tried to figure out how Sam and I might take advantage of it, knowing that it was not very probable.
Though I will still say that one of my best vacations ever was the week in Oahu, I must admit that Vegas is my favorite city. I hate admitting that because it seems like such a small-minded, shallow, bourgeois selection compared to a host of other possible choices, ones that offer history, culture, and class. One could easily argue that Las Vegas offers no history, a diluted version of culture, and faux class; instead, it serves up flash and glitz and a generous helping of gaud.
And as much as I hate to admit it, that is exactly why I love it. No thinking needed. Days can go by without really using my brain beyond deciding what buffet to have for dinner. In fact, I think it is totally believable that if I were in Vegas for the last few days, I would still have not heard about the earthquake in Japan. The escapism that Vegas offers is that enveloping, so thorough as to be unavoidable.
It's not even so much about the gambling that I find so attractive, though there is plenty of it and I could while away an entire afternoon at a lively craps table. And it's not the club scene, as I don't think I've stepped inside a club in years. Though I love the kitchiness of it all, the audacity, I know deep inside that none of it is real, and everything I see is designed for one purpose only: to part everyone who visits with their hard-earned money.
But that is kind of the beauty of it all, isn't it, the simplicity? It has become, for me at least, a vacation destination where I do not have to think at all. By now, I have stayed in over half of all the major hotels in the city, and can probably tell you tourist information that rivals a hotel's concierge. I know back streets to get from one end of the Strip to the other, and can take you to every single bar listed in the local gay rag, all of which I visited when I was there by myself shortly after my 22nd birthday, including one that advertised a "foam party." Funny how Vegas defines a foam party: what I imagined to be a room full of half-naked men writhing to house music in a sea of, well, foam turned out to be nothing more than an inflatable kiddie pool plopped in the middle of a small dance floor with some bubble bath and one sad queen dancing by himself in the corner.
Vegas can be like that, I guess; nothing is as it should be. Ancient Rome is brought to life down the street from the Eiffel Tower, which reflects the lights and glamour of Hollywood, which is adjacent to the "Manhattan" skyline, which sits a block from an "Egyptian" pyramid.
Some day, I'd like to see the real Colisseum, visit the real Eiffel Tower, or maybe even have my breath taken away by the actual Sphinx crouching next to actual pyramids. For now, I guess I can settle for Vegas versions, or, as my case may be, just spend an hour thinking about them. At least it did, for a moment, make me feel like I was right there. Seems like this is the closest I'll get to a vacation any time soon.
The other day, I got a little postcard from a hotel/casino in Vegas, offering me a couple of free nights and a show. I caught myself looking longingly at it as I tried to figure out how Sam and I might take advantage of it, knowing that it was not very probable.
Though I will still say that one of my best vacations ever was the week in Oahu, I must admit that Vegas is my favorite city. I hate admitting that because it seems like such a small-minded, shallow, bourgeois selection compared to a host of other possible choices, ones that offer history, culture, and class. One could easily argue that Las Vegas offers no history, a diluted version of culture, and faux class; instead, it serves up flash and glitz and a generous helping of gaud.
And as much as I hate to admit it, that is exactly why I love it. No thinking needed. Days can go by without really using my brain beyond deciding what buffet to have for dinner. In fact, I think it is totally believable that if I were in Vegas for the last few days, I would still have not heard about the earthquake in Japan. The escapism that Vegas offers is that enveloping, so thorough as to be unavoidable.
It's not even so much about the gambling that I find so attractive, though there is plenty of it and I could while away an entire afternoon at a lively craps table. And it's not the club scene, as I don't think I've stepped inside a club in years. Though I love the kitchiness of it all, the audacity, I know deep inside that none of it is real, and everything I see is designed for one purpose only: to part everyone who visits with their hard-earned money.
But that is kind of the beauty of it all, isn't it, the simplicity? It has become, for me at least, a vacation destination where I do not have to think at all. By now, I have stayed in over half of all the major hotels in the city, and can probably tell you tourist information that rivals a hotel's concierge. I know back streets to get from one end of the Strip to the other, and can take you to every single bar listed in the local gay rag, all of which I visited when I was there by myself shortly after my 22nd birthday, including one that advertised a "foam party." Funny how Vegas defines a foam party: what I imagined to be a room full of half-naked men writhing to house music in a sea of, well, foam turned out to be nothing more than an inflatable kiddie pool plopped in the middle of a small dance floor with some bubble bath and one sad queen dancing by himself in the corner.
Vegas can be like that, I guess; nothing is as it should be. Ancient Rome is brought to life down the street from the Eiffel Tower, which reflects the lights and glamour of Hollywood, which is adjacent to the "Manhattan" skyline, which sits a block from an "Egyptian" pyramid.
