A B C D E S F J.... Wait, That's Not Right.

I once took a (ahem - very scientific) online personality test which deemed me an 'ESFJ'. Basically Carl Jung (okay maybe not him, but whatever) thinks I'm a Caregiver with 'Extroverted Feeling with Introverted Sensing'. Yay for Analytical Psych 203!
 
The ESJF explanation read,

ESFJs are people persons - they love people. They are warmly interested in others. They use their Sensing and Judging characteristics to gather specific, detailed information about others, and turn this information into supportive judgments. They want to like people, and have a special skill at bringing out the best in others. They are extremely good at reading others, and understanding their point of view. The ESFJ's strong desire to be liked and for everything to be pleasant makes them highly supportive of others. People like to be around ESFJs, because the ESFJ has a special gift of invariably making people feel good about themselves.


...ESFJs are warm and energetic. They need approval from others to feel good about themselves. They are hurt by indifference and don't understand unkindness. They are very giving people, who get a lot of their personal satisfaction from the happiness of others. They want to be appreciated for who they are, and what they give. They're very sensitive to others, and freely give practical care. ...An ESFJ who has developed in a less than ideal way may be prone to being quite insecure, and focus all of their attention on pleasing others.

Carl Jung knows me! I'm - like - famous! Okaymaybenot.


You like me!
You really like me!



But it rings true. It's scientific evidence of Love Me! Love Me! Syndrome (here). I want everyone to like me. NobutseriouslyIdo. Is this news? No. I'm a Shopgirl for a reason! I want women to feel beautiful and I want them to like me Godammnit! Aaaand... I can usually read a woman in my store within two seconds...

In need of retail therapy? Lean on me. 
A break from your bratty teenage daughter? She'll realize how cool you are in a couple years.
Feeling fat? You're not; here try on this necklace.
I also have a knack for sensing the type woman a guy I am interested in wants, and being that girl.

Oh, you have White Knight Syndrome?
I'll be your Damsel in Distress.

You want witty banter & sarcastic flirting? Puhlease.
You want want fragile & in need of saving? Rescue me.
You want a hostess in high heels? Why, it's my pleasure.
Now, this is not to say that I am fake, or faking my personality for guys; I just have a tendency to lean into certain aspects of myself around certain people. Maybe it's just me; maybe it's everyone who does this - on this, I can only speak for myself. Well, and the Myers-Briggs explanation above can speak for me too.
I'm a lean mean leaning-machine.
With guys, my brain turns immediately to: I want you to love me - and I will make sure you do - and then I'll decide if I love you back. My relationships with women are similar - I want women to like me too! (Not in the same sense, but youknowhatImean.)
You need a Big Sister? Then this is what I think you should do.
You need a Little Sister? Then what should I do?
You need an Ally? Conspiratorial wink.

Girl crushes abound!

I lean into my relationships with women just like I do with men, yet in a much healthier context -  especially these days. Slowly, over the past year, I have been - for the first time in my entire life - learning how to base my own perceived value as a person on the quality of relationships I have with my friends & not just on how men view me. It has finally become more important to me to start a conversation with a girlfriend than to stop traffic. (Though thats nice too.) And the quality of my life - as well as the quality of my relationships with my girlfriends - is waaaaay better for it. When I only really valued myself as  a woman solely on men loving me, while still wanting everyone including other women, to like me - but it didn't make for very whole connections with other girls. I am a better friend now than I have ever been - not in an arrogant way, mind you, but but because in the past I did not value my friendships like I do now; I simply wasn't a very good friend. And yet, I couldn't forthelifeofme understand why women didn't really like me. When my Ex & I broke up, I had few girlfriends & female acquaintances & I have stayed close with um... like maybe two of them. It's funny though; I once had this shocking epiphany that went something like, Oh my God, there are probably people out there who don't like me and my boyfriend! I was 27. The reality is other women didn't really know me well enough to like me; and you know what? I wasn't even very likable. I was smug, and spent most of my time leaning into what my Ex wanted in a girlfriend; which was sort of a silent caretaker of sorts. Ah, how Jungian.


PILLOWFIGHT!!!

 In the past, and even now, I've struggled with articulating my feelings and thoughts in friendships and in relationships; if anything is true of this little project it is that it has given me the ability to form deeper and more meaningful friendships; it has allowed people to know me in a way I could never verbalize in the past. It has allowed me to lean into myself. Goldi got a little behind on reading SS&R during the dark days of the Dutchman, and when she finally caught up, she called in tears, sad that she hadn't known how awful was feeling - And I realized that without this outlet for myself; no one would have known. Speaking of my Dutchman, he once commented that I was a far better writer than I was talker. He was right. I may lean into people, but its nice to know I now have people to lean on. I believe I've said it before, but I'll say it again - one of the biggest wake up calls I've ever had is when one of my Little Sisters told me she wished she knew me better.
She also once said to me, when I really needed to hear it;

You can let me be the Big Sister too, you know. 

You can lean on me.

And I did.

Sidenotes: I have gone on a couple 'distraction dates' just to 'get back out there'. Cheeseball, I know - but who knows, it can't hurt.

Distraction Date #1: Sushi. Halfway into our edamame, he kindly asked the waitress in Japanese if she was, in fact Japanese. When she replied with a no, he switched to Korean, and asked if she was Korean. He looked back at me proudly, and whispered, "I don't actually know what I'm saying - I just have those phrases memorized." I held in my eye-roll (I hope). I mean, I knew going in that this date would not lead anywhere, but really dude? I wanted to say, "Yeaaah, my last boyfriend spoke four languages. You're an idiot and Ihatchu. And you're short."

