coping and moping.

Most of my social interactions revolve around me:

 

1. Hastily building a facade of calm so that I don't look like a total spaz.

2. Failing immediately at that venture.

3. Asking about a million questions to take the pressure off of myself.

(4) And/or drinking quite a lot and hastily skipping from topic to topic with much passion and enthusiastic hand gestures for each, albeit fleetingly, as I no longer have any semblance of an attention span.

 

 

 

Which is probably why sitting on my front porch yesterday evening, after the horrifying debacle of losing quite a bit of my current writing, with a novel whilst (on an empty stomach, of course) consuming approximately eight cans of leftover cheap beer from my recent camping weekend was, basically, a perfect night.

 

Until Matt got home from working a very long day around 7:45 to find me quite drunk and not at all packed for the weekend away we're departing on in approximately three hours. Two of which will be spent at my desk, at work.

 

God love him.

 

dropping the string.

I've been thinking about friendship a lot lately.

I usually do, because I pull myself thinly in every direction in a never ending battle to stay in touch with all of the people that I care about. Not just in touch, but to stay friends with. To span the miles. To span the time apart. To be a viable person to pick up the phone and call.

As much as I hate to admit it, it's harder when you're in a romantic relationship. These things take time to upkeep, force things that were once in the foreground out into the periphery. I've struggled with that a lot since Matt and I got together. Before, I was mostly single for two years, and before that, I was always sort of a rolling stone anyway. I'd prioritize girl time above all else. Now, it's different. Not worse or better. Just different.

I heard once that we only have the emotional capacity to really engage in a limited number of relationships at once. Like theater seating almost. You have your front row, the next row, and everything else receding behind it tapers in importance and investment. I just try to stretch the limit.

I always want more.

It's not really THAT many people, because I am a bit of a friend snob. I always have been. I've never been incredibly popular, or the person that everyone orbits around, the glue. But I have a discerning eye when it comes to forming relationships. I'll hold out when I have to. I'll cut people out without warning when the situation requires. 

I don't trust easily.

The people that I surround myself with, they're my heart. In return I'll give you my last dollar, tissue, minute of free time, gallon of gas, and I'll love you. I'll love you the best I can, which admittedly sometimes falls a bit short. But I try. God, do I try.

I've missed things, gatherings. Whole weeks I could have spent within a tight circle of gal pals, sleepovers and wine nights and movies. I've missed things, I know I have. But in as many more times I've risked the peace of my relationship to stay relevant within the group. I strive for the balance, even if I've fallen short. And I'm quick to say "I'm sorry" when I feel I haven't upheld my end of the unspoken agreement, when I've lacked in some way at being a good and decent friend.

I'm an introvert. When I make connections with people, they mean everything to me. I'll turn a single exchange over and over in my head trying to make sense of it. I'm slow with friendship. I'll build it, patiently, defying my usual nownownow outlook on life. Most importantly, I make sure it's built strongly. With the best materials- double, triple reinforced.

I have honed my skill, when it comes to picking out people to trust. I rarely make mistakes now. I rarely waste my time. I'm efficient when it comes to relationships, if nothing else. It's not about judgement, it's about knowing you could trust a person not to crush you. It's about being willing and able to give and receive friendship. Holding a bond, the other end of the string. Trust.

Sure, I've been crushed, I've made mistakes in choosing friends. Who hasn't?

But I've been right more than I've been wrong. It's one of the few skills of mine that I truly treasure. I know a good person. I can see right through.

Recently, though, I've had a sneaking suspicion that I've made a huge mistake.

That something, someone I put so much faith and time and effort into maintaining a friendship with, they're just slipping away.

And no matter how far I try to reach to meet them halfway, they're walking in the other direction.

To be rocked this way, to be wrong, it feels almost like a breakup, although there will be no closure. No conversation. No confrontation.

In some ways ending a friendship is so much more painful than ending a romantic relationship. Sure, you don't have to show up with a box of things to return, necessarily. Divvy up the memories to 'yours' and 'mine.' With friendship, I've found things fade away. Lose their luster. The tide recedes back into the rest of the ocean. There's not really a point in confrontation, because at best, things are never as effortless as they once were, and at worst, it's an awkward conversation or disagreement that creates and chism between the entire group. There's simply no end. Just the haunted feeling that even though you grasp your end of the string with all your might, the other person has let go, wandered off.

We'll still see each other at group gatherings. I'll still laugh at her jokes. 

But I don't see how I could let her in again. It's not even really a choice. I just can't.

I'm just tired, so tired of exhausting myself and fretting over what I could have done to salvage it.

I'm done. The string? It's probably floating around in oblivion somewhere, with no one left to anchor it. The pictures? They can stay.

lack of patience.