Some day, I'd like to see the real Colisseum, visit the real Eiffel Tower, or maybe even have my breath taken away by the actual Sphinx crouching next to actual pyramids. For now, I guess I can settle for Vegas versions, or, as my case may be, just spend an hour thinking about them. At least it did, for a moment, make me feel like I was right there. Seems like this is the closest I'll get to a vacation any time soon.
Friday, March 11, 2011
3/11/2011 - perspective. . .
What can I say today that won't seem trite in light of the earthquake in Japan? Everything I complain about is put into perspective, and I have everything to be grateful for.
(Donate to the American Red Cross to help their disaster relief efforts.)
(Donate to the American Red Cross to help their disaster relief efforts.)
Thursday, March 10, 2011
3/10/2011 - not so much about gratitude. . .
I think I may have understated my feelings about Grr the other day when I said that I was a little annoyed at him. To say that I have been feeling very ambivalent about him would be putting it in the best possible light, but to just go ahead and say that I feel a growing resentment directed toward him would be more accurate.
I don't want to feel this way, especially since he is a really sweet little pup, but I can't seem to help myself. I could easily explain it as a matter of irritability due to a lack of sleep, but I know that it is more than that.
Actually, I should clarify. It may have originally been about a lack of sleep, but because it went unaddressed, the problem now has become something of a philosophical issue (as many issues end up when I get my hands on them). Now, it is not merely about Grr not sleeping through the night, or his accidents in the house, or his inability to go outside because he is scared of the traffic noise. It has become an issue of character. My character.
I'm going to say something here that I'm not sure if I really even mean, but I have no other way of expressing the magnitude of how I feel other than to say that I wish Sam and I never adopted this dog in the first place.
Does that make me a bad person? Even if it does, it shouldn't, right? Nowhere does it say that I must welcome a dog into my life as some point with open arms. Yet I know that my inability to cope with Grr's behavioral issues in the midst of night after night of broken sleep somehow makes me selfish or worthy of judgment. You're probably judging me right now, and that's totally fine because to some degree, I feel like I deserve it.
Eleanor Roosevelt famously said that no one can make you feel inferior without your consent. I think it would have been more accurate to add an addendum to the end of that phrase to say, "but they can make you reassess your own character and if you end up feeling inferior, it's not their fault."
My mom wrote me an e-mail the other day after I told her that I was extremely frustrated with Grr and am finding him harder and harder to bear. She dispensed some advice that was more or less what I had already heard from countless websites I consulted, but she closed her note with the following: "If you have love, then you would be willing to tolerate anything." The implication there is that if I don't accept Grr for all he is and love him because (as opposed to in spite of), then I don't have the capacity for love.
And maybe I don't, but I don't need her to tell me, and I certainly don't need Grr here for the hands-on demonstration. And if I don't, then it would be a very disappointing realization that I will eventually have to deal with, because I never thought of myself as the kind of person with a finite amount of love.
But before I plunge into a deep existential crisis, I know that the past few weeks have been difficult in large part due to my approach to the matter. I know that if I changed my attitude, shifted my paradigm a little and focused on the future, the one where Grr inevitably becomes the kind of dog I need while I hopefully grow to become the kind of owner Grr wants, this whole issue will then barely even be a blip on the radar.
On the flip side, Sam has been endlessly patient, loving, and caring toward Grr, something that I absolutely did not expect from him. He walks and talks to him around the garage while trying to make him go pee and/or poop, turning it into a casual stroll (in a tight circle, but a stroll nonetheless). When Grr pees in the house, he calmly gives him a dirty look, but then says not another word about it as he cleans it up. He holds him up to the window so they can look out at the passing cars together and get used to the noise. Meanwhile, I stand there and beg him to go pee and curse quietly to myself when he misses his puppy pads or has an accident. When he was afraid to go outside, I instinctively turned on my bad parentings skills, like King George to Bertie and his stutter in The King's Speech: "Just get it out, boy! Get over it!"
That is not who I want to be, nor is it who I want Grr to think I am, but at the same time, I can't get the idea out of my head that just three weeks ago, my life was simple and plain and just the way I wanted it. To say that I miss that life would be yet another understatement; I long for that life. And I feel like I am failing to meet the expectations that this should be a happy occassion, one full of love and fun and discovery. This further fuels my frustration, though I guess I do accomplish that last one, since the last fewdays weeks have been all about discovery, though not exactly in the way that I had wanted or expected.
So today is really not so much about gratitude as it is about personal introspection, a fessing up of how I have been trying to spin Grr's presence in my life into something positive when I really am running out of ways to feel good. I'm hoping if I admit that so far, the pet-owning experience has not been all about fun and cuteness, I can maybe move beyond what I think is expected of me and how I should be feeling and actually try to feel something genuine, something altogether better than how I've been feeling so far.
I don't want to feel this way, especially since he is a really sweet little pup, but I can't seem to help myself. I could easily explain it as a matter of irritability due to a lack of sleep, but I know that it is more than that.
