30: A Blank Page of Paint by Numbers.

...Just enjoy the house to yourself! We should be home by 9.

I haven't been in a space this large, by myself, in as long as I can remember. I am sitting at the dining room table tap-tap-typing away in an empty house in the desert, eating hummus and drinking a glass of Barefoot from of one of those tiny 'American Doll' sized bottles sold by the checkout at the drugstore. I am alone. But, it's different than being alone at my 'house' (cough! studio!). There's a bike in the kitchen, a Buddha decorated with fortunes on the counter* and a plastic bowling pin set on the floor to my right.
I can hear the family dog in another room, dogtag jangling.
It smells like dinner and kids and A Home.

*I originally called it the bar, but in a family home, I realized, its not a bar .

It's a countertop. Duh. I'm new.

I haven't had this, especially to myself, in as long as I can remember.

You know, being technically 'unemployed' is an odd thing. One one hand, I have days where I haven't anywhere in particular that I need to be, but many days where I find myself choosing to be places I haven't been in many many years. Such as, but not limited to LA, Santa Monica and Newport (but Newport for fun, which I never used to do.) I mean, I see my Malibu Bad Ass more now that she resides near the Miracle Mile than I did when she lived down the street. On the other hand, though I find I have nothing technically on the docket, I feel like I've been busy, busy, busy. A lot of it has to do with the aforementioned travelling, but also that the two or three days I do spend working, I spend the night out of town.
Right now, I'm in the middle of a three day stretch in the desert of Southern California, where it's a balmy 75 degrees & a storm'sabrewing. (Literally.) The house I'm writing from is the home of the sister of the owner of my shop. I mean, not only have I not spent time in a real Home in years but its also been a long time since I have spent so much time with a Family in general, Capital F. I mean, I have spent the last two years bouncing between the couches of my girlfriends and the beds of my, errrr... Let's go with 'lovers' on that one, so being around a Family has been... Comforting. It's a dog, kids - the whole familial shebang.
Something I haven't been wholly surrounded by since I was a kid myself and I'd forgotten how comforting it is; how much I love it.
And, when I wake up in the morning, there are two little boys excited that I am 'finally!' awake.
Sometimes it feels like going to 'work' is more like a vacation from Life.

See: Cacti.

(See: jobless, boyfriendless, aimless.)
In the Desert, I have a purpose, I have a Family, I have a sense of value; I feel a sense of unconditional love from the Family that I have grown to be a part of; my boss, her parents - especially her father - her sister, her sister's two sons.
I just generally feel less Lost.
Now! Don't get me wrong - I have a family of friends in my Tiny Little Beach Town too, but these people have known me since I was 24; since I was six months into a relationship with the Ex of 5 years. They saw me grow up, move out, move on, and now they're here for me when I've lost my job and am in a state of total flux.
Because, being jobless, boyfriendless & with a milestone birthday on the horizon - I am feeling at a loss.
All the things that used to define me do not anymore - Everything (everything!) is in Flux right now.
It's all blank.
Nothing is defined; I am not coloring within the lines because there are no lines to color within.
I am approaching 30 with a blank page in hand.
Not a blank slate. Just an empty page.
I feel like I pressed the 'Pause' button on my own life's remote. You know, so that I could really take in what just happened, and I've just kept rewinding the last scenes, dissecting them ad nauseam, totally unsure of what to expect next.
I feel like my life has been paused. And I'm waiting for someone else to come along and press 'Play' because I am afraid of what's to follow & haven't even totally digested what's already happened.
This folks, is why I don't like watching movies alone.
The hardest part of the Blank and the Pause is that with all the time in the world to think - with the uncertainty of it all - comes my uncanny knack for over-thought. 
I am over-thinking a paused frame, I am over-thinking a blank page.

Vogue!

