Start Living the Life You Want To Have

Most of you know I'm completely at the feet of the impeccable
Mad Men. Every week I take away some juicy bit of writing to gnaw on and savor as I while away the day at an office that shares an address with its fictional counterpart but only dreams of its edgy, smoky productivity.

And then there are the gals. Oh, those are my kinda broads. Kept, some of them, burdened by gender politics, all of them, but each desperate to define herself and fighting like hell with perfect, red oval fingernails to scratch through the surface of Brill Cream, bourbon and boy's clubs.

A couple of episodes ago, one of my Mad babes, Bobbi Barrett, wife of an obnoxious, of-the-time comedian who'd been carrying on with with the leading man (Creative Director at the ad agency where her husband was under contract), had a scene that will stay with me forever. She'd been in a drunken car accident with aforementioned lead and was in pretty bad shape. She couldn't go home with a black eye and explain how it'd happened, so to her rescue came Peggy, the homely young copywriter from the office. Peggy put Bobbi up in her modest Brooklyn apartment for a few days while she healed. Naturally, as storylines like this go, the women had a few things to learn from each other. Peggy's discretion was foreign to Bobbi, who lounged for days and smoked cigarettes on her couch in a lacy black slip. But to Peggy, Bobbi was what she seemed to me: sultry, fragile, calculating and absolutely magnetic. At the end of her stay, as Bobbi patched up her face so she could go home and slide comfortably back into her role as domestic femme fatale, she told Peggy that you decide who you're going to be and that to get where you want to end up you just simply "start living the life you want to have".

I don't know why, but that line got inside me. And it was still banging around in my mind days later when I had a martini with a friend (going for style points) and we talked about how much has changed in the last year. I've moved, decided that I'm applying to school, finished the pilot. But I still can't cut myself loose from this job. It's my last anchor to the life I'm so ready to move on from.

So, what would happen if I just started living the life I wanted to have? My friend suggested that I urge things along by cleaning out my desk at the office. Hey, okay. Since I'll be leaving soon anyway, right? Why not start packing up? See what happens. I actually gave my email address to our IT guy the other day and said "hey, don't think I'll be around long. Here's this for when I'm gone. We'll grab a drink." I'm living the life I want to have. I plan to submit my application to The New School this weekend. I have no idea how I'll pay for school, or how I could continue working this job and be in classes. Oh well, I can't worry about all that now. I'm busy living the life I want to have. Right?

I'm gonna try on Bobbi Barrett's lace slip for awhile and see how it suits me. I've already tried the other method--living the life I don't want to have--and that hasn't worked for years. So, let's just see how this goes. I'm taking my desk plant home tonight.