Showing posts with label musings on life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label musings on life. Show all posts

Overwhelmed. with a capital o.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010

"Mommy - gooooooooo!" says my daughter. Go means both go and come and this morning at 6:25 AM, go means come play with me.

"Daddy is going to go play this morning. Mommy needs to sleep a little more," I respond, grateful that my husband is getting up with Evvy this morning.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!" Evidently, she has chosen this morning to be anti-daddy. Great.

We try a few more times, but she wants nothing to do with her father this morning. So I lug myself out of bed and into the family room where she has now decided that Daddy is a sufficient playmate. I set up a makeshift bed on the floor so that I am still there but can close my eyes for a few more minutes. Today I feel exhausted. And my belly is itchy. And have I mentioned that my ass seems to decided it should keep up with my stomach? I'm going to need to get it it's own seat on our next flight. I keep making lists of things I need to get done but relaxing doesn't seem to be anywhere on that list. With the exception of the occassional pre-natal yoga class, I can't seem to find anytime for myself. It doesn't matter that I don't plan anything most evenings - there are dishes and laundry and bills. And those are just the weekly things - forget all the things on my list to get done before the baby arrives. I am exhausted.

At 7:15, while they go to walk the dogs, I get up and empty the dishwasher, reload the dishwasher, and start to get things ready for the sitter who will be arriving in an hour. Evvy has decided she wants cornichons for breakfast. Hey - whatever works.

I run to the grocery store to grab milk, which we are out of, since there will not be a successful naptime without milk. I take advantage of these 15 minutes to catch up with a good friend in NYC who has recently had her 2nd child - grateful for her words of wisdom and thoughts on how to juggle two as best as possible. (best as possible seems to be the key.)

I come home feeling mildly less overwhelmed when I enter my kitchen to my husband and child sitting on the floor surrounded by the contents of an entire container of Happy Baby puffs, most of her sippy cups and a slew of other things from the cabinets that I can't recall seeing because I was only seeing mild shades of red. Perhaps my baby is happy, but I am not.

I understand that my husband simply wants to keep her happy, but all too soon, he is going to realize the value of keeping mommy happy as well. Because he and I both know that now that I am home, he will need to get in a shower to leave for the day and I will be left to not only attempt to keep my toddler happy, but to also clean up the contents of the floor.

I spend the first 30 minutes that the sitter is there doing just that and getting dressed and I finally get out the door, knowing that at least I am on my way to yoga to try to clear my mind and my heart and my spirit. I am Overwhelmed - yes...with a capital O.

I was so zen during my pregnancy with Evvy but I am having immense trouble finding my zen this time around. I can't help but spend hours on end wondering how the hell I'm going to make it all work when there are 2. And yes, if you are my mother or my father or my aunt or anyone else of that generation, I am sure you are reading this, perhaps chuckling, thinking about how you did it and we all turned out fine. And that may be true. But I am not you, and I haven't done it yet and I am Overwhelmed. How do you tend to an infant, who literally needs you to survive, and a toddler, who emotionally needs you (and is still a baby too) at the same time? I know that people do it AAAAAAAAAAAAALL the time, but I haven't figured out how I'm going to do it. And to be honest, the questions from the other moms who have 18 month olds, asking me if I'm nervous about how I'm going to do it aren't helping. I smile warmly and say, "a bit, but we knew it would be more work at the beginning - we wanted the kids to be close in age." But what I want to say is, "Are you nuts? Of COURSE I'm nervous. I'm totally insane. What the hell was I thinking??????????" I don't.

I know that Evvy will be fine - that she will adapt. I know that I will manage to give the baby everything she needs as well. I know that there will just have to be enough of me to go around and that second babies tend to be more adaptable and that Evvy will adapt too. At least I tell myself these things to try to feel better. But when I'm done taking care of everyone else, I can't help but wonder, will there be enough of me left for me? Perhaps that's selfish of me, but to be perfectly honest, I think that in order to be a good mother, you need to be selfish sometimes. How do you give 100% of yourself to everyone else? You have to save a little bit for you. And I'm worried that there will be nothing left for me...

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 9:39 AM 0 comments  

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LOVE AND LIGHT
Monday, August 16, 2010

To be honest with you, I don’t know if the movie Eat Pray Love was good or not. I don’t know because I felt moved at times, inspired, and connected. A movie doesn’t have to be well done to do that, but when it does do those things for me, it’s hard for me to determine if I think it’s a good movie. I’ve seen a few HORRIBLE movies that I left the theater loving because I related. Upon 2nd viewing, I would realize that it was simply the circumstance or the place I was in my life at that moment or whatever – but that the movie itself was actually awful. I don’t know if Eat Pray Love falls into this category (the reviews would have me believe so) or not, but I left feeling satisfied.

There is a moment when the main character is in India talking about her ex-husband and looking for forgiveness or looking for him to tell her she’s ok and it’s ok or whatever it is she’s looking for that is not only outside of herself, but outside of her control. And her friend at the Ashram tells her that all she can do is forgive herself – that when a person that she is concerned about floats into her consciousness, all she can do is wish that person Love and Light – and then move them out of her consciousness.

In the past year, I have struggled with a few close relationships in my life. Close is a funny word to describe them, because that’s exactly what I no longer feel with these people. None of them have relationships with each other – the only thing they have in common is that at one time in their lives, they had an extremely close relationship with me. And from my perspective, we don’t have the same relationship anymore. The details are different with each person but the underlying reason is the same. Things change. People change – even the people that you are sure you know because you’ve known them for 10 or 15 or 20 years. We all grow up and new people enter our lives and new experiences effect us and we grow and we shift and we change. So we’ve probably both changed and with that, so has the friendship. I don’t know whether or not they feel the things that I feel, but I no longer feel good or happy or fulfilled by these relationships. I often find myself angry after interactions with any of these people. I go in hoping things will be what they once were – but fool me once, shame on you…fool me twice, well – you know the rest. So shame on me for expecting things to be different at this point. I leave angry, hurt, frustrated, nostalgic. But more than anything, I’m left sad. And conflicted. I care deeply for all of these people. But I no longer desire to have the relationship that we once had. And my inability to figure out how to “let go” has taken up a part of my being that would be so much better used for other, more positive things. I ultimately wind up angry at MYSELF. Why am I letting someone that I don’t even really LIKE anymore get to me so deeply? Why am I spending so much time thinking about it? Why, just when I think I’ve gotten to a new level, does something happen that sends me reeling all over again? And in the end, I’m the one who’s left with all the shit swimming in my head and my heart. It’s not good for me.

