angelaboration

Whirled World, Part VI: London

2010-08-29T22:30:00.003-04:00

The Romantic I Was Meant to Be

(Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, & Part V)

I knew that I wouldn't have a lot of time to spend with Phil when I returned to London. I was getting back late on June 29th, and was leaving early on July 1st. And unfortunately, he had a writing deadline: the draft of the television episode he was writing was due on the 1st. So June 30th -- our one day together -- would be the day when he'd be hurrying to implement all of the last minute notes handed to him by the production company. And additionally, Phil's new roommate was moving in on the morning of the 1st, around the time I was supposed to be heading for the airport.

Phil seemed stressed. It was clear that my visit was happening at the worst possible time for him. I told him not to worry. After all, I know my way around the city, and I'm rather self-sufficient. I'd take as much of him as I could get, but I didn't want to make any demands on him that would throw off his world.

The truth, of course, was that I'd already said my goodbyes to London. More than anything, the reason I was excited to return was that I'd have more time to say goodbye to him.

My flight from Milan to Gatwick mysteriously got in twenty minutes early. Around 8:00pm. I texted Phil to let him know. He seemed ecstatic. But I told him that we had some things to take care of before we left the airport, and it would still be a while before I was on my way.

Two-Shots-Up and I had taken turns paying for our reservations to things like hostels and boats (some in pounds, some in euros, and some in dollars), and had to get everything evened out. In order to do this, we had to pay for the internet at side-by-side airport computers, and trust each other's math. It took awhile, but it seemed like a good idea to get it all out of the way. In the end, I think she owed me about 3 Euro, and I told her to just forget about it.

But then the second problem: somewhere in Greece, Two-Shots-Up had lost her mobile phone. And she was going to be staying in her friend's flat in London while said friend was out of town. And she couldn't get in touch with the friend's flatmates (any of the ten -- yes, ten -- of them). And my mobile, which we were both relying on, was low on both batteries and credit (I had a pay-as-you-go phone). She was worried about getting to the place and being locked out. I said I'd go with her if necessary, or that she might be able to come with me. She felt guilty for keeping me away from Phil. But eventually, she got in touch with the right person, and I began the tube journey to Phil's place alone... two hours after I'd landed.

He said he'd meet me at Angel station. I got there first. I'd taken a train, a train, a Milan subway, a bus, a plane, the Gatwick Express, and a couple of tube lines to get to him. The last water that had touched my hair was the Mediterranean Sea. I was frustrated from the stressed conversations with Two-Shots-Up. Sweaty. Dirty. Tired.

And then he walked down the street. And I nearly cried.

He had dressed up to meet me. He looked incredibly handsome, even more than I remembered. And when he hugged me, I breathed deeply. He smelled so nice.

And I felt like I was home. My journey had led me back to him. Back to his arms.

I don't think I knew how much I'd missed him until I saw him.

He helped me with the luggage that I'd managed all over Europe. Part of me felt silly for that, but mostly grateful. As we walked to his flat, I just kept staring at him. I had to keep noticing the moments as they were happening. I had to make sure they were real.

He kissed me in the elevator. And he led me into his flat.

I put down my suitcase in the hallway. And I saw rose petals.

Yes, rose petals.

The kind of thing I'd normally laugh at. I've never been a romantic. I roll my eyes at cheesy things. I don't watch chick flicks and yearn for a man to treat me like a princess. I actually told my first boyfriend about how I thought it was condescending that he insisted on opening doors for me. And I usually forget when it's Valentine's Day.

But in that moment...

I realized that I am a romantic.

I just never knew it.

Maybe it's one more example of me talking myself into wanting things I have, and talking myself out of things I think I won't have. Maybe the reason I never wanted romance is because I thought I'd never had it.

But I had it. And I hugged him. And I cried.

The rose petals were everywhere. And roses around his room. An ice bucket with champagne, and two champagne flutes (all of which he had purchased that morning in preparation for my arrival). And a plate of strawberries (echoing the memory of grapes that he had once suggested we should feed to each other in a park "in a decadent manner").

I thanked him. He held me. And he said he had one more surprise for me.

He had finished the draft of his episode early so that he'd get to spend more time with me.

And I felt... lucky.

He told me that we didn't have to do the whole champagne and strawberries thing if I didn't want to. He had a feeling I'd be tired, and I could just go to bed if I wanted. Or we could watch a movie. Or talk. Whatever I wanted to do. It was up to me.

So I told him that I wanted to take a shower. (Seriously, it sucks to feel gross when someone is pouring affection over you.)

Once clean, we talked. And ate strawberries. And I gave him at least one of his presents from my travels.

I don't remember what I gave him when, in retrospect. (It's been two months since this happened... can you blame me for being foggy on the details?)

I know I gave him a small elephant statue from Delphi (a reference to the movie Frankie and Johnny, which we had discussed). And a snow globe from Riomaggiore (which is quite funny, as it doesn't snow there... and was a reference to the play we'd met at, The Real Thing). And a silly hat. And some Italian pesto. And a funny postcard I found that blended political sentiment with a safe sex message: "YES WE CONDOM!" (He put it on his fridge.)

In the morning, we went and got breakfast at a little café down the street from his place. We sat outside. I was happy. And simultaneously calm and excited.

We went to the Study Centre to retrieve the two bags I'd left there during my travels. I saw Deron (one of the men whom I thought was interested in me... but I did not reciprocate feelings for). I tried to rush Phil out of that situation, grabbing my own suitcase and saying, "No, I can get it. I'm stronger than you." I meant it jokingly, but realized my error as soon as it had come out of my mouth. (Word to the wise: NEVER emasculate a man like that. I apologized profusely, but Phil is still giving me a hard time about that one...) But at least I got us away from Deron before Phil and I had to have the "who are we to each other" explanatory exchange... We hadn't had it with each other yet, and I seriously didn't want to have to answer the awkward question that I felt coming from Deron.

I said goodbye to Blake as Phil waited downstairs. I brought him olive paté from Cinque Terre, which he seemed pleased with. I gave him an awkward hug, and told him I was sure I'd see him in Florida.

After dragging myself back to his place, Phil and I got sandwiches at a Caffé Nero to eat on our way. He told me that the strange soft electric violet-blue on the bags was his favorite color (so I saved the bag and took it with me back to the States to try to identify it, which is NOT the blue on the website... the closest I've come so far is Majorelle Blue). We ate on a bench by the Millennium Bridge as he complained about work. It felt very couple-y.

We walked over the bridge and went to the Tate Modern at my request. I had been in 2003, but somehow had not made it in the six weeks of this summer. I got to visit my favorite Dalí. Phil made friends with a strange sculpture. We saw great some Jackson Pollocks and a Monet. And we were both thoroughly confused by some of the art. (read: "art")

(Me with "Metamorphosis of Narcissus" by Salvador Dalí)

(Phil being goofy with a sculpture he liked.)

We ended up in an exhibit called "EXPOSED: Voyeurism, Surveillance and the Camera". It was seriously cool. I loved the celebrity room, which did a great job of showing how sick and obsessive we are as a culture. The room about sexual voyeurism was a bit of a turn-on, but Phil went off missing around that point, so I never made any move toward becoming an exhibitionist in a room of voyeurs. I found him around the war surveillance tapes and photographs.

(Stupid accidental photo-bomber guy ruining a perfectly good picture.)

On the way back we stopped at a cute milkshake place. I can't remember what candy-bar concoction I ended up with. It might've been Snickers. I just remember that it wasn't as good as Phil's cookie dough shake.

And then the calls and e-mails started coming. Despite his efforts with getting the draft in early, Phil was being harassed by the Big Bad Company. They began bombarding him with notes about the script. I told him not to worry. I had to repack my suitcases in a way that would make them all under the plane weight limits, and this would give me time to do that. He seemed amazed that I was okay with him having to work. But I was.

I dressed sexy that night. I kept on the blue and white polka-dotted dress that I'd acquired from the Hot Topic-inspired section of Camdentown that I'd been wearing all day. I added thigh-high hold-up stockings with a sexy open weave pattern in the back and lace tops. I put on glamorous makeup. I held back my hair with a white rose pin. And I put on the killer lace-up heels that I'd been dying to wear. I looked seriously hot.

Phil wanted to go out to a restaurant initially. I can't remember why we didn't. (Maybe I looked too hot?) I remember ordering a pizza online, and then going out to get mixers for the Raspberry Stoli I'd gotten at an airport duty-free shop. We chatted with his roommates. We watched an episode of 30 Rock. We ate pizza.

We played some sort of drinking game version of Scrabble. I got a bingo on my first play, making the score about 15 to 75. Phil wasn't thrilled. I'm not an expert in Scrabble, but I played online with my coworkers in Chicago a lot as a way of making the day go by faster. So on an on average play, I aim to get 20-40 points. Phil was aiming to get over 10. We quit about halfway through the game due to his increasing frustration. Luckily, he was in a pretty good mood despite that.

We had considered going to a bar or a club, but we never did. We just stayed in and enjoyed each other's company.

Eventually, we had a conversation. A "let's be realistic" conversation. A "this isn't going to work" conversation. An "it's been fun while it's lasted" conversation. While we lay next to each other on his bed.

I didn't cry. I knew it was coming. I couldn't help but thinking of the conversation I'd had with Brian, while laying next to him on his bed, in which he said he didn't love me anymore. Or the conversation where Michael came to my place, sat on my bed, and promptly dumped me.

(I really need to stop having relationship conversations on beds. They don't turn out well for me.)

He was right, and I knew it. This couldn't be. It was too hard. It was too scary. It was too unlikely. It would end in heartbreak. So I smiled and said it was alright, and that I knew this had to be how it ended. I was glad that I'd gotten to spend as much time with him as I had.

My subconscious brain took it out on him with a vicious attack of flying fists in my sleep.

We got up in the morning. We ate cereal with bananas. He made me one last cup of tea.

Phil let his new roommate into the building with his belongings in tow. And he escorted me out of it, lugging half of mine.

We stopped at the post office so that I could get stamps for the postcards I'd been writing one at a time on my trip, but had as of yet to send. Phil promised to mail them for me. He asked permission to read them on his way back home. I granted it, feeling silly... After all, I had quoted him on a couple of the postcards without crediting him. I had quoted the text message he sent me the day after we met.

Phil
06/06/2010
8:28pm
Wouldnt it be nice to bottle this feeling ... X

That is, after all, what I wanted: to bottle the feeling of London, and take it with me. Not just Phil, but all of it. The circus friends who gave me hope. The liberation I got from seeing Hair. The sense of culture everywhere, and the appreciation for art that everyone seemed to have. The history and the ambience. The cold rainy days, and the sweaty summer ones. The chaos of the markets, and the solitude of the river. City-watching from Greenwich, and people-watching on the Tube. I want to drink it, inhale it, and bathe in it. I want to carry it with me wherever I am.

He brought me to Paddington station so that I could catch the Heathrow Express to the airport. We hugged. We kissed. We thanked each other. We stared into each others eyes with the kind of silence that says more than words. The train was there waiting for me with open doors. I knew I could take a later one. I could postpone this and drag it out. But I knew it would be just as hard to say goodbye in another 15 minutes as it was then. Besides, he had more notes on his script from the Back-Breaking Creeps, and they wanted him to get in touch with them ASAP.

We got my bags on board. I stood on the train saying a last goodbye as he stood on the platform, inches away from me.

And suddenly, I felt lightness. I looked at him, and I wasn't afraid or sad anymore. I smiled. And I laughed. And I felt hope.

"This isn't the end," I told him, still smiling. "I know there's more."

The sliding door closed between us.

He waved. I walked to a seat. I watched him walk up the stairs, texting. He stopped on the landing and looked back at the train. I wondered which of his editors he was writing, although I secretly hoped that he was actually writing to me. As the train pulled out of the station, he stood there waving to me.

And then I got his text message.

Phil
07/01/2010
12:12pm
We just had a battlestar moment! Like the episode with starbuck interrogating that cylon at the end. But you got it. I will miss you so much. Im supposed to be a writer but words have failed me. you are a beautiful human being and my life has been so enriched because of you. X

And I cried.

I don't know why I turned into such an insane crying lunatic over this whole situation. Crying over a boy whom I'd known for three weeks and had in reality spent very little time with. But he watched Battlestar Galactica at my recommendation and referenced an episode in his text (proving that he's the very sort of geeky, awkward Sci-Fi lover that I adore). And he just... *sigh*

Angela (to Phil)
07/01/2010
12:22pm
You have made me the sentimental romantic that I never thought I'd be. You are the magic that I thought movies lied about. I found a piece of myself in you.

I made it to the airport. I got through security. I noticed that I had a long, long time before my flight was taking off. And then I sat down on the floor near the entrance of the British Airways exclusive-sounding club, and bummed Wi-Fi long enough to write an e-mail to Phil.

Why e-mails are better than text messages:

1. They don't cost 10p every time you want to send one. (which is a pain when you're down to 76p in credit on your mobile)
2. You can send them even in airports with no mobile phone reception. (if you can bum Wi-Fi off of the neighboring Galleries Lounge with your handy dandy laptop)
3. You're not limited to 160 characters (or whatever ridiculous amount they put on there).
4. You can type with your eyes closed and let your brain do the talking, instead of trying to hunt down which numbers correspond to various letters and pieces of punctuation, and calculate how many times you have to press them (or wait between pressing them).
5. You can attach songs. :)
5. Less guilt if there's lag time between the received message and the response to it.

That said, even now that I have a better medium on which to communicate my emotions, I don't really know what to say.

Part of me wants to say goodbye, but I think we've taken care of that.

Part of me wants to say all the things that I almost did and said, but didn't... Like how I considered making some grand gesture, like jumping off the train, interrupting the text message you were composing as you smiled and paced on the stairs, kissing you until time didn't matter any more, and not caring if all my luggage went off to Heathrow without me. (That idea, by the way, is insanely uncharacteristic of an OCD worrier like me... so the fact that it even went through my head shows how much of an effect you've had on my psyche.)

Part of me wants to express joy over every text message and e-mail you've sent me, including (and especially) that last one.

Part of me wants to type up every moment I've spent with you, just so that there's a more permanent record of our time together than the memories I keep in my heart (which will surely grow more idealized and hazy with time).

Part of me wants to recite every thing about you that I think is wonderful. Not only because I want you to know what you are to me, but also because I think you need someone to tell you how fantastic you are. As much as you say that you're big, busy and important, and as many times as you slide remarks into conversations about your being intelligent and talented, I still think my conviction regarding your favorable qualities is stronger than yours.

Most of me wants to thank you. But that almost seems silly. You know how much happiness you've brought me over the last couple of weeks. If you don't know, then you haven't been paying attention.

By the time the woman came to check my ticket, my cheeks were tear-stained. But they weren't tears of sorrow; rather, they were tears of joy. And I thanked God for bringing us together.

I wasn't wrong that night when I said that I thought my life had just changed. You have changed me. You have made me feel interesting, intelligent, lovable, and beautiful. You have opened me up, given me hope, and showed me that sometimes life really does play out in a romantic and cinematic fashion. My life was good before I met you, but you turned it into something magical. I'm the protagonist at the very beginning of a story, and I've been waking up every morning excited for the next chapter.

Today wasn't really a goodbye. I couldn't possibly say goodbye that easily to someone who has infiltrated my life the way that you have. We will meet again. We will speak soon. We will be able to write whenever we wish. And we will continue to help each other out on our journeys through life. I'm sure of all of that.

Good luck with the script. Good luck with the new roommate. Good luck with the Ball-Busting Cankers, Big Bad Criminals, Beastly Barbaric Cannibals, Bane Belligerent Cows, and the Brow-Beating Cursed.

I wish you all good things.
All good things come to an end.

~A~

I attached Shawn Colvin's cover of "Every Little Thing He Does Is Magic". He had been magic to me from the beginning. It seemed fitting.

I sat on the floor of Heathrow and pouted for awhile. I decided I wanted a fun, silly, pointless chick lit book to cheer me up on the flight, so I went through the (frequently warned against, but actually usually successful) process of choosing one by its cover. I ate a banana. I goofed off on the internet. I wrote a couple more postcards. I consoled myself. I started reading my chick lit book. And I nearly missed my plane, because it turned out I was in the completely wrong terminal, and ended up running like a madwoman even though I'd gotten to the airport with hours to spare.

As I ran with my luggage, part of me wanted to miss the plane. Have an excuse to stay just a little bit longer. But no. I'd inconvenienced him enough. He had work to do. He had a life to live. And I had... Connecticut, I guess.

The line to get on the plane was long and going at the speed of honey, so I made it in plenty of time. I saw my classmate O.D. on the plane, already asleep, two rows ahead of me.

I couldn't stop thinking about Phil. Would it be overkill to send a text (with some of the last remaining change on my phone) to tell him I had sent an e-mail? Was that stereotypical over-reacting girl stalker behavior?

Angela (to Phil)
07/01/2010
3:39pm
Boarded. Sent you a frivolous, superfluous, sappy, pretentious, honest email. Still not wholly convinced that I'll be waking up without you tomorrow.

Probably stereotypical over-reacting girl stalker behavior. But I decided I didn't care. I sent it. And my phone buzzed quickly with a text from him.

Phil
07/01/2010
3:39pm
Have read it and replied with an equally if not more sappy response. bon voyage my darling. x

I felt better.

I pulled out my book with the cute cover art and generically chick-lit title. The one that I thought would be a light-hearted read for my trans-Atlantic journey. As it turns out, Single in the City is about a 26-year-old who moves from Connecticut to London, and then falls in love. I might've known that if I had picked it for something other than the cover art, but as it was, I had picked it up by coincidence. Having woken up in London that morning, and knowing I'd be going to bed in Connecticut that night, nearly-26-year-old Angela got a little emotional.

It's actually an entertaining book. But it wasn't ideal timing for me to be reading about adventures in the place that I was unhappily leaving.

So I put the book down and turned on the television implanted in the seat-back in front of me. I found a limited selection of mediocre entertainment to choose from. (Yes, I'm aware how spoiled that complaint makes me sound.) And since I wasn't in the mood to watch the anime that had taken over several channels (or to watch the latter half of the movie Valentine's Day, which, by the way, seems to be just as bad as you might imagine), I ended up tuning in to Dear John.

I don’t watch a lot of films in that über-chick sappy romance genre. It’s not my thing. If it’s a romantic comedy (especially one that’s mostly comedy), that’s one thing (e.g. The 40 Year Old Virgin). Dramas that contain romantic elements would also be on the list of exceptions (e.g. Atonement). I’ll even accept musical theatre (e.g. Moulin Rouge). But romance for romance sake? Not something I seek out.

Additionally, I find Amanda Seyfried overrated. And I had heard nothing but bad things about Channing Tatum.

So really the only situation in which there would be a chance of me seeing this movie was the scenario involving me being strapped into a seat of a pressure-controlled cabin for 9 hours with limited options for entertainment.

In spite of my preconceived notions of how much of a disaster this movie would surely turn out to be, I watched the entire thing (minus the first few minutes, during which I was desperately seeking a better alternative on the other 12 channels, to no avail).

Why?

Because it was about two people who met, spent two weeks together, and were separated.

(Direct quotation from the movie: “Two weeks together. That’s all it took. Two weeks for me to fall for you.”)

If I had seen that movie a month ago, I would’ve either laughed or rolled my eyes before turning off the television and choosing to attempt the impossible act of sleeping on an airplane seat.

It’s too cheesy. Too naïve. Too Hollywood. Too romantic-movie-plot. Too unrealistic.

But sometimes the universe laughs at us, and life becomes like the movies. After the time I’d spent with Phil, I couldn’t turn that movie off. It was too connected to my immediate experience. It was one more coincidence in the collection that had surrounded my time with him. So I watched it.

(Also, the movie contains a conversation in which the girl says that she doesn’t smoke, rarely drinks, avoids cursing, and implies that she might very well be a virgin. After that, there was no way I could stop watching.)

I know I wrote this in my e-mail to him, but I think it bears repeating: being around Phil turned me into more of a romantic than I ever remember being in the past.

I won't pretend it was a good movie. It wasn't. And I won't pretend the story told in the movie was ours. But it did make me want to write him a letter. I started composing one on the plane.

And as I wrote, I realized how much of myself I had discovered in my time abroad. I found a little piece of myself in the mountains of Delphi. I found a little piece of myself as I wept at the Parthenon. I found a piece with Stratos the Greek man, who gave me wisdom and confidence. A piece in Santorini, where I found my sense of adventure and lost my fear. A piece in Cinque Terre, where I learned how to vacation. As I'd said in my text to him, I found a piece of myself in Phil: the romantic that I never knew was there.

And then, there's London... I found more of myself in London than I knew was lost. In fact, there was so much of me over there that I couldn't fit it all into my suitcases that night when I sat rearranging their contents on Phil's living room floor as he worked. I took a lot from London, but I think I need to go back and be with the rest of my pieces. I think going back to London might be the only way to be whole.

Eventually, the plane landed. I had an awkward conversation with O.D. at baggage claim (during which he failed to mention that he had gotten engaged since the last time I'd seen him). I got in the car with my parents. And I talked about Phil the whole way home. And the whole time, I kept reminding them that Phil and I were not dating. We were not doing the long-distance thing. Even though we fit so well together. Even though I was crazy about him. Even though he was my favorite thing in the world at that very moment.

I only half-believed myself.

When I got back to my parents' house, I read the e-mail Phil had mentioned in his text. He had sent me his blog post about the day we met.

He warned me that it might be uncomfortable or weird to read it, just as it had been when I'd read him a few posts from my own blog a couple of weeks before. But that he was sending it in its entirety anyway, as it was the truth of his experience.