Sometimes when I want to do everythingrightthissecond, I need to just remind myself to just knock it off. Yes, it's 2012 and I'm itching to get my year off to a good start, but I'm not going to accomplish everything overnight.

Which is basically the hardest thing to try to tell yourself when you spent college completing semester-long projects the eve before they were due and still getting A's. Because then, everything could be accomplished overnight.

This is not college.


This is real life.


And these things take time.


So, someday, but not today, I'll look back on all the progress and be impressed.

Until then, I'll be dreaming of this:

crash.

Matt is going to be fine.

He hit a deer on the way to work in the middle-of-nowhere in pitch dark at sixty miles an hour last Thursday. We were on the phone. It scared the piss out of me. In fact, I don't really remember the rest of my drive to work after it happened.

We were on the phone with each other when it happened because we talk on the phone on our way to work every morning.  Apparently we can't get enough of each other what with living together and spending the majority of our free time together. Isn't love annoying?

Anyway. All of the sudden there's a loud commotion and then complete silence. I have no idea what's going on.

Then comes the voice.

The I'm-not-okay-this-is-really-scary-oh-shit voice.

Very shaky.

"Oh my god. Oh my god. I just crashed babe. Oh my god. I just got hit with the airbag. I've never been hit by an airbag before. holy shit I just crashed at 60 miles an hour."

So naturally I hit him with a million questions because I'm in panic mode.

It was terrifying. He hit a deer head-on at a good clip and managed to get his truck to the side of the road. They had to give him a new work truck because his is basically totalled.

Matt was shaken, but he walked away from the accident.

The deer was killed on impact, and luckily, didn't have to suffer.

Thankfully, no one else was involved in the accident and the sheriff and Matt's boss arrived promptly to the scene.

But I'll probably never forget the sound of his voice that morning.

heavy.

Days like today feel heavy.

 

The fact that it's cloudless and the sun is playing on the colors of the leaves like stained glass as the wind sighs through them isn't helping. The fact that it's November and 65 degrees and better than ideal isn't helping.

 

It's nothing to do with the weather and everything to do with me. But the fact that I feel this heavy on a perfect day somehow makes it all seem so much worse.

 

It's just that sometimes I look around and I'm not sure how I got to where I am standing. It's just so far from where I want to be, in almost every facet of my life.

 

What the fuck am I doing?

 

Sometimes it feels like if I could just get mad enough or sad enough or joyful enough or one extreme or that other I could make some headway. I know that's not how it works. I know a lot of things about 'that's not how it works." I guess I'm lacking on 'the way it works' front.

 

You know what else? Nothing about my life is even wrong. Everything is fine. I'm fine. We're all fine. I've got absolutely no reason to feel so gloomy.

 

Which is why it feels heavier today. Because if it were raining or cold or cloudy, at least I would have something to feebly tether the blame for feeling this miserable.

every little thing

I've been pretty much repeating the mantra "Every little thing is going to be all right" on a loop lately.

Partially because it's true and partially because I freak out a lot.

This week even minor things have been coming dangerously close to making me howl like a banshee and/or put innocent bystanders in mild to moderate danger.

Every little thing is going to be all right.

Despite:

...My hair desperately needing to be cut. Desperately. Sorry strands, not in the budget this month, stop splitting yourselves. Seriously. Not funny.

...Is that a piece of popcorn kernel or an infectious tumor under my tonsil? For the last three days. Poking my esophageal cavity every time I swallow or move. Just kill me.

...Two terrible mornings in a row. I mean running out the door with no shoes on because I'm late and then realizing it and having to go back in to find shoes and not being able to find me keys. Just, GAHHH.

...Trying to coordinate a bachelorette party for a lovely friend and only hearing back from one other member of the bridal party. OMG it's in less than a month. COME ON.

...Is that pair of pants TIGHTER than usual? Oh holy holy lord, please don't let it be so.

...Yup, they're definitely tighter. Time to go running... OH MY GOD THIS IS TERRIBLE.

...That shirt I need to wear to my mentoring session today so the school knows I'm legit? Yeah, it's nowhere to be found, and it's wrinkly wherever I'm not finding it.  Fuck.

...I think I'll commiserate over my trivial problems with one of my gal pals. OH WAIT, there's only one left in town. Vacation? I LOVE VACATIONS. *&#(*#$ When did travel to remote parts of the country and world get so expensive?!


Every LITTLE thing is going to be all right.

And they're ALL little things, in the grand scheme.

So I guess that means I'm a pretty lucky girl.

Maybe that should be my new mantra.

Xo Sare

close to home

I've talked about Drama Island before.






Look like fun, eh?



I met a few of my very best friends and favorite people and former heart stomping, soul crushing, love there.


