Twenty-Year-Old Logic

I sat on the carpet floor in front of the vanity that held the two sinks on the way to the bathroom in our two-king-sized-bed-one-large-walk-in-closet-attached-bathroom suite. I distinctly remember telling her, "There will be a day when I stop making responsible decisions. I can feel it coming." The central air kicked on and gave me goose bumps.

I held it together that semester the best I could. I made routines and then sought out spontaneity to break them. I burned a vanilla candle every night and curled into bed with my journal. Put Dashboard Confessionals on repeat. "It's colder than it ought to be in March, and I still got a day or two ahead of me till I'll be heading home..." And waited for the night sky to turn purple under the weight of the smog. But I was also the first person to say yes to a late-night trip to the psychic. We climbed into the back of the old BMW and chugged down Melrose until we found a parking space under the pink, florescent sign. Almost mid-night on a Thursday, all six of us piled out of the car.

That semester had a weak structure of broken promises and misconceptions. I learned to grow around them. But its foundation was still uncertainty. I had no idea what the future would hold. I left for L.A. looking for answers that I wouldn't find for years, if ever. “And I asked myself about the present: how wide it was, how deep it was, how much was mine to keep.”  But that didn't keep me from trying. Under the light of the candle, under the light of the psychic's sign. I was the first to say yes, but I never went in. My phone rang and I knew that was the best answer I was going to get.

For most of college, my best friend and I had a mantra: "It's not as bad of a decision, if you know that you're making a bad decision." We offered it quietly at 11pm at first, but it gained its momentum until we said it as a matter of fact at noon lunches. While the rest of the table tried to untangle and debate our twenty-year-old logic. We wouldn't debate it. We wouldn't untangle it. We just stuck to it.

Years later, as in sometime in February of 2010, I realized why we hung onto that mantra for so long: it gave us permission to take risks. It gave us permission to identify and act on what we wanted to do rather than what we thought we should do. We made those "bad decisions" on a regular basis in college, and we made then with the unwavering support of one another. Looking back, I realize, they were never bad decisions. They were declarations of true desires; they were the guts it takes to name those desires and act on them; and they were the unconditional support and love to go. after. what. you. truly. want.

That was almost ten years ago.

I have a vanilla candle that I think it's time to light...


 
Dashboard Confessionals, A Plain Morning
Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five

From The Department of Teen Dramas

Sometimes there are nights, after days that don't really go the way you want them to (sometimes on repeat), when you sit down in front of the CW (do you remember doing this in the days of the WB?) and indulge in someone else's struggle, drama, story arc. Sometimes you pull your computer into your lap and send emails of the show's one-liners in bold, huge, centered font to a friend who will, more likely than not, just get it. Sometimes she's in the same place in another state and always just gets it. And sometimes you are mostly kidding and sometimes you are mostly not. And sometimes, you unexpectedly have a fabulous night.

Tonight's Wisdom Gleaned From One Tree Hill 

(cut and paste from our emails, sans my huge, bold font)

• WHAT COMES NEXT? 
• I DON'T WANT TO BE ANYTHING OTHER THAN WHAT I HAVE BEEN TRYING TO BE LATELY.
• I KNOW THAT SOMETIMES UNEMPLOYMENT LEADS TO CRACK SMOKING, AND I UNDERSTAND THAT, BUT I THOUGHT YOU WOULD BE MORE EXCITED ABOUT THIS.
• YOU MAKE SAD LOOK BEAUTIFUL.
• I understand business, I understand what we COULD do. I also understand what is fair, what is right and what is honorable. Do I want you to accept this? And to support it? And to be proud of me for it? Yes. But if you don't, it doesn't matter to me, maybe for the first time.
• WHAT COMES NEXT IS UP TO YOU.
• we're going to be okay.
• I WILL BE [FINE] 'CAUSE OF YOU.
• FOCUS ON YOUR TALENTS, EVERYTHING ELSE WILL WORK ITSELF OUT.
• dont' focus on your work, focus on your life. you are young and beautiful.
• SO FOR NOW, I SAY GOODBYE TO THIS CHAPTER IN MY LIFE, AND I LOOK FORWARD TO WHAT COMES NEXT.