So I’m going to try something new. When anything happens with one of these people, or if I just happen to be thinking about them for whatever reason – be it because they’ve reached out or have come up in conversation or whatever – instead of thinking and thinking and thinking some more about what used to be and what isn’t now and what happened the last time we saw each other or spoke that just chipped another piece away from the relationship – I’m going to send them Love and Light and then I’m going to move them out of my consciousness. It makes sense – I struggle because I do love, even if I don’t like so much anymore. And looking for answers has my chasing my tail. So I’m going to try only being positive and letting go.

Yes it’s totally idealistic. But I’ve been trying to let go for a few years with some of these people and nothing has worked. So as someone smart once said, “Don’t knock it ‘til you try it.”

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 8:45 PM 1 comments  

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The wishes that can't come true...
Friday, July 31, 2009

I've written this post in my head so many times over the past 2-ish years but tonight, I just felt the need to actually put pen to paper (so to speak...and btw, I love the idea of actually putting pen to paper these days. The computer screen is so bright...)


My friend Stacey is on a plane to NYC right now. She wasn't supposed to go until Tuesday. But she got that phone call  - the "you need to come now" phone call. She got the phone call I got 2 years ago, the one I chose not to act on because I'd had my "last" visit. But Stacey hadn't yet had hers - it was planned for Tuesday but it needs to be tomorrow instead. I don't know why talking to Stacey prompted me to write when other moments have not. The brief conversation we had on the phone tonight brought emotions flooding for me.  Maybe it's that I feel uncannily connected to Stacey.  Maybe because my grandmother's birthday was this week and I can't bring myself to take it (or her phone number) out of my blackberry. Maybe it's because the circumstances surrounding Stacey's trip felt all too familiar and because Stacey's relationship with her grandmother seems so similar to the one I had with mine. Maybe there's no reason that it's hitting me right now specifically.  There's not much to say in those moments so I just shared what had brought me peace in those final weeks - that my grandmother wasn't comfortable anymore and that it didn't matter how much we were all going to miss her (terribly beyond words) - because her life wasn't what she would want it to be. And so, while it was painful to see her go, it was best for HER. I said it without a quiver in my voice, but I hung up the phone and for the first time since my grandmother's unveiling last September, I cried that she was gone. 

A few months ago I brought Evvy to Massachusetts for the first time. And when I walked into my parents house, I had the oddest sensation. I had to remind myself over and over that my grandmother wasn't here anymore because I kept having this overwhelming desire to pick up the phone and call her to say that we were here the way I always did when I got home. I've often missed my Grammy, but I've rarely wished her back - except in that moment. She would have loved Evvy - not just because she was her great grand-daughter - but because she has great pulkies (as my mother-in-law says, "her rolls have rolls!") and she has great spirit. At 4 months old, this kid has chutzpah that can rival the best of them. 

I wish she could meet her. I know in my heart that she knows her - probably more than even I do at this point. But tonight,  I wish her back just for a moment...

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 8:32 PM 1 comments  

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Your path is your own
Sunday, March 15, 2009

There's been a lot of discussion of age recently. Not simply because we're having a baby, although I know from personal experience that other people's "milestones" (of which I have always felt having a baby is one) tends to leave others looking and reflecting on their lives...which often leads to looking at age and where you are, where you expected to be, blah blah blah. In the course of a couple of weeks, I have been to the birthday celebration of a person turning 50, a dinner party for someone turning 39 and tonight we're headed to a dinner for someone turning 33. My husband's birthday is on Monday and of course, the most significant (for me) literal birth day is swiftly approaching. And that doesn't even cover the 7 or 8 other friends who had a birthday last week or are approaching one this week. 


Birthdays bring up age and age seems to bring up all sorts of shit. I remember when I was 21, the thought of 30 was insane. 30 was OLD. But it was 9 years away and I had lots of life to live before I hit that. I'd be married and successful by then (whatever that meant) and maybe even have a baby. Shortly before my 23rd birthday, I moved to NYC and started waiting tables while I was auditioning. I landed a job that most NYC waiters coveted but it wasn't the restaurant that I was taken with - it was the people that I had the amazing good fortune to work with. It was an eclectic, bright, vibrant group of creatives - everyone from furniture makers to dancers to actors to philosophers to students to the ultimate fashionistas and foodies. And they ranged in age from 19 to 55. Two years prior I wouldn't have thought that I would have much to say to that 55 year old, but all of a sudden, I was blind to age. I was thrilled by their knowledge, by their thoughts on life, by their triumphs and struggles. One of my closest friends in the group celebrated her 30th birthday that year - and she was anything but old. I had learned my lesson - age was just a number. 

We discussed that at the birthday of the 50 year old this past weekend. If I had thought that 30 was 0ld when I was 21, then 50 must have been one foot in the grave. Now, 50 is young. Perhaps that's because of the youth and vibrance of those that I know that are 50. After all, it is still quite possible to be 50 and be old. But it's also possible to be 20 and to be old. Age is just a number.

It's amazing to me that I spent so many years placing ultimatums on myself surrounding my age. What made me think that I should be married by 30? (Besides a large portion of society acting as though you're a leper if you haven't settled down by a certain age.) I know plenty of people who DID get married by 30 - and now they're divorced. These things should be dictated by nothing more than finding a person with whom you truly want to spend the rest of your life. Not how old you are or how long you've been together. Simply by whether or not you think that you will be a good match for each other...forever. 

And then there's the baby thing. And for women, this is a huge issue because it's not mental - it's physical. As a man, you can get someone pregnant until the day you die. You don't have a "limit" as to when you are able to have a biological child. As a woman, plain and simply, you do. Your body will only allow you to conceive for a certain amount of time, whether you like it or not, whether you're ready or not. While this is (not SEEMS - IS) completely unfair to women, it's a fact and one that women I know deal with on a daily basis. Some women aren't ready to have kids, but worry that if they wait, they won't be able to. Some women are ready but haven't found a partner and worry that they won't before they lose their ability to have a child. Many women (again, myself included at one time) look at those around them having kids and feel like they're not where they're "supposed" to be by this time. Even if we don't think about that on a daily basis, it comes up now and then...often when we least expect it, triggered by someone else's news that should only be about them but all of a sudden has us spinning out about ourselves. And usually, it comes back to, "I'm 29/34/41/56. How am I not where I thought I should be by this age?"