Distraction Date #2: Lunch on a Patio. Ended with the following text to Goldi: I don't think the spark was there for either of us. Topics of conversation included: Leprosy, Tara Reid, fantasy football, salmon.

This is going... Yeah. I'm just glad I have my coworkers, friends & neighbors to lean on.

Well, the Answer Used to Be 'A Bird'.

So verrrrry nice to meet you.

In addition to my best friends in my tiny town and my Best Friend(s) in San Francisco, I also have a Best Friend in France. Actually, she isn't in France anymore, but for clarification's sake, that's still how I refer to her as she lived there for a couple years.

In college, she and I roamed the streets of LA with all the entitlement of two twenty two year olds that didn't know any better. Both brunettes - we likened ourselves to the blonde Chloe girls that were all over the magazines back then. We introduced ourselves as the Crown Princesses of Belgium with our hands extended for a kiss, rubbed shoulders with handsome heirs, and got into Trouble. Capital T. We got into even more Trouble when we were joined by my Best Friend in San Francisco. What a trio we were, I tell you.
And, when people asked the two of us what we wanted to be when we grew up, our answer was always, 'An Icon.'

(Admittedly, we were kind of total bitches. But it was fun.)
As we've grown older, and more mature (wellonecanonlyhope) - we still joke about being Icons. Capital I. A la Lauren Hutton, the Olsens, Kate Moss, Goldie Hawn or Gwen Stefani.
 

I have the icons of a 16 year old circa 2003.

 

Um... Why are all my icons blonde?



And the icons of a 15 year old circa 1993.

So what do I want to be when I grow up, you ask? Well, the answer hasn't changed much.
I want to be an Icon. And an astronaut. And a good person. Oh hell, I don't know.
I want to be a grown up. And an Icon.

How to Make A California Girl Quilt.

You've got the best of both worlds
You're the kind of girl who can take down a man,
And lift him back up again
You are strong but you're needy,
Humble but you're greedy
And based on your body language,
And shoddy cursive I've been reading
Your style is quite selective,
though your mind is rather reckless
Well I guess it just suggests
that this is just what happiness is
Hey, what a beautiful mess this is...

-Jason Mraz, A Beautiful Mess

Lately I've been thinking a lot about what it is that has made me who I am. Why I react the way I do to certain things. Am I simply a product of my upbringing - of learning to share, being a sister, and learning how to use the big girl potty? Am I a product of what what instilled in me at my core by 3 years old, like some psychologists would argue? Or by 13? OhGodIhopenot. Am I simply just turning into my mother? Probably. Or am I a product of my parents divorce? How am I both strong and fragile? Why do I gravitate towards neon yellow underwear? How is it that I am both pragmatic and logical while still totally guided (and sometimes misguided) by my heart & the need to be loved? Are my reactions to things just the way my brain is made up - synapses firing, dopamine released? Is it simply just what being human is - am I just this way because that is how God made me?

Quilting 101? Sure.
 Because
Underwater Basketweaving
was full.

While I will never have an actual answer to any of these questions, the one thing I do believe is yes - to all of the above. Sorta. Although I may feel like a beautiful mess at times, more often than not
I feel like I am a beautiful homesewn quilt that will never be finished. Like a security blanket that I carry everywhere I  go.

See that patch over there?
Yes, yes that one - that's five years with my Ex. But the one down there, that is the two seconds it took for that boy in PE in 9th grade to tell me, "You are just so ugly. I can't even look at you."

Close by, is that same boy telling me at the end of the year, unprompted, that he was sorry for saying that & actually had had a crush on me. Idiot. There is a gorgeous patch for my 10+ year anchoring friendship with my Best Friend in San Francisco, a patch for her older brother breaking my heart at twenty two, and a tiny patch for her other brother calling me White Trash when we were teenagers. The stitching around these patches -- what has been stitched in that exact instant into my identity & into my quilt, that's me believing it, thats me internalizing it. Some of the stitching is thin, nearly removable, easily breakable - and some of it is a strong running back stitch done of thick yarn. Sewn into my quilt, my identity, are both my strength and my fragility, both the analytical and the illogical.
Thankfully, sewn into my quilt with that thick yarn is my best guy friend of over ten years telling me,

Ok so, here's the deal, if I knew how to express the feeling I get when I see a picture of you or when I'm with you, I would be rich. Because it's just a feeling.

And my mother and father repeating I love you over & over again the past 29 years.

Unfortunately, with that same thick yarn is sewn,

I just don't see you as my future wife anymore, as the future mother of my children. I just can't do it anymore. I'm just not in love with you anymore.

My Dutchman has a patch, my parents divorce has a patch. My eight years in my tiny town has a patch. I have patches for what has uplifted me sewn in with gold thread, but there are also patches for what has broken me down. Patches for love, for friends, for abuse and for self destruction, for laughing, and for forgiveness.
The backing of my quilt; what holds it all together, the part that envelopes me as I walk this Earth, and my tiny town -  thats me at my core; thats the make up of my brain. But the myriad of patches on the opposite side - the words uttered, the life experiences - that's what makes my quilt Mine. Capital M.
I am like a beautiful, imperfect homesewn quilt that will never be finished - We all are.
And if my quilt becomes a beautiful mess, I just have to remind myself that there is this nifty little invention called a 'seam ripper.'