I don't think he'd like me attaching it here in its entirety, as he's a far more private person than I am. But here's a little tiny bit of it:

It was a hot June day and in the lobby I noticed a stunning woman in an elegant blue summer dress. She looked stunningly glamorous – dark flowing hair, strikingly beautiful features, terrific figure…there was an air of the exotic about. I thought that she was perhaps Brazilian, Mexican or Spanish. She reminded me a little of the girl that Chandler meets (again, ironically, at the Theatre, to see Joey in the musical Freud!) in the first season of Friends, and whom he is convinced is a million miles out of his league. She seemed to be from another entirely more glamorous universe. There was I in my khaki combat shorts and cheap checked shirt, looking like a German tourist.

Anyway, when I eventually took my seat (on the aisle, naturally) to my great surprise this stunning creature was in the seat next to mine. Futhermore, somewhat astonishingly, she was on her own (I would imagine her to be accompanied at all times by some Greek God type figure, some bronzed Adonis called Marco who has been her boyfriend since birth). Despite her good looks, she seemed warm and friendly. At the interval, she even sparked up a conversation with me about the play. (On a side note, ‘The Real Thing’ is one of my favourites, and appropriately enough it deals with the various romantic entanglements of a passionate playwright – [...] art and life bleed into one another). I discover – of course – that she was

A) An actress

B) American

C) Going back to the USA in less than two weeks

(For the record, he did not look like a German tourist.)

He was right: he had written some things that were hard for me to read. That it was an adjustment for him to be dating a virgin. That he's learned his lesson about long-distance relationships. That he'd be an idiot to not have spotted a pattern in his love-life (of dating Americans and the heartbreak that follows).

But there were other parts that made me melt.

"It was like the world stopped. She leant over to me, a stunned look in her eye, and told me that she felt like her life just changed. It was one of the best days of my life. My romantic streak [...] had been re-awakened."

After reading it, my heart fluttered. I wanted to get on a plane and go right back. I wanted to Skype him right that very moment. Even though the difficulties were there and there was an ocean between us, it still seemed like maybe things could work.

I had hope.

Maybe it was silly. Maybe it was stupid. Maybe it was dangerous.

But it was there. Hope.

I guess that's just the romantic in me.

May you find the hopeful romantic in you,

~A~

P.S. I love you all. Thank you for reading. Thank you for the comments and encouragement. Thank you for your love.

P.P.S. The Whirled World series is over, but this story certainly isn't. I have so much to tell you. Some good, some bad, and all of it surely to be long-winded.

Whirled World, Part V: Cinque Terre

2010-08-22T22:30:00.025-04:00

Librarian, Italian, and Attention-Whore

(The main street of Riomaggiore)

(Part I, Part II, Part III, & Part IV)

We made it to Athens. We caught our plane to Milan. We somehow found our way from the Milan airport to our Milan hostel. And when we got there (to a room that had a bidet about 3 feet from our bed) we ordered a pizza, and promptly passed out. As soon as we woke up, we began our trek to Cinque Terre.

I am ethnically Italian. I don't know how in touch with my Italian side I am, as that side of my family emigrated more recently than the other side. I'm around more "Italian-American" customs than "Italian" ones. My mother is full-blooded Italian (all four of her great-grandparents came over from Italy; her parents were born here). Her parents knew how to speak Italian (although I'm not sure how fluent they were), but they used it as a code language (you know how some parents spell words out so that their kids won't know what they're talking about? My grandparents used Italian for those purposes), so she never learned it. My father, who is not Italian, studied in Florence in undergrad and speaks more Italian pretty well. Yes that's right: ironically, my non-Italian father speaks the language that my Italian mother does not. (Did I just use the word "ironically" correctly? Because I think I may have, but I'm never quite confident on that matter.)

So yes. I'm Italian. And I took three semesters of Italian in undergrad. And I spent a semester abroad in Rome.

Despite this, my Italian is practically non-existent. And unlike most places in Italy, the people in the train stations on our route did not speak English (nor did most of the locals with whom we attempted to communicate). So I was incredibly proud of the fact that I managed to speak to people in my extremely-limited Italian, and figure things out just fine. Apparently, I understand a lot more of it than I thought I did. And I used some "creative language skills" that I learned from German classes in high school, meaning that I circled what I wanted to say until people understood it. When I didn't know the word for "pathetic", I used the word for "sad". Apparently it was completely grammatically incorrect, but they understood what I meant well enough to correct me.

(In one of my German classes, we could get extra-credit on a test if we explained something that we didn't have the vocabulary for. Example: The question asked us to explain the process of changing a tire. We didn't know the words for "tire", "jack", "flat", or "wrench", but we did know the words like "car", "bad", "road", "lift", and "circle". If you could fake it well enough that someone might be able to catch your drift, then you got extra credit. Really quite a brilliant method of teaching students to think on their feet in another language, in retrospect...)

Cinque Terre is a group of five small seaside towns. You can hike between them, and it's about 12km total. We ended up staying in Riomaggiore, which is referred to as the "last" of the five towns (although it seems to me that it could be the first if headed from the other direction... Whatever.)

It's gorgeous. The main part of the town is just a street. It leads down to a very small little dock, and giant rocks that people lay on to get sun. And there's a very small rock beach. It's quieter than some of the other towns, which I liked. It was my favorite of the towns (well, the four I saw... we never made it to Corniglia).

(The dock end of Riomaggiore.)

We were in a hostel room for 9, which was our first non-private hostel on the trip. There was a group of three Aussie girls: Kate, Katie, and Emma. There were a couple of Kiwis (from New Zealand, if you're not up on the lingo), who were traveling with some boys in a neighboring room. There were a couple of girls from Idaho who were also traveling with some boys in the neighboring room.

The first night, Two-Shots-Up and I got some pasta from a cute little shop. She also got focaccia, which is an Italian bread that I had introduced her to in the train station in Genoa. Then we went to the rocks and watched the sunset.

(Best sunset picture I've taken yet. Seriously, check that.)

We went out to a little bar. We got hit on by some horrifying men. And by the end of the night we were chatting with a very drunk Kiwi (who was traveling with our hostel-mates), a geeky young guy from the USA, and an older guy from Manchester, England who was there leading a cycling tour. When the bar was closing, someone suggested that we should get some wine and head down to the rocks at the pier. So we did.

(Two-Shots-Up and Ryan. I think you can tell what she thought of him. But you certainly can't tell just how WASTED he was.)

On our way there, Ryan the Drunken Kiwi pulled me aside and tried to hit on me. Now, if you'll remember my history, I don't have a great track record of knowing when people are hitting on me. So what tipped me off?

RYAN: Hey, you and I have some business to discuss.
ANGELA: We do?
RYAN: Yeah. You've been flirting with me all night.
ANGELA: No, I haven't.
RYAN: Yeah you have. Looking at me through those glasses of yours. You look like a naughty librarian.
ANGELA: I'm going down to the rocks.
RYAN: No, no, no. You can't go down. We have other plans.
ANGELA: What?
RYAN: Can you tell me I have books overdue, and that if I can't pay the fines then I'll have to make it up to you? You know, sexually?
ANGELA: No.
RYAN: I've been a very bad boy. I was too loud. And it's supposed to be silent.
ANGELA: I'm leaving.
RYAN: NO! I mean, I really like you. And I just want to take you home, cuddle with you, kiss you, and feel your boobies.

Most of that conversation is probably paraphrased (as it was a while ago, and also I was speaking with a drunk guy who had a thick dialect, and wasn't exactly easy to understand)... but that last line? Verbatim. (Two points for honesty?)

Eventually, I just gave up on trying to reason with him and started walking toward the rocks with the others.

On our way there, we passed a group of guys. Ryan ran up to them yelling in the worst fake Italian accent you've ever heard:

"ARE-A YOU-A ITALIAN-O?"

My immediate reaction was to use a good Italian accent (I'm Italian, and I study accents in grad school... so it was decent) to say, "Don't listen to him. He's not an Italian. He's drunk."

One of the guys from the group came up to me, speaking with a strong Irish dialect. "Are you Italian then?"

"Yes, I am," I replied, still using my fake accent. It wasn't a lie. I'm half Italian.

"That's great, isn't it. Are you from here, then?"

"Not exactly from here..."

"Well, I guess prob'ly no one's really from here, it bein' a tourist town and all. I'm from Ireland, myself."

And then, without thinking, I said, "Are you, now?"

... in an IRISH DIALECT.

The Irish dialect I'd studied in grad school last semester. The one that ISN'T VERY GOOD.

And in the millisecond after I did it, I was MORTIFIED. Not only because I'd blown my cover as an Italian, but also because the guy probably thought I was mocking him or something.

He said, "Wait, what did you just say? You sounded Irish there for a second."

I don't know what possessed me to do so, but I returned to my Italian accent, and said, "Oh, yes, well, I have a friend who is from Ireland, and sometimes it is easier for her to understand my English if I try to talk the way she does."

And the guy TOTALLY BOUGHT IT. No, seriously. TOTALLY BOUGHT IT.

And I saw that the Kiwi, the Brit, the Geek, and Two-Shots-Up were all conversing with his big group of compatriots, and therefore wouldn't call my bluff...

So I continued my ruse.

STEVE: My name's Steve. What's yours?
ANGELA: Angela. (Thank God I have an Italian name)
STEVE: So Angela, do you have any friends in other places?
ANGELA: (switching to RP British dialect) I have some friends in England, actually.
STEVE: That's AMAZING! Anywhere else?
ANGELA: (switching to general New York dialect) And I do have the one friend in Long Island...
STEVE: OH MY GOD. You sound like you're in a movie or something.
ANGELA: (switching to Tennessee dialect) And my one friend is from way back home in Tennessee...
STEVE: Wait... Wait... You're not really an Italian, are you?
ANGELA: (switching to a Midwestern dialect) Maybe I am, and maybe I'm not.
STEVE: Well, what are you?
ANGELA: (switching to my real dialect, which is a pretty standardized form of American, thanks to my theatrical training) You tell me.
STEVE: OH MY GOD, You're really feckin' with my head here.
ANGELA: (switching back to Irish dialect) Oh, am I now?
STEVE: That's seriously good! Oh my God.
ANGELA: (switching back to Italian)Thank you kindly.
STEVE: Well, I'm guessin' you're an American, because you know a lot of those...
ANGELA: (switching back to New York) But which American is it?

This went on for a few more minutes before Steve guessed correctly.

This story is so much better told in person, but I felt the need to share it with you, as it's easily one of the most entertaining pranks I've ever pulled.

It led to Steve trying to convincing me to pull the same trick on his friends, and then Two-Shots-Up not knowing what I was doing and calling me out on it. The group Steve was with? A bunch of guys who were traveling solo and had met each other in a hostel in Florence. They had gotten along so well that they decided to go to Cinque Terre together. They made me guess their accents one by one. I got Irish, Scottish, British, Australian, and New Zealand... but one stumped me. Spencer sounded like an American (a mix between Californian and Midwestern), but said he wasn't one. It turned out he was from the Bahamas, but his mother was born in Iowa, so he doesn't even sound like a normal Bahamian.

Steve the Irishman, Spencer the Bahamian, and Reece the Aussie decided to join our merry bandwagon to the rocks. It was most fortunate, as they unknowingly cock-blocked the randy Kiwi (who at that point was hitting on Two-Shots-Up and I interchangeably) and the middle-aged Manchester cyclist (who seemed quite keen on Two-Shots-Up). It was a beautiful night, and we just stayed out for awhile. More near each other than with each other. It was nice.

The next day, we ran into Steve, Spencer, and Reece randomly. Steve was about to go back to Ireland, and the others were waiting with him outside the main office of the hostel with his baggage until it was time for him to catch the train. So we sat on the cobblestone road and waited with them. After all, we had no other plans (it was most truly a vacation, in a way I don't think I've ever had a vacation before). And that was the beginning of our beautiful friendship.

(Steve the Irishman, Reece the Aussie, and Spencer the Bahamian)

We ended up going to the rocks with Spencer and Reece, eating fresh fruit that we'd purchased at a market in town. I bought a plum and a lemon (which I was told would be sweeter than an American lemon... It wasn't. But I ate it anyway.)

(Spencer titled this photo "Angela con Limon" on facebook)

I wore my polka dot bikini without being self-conscious whatsoever: after all, I'd never see any of the people in Cinque Terre again (with the exception of Two-Shots-Up, but I'd been sharing rooms -- and beds -- with her for 7 weeks at that point, so I didn't care).

(Spencer, Reece, and Two-Shots-Up climbed down the giant rocks to get to the water)

Reece convinced me to get in the water. It was terrifying at first, with all the rocks around, but it became fun. We found slimy rocks to touch down on so that we weren't treading water the whole time. It was... nice. I don't know. Calm. And it was nice to not want to flirt or impress anyone. And my social anxiety didn't come out at all.

(self-portrait)

The boys told us about a photo they'd taken the day before that had an accidental photo-bomb in it. Eventually, they showed it to us. So now, I'll show it to you.

(It was supposed to just be a photo of how Spencer couldn't get his suntan lotion to blend in. But no. So much better and more awkward. They insist that they didn't notice the orange beach towel woman there until they were looking back at the photos later in the day.)

And then later, Two-Shots-Up and I had a fun little impromptu modeling session while Spencer took photos of us being as goofy as is humanly possible.

When we left the beach, we all went to a few grocery stores together and bought ingredients to cook our own dinner. I was in charge of the pasta (because, as an Italian, it's the one thing that I can cook... and I always make it perfectly. It's genetic). Two-Shots-Up made Sangria and sausages. We put mozzarella and antipasti in our pasta, along with some sauce the boys had made. And we had SO MUCH FOOD that we ended up sharing with all of our hostel-mates.

(I was REALLY excited about the Nutella glass with cartoon characters on it.)

(Two-Shots-Up's homemade Sangrias. They were potent.)

It's hard to explain how the town is set up, and where our hostel was... But basically, there was a narrow staircase from the town leading to the beach, and at one of the landings of the staircase where it took it's final turn, the door to our hostel room opened onto the landing. It wasn't the MAIN staircase to the beach... so we all sat on the stairs. And ate our food. And talked, joked, laughed, and sang. And the food was DELICIOUS! And people were going nuts over the Sangria. And every time someone started coming our way on the stairs, one of the Aussies yelled "CAR!", and we all picked up our dishes and stood against the wall so that the walkers could pass. I can't tell you how much fun it was. One of my favorite things that happened on my whole trip.

(Two-Shots Up, Reece, and Spencer in the narrow stairs. Kate, whose knees you see, was sitting in our doorway.)

I remember going out for drinks. The Aussies told us that they had gotten Nutella Daiquiris the night before (I was never able to obtain one, but doesn't it sound awesome?). So we decided to find another local drink... And we did. The Gelato Cocktail. Mine was mint and chocolate, making it more of a Grasshopper Milkshake than a cocktail. It was still a lot of fun. :)

(Spencer, Em, Two-Shots-Up, Reece, & Katie walking through a piazza over the road)

At one point, everyone started giving each other back-rubs. I don't remember how it started. Because of my back problems, I spent many years of my life not letting people touch my back. I even had to be careful when hugging people. During my first year of graduate school, my body became so knotted and warped that my Movement Professor said I was banned from participating in class until I got a full-body deep-tissue massage (no joke), so that was the first time I let someone massage me. It was terrifying, but ultimately a good experience. And grad school in general has both healed my back and also made me a lot less fearful than I used to be... so I've let people touch me more.

Anyway. Spencer the Bahamian was getting a reputation amongst the girls as being terrible at back-rubs. So he came over to me, where he could get a back-rub without giving one in return. One of my best friends from college (Greg) was a baseball pitcher, and taught me how to manipulate his upper back and shoulders, so I just do that on everyone now. Spencer not only seemed to love it, but he wanted to try. So I let go of my fear and said he could try on me. And, shockingly, he was doing great. It felt good. And I commented as such.

And then Two-Shots-Up shoved me out of the way and demanded that he work on her back instead. I was taken aback, of course. She said, "He owes me." It was weird. But whatever.

I believe that was the night we watched the World Cup game between the USA and Ghana. Two-Shots-Up had lived in Ghana for a year in undergrad, so she was rooting for them. And plenty of the people we were with were happy to root against the USA (mostly the Aussies, for some reason). But the majority of the people at the bar were American, and we're too pleased when Two-Shots-Up led the cheering section (in a clearly American dialect) whenever Ghana did something right. (Ghana won the game, in case you're as out of the sports loop as I normally am).

I walked up a hill with my laptop during the game to try to Skype with Phil. I found wifi. I didn't find Phil. I was a little grumpy as a result. The whole gang ended up in my hostel room trying to figure out what to do next, but I ended up passing out on top of my covers while they talked. Two of the Aussie girls tucked me in, and they all headed out to a beach (where they apparently all cuddled for warmth until they fell asleep). I'm glad I finally caught up on a little sleep. I think I needed it.

The next day, Two-Shots-Up and I decided to attempt the hike between the five towns. We took the train to Monterosso (the 1st town). We shopped around the old town and new town (Monterosso seems to be the biggest of the towns, and is divided in two parts). Then we started the hike to Vernazza.

What we didn't know: the hike from Monterosso to Vernazza is the hardest of the four hikes. OH. MY. GOD. It felt like we were going uphill forever. There was a staircase that felt never-ending (I kept thinking I could see the top... I was wrong at least 4 times. No joke). It was gorgeous, of course. But I'm not an athletic person, and it was VERY hot. I ended up stripping down to my bikini after the first 1/4 of that trail, and I was STILL hot (and I'm the sort of person who normally runs cold). I've never sweat so much in my life. And some of the trail was narrow and really quite treacherous. I almost fell down the mountain about 4 times.

(The never-ending staircase. This was about half-way up it. And no, that thing that you think is the top is NOT the top.)

In the end, it was worthwhile. We were surrounded by so much beauty. The vineyards. The ocean. The towns. It was a lovely little adventure.

(The vineyards we walked through)

(A waterfall next to one of the safer -- yet still narrow -- parts of the path)

(Vernazza, from the trail)

When we got to Vernazza, we randomly ran into Spencer and Reece. We ended up getting dinner with them at a seafood restaurant (I don't eat seafood... I can't remember what my compromise was) that had a television so that Two-Shots-Up could watch whatever World Cup game was on that night. The conversation wasn't quite as free-flowing as it had been. Something seemed a little off, and I didn't know why.

We ended up getting gelato cocktails and gelato sandwiches (it's like an ice-cream sandwich, except instead of cookies it's in a croissant, and instead of ice cream it's gelato... and it's delicious) and sitting on the cobblestone road with all the Aussie and Kiwi girls. Two-Shots-Up had gone off drinking wine with one of the Kiwis and a couple of native Cinque Terre men. We were laughing, joking, talking... And eventually giving each other back-rubs. Actually, that's not entirely true... It was mostly just me giving other people back-rubs. (I like doing it. I don't know why. Just do.)

Eventually, other people joined in, and we had a little rotation going. I wasn't getting back-rubs, but Spencer the Bahamian insisted on giving me one, as he hadn't gotten to "repay" me from before. So I agreed. He was doing quite well. And about 30 seconds into it, Two-Shots-Up showed up, out of nowhere, and once again shoved me away from him and took my place.

"Seriously?"

"What?" She seemed oblivious to the fact that she had just knocked me onto the cobblestone paved.

"Did you seriously just do that AGAIN?"

"He owes me."

"For what?"

"I need this," she said. "Besides, you don't even like back-rubs."

"Don't tell me what I like."

"You wouldn't be able to tell Phil about it anyway."

"What? Why not?"

"Just stop making such a big deal out of it."

So I dropped it. She was drunk, if rude. I didn't understand her comment about Phil. It wouldn't have been any sort of betrayal, as it meant nothing.

Eventually the one cop in town told us to get off of the street, so we headed down to the rock beach. Two-Shots-Up came with us, but quickly disappeared with the Kiwi girl, apparently in search of some hot Italian she'd seen that night. So I ended up laying on some hugely uncomfortable rocks with Reece the Aussie, Spencer the Bahamian, and Kate the Aussie. Kate's from Melbourne and Reece is from Sydney, so they had this huge rivalry, and just kept doing that weird flirt-fighting thing that people do that I've never really understood or felt compelled to participate in. I moved over next to Spencer and just looked at the stars in the dark, clear night.

The next thing I remember was waking up in the dark, cuddling with Spencer. The others had left. I was in an incredibly uncomfortable position. I woke Spencer, but he was pretty out-of-it. We walked back to our respective hostel rooms.

In the morning we said goodbye to Reece and Spencer, and we decided to head back to Monterosso. As we were waiting for the train, I tried to make small talk with Two-Shots-Up, but she was clearly in a bad mood. I tried to be positive and keep things light, as I always do, until she cut me off.

"I've been having a problem with you," she said, looking away from me.

So I decided to be open to whatever she was going to say. We had one more day together, and it seemed like the easiest course to take.

She proceeded to tell me many things. Some of them made more sense to me than others. But the gist of things is that she thinks sometimes I try too hard. And that I'm an attention whore. And that I flirt with everyone. And that I'm constantly trying to fight with her for other people's attention. And that I don't really listen when people speak to me.

To be honest, about 90% of the things that she was having "problems" with were things that I had mentally accused her of as well.

It's strange to be confronted with someone else's perception of you, particularly when it doesn't align with your own. In some ways, it wasn't much different from how strange I felt when Ryan the Kiwi wanted me to be a Naughty Librarian. It makes me want to correct the other person. But perhaps what I should be doing is trying to see why they came to that conclusion about me in the first place.

So I took all of her criticisms without flinching. I didn't get defensive. I tried not to get offended. I apologized. I thanked her for bringing things to my attention. I thanked her for her honesty, and her bravery (as I imagine it wasn't easy for her to raise all these points that had clearly bothered her... after all, I hadn't said anything to her about the things she did that bothered me). And I said I'd work on everything.

