Wisdom of P!nk (T-Plus 312 Days)

I do some of my best thinking when I’m running. The fitness enthusiasts among you would probably say it’s because my head is clear and I’m at peace with nature or some crap, but really it’s a defense mechanism. I desperately need something to distract from my huffing, puffing and obsessing over whether or not my foot feels like it is going to fall off.

Regardless of the reasoning behind them though, the thoughts are usually pretty good. I was traveling over the weekend for work and enjoying a jog through balmy 22-degree temps when P!nk’s “Try”came on my workout mix. Not sure if it is uncool or not to admit, but I am a rather large P!nk fan. I have at least 10 songs that never fail to get my up and going and her latest is no different.

Where there is desire, there is gonna be a flame. Where is a flame, someone is bound to get burned. 

Now there are certainly more significant lyrics out there, but in pondering the chorus and idea of the consequences of flames, my mind went in the opposite direction to how flames start … With sparks, of course.

Oh Sparks.

Yep, I just can’t seem to shake him (try as I might over the last year plus).

To get you up to speed: Back in November, we saw each other on the road for a mutual work event. Even though we had stayed in touch and flirted via text on a regular basis, I was still a little worried about it being awkward or there being too much pressure on the situation to make it good, but everything just clicked like it always had. Sparks were flying, one might say.

Unfortunately, after an incredible dinner and night out, the hotel was sold out and we both had road roommates, so there were no marathon slump-busting sessions, despite our every attempt into bribing the late-night hotel desk clerk to find us a room (seriously). After failing there, we resorted to making out in a back banquet hallway of the hotel (even the bathrooms were locked!), where we were eventually caught. Humiliating, but too hilarious not to mention.

So we parted ways there and went back to the occasional text/email/etc. and I started to settle into the idea things would continue on like this for months or years until we saw each other again, but about two weeks later, I was once again traveling and met up with one of my besties to whom, after sharing much wine, I ended up gushing to about Sparks. She gave me some perspective on the way I apparently act when I talk about him and the way I describe him and our relationship and pointed out the fact it was unlike anything else since she's known me.

I realized then I wasn't ready to give up on it, but nor was I willing to accept the way things had gone on for so long. While trying to come up with a way to present all this to him, however, I got a series of texts from him the next night along the lines of "Sunday-Monday? Halfway?"

Yes, we met halfway and yes, made up for lost time, but also had some really good conversation. For as long as this had gone on and as many years as we've known each other, we've only had a handful of proper dates and we have a lot of ground to cover.

Sh!t got real that night.

We talked about a lot of stuff which made this way more real and not just the picture-perfect hookups I was remembering so fondly. If anything, it made me more committed to wanting something more with him, though at the same time even more daunted about what it is going to take to make it happen.

Fast forward nearly two months and all those concerns seem to be warranted. My naïve idea to try and meet once a month was quickly thwarted by life and little by little, the days between communication tack onto each other and they've stretched to two weeks. There's so much to say, yet nowhere to begin. 

At the risk of sounding stalker-y or at least like a lame girl pining, I think about it. I think about him. I try to go out with other men and they don’t even come close. I don't want them too.

And so I'm worried that P!nk is right. That the sparks are going to turn to flames and, before I know it, those flames are going to burn my heart beyond recognition. I spent the balance of my run wondering if  it’s a risk I want to take, a matter which has remained fodder for the week through more runs and many rounds of the song on repeat.

Turns out the answer is right there in the lyrics:

But just because it burns, doesn't mean you're gonna die. You gotta get up and try. And try and try.

The Power of Flour (T-Plus 292 Days)

No matter what questions or mysteries are going on in life, one thing remains the same – the correct combination of butter, sugar, flour and 350 degrees yields wonderful results. You can add chocolate, pumpkin, banana, carrot … whatever; it will likely turn out pretty amazing.