Sidenotes: In the last couple weeks I have finally returned to Normal - or as close to it as possible. Good things have been happening, and I finally feel back to being Myself - single and strong and fragile and happy. Happy with my decisions, and happy with my surroundings. Damn, I've got good friends.
Aaaaand... Goldi & the Doctor are exclusive.

Truth? Errrr Dare. (or Why Mick Jagger May Not Be My Savior After All.)

I believe in the power of the patio. My life is essentially lived on sunkissed patios - or at the very least patios with heat lamps and a veiw of the patio next door. I am a veritable walking Patio Party. Which is certainly better than a Pity Party; although, I've have quite a few Patio Pity Parties. Thankfully, the two are not mutually exclusive. I have the luxury (now) of having many friends who know me very well to sit on said patios with. So, like many of my stories...
I was sitting on a patio with one of my nearest and dearest - a newly-single Bijou. She flung herself into her seat in a navy blue printed dress, her wheat-blonde waist length hair going everywhere and motioned for an ashtray.

So, I read your blog, she said, crisply.  I have to tell you, I don't agree with you. You do always get what you want. And its not that you go for what you can't have; its that you like the challenge. Even with the Dutchman - he came back for you. You got what you wanted. You may have hoped that it would work out in the long run, wished for it - but he still came back for you.

Shit.
She's right. I get a thrill out of making the commitmentphobes, the wanderlusts and the otherwise seemingly unattainable mine. Most of my relationships have begun as almost a Dare.
As in, Oh? I can't have you? Dare me.
I am a walking-talking anti-Bonnie Raitt song - I Can't Make You Love Me, anyone?
Because in my subconcious, I think - Oh yes I can. Just watch.

I believe Bianca may have had the same affliction.

Now, I don't believe that my thrill-seeking daredevilish ways take away from the quality of my relationships; nor do mean to belittle the love I have felt (and feel) for my Dutchman, my Ex or anyone else otherwise - I'm simply admitting that Bijou is right - I more often than not do get what I want; and it isn't that I want what I cannot have - it's that I like the thrill of the challenge. Sometimes it leads to two year relationships, sometimes five. It once led to a wonderful man from far far away hopping on a plane and being perfect for three weeks with me. Sometimes, it has led to heartbreak - to me looking someone square in the eye, saying, fuck you and walking away.
So... In short, sometimes I succeed. Sometimes I fail. So is Life, I guess.
So is life.

Sidenote: This also explains my tendency to go for whomever I think is the best looking in the room - or on the patio, forthatmatter.

Thank You Mick Jagger (or Why I Can't Get No Satisfaction).

Oh? You aren't ready for a relationship? Great.
Oh? You have a job that will take you out of the country four days a week? Fantastic.
Oh? Wait, you live out of the country? Even better.
I will fall madly in love with You.

I know They say (whoever They are - in this case I'm pretty sure it is the Rolling Stones but thatsneitherherenorthere) that you can't always get what you want. And this is true, I guess, but with a little reflection I've come to realize that...
I always get what I want.
You wanna know why?
Because, I only want what I can't actually have. I don't want the guy who continually texts me, because thats really annoying of him - whydoesn'tHegetit? I want the guy who never asked for my number in the first place. I don't want the sweet man who's face may or may not have turned into a troll when he leaned left but was crazy about me - I wanted the asshole who asked me point blank 'Why are you still single?' and that I was crazy about. When we were naked. (Sorry, mom.)
Which, really - Why the F do people think that this is an okay thing to ask? I get that they - I guess - are trying to compliment me, but its such a burn. And rude. Worse though, "Why aren't you married yet?" At least I had clothes on when I was asked that. F you all.
I don't want to date the sweet boy down the road, I want to marry sweet boy six thousand miles away.

My friend's lawyer brother
who lived in Madagascar.
who 'just wasn't ready for a relationship'.
I loved him dearly.

Ha! I am still single because I always get what I want. I always want what I can't have. Those men I've ached for phone calls from; the ones who have said, 'I'm just not ready for a relationship right now'. You know, its a hard pill to swallow, but if you or I was the right girl for them, they'd be ready. If they really liked us, they'd call back.
Or - better yet - call in the first place. To some, we could be anyone; we are disposable. Man, I've been known to kick that dead horse for as long as my ego allows for itself to get kicked right back. (Bad analogy, I know, as most dead horses can't kick...) It seems that then - once my ego is bruised and battered enough - and I have the wherewithall to change their name in my phone to lets just say, for instance, The Englishman Is An Asshole, then - BAM! I am faced with yet again - or find, it would seem - someone new, someone who I cannot really have.  I mean, I may have my Dutchman's heart & he may have mine, but somewhere my heart must've known that he, too, I could not have. And so my heart screamed, Let the falling in love begin, folks! F it, too by the way.

You know, it is quite funny actually; because, for the most part - my Ex included - I have had a lot of luck in my relationships --- I fall & I fall hard for Good Men. My real relationships, although flawed - were with men who treated me spectacularly. My boyfriends have treated me like a queen, I have been spoiled and I have been adored. But in retrospect (I am remembering even more while I write this) most of these relationships have begun in ways that made them seem impossible to maintain; with boys I was not supposed to have. With apologetic 3 page letters on the window sheilds of my friend's cars, with phone calls to my friends, stating things like, I've secretly been dating your brother/exboyfriend/thatguyyouhate. My college roommate told me that my Ex was, quote, not a good guy & had dated her sorority sister to distasterous results. What did I do? I shacked up with him within a matter of monthes. We're movin' in! 