They say that you're likely to be bothered by things that others do if they're issues you have yourself. Maybe Two-Shots-Up and I are too alike.

But then, she wasn't the one who fell asleep on the beach cuddling with a stranger the night before. So maybe I am everything she said. I don't know.

The rest of the day was fine. Once she got everything off her chest, she returned to being the lovely, happy, caring person that she had been in Santorini. We shopped in Monterosso. We took the train to Manarola (town #4) for dinner, gelato, and the sunset. And it was great.

(a statue of a local goddess, with Manarola in the background)

The restaurant we stopped at for dinner was super-cute. And the waiter asked us if we wanted to hang out with him when he got off of his shift. It's not the sort of thing I would have normally agreed to, but Two-Shots-Up is a more spontaneous girl than I am... So we agreed. She and I walked from Manarola to Riomaggiore on the easiest part of the hike: "The Lover's Walk". It was easy to be friends.

(The Lover's Walk. It's built into the mountain. This was, unfortunately, the best picture I could get with my point-and-shoot at that hour of the night.)

We met our waiter at a bar there with some of his friends. They spoke varying amounts of English, all with thick Italian accents (and the guy who claimed to speak the most English -- and who told us he TAUGHT English -- was actually the most difficult to understand). I spoke in half-English, half-Italian with the waiter. Two-Shots-Up spoke in mostly-English with one of his friends, and occasionally threw out a few words of Spanish, hoping that he'd understand them. We all did splendidly, I thought.

I was somewhat self-conscious throughout the encounter. I went out of my way to not do anything that might be perceived as flirtation. I avoided it to the point that I stopped feeling like myself. But I felt as though I had something to prove to Two-Shots-Up.

As the guys left, I asked Two-Shots-Up how I had done. She said, "I can't tell you that. You have to learn what feels right to you."

That only served to confuse me. What feels right to me is exactly what she said was wrong to her. I didn't push the issue.

We climbed into our beds earlier than usual so that we could head out in the morning. And I counted the hours until I would be in London, with Phil once again. And suddenly nothing else mattered.

I don't always know who I am. I don't always know how what I'm doing looks to other people. I'm not always the person I think I am, or the one I wish I could be.

In Cinque Terre, I found a little piece of myself. I didn't care about the passage of time. I wasn't nervous in big groups of people, where most were strangers. I ate gelato twice a day without beating myself up over it. I finally learned how to take a vacation.

Maybe what I really did was get in touch with my Italian side.

I am, after all, a pretty convincing Italian.

Just ask Steve the Irishman.

To be continued...

No matter what people think you may be, may you always be exactly what you want to be.

~A~

P.S. "When we see men of a contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves." - Confucius

Be Back Soon

2010-08-09T19:50:00.004-04:00

(a picture I took of a double-rainbow a couple of weeks ago in CT. )

I went to Florida and moved into the big bedroom of my condo, which is reserved for the 3rd-year student.

Brian came to visit me in Connecticut for a few days.

I went to NYC to visit some friends.

I've been picking up hours at the store I work at whenever I can.

And those are only some of the reasons I haven't blogged.

Part of it is because I'm enjoying living in the present, which makes it hard to blog about the past. I was in Cinque Terre (which will be the next installment of Whirled World) over a month ago.

But, paradoxically, I feel like I can't fill you in on the present until I fill in the gaps of the past...

Curses.

Forgive the delay. But know that I haven't forgotten about you, blogging world. I'll be back. And the story will go on.

~A~

Whirled World, Part IV: Santorini

2010-07-24T21:00:00.006-04:00

Breaking down, Jumping in, and Letting Go

(self-portrait in a hostel room)

(Part I, Part II, & Part III)

Two-Shots-Up and I left All-the-Way & Killer at an ungodly hour of the morning without saying a proper goodbye. And then we began a journey through foreign subway trains that led us to the dock with our waiting ferry. There were some initial complications aboard the ferry, but once I sorted them out, it was smooth sailing. (Hah! Didn't mean to make a pun there... enjoy it, I guess.)

(Helpful hint: If you ever take a ferry from Athens to one of the islands, it is TOTALLY WORTH IT to get an upgrade to something called "Air Type Seats". The website does NOT explain them. Basically, you get a reserved seat that's comfy like an airplane seat. If you do not get an "Air Type Seat", then you're left to scrounge for whatever random chairs are around the boat. They're not comfortable, and it isn't pretty.)

(View from our ferry window. I couldn't believe how gorgeous the water was.)

When we arrived in Santorini, we were overwhelmed by beauty. The bluest water I'd ever seen. Just amazing.

(My first picture on Santorini. That's the caldera.)

Santorini was created by volcanic activity, and has a caldera. Here's my simplistic (and probably not completely accurate) understanding of it... So imagine that an undersea volcano erupted and created a huge island. Now imagine that water seeped back into the middle of the island... So now, it's kind of like a ring of smaller islands with water in the middle, that are all secretly connected (deep) under that water. Now imagine that the volcano erupted again, so there was another island in the middle. So what you end up with looks like this. Yeah, that's Santorini. And it's super cool.

We spent our first evening hanging out on a black pebble beach. If you walked into the water, there was no sand. Instead, it was all one giant, slimy stone surface. The island was created from a volcano, so it's just... more of the island, but under water. Totally weird. Not long after we got to the beach, we found ourselves alone there. I covered my legs in the warm black pebbles and felt like I belonged to the beach.

Honestly, the days in Santorini don't seem like days in my memory at all. It seems like one big gob of time. Perhaps it was the only part of my trip that was truly a vacation.

It was also the only part of my trip in which I really didn't communicate with Phil at all. In order to get online, I had to walk a couple of blocks on the side of the road with Lady MacBook in tow, and then sit on a bench (also on the side of the road) to get the internet.

The second day we were in town, we rented a 4-wheel motorbike. Normally, this would've terrified me. But after hopping onto the back of a stranger's motorcycle in Athens, it no longer seemed dangerous. (If there's an antonym for "traffic", that would describe the roads of Santorini pretty well.)

Two-Shots-Up drove. We went to the red beach (so called because of the red cliffs around it, and the red pebbles mixed into the white chalky ones on the shore).

I blew a kiss to Phil from every beach, as I had promised I would. Two-Shots-Up joined me from time to time.

We went to Fira (the main city of the island), where we shopped around for a bit. We had hot cocoa in a little restaurant and admired the view.

And we decided to head up to Ia (pronounced EE-uh, not EYE-uh like my nickname Aiea) for the sunset.

But on our way, our motorbike broke down.
(We broke down at the edge of the road turning a bend, overlooking the village of Ia.)

We tried to restart it a couple of times to no avail. We tried to call our rental place, but after my phone refused to dial them, it decided to run out of battery. So I calmly flagged down the first passing car. The women inside were familiar with the island, called our rental place, and explained to them where we were on the island (in Greek, no less). So Two-Shots-Up and I waited on the side of a desolate road for over an hour until help arrived. By then, it was pitch black.

(Same view of Ia by the time we got picked up.)

The nice thing about it was that we remained calm. I'm usually pretty good in cases of emergency (as I mentioned in the last post), but I didn't know how Two-Shots-Up would be. She was great, and it worked out totally fine. It never really felt like we were lost, since we were together. She was the only person I knew on the island, and I was with her. Nothing about where we were in that hour was any more foreign than anywhere else we'd been. We were cool.

The people from the shop came. One of them was an attractive 20-year-old guy. I think Two-Shots-Up may have been flirting with him, but it's hard to tell. Like me, her normal behavior is often mistaken for flirtation, even when that's not what she's intending. It's one of many things we have in common. (But that's a story for Part V.)

We celebrated by getting really fantastic (non-alcoholic) drinks at a tiki bar where a reggae band was playing. Mine was a bunch of tart fruits blended together, and poured over vanilla ice cream (which was sweet enough to balance it out). It's one of the most delicious drinks I've ever had in my life. (It's up there with the entirely-too-small butterscotch Mini-Freeze from Minnie's in Chicago. Mmm.)

On our third day, we took a half-day trip to the volcano and hot springs. Walking on an active volcano was... actually not as exciting as I thought it would be. Nice views, but it was basically just a big pile of rocks.

(Yes, the water really was that color. I didn't edit this.)

But then we went to the hot springs.

I have a fear of drowning. And I don't generally swim. I technically know how to swim (and once won a 2nd-place ribbon in a backstroke competition when I was 7), but I'm easily fatigued and I'm out of practice. I remember being in a pool in May 1998, and then not again until April 2009. I hadn't owned a swimsuit for years until I got one for a homework assignment in my second month of graduate school.

So I was pretty nervous when the boat we were traveling on stopped far away from the shore, and we were suddenly informed that we were expected to JUMP OFF THE BOAT into deep blue water (where I could not see the bottom! AAAAAH!) and SWIM to the hot springs.

I do not remember the last time I swam in water where I could not see the bottom. I mean, I know that I must've done it as some point in my life, but I honestly have no recollection of it. If it has happened in the past, I must've been in elementary school. No, I'm not kidding.

So it was a bit scary for me.

But then I thought of all the fears I've overcome. I went to the top of the Eiffel Tower. I rode on a motorcycle. I'm a WILD WOMAN! And I looked down at my swimsuit: a two-piece. It was, in fact, the first day in my entire life that I had ever donned a bikini. I have gotten over so many of my body image issues that I was wearing a bikini IN PUBLIC. Huge step for me.

(This is a view from where the boat stopped. See that little brown/red/hazy part? The darkest part of it? That's where I had to swim to. It was far. At least to me. To give you a little idea of scale, all 40+ people from our boat were hanging out in that red strip.)

So I jumped in. And I swam. And Two-Shots-Up gave me tons of verbal encouragement. I swam over to some big rocks to take a break half-way to the shallow springs. But I did eventually make it. The water was warm and brown. There was mud at the bottom that people were caking onto their bodies, claiming that it had exfoliating properties. I don't think my skin got any softer, but the white polka-dots on my black bikini are now stained light brown as a result.

At the end, I swam back to the boat. And I felt accomplished. I felt like I had somehow conquered something. And like maybe I'd found another piece of myself.

After the tour, a girl came up to me and said, "Excuse me, but are you from Michigan?" I said yes, looking at my clothing to see if I had any identifying writing on me. I did not. "Did you go to O***** High School?" I did, in fact. As it turns out, this girl was a freshman when I was a senior. She was in classes with my younger brother. She was in the band, and remembered that I was in the orchestra. The weird thing is, I didn't recognize her AT ALL. (I wonder if that's what fame feels like... You know: people knowing who you are without you having any clue who they are.) But we were on the same 40-person volcano tour on Santorini. And now she's my facebook friend. The world is small.

Two-Shots-Up and I ended up watching the sunset that night from our same little cocoa restaurant built high on the hill of Fira. I discovered a new love for sunsets (and for the "sunset" function on my camera that I didn't previously know existed). And I appreciated just sitting there in silence with a friend, feeling calm. There was nothing we needed to be doing, and no where we needed to be. We could just sit and feel the wonders of the world.

Of course, that calm disappeared the next day. The Greek ferries decided to all go on strike, on the very day that we needed one. Yes, they were striking for ONE DAY. What the hell kind of strike is that?

I texted both Phil and Blake. It was something along the lines of: "Our ferry is on strike, so we might miss get stuck in Santorini and miss our plane to Milan. Please pray for us."

Blake wrote back first, with a slightly confusing message:
"Its a tough life you lead"

It took me a few seconds before I realized that he didn't take my text seriously. He misunderstood it as, "Oh no, I might be stuck in a beautiful island paradise!" Just one more miscommunication I had with Blake. (Note: When I later thanked people for their prayers on Facebook, Blake apologized for the text and said that he had misunderstood. I absolved him, saying that I thought that might have been the case.)

Phil wrote back as well, which I wasn't expecting (as he had said he wanted to avoid texting, as it was an expensive form of communication).
"Oh no. I will pray for you. I hope you find solace in your philosophy. If it makes you feel better im watching BSG and i submitted my last draft 2 days early so that hopefully Ill be finished by the 29th. but I guess itll be what itll be baby. x"

This boy I'd left back in London, whom I hadn't communicated with (or even really spoken about) for three days, was still thinking about me. He was watching Battlestar Galactica at my recommendation. He was trying to beat a deadline with his writing to speed up the process so that he could spend more time with me when I returned to London. And that made me feel... incredible.

The philosophy he was referring to? Everything happens for a reason. Which, of course, it does. Two-Shots-Up and I ended up spending an extra 8 hours on Santorini, and getting on a faster ferry at 12:40am. We got in our "Air-Type Seats", and sailed into Athens. When we got there, we had plenty of time for Two-Shots-Up to mail some packages home (and I slept for 90 minutes in the post office while she dealt with the complications stemming from that fun little errand). We made it to the airport with plenty of time before our flight to Milan. And all was right with the world.

To be continued...

May you not be afraid of breaking down.

May you take the chance and jump in.

May you give yourself permission to let go.

~A~

Whirled World, Part III: Athens

2010-07-19T22:00:00.005-04:00

Negativity, Listlessness, and How I Became a Greek Man's Angel

(Part I, Part II, and further exposition)

Delphi was remarkably smooth sailing, considering that I was traveling with three of my classmates. We've seen each other for up to 12 hours every day for the past 2 years, which means that we occasionally annoy the skin off of each other. But Delphi was peachy.

Athens was the point where it started feeling slightly less than peachy.

I think that I'm actually an easier person than most to travel with. Reasons:

1. I have few things in any given place that I absolutely-positively-have-to-do (in Athens the only list item was "go to the Parthenon"). Anything I do beyond that is gravy. Which means I am more than willing to follow others around to whatever they want to do or see... or go to bed early if they're feeling weary. Whatever.

2. After facing a lifetime of challenges for being a picky eater, I can now find SOMETHING to eat at pretty much any food establishment you bring me to (e.g. if you take me to a ramen noodle place like Wagamama, I will order the passion-fruit vanilla cheesecake in lieu of lunch, and it will make me perfectly happy). Therefore, I have no issues with my travel partners choosing where we eat. I have no problem grabbing a bottle of water and a sandwich at a street vendor. I have no problem going to a super fancy restaurant (where I will be ordering one of the cheap things on the menu). I don't care. Food is not that high a priority for me.

3. As an insomniac, I am used to operating on very little sleep. As a result, going to bed late, waking up early, and having uncomfortable beds are not things that will make me grumpy all day.

4. Some people are "darters" (going directly from tourist spot to tourist spot). Some people are "meanderers" (going in every shop, striking up conversations with strangers). I have no problem doing either, or a little bit of both. I'm adaptable.

5. I have no problem going out on my own. If my travel buddies feel like taking a nap (which mine did in both Delphi and Athens), then I'll go exploring for a bit. Totally fine with me.

6. I will sleep in hostels. In dorm rooms. Sharing a bed. Sleeping on the floor. Or in a chair. Whatever. As long as it's not too loud, not too light, and there are no visible bugs, I'm cool.

7. I don't usually freak out in high stress situations. (I'm much cooler-headed in emergencies than I am in daily life. Ask my mother if you don't believe me. I may freak out about everything else in my world, but when someone faints and everyone else is freaking out, I'm the one who gets to a phone and calmly explains the situation to the 911 operator. And no, that's not a theoretical situation.) My first reaction is not to figure out what went wrong, but how to work around it.

8. In general, I'm a pretty positive person. My younger brother would disagree wholeheartedly with that statement (he thinks I'm the most negative person who ever lived), but I stand by it. I'm pretty darn positive. (Or maybe I just am in comparison to the people that I'm usually around and therefore have a tainted worldview...) And when I feel negativity around, I try to verbally accentuate the positives as much as possible, in order to balance things out.

But when other people start being negative around me while traveling and I can't do anything to change their minds, that's when I get grumpy. That's when I get headaches. That's when I get stressed out.

In Athens, I started to feel negativity from my travel partners. I don't know if they were annoyed with me, with travel, with each other, or with all of the above. But it was there. And it sucked.

When we got to Athens, our hostel (which apparently was unable to put us in a 4-person room), had put us in a 4-bedroom apartment. I had a bedroom. Two-Shots-Up had a bedroom. Killer & All-The-Way had a bedroom. And there was a whole extra bedroom with 4 beds in it that we didn't even need (and a couple more in the front hallway just for fun). There was a cavernous hall space with a table and chairs. There was a kitchen, a shower room, a toilet room (they were next door to each other so that one person could take a shower while another used the facilities... BRILLIANT), and even a room with a washing machine. And all this was only costing us 17 Euro per person per night (which was about $20.40). It was amazing. (But of course, one of the first reactions I heard from one of my roommates was a complaint that it was not air conditioned.)

I remember feeling so lonely that first night in Athens. I had tried to talk to my parents on my mobile phone (it's a British phone, hence why I use the term "mobile" and not "cell", but had woken up one of my travel buddies through the thin wall and been asked to be quiet (so when the call got cut off moments later, I didn't call them back). I found a place where I could get online with Lady MacBook (which was a garden in the main hostel building), and I began typing Phil an incredibly long e-mail venting about how frustrated I was getting. (I won't share all of that now for multiple reasons.) But while I was typing, he signed on to Skype.

His video camera was broken, but he could see me. And we could talk, for the first time in days. And he let me tell him all the silly, petty things that had begun to irritate me. He let me just talk, whine, complain. He gave me an outlet so that I didn't explode over something stupid. He just listened. And I was so grateful.

And it felt... different. I don't know how to explain it. I guess by showing a side of myself that I find to be unpleasant and unappealing, and him being okay with it... It made the concept of "us" seem more real than it had previously. Maybe we'd already gotten to this point and my memory is just cloudy... He had, after all, already complained to me plenty (and I to him, especially while going through the arduous process of travel planning). Well, at some point, things had changed. Although still in a state of twitterpation, my point-of-view on him had changed from "guy I'm obsessed with and can't stop talking about" to "guy I lean on and trust (and am still obsessed with and talk about constantly)".

It was so great to hear his voice. And flirt a little.

I realized after signing off how much I missed him. Ridiculous, I know. As of that date, I had known him for two weeks. I had seen him last three days previously. But in my mind it was all being measured in epic, exponential proportions. It seemed like I'd known him for months and had been away for weeks. I don't know how, when, or why he became such an important and irreplaceable part of my life, but he did.

And in that moment, all I wanted was to improve the world for him.

I don't think that I've ever truly wanted that before. I mean, in past dating situations, I've tried to be a caring, compassionate person. I've tried to help the other person out as much as possible. But I'm usually doing it out of some sense of obligation. I've tried to fit into what I thought I should be, or what the other person needed me to be.

But that night it felt different. I don't know how or why, and I can't explain it.

I wanted to be a good thing for Phil. I wanted to help. Make his life easier. Or better.

It was a warming feeling. Rejuvenating. Galvanizing. But simultaneously terrifying.

Do you know how upsetting it is to realize that you've -- even for 5 minutes at 2:00am when you're lonely in Greece -- lost sight of your own personal happiness and life goals because all you can think about is being a helpful sidekick in someone else's story? And can you imagine how much more heart-stopping that realization is when you account for the fact that the person you have this strong of a sense of purpose for is someone you've known for TWO WEEKS? It makes you feel certifiably insane.

So I packed up Lady MacBook and took her away from the WiFi and back to my bed. And I started typing up a list.

(Quiz time: did you read my last post?)

I didn't exactly remake the first list I had. The list that was lost with the first death of Lady MacBook. Some of the list items were the same, but some were new. And I think some that were on the first list were dropped off.

After typing the list, I couldn't turn off my brain to sleep (despite being incredibly tired physically, spiritually, and emotionally). So I laid face-down on my bed with my arms extended past my head to Lady MacBook's keyboard, and I typed whatever was crowding my brain until I fell asleep. I do this sometimes. It usually makes for a pretty hilarious read the next day.

And this case was no exception... Examples of things my subconscious brain composed in my dream-like stupor include:

- "I wonder if [high school classmate's] hair will always look grey in photographs. In my head, it does."

- "I can't take this. Orange juice in my brain. I want it drained. Fold that chair. Fold it. Fold it. This is getting ridiculous. My fingers aren't even on the right spots in the restaurant food stalls anymore, and now I can listen to Ingrid and fly in my soul. I don't remember why. Everybody wants to love."

- "I don't talk dirty. I don't act dirty. I don't even think dirty. But good clean fun can only last for so long."

- "[Erin's twins] are going to be great girls. I can't wait to meet them. Especially if I meet them around age 9 or so. When they're starting to get really interesting. Or, at least, that's when I got interesting."

- "I don't drink wine. I don't drink wine."

- "Those are not men’s pants, [Iceman]. They are now. Everybody wants to sign off at a vampire close in arm, but he would die by his own people. This is sacred group. He's letting us it? Awesome. I don't understand about the tourist stuff. I need spell check. Goodnight."

(NOTE: This is the text's original form. Yes, I really do use capitalization and punctuation even when I'm half-asleep and not looking at the keyboard. I wonder what that says about me...)

But here's the thing I read in the morning that really got to me:

"I am meant to be alone? A lone wolf? No. I'm not. I'm meant to get married. As much as I hate to admit it, there's a good chance that I'm destined to be a mother. And, though I hate to say it, I'm pretty sure that something is going to go haywire on my road to adulthood. [...*] I hate it, but it's true. I mean, I love and believe in God, but the punishment for moral sins isn't as real to me as the punishment of pregnancy."

(* Incomprehensible babble that appears to be off-topic.)

So there you (and I) have it. Straight from the mouth of my subconscious (or semi-conscious) mind. I don't know if any of my ramblings can be taken seriously (orange juice in my brain?), but I'd say there's a decent chance that I have a deep dark fear of becoming a parent. Or perhaps it's just a fear of being one when I'm not ready to be one (which would be now... and probably for a long while). The strongest reason on my long list of reasons I'm not going to have sex tomorrow? Extreme fear of pregnancy.