Actually, I should clarify. It may have originally been about a lack of sleep, but because it went unaddressed, the problem now has become something of a philosophical issue (as many issues end up when I get my hands on them). Now, it is not merely about Grr not sleeping through the night, or his accidents in the house, or his inability to go outside because he is scared of the traffic noise. It has become an issue of character. My character.
I'm going to say something here that I'm not sure if I really even mean, but I have no other way of expressing the magnitude of how I feel other than to say that I wish Sam and I never adopted this dog in the first place.
Does that make me a bad person? Even if it does, it shouldn't, right? Nowhere does it say that I must welcome a dog into my life as some point with open arms. Yet I know that my inability to cope with Grr's behavioral issues in the midst of night after night of broken sleep somehow makes me selfish or worthy of judgment. You're probably judging me right now, and that's totally fine because to some degree, I feel like I deserve it.
Eleanor Roosevelt famously said that no one can make you feel inferior without your consent. I think it would have been more accurate to add an addendum to the end of that phrase to say, "but they can make you reassess your own character and if you end up feeling inferior, it's not their fault."
My mom wrote me an e-mail the other day after I told her that I was extremely frustrated with Grr and am finding him harder and harder to bear. She dispensed some advice that was more or less what I had already heard from countless websites I consulted, but she closed her note with the following: "If you have love, then you would be willing to tolerate anything." The implication there is that if I don't accept Grr for all he is and love him because (as opposed to in spite of), then I don't have the capacity for love.
And maybe I don't, but I don't need her to tell me, and I certainly don't need Grr here for the hands-on demonstration. And if I don't, then it would be a very disappointing realization that I will eventually have to deal with, because I never thought of myself as the kind of person with a finite amount of love.
But before I plunge into a deep existential crisis, I know that the past few weeks have been difficult in large part due to my approach to the matter. I know that if I changed my attitude, shifted my paradigm a little and focused on the future, the one where Grr inevitably becomes the kind of dog I need while I hopefully grow to become the kind of owner Grr wants, this whole issue will then barely even be a blip on the radar.
On the flip side, Sam has been endlessly patient, loving, and caring toward Grr, something that I absolutely did not expect from him. He walks and talks to him around the garage while trying to make him go pee and/or poop, turning it into a casual stroll (in a tight circle, but a stroll nonetheless). When Grr pees in the house, he calmly gives him a dirty look, but then says not another word about it as he cleans it up. He holds him up to the window so they can look out at the passing cars together and get used to the noise. Meanwhile, I stand there and beg him to go pee and curse quietly to myself when he misses his puppy pads or has an accident. When he was afraid to go outside, I instinctively turned on my bad parentings skills, like King George to Bertie and his stutter in The King's Speech: "Just get it out, boy! Get over it!"
That is not who I want to be, nor is it who I want Grr to think I am, but at the same time, I can't get the idea out of my head that just three weeks ago, my life was simple and plain and just the way I wanted it. To say that I miss that life would be yet another understatement; I long for that life. And I feel like I am failing to meet the expectations that this should be a happy occassion, one full of love and fun and discovery. This further fuels my frustration, though I guess I do accomplish that last one, since the last few
So today is really not so much about gratitude as it is about personal introspection, a fessing up of how I have been trying to spin Grr's presence in my life into something positive when I really am running out of ways to feel good. I'm hoping if I admit that so far, the pet-owning experience has not been all about fun and cuteness, I can maybe move beyond what I think is expected of me and how I should be feeling and actually try to feel something genuine, something altogether better than how I've been feeling so far.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
3/9/2011 - the other bumbling ways I've come out. . .
Tonight, I flexed my considerably shaky cooking skills and attempted to make Cuban-style picadillo for dinner. Turns out that picadillo, or cooking it at least, jogged one very specific kind of memory: the act of coming out. More specifically, the act of coming out badly.
It all began because picadillo reminded me of Max's Opera Cafe, my first post-college job where I waited tables. Picadillo was introduced as a special one day and stuck around for a few months out of demand. It was pretty tasty. But what I remember most was having it one afternoon after finishing a shift and a fellow server sidled into the booth to strike up a conversation that went something like this:
Marie: Hey Austin! (shit-eating grin)
Me: Hey you.
Marie: How was your shift today?
Me: Oh, pretty slow, but I had some good tables. How about you?
Marie: Yea, same. So you are gay. . .
Apparently, my sexuality had been under debate for quite some time between some of the other servers and even one of the managers. Max's was just that kind of place. And besides, servers sang showtunes during the dinner shift, so I was probably already questionable, and I don't imagine the debate was all that furious.
Thinking about that conversation always makes me smile, as it did tonight while I sautéed onions and bay leaves. I then thought of all the other bumbling ways I've come out, how it happened with a girl I met as an afterschool SAT tutor. I was hired to teach the verbal section to a class of high school students, and Monica was assigned to cover the math portion. We were around the same age, had similar interests, and quickly became friends.