So the question remains - who created an age by which you SHOULD have? Reached your goals. Started a family. Found a partner. Become an adult...(I know 49 year olds who will never be an "adult" and I know 22 year olds who are far too adult for their own good.) Who stuck these parameters - these limitations on our lives? And how do we shed ourselves of them so that we can just BE. And live. And enjoy. And strive. And take away the feelings of failure for not having achieved by a certain AGE. Because, as one of my wisest friends once said to me, your path is your own. And age is just a number. 

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 10:55 AM 2 comments  

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Live the Questions Now
Wednesday, November 26, 2008

The days seem to be going by faster than I can keep track of and all of a sudden, I'm having a baby in 4 months. What the hell?? I just got pregnant! How did all of this happen so freaking fast? How is it Thanksgiving?

The impending birth of a child has made me sit back and reflect a lot. On my past 33 years (ok, ok - I don't remember being 2. But at least most of my "adult" life when I wasn't too drunk to forget. Did I just say adult life? Heh. Who's an adult? Just because I'm having a baby now I'm supposed to be an adult???) I'm reflecting on the things that I want to instill in my kids. On the traits I have that I'd like to work on more so that they don't learn my behavior. On the ways in which I'd like to help my kids see the world. (Sure, it's singular now...but now that the can of worms has been opened...) 

It's been a highly reflective time, but I've had trouble finding the words to frame it. I'm working hard on staying present these days - on enjoying the small moments. I'm starting to understand that each moment that happens will only last for a small amount of time. And while some of the phases I've been through in my life have been tumultuous, have felt tortured and confused - I have looked back upon many of those times, feeling like I didn't know how good those tortured moments were.

I think sometimes life is hard to see while we're living it. But I don't want to turn around and feel like I wasn't truly experiencing each moment anymore because I was so anxious to get out of it and get some answers. I think I'm starting to realize that Rilke had a point. That the only way to find the answers is to live your way into them...

I think that's what I want to instill most in my kids. That it's ok to not know the answers before you leap. That leaping is the only way to truly find the answers. And that it's ok to wade and to wallow a bit while you try to figure out which direction to leap in. That it's ok to fall down - as long as you get back up. That when the doors all seem locked, try a window, and if the windows are locked too, find a vent. To treat others with compassion. To have patience for those around you - to work hard on having that patience with those who try it most because they probably need it the most. To stand your ground with what you believe in and to live it out loud and strong. To move forward but not forget where you come from. To fly high but keep your feet firmly fastened on the ground. To ask questions and to search and explore. That grudges are cancerous and there's no point in holding them. You don't have to like everyone or everything, but it's so much better for your spirit and your health to let it go and move forward.

Do I live these ideas? Some of them...not all of them. Some of the time, not all of the time.

And there are the things that I am working on right now. I am too hard on myself and therefore, often too hard on others. I try too hard to keep everyone else happy but sometimes I just need to make myself happy. I know that when I don't like someone or something, I'm not so great at hiding it. I'm really loud. I'm constantly afraid of letting people down. I question my abilities too often. I need to be more flexible and learn to relinquish control. I'm learning to ask myself what truly bothers me in situations that do - rather than to just get angry, upset, irrational, etc. To get to the bottom of why I feel a certain way, rather than just letting the emotion take over me completely. So I'm learning. I guess having a baby is making me want to be better.


I don't know what kind of parent I'm going to be. I know how I'd like to be - but things don't always turn out the way we plan. And let's not even discuss things like how much college is going to cost by the time my kids go to school...But I'm just letting it all fall into place. I'm not worrying about things before they happen. Or if I do, I remind myself that I said I wouldn't. And yes, SOMEHOW that zen buddha jedi mind trick is actually working. I just keep reminding myself to live. To the live the questions now so that one day, I can live my way into the answers.

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with love, laughter and lots of wonderful questions.

"...I would like to beg you dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer. "
                                     -Rainier Maria Rilke, 1903 Letters to a Young Poet



Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 3:31 PM 0 comments  

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HOPE
Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Today I feel hope for a new tomorrow. Today I feel a world with a little less hate, a little more acceptance. Today I feel a world where dreams can come true. Today I am proud to live in a country that believes in change. Today I feel proud to be an American - a feeling I've not felt in a really long time. Today I feel inspired. Today I feel a world filled with possibility.

Today I feel excited about the world we are bringing our child into.

But I am not blind to the irony that exists in a country that voted for change but is also voting to openly discriminate against same sex couples. In Florida, same sex couples can not marry. In Arizona, not only can they not marry, but they can no longer adopt children. And in California, Prop 8 passed by a narrow margin, overturning the decision that same sex couples have the same rights as heterosexual couples.

I can't help but feel I need an umbrella for my parade today. In the grand scheme of things, open-minded won. In the smaller scheme, discrimination was justified again and again. I supposed I simply need to look at it as the next hurdle in a country where we overcame a huge one. It's just hard to understand how any minority - be it women or blacks or any one else who had to fight for the right to anything - could sit back and deny someone else their rights. And these propositions didn't pass based solely on the votes of white men.

But. We did it. We looked forward to change, to something new, to hope. We did it once, we can do it again.

Yes we can.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 4:05 PM 1 comments  

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Thoughts for Monday lifted from the back of my Starbucks cup
Monday, November 3, 2008

The Way I See It #293

The way I see it
Isn't necessarily
The way you see it
Or the way it is
Or ought to be
What's more important
Is that we're all
Looking for it
And a way to see it

--Desi Di Nardo
Author and poet.
She lives in Toronto, Canada.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 10:37 AM 0 comments  

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Anyone out there??
Thursday, October 23, 2008

Hellooooo? Are you there? It's me. Meesh. Yes. It's actually me. Writing an actual post.

I've been gone a long time. I mean, I know I've been around...poking my head in here and there in between Burma sagas. But really? I haven't written a whole lot since July. And there's actually a reason for that.

Which I'm not going to tell you.

KIDDING. I'm kidding.

Secrets are hard to keep. Whether they're of the "my life is falling apart and I don't want you to know" variety or "I'm so excited I'm going to explode but I can't tell you yet" variety. They both - in their own ways - leave you avoiding the people you love the most because there's not much else on your mind besides that secret.

"How are you?"

"Fine. I'm fine. Everything is fine. Not much to tell." when you really want to say:

"My life sucks. I'm miserable. Absolutely miserable. Pretty much everything has gone to hell. Crying has become my biggest extra curricular activity and I wish I could crawl in a hole and shrivel up."