After reading that, my roommates and I went to the Acropolis. (Abrupt story change, I know... but that's how my life works.) It was incredible. I literally wept when I saw the Parthenon. I didn't know that it meant so much to me to see it, but it did. I found a little tiny part of myself that day that I didn't know was missing.

My roommates were exhausted and wanted to go back to the hostel to nap. We decided to cancel our plans to see any other points of historical importance in Athens beyond what we had already seen (which included a church where St. Paul attempted to convert the Greeks to Christianity). I had seen the Parthenon, so that didn't bother me in the least. But though I had gotten the least sleep of any of us, my insomniac body is used to it, and I really didn't feel like napping. I decided that while they were resting, I wanted to go out shopping.

Now, I should mention, when I use the word "shopping" (especially while traveling), I don't use it like other people use it. For me, "shopping" is not synonymous with "buying". I can spend hours in a mall and leave without spending money. But I still love it. When I'm in other countries, I think it's fascinating to go into stores. Even really tourist-y shops. It's interesting from an anthropological/sociological standpoint to see what people choose to celebrate from their own culture, and what they think is marketable to people in other cultures. Or to try on fashion from another country and see how inevitably horrible it looks on me (seriously, everything I tried on in Athens made me look pregnant... and you now know how uncomfortable I am with that image).

So I walked in and out of shops. I struck up conversations with shop workers. Some of them attempted to teach me phrases in Greek, which was fun (and I used my grad school knowledge of the International Phonetic Alphabet to nail down the pronunciations pretty darn well, if I do say so myself). I talked to two women who said they were both named Flora about their men troubles, and then told them about Phil. When I reached the next shop, the owner said that I had the most beautiful and genuine smile she'd ever seen on someone walking into her shop (which may or may not have been because I was still thinking about Phil).

I went into a shop selling linens, and the shop owner greeted me in Greek. I returned the greeting in my best Greek accent, and looked around. He then tried to strike up a conversation with me... in Greek. When I gave him a blank look and said, "I'm sorry...," he started laughing. He said that he had truly believed I was Greek.

Somehow, our conversation kept going. I found out that the Greek Man was named Stratos. And that he had once lived in my home state of Michigan. In fact, he went to college at Michigan State University (right near my home town, and where my father had taught for 20+ years).

More coincidences kept piling up in our conversation, and the words flowed like water. It was the easiest conversation I'd had since... Phil.

Of course, eventually Phil came up (as he did in all my conversations). And Stratos wanted to know the whole story. He pulled out a chair for me, used the incredibly-not-Greek phrase, "Pop a squat," and sat on the other side of the tablecloth-draped surface where his wares were being displayed.

So I told him everything. More than I had told anyone else on my journeys. More than I had told any of my classmates. I didn't know him, so it seemed like I had nothing to lose.

When I told him that I was going back to London after my Greece and Italy adventures, the first thing that Stratos said was, "Promise me something... Promise me you're not going to sleep with him."

"How do you know I haven't already," I countered.

"I just know," he said, looking me in the eye. "Don't sleep with him."

"Don't worry," I said, thinking of the list I'd typed the night before. "I don't have sex."

And that answer opened the door to my enlightenment.

You remember my stories of all those persistent Greek men in Delphi, right? Prepare to drop your mental stereotypes.

Stratos is a 31-year-old Greek man. And Stratos is a virgin.

No, I'm not joking. And no, he wasn't lying. We spoke for another hour and a half, and I can say that with the utmost certainty.

We talked about religion for awhile. He's Greek Orthodox. I'm Roman Catholic. The way I practice my faith is mostly centered around praising God. His way of practicing faith also contains a strong fear of the devil.

He told me that his present girlfriend, whom he'd been dating for two years, had started pressuring him to have sex with her. She'd had sex in previous relationships, and was sick of waiting. He looked like a big tough guy, so I was surprised when he told me that he'd been crying himself to sleep most nights with the weight of his arguments with her.

I told him that he knew what had to be done; he needed to end things with her. If he was crying himself to sleep, then she wasn't worth it. I could tell he knew I was right. I think he needed to hear it from a stranger to believe it. More than that, as crazy as it may sound, I think he needed to hear it from me. Specifically me. A virgin from Michigan whom he thought was beautiful.

He told me that he'd given up hope that girls like me were still around in the world. He called me "pure", and for perhaps the first time, it sounded like a good thing (and not like one of Rizzo's cut-downs to Sandy in Grease).

I told him about the list I'd been making the night before. He said he thought it was good to be conscious of whatever reasons I had. He said that God was betting on me making good decisions, and that I should do my best not to disappoint God.

Stratos grew up with 5 other guys who shared his moral beliefs, and all vowed to stay virgins until marriage. One of them had gotten drunk and been basically date-raped by a girl three days before, and was having a huge emotional crisis about the whole thing. Stratos warned me not to end up like that.

And he told me the story of another one of the 5... The only one who had gotten married so far.

When Gus (not the friend's actual name) married his girlfriend (whom he only refers to as "My Princess", which is so sickly sweet that I can't digest it), all the guys verbally cheered him on before the big night. The morning after, Stratos called him up to ask how things had gone.

"Man, you're not going to believe this," Gus said, "but we didn't have sex."

"What?" Stratos was shocked. "You guys have been struggling to keep your hands off each other for years. What do you mean you didn't have sex?"

"I don't know, man. We just started talking, and it was amazing. We fell asleep holding hands. It was one of the best nights we've ever spent together."

Stratos was shocked. He encouraged Gus to go ahead with it that night. Gus seemed excited to finally get to have sex with his new bride.

The next day, Stratos called back.

"We still didn't have sex, man."

"Do you have a problem or something? Are you gay?"

"No, it's not like that," Gus swore. "We got undressed... We were ready to go... But then, I don't know. It was just so sexy, and we just cuddled."

The story was the same every day. Gus and his Princess were so in love with being in love. They loved knowing that they could have each other whenever they wanted, and deciding to wait even longer. They loved how close it brought them to know that their relationship was so strong and so pure that they didn't have to rely on sex to be a couple.

They've been married for over two years now. They still haven't had sex. And Stratos says he has never seen a couple more in love with each other than they are.

The only people who know are Stratos, their priest, a couple of very close friends, and me. Their priest says that God has given them a special blessing, and that they should let it be as long as God wants it to be. They will have sex eventually (they both want children), but they're not going to rush it.

I know what you're thinking: that's f***ed up.

Or at least, that's what I was thinking when he told me this story.

In fact, I'm pretty sure I laughed.

But Stratos changed my mind. He told me that he wished he could find that kind of love. He wished that he could find a person whom he was so deeply in love with that just falling asleep next to her was the sexiest thing in the world. He wanted a love so pure and true that it didn't depend on physical acts to be bonded.

And as he said it... as nuts as this is... I understood why he wanted it. And some part of me wanted it, too.

(But I'll be honest: the idea of getting married and not getting busy just seems frustrating. If I'm going to wait that long, I won't want to wait any longer than that.)

Stratos told me many things. He told me that if this (or any other) guy broke my heart, that he had a large network of friends that could "teach him a lesson" for me (he explained in more detail and gave incriminating past examples that I won't share online). He told me that I should never settle, because I was an ideal to some people in the world for being smart, beautiful, passionate, faithful, and strong (I think he included himself in the number who idealized me, although he went out of his way not to say it). He told me he wasn't worried about me, because he could tell that I had a good head on my shoulders.

He also said he could tell that Phil isn't right for me. He said, "Baby girl, when it's right, that guy's going to knock you right out of your socks, and you're not going to know what hit you." I tried to explain that's exactly what happened with Phil, but he didn't seem convinced. But I'm at least somewhat sure that he was speaking from a place of jealousy.

After two hours of talking to the random Greek man in the linen shop, I decided I should go find my roommates and see what they wanted to do for dinner. I said goodbye, gave him my e-mail address, and thanked him for everything.

And I knew then that God had brought us together. The night after I made a list of reasons I wasn't going to have sex... The night after his girlfriend gave him a sex-based ultimatum... We found each other. We gave each other hope. We gave each other strength.

Look, I know the sex thing isn't easy for guys to get around. The vast majority of men have had sex. Men who have had sex want to keep having sex. (Most men who have not had sex seem to want to have it as soon as possible.) I'm a (debatably) sexy woman. Men want to have sex with me. When men find out that they're not going to have sex with me, they just want to have sex with me even more. That, my friends, is my understanding of the world.

And Phil, like pretty much every other warm-blooded male I've met, is no exception to that.

But after talking to Stratos, I felt good about my decision to not have sex with Phil. I mean, I had already made the decision that it wasn't going to happen when I went back to London at the end of my tour of Italy... but it wasn't until I talked to Stratos that I stopped feeling like it was something that I should apologize for or feel guilty about. (NOTE: Phil has never made me feel like it was something I should apologize for or feel guilty about. If he did, it'd send up a red flag, and he'd be gone.)

I told my travel buddies all about Stratos the Greek Man. They didn't really seem to know how to react to it. When we had issues with where to go for dinner, we ended up going back to Stratos to get a recommendation. And after we finished dinner at the place he suggested, I went back to his shop and spoke with him some more.

By that point it was dark outside, and few people were still shopping. I told him that I hadn't been able to stop thinking about our conversation. And about how everything with Phil had just become a little less certain in my head. Up until my talk with Stratos, everything with Phil had seemed so magical. I had made it all seem to be such a perfect world in my imagination. I hadn't been skeptical. I hadn't questioned his motives. I had let Phil sweep me off my feet, and suddenly I found myself in mid-air, once again afraid to fall.

Stratos comforted me, brought me back down to the earth, and got my feet firmly on the ground. He said that it was good to have been brought out of my fantasy land where Phil is perfect and back to reality where I can look at him, flaws and all. He said it was healthier, and it would save me time and heartbreak.

I talked to him for another hour or so. He closed up his shop. He drove me back to my hostel-apartment on his motorcycle (and let me tell you, I was TERRIFIED). He made me promise to tell him what happened with Phil when I got back to London. But before we parted ways, he said once again that he wasn't worried about me.

And he had a moment of revelation regarding my name that several others before him have taken as some sort of otherworldly sign: Angela contains the word "angel". (But that, in my opinion, is doing exactly what Dr. Jack Shepherd warned against on LOST: mistaking coincidence for fate.) I do think that God helped us to meet that day. But I assure you as I assured Stratos: I am no angel.

To be continued...

May you be led to the people who can help you.
May you be led to the people you can help.

~A~

The Sex I'm Not Having

2010-07-13T10:12:00.009-04:00

In my last post, I mentioned mentally comparing all the men I've dated. But I left out one subject that crossed my mind. Not because I was trying to hide something, but rather because I decided that it deserved its own post. (And also because if I do ever make the smart decision to hide this post, the other part of this story won't have to be taken down as well.) It's a subject I wouldn't have even mentioned on my blog two years ago, and which now it feels unnatural to hide...

Sex.

As far as the guys are concerned, there's no pattern whatsoever.

One of them was a virgin (at the time... who knows what he's been up to since). One has slept with one other woman: his ex-wife. One is in low single-digits. One is in high single-digits. One is in double-digits.

In case you've missed the memo, I have never had sex.

Yeah, that bit of information usually gets a reaction. Like, "But why? You're not ugly." Or, "Yeah, right. I'm not falling for that." Or, "Are you one of those religious freaks?" Or even, "I'll have sex with you right now."

Anyway. It's true. I'm a card-carrying member of the V-Club.

Honestly, I like that I haven't had sex. I'm proud of it. And I think by knowing that, you can deduce a lot about me as a person that you might otherwise not assume. It's part of my identity now. Everyone at my grad school knows. I usually tell people right up front. (I told #1, #3, and #4 before I started dating them. #2 found out from my roommate before he'd asked me out. I told Phil the day I met him. They all stuck around anyway.)

Some guys get freaked out by it. Some get sickly turned on by it. Some seem to want to take me on as a challenge. (Those are the three most popular responses... although the last of which is one that they don't admit to in front of me.) Some see it as a potentially insurmountable issue. Some are willing to try to work around it. Some stop flirting with me and start getting protective-big-brother around me. Some seem relieved. Some seem in awe. Some try to give me advice (everything from "lose it now, because no one will want to be your first" to "now that you've made it this far, you should really just wait, because any guy who tries now is just using you"). No matter what their initial response, all have questions.

When people ask me why, I usually give one of two canned answers.

If I want to be quick and dismissive about it, the answer is: "I'm Catholic."

If I want to lessen the awkwardness regarding the situation, I say, "One boyfriend was a virgin. One had only slept with his ex-wife (and they waited until marriage). One was freaked out by the prospect of "deflowering" me (his word, not mine). One was long-distance, and when we were finally in the same place, he dumped me." (Something about it being situational as opposed to a religious choice seems to put people at ease... Although, truth be told, at least three of those guys absolutely would have had sex with me if I had agreed to it.)

But if I'm being honest, it's neither of these canned answers. I mean, in some ways, it's both. It's a lot of things.

At one point, when I'd just started dating one of the numbered exes, I actually made a list of all the reasons that I hadn't had sex yet (or perhaps reasons I didn't want to have sex yet). Some of the reasons were serious. Some were just minor little things. Some were downright funny. But I wrote everything that came into my head. And I ended up with quite a long list with reasons of various importance.

My point is, I don't have just one reason. I have many. And yes, maybe some of them are ridiculous, but they add up.

But I've known since I made the list that it's possible that I won't wait until all the problems on the list get solved. Rather, someday I will read every item on that list, make the conscious decision that they don't matter, and throw it out the window. And if that day comes, then I know I won't have regrets afterwards.

But that day is not today.

Sometimes I read Christian propaganda that almost makes me feel guilty for the thought of pre-marital sex ever crossing my mind.

And other times I read feminist literature that says that by perpetuating "the purity myth" (that withholding sex is the most power a woman can have, or that a woman is most valuable before she's had it) I'm somehow forwarding male hegemony. And that almost makes me feel guilty for staying this way for so long.

But notice that I used the word "almost" both times there.

I'm a strong person, and I'm not going to let guilt make my decisions for me. I'm also not going to let propaganda from any direction make my choices.

Anyway.

I won't be sharing the list I made on this blog. It's really no one's business but mine.

But I will tell you one of the revelations I had on the subject while I was in London... I decided that if/when I do decide to have sex, I want it to have as much gravity (or nearly as much) for the other person as it does to me. That doesn't mean that I have to be his first; but I want there to be a very real possibility in his mind that I might be his last.

I mentioned that in conversation to someone in London, and he said he thought that was a bad idea. He said that it was sort of unfair and unrealistic to put that much pressure on someone else, especially if they've had an active sex-life before dating me.

But I don't care. I think it's reasonable to wait until I'm in a serious relationship. In a perfect world, my first will end up being my only.

I don't feel like going through an inspection of my sex-less sex-life online, or making any sort of checklist about what I have and haven't done, or what I would or wouldn't be willing to try. In my experience, it's not easy to find anyone in my age group (I'll be 26 in October) who hasn't rounded all the bases. I know that I am an anomaly, regardless of what the statics around say. (90% of Americans have pre-marital sex... that means that there are 10% who don't? Really? If that's true, then where the hell are they?) I have literally been referred to as "a relic" more than once in my life (and not with a flattering tone).

The truth is, I lost that list. It was on the Stickies application on Lady MacBook when she crashed in September 2009.

But my first night in Athens, I couldn't sleep. I felt uneasy about many things in my life. And I kept thinking of a story that my friend told me about her first time. She had traveled to Greece when she was in her mid-20s (which is probably why it came into my head), met a man, and spent a week learning about sex with him. She made it sound like such a positive experience.

Now, I was not about to have sex with some random guy in Greece in order to emulate her life. But I won't lie: there was a tiny voice at the back of my head that thought, "Well, I am going back to London in a couple of weeks... And it'll be the last time I see Phil... at least for awhile... And he's pretty great..."

And I hated that voice the minute it arose. Loathed. It felt dirty, wrong, and -- to be honest with you -- Satanic. If I've gone my entire life without having sex, I'm not going to suddenly lose it to a guy I'd met two weeks before, and with whom I had no formal relationship label. Absolutely not.

So I made a list again. A list of all the reasons that I'd kept it up this far. A list of all the reasons that I might want to keep it up in the future. A list of all the reasons that I was going to pass up an opportunity and resist temptation when I got back to London. A list to keep me strong, and to kill the voice I hated.

I fell asleep writing it. I think I knew that I needed to write it so that I would have it around in case I wanted to read it. I'll need it someday. I want to read every item on that list before I chuck it out the window. I think it'll help me to make a good conscious decision, instead of just acting on a lustful impulse that (knowing myself as I do) I will come to regret.

You might be wondering what inspired me to write this post. Why now? Why distract from the "Whirled World" series with this interruption to our regularly scheduled programming?

The answer, of course, is that this post is to explain my given circumstances. It's a bit of exposition that is required for the next part of our tour.

May you hold on to your sense of self.
May you be strong in your beliefs.
May you always make your choices for yourself.
May you be proud of the path you've taken.
And if you're ever considering straying from that path, may you have the foresight to make yourself a list of pros and cons before taking action.

~A~

Whirled World, Part II: Delphi

2010-07-12T22:22:00.010-04:00

My Many Men, and The Persistent Adonis

June 17th was the day I'd been dreading since I got to London. While some of my classmates had anxious countdowns to get back to their loved ones in the States, I was in denial that I'd ever have to leave the UK.

I stayed up until the wee hours, doing the packing that I had put off doing (in favor of spending more time enjoying London... and Phil). As a result, I had about 45 minutes of quasi-sleep before I had to get up and start hurrying about, doing all the last minute "check out of the building" nonsense, and getting my bum (that's what they call them there) on a bus to London Gatwick.

Killer, All-The-Way, Two-Shots-Up, and I caught our EasyJet flight to Athens, and then promptly boarded a bus to Delphi (which was tricky in and of itself, as the buses in Delphi had frivolously gone on strike until 5pm that day. As it turns out, I really don't understand Greek transportation strikes).

On the way to Delphi, I took out my laptop. The night before, I'd downloaded an attachment from an e-mail that Phil had sent me. A script for a sci-fi/action movie he'd written. He had sent it to me with a note that I could read it on a beach and think of him. But I was bored on a bus (and Lady MacBook has been so fussy lately that I wouldn't dare risk bringing her near sand and/or water), so I read it then.

And it was seriously good.

I'm not supposed to say any more than that. But trust me. Good. Phil is very good at what he does. I kept having audible reactions as I read it (gasping, laughing, and the like) that made my traveling buddies look over to me with curiosity.

Look... I am not attracted to Phil because he's a writer. I'm not. I like Phil because he's awesome. But this whole writer thing? Huge bonus.

And as I noticed that, I realized that Phil's not the first writer I've dated... And then I started trying to make mental connections between Boyfriends #1 (Jake), #2 (Michael), #3 (Brian... although technically our agreed terminology was "metaphysically dating", but in retrospect I absolutely classify him as a boyfriend of time gone by), #4 (Daniel, The Filmmaker), and Phil. Here's all I've come up with:

- They are all writers in some capacity (3 of them did screenwriting; 4 have flirted with me in e-mail correspondence at the beginnings of the relationships; all 5 have had some sort of blog at some point while I was dating them)
- They're all 6-foot or taller. (Although really, I think that's just a coincidence. I've certainly been interested in -- and have quasi-dated -- men shorter than that. And I don't think I would have any problem dating someone shorter than I am... I'm 5'6", for the record.)
- They're all Caucasian. (Also probably a coincidence. My first kiss was with a Mexican guy... but then he stopped returning my phone calls and started dating a Mexican chick. They've now been married for 3 years, so I guess I can't really be all that upset.)
- They're all Christian. (Not a coincidence. 2 Catholic, 1 Protestant, 1 Non-Denominational, and 1 that I honestly can't remember right now.)
- They all like Sci-Fi.

Other potential patterns amongst them:
- 2 were in the Air Force
- 4 have brown hair
- 2 professional actors (and 2 others had acted for fun)
- 2 loved Lost (and 2 others enjoyed Lost, fell behind in watching episodes, and swore to me they were going to get caught up again)
- 2 were obsessed with Star Wars
- 2 really loved the Indiana Jones movies
- 2 liked the video game "Portal"
- 2 are only children
- 2 are eldest children
- 3 are Leos (well, 2.5... one was on the Leo/Virgo cusp)
- 2 are on the cusp (Leo/Virgo & Virgo/Libra... For the record, I'm on the Libra/Scorpio cusp. And supposedly people on the cusp are drawn to other people on the cusp. If you're curious, the 5th guy was a Cancer... and he's the one who's often the answer to "one of these things is not like the others" puzzle of this list)

And then I remembered something else... Music. They had all, in one form or another, given me music.

(Honestly, this is not an important part of the story, but I think it's amusing, so I'm going to elaborate.)

Boyfriend #1: About 2 months into dating him, he made me a mix CD. It reminded me a great deal of the song "Mix Tape" from Avenue Q in that I had no idea what he was trying to say with it. Some of the songs were clearly chosen because he thought that they lyrically applied to our relationship ("I Think We're Alone Now", "I've Got My Mind Set on You", "The Longest Time"). But some were about CHEATING... ("Tempted", "Roll to Me", "Runaround Sue",... I assume he chose the first two for their titles as opposed to by their actual lyrics). And some were just a big ball of mystery ("I, Don Quixote"... WTF?).