One night after we finished our classes, she and I sat on a curb by my car in downtown Sacramento and tried to decide what to do with our evening:
Monica: Wanna grab some coffee?
Me: Sure. There's a dessert place right down the street.
Monica: Or we could go see a movie.
Me: You know I'm gay, right?
Monica: Ummmm, no?
Me: Oh.
And yet both of those scenarios were less awkward than how I was outed to my friend Harrison in my third year of college. Though I had been officially out for years at that point, I hesitated coming out directly to Harrison because he was a staunch heterosexual in the Air Force Reserves, and I admittedly had a tiny crush on him. One afternoon, as he and I left an English lecture and was just about to leave the building, my entirely gay friend Sothea came bounding around the corner and proclaimed as only a nelly queen can:
Sothea: Heeey bitch!
Me: Um, hey, Sothea.
Sothea: Ooooohhhh, were you wit' yo' man last night?
Me: Um, no. So, uh, wh-wh-what's, uh, going on with you?
Sothea: Mmmmmm-hmmmmmm. . . (through pursed lips)
Harrison said that he had never seen me turn so red so fast.
All this to say that I made picadillo tonight, and it was pretty delicious, if I do say so (Sam did too). And even if we didn't, we would still have to eat it tomorrow since the recipe made enough for six.
It all began because picadillo reminded me of Max's Opera Cafe, my first post-college job where I waited tables. Picadillo was introduced as a special one day and stuck around for a few months out of demand. It was pretty tasty. But what I remember most was having it one afternoon after finishing a shift and a fellow server sidled into the booth to strike up a conversation that went something like this:
Marie: Hey Austin! (shit-eating grin)
Me: Hey you.
Marie: How was your shift today?
Me: Oh, pretty slow, but I had some good tables. How about you?
Marie: Yea, same. So you are gay. . .
Apparently, my sexuality had been under debate for quite some time between some of the other servers and even one of the managers. Max's was just that kind of place. And besides, servers sang showtunes during the dinner shift, so I was probably already questionable, and I don't imagine the debate was all that furious.
Thinking about that conversation always makes me smile, as it did tonight while I sautéed onions and bay leaves. I then thought of all the other bumbling ways I've come out, how it happened with a girl I met as an afterschool SAT tutor. I was hired to teach the verbal section to a class of high school students, and Monica was assigned to cover the math portion. We were around the same age, had similar interests, and quickly became friends.
One night after we finished our classes, she and I sat on a curb by my car in downtown Sacramento and tried to decide what to do with our evening:
Monica: Wanna grab some coffee?
Me: Sure. There's a dessert place right down the street.
Monica: Or we could go see a movie.
Me: You know I'm gay, right?
Monica: Ummmm, no?
Me: Oh.
And yet both of those scenarios were less awkward than how I was outed to my friend Harrison in my third year of college. Though I had been officially out for years at that point, I hesitated coming out directly to Harrison because he was a staunch heterosexual in the Air Force Reserves, and I admittedly had a tiny crush on him. One afternoon, as he and I left an English lecture and was just about to leave the building, my entirely gay friend Sothea came bounding around the corner and proclaimed as only a nelly queen can:
Sothea: Heeey bitch!
Me: Um, hey, Sothea.
Sothea: Ooooohhhh, were you wit' yo' man last night?
Me: Um, no. So, uh, wh-wh-what's, uh, going on with you?
Sothea: Mmmmmm-hmmmmmm. . . (through pursed lips)
Harrison said that he had never seen me turn so red so fast.
All this to say that I made picadillo tonight, and it was pretty delicious, if I do say so (Sam did too). And even if we didn't, we would still have to eat it tomorrow since the recipe made enough for six.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
3/8/2011 - writing about the good in life. . .
I woke up this morning in the worst mood possible. This ill-humor has been slowly building as the days go by, days that now unofficially begin when Grr decides he wants to whine and rattle his crate. I explained this habit of his to a friend the other day as analogous to an inmate banging his tin cup against the bars of his cell, only in this case, I feel like the prisoner. An eternally tired, irritated prisoner.
So I thought that today would be a great day to put this gratitude experiment to the test, see if all these weeks of writing about the good in life and thankfulness really have changed me at all. First, I thought I should list what I can reasonably blame for my bad mood. Well, it would be a very short list: Grr. I'm just kidding. Kind of. But not really:
So now that that's done, do I feel better? I think there are two answers. Quantifiably? Yes, definitely; numbers don't lie. But actually? I'm not sure. Maybe. But I guess it's better than what I would have said before I saw the two lists, which would have been a categorical 'no.'
So I'm going to go ahead and mark it as a success. Yay. Maybe this means I can stop doing this blog now. .
So I thought that today would be a great day to put this gratitude experiment to the test, see if all these weeks of writing about the good in life and thankfulness really have changed me at all. First, I thought I should list what I can reasonably blame for my bad mood. Well, it would be a very short list: Grr. I'm just kidding. Kind of. But not really:
- Grr's whining, which started at 3:00 this morning (2:00 yesterday, and various other times of o'dark-thirty in all the mornings prior). He tested out an arsenal of intonations and pitches over the span of maybe half an hour, varying them all just enough so I couldn't easily tune them out.