I think this is what I love most about baking – the formulaic certainty combined with the endless possibilities for creativity. It is no wonder this is the activity I turn to most often to relieve stress, quell sadness, exude happiness and express lo_ _ … err, appreciation.

I have come up with some pretty incredible recipe combinations in the last several months, covering a gamut of emotions and each forever tied with a given moment. NDNS’ birthday cupcakes, road trip cookies, Sparks’ care package or just a lonely wine-filled Sunday afternoon.

The months since turning 30, and even more so since I last produced something blog-worthy, have gone by in a blur that have somehow been both action-packed and yet uneventful. In short, they have left a lot of room for baking.

Some 173 days ago, I thought my whole life was coming together. I was in the process of getting to know a truly extraordinary man and was interviewing for a job that was everything I had been looking for, including close to him. As it turns out, neither was meant to be.

The two things were so joined in my mind that, when I didn’t get the job, I realized many of my feelings for the man just weren’t there, despite how much I wanted them to be. He was, and still is, wonderful, but at the risk of being a total cornball, there just weren’t … sparks.

And we all know how important I think those are.

In the months since, there have been some incredibly low, lonely moments, but also some not-so-lonely ones, completely blissful ones as well. I find myself in the kitchen more and more, biding my time between the two extremes and continually searching for my happy medium.

As for tonight’s baked goods? I have banana cupcakes cooling right now and just waiting to be piped with cinnamon honey buttercream. The purpose of them is twofold – to use the rotten bananas stinking up the fruit bowl and to create something which makes sense. Because sometimes that is all you can do.

The Right Direction (T-Plus 119 Days)

I have always been one of those women who rolled her eyes when friends used the lines “it will happen when you least expect it” or “if it’s meant to be, it will find a way.” These are just the semi-condescending things smug married types tell single friends after another breakup before sitting back and admiring their own china patterns … or at least I thought.

As it turns out, they just may be right (as much as it pains me to admit).

Just over six weeks ago I stood beside one of my very best friends as she pledged to love and honor for the rest of her life in a beautiful beachside wedding ceremony on an island off the North Carolina coast. For much of the weeks beforehand, I was more concerned with fitting into the disproportioned pastel polyester frock I was asked to wear, but in the moment they both said “I do,” there was little else to focus on besides their pure happiness … and to be honest, the good-looking groomsman standing across the way.

He and I had met a handful of times in the eight years my BFF and I have known each other as the two of them went to college together and are each other’s closest guy/girl friend. I had always enjoyed talking to him the times we had hung out, but there was something different this time. After a couple days surrounded by drinking, dancing and wedded bliss, the weekend ended with a post-reception hookup.

Which is actually just the moment it all began.

Since returning home, we have engaged in phone calls and text exchanges worthy of two high schoolers with crushes. I have made the trek to see him and now eagerly await his return visit, checking the flight confirmation daily with hope the date magically moved up.  

This situation is far from ideal, but yet I am ridiculously happy. It’s natural to compare what we have going on to some of the characters in the last couple years and I have to say it is refreshing to associate with someone who wasted no time in deciding how he feels, acting on it and being willing to do just about anything to make it work. And then actually have it work … without needing to analyze, discuss or obsess (even though that makes for much less entertaining blog material).

Life is good.

There is another layer to this story, however. A job opportunity presented itself a few weeks ago at a place which is pretty darn close to the perfect combination of what I was looking for. I polled my Life Advisory Board (The LAB – a topic for another time) and everyone agreed this was an opening I needed to pursue and put themselves into campaign mode to present me as the best possible candidate.

There is a reason all these folks are on The LAB and each performed their role to a T. There are still several factors in play and the process is far from over, but I am in about as good of a position as I possibly could be.

So how are these two topics – new job and new chance at L-word – related? My interest in both is mutually exclusive and before I moved forward with either, I had to conclude my commitment to each was not dependent on the other. In a crazy, serendipitous turn of events, however, they are a straight-shot, 60-mile drive apart, which is practically next door compared to the current situation.