Boyfriend #2: He didn't make me a CD. No. Instead, he sent me lists of songs that I should download, or when he was on my computer he downloaded them for me. He once even acknowledged that he was just trying to submit me to his tastes, hoping they would rub off on me. He used a different verb, though, although I can't for the life of me remember what it was. I think it sounded like "submerge", but meant something more like "brainwash" or "indoctrinate". (Actually, this story is pretty telling of our entire relationship... Him trying to get me to convert to his way of life, and me letting him try while knowing deep down that it wasn't going to work.) His music included a lot of Wilco, The Decemberists, Elvis Costello, and Harry Nilsson. And then he told me how much he hated some of the music I liked at the time, such as a Basement Jaxx song I was obsessed with, the Butterfly Boucher jam that I was calling "my favorite song", and all of my Motion City Soundtrack.

(Side note: Boyfriend #2 also once refused to dance with me or kiss me while the song "Stolen" by Dashboard Confessional was playing in the background, as he said it made him feel like he was on an episode of One Tree Hill. In contrast, I sent Phil that song and he freaking LOVES it. It's probably his favorite of all the songs I've sent him.)

Boyfriend #3: He made me CDs of songs that he thought I'd actually like. (Novel concept!) And he's the closest I think I've ever come to finding someone who had the same musical tastes as me. He introduced me to Kara DioGuardi and Platinum Weird (totally great). Strangely, he also had a thing for Disney stars. He sent me songs from the solo albums of Vanessa Hudgens and Ashley Tisdale. Yes, songs. As in plural. (*NOTE: I heart you, Brian. And the fact that you like that music? Totally endearing. Don't ever change.*)

Boyfriend #4: Before I took a 5.5 hour road-trip to see him, he mailed me a package containing 4 mixed CDs of music that he wanted to introduce me to. CD 1: Rock Opera. CD 2: Christian Rock. CD 3: Instrumental music from the soundtracks of movies and video games. CD 4: Electronica/Techno and a couple of random Rock songs. (Okay, go look at whatever random playlist is currently on top of this blog. Because I'm like 99% sure that no matter what playlist I've set it on now or in the future, you will look at it and wonder how he and I dated as long as we did. Seriously? Themes from Halo? Three songs by Naio Ssaion? I'm pretty musically eclectic, but I just couldn't listen to some of that.)

Phil: A week into knowing him, he made me a mix CD. He chose the songs lyrically, much in the way that Boyfriend #1 had attempted, but more successfully. Only 11 songs. Definitely NOT chosen for their titles ("Letters to God, pt. II", "Daniel", and "Death" are amongst them), but actually for what the lyrics mid-song are. And one ("Last Train Home") he explained is on the CD because he bought it earlier in the day on the day we met, so in his head it's forever linked to me. Some of them I love ("Enchanted", "Death", "Saturday Night", "Be Sensible"). I don't hate any of them, which I'm glad about (because seriously, I can't stand Elvis Costello, and I just can't go through that again).

(NOTE: If you are reading this post around the time I've written it, then some of the songs he sent me are on the playlist on the top of this page. "Daniel", "Last Train Home", "Apartment Story", "Enchanted", "Sweet Disposition", "Saturday Night" -- although a different version, "Death", "VCR", and "Hysteric".)

Yes. All this stuff was going through my head on the bus to Delphi. It was a long bus ride, and I'm a fast reader (and I'm generally a pretty quick thinker as well... it matches my fast-paced and erratic psycho-physical rhythm). Eventually I stopped thinking about my past relationships and started taking pictures out the window of the bus.

I didn't get a text from Phil all day, which was unusual to the point of being worrisome. But when I checked my e-mail he explained that he gets charged an extortionate amount to text abroad. Among other things, he wrote:

My life has an Angela-shaped hole in it right now. The last two nights have been so boring!

(My heart did a selfish little dance at that.)

Delphi was idyllic. Gorgeous. Like a little slice of heaven. The view of the mountains from the balcony of my 17-euro-per-person hotel room was unbelievable... and I don't even really LIKE mountains. I found a little piece of myself in Delphi that I didn't know was missing. We only spent a couple of days there, and it was hard to leave for Athens. I think we all knew that Athens wouldn't be as lovely as Delphi was.

I had the best tzaziki of my life there. I even got bold and ventured into the unfamiliar territory of lamb. I walked to where Apollo's oracle sat, and marveled at how far people traveled through the mountains to get to that spot. I bought super cool handmade ring made of sterling silver and rock crystal.

And I talked about Phil everywhere I went.

No seriously, everywhere. As in, my travel buddies apparently started having conversations behind my back about whether to try to get me to stop talking about Phil, and if so, how to do it most tactfully. (Two-Shots-Up mentioned on our last night in Delphi that I'd been talking about him a lot, so I made the conscious decision to stop talking about him altogether for a while. It was actually quite challenging, as he had become my favorite subject.)

One of my conversations about Phil was with an American woman named Sharaine who worked in a jewelry store (and who sold me an amethyst ring for a much better price than she should have). She told me the story of how she met a man when she was on a trip to Greece, how he pursued her, how she came to visit him... and how they've now been married for 8 years. She told me not to lose my head over this guy. But she also told me not to rule him out.

Later that night, I found myself club-hopping with Two-Shots-Up. And by "club-hopping", I mean, "We went to both clubs in Delphi." The entire town has two streets. The two clubs are on the same street, about a 2 minute walk apart.

As soon as we walked into a club, a man handed me a tequila shot. People (well, men) were buying us drinks left and right. The bartender kept giving us free shots that he called "Sex on the Beach", but which we don't think actually were. The first 4 tasted like straight grapefruit juice; if there was any alcohol in them, we could neither taste it nor feel it. His recipe changed around shot 5, and then it tasted like grapefruit juice mixed with black licorice (which I can only assume was ouzo). Weakest drinks I've ever had (and I'm the kind of person who can taste the alcohol in EVERYTHING).

The bartenders loved us. And one of the DJs actually cleared a space on his DJ station because he wanted me to dance on it. So, of course, I did. Also danced on a bar. (Which I used to do semi-professionally in Chicago as part of Tony n Tina's Wedding, so I'm quite good at dancing on counters of various widths.) It was quite fun. Most of the people in the bar were teenagers from Spain, so that was a little weird, but still entertaining.

We had so much mojo flowing between the two of us that boys were appearing out of the air. I had to fight men off with a (metaphorical) stick. And by metaphorical stick, I mean I used variations on the statement, "I have a boy back in England."

One of the (many) men to hit on me was in a black undershirt and looked like he'd oiled his muscles that day. He wanted me to dance on a chair for him. I did nothing to encourage him. I even escaped to the bathroom at one point. But nonetheless, he asked why I wouldn't kiss him. So I exaggerated a little on my "boy back in England" line, and instead gave him a standard answer that I'd use in the USA: "I have a boyfriend." That made him leave me alone, but it left me feeling uncomfortable. It's easier to use that line when I'm single and it's a complete lie. It's weird to use it when I'm in a weird label-less, commitment-less, relationship limbo.

At the second club, the (hot!) bartender gave me flirty winks between free drinks. He backed off when he saw his friend Sakis trying to hit on me. He looked like he'd walked out of a time-machine from the 1980s. I explained to Sakis that I had a boy back in Britain. He kept insisting (in mediocre English) that he just wanted someone to talk to. But not long after that he started mentioning how we looked like a good couple in the mirror, complimenting my lips, and asking why I wouldn't kiss him. He gave me his phone number before I left the bar, and told me to give me a call if I needed anything in Athens.

Around that time, I tried to get Two-Shots-Up to leave the bar so that I could attempt to Skype with Phil before he went to sleep. It took awhile to pull her away from the masses of men hitting on her. (Have I mentioned that she's super-hot, really friendly, wears sexy clothes, and is a wicked dancer? Total heart-breaker, that one). But when we left the bar, she wanted to hunt down some food.

We ended up at the local gyro joint. They'd shut down the gyro machine, but some guys were sitting inside the restaurant and beckoned us in. They had some pizza for themselves and offered us some. One of them was a young hot guy (and had apparently been dancing with us at one of the clubs... although I didn't remember him from that). The other was funny and seemed nice. They had the idea that we should go get ice cream and keep talking. On the way, Two-Shots-Up noticed how built Young&Hot was, and he encouraged us to touch his muscles. And then I tried not to drool.

After we got the ice cream (the guys paid), it became apparent pretty quickly that they were trying to divide and conquer... The hot guy wanted me, and the other guy wanted Two-Shots-Up. The guy was nice enough, and we started having a conversation... but then he tried to kiss me (out of nowhere), and I pulled away. Like all the others before him, we had the exchange of, "Why won't you kiss me?" and "Because I have a boyfriend." But Hottie's response was (AND I QUOTE), "That's okay. I have a girlfriend. Doesn't bother me." And then he tried to kiss me again.

Greek men are persistent.

Yes, he was charming. Yes, he was cute. Yes, he had a really good body (OMG! SO GOOD!). And yes, technically, the boyfriend thing was a lie and I had no strings attached to me. But I was NOT going to make out with someone else's boyfriend. Cheating is dumb. I'm whole-heartedly against it, and I will not play a role in it.

And you probably know my next thought without me having to type it...

Even if the Greek guy were single, I wouldn't have made out with him. Not just because random make outs aren't really my thing (because they're not), but because it didn't matter how hot he was; I didn't want him.

All I could think about was Phil.

I was actually sad to be eating ice cream under the stars by beautiful Grecian mountains with my own personal authentic Greek Adonis who thought I was sexy and wanted desperately to make out with me. Yes, sad. In that moment, I would've traded it to be in a hotel room, laying on an uncomfortable bed, whispering on Skype (because of paper-thin walls) with an over-worked, sleep-deprived Brit.

The Greek guy tried to flirt, bargain, and plead with me to make out with him, but I refused. He even tried to sneak-attack kiss me (which, by the way, is so not cool. Why do guys think that's going to get a positive response out of me?) and I literally put my hand over my mouth to block him. The more he tried, the less attractive he appeared to me. I got to our room, checked Skype for Phil (who wasn't on), and went to bed.

When I woke up, I had an email from Phil apologizing that he fell asleep before being able to Skype with me. And also saying that, at my recommendation, he had rented the first season of Battlestar Galactica and had begun watching it. (For the record, Boyfriend #3 introduced me to it, and Boyfriend #4 became interested in me after hearing I liked it. See? I told you. All my men like sci-fi.)

I wrote Phil about my adventure, and about fending off the unwanted advances of countless Greek men. I wrote that all I could think about was him. He seemed grateful at that. And he wrote, "Yep, you're much better off with a pale-skinned, bumbling, neurotic Brit. ;)"

And I knew he was right.

Besides, that Greek guy probably didn't even like Sci-Fi.

To be continued...

May you figure out your patterns, both good and bad.

And may you have such great options in your life that temptation becomes easy to walk away from.

~A~

Whirled World, Part I: End of the Beginning

2010-07-09T20:00:00.002-04:00

I don't even know where to begin. I've been back in the USA for just over a week. And in the few weeks since I blogged last, so much has happened to me. And parts of it don't truly feel like they happened. Coming back to Connecticut makes it feel like all of my time abroad was some sort of crazy dream.

Honestly, this is way too much for one blog post. So I'll make it as many posts as I need to make it. As I've said before, I'm not writing for an audience... I'm writing for me. So I'm just going to write in a way that helps me organize my thoughts and archive my inner monologue. I'm sorry if it alienates or disappoints you. But then, I've never been a very conventional blogger, so maybe you'll be happy to be along for the ride.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The events of June 16 & June 17, 2010

The night that I wrote Falling into Place, I did indeed meet P from *Insert My Blog Name Here*.

(Me & P, in Cyberdog)

She let me lead her around the madness that is called Camdentown Market. I took her inside a crazy cyber-punk store called Cyberdog. We ate crepes while sitting on motorcycles next to a river. She convinced me to buy a dress as one last London present to myself, and it was a great decision. She allowed me to tell her all about my love life in greater detail than I generally allow myself to go into online, and it was nice to vent. For the record, she's completely delightful (and speaks with a seriously awesome dialect). I wish that we'd been able to spend more time together. If we lived in closer proximity, I know we'd be great friends. :)

Then I went to see a show with my classmate Wifey. It was a 3+ hour production of As You Like It directed by Sam Mendes at the Old Vic. It was the same theatre where I met Phil. And it was easily the best production of that play I've ever seen. Actually, it ranks high on my list of Shakespeare productions of all time. Splendid production.

After the show got out, I discovered that Phil had been desperately trying to text me during it. He was trying to figure out where I was and how we could meet up. I was supposed to go back to my flat and crack open a bottle of champagne with Wifey that we had purchased together at duty-free on our way back from Paris... But instead I separated from her. And Phil met me by the theatre, looking handsome as usual.

I don't know if I've mentioned this, but he makes himself all handsome before he comes to see me. I mean, I've seen him in casual gear. But for when we have our dates? He's nicely dressed. And he smells good. And it just makes me want to melt. And grab onto him and never let go.

But anyway.

He knew that it had been a pipe dream of mine to go to karaoke at some point while I was in London, so he did research into places that would have karaoke on a Tuesday night. We walked there, under the stars. We walked along the South Bank of the river, which I'd never done at night before. And we talked. And I got to learn even more about this fascinating human being who had (at that point) only entered my life a couple of weeks before. I remember not caring if we ever made it to karaoke or anywhere else that night. I just wanted to absorb as much of him as I could.

As we walked, he admitted that he had been upset when he discovered I had gone to As You Like It. He was frustrated that I would be spending three hours watching a play instead of spending those three hours with him. He was jealous that the play was getting my attention. But he said that once he saw me and we were walking together, that frustration went away. He was so happy to be around me for whatever time he could.

We did end up making it to karaoke, in the dive-iest dive karaoke bar I've ever seen. We took up residence at a table in the dark back corner of the room. I drank a couple of Coronas, which, for me, is enough to get certifiably intoxicated (Side Note: I love being a light-weight. It saves so much time and money.) We sang "Use Somebody" by the Kings of Leon, and the 8 middle-aged drunk people in the bar sang along with us. And then we did a fantastic job on "Love Shack" by The B-52s. No seriously, we rocked that karaoke dive. Phil did his best Fred Schneider impression, and I sang all the girls' parts. The other people in the bar were impressed and complimenting us. We left on a high note.

By the time we got back to the party my classmates were having at my flat, the alcohol was gone (including the Parisian champagne), and everyone had gone to bed.

So Phil and I sat talking on my couch. And he expressed interest in my blog.

Now, I've learned some lessons about this blog and men:
- Michael had access to it, but never read it. It made me feel horribly unimportant to him (which, ultimately, I was... but still, it hurt to feel that way).
- Brian had access to it from the first post, and read it before, during, and after the time we were dating (and might end up reading this very post. *waves to Brian*). After Brian dumped me, he was hurt by the comments left by people supporting me who looked at him some sort of villain (and since I am the heroine of my own story, at that point it was exactly how one would expect them to interpret my writing).
- Daniel didn't read it while we were dating, but he knew the title of it. He found it after we broke up and tortured himself by reading about my life without him. I noticed his IP address (which I had tracked from my other blog), and sent him an e-mail. I wrote that I couldn't make him stop reading it, but that I didn't think it was the best way to get information from me, and I thought he'd end up hurting himself by reading it. He did hurt himself, and then stopped.

Learning from the pain that this blog has caused me and others in the past, I decided it best to not let Phil see it. And I recommended to him that he not attempt to seek it out, for his own emotional safety. He agreed.

But somehow, it felt like it made sense in our extremely honest courtship for him to know what was in it.

Also, I'd been drinking.

So I sat on the couch facing him with Lady MacBook on my lap. And I read to him in a strange sort of narcissistic story-time. He sat there, interested, as I read him a story about himself. Reading my own words was somehow not as uncomfortable as I thought it might be, which perhaps was a result of having just done it for weeks in my playwriting class. I read Discovering Magic, the post about the night I met him. I felt vulnerable, and a bit self-conscious, but like it was the right thing to do.

He sat there listening intently, and I'm sure that his mind was working actively. Mine would have been if the roles had been reversed. I would have been connecting the dots. Attempting reconcile information from the night to see if my memory and his matched. Observing what moments he found important enough to mention. Noticing which other moments were left out. Trying to find out what he found so great about me. And doing my best to determine if he liked me as much as I liked him. I can only speculate that he was doing the same.

When I finished that post, he asked if there were more. So I read him Afraid to Fall. And he still seemed really fascinated by the whole thing. So I read him Falling into Place, which I had written only hours before. I read to him about Alessandro and Blake.

I don't remember ever feeling so exposed. All of my cards were on the table. All the intensity of my feelings for him. All that talk of me rooting for things with him to work out. All of my talk about the other men in my life that proceeded him by a matter of days.

And after it was over, he thanked me. He seemed grateful, realizing that I'd just given him a piece of myself. He said it was a little weird, hearing his own words quoted back to him. But he loved remembering the moments along with me. And he loved knowing that some of the seemingly innocuous things that he said and did in my presence meant enough to me that I remembered them and wrote about them. He said he was in disbelief that I think he's as great as I do.

We spent a little time together the next morning, and left each other with the idea that we'd meet up again in the evening.

I saw Blake only briefly when I got my ticket to the London Eye, and he was with several of his coworkers. We didn't really get to talk, or to get any sort of proper goodbye. I sensed that he wanted to say more to me than he could as we stopped to chat on the bridge. He never again mentioned the fancy restaurant he had promised to take me to so that I could wear my new white dress. It's just as well, as I never mentioned to him that I wore my new white dress on a date with Phil.

(Me, Two-Shots-Up, and our friend on the London Eye. I'm wearing the dress that I bought with P the day before.)

I went on the London Eye without any sort of height-induced panic attack. It was an enclosed space, so I wasn't afraid of falling. Then I went out to dinner and drinks with my classmates and a couple of my professors. Even then, I couldn't stop talking about the guy who had so enchanted me.

But while I was out at the bar, I got a text from Phil, canceling on me for the evening. He was stressed with work and had a deadline to meet. Valid as that may have been, I knew it was an excuse. He then admitted that it was because he didn't want to go through a tearful goodbye.

To be honest, I remember thinking that was stupid. After all, I would be seeing him again in two weeks, and the truly upsetting goodbye would be the one before I flew back to the USA. This one was just a soft goodbye. A practice run. A "Be Back Soon". A short vacation, with the knowledge that I would return to him (at this moment, that's what I hope all of our goodbyes will be).

I hated not seeing him that night. For him, it was easier that way. He liked that our goodbye didn't feel final. In fact, it was easier that morning than most of the times we parted after a night together, simply because there was the hope that we'd see each other soon. But I loathed that my expectation of getting to see him again before leaving wasn't going to be met.

There are few chores, errands, and other acts of responsibility that I truly hate in life. Here's the closest I can come to an exhaustive list right now:
- Putting clothing on hangers
- Planning anything involving travel
- Packing
- Moving

Attempting to pack up all of my stuff into two small suitcases in order to move? Not fun. Attempting to do it while thinking about Phil? Not easy. I ended up sitting in my living room and drinking with my classmates until about 3 hours before my early morning trip to the airport.

I didn't want to leave London. Any other sane person would have been excited for adventures in Greece and Italy. But me? I just wanted to stay.

I wanted to have more time in London. I wanted to have time to finally go to the Tate. Or to spend a proper day in the British Museum (which was literally a block away from where I lived, but I only took a 20-minute walk through it during the entirety of my 6-week stay). Or to take a lesson at The Make-Up Store on Carnaby Street, which I had promised myself (and the sales staff) that I would. Or to get my haircut at Brooks + Brooks, as I'd been saying I would since the week I arrived. Or to go to the Greenwich Market (which Phil and I attempted to go to, but ended up in the wrong part of Greenwich). I wanted to see The Tempest, which was directed by Sam Mendes as a companion piece to that spectacular production of As You Like It and had all the same actors in it (it's part of The Bridge Project).

And, almost separately from my desire to stay in the city I love so well, was my desire to stay with Phil.

I wanted more time to experience the city. I wanted more time to experience the person. And although I knew I'd be coming back and would have another full day in London, I knew that the two things I had fallen for would be competing for my attention... and no matter how I spent that last day, I wouldn't have great closure with either.

To be continued...
(as I suppose could be said about any blog post that is to be followed eventually by another blog post)

May you be safe in your vulnerability.

~A~

Falling into Place

2010-06-15T09:21:00.006-04:00

(Me and Phil last week. He doesn't like this picture, but I think he looks cute... So maybe don't tell him that I put it on the blog, okay?)

Almost done. Can't believe it. Why do the good parts of life go by so much faster than the rotten parts?

There are so many things left to do in this city that I promised myself I'd get around to, but never did. Clearly, I'll have to come back.

I feel more myself here than I remember feeling.

The last 6 weeks have been incredible. Part of me wants to refer to this abroad experience as the best time of my life... but I won't.

The explanation for why I won't can be found in Shakespeare's Sonnet 115. For those of you who don't feel like trying to analyze a sonnet to understand my meaning, here it is: to say that this has been the best time of my life seems to somehow ignore (or even prevent) the possibility of greater times to come. And I would hate to limit my life with a premature superlative exclamation bounding forth from a sense of enveloping joy.

But it has been great.

Don't get me wrong, some things have been rough. One thing was quite rough, in fact...

A classmate that I have had problems with in the past -- the one who has been the monster in my nightmares -- caused more problems here. And after dealing with it to the best of our ability for weeks, it passed the tipping point. As a result, he was sent home from London. And we have heard that he has been released from our graduate program.

Although I expected to feel a sense of relief after the ordeal, that was only one ingredient in the stew of emotions that boiled in my stomach.

Mostly, I felt two kinds of guilt. The first was a guilt that I had contributed to something in this person's life being destroyed. The second guilt was for not taking action sooner and perhaps saving my classmates some of the anguish that we have suffered over the last two years.