- When I finally did drag myself out of bed, I took Grr out to the garage to do his business (since he is terrified of the outdoors). He peed and pooped twice each in four different places, not one of them included the puppy pads I laid down. Soaking up pee and scooping up poop is not exactly what I want to do first thing in the morning.
- What I do typically want to do first thing in the morning, I have not been able to. This next item may be too much information, but in the spirit of honesty, I present it here with no further comment, hidden for the sensitive types: I'm sexually frustrated. (Of course, now you can't look away.)
- Despite my mood and tiredness, I still managed to work out to a point where my arms felt noodley.
- Hunter, the cute front desk boy at the gym, said 'good morning' and remembered my name.
- There was a huge supply of free gum by the mailboxes at work. (I don't really chew or like gum, but my Asianness holds its own pride parade when 'free' is involved, so I now have 15 boxes of gum in my drawer.)
- Sam let me vent about my frustrations (except #3, above, since I was sitting in the cafeteria at work), and despite the conclusion we reached that I feel totally trapped in my life right now, he still managed to make me laugh. A little.
- The stock market closed up after a few rollercoaster days. Even though I know it is totally unrelated, I still feel like it somehow increases my home value.
- My weekly staff meeting got cancelled today, which allowed me to eat lunch at my normal time.
- I bought a bag of Sour Patch Kids and ate them until my tongue went numb.
- I also managed to choke down two protein shakes, and I'm imagining them turning me into the buff Abercrombie model I've always wanted to be even as I type.
- It didn't rain on my commute to or from work, and on my way home, I hit mostly green lights.
- Sam and I had burritos from our favorite taqueria for dinner.
- Tomorrow is Wednesday, which is my designated day off from the gym, which means I can go to bed tonight without the burden of knowing that I'll be back up at five tomorrow morning. Of course, I probably still will be (damn you, Grr), but at least I don't have to go to the gym.
- When I'm not tired and annoyed and running after him to clean up his excrements, Grr is still the handsomest puppy I could ever have hoped for:
So now that that's done, do I feel better? I think there are two answers. Quantifiably? Yes, definitely; numbers don't lie. But actually? I'm not sure. Maybe. But I guess it's better than what I would have said before I saw the two lists, which would have been a categorical 'no.'
So I'm going to go ahead and mark it as a success. Yay. Maybe this means I can stop doing this blog now. .
Monday, March 7, 2011
3/7/2011 - the power of pretend. . .
In a theoretical way, I always thought that I would make a great dad some day. In theory, I'd like to think of myself as parental and a good caregiver, the fun dad that my kids would call "Pop." In reality, I have less than no idea how to relate to them.
By the time kids have made their way through baby- and toddlerhood, they likely have developed little personalities and want to play games, pretend and imagine. I'm no good at any of that stuff. In that way, I have always been old. Even when I was young, I was old. I think I first got the acute sense of it when I was nine or 10, and I discovered that I lacked imagination. For Christmas one year, I got an elaborate Lego set of a medieval castle, complete with four walls, an articulating drawbridge, and a glow-in-the-dark ghost to haunt the tower. Exactly what I wanted.
It took me a few weeks to put it all together according to the included specs, and it was great fun to see it through to completion. Once I placed the final Lego flag on the final Lego tower, I remember feeling a vague sense of disappointment, like a "What do I do with this now?" kind of feeling. I didn't know, so I just looked at it, raising and lowering the drawbridge from time to time.
Mostly, it just sat there on my desk, like a monument to my failure. I wanted to play with it, wage battles and quests with my horse-mounted Lego men, but I lacked the power of pretend and did not know how to play. I could not move those Lego characters without seeing my hand doing the moving, could not act out scenes from King Arthur without seeing the carpet underneath the castle floors. I couldn't even tear it apart and build something else with the pieces, anything other than what the instructions dictated.
In college, I dated a man with a five-year-old son named James. James liked me well enough at first, constantly asking me to play Matchbox cars with him. And I would, but tried as I did, I just could never make those Matchbox cars be anything more than palm-sized replicas of actual race cars (which itself didn't exactly thrill me in the first place). The worst part was that I think he knew. Eventually, he stopped asking me to play with him; could there be anything worse than failing at playing with a five-year-old?
But now I have Grr, practically a child himself in his needs and behaviors (both the good and the bad), and I think he sees me as the most fun dad that I could ever be. When I come down the stairs, he often gallops over with his ears plastered to the side of his head, wagging his entire body along with his tail like it had been ages since he'd seen me last. If I sit on the floor with him, he inevitably plops down on my lap with whatever chew toy he conveniently grabbed on his way. In the mornings when he comes upstairs and I'm still in bed, he gives me little kisses all over my face and falls down right on my chest, as if to say, "I can't wait for you to wake up, give me all of your attention, and play!"