The island has been a big part of my life since I stepped foot onto that rock for the first time on a blustery day in 2007. Riding the ferry over for my interview as the vessel was tossed by wind and waves, my stomach was in knots- and not the sea-sick variety, what was I thinking? 

In the end, touring the streets and chatting over pizza that day with my future boss felt more like an invitation than a job interview- and that's what I saw it as, an invitation.


I decided on the three hour drive home that day I needed to take a leap, and that leap would be moving less than three months later to a tiny island where I knew nary a soul for the summer and serving/bar tending for tourists and boaters. No grand internship to enrich my future, just cold hard cash.


Hey, totally NOT LANDLOCKED, of course I was going.


I'd just had an academically kick-ass junior year in college. I finally had the rest of my academic undergrad mapped out. I was going to make it with two majors and a minor in four years. I was doing it. I was fucking rocking it out mosh style.


My personal life, not so grand. Actually, kind of in shambles- blah blah blah heart break blah blah blah bad decisions.


So I ran away to a place where no one knew me. Again.


That tiny island, its quirky little community, and the other lost souls wandering up to staff it for the summer picked me up, shook me around a bit,  and wrapped me in sunshine. And booze. Lots of booze.


Drama ran rampant, real world problems didn't actually make it all the way over on the ferry. I was living in a bubble world, albeit one I knew I'd have to cut ties with eventually in order to thrive in the real one.


Yet I went back for a second, equally booze filled, equally dramatic, equally sunshiny second summer. Despite now having a college degree and a 'real job' waiting. I probably should have left it at one epic summer, but the island beckoned me back and I just couldn't shake the part of me that was content inside a carefree, effortless, irresponsible summer.


As things started to turn sour in early August of my second summer, I left that place and most of those people and haven't really looked back since, I can't really let myself look back. On the rare occasion I let myself mull over my time on the island,  I usually feel physical pain at how much I miss it. Other times I'll shudder at the notion of ever going back to visit-even for the day.


'I'll never have a place like that or times exactly like that again, even if I went back now,' is what I always remind myself as I shake the idea out of my head.


When I think about the people that I knew who are still there, I feel a mixture of empathy and furious jealousy. But with so few people, many returning year after year, relationships and alliances change like tides and even the most healthy friendship can quickly turn to a toxic cesspool. Not to mention the social hierarchies in place, they'll tear you apart if you step out of your line.


But, you also meet people that change your life. And stick with you after the dog days are over. And become your best friends.


It's just a little gem I keep the pocket of my memory, sort of surreal at times. It's smooth and it feels good to rub on the memories. I trust the island, I know it. I've outgrown the tiny rock, but that doesn't mean I don't love that I once lived and flourished there.

I ran all its roads and drunkenly stumbled along its paths. I've cheered, beer in hand, at many a softball game on the single grassy diamond and dined and drank at just about every restaurant and bar. I knew the police, took shots with the locals, saw the underbelly and alleys after a busy tourist-filled weekend. I swam in the pools at every hotel, legally and illegally, and watched the sun set from dozens of points in the shore. I've laughed, I've cried, I've given parts of myself I'll never get back to that place. It was home for those summers and I treasure that.


And now an unspeakable crime has rocked that tiny community.


Over the weekend, a man my age was murdered and left under a tarp, behind a rental cottage in the woods. He was found by his family 18 hours after he was reported missing. Brutally killed.


Plenty of people every summer get alcohol poisoning (myself included on my 21st birthday). Some get into minor squabbles or suffer other alcohol related injuries such as twisted ankles or gnarly sunburn. It's a place where if you get caught peeing in public, they throw you in the drunk tank over night at the tiny jail. Plenty of people get busted up driving golf carts around when they shouldn't be operating a vehicle. It's not a place without its dark side.


But never, ever, has such an act of violence been committed there.


I can't remember once locking the door to my apartment, even on the busiest of weekends. You never know when a friend or acquaintance will be wrapping up their night and need a couch to crash on, after all.


On holiday weekends such as Labor Day, thousands of people flood in on ferries and private boats from near and far for little tropical vacations in the Midwest, making the island families who own restaurants and bars rich, but turning the place upside down with filth and drunken lack of respect or courtesy for those who make the island their home.


And even so, never once did I think such a thing could happen here.


Which just means, it can happen anywhere.


My thoughts are with my tiny once-home island community as they struggle to make sense of a killing in their midst- I'll always think of this special place like a dip in cool water, drenched in sunshine, with music like a pulse coming from every direction.

Xo Sara

life doesn't play fair -part 2

This is a continuation of yesterday's post, so you may want to go read it, or you will probably be lost.



Almost immediately Eric and my mother are taken into an ER exam room, which to be honest is kind of surprising for a college town ER on a weekend morning... considering the one Sunday morning in college I needed to go to the hospital for a foot x-ray resulted in a seven hour ordeal.