Lastly, I felt fear. The fear has left me at the moment, as the person I'm afraid of is on a different continent, but I won't be surprised if it returns to me once my feet hit Floridian sands again. If he attempts to seek vengeance, I'm positive that I will be on the list of potential targets, and my name may be higher than most...

But he's gone now. It took a few days, but the relief I had expected did indeed wash over me. And our class seems... Complete. Fixed. Right. As though this is what we were meant to be all along. We are the ensemble now that we couldn't have been before. I didn't realize that, although I was a great target of his abuse, I was not the only one suffering from it. I didn't realize that his destructive presence was the reason that our class had developed antibodies. As soon as we had class without him, we found our peace.

We even started doing something that we have never done before: socializing in a group, instead of in sects of twos and threes. Last night, nine of the ten of us sat in my flat, having a marvelous time.

We're healed. Or at the very least, we're in remission. And it feels like a miracle.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In an unrelated story...

A couple of days ago, I was on my way to meet Phil. Because of some complications with Tube construction, I was going at a different time (and via different route) than originally intended.

And as I walked underground in a passage to transfer from the Central line to the Northern Line, I saw a familiar face.

Alessandro.

The Italian resident of London that I had gone on a few dates with... The one who happened to be out of town when I met Phil.

He stopped and took off his headphones, so I returned the gesture. He looked as surprised to see me as I felt seeing him. He looked different somehow. Maybe it was just because he was clean-shaven. Or maybe it was merely because he had become something different to me since the last time I'd seen him.

We made small-talk for about a minute. He remembered the date of my departure from town and asked about my schedule until then. I made myself sound busy (which, actually, I am). When he asked where I was going via Tube, I merely stated that I was switching lines, carefully avoiding mention of the man I was on my way to meet. I didn't want to hurt Alessandro any more than I already had.

I hugged him. And then we had an awkward moment of having to detangle our headphone cords from each other before we went on our separate ways.

There are millions of people in this city. And I couldn't help but suspect, as I always do, that God pulled some strings so that this encounter would happen.

As I walked away from Alessandro, I felt like I should have said more. Perhaps I should have acknowledged I saw he had changed his facebook status to a series of question marks moments after ending the phone call when I told him I was seeing someone else. Or perhaps I should have thanked him for showing me one of my favorite parts of the city (which I in turn showed to my classmate Wifey, and thanks to Alessandro's guidance and insights it became one of her favorites as well). Maybe I should have apologized.

Mostly, I wish I'd thanked him. I may not have written much about it here (nor do I plan to, at this point), but he did wonderful things for me. He gave me stories about my time in London, and they're a greater gift than I realized when they were being formed.

I don't regret ending things with Alessandro for Phil. Not in the least.

Nor do I regret never really starting things with Blake.

One night, a couple of weeks ago, I had a perfect opportunity to spend some unexpected one-on-one time with Blake, but missed it because I had tentative plans with Alessandro. I tried to rectify the situation, but it had passed. I was kicking myself over it, and ended up canceling with Alessandro (not wanting, of course, to be in a bad mood with one guy because I was disappointed about another). And then I felt like I'd screwed things up with both of them. I remember complaining to D-Train and Two-Shots-Up that night, lamenting that I am an awkward disaster in the realm of casual dating.

It's funny in retrospect. I remember trying to comfort myself at the time with my mantra that "everything happens for a reason", and being unable to find solace in it. As it turns out, I would've been right to trust it.

That night, I texted back and forth with Blake. He sent me a message saying that we could always arrange a one-on-one encounter at another time. He had already suggested that we go out for coffee weeks before that, although no plans were made. And then again last Thursday he offered the possibility of us going out to dinner together. And at that point, I was incredibly hopeful about it.

But Blake went out of town the same weekend that Alessandro did. Which was long enough for me to meet Phil and promptly forget all about any other possibilities.

I ran into Blake on Friday. It was the first time I'd seen him in over a week. The last I saw him, he said there was a nice restaurant he thought we should go to, where I would have an excuse to wear my new white dress.

"Hey, I feel like I haven't seen you in a long time," he said. He looked at me in a way that he hadn't before. More melancholy, perhaps.

"That's because you haven't", I responded.

I asked how he'd been. How his trip to Ireland had gone. And I invited him to go out dancing that night (I had plans to go with Phil, D-Train, and several people who ended up changing their minds). He declined.

"But we should hang out at some point before you leave," he submitted. I smiled and agreed before walking away, knowing that there was a good chance that it wouldn't come to fruition.

When I got back to my flat, I spoke with D-Train and Two-Shots-Up. They had seen Blake earlier in the day, and had shown him pictures on Facebook of us dancing at a bar called "Tiger Tiger". Blake had come across one of me with Phil, taken the day that he and I had met.

"Who's that," Blake asked them.

Two-Shots-Up exclaimed, "That's her MAN!"

She and D-Train both immediately realized that her statement may not have been the best thing to say in front of Blake. In my imagination, he looked crestfallen at the words, although I don't think either of them actually gave me verbal acknowledgement of that when telling the story.

"When did she meet him," Blake asked, downplaying his reaction.

"Really recently," D-Train attempted to state tactfully, attempting to soften the blow. "Just a few days ago, really."

"But you know how it is," Two-Shots-Up explained, "sometimes you meet someone and you just know."

I guess I'm glad that Blake didn't have to hear it from me. But I guess that explains why he seemed to be something slightly other than himself when I ran into him.

I do like Blake. He's a lovely person. And I suppose part of me wonders if anything would have happened between us had I not met Phil.

But honestly, I don't feel guilty about Blake the way I do with Alessandro. He could've taken me out, but never did. He could've done more than send me the occasional debatably-flirtatious text message. He didn't.

Blake had the right cards in his hand, but folded. Alessandro knew how to play, but he just didn't have the cards.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I talked with Phil a few days ago about the stuff in my last post. And by "stuff", I mean, "What are we doing, how do we handle this, and where do we go from here?"

He's done the long-distance thing in the past. He has dated two Americans before. And it sounds like those two girls were the most profound heartbreaks of his life. So he's understandably terrified.

He thinks he's falling in love with me.

(His words. Unprovoked. I promise.)

He said we could try to make a go of it, but it might be too hard to do it without fear. Or we could wait and see if our lives lead us to the same place (like L.A.), but it might ruin other things in the meanwhile.

Of course, being the obsessive/compulsive over-thinking, worrying, worst-case-scenario planner that I am, I had already pondered these situations, and had come up with the alternative a couple days before (and, in fact, had blogged it).

I suggested my plan...

No formal commitment.
Stay in good contact (in a commitment-less dating sort of way).
Hope that at some point it will become obvious that we should either become committed or break it off before commitment sets in.

After all, I know that the feelings we're having are intensified because of this pressure-cooker of a time limit. If the circumstances were different, I wouldn't lock someone I met a week and a half ago into an exclusive relationship. And to try to do that with a 5-hour time zone gap and an ocean separating us would be, in my mind, idealistic and foolhardy. I don't want to rush into anything. If we're going to do this, I want to do it right.

He says he's still in the same stage as I am, where he can't stop talking about me. His flatmate will be eating an apple, and Phil will say, "Angela likes apples." His roommate will say he's about to walk down the street, and Phil will reply, "The other day Angela and I were walking down a street..." (These exaggerations are his and not mine, in case you're curious.)

Phil said he wants to call up people he hasn't spoken with in months just to tell them the story of how we met. He said thinks he'll still be doing that six months from now. It gave me hope to hear that. In his imagination, I'm still important six months from now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Today was my last day of classes in London. For the rest of grad school, really. It's mostly performing from here on out.

I'm going to try to meet P from *Insert My Blog Name Here* today, as she happens to be in town. I'm rather excited about that. :)

I was going to try to see a show tonight. Perhaps I still will. Or maybe go to karaoke, if the stars align. Or to a museum. To one of the many things I promised myself I'd do, but that took the back burner when I discovered other wonderful things.

I plan to see Phil tonight and tomorrow morning. And then to have a very unhappy goodbye.

I'm going on the glorified ferris wheel tourist trap known as the London Eye tomorrow with Two-Shots-Up. I'm hoping that my fear of heights stays in check.

I'll see Blake tomorrow. He's meeting Two-Shots-Up and I to give us the tickets. Maybe he'll end up on the Eye with us so that he and I can have that chat he asked for. Or maybe not. I have faith that things will work out exactly the way they that they are meant to.

Early Thursday morning, I'll leave for Greece with Two-Shots-Up, All-The-Way, and Killer. We're spending two nights in Delphi and two in Athens.

After that, Two-Shots-Up and I have more adventures planned. Santorini, Milan, and Cinque Terre. We don't have all the kinks worked out, but I'm starting to feel less terrified about the whole thing.

And then I come back to London on the evening on the 29th. And I leave on the morning of July 1st.

I don't know if that last sentence registered in your head, but to me, it's the most exciting of my travel plans.

I get to spend just a little more time with Phil.

And then I'll head back to Connecticut. And only God knows what will happen from there.

Maybe this is unwise...

but I have my hopes up.

May you conquer your fear of falling.
And when things start falling apart, may it be so that they can fall into place.

(And when falling... Mind the Gap.)

~A~

Afraid to Fall

2010-06-09T19:42:00.008-04:00

Last night, I went to see the play All My Sons starring David Suchet and Zoë Wanamaker (one of my favorite plays, with two actors I greatly respect).

When I got to the theatre, I was on the top balcony (which is basically the 4th floor), in the very last row of the steepest stadium-seating I've ever seen. (It's apparently the highest seating in any theatre in London.) Before I even climbed the last set of stairs, I had to sit down, hyperventilating and freaking out. When I got to my seat, it was directly next to the very steep center aisle, and I had to look down to see the stage. There was a red bar in front of me (I don't know if I was supposed to hold onto it, lean on it, or just somehow be comforted by the illusion/delusion that it could save me), but open space below it. I was terrified and dizzy. I thought I was going to pass out and/or die.

D-Train had to get me out of my seat. With my eyes closed, I told him that I was too afraid to stand up. He wisely informed me that waiting wasn't going to make it better. As he lead me down the stairs, I started crying hysterically and hyperventilating again. It wasn't until he sat me down in an enclosed room that I could start breathing and begin to calm down.

You know what's funny about that? Last week, I stood at the summit of the Eiffel Tower, and I was just fine.

You see, I don't have a fear of heights...

I have a fear of falling.

An arresting, debilitating, irrational fear of falling.

So does Phil.

Just one more weird way that we match.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In case you were wondering, Phil is still great.

And I'm getting scared.

I have a week left in London, and he's super busy.

Two days ago, he met me for a picnic lunch between my classes (and insisted on buying grapes so that he could feed them to me "in a decadent manner"). He met me at a theatre last night after a show I attended, and we went out to a bar with some of my people. I was at his house this morning, and he made me tea. We're going out for dinner tomorrow night, and going out dancing with his friends and mine on Friday.

But it doesn't feel like enough time.

And I don't know what to do.

If I lived here, it would be easy. But I don't.

Long distance relationships blow (I know from a great deal of experience). And when the long-distance involves a different time zone? Incredibly challenging. And to enter into one with someone you've just met? Sort of insane.

I'm afraid to even bring up the subject with him. Mostly because I'll be heart-broken if he suggests the obvious course of action: end things when I leave.

(Heart-broken? Seriously?... Maybe I'm exaggerating.)

Hurt. Disappointed. Sad. Angry at circumstance.

He says he thinks about me all the time. That he's distracted from his work. And, to be honest, I was pretty distracted in class today because I kept thinking about a conversation we had this morning.

Yesterday, he had a bad day (extraordinarily bad... three huge, bad things hit on the same day). But when he met me at the theatre, he said that all day, he'd been calming himself down with the reminder that he'd get to see me. And that somehow just by seeing me, he felt better. He referred to me as being the light at the end of the tunnel.

We've been incredibly open and honest with each other thus far. More so than I ever remember being in any dating situation I've been in up to this point. I love that. No games. No strategizing. We're just present. And it's easy.

I'm too attached to him. That's the problem. I want to be around him as much is as physically possible. And he says he feels the same way.

Part of me thinks I should spend less time with him now. Just enjoy London. Not get dependent on him, as I once got with Brian. Because honestly, as much as I once cared about The Filmmaker, I think the way I feel about Phil is closer to the way I felt about Brian. I don't know how to explain it. I want to say something big and dramatic, like there was a puzzle piece missing in my life, and he fits. But that's not it.

It's more like... I think he sees more in me than I see in myself. I think he sees inside me somehow. And it makes me feel vulnerable and safe all at the same time.

I cried twice last night. The first time was at the theatre, during my height-induced panic attack. The second time was when I was alone with Phil. I felt so close to him, and I had a moment where I was afraid of falling, but not in a literal sense. And just like with D-Train leading me down the stairs, it wasn't until I was being led away from the terrifying thing that I cried.

Phil said all the right things. He said things that I didn't know I needed to hear. And I don't mean that in a delusional, "He said something different than what I wanted, but I'm going to rationalize that it was what I needed" kind of way (because, unfortunately, I have gone through that sort of denial in the past). I don't want to ruin my memory of the moment by trying to write it. But one of the things he said was that it made perfect sense for me to be feeling the way I was feeling. He gave me validation without me asking for it. And that's when I cried.

And then I apologized for crying. He smiled at me, and calmed me down, telling me that there was no need to apologize. That I never needed to apologize to him.

I felt vulnerable. And safe. And like I'd just reached a level of intimacy with him that didn't make sense with someone I've known for only a few days.

And now I'm filled with self-knowledge that had previously been lurking below the surface. Mostly regret for things in my past. Things I led myself to believe were real, but that truly never were. Regret for convincing myself that I was comfortable with things that had been said and done, when I never truly was.

So today, I officially ended things with Alessandro, the Italian boy whom I've enjoyed spending time with. I knew I had to. Phil is worth so much more to me than Alessandro ever was or ever could be. It was awkward and uncomfortable for me, and I hated the idea of hurting him... but ultimately went much better and more easily than I thought it would. I guess I didn't as much to him as I thought I did (or maybe he just covered it well?). But then, I guess he didn't mean as much to me as I thought he did, either.

The scariest part of ending things with Alessandro actually had nothing to do with Alessandro. The scariest part was knowing that, in some way, I'd just made a choice to commit to Phil... without Phil having to do anything to commit to me. I gave over a little more. I signed on a little more. I put myself in a more vulnerable position.

Phil isn't perfect. And I'm not sure he's right for me. Which makes it harder to make leaps like this.

But something about him is wonderful. And it makes me cheer deeply for there to be a way for this to work. God, please let there be a way to make this work.

I don't know why I'm rooting so hard for this in my head. But I am. I want this to be Happily-Ever-After instead of a star in the trail to Neverland.

And I feel crazy for thinking that. Absolutely insane. I feel like a needy, delusional stalker chick.

I've been so honest with him about so many other things, and he with me. But I haven't told him how much I'm rooting for this. I have a fear that I'll scare him off. I don't want to be one of those girls. And I think I've somehow just become one of those girls.

Maybe it's a mistake seeing him at all right now. Maybe the smart thing to do is just enjoy my last week in London, and not waste time falling further into infatuation with a guy I won't have time to solve things with. I don't want my life to turn out like the series finale of FlashForward (i.e. completely unresolved, despite the creative team having plenty of reasons to suspect that it was about to be canceled).

D-Train says that I shouldn't pull away. He says when you find someone you connect with like this, you have to enjoy it. But he also said not to get my hopes up about the future. And I know he's right.

It's just too hard.

The logical side of me has the solution, of course.
Step 1: Spend time with him while I'm here, and enjoy it.
Step 2: Don't define anything.
Step 3: Stay in touch when I get back to the USA, but don't have any sort of commitment.
Step 4: If it becomes apparent once I'm back in the USA that we actually want commitment, THEN consider it.
Step 5: If we both end up in the same city when I'm out of grad school (most likely possibility: Los Angeles) and are still in contact and single, then go for it.

But right now, the irrational side of me is beating the logical side over the head with a sledgehammer of emotion.

If I take any other course than the one the logical side has chosen, I'm setting myself up for heartbreak. I know that.

And I'm terrified of it.

I don't mind being in a vulnerable position. I don't mind being open and honest with him. I don't mind being so connected to a person that I just met.

I'm not afraid of being that high.

I'm just afraid to fall.

May you conquer your fears. And may you find a Happily-Ever-After to root for.

~A~

P.S. Both pictures in this post were taken the day I met Phil. Neither of us thinks that these photos do either of us justice. We are both much more attractive in real life. (Phil thinks he looks insane in the second one.) But this is what I have so far, and I figured you'd want to see the guy I'm so insane over.

Discovering Magic

2010-06-06T12:25:00.006-04:00

I went to a performance of The Real Thing by Tom Stoppard at The Old Vic theatre yesterday. (That's the theatre for which Kevin Spacey is the artistic director.)

And a cute guy sat next to me.

And we talked at intermission (or, as they call it in the UK, "the interval").

And we talked after the show.

And we went out to get a drink... which turned into dinner.

And I went to a pub with him and his friend.

And then to another pub.

And he came out to a dance club with me and my friends.

And we walked around the city talking.

And we went back to his place and kept talking.

And I got home today around noon.

His name is Phil.

I want to describe him. Or the way I feel about him. But the word that keeps running through my head is "magic". He is magic. Yesterday was magic. This whole experience. Magic.

He's 28. He's from Liverpool, but went to school in Wales, and now lives in London. He's a playwright/screenwriter/director/actor.

And it feels like... I don't know. Like we match. We fit. We're right.

Phil feels it, too. It's like we've met before. Or like I understand his life-force or something.

I know this is going to sound nuts (and it probably is), but I think that he's important. He's a significant event in my life-story. He's not just one of the other random guys from the last post I wrote (or the guys that have come along since I wrote that post... because there have been more).

I feel like my life just changed.

Okay, that's probably ridiculous.

But maybe it's not.

My roommate asked me, "What are you going to do about the other men," and I said, "What other men?"

I mean, I had agreed to dates with two other guys next week, and two more had asked me out. And now I know that I'm going to say no to all of them. I don't care about the other dates. Any of them. They're meaningless now. Pointless.

So in that way, yes, I think it is going to change my life. Especially since one of the guys I won't be going on a date with lives in Florida, and had already talked about visiting me when we got back to the states. That probably won't happen now.

I had a similar realization when I met The Filmmaker... I remember realizing that The Engineer just wasn't right for me, and there was no point wasting my time with him when there were better people for me out there. I feel that way again with Phil... I don't need to waste time with Alessandro, Blake, Deron, Andrew, Nael, Luke, Nsikan, Wael, or anyone else. Because even if Phil isn't the guy I'm meant to be with in the long run, he has reminded me how important it is to me to actually care about the guys I'm test-driving (for lack of a better term).

So I'm done with my newfound wild woman ways. To quote The Real Thing, "The thing that 'free love' is free of is love."

You know what's funny? When I originally tried to get a ticket to The Real Thing, I was trying for the Saturday evening performance. But they were out of student tickets. And Phil? He had gone to the theatre on Friday to try to get a last minute seat, but it was sold out. So he figured he'd have better luck with the matinee.

That, my friends, is magic. Or angels. Or fate. Or maybe just a very fortunate coincidence. But I've said it before and I'll say it again: I believe that everything happens for a reason.

He said that when he showed up to the theatre on Saturday to try to get a ticket, I was standing in line in front of him. And he thought I was gorgeous. And then he ended up sitting next to me and was excited. He figured I probably get harassed a lot by strange men, and he didn't want to be that way, so he talked himself out of talking with me. But I initiated a conversation at the interval. And he said he spent the whole second act trying to figure out a good way to ask me out after the show.

He has social anxiety, just like me. He has an old white MacBook that is even closer to death than mine (Lady MacBook) is. He has a personal blog that he keeps private from people in his life (yes, that's right: I found a blogger).

He's easy to talk to. And he's talented (I asked to see some of his work, so he showed me a short film he wrote... and it was great). And he's got a good balance between being hot and cute. And he speaks with a really charming dialect, which is a nice bonus.

And as my roommate pointed out, this began in an unusual manner for me: Phil and I were interested in each other. I generally only go for guys who have shown interest in me first. And I have friends with the opposite bad habit: they go for guys that they're interested in, but the guys usually don't care about my friends as much as my friends care about the guys. But this time, I haven't fallen into either trap. And I think it's healthier this way.

I wish I'd met him weeks ago, as my time in England is almost up... But I guess I'm just going to have to trust that there's a reason we were brought together when we were: at a play dealing with what it is to be a writer, what it is to be an actor, and what it is to be in love.

Phil says he doesn't know how he could possibly explain what had happened to us yesterday. He says that people couldn't understand how connected we felt after such a short period of time, or maybe they just wouldn't believe it.

He joked that he's going to steal my passport to stop me from leaving. I understand the impulse. I want to spend as much time with him as possible before I leave.

I don't believe in love at first sight. I'm not in love with him. But I do have an incredible infatuation with him. And he with me.

In my playwriting class here, one of my classmates wrote a monologue about how hard it is to find love. In it, she said that trying to find the one other person on the planet who is meant to be with you out of the billions on the planet was worse than searching for a needle in the haystack; it's more like searching for a bubble in the sea.

I've crossed the sea and landed in London. Have I found my bubble?

I guess we'll see.

May you find your bubble.

~A~

Love from the Wild Child

2010-05-29T16:22:00.023-04:00

Hello all.

I am in Paris this weekend.

London has been amazing. I am squeezing every last drop out of it, I promise.

(me in Conwy Castle in Wales)

I went to see Hair, which has transferred over here from Broadway, and it totally changed my perspective on life. Normally, I am a pretty conservative person socially, sexually, and morally (although not politically). But when I saw Hair, I wanted nothing more than to do drugs and get naked.