I mean, I have a Secret-Ex-Boyfriend for godssakes.*                

*he was never my boyfriend, I know. See!?!

My Dutchman told me he was leaving in two and a half days the day I met him. I consider him one of my Great Loves. But that thought, that consideration -it is always followed up with a wistfull, If only he was here...

The men who chase me, the ones who live in a respectable vicinity, the ones who have called me ontheregular (B---- for instance, as I still occassionally get an 'I still miss you' text from him) - they become disposable. Why?! I once dated a total asshole, but an asshole who was crazy about me, who complained that I often seemed cold emotionally & that when he told me he was leaving out of town for a couple days, he didn't like that I didn't ask where he was going & simply said 'Have fun, call me when you get back.' Click. He told me this bothered him. Nope, next please. (That actually, in retrospect was a fantastic call on my part.)
I have more than once had to respond, Thank you to an I love you.
...on the other hand...
I have more than once looked someone in the the eyes and thought, Why won't you love me?

So, I am lovable, I have the capacity to love; but I fall for whomever is just too far away to reach - whether it be emotionally or physically. I fall for the boys off-limits, the wanderlusts, the foreigners and the I-Forgot-To-Call-ers.

Peeping Toms? Thats a new one.

You know, part of this whole trying to be a grown up I've been working on, this whole Saturn's Return 'of restructuring one's life & making it more sound' thing I've been going through... Um, yeah. Time to restructure this whole going for those I cannot get thing.

You know they (the Stones) say,

You can't always get what you want...

but they follow it up with,

But if you try sometimes you just might find
You get what you need.

I need to learn to find (and fall for) those I can have. And who want to have me in return.
And then perhaps I won't have to dodge that really fucking annoying question anymore.
Or... I could just hang out with more polite people.
Ah, it's one in the same really.

Sidenotes: A couple people have mentioned that they often wanted to comment; I say go ahead. If you're so inclined, chatter away. I  mean, I do. I've made it easy - you don't have to sign in or anything.

So, Its been a funny couple weeks; people are either shacking up or breaking up. A lot of my friends have had experiences in the past month that have further solidified their relationships - the Doctor and Goldi are going strong, Honey and her Honey have relocated her kitty to his place. A very cute boy said something to my best friend in San Francsico about his general intentions with my other best friend in San Francisco...But on the other end, a lot of people I know have been breaking up - myself included, or dealing with general uneasiness in their relationships. Maybe it is the changing of the seasons, or something in the stars... 

Heart (xx).

Absence is to love as wind is to fire.
If it is a small fire, it extinguishes it,
if it is a large fire, it intensifies it.

- Diane von Furstenberg

Swan Lake.

the OG Rebel Ballerina.

Damn You, Cruise Control.

You know that feeling you get when driving, where you look around -  and BOOM! you are suddenly aware of your surroundings and you think to yourself, How the fuck did I get here?!
When you know you've been going through the motions of driving, you've known your destination, but you have been so stuckinyourownhead have no real recollection the actual drive itself?
That's me, at 3 pm yesterday - Being visited by a client/soulsisterofsorts I hadn't seen for awhile after being asked, So, what've you been up to?
I paused. I had no answer.
At 3 pm yesterday, I looked around & BOOM. How the fuck did I get here?
I have been going through motions these past weeks, taking them for granted almost - without actually taking them in.


f cruise control.
I'm hoofing it.

Heartbreak aside; in the past few weeks - I have been surrounded by & contacted by almost every one of my favorite people in the world. I have reconnected & rekindled friendships with some of my absolute favorites; I have a support system of girlfriends I didn't have to grovel for - They were (and are) simply there. Yet I was on such autopilot that I barely noticed. This is not the post-break up grasping at straws; the  desperate someonepleasehangoutwithme!!!  This is simply a realization that I have good people. And I had been so stuckinmyownhead to take note. I am suddenly aware of my surroundings; and I am surrounded by awesome. Okay, so maybe I do know one thing. Nowyatellme.

So, I guess what I am saying is, I need to remember to Be Here Now. That's my new mantra.


On all sides.

 

Insert: Clever Comment re: Time. K Thanks.
 (Breakfast at Tiffany's)

Can I Be Her Now? (Rochas)

 Sidenotes: Nah, I got none. I haven't been really paying attention. Shit.

Note to self: Stop being so self-absorbed. Be here now. Be here now.

You mean to say....
It's not just all about me me me?!
Fuuuuck.
Kk, Got it.



Narnia. Neverland. Same F-ing Thing.

The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing. -Socrates.

I know nothing. This I know for sure. I may think I know everything most of the time; I may have this dense little blog that was supposed to be about style and inspiration and trying to be a grown up with funny anecdotes about my dating life, but has now turned into the Chronicles of Love with an Accent - or The Dutchman, the Aussie & the Wardrobe, either will do - and I know I can seem preachy and bossy and lost all in the same sentence - because I am; but for the most part, I am just writing these words as reminders to myself. As some sort of proof of knowing something. Anything.
And then, after a long day in my brain - I arrive home and I realize - I remember - that I know absolutely nothing. I know this for sure.

I have made a terrible mistake.
I have made the right decision.
The latter. The later. The latter. The later.