They sit in the exam room, my mother's lips pressed into a straight line, most likely rifling through her purse to keep her hands busy out of worry, as she glances frequently at my now almost gaunt 18 year old brother, the football player, the hard hitter, the one who has been puking his guts out and running into walls the past two weeks, while still completing grueling practices and adjusting to college, the one who can now barely get out of bed. They wait for the doctor and hope for the best.


"Oh my, I can smell it from the doorway. Come here and let me smell your breath." Sounds the initial greeting from the Doc. He just arrived and he already knows what's going on here.




After some tests to confirm, the case was cracked and a diagnosis was reached: Type 1 Diabetes.




When they brought Eric into the hospital, his blood sugar was above 550 and he was entering Renal failure.




I know nothing about blood sugar, but according to my compulsive research,  a reading of 90 is normal in the morning. I do know what Renal failure is, or at least enough to recognize that you don't want your major organs or those of anyone you love and care for shutting down for the hell of it. The way our body says "I'm done."

 Just absurd.

 Thank goodness for mothers and their tingly spidey-sense feelings when something is wrong with one of their children.



And Eric will be fine, a fact for which I am so, so grateful. He was kept in the hospital for a few days until they could get his sugar levels down and teach him how to measure and administer the correct amount of insulin for his body. I went and visited him on Monday and he seemed okay. As okay as someone whose life is shifting underneath them without warning. As okay as someone can be hooked up to machines and unsure of what's to come. I'm grateful that my brother has the resources available so that he may learn to resume a life as close to his now as possible, with time.




But I'm also so, so angry. It's the side of me that wants to let out my fiercest growl start shouting toward the sky. The side of me that is confused, and hurt, and pissed- because the shell of invincibility I had fully believed  was extended around myself and those closest to my heart, swaddling us like a blanket from anything terrible- well, let's just say it was a mirage of mind.

 And it could be much, much worse. And I'm truly grateful that it's not. But this is a serious chronic condition.




The lifelong kind, where you have to monitor your every move. So all the sudden, Eric might not get to play college football, the thing he hinged all his decisions on and worked for almost his whole life.
 How do you tell a healthy, smart, regimented 18 year old, who is reaching for the stars and just starting the part of his life that's actually HIS OWN that he can't work out with the rest of his friends because you don't yet know how certain insulin amounts will react with his blood when he's exercising? Or that if he hadn't been brought in RIGHT THEN he would likely have fallen into a coma he'd have never woken up from? I don't know.

I just don't know anything.


I mean, I supposed I know it could be SO SO SO much worse, but at the same time all the sudden my baby brother has this huge thing to carry with him for always, influencing almost every decision he makes for the rest of his life. No drinking or partying or last minute road trips or ice cream stops or maybe even football, for now. Isn't that what being 18 is all about? Can you imagine not being able to grab one of those suckers from the bank or share a soda with your significant other, or just snack for the sake of snacking? For Christ's sake, I SNACK ALL THE TIME.

It feels like maybe there's been some mistake.

Life is this wonderful, exciting, intoxicating ride that sends you on all sorts of adventures and puts good music in the speakers and gives you so much.

But it just doesn't play fair.

Or maybe it's just incredibly fragile.

Like I said, I don't know.
Xo Sare

life doesn't play fair- part 1

Sixteen days ago my parents moved my brother, Eric, into his dorm room- a healthy eighteen year old college freshman eager to hit the books and  hit the football field and hit the booze. 


I watched my brother grow up, he was born when I was almost seven. He's more like me in personality than either of my other two siblings. He's a sarcastic little bastard... as am I.  He's always excelled academically and despite bad Asthma as a kid, worked extra hard so he would excel at football.




And excel he did.




We've always been a big football family, and I mean tears are shed and entire autumns hinge upon the sport, but I swear I've spent the past several years rolling my eyes repeatedly during every family interaction because of the degree to which my parent's lives have obviously revolved around Eric's football aspirations. But who wouldn't want to have supportive parents willing to get involved and make sure you have everything you need to succeed?


Not only have my parents never missed a game, my dad flew and drove with Eric to schools around the country as he was deciding where he would go to college and ultimately, play football. He had lots of schools interested in him athletically and academically. And I get to brag about him because he's my brother.


He's good.


He's just really good at football.


So when he finally chose a school only 45 minutes away from home for college, it was no surprise that part of his decision fed into the fact that he wanted my parents and the rest of our family to continue to be able to come to every game. And he picked a smaller school because he planned to start. As a freshman.


Stubborn determination, always. We have that in common as well.