Later that night, I went out dancing. At one point, the people I was with were getting drinks when I headed down to the basement dance floor of a club. It was just me, the DJ, and a bunch of laser lights. I took over the dance floor in a way that you've never seen. For two songs, I was more free than I ever remember being. I mean, I'm always free when I dance, but not like that. It was like I'd entered another state of consciousness. I wasn't fully cognizant of what I was doing, but somehow I melted into the room and became one with it. (And for the record, I was sober.)

You know what? I am free because I'm HERE. When crazy things happen, I just wink and say, "London". It is the best explanation and excuse in the world.

(Hanging out with my classmates the night I saw Hair. A little drinking was involved.)

I am totally boy crazy. And a little girl crazy, too. This might be crazy, but I think I'm bisexual. I've just been lying dormant for a long time. No, I'm not joking.

I think I already mentioned my crushes on the French circus boys. Yeah, I miss them. They were fun. Mmmm...

(hanging out with my French circus friends)

(Me with Julien. I seriously wanted him and we had fun on the dance floor. But he's in a relationship on Facebook... and doesn't speak much English.)

(Me and Flo. Being around him is joy-inducing. Sadly, he also has a girlfriend.)

(Nael and me. He's the one who actually kissed me, and it was completely awkward. Oh well.)

(Guillaume was totally cute too -- and totally trying to flirt with me -- but my roommate/classmate was crushed on him, so I was a good girl and backed down. And yes, my love Julien is totally kissing my head in this picture. *sigh*)

I have occasional crushes on my classmates, but they're usually fleeting. More than anything else, it's just an appreciation of them as people more than an active sexual or romantic desire for them.

(me with my classmate D-Train, wearing my famous pink and purple hat)

During a production of Macbeth at The Globe Theatre, I totally connected with the actor playing Malcolm. He kept making eye contact with me. I swear to you, at one point he gestured toward me and winked at me during a scene (in which he was in the background and had no lines). Luke -- the nice, cute undergrad who was standing next to me -- noticed my Malcolm moments and commented on them. After the show, Luke was going to a talkback with the actors, so I gave him my business card (which has my name, headshot, and e-mail address on it), and he passed it along to Malcolm for me (who is apparently actually named James). Haven't heard from him yet, but that's most definitely the most forward move I've ever made towards a man. Huge deal for me. (Unfortunately, the phone number on my business card in my American phone... I hope he has the sense to facebook me or e-mail me... Because CLEARLY he's going to contact me.)

My classmate Wifey thinks that Luke has a thing for me. He keeps trying to get me to salsa dance with him, and just generally appears to go out of his way to talk with me and be around me. And I think another undergrad named Nic might have a thing for me as well (he's sweet, and he keeps offering to take my picture with various landmarks). And most likely an IT guy who works for the program named Deron who wanted me to watch the finale of LOST with him.

(Me with Deron)

I have a crush on a Blue Badge tour guide, whom is significantly older than my usual self-limited datable age range. (my Google-stalking suggests he's 39, but I'm guessing that information is old). Dude, intelligence is sexy. Also, he has a great sense of humor. And I'm pretty sure he was flirting with me in Westminster Abbey.

(Me and Blue Badge Seán)

People over here love me. I think it's my cute American dialect. I have been hit on by so many people (men and women) that I've lost track. And the guys here keep asking me if they can make out with me, to which I say no. I don't care how cute the guy is. I am not going to make out with any random nameless person. There has to be at least SOME backstory involved. Dancing with me for 3 minutes does not count.

See those two hot chicks? Yeah, they both wanted me. No, I'm not joking. Look at them, and then look at me. Clearly, they are the hotties in that picture. And believe me, it does not do them justice... They had tight mini-dresses on, and legs that went on for days. And they were really great dancers as well. They wanted me to go to another bar with them, but was celebrating a friend's birthday that night and felt like I couldn't ditch her... In retrospect, I regret the decision. They were HOT.

I've been asked on dates by men from at least 4 countries.

The first was Blake, an American who works for the program in an R.A. sort of way. He's actually younger than I am. He started flirting with me about an hour after I landed in this country.

We had a nice long talk one day, and he asked me out for coffee (which has yet to come to fruition). Then last weekend, I spent a good amount of time hanging out with him in Liverpool and Wales. We talked, danced, and flirted. He sent me text messages telling me that I should come hang out with him in various locations. But the last night we were in Wales, he ended up making out with some other chick on the dancefloor at a club (I don't know who she was... either a Welsh chick, or an undergrad). No big deal. I have other men around... But then this morning our trips aligned briefly (mine to Paris, and his to Amsterdam), and he was both flirting with me and actively following me around. And then he sent me a text message from Amsterdam saying that he wishes I were there... So we'll see.

(Blake and me on a hill in Llandudno, Wales)

Actually, at one point I was pretty sure that another guy with Blake's job was flirting with me as well. But he ended up going for my classmate/roommate instead of me (same classmate/roommate that went for circus-boy Guillaume, actually), so that shut the door on him.

A statuesque black man in a suit approached me in a club and wanted to get to know me better. He's a Brit named Nsikan who works for the United Nations. I gave him my e-mail address instead of my British phone number (because I hadn't memorized it yet), and he has been actively pursuing me through that medium. Unfortunately for him, I have a very busy schedule...

A Palestinian man named Wael wants me as well. He's a musician. And tomorrow, in London, he's performing in a show that Will.I.Am. and Cheryl Cole are also scheduled to appear at. I think he's in the opening act or something. He told me he could get me in backstage, but unfortunately, I'm in Paris.

(me and Wael in a Reggae club)

So far, I've only actually gone out with one of them. He's an Italian (who lives in London) named Alessandro, and he's delightful. As Captain Hammer would say, "Not my usual, but nice." He took me to a really terrible Bollywood dance-based show with a pathetic excuse for a plot. And then we went to a bar and got drinks that were called "I Can't Believe It's Not Watermelon". And then we got on a double-decker bus to Trafalgar Square, and I learned that my usual apprehension regarding public displays of affection does not apply in foreign countries. At all. The next day, he took me to the Camden Town market (which was great fun), and was just charming and lovely the whole way through. He really, really wants me. He wants to steal the purple and pink hat that I'm always wearing, and not give it back to me until I come visit him in Italy.

(Alessandro and me in Camden Town.)

But enough about boys.

I bought a great dress. I'm in love with it. I saw a girl wearing it around town, and I stopped her and asked her where she bought it. She told me it was at TopShop for 70 pounds (roughly $105). But when I got to TopShop, it was only 60 pounds (the tax is included) and I get an international student discount there, bringing the total to 54 pounds (roughly $81). Expensive, but it's the first major purchase I've made after being abroad for over 3 weeks. And it's totally worth it to me. Dude, I look hot in it.

Note: That photo makes me look deceptively skinny. I have actually gained weight since getting to London. I don't usually think of myself as being on a diet, but I watch what I eat (which is usually mostly made up of South Beach Diet bars and SmartOnes frozen meals), and I'm not doing that at all here. I have started eating ice cream, french fries, and mayonnaise here (all of which have been on my Forbidden list for awhile back in the USA).

I'm a wild woman.

Anyway. I thought you all deserved an update of my plot.

May you find your wild side.

~A~

Circus Folk

2010-05-16T15:44:00.006-04:00

(Me dancing with one of my new friends. 05/11/10)

(Note: I'm composing this quickly and without editing, so I apologize if it's a boring/confusing/badly composed post)

So in case you haven't been reading my twitter, there are two things you should know.

1. I'm in London.

2. I have met (and become obsessed with) a bunch of circus-trained performers this week.

So. Much. Hotness.

I like to dance. A lot. I make a fool out of myself on the dancefloor. And circus boys? They keep up with me. I love that.

They've been in this show in London, in which they use their circus skills as part of their story-telling. It's about 11 people with different mental problems (schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, amnesia, manic, intermittent explosive disorder, agoraphobia, hypochondria, sex addiction, insomnia, paranoia, & multiple personality disorder) It's brilliant. I saw it three times. And it was worth it.

The videos do not do them justice, but you'll get an idea:

(And if you speak French, I guess you could watch this. The three men that speak in it are three of my favorite buddies in the group, and you get to see them do a little of their stuff.)

After I went to see their show the first time, we (meaning the three classmates who came along with me and myself) went out dancing with them.

And then I saw the show again, and went to a bar with them.

And then I saw the show again, and went out to lunch with them.

And then their show closed, and I went out to some bars and a house party with them (that was last night... didn't get home until 6:15am).

Of the 11 performers, I've hung out with 8 of them, and I'd say that 4 of them (three guys and a girl) I now consider to be my friends (even though one of them doesn't speak English terribly well).

(NOTE: A guy who is not one of those four kissed me last night, but it was awkward... so I'm just going to pretend that didn't happen.)

I can't tell you how hot they are. Each one hotter than the last. Maybe that's just because I'm sexually attracted to talent... But I think that's only part of it.

I realize that I just met them, but I am horribly sad that they've left town. One in particular I would like to pack into a suitcase and take back to the USA with me, because I think we'd be great friends. And my crush on another one was ruined by Facebook tragically informing me that he's in a relationship (somehow I wasn't bothered by the fact that his English isn't extensive and my French is nonexistent).

It's just nice to dance with people who want to dance. So nice. It wasn't a sexual thing. It was just an appreciation of movement.

And they kept encouraging me in my own movement work. I've always wanted to learn contortion, and they gave me some pointers on how to move forward. They also complimented my "lines", and the natural arch of my foot and point of my toes, and my extension, and my flexibility (this was in a bar, by the way). And I ended up learning a new trick already just from their verbal advice (a wall-assisted back-walkover, which I'm very proud of). They gave me greater belief in myself, even though they'd only just met me.

And it's nice to have people to hang out with other than people I've been in school with for two years. I love (most of) my classmates, but I liked being able to meet people beyond them. It's not an opportunity I usually have in Florida.

Next weekend, I signed up to go on a trip to Wales and Liverpool that the university is taking the undergraduate students on. I'm the only person in my class going. In some ways, I'm glad to get away from my class. But in others... Well, at the ripe old age of 25, I'm going to feel out of place around undergrads.

Ugh. I'm lonely.

London is good, though. I've been having a great time. Unfortunately, I think I'm getting sick. I've had a cough since March that won't quit, and the coughing fits I've had over the last couple of days have given me a wicked sore throat (one more reason why that one French circus boy probably should not have awkwardly kissed me).

Also random: British men love me. I don't know why. I get hit on over here on a daily basis. In the USA, when I get hit on, it's something to write home about. But here? Left and right. It's like magic.

Okay, I should stop writing this nonsense and go work on my playwriting homework. Blergh.

Ugh, I feel sick.

May you make friends who inspire you and believe in you.
And may you never feel lonely when you're not alone.

~A~

Tele-Therapist, Cell-Counselor

2010-05-02T00:01:00.000-04:00

I almost went out on Thursday night for one reason and for one reason only: it was April 29.

I haven't written about it in quite some time, but it used to be a very big deal to me. And I guess it still is. It is, after all, my lucky day. (Not that I believe in luck... but I do have a special affinity for that date.)

I guess, if nothing else, I give myself more permission to follow my impulses on April 29 than I do on most days. I trust more in the universe.

Maybe that's silly.

...

Okay, fine, it's silly. But I don't care. It's more of a tradition at this point than a superstition.

(Although if as many fortuitous events had happened to you on the same date in different years as have happened to me on April 29, you might start to pay special attention to it as well.)

And I wanted to go out. (I won't lie to you... I wanted to use the date as an excuse to drink and make bad choices. Perhaps involving a person in whom I wish I were not interested.)

And right after I sent out a mass text that I would be going out, and that people were welcome to join me, I got a phone call from Brian.

I didn't end up going out. And I am completely and totally okay with that. Talking to him was more important.

I love that he came to me when he had a problem. I love that.

I still love Brian, but my love for him has taken a different shape than it had before. I love him as a human being.

I'm different now. I'm stronger. I'm wiser. I'm less dependent. I'm more determined. He's different, too. It's hard for me to articulate how, but I can feel it. Every word I try to put with it isn't quite right. He's hardier? He's broader? He's older? They're all wrong. They're all circling something. Maybe I don't fully understand what it is. But he's a different Brian. And I'm a different Angela.

It's probably ridiculous to admit this... but I guess the part of me that is still Angela from 2007 still misses the Brian from 2007. I suppose that part of me will always exist.

But I like how my friendship with Brian has evolved. Present Day Me is incredibly grateful to have Present Day Brian in my life in exactly the capacity I have him. And I think he feels the same way.

The strange thing is... I'm so distant with most people in my life these days that, though I rarely speak with him, I might still call Brian my best friend. He's certainly high on the list.

Anyway. I was glad that he called. And I was happy to put aside my April 29 fantasies for him. I didn't miss them at all.

Honestly, I don't know if I helped him. Realistically, I doubt I did. But if nothing else, it was nice to be able to be there for him. He's been there for me at many times when I desperately needed someone. I was glad to have a chance to return the favor.

...

And then came April 30.

...

On April 30, I got a call from a different person in my life. A person who always seems to be in a dire situation, and is in need of immediate help. And Mr. Dire needed me again.

I have talked Mr. Dire down on several occasions, over a span of six months. Considering that I have only known him for about 15 months, and have seen in him person maybe 15 times (and haven't seen him in 10 months), I'm not sure how I got the role of "savior" in his ongoing drama, but I did. I am the person he calls when he's having a panic attack. I am the person he calls when his social anxiety acts up at a party and he needs an excuse to get out. I am the person he calls when his self-esteem plummets. I am the person he calls when the suicide hot-lines aren't helpful enough.

He only calls me when things get pretty bad. And I care about his well-being, so I pick up the phone, even though I know that by doing so I am accepting several hours worth of him calling me, begging me for validation, hanging up on me, and then calling back.

Maybe this is one of the remnants of the Savior Complex that I've been trying to eliminate.

It's difficult. It's painful. And it's frustrating. It takes so much energy for me to try tactic after tactic of trying to help a person whom I can't help. I know that I can't do anything until he chooses to help himself.

Last night, Mr. Dire kept calling back. He had left the bar where he'd had a panic attack, and was wandering the city he was visiting in the dark, with no idea where he was, upset and presumably intoxicated. And couldn't take it anymore. I ditched him. I told him I had to go to bed.

It felt selfish. And mean. And I'm not particularly proud of it.

But I had to get off the phone with him. I was tired. And stressed out from my own life. And making no progress whatsoever in improving his self-esteem, or calming him down from his episode.

I feel like I barely even know this guy. I don't know how to help him. Although apparently, he thinks I'll know how to help him, as he keeps calling me.

Which he did.

After I got off the phone with him, Mr. Dire called me back. And again I told him I had to go to sleep, and we got off the phone. And again he called me back. And again I said goodnight. And then I fell asleep briefly, and was woken up by him calling me back (at which point I saw that during the brief time that I had dozed off, I had actually missed more calls from him). And I got off the phone with him one last time. And I felt like a terrible person for doing so.

It's hard to abandon someone who is so clearly in need of help, and who has reached out in your direction. And in the moment, it feels like the wrong decision (at least to me). But sometimes, I think it's the healthier choice to make. Part of me feels selfish, and the other part feels brave.

Mr. Dire is not dead. He's fine. He texted me today. First with an apology for last night. And then with more of his usual "I hate myself" sentiments.

I'm leaving the country. For two months. I hope he finds someone else to need, because I won't be here. And to be honest, I don't want the job back upon my return.

How is it that I so love the job of counseling through the phone when it's Brian, yet loathe and resent it so when it's Mr. Dire?

See, this is why I didn't follow through on being a psych major. I'd rather pick and choose my roles.

May you never feel guilty for saving yourself.

~A~

P.S. I drank on New Years' Eve. And I didn't drink again until April 24th. I also drank on April 26th. And again on April 27th. So perhaps not drinking on April 29 broke some sort of streak I was starting. Which I guess could be a good thing.

Old Poetry

2010-04-29T01:00:00.000-04:00

So I'm going through my high school journal (which, let me tell you, is pretty hilarious) at the moment. I started because my friend Kate said that Megan McCafferty (author of Sloppy Firsts) has been tweeting parts of her own journal. And it was a fantastic decision.

Anyway.

I found this poem that I wrote awhile back. I'm pretty sure it was meant to be spoken poetry (as I wrote it right around the time that I discovered Russell Simmons' Def Poetry Jam), so use your imagination. Or recite it. Whatever.

07/29/02

I lie on my bed
as you run through my head
and I remember you said
those little words of encouragement
never discouragement
never knew what courage meant
until I tried
and I spied
and I lost my pride
somehow inside
a river that drowned me
but still you found me
why must you bound me
with this invisible wire?
I quickly tire
from this melting fire
as you call me a liar
and say we're not attached
that we've always mismatched
and now, with my feelings dispatched
and I can't help but feel
I've lost control of the wheel
and this strife
is just life
and though you try to ignore
attempt to bore
I think to myself,
while putting you back on the shelf,
that maybe I don't know you anymore.

The Good News

2010-04-28T17:00:00.005-04:00

(Me as Vittoria, my Commedia dell'Arte character for Movement class. 04/24/10)

I am officially done with classes. Which is crazy. I've been in a pattern for the last two years of my life that is about to change drastically, and I feel somewhat thrown by that.

Of course, I have another year at my Conservatory (during which I'll be acting in the Cool Regional Theatre, instead of taking classes). And before that, I'll be in classes in London for 6 weeks. But that's so not the same thing.

My super-secret callback for that pre-Broadway musical run? It went HORRENDOUSLY badly. Embarrassingly badly. I won't go into the whole story, but let it suffice to say that after singing, they didn't even keep me around to read the sides from the script that they had asked me to prepare. It was bad. And it made my self-esteem sink to a level even lower than my norm.

But then yesterday, I got my casting for the season.

My self-esteem has bounced back as a result. I'm just fine.

Unfortunately, after a couple of my classmates and I posted our casting on facebook, I promptly received 4 (FOUR!!!) e-mails from people who work at the theatre asking me to remove it from my profile (with degrees of tone varying from polite-yet-stern to scalding-veiled-threat). Why they didn't tell us that the casting was confidential when they gave it to us is beyond me. (Especially as they usually make a point to tell me if there's something that I can't put in my blog... which, fortunately for them, I hadn't done with my casting yet.)

So I deleted my casting from my facebook status. But when I ran into the head of my program today, he yelled at me about it once more. Even though I had already taken it down. You know, in case the FOUR E-MAILS I had received hadn't properly conveyed the severity of my misstep. *sigh*

But I do have a good season. I may not have gotten into the musical, but I did get a great role. In fact, I got exactly the wish that I sent To the Universe. And on top of the great role that I got, I'm also in the ensembles of two other shows, and I'm going to be in a new play festival in some as-yet-to-be-determined capacity.

In short, I'll quote Natalie Imbruglia when she won the MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1998:

I am a very happy bunny.

(\ (\
(='-')
(_")")

Sadly, I cannot say the same for all of my classmates. I'm not positive that I've heard/remembered everything correctly, but I think the breakdown* is:

- One girl has 2 leads and 1 supporting role. (yeah, she totally cleaned up... but she's fiercely talented)
- One boy has 1 lead, and is in the super-awesome-pre-Broadway musical (but his role is TBA).
- One boy has 1 lead, 1 supporting role, and 2 ensemble roles.
- I have 1 lead, and 2 ensemble roles.
- One boy has 1 lead, and 2 ensemble roles
- One girl has 1 lead, and 1 ensemble role.
- Three boys have 1 supporting role and 3 ensemble roles.
- One girl has 3 ensemble roles. (which sucks, and I don't fully understand why it happened)
- (And one girl hasn't gotten her casting yet... but based on what we haven't heard casting for yet, I'm going to guess that she has 2 leads, and 1 ensemble)

*(Note: If I wrote "lead", it means they fall somewhere between "awesome, good-sized role" to "star of the play". If I wrote "supporting" it means "character with a name". If I wrote "ensemble" in means that they were told something like "maid", "lady", "servant", "ensemble", or "chorus" in their casting meetings.)

Actually, when I break it down like that, my stuff doesn't look quite as exciting as it actually is to me. But trust me, I AM EXCITED. (ETA: Also, in comparison to the class ahead of us, my class fared better on average.)

And you know what? It's hard to be excited when you're around people who are disappointed. Especially when those people are ones whom you love, care about, and believe in.

I know what they're going through, because I went through it this year. I know what it feels like to be given a mediocre-to-weak season while surrounded by people who got great ones. I know how it makes you question yourself, and your talent, and your reputation. It makes you wonder how others perceive you, and makes you want to defend yourself. It puts you in a position of continually seeking validation. And that sucks.

I spent so much of yesterday worried about the disappointed people I love, that I actually took very little time to revel in my own luck and success. Also, it doesn't feel real yet.

It's funny; doing badly in my musical callback shook up my world. But great casting brought me to a state of relief more than one of joy.

Maybe it's just that I've regained equilibrium.

Or maybe failure is more immediately tangible than success.

Or maybe I can't process the happiness because of the melancholy around me.

But I am content.

And relieved.

And proud.

And validated.

Yes. And I'll take it.

May the good outweigh the bad in the end.

And may the sadness of others never prevent you from feeling joy.

~A~

It's Tough to Have a Crush

2010-04-24T23:30:00.002-04:00

If a person had a long-standing history of hopping out of your nice and tidy "As Good As Gay" box...

And if that person was in a relationship and off-limits...

But seemed to be verbally and physically propositioning you anyway during the time he was coupled...

And you found that person entirely attractive...

Then if that person suddenly became single, and therefore no longer off limits...

And then at a party a couple of days later, in his newly-single state, was drunkenly throwing himself at every female in sight -- EXCEPT for you...

That would suck.