Who actually knows what he means since we can't exactly sit down and chat about it (that would pretty much solve my problems with kids, too, if I could do that). But for now, I'll just pretend that that's what he means, and maybe with enough time, I'll come to learn that I do know how to play after all.
By the time kids have made their way through baby- and toddlerhood, they likely have developed little personalities and want to play games, pretend and imagine. I'm no good at any of that stuff. In that way, I have always been old. Even when I was young, I was old. I think I first got the acute sense of it when I was nine or 10, and I discovered that I lacked imagination. For Christmas one year, I got an elaborate Lego set of a medieval castle, complete with four walls, an articulating drawbridge, and a glow-in-the-dark ghost to haunt the tower. Exactly what I wanted.
It took me a few weeks to put it all together according to the included specs, and it was great fun to see it through to completion. Once I placed the final Lego flag on the final Lego tower, I remember feeling a vague sense of disappointment, like a "What do I do with this now?" kind of feeling. I didn't know, so I just looked at it, raising and lowering the drawbridge from time to time.
Mostly, it just sat there on my desk, like a monument to my failure. I wanted to play with it, wage battles and quests with my horse-mounted Lego men, but I lacked the power of pretend and did not know how to play. I could not move those Lego characters without seeing my hand doing the moving, could not act out scenes from King Arthur without seeing the carpet underneath the castle floors. I couldn't even tear it apart and build something else with the pieces, anything other than what the instructions dictated.
In college, I dated a man with a five-year-old son named James. James liked me well enough at first, constantly asking me to play Matchbox cars with him. And I would, but tried as I did, I just could never make those Matchbox cars be anything more than palm-sized replicas of actual race cars (which itself didn't exactly thrill me in the first place). The worst part was that I think he knew. Eventually, he stopped asking me to play with him; could there be anything worse than failing at playing with a five-year-old?
But now I have Grr, practically a child himself in his needs and behaviors (both the good and the bad), and I think he sees me as the most fun dad that I could ever be. When I come down the stairs, he often gallops over with his ears plastered to the side of his head, wagging his entire body along with his tail like it had been ages since he'd seen me last. If I sit on the floor with him, he inevitably plops down on my lap with whatever chew toy he conveniently grabbed on his way. In the mornings when he comes upstairs and I'm still in bed, he gives me little kisses all over my face and falls down right on my chest, as if to say, "I can't wait for you to wake up, give me all of your attention, and play!"
Who actually knows what he means since we can't exactly sit down and chat about it (that would pretty much solve my problems with kids, too, if I could do that). But for now, I'll just pretend that that's what he means, and maybe with enough time, I'll come to learn that I do know how to play after all.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
3/6/2011 - the fear of wanting to fall. . .
I woke up this morning thinking about relationships for some reason, the delicate nature of them. I wish I could explain where these thoughts come from and why. Or, actually, it'd be nice to just think of simpler things like American Idol or whatever else is cool nowadays. But as I laid in bed, fighting the morning, simultaneously wanting to get up to start the day and putting it off indefinitely, I wrestled with the question of how it is that two people manage to not only find each other but stay together for any amount of time. I don't know why I thought this, or what it means that I did, but the idea of it bounced back and forth in my head.
I thought of how a relationship feels like it is held in supreme balance on good days, leveled on the head of a pin. On bad ones, though, it feels more like standing on a cliffside with your toes dangling over the edge. Milan Kundera in The Unbearable Lightness of Being defined vertigo as not necessarily the fear of falling, but the fear of wanting to fall. I think in a way, he could have been talking about love, both the pursuit and abdication of it.
I thought about Sam, a self-professed loner who claims that he is not one to pursue or care about being in a relationship of any kind, romantic or otherwise. Where on the surface, this statement should put me in a rather dubious position, I know that he is just putting up a facade (or at least I hope). I know that he once had a profile on Match.com, went on dates that ranged from fruitful to disastrous with people he enjoyed meeting and others he forgot about immediately afterwards. Still, somewhere inside, he must have wanted to be with someone if he put forth the effort. In spite of himself, he must have looked for love, and now, it is just too difficult to admit through the thick shell of armor he wears that he ever could have wanted something so human.
I'm not even sure why I am writing this, what it is I am thankful for today, or why it all came to me in the haze between waking and not. It's just that I heard Sam and Grr playing downstairs, a sporadic squeak from Grr's raccoon chew toy, and as much as I wanted to join them, I could not will my body to move. I was that tired. Yet my mind was active and heard every time Sam laughed at Grr, told him to quiet down because I was sleeping, every time he said, "Good boy" as if it was the most exciting thing he had uttered in his life. While fading in and out, I wondered how we, Sam and I, and to some extent, Grr as well, how we all got to where we are today.