And then graduation and this summer flew right by,  a whirlwind of work-outs, getting ready for college, figuring out what classes a physical therapy major takes their first semester, and corrdinating who was bringing what with his roommate. In all the activity and heat and hard work, he lost thirty pounds. Granted, he was still like 220 lbs, but still, he was looking svelte and ready to hit the books football field. All the sudden BOOM he was gone at school and my life didn't change that much.


And then yesterday morning my mom got a funny mom-sense tingle that something wasn't quite right, because despite hard work-outs and a slight environmental change, there was no possible way her son should have lost what was now 40 pounds.


So she got up, drove to his college, and took his ass to the hospital.




And almost immediately, everything changed.




To be continued...


Xo Sare

stuck.

Sorry about the lack of posting and all.

 

I've just been tearing through every word Tana French has ever written (that I can feasibly get my hands on) and doing everything I possibly can to avoid tackling the ever-growing mountain of my clothes piling up on the bedroom floor since Manfriend and I kicked Hally out of the master bedroom and moved our stuff in.

 

Yeah, we were sleeping in the tiny second bedroom. It's a long story. The fact of the matter is that the closets aren't switched over yet, and hopefully I'll get a gust of energy this week that forces me to take care of it. I'm not a betting woman, either way.

 

In an effort to keep the restlessness bubbling up inside me from boiling over and scorching everything in sight, I've been a flurry of nesting and thrifting and antiquing. It's getting expensive, but I'll fill your head with another empty promise of pictures soon. Pictures, soon. I promise. I'm trying. It's just that we don't exactly have internet right now. Yes, we have satellite, but no internet. I have to go back to casa del parentals for that kind of luxury.

 

We DO have a washer and dryer now, though!!!!!!!! YAY DOMESTIC THINGS.

 

 

I don't cook.  

 

The meat and potatoes of it is that I feel weird. Yes, I always feel weird, but I guess I feel weirdly off.

 

 

Not long ago, I felt like I couldn't go one night a week without seeing one of my girlfriends for one reason or another. Impromptu cook-outs, a quick drink after work, a jog or a trip to the store- it seemed like there was always a posse around.

 

 

Not anymore.

 

 

Now, it's official.

 

 

Erin and I are the only two left in this city, including the greater outlying area, and to be honest I never imagined I'd be one of the last two standing.

 

I've got a gal pal in Korea, one in Kenya, two gone to the east coast and even more that have shipped out west. We're spreading, exactly what I always expected to happen with any group of friends I made. I've always been ready and willing to deploy the shards of my heart to all the corners of the world in the name of a grand adventure for the ones I love, and now it's happened in spades and I don't quite feel like myself.

 

I'm grateful to be able to surround myself (even at the distance) with women who aren't just unafraid to pack a bag and raise their face to the breeze and set off to wherever the destination may be, but who crave it. I wouldn't have it any other way. But for me this time, watching it all happen and knowing I'm staying here, for however long it turns out to be until it's my turn for another grand run of the adventure track, just seems however TOO long.

 

Sure I can plan trips wherever, a weekend in Chicago, a few days back in the old college town, even a week in a place I've never been, but for me there's nothing as scream-at-the-top-of-your-lungs wonderful as the rush of adrenaline that comes with watching everything you built your life around fade into the scenery. Those terrifying moments where the line between 'Too late to turn back now' and 'I could totally pretend I never really planned on doing this in the first place if I wanted to' start blurring into each other and in the back of your mind you can just see yourself falling. It's the moment when you're far enough away that suddenly everything coming into focus holds the immeasurable potential to shape the whole next segment of your life. Could this be the destination for this new adventure?

 

I can just see myself at that stage. Gas-station sunglasses, friendly-fighting with Manfriend over who has to eat the orange and green gummy worms, daring him to eat all the sugar at the bottom of the bag. My hand reaches out for the volume knob and I give him a devilish grin as I crank it up much higher than he deems necessary. It doesn't matter where we're going, we're on our way. Happy.

 

I'm not sulking, really I'm not. I know my chance will come whether it takes another 200 fitful nights of sleep or 20.

 

But it doesn't change the fact that it's simply not today, and that I'm the one who's been left this time with the usual, the routine, the familiar- and they're the one's who are getting the opportunity to have their minds blown wide-open with new.

 

Be back sooner than later.

 

XO Sare

 

sorry about the window.

So, I've got some news on the couch front!


...Which we'll go into tomorrow because today is for TODAY THINGS. Today, let me give you a little glimpse of what it is like to live in my world of mortification and awkward moments.




On Saturday, my friend Mel drove into town so that myself and another of her bridesmaids, Hannah, could pinpoint and execute the whole purchasing of the bridesmaids dress portion of the wedding. 


