why your 20s are disconcerting

Morgan:  Does it ever freak you out a little bit that [girl who we 

         lived with in college] is....a doctor?

         I mean, this is the girl who not once, not twice, but 

         three times forgot she left her cell phone in her pants, 
         and put them in the washing machine.

Me:      It would freak me out less if [this girl] was the only 

         person I knew who made me think, "....seriously?  They're 
         letting you be a doctor/lawyer/CPA/other relatively 
         responsible person?"

Morgan:  TESTIFY.

ambush

You know that twilight country you pass through every night, in between awake and asleep?  You have to be careful there.  That's where all those things you managed to push out of your mind during the day will sneak up and ambush you.  And it's where I am, my brain finally slipping into neutral after a long Monday, when I'm jumped by a memory.  

A different night, in Charles' bed.  I was at just the same point of awake-but-not-really.  He had asked me something, I think about whether I was warm and should he open the sliding door.  But my lips were too heavy to answer, and when he realized it, he stopped asking questions and just kissed my forehead.  One slow, contented kiss -- more for his benefit than mine, since he wasn't sure I was awake.  I drifted off to sleep reveling in that small gesture of possession.

The memory jerks me upwards, like a diver breaking the surface of the water.  I'm back in my own bed, wide awake and unhappy.

If there's anything better than being held by someone you care about -- or think you might be able to care about -- while you fall asleep, I haven't discovered it yet. So when you've gotten used to that luxury, even just a little, even just for a few weeks, it's difficult to revert.  As my subconscious is now pointedly reminding me.

I'll keep slogging, I guess.  And maybe have glass of wine before bed.

this again

It's past midnight and I should really be in bed, but my head feels like a jar of lightning bugs, thoughts flashing so softly and insistently that I know I'll never get to sleep. So instead I'm on my roof. I came up thinking I'd look at the stars, but no luck. They say, this town, the stars stay up all night....but I don't know, can't see 'em, for the glow of the neon lights. Lights or no, it's overcast anyway.

I just made it home from a birthday party in West Hollywood. We lounged on The Foundry's patio, sipped tequila, listened to the jazz band. I think I managed to keep my poker face.

The Foundry, of course, is where I began a very good second date with the boy I'm trying to forget about -- so naturally that's where we all wound up tonight, just to twist the knife a little. We almost went to The Village Idiot instead, not that it would have helped, since that's where I finished that second date. The Village Idiot is also where I spent a long and memorable evening with a different boy, late in the summer of 2007, shaking salt all over the table and tying straw wrappers into knots. Both The Foundry and The Village Idiot are right down the street from Angeli Caffe, the little Italian place where I ate gnocchi and roasted chicken and closed down the restaurant with the boy I was trying to forget when I started this blog.  

I've been dating too much, or living here too long, or something. All the memories are starting to layer. Some nights, every bar and restaurant and theater and club and cafe I step into feels like another stop on a historical tour of my checkered romantic past.

This boy I'm trying to forget. He took me to Geoffrey's one evening, which is this absurdly lovely restaurant in Malibu. Spectacular ocean views, and at night the big twisted trees glow over the patio, encrusted with white lights. He was the third boy I had been there with, a fact I was doing my best not to think about. But at some point during dinner, he asked me playfully to tell him about the best date I'd ever been on. And I had to shake my head and say I didn't want to tell him and change the subject. Because of course, the date that came to mind was one that had happened at that restaurant, on that patio, maybe even at the very table where we were sitting.

Some nights, the only thing I want is a fresh slate. Whether it's about the boy or the restaurant -- to stop thinking, this again.

It is, of course, raining up here on the roof. Just misting, really. Tiny drops spangle my computer screen.  As close as I'll get to stars tonight.

one long laugh

Today is my grandparents' 59th wedding anniversary.  

When I called them on my way home from work, they wanted to tell me all about their lunch.  Apparently my grandpa decided to mark the day by taking my grandma to a seafood restaurant she loves, "which is all of fifteen minutes away," she supplied.  "It only took us two and a half hours," he chimed in.  Their commingled laugher echoed down the line.  It seems they took a wrong turn ("Your grandfather turned right, even though I told him to turn left, and of course left was the right way.") and while they have a GPS, they're not really all that good at using it. ("That damn thing kept telling us to go in a circle!")  But they made it, eventually, and the lobster was delicious.  

Then my grandma said, reflectively, "I remember when your grandpa asked me to marry him.  I told him, 'I think if I marry you, it's just going to be one long laugh.'  And you know... it has been."

They were still giggling when I hung up with them.

We should all be so lucky, eh?

neophyte

We're sitting at opposite ends of his sectional couch, like boat anchors. And we are awash in opera music. Big sonorous waves of it are pouring out of his tiny speakers, pressing us backwards into the cushions. I've closed my eyes, listening hard.

I am decidedly out of my element, but even I can tell that this isn't really a 400-level course. He's starting me off with broad, appealing opera, the kind of stuff you'd have to be insensate not to at least appreciate. He talks me through plot lines and voice qualities: first Maria Callas, then each of the Three Tenors.

At some point, I laugh aloud. He doesn't ask why -- maybe doesn't notice, so intent is he on Maria's tone -- and I don't volunteer.

But this makes me think of that time my sister called me out of the blue, bubbling over about Pablo Neruda. "Have you ever HEARD of him?" she asked me, the English major who had just bought her fourth ceiling-height bookshelf. "He's so AMAZING. Poetry! I think I get it now!"

I was sure for a few minutes that she must have suffered some kind of traumatic head injury. But then, of course, the explanation came tumbling out, and it wasn't just Pablo she wanted to gush over. "I've been trying to get you to read poetry for the last 15 years of your life," I remember saying, "But all it takes is one good-looking Spanish boy with Neruda on his bedside table, and suddenly you're a fanatic."

Now, in the living room, iTunes recedes into silence. "Did you like that one?" he asks.

And I say, "I think I get it now."