OR

"What's going on?"

"Nothing. Every thing's great. Just rolling along. Really terrific. Not much to tell." when what you really want to say is:

"UMMMMMMMMMMM...I'M PREGNANT!!!!"

I'm pregnant. 19 weeks pregnant to be exact. I've been slowly going public over the past 7 weeks or so with some hitches in the middle (which I'll share along the way as I started to write while I was keeping this secret in so that I would have SOME sort of outlet.) I would have written about it sooner, but Burma was a way for me to be here and have a presence without having to try to figure out what the hell I was going to talk about when all I really wanted to say waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaas, "I'M PREGNANT!!!"

At the beginning of all of this, I wished that I was blognonymous. But people I am related to, have known for years, work with read this blog. And therefore, I had to keep it a secret.

I promise this is not going to turn into a pregnancy blog. I don't promise that I'll never write about it but it won't be all that I write about either.

Aaaah. I feel relieved that I don't have to just say "I'm fine. Great. Couldn't be better" anymore...

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 2:00 PM 4 comments  

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Upon the closing of RENT
Tuesday, September 9, 2008

ed note: I wrote this two days ago but I needed to sit with it for a moment. RENT closed on
Sunday, September 7 after 5,124 performances on Broadway.

I watched RENT for the first time on the Tony Awards in the spring of 1996 - my Junior year of college. I was awe-struck and overwhelmed by the innovation and excitement I was seeing on stage. I knew I was seeing something new, something life changing. I felt like I was going to jump up and start dancing as they performed "La Vie Boheme". I didn't care what or how - I had to get to New York to see the show. And that fall, after I'd already memorized the entire album (and consequently had driven my Senior Year roommates absolutely mad - it was the only thing I listened to. Ever.) one of my best friends and I went to NYC for my 21st birthday to see RENT.

I saw the show at least 7 or 8 times in next 7 years. Sometimes I was madly in love with it and sometimes I was underwhelmed. That's the joy of live theater - you never get the same thing twice. But no matter how much I loved that particular show or not, I always left that theater inspired and fully and completely alive. Like tingling. From head to toe.

8 years after I watched those Tony Awards, I went to work for the men responsible for bringing the show to Broadway. I sat in the audience again during a particularly impressive performance and once again, I was awestruck. I felt the magic of what good theatre does. I felt like absolutely anything was possible. La Vie Boheme.

And last night, as the curtain came down on a show that changed my life in so many more ways than I ever could have possibly imagined, I was not in NYC to witness it or to celebrate it. But I thought about it.

I thought about Seasons of Love and how much I've been reflecting on it lately without even realizing it.

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes,
Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments so dear.
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?

In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee
In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.
In five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure a year in the life?

I still cry every time I hear those lyrics. Every single time. I'm crying now as I read what I just typed. Simple. Genius. Simply genius. And so apropos when you think that the man who wrote them died before he ever got to see them performed on a Broadway stage.

So last night, while I couldn't be there in person, I found my spirit soaring to NYC to the Nederlander Theater. And I taped those lyrics to my computer. And I said outloud "You measure in love. Seasons of Love."

That's my mantra these days. Measure in love. Not much else matters. And I find my spirit soaring to NYC more and more. Even if my body is physically in Los Angeles. Just to feel the pulse of the streets and the energy of the people. And the love of the people that I have there. And the familiarity. La Vie Boheme.

There's so much going on right now -some of which I can't post about, some of which I've been choosing not to. So I've been escaping to a story from my past - to write, to have a presence here, because I'm curious to have people read something that I've been working on in addition to my random ramblings and musings and thoughts.

But tonight I had to write. I'm feeling the end of an era. That show rocked my world in a way I didn't even realize at the time. It has become a part of my identity. It's part of how I measure my life. La Vie Boheme.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 10:01 PM 1 comments  

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If You Can Know Where You're Going, You've Already Gone.
Monday, June 16, 2008

Before I left NYC in July of 2004, I had spent the previous five years seeing every show there was to see on Broadway. I went to open dress rehearsals, got tickets to shows in previews, was given the Tony award tickets that my bosses couldn't use. After I moved that summer, I spent my time in NYC seeing friends, not shows. In the time between July 2004 and March 2008, I saw three shows. Three shows in three and a half years. I didn't even watch the Tony Awards last year.

Last night, as I sat watching (or should I say, weeping through) the Tony Awards, it occurred to me that it was quite possible that my lack of current knowledge about the NYC theater scene had been intentional.

Yes, it's true I am usually only in NYC for a long weekend. It's true that I rarely have the opportunity to go back for extended periods of time and that the majority of the people closest to me all live in that city. Time certainly played a role.

But more than anything, I think I couldn't. I couldn't keep track of the theater world because if I did, then I was wildly aware of what I was missing. If I continued to keep track - to read all the websites, the theater section of the NY Times - I was going to stay stuck. Upset that I wasn't there. That I had moved on.

So I left it behind.

I remember going to see Clay at the Kirk Douglas last fall and that feeling I got from seeing live theater again. Inspired. Invigorated. Excited. I knew that I couldn't leave that part of me behind anymore. I knew that instead, I had to just keep it tucked away for the time being.

In March we went to see August Osage County on a Friday and went to the opening of In the Heights on a Sunday. After three shows in three years, I was seeing two in one weekend. I felt like I did when my mom took me to see Peter Pan at the Colonial in Boston when I was five. Theater felt special again.

And when I sat in those audiences, I had this visceral reaction, one which I haven't had since I was 15 years old. It was the summer of 1988. I had gone to New York City with my camp to see The Phantom of the Opera. I watched the entire show perched on the edge of my seat. And at the end of the show, as is customary, the audience applauded. They applauded hard. Harder and harder with each actor that came on stage. And when Christine came out, the audience leapt to it's feet. The sounds of hands beating together swelled and all of a sudden, I realized I had tears streaming down my face. I couldn't stop it, I wasn't even aware that it had happened. The energy in that room was so overwhemingly HUGE in that moment...the actors on stage beaming, the audience in that moment giving back what it had received for the past three hours.

And that weekend, as I sat through the curtain calls of August Osage County and In the Heights, the tears rolled down my cheeks again. When the audience is just so electrified by what they've seen that the applause doesn't stop...I'm telling you - the beating of hands over and over again, so hard that your palms turn red, so incessantly to make certain that the recipients are clear that you are grateful for the three hours in which they just gave to you so fully and completely...It makes me explode. It's why I am madly and deeply in love with theater.