Originally, we were all going to take a swatch and go crazy in our own favorite shops and boutiques so our dresses would reflect our own personal style and preference. Cute, I know. However, do you know how difficult it is to find a pewter-hued dress in the middle of summer? Nearly fucking impossible. This was the second attempt at this mission for that very reason.


David's Bridal it is!


Hannah and I stroll into the store with Mel in tow and the place is teeming with people. So naturally, I grab one of every dress and make for the dressing rooms, in attack mode. We snag rooms next to each other and start throwing on dresses left and right. out of pure fate Hannah and I select the same dress and BOOM we learn that Mel's sister is also wearing that dress. OMG NOW WE ALL MATCH, PSHAWWW.


 Hannah buys a size down from her normal size and I buy a size up, even though in some strange turn of events, I tried on a size down and it fit. David's Bridal, I think I love you. Anyway, let's face it, this is a winter wedding and that's when I pack on the excess lbs, no matter how hard I'll to try to the contrary. In fact, we're talking the dreaded danger zone- the time between Thanksgiving feasting and Christmas feasting = nonstop cookies and feasting.






TA DA.... Squats forever until December!


Yeah, I really played that one well.


Anyway, we buy our dresses and scamper off to the mall to look at shoes, jewelry, etc. Lots of looking and no finding. Worst game of hide-and-seek ever. EVER.


Anyway, we're driving back to Hannah's after the mall/much needed cocktail break and we hop into Mel's car and IT IS HOT. Devil producing baby devil spawn HOT. HEAT OF A THOUSAND SUNS HOT... okay just one sun, but seriously, hot. So I roll down my window.


Harmless move, really. Just rolling down the window for some air that hasn't been trapped in a stationery heat-box for four hours while we trolled the mall.


Really bad move.


The instant I roll down my window, only about six inches, Mel whips her head in my direction, completely panic stricken, and yells "Roll that up RIGHT NOW."


Melissa doesn't panic or get upset. She calls everyone 'Punkin,' uses excessive <3's, and can make even the most tense conversations feel light and breezy.

This was panic. AND I should have known better, I'd been cautioned months ago when I drove out to visit her and rested my hand a little too close to the window control button. Uh durrrrrrr...I forgot?


So I immediately try to roll up the window. To no avail, of course. I can hear the motor working as I press the button, but the window isn't fucking moving. So naturally I try to push it up as I press the button. Again, nothing. Damn you feeble arms! Maybe I'm not trying hard enough.  I get out of the car, straddle the door, and force the window up with all of my strength.


Finally, it goes up and stays. We all give tense half-laugh of relief.


"The driver's side cost us $500 dollars to fix, so that would have been awful. Plus with the wedding and me needing a new laptop... That just would have been really bad."


Tee hee hee. Fuck. Me. I'm sweaty, my feet hurt, and I just broke something expensive that isn't mine.


After a couple of minutes the frightening window debacle is mostly forgotten and "Say My Name" comes on the radio. Oh, hello eighth grade, I've missed you. Not really, but our rendition was truly moving. And all remnants of panic and awkward are forgotten.


Say my name, SAY MY NAME! If no one is around you, say 'Baby I love you!"


Goddamn it. I look over and the window has slipped almost an inch. I don't think anyone else has noticed, so I try to shield view of it with my body and start dancing really erratically. Destiny's Child goes off and I'm now the only one dancing to some random rap song, which actually makes erratic dancing pretty natural. So far, no more slippage and we're almost back to Hannah's, where I can pull the hands-on-either-side-of-the-window bit and force it up again. This time, with more UMPH so it won't fall back down.


And then everything starts moving in slow motion. We're rounding LITERALLY the final curve before Hannah's apartment. I'm dancing with the window behind me, hoping the girls haven't noticed. We're cheers-ing our rings together like Captain Planet. I'm thisclose to cocktail hour. Smiles all around.


All of the sudden there's a huge crashing sound and I look behind me, and there is no longer a window. It has fallen COMPLETELY into the door. All of it. Bye bye window.


Obviously I start hysterically laughing because that's what I do when I don't know what else to do.

SIDENOTE: I just spilled an entire unsipped cup of coffee all over my person and my cubicle. ENTIRE CUP. Everything is sticky. My life, a comedy of errors.

Back on track, I look over a Mel, and thank the heavens, she's CRACKING UP. Turns out we both panic laugh.

The bad thing is that her fiance, Adam, (Who consequently hosted my very first college party on my very first night in the dorms) is somewhere in the mountains of New York doing fieldwork for his PHD program all summer and she doesn't have a man around to help her. He'll be back in 18 days.

I know that's pretty sexist, but I'm not trying to fix a car window, are you?

Mel was pretty cool about it, despite the fact that I've ruined her dreams of a new laptop and possibly her wedding, which means probably her whole life.  We had the wind in our hair on the way back to my house.

