Conversations of the Heart

A long, long time ago, I had this dream of Jake Ryan pulling up outside my house, in his cherry red Porsche, and rescuing me from my life.  Sitting on top of the dining room table to eat birthday cake was optional, but the Thompson Twins would definitely be playing the background. Sigh!  "If You Were Here".  Jake was the original teenage dream. 

 And sure, lots of other boys earned my affection in the years since Sixteen Candles, but there’s just something about Jake Ryan that still gives my estrogen a massive tweak.  Maybe it's that he can actually rock a sweater vest.  Or that he's just so damn hot.  It doesn't matter, the teenager in me will keep him as my perpetual valentine. 

So far as I can see, there are only two good things about Valentine’s Day:

1. Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown – something about poor Linus cursing Elizabeth Barrett Browning just cracks me up.
2. Conversation Hearts.  I’d never eat plain old Necco wafers because to be perfectly honest, they pretty much taste like crap.  But shape them in hearts and slap a catchy phrase on them and suddenly, every February, it’s like these candies actually taste good.  Though the messages have gotten a little funky over the year.  

I’m fan of the classics – “Kiss Me” and “Be Mine”.  But new phrases that showed up this year, specifically “Just One” and “Dare You” just confuse me. 

“Just One” what?  One candy?  Not going to happen.  I’ll eat them until my stomach aches of ulcers.  One kiss?  Not going to work either.  I’m greedy that way. One drink?  Easier said than done sometimes.  One love?  Well, maybe in the movies.  I’m not advocating a life of slutdom, but if we all stuck with the first person we fell in love with (or at least what we thought was love at the time), well, I’d either be stalking poor Jake Ryan (which I guess I kind of am, but I swear I know he's not real) or the upperclassman I was lusting in high school (sorry, dude for all that ogling in the hallways on my way to Social Studies). 

As for “Dare You”, well dare you to what?  I dare you to love me.  Ouch!  I dare you to eat this candy?  Well, close up they do look a little sketchy.  Though people often option for the dare over the truth, so maybe the people at Necco are onto something. Honesty has no place on a day with the initials "VD".  Just saying.

And then there’s the “You Rock” heart.   And sometimes the “R” isn’t so clear so it actually looks more like the kind of candy message you’d give the a-hole that dumped you.  Now a box of Convo Hearts to give to people who broke your heart….now those would be fun to make!

Alas, I don’t want to be mistaken for a bitter chick, just because it’s nonsense commercial holiday and I happen to be single this year.  Truth be told I’d rather get flowers (and something more creative than red roses, please) on April 6^th.  It’s my half birthday.  So if I can meet a boy who remembers that, well, I’ll be sure the candy heart you get is a “You Rock”!

As for love, it can be a wonderfully, amazing, painful, scary, worth-taking-the-leap-of-faith-for thing.  And I’m very lucky and very grateful to have so much love in my life.  No sarcasm.  No snarky remarks.  At the end of the day, I’m a romantic at heart.  Which is probably why a line from an episode of Castle struck a chord with me.  Castle asks Beckett how she knows when she’s in love and she replies, “All the songs make sense.”  I couldn’t agree more.

So today, I respectfully turn it over to a song that always makes sense to me.  I tip my hat to the original, but sometimes the cover just kicks more ass.  “You and me babe, how about it?”

Not For Nothing Goes Commuting

Thanks to the power of the shuffle feature on my iPod I’ve rediscovered a favorite – The Fratellis “Flathead”.

“Then stood and said oh my God til she said, Bara bap bara ra ra ra bara bap bara ra ra ra.” 

And I’ve basically been listening to it on repeat for days.  It’s the kind of song that makes me want to dance.  And sometimes I do.  Yes, I’m *that* girl on the subway, rocking out.  I have no shame.  All about embracing the happy place.  And being the chick grooving on the E train beats being one of the crazies or the smellies in my opinion. 

But nothing ruins my good happy place like the rude and the clueless.  So tonight I’m all about those people on the commute in and the commute home who make me mutter, Seriously?  I mean, not for nothing, but….