... I wish it was enough just knowing that you are out there loving me but I have come to realize that it isn’t. I need to be able to lean on the person that I love - both emotionally and physically...I wish it was as simple as love conquering everything - conquering time differences, oceans, busy schedules... I wish it was as simple as just Loving someone… it has gotten to the point where I just can’t do it, emotionally. You are simply too far away. And my heart is broken...I will never stop missing you, I will not ever stop loving you. I refuse to forget you...

You are all I could ever ask for in someone to love, and to love me in return...

...I am so sorry. I love you.

-Me

I have made a terrible mistake.
I have made the right decision.
The latter. The later. The latter. The later.

Do you ever stop to wonder who will include you in their 'life flashing before their eyes'?
Or who will be in your own version?  I am watching a very sad movie.*
Who will include you in their montage of great loves? Or of great losses.
I am haunted by a single look he gave me, over and over. I do not doubt that I will be haunted by that look for as long as I can imagine his eyes. Which, I have no doubt, will be forever. No matter what happens in the next two, ten or fifty years, in my montage - that look will be there.

I have made a terrible mistake.
I have made the right decision.
The latter. The later. The latter. The later.

I don't know. I know nothing.


* 127 Hours

Something Inspired.

This is beautiful.

Where Birds Fly.

I want to wake up where the clouds are far behind me.

Break Up Brunch: Round 2.

Tim Gunn
Goldie Hawn
my Dutchman
my best friend in San Francisco
Jane Birkin
Sean Penn

Ooh this is fun! I love this game! Six People Living or Dead to have your Dream Dinner Party with! Or brunch, whichever. The possibilities are endless! Think of the conversation... Imagine Goldie after an couple of glasses of champagne! My Dutchman being quizzed by Tim Gunn about fashion in the Netherlands - the popped collars, the footwear. Sean Penn blantantly flirting both Jane and my best friend. And me, sitting back, hand in hand with Holland and talking about my mother with Goldie, "You know you two had the same seventh grade teacher..."
I mean I could say to you, It was surreal... I had this dream last night where me, Goldie Hawn, Tim Gunn, and you were there and he was there and we were on a patio...

Sean, can you please
pass the pepper?

So I've got a story for you:
Yesterday I was sitting inside at a very familiar restaurant with Beauty - one where I know most of the waitresses by name (probably because they're all named Megan) and the owner as well. His name is not Megan. Break Up Brunch, Round 2. We were seated right next to the door, with a veiw of the patio, and enjoying guava mimosas and reccounting the night before - We had gone out together so I could drown my sorrows a little (or a lot). I'm a little (okay, a lot) heartbroken over the break up with the Dutchman, but it was something that needed to happen. So, at brunch, I see an old aquaintance of mine seating herself on the patio & I go over to say hi - we had seen eachother the night before and both looked (and felt) a bit bedraggled, we exchange pleasantries but I feel like she's giving me kind of a weird look. I follow her gaze - and BOOM. Sitting himself down next to her is...
My Secret Ex-Boyfriend.
Handsome and floppy haired - I have not seen him in six monthes or more. We do not say hello. We do not meet eyes. He plans his trips to the rest room (as he would have to walk right by my table) for when I go smoke. Longstoryshort; he was who I dated immediately (and secretly) after I broke up with me Ex. It was quite the stealth operation. We lied to our friends, hid our relationship, went out on dates where we were sure not to be spotted. He was never - technically speaking - my boyfriend, but we did have wonderful nights together, walking the beach & talking. Over the course of our three month long clandestine affair, his mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer. It was a rough time for both of us, and I deeply felt for him. I found him both brutish and brilliant; I do think he cared about me, but certainly not to the extent I cared for him. He's actually kind of a notorious playboy one town over but rarely meanders over to my tiny town; he sticks mostly to his. So, monthes went by, no one found out and I tried another shortlived stab at a relationship with my Ex and we all moved on. But then somehow, it gets out that my SEB and I dated. I find out through Bijou that it's now public knowledge and by the fact my SEB leaves several Whatthefuck!? voicemails on my phone. To this day, my SEB's best friend very much dislikes me because of the uncomfortable position I put him in because he is also best friend's with my Ex. (Obviously, this was not my moral prime.) I don't know the status of my SEB and Ex's friendship, but considering I may have accidently told my Ex about the first kiss while sleep-talking right after we broke but but still lived together, I do not believe that they are friends either. 
These are not people I would invite to my Dream Dinner-Party or Brunch; but my morning  started to feel like a dream. Perhaps it was the champagne.
So, if you're following this: I broke up with my Dutchman Friday & by Saturday I am sitting uncomfortably close to a man who broke my heart justalittle and his best friend who hates me. Well, I am sitting uncomfortably close to two men who reallyreally do not like me. More people I recognize trickle into the restaurant - all part of this same crowd of locals. Oh no. I call my best friend in San Francisco, and tell her who is there - sitting and laughing right out of veiw. She asks if my Ex is there too, and I say No, but I'm just waiting for him to walk in. Right as I am getting comfortable with the awkward yet benign situation; I see another group walk up in the window. BOOM. My stomach dropsflipsturns.
Yes, there he is. I had been waiting for it - I had been feeling like it was overdue, I mean even my Dutchman had seen him!
There he is. My real Ex boyfriend. New girlfriend & un-friended on facebook sister in tow.

Last night I had a dream that I was grabbing a drink and my Ex, my SEB, their best friend, his sister and his new girlfriend (who he went to high school with and I always suspected they had a thing for one another - she's a divorcee with a bad nose job*), that one guy who accused me of being bipolar and I were all there.                                                                       

*I know, that was low. I'm sure she's very nice.