How so?
Well, the first thing not written on the blank paper?
Not shown in the freeze frame?
'What Do I Want To Be When I Grow Up?'
I have no idea. My mother always said she just 'knew' she wanted to be a Mom. I never felt that way. (Though, spending time with this family, I am finding it harder and harder to imagine a fulfilled life without a family. Without the bike and the bowling pins and the little tiny hands.) I also know I can't work two days a week two hours away for the rest of my life, so I have to find something. But what? I don't know. Do I want to continue to be a shopgirl forever? No. I think I have more to offer to the world than what jeans will go best with that blouse. Or, conversely, if that is my calling, do I want to do it from someone else's shop forever? No. (I actually did turn down a job for just that reason last week.) So, I go to my thirtieth birthday less sure of what I want to be when I grow up as I did when I arrived at my 20th. (At Chevy's. See also: Twenty year olds are idiots.)
Second thing not written on the blank page?
'Why Am I Still Single?' Shut your fucking trap if you're thinking it's just 'cuz I haven't found The One yet; obviously, I haven't found the One.
But you know what I have found?
Well, for one - Cheetos. Family houses! P'shaw!
I found Apartment F, who though we are not Together, I still Love more than anything. The Spark & attraction may be lacking, but I still see him often, eat dinner and watch a movie with him, sleep next to him (though not with him) several nights a week. I still find myself awake at 11 pm, creeping upstairs to crawl into bed next him. I went away for work last week & when I got home he had bought Kat Moss food, fed her the 3 days I was gone, done all my dishes, taken out the trash, and...

I Have a PhD in Unavailable.

And. Cleaned the toilet and left me a cookie.
Even my PhD candidate of a sister coo'd, 'Aww. Can't you just be with him??' (In my defense, she may be smarter than me now, but she talked to herself until she was 9. I used to look out the window and see her balancing back and forth on the 6 foot fence, all Anne of Green Gables-style, chatting to herself. If I watched long enough - sure enough, 'Whoops!' She'd fall off one side or the other. In her defense, she's in the best Women's Studies PhD program in the country & was one of three (out of like 10,000) to be accepted with a scholarship. But I digress. And brag.)
I am still single because I am stupid.
I am probably still single because I am too picky. And too afraid of the responsibility that comes along with being a pillar to a house like the very one I typing from. I am still single because I am arrogant enough to think that someone will come along and sweep my off my feet.
I'm stupid, because when I am in my Tiny Room, watching New Girl with Apartment F, and Kat Moss is curled up on both of us and he starts to fall asleep; that is the only other time I can recall that even feels close to Family. F even texted me today, after a thread regarding him sneaking Kat Moss into the hockey game he attended this evening in his pocket, with,

I love that little kitty.

Also, it should be noted, Apt F is psychic, though he doesn't know it.
He calls it 'intuition' & I call it, 'Has he been reading my text messages?'
He hasn't, because if he had, he probably wouldn't be speaking to me, let alone buying me cookies. 
I also feel like I should explain that the F & I (though I know he still cares for me) are very open about not being together, and still leaning on one another, and loving each other. He knows that I feel like something is missing from our connection - or as he put it, 'You love me but you are not in love with me, that is what is missing'. And I know that - in the long run - he wants marriage and a family & I (much like my sister at 9) walk a thin wooden fence on the subject and fall on either side of that fence at any given moment allwillynillylike (while totally talking to myself). And for the two of us to then that to stay in a relationship that is only getting more and more serious when we don't fall on the same side of the fence most of the time really isn't fair to his own hopes and dreams.

Teeter totter. 

I am still single because I am terrified of being responsible for someone else's happiness, whether it is the F's or a husbands or most importantly, a child's; especially when I am so terrible at being responsible for my own.
And for the Freeze Frame, for the Pause, (no, Mom, not that 'Pause'!) I have found a Carpenter (Yes, Like Jesus) in Santa Monica to er... fill in the blanks for the time being. It's been about three weeks.
Of steady not going steady.

What?! Carpenters wear a lot of plaid.
Even if they're from Calabasas.

Couldn't we have gone to Frida's Pitas?
That Mexi-Greek fusion place on La Brea?
No... We couldn't.
Cause I just made it up.
(It should be real though.
Make it make it happen,
Internet.) 