(To be honest I’ve been know to drop an f-bomb or two on occasion, but I’m trying to keep this PG-13 for as long as I can.)

And we’re off to the races.

The subway is a crowded place.  So, why, for the love of God are you, a grown man, wearing a backpack that appears to hold every textbook you carried around in high school?  Did you forget your locker combination or are you being hazed in some man-fraternity.  Did someone say Old School?  Listen, guy, who I’m sure is not remotely as funny as Vince Vaughn…adding three feet of literal baggage to your back (and then turning left and right to ensure you bang into people with said baggage) is annoying.  Pretending that you don’t know you’re taking up the space for four people with your one body and backpack is obnoxious.  Learn your surroundings.  Respect your fellow commuter.  Leave the friggin backpack at home.  You’re so not my boy, Blue.

People who carry ridiculously ginormous umbrellas.  There are some NYC streets where, if you’re lucky, two people can walk side-by-side (thank you piles of snow and garbage that has yet to be picked up).  If you insist on carrying an umbrella that could cover Hawaii, then maybe you should move to Hawaii.  Of course I don’t think they get much rain, but it will be a great shield from the sun.  Just be sure to ask the rest of the island if they want to live in a solar eclipse.

When the weather isn’t crappy I walk home.  I love that there are countless ways to go the forty blocks from point A to point B.  What I’m not loving is the people who cut me off on the sidewalk to get ahead, only to then walk soooooo painfully slow, a Nana in a walker could pass them. What’s the point of passing me only to walk like a Nana in a walker?  Is it a power trip thing to get ahead of me?  Suddenly you’re no longer in a rush?  Well, I love a challenge, so will happily pass you right back.  The difference is I’ll keep walking. Though will probably throw a dirty look over my shoulder and depending on my mood, potentially the aforementioned f-bomb.

Tourists.  I know they’re the bread and butter of the city and all that jazz.  I’ve *been* a tourist in other people’s cities.  But like Ferris said, “life moves pretty fast”.  Well so does NYC.  So take pictures, visit the landmarks, enjoy the lights of Times Square and pose in Rockefeller Center.  I get it.  But that’s also my path home so stopping short in the middle of the sidewalk to look up at a building…totally unacceptable.  It’s a building.  There are plenty more to see.  Posing for a pic with a group so large that you create a human traffic jam…equally annoying.  

Then there's the tourist who poses in front of the Juicy Couture on Fifth Avenue.  Why? “Remember that great vacation when we stood outside the store that sells velour track suits?”  And the tourists taking pics with police horses?  Doesn’t really get in my way, but I just don’t get it. Plus I have visions of someone’s camera flash sending one of these horses into a bizarro epileptic seizure and trampling me in the process.  That’s just sort of how my luck goes.

Next.  

People who run down the street like they’re being chased by the cops.  (People on the street clearly tweak my nerves the most, hmmmm?)  They’re either trying to catch a bus, flag a taxi or get across the street before the light changes.  News flash!  Not only do you look ridiculous and cause all sorts of chaos by shoving your way through the peeps just walking down the street, but history should tell you, the bus rarely waits, the taxi will already be taken and you just might fall down. (Snicker! Snicker!)  And that would be very sad. (Snicker!)  And embarrassing.  For you.  (And yes, I’m laughing at you, so long as you’re not seriously hurt because I’m a bitch and you’re an asshole and you probably sideswiped me on your way by). 

And lastly, people eating on the subway.  The popcorn they sell in subway stations always smells like feet.  It’s the case in New York.  It was the case in Boston.  I love popcorn.  I hate feet.  I beg you.  Please stop ruining a good thing for me.

And for that matter, any kind of street meat, fast food, unidentifiable something in a Styrofoam container (often also smells like feet, though now dipped in poo).  Or food that requires hand-to-mouth eating (chips, M&M’s…you follow me).  And then that hand that’s got your saliva all over it is now touching the pole. (Never mind what might be on that pole that you’ve now put in your mouth. Time for a tetanus shot.)  Plus, I may also have to hold onto that pole when my balance is off and I need to make sure I don’t fall over like a drunk 21-year-old on her birthday.  