He'll probably marry her.

It just seems too unreal. But it's a tiny town, and we are all roaming the same main drag.
But still.

why, yes, these are the smallest size they make,
thank you for asking.

The restaurant owner watched the whole scene unfold with sheer terror.
But it is not a dream. It is a nightmare. My unwelcome BB:R2 has become a hilarious - yet still unwelcome - nightmare.
Imeanreally? Really? Who is walking in next? The Aussie? Nothing would shock me.
This is the worst Dream Dinner Party (or Brunch) ever. Although, I will say I have never been happier that I was wearing my skinniest of skinny jeans and had actually blow dried my hair.
There was no hello, my Ex could not even look me in the eye. My SEB, that's a whole other deal, that was a couple monthes but my Ex-Boyfriend of 5 years could not even manage a wave. I stayed put though - well actually, Beauty and I popped around to a couple tables, champagne in hand. It was basically the most ridicuous collection of EverySinglePersonIDoNotWantToSee the day after I break up with my boyfriend. A parade of Ex's, a patio filled with people I have poured my heart out to. I refused to leave the restaurant before them, it would have let them win in my head.
It's my tiny town too, godammnit.
And seriously, I couldn't have been the only uncomfortable one in the restaurant.
The good news is - I'm friends with his sister again on facebook.



Sidenotes: I am so sad about breaking up with my Dutchman, but in the same breathe I will say that it has taken a weight off my heart. I will always care for him; he is a good man & hopefully although it might seem impossible, hopefully - if the stars align - we can try again sometime in the future; I just can't hold my breathe hoping for that. It was too much.
More on that later.

You Can't Have Your Cakebread & Drink It Too.

Oh that's right, I am with you!
And you're with me!
We're so used to dating, we forgot we're going Dutch!*           

*no pun intended.            

It didn't occur to us to even look at prices.
Seated on overstuffed brown leather bar stools, with a rainbow of liquor bottles extending all the way up to the ceiling behind us, my Ex-Co-Shopgirl now Good Girlfriend and I laughed and clinked our wine glasses together. We had just unwittingly ordered the most expensive glasses of wine on the menu at the bartender's suggestion. (It was not Cakebread.) We did not know this until he handed us the menu after we had placed out drink order. Douche.
My small frame swallowed by a black long sleeve jersey dress & motorcycle boots and her, tall as it is, in expensive bellbottoms and suede pumps - We are typical girls out for a drink. (I told you, I know my experience is parrallel to many!) We are those typical pretty young things sitting at a bar on a Wednesday talking about boyfriends, talking about fashion, talking about skincare discoveries, talking about everything over white wine & a bread basket. There were probably others just like us across the bar - though I recall only us at the bar. (Well, us plus the bartender & the fat man to my left that we tried, unsuccessfully, to ignore, and, well, the piano player.) Deep in conversation, she and I were alone in a room full of people. Both battling heartbreaks at the moment; those dull aching heartbreaks that are easily set off by a song sung about blue eyes or far away lovers or 'Big Girls Don't Cry' by Fergie. I hate that song.
But, at the same time, she and I are both hopeful, both headstrong.
(We are both currently in Self-Preservation Mode.)

his brain.

She is recently out of a relationship, and I am dealing with the looming and very real possibility of my own being impossible to maintain. Our wine is served - it's okay, but definitely not worth our firstborn children. Conversation heads right to the difference between men and women's brains; the idea that typically women think globally whereas men compartmentalize. They go to work - they're in 'Work Mode', they are with their girlfriend, they are in 'Girlfriend Mode' yaddayaddayadda. Women are more apt to take their whole day - take all of the experiences over the dayweekmonth and connect them on a their mental map as a whole - our life is experienced as a whole totally made up by the sum of its parts. While we are working, we are thinking about boyfriends and mothers, and experiences and emotions - and they are all pieces of the same puzzle, slowly being fixed together. My sadness over missing the Dutchman has effected my work and my relationships with my friends. I do not doubt that my Dutchman thinks of me often over the course of his day (he tells me this when we do talk) but it is not the same; he is working, he is busy with a hectic work schedule and that is his life right now. Now, I'm not saying all men (or women) are like this - but I am that type of woman and he is that type of man. Our wonderful perfect three weeks were his 'Girlfriend Mode' and these past three weeks, he is in total 'Work Mode'. The two are not interlocking pieces of the same puzzle; they are two totally different puzzles altogether. Fuck, they're not even puzzles, they're like separate drawers in the same filing cabinet.

This situation would be easier if he was here; if when he got done with work he came home and unwound and switched into 'Girlfriend Mode'. If he filed away his workday, and opened the drawer labeled "Her". But this does not happen when you are permenently separated by nine hours and an ocean.

No matter how much you love a person.

The piano is playing and she and I are still seated - pretty young things - at the dimly lit bar...

After a good laugh over a beehived girl we both worked with who didn't know which way was East and which way was West, Ikidyounot, the conversation veered back to relationships - & good byes. About a year ago, my beautiful Ex-Co-Shopgirl was forced to say goodbye to her own foreign-born boyfriend - They were together for years and the best of friends. He was leaving on an extended business trip, without a return ticket.