It is somewhat of an unnatural feeling to have things work out better than I imagined at a time where I wasn't even looking for it, but I am embracing it.

At the very moment I had accepted my current path and found a newfound level of contentment with it, the universe conjured up a new plan and decided to send me down a new trail. Without a map, I am using in my directionally-challenged heart as a compass and trusting in it – and the greater plan – to keep me headed in the right direction. Destination: groove.  

“When you want something all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

“Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.”

- Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist -

A Lot of Groove Left to Find (T-Plus 90 Days)

I can fully attest to the idea time moves faster the older we get. It has been nearly three months since I turned 30 and I swear it has passed in the blink of an eye. The majority of the time I don’t give it a second thought, unless of course I am being melodramatic about being old or inputting into a cardio machine. (Sidenote: apparently 30-year olds burn more calories than 29-year olds, or least the cross trainer tells me. So bonus.)

If anything, I completely ignored the birthday and spent the first few weeks reverting backwards. Without even realizing it, I found myself getting sucked back into a pseudo-relationship with Mr. NDNS, engaging Sparks in the flirtatious text exchanges and being a passive aggressive as ever with my boss.

I mean, that all is just so 29.

And then an opportunity for change presented itself. My landlord informed me she would be moving back to this fair city and would want her house back, meaning I would need to relocate. I had been talking about leaving for months; maybe this was the time. 

I spent a few weeks in a state which can only be described as panic as I simultaneously searched for jobs thousands of miles away and apartments within a mile radius of where I was. I figured whichever panned out first was the way it was meant to be (for now). Turns out it was the apartment and so I moved 1.2 miles away into a beautiful old building with wood floors that make my knees weak. Or maybe that’s creaking floorboards. Either way, the floors are gorgeous.

I decided then to focus my attention on starting over as much as I could without really going anywhere. With all the moving around I have done since college, I had never taken the opportunity to truly go through what I owned and ask myself whether I wanted it. So I took stock of every piece of furniture, clothing and kitchenware I had, noting what held good memories and what held bad ones; what was giving off good energy and what was sucking out bits of my soul.

In the end, I sold almost every piece of furniture I had ever had sex on (in/under/against/you get the point), writing it off as having bad mojo. As much I hate to admit it, The Asshole was haunting me every time I sat on the couch or worked at my desk (sorry to all my friends who sat at either and now have that mental image).

Moving was an opportunity to downsize. Streamline. Simplify. Which I did, until I had almost nothing substantial left. Except my shoe collection. Of the wood furniture I kept, I stripped it, sanded it and refinished it until it was more beautiful than before and looking much more my style.

No, the metaphor of this is not lost on me.   

I have since bought new furniture to replace the bad mojo pieces and have been having a love affair with my chair and a half/ottoman for the last week. We are one.

It occurred to me somewhere around my second bottle of wine in the new pad, however, that I was doing the opposite of simplifying. I was nesting. I was turning this apartment with the stunning wood floors into something that resembled a home.

With the ink barely dry on a one-year lease though, I had stopped looking at job sites out of respect for my sanity and instead started focusing on trying to appreciate the one I have. In the time since my birthday, I experienced one of the greatest professional thrills of my career, but at the time I didn’t appreciate it.

It wasn’t until I was speaking to a class and someone asked me what makes the hours and headaches of the job worth it and that’s when I knew. I could pinpoint a precise split-second of time and I realized how much the aforementioned experience rejuvenated my desire continue and reminded me how truly lucky I am to go to work with the people and in the place(s) I do. 

My contentment might have been helped along by year-long financing on a couch and bed I have yet to make memories in, but for the first time in a long time, it feels real.

Or at least it did …

Stay tuned. I may be 30, but there is a lot of groove left to find.