The next day was the first time it rained in over a month.

Insult to injury? Sorry Mel.

Awkwardly yours,

XO Sare

well, that wasn't very smart

As I've mentioned, I became afflicted with a soul-crushing case of food poisoning this past weekend. As did Manfriend and my mother. Since my parents had three different restaurants cater in food for my brother's graduation party this weekend, it's hard to determine which culinary genius is at fault.

Obviously, I blame my brother. Had he never been born, he'd never have graduated from high school and warranted a grad party that required the services of two more restaurants than my own 2004 soiree. Although, he is a football player, so his army of numskull friends throw back a lot more food than mine probably did.

I also blame him for what's happened thus far this afternoon.

As is common procedure for birthdays in my department at the office, the honoree chooses a place we all order food from and one person fetches it for the rest of the flock. Pretty standard.

Today, the birthday woman, who is otherwise my favorite co-worker, picked a shitty restaurant that I hate, but everyone else seems over the moon for.

Being that I just took on a full-time unpaid campaign job in addition to this joke of a vocation and I had a four hour long training last night for my other volunteer group- I have a shit ton of email to pretend to read and today was also the last day of the week I can get my allergy shot. Plus I just started a new book and I was going to try to squeeze in a couple of pages.

I. Had. Shit. To. Do.

Please don't think I'm complaining either, I crave this flurry of activity and the earned exhaustion of being fully engaged in every ever loving thing I cram into my waking days.

But seriously, every lunch we have together, it's the same stories about one co-worker's family and the same collective awkward of watching each other eat because we don't have anything new to say.

But, I like this broad, so I suck it up and kiss my congestion-free weekend goodbye.

And you know what I ordered on my still-delicate empty stomach?

A fucking greasy-ass burger, fries, and a chocolate milk shake. My regular.

Arguably the worst decision I've ever made. I've been eating healthier for the past several months- Like, where I once would have consumed the entirety of this meal with ease and regularity, I honestly can't remember the last time I hit up fast food.


I've been cowering in my cubicle since the meal wrapped up. I feel like I have food-poisoning again. And just.... blahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. And a sloth. A SLOTH.

Me right now. Only not smiley because I feel literally within inches of death.

Maybe it was too soon after the illness or maybe my body hates grease now, I don't really know whats going on in there. But it's really not good. Grease and I are taking a serious break.

XO Sare

thanks, part 4.

Hey Guys, another week of thank youuuuus. Who knew I could keep this going for four weeks? Not me. Sorry it's so long, just know I'm making a conscious effort to cut down my post-lengths. What can I say, though? I've got a big mouth.

As always, thanks for reading!

XO Sare


 

Hi, Stranger.

So, I know we're not speaking. Since the falling out; that argument via text about you being shady and unreliable and me being morally bankrupt. But I'll allow this thank-you note to slide in and I don't see it as me giving in first. If you do, that's fine. We tend to disagree these days anyway.

I don't know if you know this, but you were my first crush in a new town. The end of eighth grade, track practice- I'm cast as the new kid, yet again. You were tall and quiet with a weird name. I was desperate to make friends that didn't participate in the make-yourself-pass-out game in the bathroom during lunch. Anyway, we never spoke, you and I. But I knew who you were and I'm just glad you were there, thanks for being a distraction from the garbage I was wading in.

In high school we had German together every. single. semester. And usually another class too. And cross country practice. And track practice. I thankfully made brighter, better girl friends. We saw each other, interacted every single day. You were always so cranky during wrestling season, even if you weren't cutting weight. Now that I think about it, that may have just been the winter blues. They get the best of us. You always took the longest to take tests and quizzes- checking and rechecking, still hunkered over that too-small desk when the bell rang. I can't remember exactly when, but at one point we became actual, legitimate friends. You were so weird, your family life and religion-centered upbringing- when all along I thought Catholic guilt was bad. I'm so glad I knew you then, thanks for being the first real male friend I ever had.

I remember having a vague crush on you throughout high school, but nothing heartbreaking, I had a crush on just about everyone. I think I more liked you as a person, the strong, stoic, soft spoken type. Anyway, you never dated. I was boy crazy. I've always been a little boy crazy.

And then the summer after high school. That summer the four of us hung out every single night. That's not an exaggeration, every night. You three guys and me. Sometimes we'd throw in a few more faces, one girl we were all friends with or another, but it was always the four of us. D left for college first. M worked nights. School started late for me, almost October. You were getting ready to go on your mission. Thanks for that summer. Thank all three of you for that summer. It was sticky and full of fishing and country music and driving around aimlessly. All that time and heat to kill, but nowhere to go. 