And then in May, a necessary trip to NYC for some family stuff, and the best surprise ever when my mom asked me if I wanted to try to see a show. Sunday in the Park with George. A show about art and artists and struggle and change. I have not stopped thinking about it since I heard these lyrics:
Stop worrying where you're going
Move on
If you can know where you're going
You've already gone...

I chose and my world was shaken
So what?
The choice may have been mistaken
The choosing was not
You have to move on

And once again, as the audience roared their thunderous appreciation of applause, for the third time in two months, the tears rolled down my cheeks. Thank you Mr. Sondheim.

I don't remember everything about the end of In the Heights - I know the last song was about being home, coming home...something along those lines. Those are the only words I can remember because the whole concept resonated so true for me. Sitting in the mezzanine at my first opening since I moved to Los Angeles, I felt the ease you experience when you share a glass of wine with your best friend, when you walk through the door into the house you grew up in and the smells of your mother's cooking waft through the halls, that sense of familiarity and pure comfort. I was home.

And last night, I cried my way through the Tony awards. I miss the theater. I miss the sense of community. I miss the art. Theater artists give blood, sweat and tears to put on a show. They are unbelievably grateful for the work they do, for the audience that comes to see them work. They write and rewrite and rewrite again. Not for weeks or months. For years. And those actors get up and perform live - eight shows a week. They recreate these crazy, insane, exuberant, ALIVE characters...every single night. There's nothing like the theater.

Look at what you want
Not what might have been
Only what could be

I miss the theater. It time to brush off that part of myself that's been tucked away and see what it wants to do. The lyrics of that song don't only mean what they seemed to initially...I heard them and thought about leaving things behind, focusing on the new. But sometimes moving on means refinding, redefining and recreating the old.

It's time to move on.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 2:30 PM 1 comments  

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One Year
Monday, May 26, 2008

"You know, when I was 19, Granpa took me on a roller coaster. Up, down, up, down. Oh what a ride! I always wanted to go again. You know, it was always so interesting to me that a ride could make me so frightened, so scared, so excited and so thrilled all together! Some didn't like it. They went on the merry-go-round. That just goes around. Nothing. I like the roller coaster. You get more out of it." -Grandma in Parenthood


Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 12:00 PM 4 comments  

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A Love Letter to Ina
Monday, May 5, 2008

I read cookbooks. Like cover to cover.

This is a shock to me. I had no idea that I was going to grow up and be a cookbook reader.

This evening I came home from work and my Amazon.com shipment had arrived. It contained three books:

1. How'd You Score That Gig - a book that was promoted in my "Daily Cents" email and I just couldn't resist given my influx of career thoughts these days.

2. Colin Cowie's Chic- I recently bought this for a close friend for her birthday and it was nearly impossible not to keep it for myself. So I did the next best thing and bought myself one too. How do you resist a book with PERFECT advice on home, entertaining, travel, and work from one of the most fabulous gay men alive???

3. The Barefoot Contessa at Home- which brings me to this post. You know how Sesame Street is brought to you by a letter? Like the letter Q. or R. or any of the other 24 letters. This post is brought to you by the Barefoot Contessa.

When I opened the package, I stared at all three and contemplated - but I was immediately drawn to Ina. And I didn't just turn to the recipes. I wanted to read her introduction. I WANTED to. Ummmmm...I am a cookbook introduction reading 32 year old woman. AND I LOVE IT.

I'm only 40 pages into her 249 pages of delectable delights but I'm already dreaming of dinner parties with perfect margaritas (no margarita mix!!!!) and pan-fried french onion dip (made ENTIRELY from scratch) and most importantly lots and lots of laughing. And warmth. Ina talks about a home filled with warmth. Where people walk in and they feel like family. And that's why I love Ina. Sure, her recipes are amaaaaazing. Next level. Truly my favorites. I know if I cook Barefoot, I'm cooking a good meal. But the Ina's philosophy rings true for me even more:

"A good home should gather you up in its arms like a warm cashmere blanket, soothe your hurt feelings, and prepare you to go back out into that big bad world tomorrow all ready to fight the dragons....Sure it has to make (myself and my husband) feel comfortable, but equally important, it has to make my friends want to drop by."

This. This is the philosophy I want to live by. This is what life is about. Having a home that feels like a home to each and every person that comes here. With chairs that they can sink their bodies into and food they can sink their teeth into and conversation they can sink their souls into. This is what life is about.

I'm 32 and I read cookbooks. Excuse me now. I have to go finish...

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 8:48 PM 4 comments  

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Getting Old
Friday, April 4, 2008

Every single time I see Avenue Q, I cry when they sing "I Wish I Could Go Back To College." I haven't just seen Avenue Q once or twice. I was a part of the entire creative process...from workshop to Broadway opening which means that I've seen the show at least twenty times, probably more. It doesn't matter. That song has the same effect on me every single time. I mean, who can't relate to a puppet singing the lines "I wish I could just drop a class...Or get into a play...Or change my major...Or fuck my T.A. I need an academic advisor to point the way!" Those words seem to resonate with me more and more the older I get. Sometimes I would give my right arm for a freaking academic advisor to point the way.

There have been many different reasons at different times in my life that I've wanted to go back to college - to have almost all of my closest friends within a 4 mile radius, to not have to deal with real adult life, to be able to drink my current self under the table until 2 in the morning and then get up and be ready for a 9 AM dance class with no issue at all, to feel like I have my entire future ahead of me - to name a few. Seldom has my desire to go back to college had anything to do with academics.

But there is that rare occasion that I've wanted to go back to college to learn. I didn't learn nearly enough academically in college. Not because I wasn't given the opportunity - I went to an incredible school. (Go Cats!) BUT. I don't think that I'm alone when I say that learning wasn't necessarily always my first priority in college. It's not that I didn't want to do well - that was EXTREMELY important to me. But learning to do well on tests is far different from actually learning - soaking in the information so that you have it to go back to again and again. In many of my classes, I learned the first way, and I did exactly what I'd hoped. I got great grades. Most of my theater classes were more hands on. They weren't based on tests. They were based on how I performed in class or the projects that I handed in. And those are the classes from which I remember the most. But I often wish that I'd fought harder to get into some of the "impossible to get into" classes. I wish that I'd paid more attention in some of the lectures that were far more interesting than I realized. I wish that I'd taken more classes outside of the School of Speech. I wish that I'd cared less about doing well on tests and cared more about truly learning. But I was 18, 19, 20...and I cared about proving myself in my acting class, and getting a part in "Pippin", and what I was going to choreograph for Graffiti Dancers, and who I was taking to the next date party. I cared about taking a nap in between tailgates and going downtown on Saturday night and I cared about who I was living with Senior Year. I was too busy worrying about those things to truly pay attention in Human Sexuality (which I'm sure was absolutely fascinating but I can't remember a single thing about it.) To be honest, I've forgotten a lot of the classes that I took. All in all, outside of my theater and dance classes and a few others here and there, most of it is a blur.