Pushing her hair out of her face, she explained,

He was in the towncar going to the airport, and I was driving our Range Rover - we were cruising side by side having just said our goodbyes. Down PCH, until the towncar made a right. I kept driving straight. His car went right, and I didn't. And as I watched them turn in my rearveiw mirror, it felt like I was watching my Whole Life turn right with him in that car - everything I had known for the past two years had made a right at that corner while I kept going straight, on my own.

And I knew I would never see him, as my Boyfriend, on American soil again.

And, I didn't.

When my Dutchman said his final goodbye at the airport, after he whispered I love you to me in Dutch, after he blew me a kiss from the sidewalk, as I drove off; I had the exact same sensation. The fear that That Life - a life with him - was left on that sidewalk along with him and his luggage in my rearveiw while I drove straight, on my own. And like my girlfriend, I didn't want it to be true either.

This morning I sent the email I finally realized I needed to write.
I have broken up with my wonderful Dutchman.
But, not for lack of deeply loving him.

Back to School & Back to Saturn.

I woke up this morning and something was different.
Perhaps... perhaps it's the arrival of September. Like a muscle memory from childhood; back to school time, the prospect of a whole new year ahead filled with endless possibilities - the new school supplies, new school clothes. The trying to look effortless in an outfit clearly planned a week in advance.
The thoughts of, Maybe, just maybe this year will be My Year...

Yes! Yes! Yessss!
I'll have what she's having.

So this morning, I got up and my skin was clear. I was light on my feet. I felt the whole day stretched out ahead of me with nothing to do, but I did not dread it - I was looking forward to it. I got in the shower, got dressed, blew dry my hair & lo & behold! Good hair day! My apartment needed cleaning, but not too much cleaning. I went into town, and found designer jeans, never been worn, in my size on sale for $20.
It's 80 degrees out and not a cloud in the sky.
I'm not sure if it was a much needed dinner with Goldi last night, the fun of spoiling ourselves with a bottle of pinot grigio and rockstar treatment at the restaurant or what, but I feel a little bit like I'm back.
I'm back bitches - back to school, no - but back to Saturn, back to Me & I am ready for Fall.
Summer was... Lipstick Summer was wild and crazy and romantic and wonderful. It was the best summer I can remember. But I'm ready for the leaves to change.

Fall of Cozy Cable Knits.

Fall for H&M.
The Dutchman once said, of his type & of me:
I love your classic face.
You look like and H&M girl.

Now, I want skinny jeans and leather jackets. I want fur vests and new boots. I want Seventies Revival and I want clean & classic. I want it to get dark earlier. I want to change up my make up. I want maxi dressed and jackets. I want to wear white jeans in the middle of a rainstorm &Iwillgodammnit, and cozy up on my girlfriends' couches drinking red wine while pretending to care about what is flickering on the television.

I want Halloween, & I want heat lamps on the patio.

I may be a Summer Girl at heart, but I am ready to celebrate all that is Autumnal.

Fall of Redecorating Goldi's apartment.

Fall of too much mascara.
NoSeriously,ThatsMyPlan.

I'll take this in any season thankyouverymuch.



Fall of mixing prints like I mix metaphors.



I want this to be the Fall of Flowers in our Hair.

Kiss Kiss. Bang Bang.

I have one friend left from my many many years with the Ex. Actually, when he first met her - he came home and said,

My friend's new girlfriend reminds me exactly of you when I first met you.

So, naturally, I liked her right off the bat. Now this was many years ago, and we were friends right away. But the type of friends that are created by boyfriends, really. She came to my birthdays, we met up as duos for drinks and drinking, ran into each other on holiday weekends. We bonded while chain smoking outsides restaurants over fashion, shoes, ebay finds & The Boys. Rarely, if ever, did we see each other one-on-one.


She should have been a Parisian.

Then, last summer, when I found myself - as you well know - without a boyfriend, without his family, and without friends of my own, it was she who I turned to. She was on a brief break from her boyfriend at the time, so she and I met up for drinks on the rooftop bar of that gym where you can charge your drinks to your gym membership. Three mile run followed by a pitcher of Coors, anyone? From then on, she always made it a point to keep her plans with me when everyone else was wavering, flaking & probably couldn't stand me due to my constant lamenting over my my life sans the Ex. I was going through a hard time, she knew it, and she stood by me & actually listened. She returned my calls, she invited me to parties where I wouldn't know a soul, just to get me out of my house. She kept my secrets and told me hers.
Standing in my tiny kitchen last summer, mixing wine spritzers in to-go cups for the beach, I opened the freezer with my left hand, followed by a hammer from the jar on the table with my right, and started pounding away at the ice block that had formed in my store-bought bag of ice, she laughed her infectious laugh and said,

See!?! Look at us! We don't need no stinkin' men!

In that instant, for first time in a long time, I felt like I finally had an ally standing next to me in my new single studio apartment. On my own for the first time ever, I finally had a Friend of my own in my tiny town. Ironically, it is through her that I have met most of my other friends - my life now is actually the result of my friendship with this little doe-eyed Girlfriend of a friend of my Ex. (Say that three times fast.) She was the key to me creating my own bubble as opposed to walking on blistered tiptoes around my Ex's.

She is dark, hilarious, snarky and fiercely loyal.



We once showed up to a coffee date wearing the
exact same outfit in opposite colors.
NoSeriously,WeDid.



She is the friend that will tell you when she's pissed, but then follow that up by blowing you a kiss.

If I am a Rebel Ballerina, she is my Renegade Little Sister.

Bijou, bijou mon amour.