You're a DAD now. And a step dad. Or maybe you adopted her son. I wouldn't know.  I never saw you as the type to get married young or to have children. You were never nurturing, I can't picture you as a father-figure. I mean, engaged after how many months of knowing her? Five? I find it ridiculous and I'm sorry for that. I've seen you as many things, but never a nurturer. Remember how you used to eat locusts after cross country practice when people would pool together enough money to make the bet worth your while? I wonder what you spent your winnings on.

Anyway, I can't help feeling like I lost you to that mission somehow. Two years in Brazil. I was busy partying and finding my passion for the world and you were learning Portuguese and bringing God to the people. You did come to visit once before you shipped out, though. The three guys, my three amigos. It wasn't your scene, but still, thanks for coming. I'm sorry if I'd changed or something. It was never something I could feel tangibly, but it must have seemed stark.

I can't remember exactly when, but at some point during that summer we all hung out every day I stopped seeing you as someone I had a crush on, and started seeing you as just my friend. Not that I didn't like you as a person anymore, I guess I just felt you were bigger than that. You were my friend. Friendships don't usually end suddenly in a break-up. Maybe I subconsciously wanted to remove the risk of losing you. I don't know.

Anyway, you were gone before long. Brazil. I wrote you letters. You wrote me letters. The entire two years. I'd never have guessed you'd have written me consistently for two years. I mean, I've seen how slow you write. How you agonize over every sweep of the pencil. (always pencil) German, remember? Sometimes I just want to remind you that people write in pencil so they don't HAVE to be as careful. Pencil can be erased.

I always write in pen. But you got my letters, you know that.

Anyway, thanks for being my friend then. Really, being my friend. you sent me birthday cards when I had no idea you even knew when my birthday was. You told me how you felt in small ways for the first time since I'd known you. We were friends. I tried to send you a stick of gum once, that letter got sent back with a nice little note from the church.

I was pissed.

Thanks for those two years of easing me into losing you. I mean, we had letters, but really, they can only go so far. Especially when you came back the way you did. I always knew you were close-minded, and I'm grateful in a sense that I got to experience a true friendship with someone whose views differ so greatly from my own, but when you got back it was a different kind of intolerance, you seemed angry.

I can't decide if I blame whoever brainwashed you or just YOU for changing so much. Where you used to be shy and almost gentle, you became rash and completely fanatical. It was probably bad timing, too. I mean, there I was going through a personal ideological revolution of sorts and it just came to a head.

One of the last times I saw you was at your engagement party. It was a weird night. M and I were the only friends from high school you invited there. And we weren't even invited to the wedding. What happened to you? It was so weird to hear someone call you Baby. I never pegged you as a pet-name guy. But then again, I guess you married your first girlfriend. I probably wouldn't have liked her anyway, but it was icing on the cake to see her act whiny and fake the entire time we were there.

Then you and your wife were at A's wedding. What a horrid night in general. I mean, the wedding was lovely, but the table vibes were enough to send me to the open bar and mingle with strangers instead of catching up with three of my best friends. Your wife was pregnant with your first child that night, I remember thinking it completely ludicrous. It was the first time in years the four of us were together, sitting at the same purple-clad table. Dressed up older than I felt. I got drunk, you and your pregnant spouse left early.

The next thing I remember in regard to you isn't your daughter's birth, although it should be. I was ready to be the eccentric old friend that buys cashmere sweaters that are completely impractical for a rapidly growing infant.  It wasn't to be, eh?

I guess my heart could have put it to rest if you married a woman you were madly in love with that had a jealous streak and didn't trust your old fishing buddy who happened to be a girl. That wouldn't be too much to handle. But I just remember the bubbling rage that started in the pit of my stomach and quickly boiled up my insides and out of my mouth. Me, screaming alone in my car. Attacked for the way I think. The way I patched together a world for myself through reading and seeing and doing everything I can get my hands on around me with wonder and excitement and open eyes.

Now, I know everyone doesn't see the world the same way. It's a truly remarkable phenomenon and it lends us something completely invaluable, perspective.

But I've never had my character or personal being attacked the way that you did that day, so easily. I guess I'm grateful that I've learned from that my ability to stand by myself, unshakable for what I believe is right. Thanks for the test, I passed. Maybe I'm not religious, but my way of thinking doesn't have me attacking other's for having different ideals than I do, either.

And thanks for making it so easy to walk away. I know you started pacing the other way as soon as I did, as if preparing for a standoff. Only there will be no standoff, because other than one last thank you, my honest gratitude to you for showing me that I'm growing and will continue to do so and thrive, I'll never turn back around.

You may have the Mormon God on your side, but I've got the golden rule. 

I'll always wish the best for you and yours, and I'm eternally grateful to have once called you my friend.


 

XO Sara