And by the way, I think most of what you're supposed to learn in college has very little to do with academics. The most important thing that I began to learn in college was who I am. I learned what was important to me. I learned how to stand up for myself and for things I believe in. I learned about the kinds of person that I want to be and the kind of people I want to surround myself with. I met people who have shaped my life in the most important ways. Those are the most important lessons of college and the ones that I'll never forget.

And why is all of this coming to mind right now?

On Wednesday night at 7 PM, I went back to college. I had the same feeling in the pit of my stomach of nerves and excitement and complete unknown as I walked across the completely unfamiliar UCLA campus trying to find Perloff hall. I walked into a lecture hall...A FREAKING LECTURE HALL!!!!! When was the last time you were in a lecture hall? I looked around wondering who all the unfamiliar faces were, wondering about their stories. I felt unbridled excitement about the fact that I was about to learn something totally and completely new. The questions that ran through my mind from the moment I arrived on campus to the moment my professor began the class were exactly the same as when I was 17 sitting in Intro to Sociology...wondering who I might be friends with (I met one of my best friends in that class), would I do well (got my first D on the midterm), wondering what my future held(I was wrong about far more than I was right about).

Except I'm far from 17...I'm Holy. Shit. FIFTEEN years older than I was when I walked into Intro to Sociology in mid-September NINETEEN NINETY THREEEEEEE.

Ummmmmmmmm. When the hell did that happen?

On Wednesday night, I felt old.

HOLD IT. Before I get the emails, the comments, the phone calls saying "Meesh. Don't be ridiculous. You are FAR from old..." please continue reading. Because I'm not actually talking about the same old. I didn't feel old the way we hear so many people talk about being old.

"I'm ooooooold." She'll say with a drone in her voice, trying to explain why she can't stay out late like she once could.

"We're getting old ." He'll reply when he forgets something, sending the old up in his voice like an Jewish man who's been saying this since he was 22, which is part of what made him old to begin with. I've been forgetting things since I was 16 years old and I sure as hell wasn't old at 16.

On Wednesday night I felt old...or at least older in all of the best possible ways. I felt older because I sat in class and I soaked in every moment of the lecture. I was present in the utmost sense of the word. I didn't, not even for a moment, think about my day at work, or what I was going to eat for dinner, or what I could be doing instead. I was there, in class, taking in everything that was possible in those 2 1/2 hours. I felt older because I could appreciate how little I know but also how far I've come. I loved being a student. Since Wednesday night, I've felt invigorated by the sheer fact that I'm going to learn something completely new. I felt old, because as I walked into the lecture hall, with all of the same uncertainty and questions about my future, there was one question that I no longer had to ask. I know exactly who I am. And that feels good. There's nothing wrong with being old.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 3:50 PM 0 comments  

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Random musings from a jaunt to Starbucks
Tuesday, March 4, 2008

I grabbed a coffee before a meeting last night. Well, it was actually a tall nonfat extra hot decaf mocha and no, I can't say that or write it without laughing at how ridiculous that sounds. Clearly I was at Starbucks (not Coffee Bean because many of you know how i feel about that). So I'm waiting for my ridiculous cofee extravaganza and there's a book called "Beautiful Boy" sitting there as part of the whole Starbucks move to not only rule the world of coffee but also the world of entertainment. (And for the record, I do prefer the indie coffee establishments but every so often, I succumb to convenience.)

SO. I pick up this book, Beautiful Boy, which is a father's account of his son's struggles with meth addiction. I take a look at the inside flap and get sucked in. The book is an expansion of an article that Sheff wrote in the NY Times Magazine about how his "good kid" turned to a life of drug addiction and Sheff's OWN struggle with being addicted to saving his child. I'm already in and then I read this quote:

"Sheff's story is honest, reflective and deeply moving. Sadly, it is a story all too relevant for our troubled times. When one of us tells the truth, he makes it easier for all of us to open our hearts to our own pain and to that of others. That’s ultimately what Beautiful Boy is about: truth and healing." --Mary Pipher, Author of Writing to Change the World and Reviving Ophelia

I read it again. When one of us tells the truth, he makes it easier for all of us to open our hearts to our own pain and to that of others. I love this woman. I love this man for not being afraid to share himself so that others can feel less alone. I have been thinking about this since I read it last night.

Is it as true for all of you as it is for me? That at the end of the day, all I really want is to be surrounded by truth rather than smoke and mirrors and walls of perfection.

That's all.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 12:17 PM 4 comments  

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Classifieds
Monday, February 25, 2008

LOST: the ability to sit patiently while waiting for life to proceed as planned at a pace that I sometimes have no control over. If patience is found, please return it to owner as quickly as possible. In fact, if you can let me borrow some of yours, I would greatly appreciate it.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 5:52 PM 2 comments  

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Structure
Friday, February 22, 2008

Lately it seems the thoughts are coming so quickly and rampantly that they start to overlap each other. They accelerate as though they're going downhill without breaks but by the time I get myself to the computer, they're gone. There are remnants, general themes left swirling around. But the lines of prose that popped into my brain as I walked down the street or watched my friends from a slight distance or breathed deeply in downward dog...they're all gone. Poof. Disappeared into thin air and I can't think of anything remotely smart or interesting to say.

Normally, the more I do, the more I want to do. I am stimulated by activity. But the writing is seemingly undone right now. I am invigorated and excited and exacerbated - all at the same time sometimes, but I'm struggling to translate it to the world, to words.