The Final Countdown (T-Minus 14 Days)

Welp, it’s two weeks until the big day and I must say I am approaching it with better peace of mind than one might have thought 400-and-some days ago. It may largely be in part to the fact I am once again on the road and will be for most of the next few weeks and therefore really don’t have the time or energy to obsess about it. Or maybe I have in fact reached some level of self acceptance.

Meh, who are we kidding? It’s most likely the former.

Regardless, I have a pivotal moment coming up before the big day. This time next week, plus about four hours, I will know whether Sparks’ and my paths will cross for the third year in a row and to be honest, I am not so sure what I am hoping for. If it doesn’t happen, then I think it’s a clear sign I should shut the door on this whole situation and that would probably be a good thing. Because if we do see each other, it will inevitably lead to drunken makeouts on street corners and strides of pride between hotels in the morning and we’ll be right back to where we were last year.

And I need to be all about forward progress.

So before we reach this critical moment next week, I figured now is as good a time as any to look back and figure out what I have learned about myself in the last 486 days.

·         I like to drink. Probably a little too much. (Though for the record, I haven’t had more than a glass of wine in a week.)

·         I have amazing friends. Seriously the best. And sometimes, all it takes is one crazy long weekend in Vegas to make friends for life and feel like you’ve already known them for a lifetime.

·         I would rather spend a year pining over someone seven hours away than to find take the time, make the effort or risk the result of looking for a relationship which isn’t doomed from the get-go.

·         Baking makes me happy.

·         There is a free spirit in me somewhere and I think it desperately wants to get out. The woman who hasn’t had more than a few days off at one time in over a decade and has put professional advancement before all else doesn’t seem so cool anymore.

·         I am not cut out for online dating.

·         When you fall off your bike, both literally and figuratively, you just have to get up and keep going even if you are unable to finish. Because sometimes it’s OK not to succeed as the lessons learned in failure can go further than those which come from success.

·         I am not Wonder Woman, even if I wear her panties.

I guess that’s a starting point, right?

I got some clarity this week from an old friend who I hadn’t spoken to in probably a couple years. On the heels of ending a four-year relationship, he got drunk and fell into a state of self-loathing I know well, channeling it into writing me an email apologizing for being such a shitty friend. I reached out a few days later with tales of my own shitty friend-ness and we caught up on everything we had going on.

Among other things, I told him about the blog; about my goal to find my groove in 500 days and he just laughed and said “If you figure out your life in 500 days, let me know the secret. I think it should take closer to 500 years." I sincerely hope that isn’t the case, but it can probably be assumed it will not happen in the next 14 days.

And that’s OK.

Have Itch. Will Travel (T-Minus 20 (!!!!) Days)

You guessed it; I’m on the road again. I am actually in one of the few cool cities I get to travel to for work, but it’s cold and rainy outside and I really just don’t feel like boozing it up on a Tuesday night. So instead I am in an abandoned banquet room in the far reaches of the ninth floor daydreaming about other places.

My reading list of late has been full of travel memoirs – all vaguely similar, but yet so completely different. Yes, each one is about a young single woman (or a few of them) who decides to throw everything else away to travel in an effort to find themselves before facing some big obstacle – turning 30, graduation, getting over a relationship or simply being at peace.

Following The Lost Girls, which I have already wholeheartedly endorsed here, I turned to The Good Girl’s Guide to Getting Lost and have Wanderlust waiting in my Nook queue , while adding countless other my Goodreads “to read” list. The trend is so evident one of my friends sent me a message just to make sure I wasn’t planning to run off to the Congo any time soon.

I hadn’t thought about, but this doesn’t look so bad. Maybe I’ll add it to my list.

One of the common threads between the women in these books is an already deep-seeded love and appreciation for travel and adventure. Now I would like to think I am in the process of developing both, but it has been a long time coming and I have not come by it naturally.