Joyeux anniversaire. xx 

To know her is to love to hear her say the word, Fantastic:
Fintaaaaaaahstic.

Sidenotes: I feel a bit more anchored today; have done a lot of thinking, went to bed ridiculously early last night (for me at least) but not before relaxing on a Japanese latern-lit patio at a barbeque with a couple glasses of Pinot Grigio and Good People.

Turning My Back On The Ocean

Summertime in my childhood was magical; my sisters and I had what essentially amounted to a park in our backyard & we spent a large portion (or what, in memory seems like a large portion) at our beachhouse in Northern California. Some years, we brought our housekeeper and her daughter with us, and some years it was just me, my parents and my two younger sisters. The water there is, by anyone else's account, cold - but to us it was just the ocean. The house backed right up to the dunes, and my mother could sit in the loft and look out the window to check on us while we played on the hot sand. My mother also taught us how to body surf - so armed with nothing other than our chattering teeth, goosebumps and fading one piece bathingsuits, my middle sister and I spent hours in the ocean catching waves. One afternoon, I was probably 7 or 8, making her right around 5, we were far enough out in the water so that we could not see the ocean floor, and could only touch it with our feet at that exact moment as the wave recedes. Swimming towards the the surf, laughing and breathing heavily from an hour or so of treading water, she and I were both pummeled by an unexpectedly large wave. It knocked us both underwater, turning us in circles. We were both small enough that in what was probably only 6 feet of water, if that, but we both lost the ability to tell which way was up and which way was down in that murky ocean water. When I finally found her hand, along with my barrings, I pulled us both up. Coughing, crying, and dry heaving from swallowing too much salt water, we traipsed back to the beach, defeated.

We both remember this event vividly.

I remember that exact feeling of confusion, eyes open to only see brown water circling around me, not knowing up from down or sky from sand. I remember exactly how it felt to finally find my sister's hand.

I have found everything so tedious lately. I don't think I will ever actually post this, because as I told my mother over one of our brief phone calls, no one wants to hear about my Musings Miserable.
I don't even want to.
Feel free to skip this one.



Maintenance may have fixed the leak,
but I'm still dealing with Waterworld.

But this is my outlet. I think  to myself, damn I need a hobby... And then I remember that this is my hobby. So, as the call center workers in India say, bare with me here.
The past couple of weeks, since my Dutchman left, I have felt like I've been just... treading water. Time has been punctuated by very little other than a raucous birthday celebration last weekend & a dinner party (of two) at a friend's house. I guess I am finally ready for summer to end. (Gasp!) Honestly, I feel like I might be losing my already precarious footing; fighting sadness, missing him, it washes over me without warning; I find myself crying at the slightest thing, overwhelmed by the even more minuscule. I just had two days off in a row from the shop, and for the first time in as long as I remember I had a hard time getting out of bed. Somehow, I walked out of the bookstore with what may very well be the most depressing book ever & I have devoured it, scribbling things in the borders, underlining passages. My mother is driving me a bit crazy, but then again - I'm driving myself a little crazy too.  I still hear very little from the Dutchman, as he is busy at work during the week making up for time lost while across the Atlantic & currently busy with a bachelor party. He promises we'll chat Sunday, but I don't know when exactly. I do know that tells me he loves me and he misses me, which I don't doubt, but it is always immediately followed by 'I have to go to bed and/or a business meeting.' Okay, not usually both at the same time.
So now not only do I miss him, miss us, I also feel taken for granted, I guess... Just waiting around, hoping he has a free millisecond to shoot me a text. How is it even possible to feel taken for granted from the Netherlands? I have expressed - albeit a tad cryptically - that I am struggling to him but I don't think he gets it. It is so hard, and I get so stuck in my head, and have the propensity towards loneliness - this grief over the return to Earth has only amplified it. That comfort with him, that quiet comfort has now turned into a deafening underwater-like silence & I am struggling to come up for air. Chest heaving, I find myself thinking, I don't know how long I can hold my breath.
A shift happened during the Dutchman's visit, the tides shifted from Single Me to I-Have-a-Boyfriend-Lets-All-Go-On-Double-Dates-Me. And my life has yet to shift back. It can't, really. I am not single - yet I have no one to be my date on double dates. The reality is, before I met him I was fine being oh so singleandreadytomingle; I mean, I was not perfectly fine, but I was fine - I had dates with B----; I had distractions - I had the beach & flirting and I guess, most importantly, I had the possibility of... Well, the possibility of meeting someone like Him. I had the possibility of the Spark. 
And I found that spark, and I fell in love with him, and now...
Now, I have his love, but I don't have him.
Really, I want him here. I know we're supposed to be all, "I don't need someone to complete me - I am  a complete person. I want someone to compliment my wholeness" and all that bullshit, but I have come to realize - of me, this is not true. I felt most whole when I had his hand to reach out for.
I am heavy-chested and have trouble breathing. This loneliness weighs down on my chest, it weighs down my arms; this loneliness has me trying to catch my breath. I feel constantly as though I've been knocked over by an unexpected wave, grasping out for a hand, and finding the hand that I am grasping for is too far away to reach.
This is not the reckless me, the pity-party me; this is me knocked down by a wave but altogether surprised by the sea.

Sidenotes: This is not to say I have nothing to look forward to - some of my favorite people and I have plans this week. I just feel like something is missing. Because it is. Also! Goldi and the Doctor are going strong, he seems - from what I know - like a really good guy.