A Carpenter who I thought would prefer to keep things on the more Casual side of Friday, but I am starting to feel like even he wants more. For instance, he wants to be invited to the St. Patrick's Day fiesta that Goldi & I strong-armed the Doctor into hosting (Apartment F wanted an invite as well) and if he isn't invited, he wants to pick me up and take me back to his (actually quite beautiful) apartment off Santa Monica Blvd when it's over. Neither of which will happen because I don't see any reason (or necessarily want) to leave my friends. (That, and there is a certain boy that will most likely be there that I may or may not have shared a Moment and a kiss over Oasis's Wonderwall on Halloween.) (Also, a glaring example of F's intuition? A text that read, I feel like you don't want me to go hang out with your friends at the Doctor's because they're trying to set you up with one of his friends.' Argh...) Anyhow, between the Carpenter (they have a really good union) wanting me to, I quote (him), 'flaunt him in front of my friends' and the fact that he took me to restaurant where the waitress not asked where his parents had been but also his Grandparents, I am getting the feeling that he wants more than I do now as well. The ripple of something that went through the air when he told his brother (yes, I have met his brother) and his roommate that he took me to 'Paco's Tacos' was... Unnerving. They looked... Surprised. It was an odd moment; and odd moment that I am probably reading too much into, but at the same time... They seemed as surprised as I was that he would take me to somewhere so intimately 'Theirs'. Though, to be honest, most of time when I am texting with the Carpenter, I convince myself he has some form of... Special Needs. (Not sexually. He just seems retarded. His texts read like... Well, 'Me Talk Pretty One Day'.) He seems so stupid via text, that I start to reckon I've missed some twitch, some form of Autism, that I find I'm always surprised that when I am with him, he is articulate, honest, forthright and sweet.
Note: He, too, made it a point to tell me, at Paco's Tacos, that he does want children. (My response? 'Filed.')
We're supposed to be Casual!* Not speaking of children at his grandparent's favorite Mexican joint.

*Yes, Tar, we put on our jeans first.

He also speaks fluent Spanish, and when I told him that I understand it better than I speak it, he was surprised that I got everything right in his little quiz (which did not include, Where is the library?). Not only that, but when we were at Paco's Tacos, the waiter asked him en espanol, if he would like a coffee after dinner, I responded that I would. En ingles. He made a crack about me being flaca, and I nearly shouted, 'I'm right here! I can hear you!' And finally, he conceded that I can actually understand Spanish better than I am able to actually speak it. With that he if I could understand one last thing; and he muttered something under his breath. I immediately thought he was making a dirty joke or fun of me and asked him to repeat himself.
He said it again, this time louder and more sheepishly, yet still very quickly.

Tu esta muy bonita

I replied, blushing, with a simple thank you.

I am still fucking single because no one is ever good enough.
And one might presume, that in my world, that no one is not just anyone...

YES! SOMEONE PLEASE FIND ME THIS!
A full page of Paint by Numbers.
Happy 30th to Me.
No? You sure?
Damn.

It's me.

So here I go: Big birthday on the Horizon; Blank Page in Hand.
Turning Thirty, jobless and single.
Unsure of anything other than that my life is inexplicably on Pause.

No, not inexplicably. It's to be expected, I guess.
Because, apparently, even after all these years...

I'm still on the fence.
I'm still fixated on the television station that airs nothing but snow.
I'm still waiting for my Life to be a fucking Paint by Numbers...
...of a House & a Home, and a bike in the kitchen and a dog in the yard.
Or a Kat.

But it's not.
No one's is.


Sidenote: I do have a Second Date with 'The Mormon' (who is not, in fact Mormon [anymore]) on Monday. Our first date was at the Hollywood Improve about two weeks ago, and went very well. Actually, if you had been at the Hollywood Improv that night, you probably would have never guessed it was our first date, but more likely would've thought we had been together for years. The only real caveat is that he is an ex-Mormon. Like, only off the church and on the sauce +/- 18 months. Nevermind that he's divorced with a four year old, I'm more worried about trying to mesh an ex-faux-Jew/college wildchild with a divorcee Mormon who just jumped into the 'civilian' dating pool.