My family did not do adventure growing up and we definitely did not do exotic travel. When I went to France with a group of classmates in high school, I was the first person in my family to get a passport. I was a junior in high school and it was just the second time I had been on an airplane. We also never appreciated what we had in our own backyard – I grew up 25 minutes from the beach and it was not until I could drive myself and later when I dated a surf instructor in college (The Badass) did I begin to revel in the ocean’s majesty.

Yes, I said majesty. Get over it.

My point is I did not grow up with the notion travel – and more so stepping out of one’s comfort zone – are necessary parts of life and I kind of resent that a little bit. My mother is very cautious and a kid has no choice but to absorb those reactions to things like heights, bridges, driving fast, oceans, planes, etc., and it has taken me a long time to realize I want to face all of those things with reckless abandon.

It’s a bit overwhelming to face at this point in life a—to learn all these ~ing skills and embrace the life they fit into.  

But I am trying.

Because if my life is for rent and I don’t learn to buy, I deserve nothing more than I get because nothing I have is truly mine.

Sound familiar?

I had my iPod on shuffle the other day and Dido’s “Life for Rent” came on and it stopped me in my tracks and I had to listen again. And again. I remember getting the CD in college and reveling in this song, but it speaks to me a little differently now.

I haven't ever really found a place that I call home

I never stick around quite long enough to make it

I apologize once again I'm not in love

But it's not as if I mind

that your heart ain't exactly breaking

It's just a thought, only a thought

But if my life is for rent and I don't learn to buy

Well I deserve nothing more than I get

‘Cause nothing I have is truly mine

I've always thought

that I would love to live by the sea

To travel the world alone

and live more simply

I have no idea what's happened to that dream

‘Cause there's really nothing left here to stop me

It's just a thought, only a thought

But if my life is for rent and I don't learn to buy

Well I deserve nothing more than I get

‘Cause nothing I have is truly mine

If my life is for rent and I don't learn to buy

Well I deserve nothing more than I get

‘Cause nothing I have is truly mine

While my heart is a shield and I won't let it down

While I am so afraid to fail so I won't even try

Well how can I say I'm alive

If my life is for rent and I don't learn to buy

Well I deserve nothing more than I get

‘Cause nothing I have is truly mine

If my life is for rent and I don't learn to buy

Well I deserve nothing more than I get

‘Cause nothing I have is truly mine

Sound familiar?

It’s taking all I have not to run off to the Congo tomorrow. Or in 20 days. With my bag of travel books and the desire to write one of my own. With this in my head:

T-Minus 35 Days. That's all I've got.

Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day and I feel like I should have some strong feelings about it and to be honest, I really don’t. I am once more on the road for work (it seems the only time I ever have to write) and I have to admit I really don’t care about too much right now.

I wish I could report I was at least abiding by my New Year’s Resolution each every day, but I had to go back and look at what I wrote because, for the life of me, I couldn’t even remember what I wrote a month and a half ago.

Fearing less? I think that would require giving a shit.

Which I don’t. Not exactly a sign of progress.

I think I have, however, finally lost hope on Sparks and I wish I just had stuck to it when I tried to give it up back before Christmas. Giving up allows more of a chance to hold onto pride than losing; at least I had some choice in the matter before. He sucked me back in though, with talk of trying to get together and with text messages that would make just about anyone blush. It appeared the pissing dog scenario came into play, even from long distance.

 Instead, it also appears he has apparently realized this – whatever this is – is simply not worth it after nearly a year. Or at least that is what I take from complete silence for the last two weeks after a reasonable facsimile of a disagreement and an awkward convo.

Who knew it was possible to lose something you never had to begin with? Or that it would suck so much.

Should our paths cross again in a month, as they have for each of the last two years and are predicted to again, it is hard to imagine having the strength (or desire) not to give in and go down this road again. For which I will apologize for now.

All I have until then are 35 more days in my 20’s, which probably isn’t enough time to figure out what I came here to do. Find some passion. Some groove.

Or maybe it is. Who knows?

I’m just trying to make myself care about it again.