I Am (Not) Awesome

Resolution: I will not Google myself. I will not Google myself. I will not Google myself. It can only cause internal bleeding, you know. There I am, nine pages in. That's a six-page downgrade from this time last year. I am quite behind myself. Realization: I appear second only to the American Horse Breeder's Association member, English quilt and chain mail designers who share my given name. Reconciliation: I have done nothing electronically indelible this year. I have no imprint.

Alas, there is good news. Shameful use of the word corpulent in reference to me has been downgraded to page twelve.

Progress, indeed.

Independence Day

Freedom is sliding the elastic waistband of these green palazzo beach pants over my pitted pockets of upper thigh skin, only to discover that no one is looking at me (and they never were). What, then, is the difference between emotional maturity and total apathy? Have I accepted my spider veins or do I just no longer care?

Anatomy of a Disappointment

Maxi dresses are completely over. I decide this as I stand sheathed in one. I decide this as two strips of double-stick fashion tape are securing its breast panels to my breastplate. Waiting on the corner of 55th and Park behind a woman whose lower torso is encased in her pencil skirt like tight snake muscle shimmering beneath its scales, I decide: maxi dresses are completely over. I decide maxi dresses are completely over because it is one decision I can make. I cannot make a disappointment into the body of a snake. I can only wear it taped to my skin and too long, sweeping the streets like a paintbrush.

Summer Days, Drifting Away

I remember my second summer in New York (the summer of '97) as though it were a hot moment in an endless fever dream. I remember it better than my first because I actually stayed here, all summer, and slowly lost my mind. During my first summer in New York (the summer of '96) I had gone home to the desert of Denver to get my navel pierced and smoke cigarettes in the back of my friend's art gallery. So it didn't really count.

During that summer of '97 I attended my first New York cattle call for Grease. That was back when I thought that just because I kinda sounded like Rizzo and sometimes wore my hair in those same rebellious adult waves, I could totally play her. I remember that day well not just because I wore a leotard and tights in front of a panel full of strangers for the first and only time in my life but also because it was hot. My first hot New York summer day. I was two months out of school and had one audition outfit: a long-sleeved, vintage blue velvet swing dress. I wore it with opaque black tights and three inch t-strap character shoes. It was 100 degrees at noon.

I remember the day like it's in my DNA. I remember sitting in my underwear on my roommate's lemon gingham sheets, curling my hair into a retro swoop as MTV ran the Spice Girls' cooing ballad on an every-half-hour rotation in the background. I remember getting a callback at the dance call and I remember meeting the director, who said he liked the darkness in my voice. Darkness. After the audition I returned to my fourth-floor walk-up to eat frozen Milano cookies in front of an open window and wait for his call.

I remember that day on every hot New York summer day. Like today. Like yesterday. New York heat tattoos itself onto your thin skin -- inner wrist, eyelid, earlobe. It sits in your spinal fluid and rises slowly to your brain, melting tissue into sense memory. It never changes. It is always that same day, in June of '97, when I was young and sweaty with ambition.

Adulthood

I have learned to accept the taste of bitterness and so now eat more kale. And brown rice. Watercress and artichoke leaves. I still don’t speak the language of letting go but I do finally understand the true meaning of the word autopilot.

I journal. About breakfast, lunch and dinner. How many cups of this and that? Four almonds and a piece of string cheese. See? Journaling.

I realize the term assets is relative and grows ever more irrelevant all at once. Yes, I see the big picture and the forest for the trees.

I avoid being attentive where I can.
I have decided passive aggression is mostly aggressive.
I do not yet see my desk as sacred space and so abide Subway bread crumbs on my legal pad.

I am confused by luck but search for meaning in everything.

Love/Hate

Love this: someone just said, "if there isn't a word for what you do, say you're a consultant." With that in mind, I am considering one of the following for business cards:

• Candy Consumption Consultant (This would appeal to niche consumers of those teeny gummy cola bottles I'm something of an expert on)
• Persona Development Consultant (Who do you need to be? Valuable office employee? Attentive friend/wife/sibling? Let me help you develop an alter ego to handle the demands. Again, I'm something of an expert here)
• Conversation Survival Consultant, Small Talk and Other (Need a few quips? A couple stock phrases? Accurate weather reports for elevator encounters? Let me be your guide through the wonderful world of all things conversationally meaningless)
  

Hate this: the word "bespoke". In the first place, it's of British origin. Tossing it around as though it belongs to us is like saying, "I'd like a spot of tea" when you really mean you want a Lipton, no sugar, to go. Here, a few translations:

Bespoke Tailoring: Don't you dare bring that in if it's not a peach-colored blazer.
Bespoke Wood Floors: Only for people whose feet are free of those gross flip-flop heel callouses.
Bespoke Lingerie: If you've got back fat, we can't help you.

Love/hate this: Yoga.

Love this: You can order beer served in 16, 24 and 32-ounce mugs at the Halifax airport. When you place your order the waitress asks if you want the "junior", "man" or "lady" size.

"I'll have a 32-ounce lady, please".

The Truth

This girl I know, she:

• Has no (secondary) hometown pride.
• Likes that one song -- what is it called?
• Prefers white tuna to spicy tuna to fatty tuna to hamachi to yellowtail to eel.
• Feels guilty when she leaves a penny lay.
• Doesn't send food back if the kitchen gets it wrong.
• Looks forward to self-medicating.
• Only pretends to know what elegiac means.
• Hates parties and always has.
• Wastes money.
• Wastes time.
• Wastes money all the time.
• Doesn't hold the elevator, even when she can.
• Is wearing the wrong shoes again.
• Wishes she had never loaned out her copy of The Player.
• Apologizes for shit she didn't do.
• Has no available credit.
• Makes kissy faces in the mirror.
• Once watched a man steal a hat.
• Is losing her edge.
  

Alas, she's just a girl. And so am I.
We are, in the end, only girls.