I think some of it stems from my lack on anonymity. There are things that I'm not sure I want to share with those that know me as much as I am willing to expose to the few dear readers I have that only know me from my words on the page. Because with those that are just a part of each others lives via the blogosphere, there are no attachments or expectations. We read each other because something grabs us. Because we can relate to each other or because we entertain. We experience new and different things through each other but also, we relate to each other and feel less alone. We sometimes live vicariously, but we also live parallely. There are no judgments or expectations. I feel good when something great happens for them. I can relate to many of their wants and hopes and fears. I read other blogs and they're anything but simple, but my relationship to them is simple. They are simply a name attached to a whole world that I get to know and see solely through their eyes. I read them with compassion and desire to know more. To understand who they are and what they are experiencing in their lives. Sometimes I long to reach through the internet and hug them, tight and close - the kind of hugs that people don't give often enough these days. Not one of those half hugs or the hug where they stand with their body about 200 feet away from yours and then gently tap you on the back with their other hand. Hugs are meant to wrap two people together. Sometimes I ache so deeply from the words of another person that I read that I want to wrap my affection around them and give them a hug. Sometimes they bring me to tears with their ability to expose themselves, to relate their worlds and their wants and their hurts and their triumphs so brilliantly.

It's actually quite simple. It all comes down to the ability to be vulnerable. And this is a medium that allows that in ways that being with other people sometimes does not. I'm aching for vulnerability these days. I rejoice in sitting with people who aren't afraid to admit that they don't have the answers. I am proud to be the person to ask for help. I love exploring life and the world with others. I feel stronger admitting that in moments I am weak. I am uninterested in putting on a good face - especially in this LA land of so many good faces under false pretenses. I don't live a perfect life (I know that's totally shocking...heh. heheh.) and I don't feel the need to pretend I do either. And I want to be around people who appreciate that. Because that is just real. And how do you truly squeeze all the juice out of life unless you're being real and true? I've liked my OJ fresh squeezed since I was 3 and I like my life that way too - pulp and even a few seeds here and there.

I told you - it's all swimming in there bursting to come out but unable to come together with beginnings, middles, and ends. But maybe that's because this is all just sort of open ended. In fact, I'd venture to say it's just the tip of the beginning.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 3:24 PM 1 comments  

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Confessions from Super Bowl Sunday
Monday, February 4, 2008

It's rare that one has epiphanies during the Super Bowl. But hey...anything can happen.

It's less of an epiphany than a confession, I suppose. Something I feel the need to recognize and accept. Something I want to own and not apologize for. Something I need to say out loud.

I don't like big parties. And I said it out loud yesterday. In the middle of a Super Bowl party with about 70 people. J to the K people. J to the K. But I did say it to myself. And I decided to own it.

I'm social. I love being with people. I love to go out and I love to have fun. So I've been sort of baffled by this aspect of myself since I moved to Los Angeles. NYC isn't a city of big parties simply because there's not much room. The only big parties I ever went to in New York were opening night parties and Tony award parties and I was throwing them and it was my job to know everyone in the room. Other than that, there weren't big parties where you'd wander through hallways looking for faces of people that you knew. There were no hallways to wander through that were longer than 5 or 6 feet. I had dance parties with my two fabulous roommates, Randy and Patrick in our Perry Street Apartment. Those parties consisted of a whopping 3. I had weekly catchup parties with Sharon - either at her apartment or across the street at Bar Veloce. I went to Super Bowl parties at Kelly and Amanda's (where I, incidentally, was so comfortable that I fell asleep on the couch through the entire Janet Jackson fiasco in the pre-tivo days.) I spent many an evening singing "Against All Odds" at karaoke parties at Winnie's in Chinatown. I had book club and supper club and social gatherings galore. My mid-20's were the years of "where should I have my birthday party" and we'd email conference until we came up with a suitably cool and hip and fun location that wouldn't be so crowded that our friends wouldn't be able to get in. I went to plenty of parties in my NYC years.

But none of these were parties. Not like LA does parties. And yes, yes...I'm sure you're right if you're saying NYC does parties like this too. They just take place in massive clubs with red velvet ropes that no one in their right mind would want to go to. In LA, they deceivingly take place in people's homes making you believe that they will feel more intimate and that you will actually know the people inhabiting the party. But I almost never do except for the few people that I go with. I spend the hours before secretly dreading the party and trying to figure out reasons why I should NOT attend the party and instead, should spend the evening curled up on the couch with a glass of wine and a good book, a good friend, or my husband. But I always go because "I should" and then there I am, at some huge party that's often loud, often either too hot or too cold, often too crowded, and generally offers little to no sitting space for relaxing. And I find myself feeling anything but social as I scream to my equally big-party dis-inclined girlfriend, "WHY DID WE COME HERE INSTEAD OF STAYING AT YOUR PLACE AND DRINKING GOOD RED WINE AND PLAYING SCRABBLE OR CELEBRITY???" as our significant others peruse the room being, well, social. Because, well, they like big parties.

So there - I've said it. I've admitted it out loud. I'm owning it. And it doesn't mean that I'm anti-social or even anti-party. I think it just means that I'm in my 30's. Wow.



Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 11:26 AM 2 comments  

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Shifts Are Better As Dresses
Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Expectations.

Buddhists learn not to have them. Yoga tells you that if you are really fully present, it's not possible to have expectations because you will only be experiencing the moment that is here now...while you are reading the words on the screen.

How, when you have friends for such a long time, do you refrain from having expectations? And I don't mean like "they should call me back immediately or they're dead to me" expectations (which, if you have, you should maybe find a shrink...although who am I to say what expectations are right or wrong. But really. Shrink. I have a few great recommendations if you want...) I mean expectations like you just know them...you know who they are and what they believe in and how they will be and well, what you can expect from them. Right? Isn't that something that just starts to happen at a certain point? You feel you truly know someone. So you think you know whether they'll be late or on time (and yes, late still annoys you...but you love 50 million other things about them so it's OK.) You think you know whether they'll be the friend who supports, the friend who encourages, the friend who tells you the truth, the friend who you eat a pint of Ben and Jerry's with. You think you know the shoes they will love and the food that they crave and the things that you can laugh at together just as much as the things you might cry about together. You think you know with whom you want to share what. You think you know...