At one of my old jobs we got a memo that said, if we were going to eat at our desks to please do so “quietly and discreetly”.  I think the MTA should issue the same.  Could be legendary. 

Or not.  But a girl can dream.

And for anyone keeping track, I survived the dentist yesterday. And score one for his office – they got massaging chairs and I swear to God it’s the best idea EVER.  I have never once felt so relaxed and so happily distracted while having someone scrape my teeth, while that little vacuum things sucks up the drool in my mouth.  Made me hate the dentist a little less.

And to celebrate my stellar experience?  I picked up a bag of Conversation Hearts on the way home.  What?  I didn’t have any cavities.  Don’t judge.

Embracing the Bumble Within

I’m feeling a bit like the Abominable Snowman today.  Some rage.  Some frustration.  I could probably stand to run a brush through my hair too.  Though no worries…I don’t have any evil plan to take some innocent reindeers hostage.  But after what feels like the fiftieth day in a row of some combination of snow, sleet and sub-freezing temps, I feel like I’m living on the North Pole.  And I’m so over it.

Yes, I choose to live in New York, so I get it.  It’s winter.  In the northeast.  The weather is supposed to suck.  But the cabin fever is giving me delusions that I’m the Bumble from Rudolph.  I’m going to go out on a limb and say that openly comparing myself to the monstrous yeti is probably a bad sign of my current state of mind (not to mention my self-esteem) these days.

And on top of the snow, I have a dentist appointment on Monday.  The poor Bumble had to have his teeth yanked out (though it did make him much nicer in the long run).  Back in junior high I had to have four teeth pulled before I got my braces put on.  I don’t know if I was any nicer in the aftermath, but I do remember crying, my dad crushing some Bayer aspirin in sugar for me to take, and having the free pass to lay in my parents’ bed and watch American Anthem on HBO.   Mitch Gaylord and Janet Jones in an epic movie set against the backdrop of gymnastics and a song by Duran Duran’s Andy Taylor.  Movies from the 80s were sheer genius.  But I digress…

And two decades later I still blame that particularly sadistic dentist for my complete fear of going for a routine cleaning appointment.  He actually yelled at me when I started crying.  Here’s a hint Dr. Demented:  the mini shot of novocaine you jammed into my gums didn’t numb the pain of the gigantic wrench you used to twist four teeth out of a scared twelve-year-old’s mouth.  And the yelling?  You guessed it!  That only made me cry more.  Which in turn only made him yell more.  Thanks for the memories!

And don’t even get me started on how the *smell* of the dentist sends my stomach into knots. But since I’m fresh out of my I-take-Xanax-to-quell-my-dental-anxiety prescription, I have to face the music without the pleasure of being comfortably numb.  I’m sure this makes me sound like a complete baby, but in my opinion there are much lamer fears out there.  Like the fear of flutes or string or knees.  They’re all real.  I Googled them.  Maybe I’m being judgy.  After all, I’m an adult writing about my fear of the dentist. I’m also not too jazzed about flying, but that’s far more common. I’m working on that one.  And by “working on”, I mean that part of the reason I’m fresh out of Xanax is because I went to Europe in the fall.  Cry me a river, right?  Yeah, that trip was totally worth it.

But come Monday my dentist (who for the record is a very lovely, very understanding, very patient with a capital “P” man) is going to check on how my stress-induced, jaw-clenching, TMJ sitch is going.  The pain was so bad back in November that I was convinced I’d either broken a filling (and there are plenty back there to choose from) or that I had a new cavity or I needed a root canal.  I also debated the possibility that ten year’s ago my oral surgeon missed a phantom fifth wisdom tooth, which finally decided to make itself known. 