I thought of how a relationship feels like it is held in supreme balance on good days, leveled on the head of a pin. On bad ones, though, it feels more like standing on a cliffside with your toes dangling over the edge. Milan Kundera in The Unbearable Lightness of Being defined vertigo as not necessarily the fear of falling, but the fear of wanting to fall. I think in a way, he could have been talking about love, both the pursuit and abdication of it.
I thought about Sam, a self-professed loner who claims that he is not one to pursue or care about being in a relationship of any kind, romantic or otherwise. Where on the surface, this statement should put me in a rather dubious position, I know that he is just putting up a facade (or at least I hope). I know that he once had a profile on Match.com, went on dates that ranged from fruitful to disastrous with people he enjoyed meeting and others he forgot about immediately afterwards. Still, somewhere inside, he must have wanted to be with someone if he put forth the effort. In spite of himself, he must have looked for love, and now, it is just too difficult to admit through the thick shell of armor he wears that he ever could have wanted something so human.
I'm not even sure why I am writing this, what it is I am thankful for today, or why it all came to me in the haze between waking and not. It's just that I heard Sam and Grr playing downstairs, a sporadic squeak from Grr's raccoon chew toy, and as much as I wanted to join them, I could not will my body to move. I was that tired. Yet my mind was active and heard every time Sam laughed at Grr, told him to quiet down because I was sleeping, every time he said, "Good boy" as if it was the most exciting thing he had uttered in his life. While fading in and out, I wondered how we, Sam and I, and to some extent, Grr as well, how we all got to where we are today.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
3/5/2011 - a complete and true picture of my friend. . .
About six years ago, I met my friend Steve. He was one of the regular morning gym-goers I would see every day, and he introduced himself after we both realized we were fixtures there. I thought, "Wow, he's a nice guy."
The next day after we 'officially' met, I was sitting on a bench, yawning and still trying to wake up. Steve came over and said, "Girl! Are you just sucking up air over here?" I thought, "Wow, I don't think you know me well enough to be calling me 'Girl!'"
Or maybe he already did. Probably so.
And I quickly learned that that was how it was with Steve. Strangers were a foreign concept to him; we were all merely friends-in-waiting. I guess he wasn't called the "unofficial mayor of the Castro" for nothing.
And luckily for me, he was like that, the counterbalance to my introvertedness. Back then, I was going through a rough patch and was very shy, almost to the point of not knowing how to be in a social setting. I didn't want to be that way; I just didn't know how to be any way else. Truth is, I never got lonely because I was alone. I got lonely because I sometimes felt like I didn't know how to be anything but alone.
Steve changed that. He would always approach me at the gym, always prepared with conversation and stories and questions to break me out of my shell. It came to a point where as soon as I would see him walk into the weight room, I would automatically adjust my routine to accommodate the extra 20 minutes of chatting we'd do. And that was a great thing. Seeing him kept me going consistently. I looked forward to it every morning, practically five days a week.
Soon, we started having lunch together, then movies on the weekends. Then he introduced me to many of his friends, and I started seeing how life could be different, and making new friends didn't have to be difficult. He arranged dinners and shows; we took trips to Napa and vacations to Vegas. And then, before I really took the time to think too much about it, he became one of my closest friends.
Of course, he was not without his flaws, one of which was his chronic tardiness. If we said that we would meet for lunch at a certain time, he would always be late. I would often stand by the railing of the Crocker Galleria, in our designated meeting place at our usual lunch spot, and watch our 12:00 meet-up time tick by, then 12:05, 12:10. When he finally showed up, he would smile and laugh in that rambunctious way of his, punch me playfully in the shoulder, roll his eyes and explain that he got cornered by his boss, or his co-worker had a complicated question, or he ran into a friend on his way over who talked his ear off. To this day, I think he had his facts wrong, and it was he who cornered his boss, he would talked his friend's ear off.
Because the truth is, the reason he was always late was because he gave everyone equal attention. If we saw John walking past, where most people would wave, say hi, and move along, Steve would introduce me to him, ask him about his children, his job, his childhood dreams and fears. If he saw Jane in line while waiting to get to the counter at Walgreens, he would pull her aside afterwards and make sure that he knew how things were going with her husband, the new dog, plans for future vacations. That was just the kind of person Steve was, interested in all that you do, and thorough to the core.
So it was fitting, then, that his first date with Jason lasted all of 50 hours or something like that and came to be known by us as the 'Longest Date in the World.' It makes perfect sense. If he could have gone on for 20 minutes or more with me at the gym everyday, a relative stranger then, why wouldn't the time he'd spend with a possible romantic connection be exponential?
Tonight, Sam and I are having dinner with Jason to commemorate this 'Longest Date in the World,' which of course got me thinking about Steve heavily for the last few days. He died about a year and a half ago, and it took me a long time to feel complete about it, meaning I couldn't even think too much about him at first, almost would prefer not to remember. I didn't want to wonder how things would be if he were still around. Jason once asked what my favorite memory of Steve was, and I couldn't even recall, much to my horror.