"This Will Probably Rank High (If Not #1) On The List Of The Weirdest Emails You Have Ever Received"

["I worked in the Medical Records Department (HIM Specialist II - aka professional copy machine attendee - ha) during summer breaks from college.  One afternoon, a man came in to sign a release form.  We were busy during that lunch hour, but I remember trying my best to give him my undivided attention and to help him fill out the form.  He came back the next day with a package for me.  (Yes, this was weird behavior.)  My supervisor called hospital security, and they swept it away without a second glance in my direction.  I found out later that afternoon that he had written me a letter and made me a mixed tape. (Do those even exist anymore?)  He said something to the effect of "I really appreciated your kindness and help the other day.  Not often do I run into such simple kindness, and I made you this tape to express my gratitude."  My supervisor was pleased with me, security was freaked out, and I had to wear my badge turned upside down for the rest of the summer.  I never got to see the contents of the package or read the letter. 

The next morning, a hospital administrator called me into her office and asked how I felt about the event.  I told her I felt badly that we live in a world where somebody tries to express gratitude and kindness, and it comes off as dangerous and unstable.  I think it is important to tell a person when s/he has made an impact on you.  I told her that I understand his actions were extreme and improper, but where is the line drawn exactly? She told me that she agreed.  She told me that she, too, thought it is important to acknowledge when people made an impact on you.  She said she thought it is important to take that risk.  

I think of that man more often than expected, and I often wonder if he knows that he inadvertently had an impact on me, also. (Ha! Yeah right, I know.)  Over time, the conversation with the hospital administrator stands out more and the potential-absolute-craziness (the check-into-the-behavioral-health-unit-two-doors-down type of craziness) wears off.  I'm telling you this story, because it is where I am coming from when I write this email: I think it is important to tell a person when s/he has made an impact on you."]

And then I proceed to write an email to a guy who would never expect it coming about how he has no idea but he made an impact on my life.  And then I promptly hit the DELETE button, because I'm pretty sure I wrote THIS SAME MESSAGE to a boy I liked when I was FOURTEEN YEARS OLD (and one at fifteen, and one at sixteen, and some skewed version of this in college).  Only I wrote it MORE THAN TEN YEARS AGO on a college-lined sheet of notebook paper and not in the draft folder of my gmail account.  I have some strange mixture of pride and humiliation that I am still determined to write emails after midnight with the keen desire to say, "HEY, YOU'RE IMPORTANT."  I still have this sneaking suspicion that the recipients needs to hear this.  Like I said - a strange mixture of pride and humiliation.  But I don't want to live in that world where an expression of kindness comes off as dangerous and unstable.  I don't know if rectifying that happens solo in "my own world" by sending a note of kindness, or if rectifying that happens in "the real world" by not sending a note of kindness.  So for now, I'm keeping that email in the trash, and I will consider writing a very short  "heeyyy, what's up?  hope all is going well in your world" email at 2pm tomorrow.  Just to be on the safe side.  I'll probably write "just a hello" in the subject line.  Honestly, I'll probably hit delete on that one too, because what I really want to say is "I THINK YOU NEED TO HEAR THIS AND I DEFINITELY NEED TO SAY THIS: YOU ARE IMPORTANT IN MY LIFE."

Don't worry, I'll go ahead and tag this post "teen angst" immediately...  But seriously - where's the line?

Red

Red fires blaze through dreams each night. Dancing flames spreading, contained. Smoldering embers glowing. I watch without fear as flames take center stage, enveloping my nights and perplexing dawns with meaning unknown.

Red walls of a teen's room, lined with records and charcoal artwork, flicker on-screen during our Tuesday mornings with the DVR play button. Red lining of our black coffee mugs match the on-screen walls, passion, blood, fireworks, love and lust. Centered Tuesday mornings in the arms of red.

Red background peeks out from behind my inbox until I lower the screen... corner to corner crimson appears with painted black streaks, notes, lyrics spattered in the crimson galaxy, random and aligned. Notes, lyrics, rhythms, beats umbrella the room from the deep red ipod reflecting my crimson desktop, and on certain evenings playing the same black painted notes across the crimson spread. Steadied, steadied, steadied by red, red, red.

We're Still Our William Smith Life

I still read Cisneros with a pen. Contemplate starting a paper at 11pm with a fresh cup of coffee. Try to catch the moon beams reflecting off the water with my lens. She'll tell me "We don't have to make sense," and I'll sit in her passenger seat listening to that song. Time as only a suggestion and convention only a passing thought.

I still search for the right words and bright colors that soothe. Eat ice cream for dinner. Think of life in terms of circles, journeys and stories. She's still the person I call at 2am while the world sleeps and we never do. Sleep as only a hassle - altering perceptions and dreams - and nights as an extension of life rather than a mimic of death.

I still tape up lists made on white paper with colored magic markers. Write to understand what I know. Crawl into an open lap. She and I escape and return together, flee and face it together. Life as an experience and the passing moments only as opportunities to feel alive.