I was knocked out for that procedure, so for all I know he stopped after the second tooth and spent the rest of my appointment playing poker with the anesthesiologist.  But finding out I had a fifth wisdom tooth wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest.  These types of things happen.  I had a friend in college who hooked up with a girl with seven toes, though til this day I’m not sure if it was seven on one foot for a total of twelve toes or three on the left and four on the right.  He didn’t really volunteer the details.  And while I’m certainly grateful for my total of ten toes (in a five and five symmetry) it doesn’t make me any less anxious about the dentist.

And just like it’s easier to put on those five pounds than it is to lose them, it’s far easier for me to sit here and be an anxious, bitchy little Bumble.  But even he found a way to bounce back, since, well, Bumbles bounce!  Literally.  And that moment at the end of Rudolph when the Bumble puts the star on the tree always warms my little black heart.  “Looky what he can do!”  So I’m doing my damnedest to bounce back too. 

First, I’m going to blast some Green Day and clean for a bit, which I fully enjoy doing.  There’s something very satisfying about knocking something off my To Do list and I do have some slight control issues.  One person’s chore is another person’s treasure. 

And sure, the weather outside makes me want to do nothing other than crawl under my covers, turn on the TV and take a really long nap.  And I’m thinking I’ll do that too.  No one said bouncing back required actual physical activity.  I’ll start with a little mental bouncing.  It’s Saturday.  Naps are totally playable. It’s been dark out since I woke up this morning.  Oxygen is playing a Glee marathon.  All signs point to giving in to the comfort of my bed. 

So with that I’m going to bounce.

What's the use of wond'rin'?

I’ve been over-thinking this first entry for far too long, because the truth is, I can over-think just about anything.  What to wear…what to watch on TV…what to eat for dinner.  I blame the Libra within – we tend to have a really hard time making up our minds. 

           

And during all this crazy over-thinking, I couldn’t help but wonder – what if I wrote something no one wanted to read?  Wondered if I could keep coming up with ideas.  Wondered if what I wrote would be good or interesting or funny.  Wondered, if my blog fell in the forest would anybody hear it?  And then a good friend of mine told me to just take the leap and to write like I was emailing her – but to be sure to change the names and fuzz out any of the incriminating details.  Because really, what’s the use of wond’rin’?

So here I am, heeding her advice, ripping off the proverbial Band-Aid and diving head first into the land of the blog where I’ll inevitably write randomly about why I find cleaning to be totally therapeutic, about my love for massages at Bliss, my addiction to baseball, the hours spent watching select reality TV (I’d like to think I’m *slightly* discriminating) and about all the other TV shows I’m proud to admit I tune into.  I’ll also chime in on celebrity gossip, the books I’m reading, the writers I admire, the songs dominating my iPod, why I love living in NYC (though the worst winter on record is making me long for a warmer climate), the nonsense in my co-op, the comedy at the gym, friendships, family, relationships, and anything else that may cross my mind at the time. 

And of course, there’s the daily antics at my office, that provides more material than any writer could hope for.  Case in point, I actually had someone ask me to clean pee off a toilet seat because I work in Operations, and we are pretty much looked at like the office maids.  I’ve worked really hard to have a position with the word “Director” in my title, but in the eyes of some of these folks I’m apparently the Director of Cleaning Up a Female Colleague’s Pee.  Good times.  But I try to keep a good sense of humor and you have to when, on occasion, you do things like book an Outlook calendar invite for all the firm to see for the “Annual Holiday Boob Signing”.  It took a week before anyone clued my into the typo, though I suspect I would have had a better turnout for the boob vs. book signing. 

But thankfully not all my writing consists of Freudian typos.  I’ve written two novels.  The first (a “write what you know” purging at it’s best…and perhaps worst) is living under my bed, where in all honesty it belongs.  The second, a mystery, is currently working the critique circuit.  And there’s a work in progress, which is suffering from some temporary neglect, but I promise, I’ll be back. 

So that’s my story.  And in the spirit of “don’t get it right, get it written,” this is me, maybe not always getting it right, but hopefully you’ll be back to see what I’ve written.