Slowly, though, I have come to remember his sense of humor, his habits, his sporadic but insistent east coast accent, the way he'd dance. Shortly after he died, I focused on the unbelievable, how only a couple of years prior, we had gone to a drag performance of an episode of the Golden Girls; a year prior, still meeting for brunch. Months before he died, we had dinner together for my birthday. And then he was gone, and I couldn't believe how much things can change.
I believe it now, but mostly, I feel OK enough to be able to think of him and remember with less sadness than nostalgia. I certainly remember how annoyed I would be with him while waiting for his late yet nonchalant arrival at the Crocker Galleria, but also how I couldn't help but smile when he finally got there. Steve just had had that kind of positive energy. And true to that, I can't help but smile now as well when I think of him, of all the memories that help me compose a complete and true picture of my friend, and who he was to me.
The next day after we 'officially' met, I was sitting on a bench, yawning and still trying to wake up. Steve came over and said, "Girl! Are you just sucking up air over here?" I thought, "Wow, I don't think you know me well enough to be calling me 'Girl!'"
Or maybe he already did. Probably so.
And I quickly learned that that was how it was with Steve. Strangers were a foreign concept to him; we were all merely friends-in-waiting. I guess he wasn't called the "unofficial mayor of the Castro" for nothing.
And luckily for me, he was like that, the counterbalance to my introvertedness. Back then, I was going through a rough patch and was very shy, almost to the point of not knowing how to be in a social setting. I didn't want to be that way; I just didn't know how to be any way else. Truth is, I never got lonely because I was alone. I got lonely because I sometimes felt like I didn't know how to be anything but alone.
Steve changed that. He would always approach me at the gym, always prepared with conversation and stories and questions to break me out of my shell. It came to a point where as soon as I would see him walk into the weight room, I would automatically adjust my routine to accommodate the extra 20 minutes of chatting we'd do. And that was a great thing. Seeing him kept me going consistently. I looked forward to it every morning, practically five days a week.
Soon, we started having lunch together, then movies on the weekends. Then he introduced me to many of his friends, and I started seeing how life could be different, and making new friends didn't have to be difficult. He arranged dinners and shows; we took trips to Napa and vacations to Vegas. And then, before I really took the time to think too much about it, he became one of my closest friends.
Of course, he was not without his flaws, one of which was his chronic tardiness. If we said that we would meet for lunch at a certain time, he would always be late. I would often stand by the railing of the Crocker Galleria, in our designated meeting place at our usual lunch spot, and watch our 12:00 meet-up time tick by, then 12:05, 12:10. When he finally showed up, he would smile and laugh in that rambunctious way of his, punch me playfully in the shoulder, roll his eyes and explain that he got cornered by his boss, or his co-worker had a complicated question, or he ran into a friend on his way over who talked his ear off. To this day, I think he had his facts wrong, and it was he who cornered his boss, he would talked his friend's ear off.
Because the truth is, the reason he was always late was because he gave everyone equal attention. If we saw John walking past, where most people would wave, say hi, and move along, Steve would introduce me to him, ask him about his children, his job, his childhood dreams and fears. If he saw Jane in line while waiting to get to the counter at Walgreens, he would pull her aside afterwards and make sure that he knew how things were going with her husband, the new dog, plans for future vacations. That was just the kind of person Steve was, interested in all that you do, and thorough to the core.
So it was fitting, then, that his first date with Jason lasted all of 50 hours or something like that and came to be known by us as the 'Longest Date in the World.' It makes perfect sense. If he could have gone on for 20 minutes or more with me at the gym everyday, a relative stranger then, why wouldn't the time he'd spend with a possible romantic connection be exponential?
Tonight, Sam and I are having dinner with Jason to commemorate this 'Longest Date in the World,' which of course got me thinking about Steve heavily for the last few days. He died about a year and a half ago, and it took me a long time to feel complete about it, meaning I couldn't even think too much about him at first, almost would prefer not to remember. I didn't want to wonder how things would be if he were still around. Jason once asked what my favorite memory of Steve was, and I couldn't even recall, much to my horror.
Slowly, though, I have come to remember his sense of humor, his habits, his sporadic but insistent east coast accent, the way he'd dance. Shortly after he died, I focused on the unbelievable, how only a couple of years prior, we had gone to a drag performance of an episode of the Golden Girls; a year prior, still meeting for brunch. Months before he died, we had dinner together for my birthday. And then he was gone, and I couldn't believe how much things can change.
I believe it now, but mostly, I feel OK enough to be able to think of him and remember with less sadness than nostalgia. I certainly remember how annoyed I would be with him while waiting for his late yet nonchalant arrival at the Crocker Galleria, but also how I couldn't help but smile when he finally got there. Steve just had had that kind of positive energy. And true to that, I can't help but smile now as well when I think of him, of all the memories that help me compose a complete and true picture of my friend, and who he was to me.
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