And then, all of a sudden, something shifts. Perhaps a life experience or a location or a partner. I am certain that there were people in my life who saw different things in me when I met my husband. Especially for the short time when I know that I lost a little of my footing in the whole process. I was trying to figure it all out - they dynamics of our relationship, what it felt like to be around him, what I believed still versus what his influences had me believe. And more than anything, I was just so, sooooooooo about the whole thing and about him that I pretty much didn't think of anyone else but me and how I was feeling about him and whether or not he was thinking about me. I know. And I think it's inevitable - when you're with a person that you are in love with, they effect your thoughts and actions. You're learning a new dance, a new language of sorts...and it takes time to find all of the parts of you that you want to maintain. Sometimes it happens with every single person you meet, sometimes it just happens the very first time you really fall in love, sometimes it happens when it's been a while since you had butterflies. But I can't think of a single friend that it hasn't happened with at some point in time. People shift - even if just ever so slightly or ever so momentarily...they shift. It's from that feeling of never wanting to be away from this new force in your life. It's from wanting to know everything they know and believe and trying to figure out how it fits in with what you know and believe. It's from trying new things and being around new people that you find through this person and figuring out life a little more because of it all. And I think that most of the time, you shift back. You find your melody inside of the symphony that's now playing and you make sure that it plays loud and clear and that together, with the other person's melody, you create a lovely harmony.


Wow - that's sooooooooo cheesy. But what I mean to say is that eventually, you find your way back to you. And generally, your other relationships go back to the way they were - whether there was tolerance or intolerance, annoyance or understanding...things go back.

Except. I don't know. Except what if they don't? What if things DON'T go back to how they were before? What if things feel just a little different? What if you notice that there's that part of someone that was sort of tempered by their last partner but gets highlighted by this one...and it's a part that's really hard for you to swallow? Do you take a deep breath and hope that it will shift back? That it's just part of it all and that it's just taking longer? Do you accept that it might never shift back and that therefore, your friendship might shift permanently? Do you relinquish those expectations that you've grown to have over the years and years and years that you've know each other? Or do you just realize that the person is happy and it's not about you?

And it's not about you...it's them being them. Perhaps a part of them that you didn't love so much, but you took with the rest. But now that part is there more. At first you thought it was just a fluke. But then you realize that since this new relationship came into their life, you've loved being around them just a little less. And it's hard. It's really, really, painfully difficult. You feel selfish and unsupportive and you want them to be happy. But you miss the stuff that you...well...grew to expect.

I know it's selfish. And I know that this is who she is. This has always been a part of her. So I suppose my more self-aware choice would be to try understand why it's so hard for me to deal with this part of her. Why does it agitate me...what does it set off in me? And I'm looking at that too...because there's no bad that can come of that.

But I'm also coming to terms with the fact that people shift. And sometimes, they don't shift back. And then, you have to shift your expectations. Or become a Buddhist.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 4:33 PM 1 comments  

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Yogi wisdom
Monday, January 7, 2008

On Saturday, my yoga teacher made a genius statement that I have embraced with all of my being. I can't say it as poetically as she did but it's something along these lines: We tag January 1 as the beginning of a new year, and it is true in that it is the first day of a new calendar year. But with it, we throw in all sorts of expectations and resolutions (unless you're me) and new beginnings. Magazines exclaim "New Year, New You!" and all kinds of starts from fresh starts to jump starts to better starts. And because it's been dubbed the definitive start, people tend to be that much more let down if it doesn't live up to their hopes.

But the truth is, every day is a new year. Literally. Perhaps not the beginning of a new numbered year on the calendar, but it is the first day of another year, with all the past days behind us. Every day is an opportunity to do things in a new way, to clean a slate, to start a new habit or kick an old one. As I'm writing this, I feel that there's absolutely NO way that I'm doing this concept any justice. It actually sounds ridiculous and sort of obvious as I type on the page. But hell, I found freedom in the revelation of this fact, and I'm sticking to it in the hopes that perhaps my words are translating in a clearer way than I think.

On Thursday I was feeling like my new year had gotten off to a sort of sour start. I was grumpy and homesick and all sorts of other things...including pissed because it was only January 3rd and I had felt so good about 2008. But then there was Friday and I had a great day on Friday. And with those words on Saturday morning I realized that I'd actually just had a couple of crappy days and now, I was having some fantastic ones. It wasn't about 2008. I could reinvent myself or my thoughts or my anything at any time. In fact, most of the time when I feel inspired it does NOT coincide with a birthday or the new year. So with each new day, I have the opportunity for a "new year."

It still is reading ridiculous. And I've tried to re-write it about 75 times. So I'm going to stop judging myself and just be grateful for yogi revelations and hope that someone, somewhere can get whatever the fuck it is that I'm trying to say.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 3:28 PM 1 comments  

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20-something bloggers
Sunday, December 23, 2007

I have to admit, I feel like I missed out. As far as I can see, there's no such thing as 30-something bloggers. I even googled it just to be certain. There are plenty of blogs pertaining to 30-something, but no sort of community or group. There's only 20-something and I can't join. And it leaves me feeling - dare I say it - old. I was 20-something once. I had all sorts of life experiences too. I was single and dating. I could hold my liquor a whole lot better. I could live in an apartment the size of shoebox and not care less. I could live with reckless abandon. I could not know what I wanted and feel sort-of ok about it (as OK as a type A personality can feel). I was tormented (ok - sometimes still am) and drunk and free of most responsibility (although I didn't realize it then). And now, because I didn't write it down, I feel left out of a generation. But only sometimes.

There are days when I revel in 30. There are days when I am fully aware of the fact that I am just beginning to enter some of the best years of my life. They are the best because I know myself better than I did when I was in my 20's. In some ways, I'm clearer about what I want and in others, to be honest, I'm less clear. Although I'm way more willing to admit that now. I'm more comfortable in my own skin. I've got a wonderful husband and true home that I'm proud of and love spending time in. I've enjoyed getting older. Mostly. There are certainly night when I long for the New York City streets, bottles of tequila, great friends, and the mystery of the next bar. But then, don't we romanticize what's past? I remember those days with great fondness, forgetting the torment and the distress that was often a part of those years. It's easy to look back and remember the great. And while there are many moments that I have to remind myself of this, I truly believe we are meant to live in the now.

But I still feel a little left out. And perhaps it's just because there's still a part of me that's nostalgic. There's still a part of me that revels in those rare nights out where I can stay awake until 2 in the morning. I still enjoy the man that flirts with me even though there's no mystery or what if's that accompany it. When I get time with my girlfriends, I am proud to admit how much I depend on them - for advice, for companionship, for laughter. I often still feel like I'm in my 20's - but like a fine wine, a little better with time.

Still, I can't help but feel a little like I've been discriminated against. Just a little. Or perhaps it's just that I'd love another day in the life of a 20-something.

Posted byMeesh-elle my Belle at 8:27 PM 1 comments  

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