And if, at said party, he made a comment about how he wanted you to lose your virginity to some random guy in London by the time your study abroad program ended...

I think you'd feel pretty justified in throwing a back-handed slap square in his chest.

(Of course, you'd apologize the next day. But it wouldn't matter, as he was so drunk that he had no recollection of anything.)

And you'd feel silly. And jealous of every girl that he preferred to you. And even sillier for feeling jealous.

And once again, you'd go back to attempting to talk yourself out of him. And try to stuff him back into that nice neat little box that he rejects so often.

May you find people to want who want you back.

~A~

To My Secret-Keepers

2010-04-19T20:52:00.005-04:00

(Me and my classmate Wifey. Yes, I'm tan, thanks for noticing. 04/14/10)

I am an excellent secret-keeper.

I am also an excellent source of information (including that of a restricted nature).

As a result, most people don't know about (or perhaps would not be inclined to believe in) my secret-keeping prowess. But I promise it's true.

I am still holding on to some major secrets that people have told me in the past. I've held one of them for 13 years, and I've never told anyone (and it is still pertinent information today). And I've discovered secrets that I really shouldn't know about that I've kept without being asked to. This includes at least one secret that affects me deeply, and that I am pained by the weight of, to the point that I occasionally hide it from myself.

But honestly? I hate keeping secrets. Especially my own.

So to the dedicated handful of followers who read this blog, even when I have long absences from it, I will now deign you my secret keepers. You have played that role for me already, as you know. And have read some blog posts that have since gone back to the mysterious land of "drafts", where I hope most people will never see them.

Today, I have two secrets for you. Keep them for me.

The first secret...

Remember a now-deleted theoretical post about what someone might do if they were put into a potentially abusive situation with a classmate or coworker?

Well, I took an action. An action I wasn't planning to take. A rather mild one, actually.

I haven't seen and repercussions of it yet. But I'm terrified of them.

And I already regret ever having said or done anything at all.

In this particular case, I just don't think it was worth the risk.

Especially since things are calm at the moment... and I may have just aggravated the waters.

The second secret...

Remember how I was asked to audition for a pre-Broadway run of a musical?

They've asked me to audition again.

And they've asked me not to tell anyone.

Normally, the theatre asking me to hide something from my classmates is something that I would falsely agree to, but then promptly disobey. After all, I hate keeping secrets. And I see no reason to keep theatre secrets from my class (whom I firmly believe should know what's going on at all times if they wish to).

And since my classmates will know my casting in 8 days anyway, it seems silly not to tell them about an audition I have in 6 days...

But I'm not going to tell them.

First of all, I don't want them to be jealous.

Second, I don't want them to beat themselves up for the next 8 days over it.

Third, if I end up not getting into the show, I don't want them to know that I had a second chance and failed.

...

(Yes, I know that the third one is silly, selfish, negative, and vain. But it's in my head.)

Fourth, this secret makes me feel a little bit powerful. The previous times I've had secrets of this nature about casting handed to me by the theatre, a select few held the same information that I did. And it seemed obvious that the information would get around. But right now, I am the only person that knows that I have this audition. Not a single one of my classmates knows. Neither of my roommates knows. The people who know are me, the people in charge of the theatre, my parents, and now you.

I suppose you could say that by putting this on the internet, I'm not keeping the secret very well. And maybe you're right. After all, I know a few people down here that know of this blog's existence. It's possible that my classmate Wifey (or her husband) is reading it right now. Or a certain 3rd-year. But I trust them. And frankly, I'm pretty sure that they don't read this anymore.

Anyway. Those are the things in my life that I don't talk about with people down here. Thank you for being my confidants.

May you be better secret-keepers than I have been today.

~A~

The Countdowns

2010-04-13T18:00:00.002-04:00

Fun and frivolous:

- 3 days until I try to sneak in to a reading that Steve Buscemi is doing in town.
- 4 days until I get to see John Landis speak.
- 6 days until the clothing swap.

A little more importantly:

7 days until my Voice showing
9 days until my Acting showing
10 days until my Movement showing

Of the utmost importance:

- 10 days until I'm done with grad school classes (although I'll still have a year in school... but it'll be as an actor more than as a student)
- 14 days until I find out my casting for the coming season.
- 17 days until my final Assessments
- 22 days until I get on a plane for London

I'm not going to worry.
I'm not going to worry.
I'm not going to worry.

I'm going to stay positive.
I'm going to stay positive.
I'm going to stay positive.

May you keep your chin up while you're counting down.

~A~

P.S. I don't have bangs. Or purple hair. Or pink hair. April fools.

New Hair

2010-04-01T00:02:00.001-04:00

So technically, I'm not allowed to dye or cut my hair.

Because of the theatre.

No, I'm not kidding.

But I'm not in any shows until October.

And I have a suspicion that they're not casting me in anything.

So I went a little crazy tonight...

Dark red with purple and pink streaks. Oh, and I have bangs.

Bite me, theatre.

Down with the man,

~A~

P.S. APRIL FOOLS!!!

To the Universe

2010-03-30T18:00:00.001-04:00

Okay, so I keep hearing lately that if you want something, sometimes you have to say you want it. Put it out into the universe.

I've prayed. And lit candles at Mass (which have been surprisingly successful). And I finally just sent an e-mail to the Head of my program about something that I really want.

So I'm going to put it into the internet, where it will surely reach all expanses of the universe.

I WANT GOOD CASTING NEXT YEAR!!!

I want to be one of the stewardesses in Boeing Boeing.

I know that they've already cast one of the three stewardesses as an Equity actress, and rumor has it that they chose the show with one of my fellow classmates in mind for another of them. So that only leaves one role left that could possibly go to me, and it could just as easily go to the classmate whom I seem to be interchangeable with. And she has requested the show as well. But she gets everything. I JUST WANT THIS ONE THING. PLEASE GOD LET ME GET THIS ONE. I NEED TO WIN ONE RIGHT NOW!!!

I would also really, really, really like to be in Bonnie & Clyde. It seems like a total long-shot... But even if I get into that (which, don't get me wrong, would be AMAZING AND AWESOME), I'm guessing I'd be in the background chorus, not in an interesting role.

And I just want one good role while I'm in grad school. Just one.

They chose 6 shows for next year's season:
- One play is only men.
- One play has no women under the age of 50
- One play has four women characters who are all TINY roles. The best among them only speaks one word at a time (which is funny, I guess). The other three don't show up until part way through the final act, and are (frankly) indistinguishable from each other.
- One play has 6 female roles (and a bazillion male roles, as usual), none of which I seem to be right for. (One is a "plump" woman, one is half-black, two are "old", and the other two small roles -- usually played by one woman -- are rumored to be cast already).
- Bonnie & Clyde (which, like I said, is a long shot, but I would be lucky -- and honored -- to be in the chorus of)
- Boeing Boeing -- a play with 4 women and 2 men.

I've read all the plays with women in my age range. Boeing Boeing is the one I'm right for. It's a silly, ridiculous, shallow, hilarious little play. And I am, if I may say so, a silly, ridiculous, shallow, hilarious little girl.

I just don't want this year to be a repeat of last year. I don't want them to think, "Oh, Angela can do anything, so we'll just put her wherever we need someone." This, my friends, is the curse of not having a strong type. I understand that it can be a blessing to not be pigeon-holed, but it also means that no one thinks of me first for anything.

And really, I don't want to leave this place without having a real role. Because honestly, if I can't get a good role here, how can I expect to get a good role anywhere?

And it's not for lack of talent or effort! (I'm sorry to brag, but it's true.) I'm good at what I do. Very good. And I think you'd be hard-pressed around here to find anyone to tell you otherwise.

I remember an episode of Seinfeld about how things have a way of evening out. I'm not complaining, but I think the black stones have been piling up on the scale in the last eight months of my life (yes, this is an allusion to Lost. Sorry for mixing karmic television ideas). I need a big white stone to balance out my scale. And the white stone that I want is good casting.

May God smile on us all.

~A~

In Case You Were Wondering

2010-03-15T08:00:00.000-04:00

- I'm going to Europe on May 5th, and will be there until July 1st.
{NOTE: If you are in Europe during this time and would like to host me for a visit, please let me know (especially if you are in Italy, Ireland, or Spain, which are all places that I'd like to go but have no place to stay). If you want to see me (and not host me) and happen to be in/near the United Kingdom (I'll be predominantly in London), or in Greece, Austria, France, or The Netherlands (all of which are countries I plan to visit), please contact me.}

- I talked to the friend who was putting me in awkward sexual situations. He stopped.

- I have a schoolmate who terrifies me, and who has harassed me in the past. I attempted to talk to the administration at my program about setting up a more clear system for students to report harassment. It's not happening.

- But I did have a complete breakdown in front of one professor, who said I will never again have to work with that classmate in her class.

- I opened a show that I'm very proud of, and that I think I'm doing good work in. My entire class is in it, which is cool. It's a total downer of a play, but the audiences seem to like it. Half of the critics love it, and the other half warn the audience that it's polarizing. I play a nurse with a New York dialect, and a prison matron with a unibrow. I love playing the nurse, but when I talk to audience members, I get more compliments on the matron.

(My entire class and our director in the pale blue shirt, after the opening of our show. 03/03/10)

- I'm on "Spring Break", which means I have no classes, but I'm still performing in six shows a week and rehearsing for another show.

- The show I'm rehearsing for is a student-produced Shakespeare play: King John. I'm playing Eleanor and Salisbury. It's a cut of the play that's rather short (70 minutes, I think). I don't have a massive role, but I'm so geeked to be in it, I can't even tell you.

- I've become friends with the classmate I once called "Alpha". We're doing pretty well right now.

- My phone says I have 13 missed calls last night between 12:35am and 1:55am from a friend. The same friend who used to be suicidal. He called me yesterday in the middle of the day really upset. I tried to call him when I woke up, but he didn't answer. I'm terrified.

- I have a t-shirt I love with a crazy print of some old-timey greyscale women dressed in 1800s clothing painting neon graffiti on a brick wall by the Eiffel tower that says "Paris Loves Hip-Hop". It's fading. I bought three different colors of sparkly fabric glitter glue to resurrect it. It looks awesome, and I'm totally proud of it.

- People keep telling me I look like I've lost weight. My scale keeps telling me I haven't.

- Two of my classmates got engaged on Valentine's Day.

- Those same two classmates are going on a Master Cleanse detox in a couple of weeks, that involves drinking homemade lemonade made from lemon juice, maple syrup, cayenne pepper, and water. Just that. For ten days. I might do it with them. I might be insane.

- I missed church this week, and I'm really bummed about it.

- I was invited to audition for a pre-Broadway run of a new musical. I did pretty well. I don't know if I'll get in or not, but I know that I'm still in the running. And that's awesome. (Please say a prayer for me if you're the praying sort. And if you're not, please send good vibes and cross your fingers.)

- My theatre has a great season next year. It sounds like there are only 4 shows that I have any chance of being in. I've read two of them, and ordered a 3rd. (The 4th is the pre-Broadway run that I'm praying for.)

- I'm terrified that I'm not going to have good casting in next year's season at the theatre. It's happened to many people before me. And frankly, my casting this year isn't great. And that's discouraging.

- My brother just got back together with the girl he'd been dating for awhile, whom I really like. They broke up on Valentine's Day, and got back together exactly one month later. I'm thrilled.

- I'm really good at the General New York dialect. And I'm really good at the Standard British dialect. And I'm really proud of both of those facts. We're doing Irish next, and it's super hard for everyone in my class. I'm going to find a way to be really good at it, I've decided.

- I love Shakespeare slightly less than I used to, just because I'm so very sick of my the way we do the scenes in my acting class... Which is basically that we COMPLETELY RE-BLOCK THEM every time we do them.

- Does that mean that I have senioritis? Or, I guess, second-year-itis? (I have another year left of grad school, but you only have classes your first two years... the third is pretty much just acting in plays)

- I want this dress and this dress (I like them both in "Bluebird", although it does not appear to be at all the same color for the two). I have been stalking both dresses for a long time. But I can't spend that kind of money on a dress. And for some reason, Express hasn't sent me any coupons in the last 3 months, and there don't seem to be any valid coupon codes on Retail Me Not (believe me, I've been trying all of them). I have one coupon, but it's not usable on the internet, and neither dress is in my local Express. This upsets me. And I think about it far more than I should.

- I made February a No-Buy Month. Meaning that I didn't buy stuff. I still bought food and other amenities. But no clothes. Or make-up. Or random junk to fill my room with. It was really, really difficult for me. As it turns out, I'm a way more emotional shopper than I thought I was.

- I'm being harder on myself for Lent this year than I have been in the past. I fasted on Ash Wednesday, and am going meatless on Fridays. I gave up alcohol (which isn't THAT hard for me, but it does suck to not have it on my opening night OR closing night parties for this show, and to not be drinking at all during Spring Break). I have also given up cookies, cake, ice cream, candy, and most other sweets. (I decided that milkshakes are my exception, because I couldn't possibly go without Shamrock Shakes at McDonalds.) And I'm trying to add more positivity into my life, and share it with others. I'm doing pretty well, actually.

- I totally had Seasonal Affected Disorder strike again this year, which I thought would never happen once I moved to Florida. But we had terrible, grey, cloudy, miserable weather for a couple of months, and I realized it coincided with me feeling generally awful about myself and my life. There was a lot of unhappiness and random bouts of crying. But the Shamrock Shakes have helped me through all of that. I'm better now.

- I got into a minor car crash in a parking lot. Which means that I was backing up, and I hit a dairy truck. Yeah. Embarrassing. And my car doesn't look great.

- After over a year of daily posts of random internet whatnot, I've decided to stop holding myself to a daily schedule on Lemon Wacky Hello. But I have one heck of an archive now, if you need some entertainment.

- I miss blogging. But I just don't have the energy.

May you never feel like you have to give up things you love,

~A~

Tempestuous Turn-ons

2010-02-01T11:00:00.001-05:00

(NOTE: This post was actually written on 01/10/10... and for some reason it posted as 01/10/09... so I'm posting it again In Case You Missed It)

Last month, I started making a mental list of things that, for one reason or another, seemed to be turn ons for me...

- the verb "to Body Worship" that a classmate used in a homework assignment for Acting class (which, as he explained it, was much hotter than what Wikipedia suggests... his involved using your hands to caress the body of your lover, using a sense of worship... it was hotter when he explained it. Seriously, every time someone mentioned that verb in class, I shivered a little.)

- young Roger Rees in the Playing Shakespeare DVDs. I'm a little obsessed.

- while we're on the subject, young Ian McKellen was pretty fine in those Playing Shakespeare DVDs, too.

- pretty much every time I've done Contact Improv with D-Train

- and sometimes when I've done contact improv with other people, too.

- or when I've watched other people do contact improv.

- a schoolmate innocently putting his hand on my leg while sitting in the audience of a workshop (although if I'm not mistaken, his hand ended up progressively higher on my leg as the workshop went on, so maybe he wasn't so innocent after all)

- a couple of text messages from a couple of guys I find attractive (one of whom I haven't even met in real life)

- any of my classmates reciting Shakespearean text (yes, even the women)

- any time a guy I know got a haircut -- even a bad haircut

- a male schoolmate accusing me of having a crush on another male schoolmate (and he was way off, for the record... but even the suggestion of it got me flustered)

- getting a hug from a male schoolmate who (accidentally, I hope) put his hand in a place where his hand should not have been during a hug

- a male schoolmate eating food off of my hands

- any time someone used an interesting word in conversation that doesn't normally enter my auditory experience (even something as basic as "modicum" or "paradigm"... which, actually, are words that I heard at my office when I worked in Chicago, and they did nothing for me then)

- reading things in books that I actually have to look up (like in the book Perfect Fifths, where I had to look up praecoxal, sapphic, abnegation, interlopers, penumbral, Mondrian, comport, and Gustave Courbet. I'll let you imagine how much I loved the part where the characters were discussing prosopopoeia and prosopagnosia)

- seeing the biceps of a classmate who works out a great deal

- cuddling with a gay man (I hope that doesn't disqualify it as being "platonic cuddling"... and I also hope it doesn't negate my label of "As Good As Gay")

- finding out that I have a friend who can name the capitals of all the countries of the world, and two friends who have memorized all 118 elements on the periodic table (and ladies, if you don't think that's hot, I'm glad, because we will never have to compete for men)

- The "Sexiest Men Alive" edition of People Magazine (despite the fact that about 90% of the men in it are not sexy... and despite the picture of Matt Damon being tiny... and despite them dedicating TWO FULL PAGES to men who play vampires in movies and television shows... and despite the fact that the picture of the three primary men from Glee somehow manages to make ALL THREE of them look less appealing than they usually do... and despite the fact that James Marsden -- who looks completely adorable in a ridiculous photo in which he's pouring syrup on a high stack of pancakes in a diner while looking away and smiling at some unseen joy-inducing sight that I can only hope is a picture of me -- is married, and that it wouldn't matter even if he weren't, as I don't actually know him and the chances that I will ever meet him are slim-to-none)

Yes, all these things. November and December were crazy times for me to live through.

I think I'm settling down now, though.

Things that have happened in the last few days that have not turned me on...

- seeing a couple I know make-out (and they're both hot)

- talking about sex (well, listening to talk about sex, as I have nothing to contribute to those conversations) with male friends in a bar

- a male classmate and I conversing in a class exercise where we were embracing and our faces were touching WHILE RECITING SHAKESPEARE

After that last one, I knew that something had changed. In retrospect, that should absolutely have turned me on, for multiple reasons. But nope. It was like doing any other classwork.

What changed?

Well, I think that going home helped. Going to Connecticut, where I don't know anyone other than my family, their neighbors, and the women I work with was bound to throw all thoughts of the opposite sex out of my consciousness for awhile. I think that's the only reason I made it through New Year's Eve relatively unscathed (except for being sneak-attack kissed by two of my schoolmates, but they were drunk and it was New Year's, so I'm just going to pretend that doesn't count).

Additionally, as I alluded to in a previous post, I had a brief but sensational encounter with a male from my past. And it knocked me right out of my bobby socks. (I don't actually wear bobby socks, but I like to take every possible opportunity to allude to the movie Grease 2. Because if I don't, who will?) And it helped me to feel so much more confident and sexy. And satisfied. And has given me the unshakable ability to rise above less appealing temptations.

Now, does this all mean that I'm incapable of being turned on now? No. Of course not. (In fact, using my memory of recent events takes care of that quickly.) I'm just no longer riding in overdrive. I'm in control. And I'm glad for that.

May you get what you need to be able to control yourself.

~A~

Death of the Party

2010-01-25T00:15:00.002-05:00

There's a party going on in my house right now. I'm in my bedroom with the lights off. Crying.

Social anxiety sucks.

I thought I was doing okay. I haven't had a bad attack in awhile, and I have good coping mechanisms. But tonight, I just felt off.

I started baking cookies mid-party. I've done it before. It gives me an excuse to be away from conversation and people for awhile, without looking like I'm abandoning a party.

It wasn't helping enough. So I ended kept plugging my ears, focusing on a spot on the floor, and humming. It was sort of helping. Until it wasn't.

When the cookies were done, I went to take them out of the oven. Someone bumped me, I burned my elbow on the oven, and I dropped a tray, which knocked some of the cookies into the rungs of the oven shelf.

And then I knew I wasn't okay.

I went to the living room, where I was alone, and tried to calm down. And I couldn't. D-Train came over and tried to calm me down. I blamed my state on the burn, so he got me ice. By the time he got back, I was crying.

He brought me upstairs with a paper towel of ice, and sat on the floor with me in the hallway. (He couldn't come into my room, of course, as it's in its usual embarrassingly disheveled state.) He held me for a few minutes, got me some tissues, and told me I was going to be okay.

He said to stay upstairs until I was calm. He said that I didn't have to come back down again, and that I shouldn't unless I had a real smile on my face.

As he left me, I heard people downstairs talking about me. "Oh, she's just upset because she dropped the cookies." "I burn myself all the time. It really hurts, so I bet that's why." Those sorts of things. Nothing mean, but it's still weird to hear people talking about you.

I heard them singing Happy Birthday to OD a couple of minutes ago. I didn't go down.

It's getting quieter. Maybe I will just stay up here.

This sucks.

I think I'm just going to keep crying. And eventually go to bed.

The funny thing is, before this, it was a pretty good day.

May you escape when you need to.

~A~

I Know Better Than That

2010-01-17T13:16:00.010-05:00

"I know better than to be friends with boys with girlfriends.
I know better than that, I know better
You'll play the victim, and I'll be the bad guy.
I know better than that, I know better"

"Boys with Girlfriends" by Meiko is about to become my new theme song. I might have to change the lyrics occasionally to fit the situation. "I know better than to be friends with boys with obsessed ex-girlfriends." "I know better than to be friends with boys who want to cheat on their girlfriends." "I know better than to be friends with boys who are occasionally having sex with my friends." That sort of thing.

There are few things I hate more than when other people say I'm something that I don't think I am, or accuse me of doing something that I don't think I've done. I'd go into a long history of things of this nature occurring in my life, but frankly, I would rather vent about current frustrations than go down a lane of unpleasant memories.

A friend of mine is non-dating a guy (I'd call it "friends-with-benefits", but I'd rather avoid the cliché). They were dating at one point, and now they've pulled it back to just being very good friends who have frequent sleepovers.

She keeps accusing me of flirting with him. Whenever there's a social gathering, and I communicate with him in any way, I upset her. And then she comes up to me (usually whispering and intoxicated) about how it doesn't matter that he's not her boyfriend, because I shouldn't flirt with him anyway, because I should know how much it hurts her when I do.

But I'm not flirting with him.

And you, dear readers, probably already know that he's in the As Good As Gay box based on the fact that he is non-dating my friend, and she clearly has strong feelings for him (or me talking to him at a party wouldn't be cause for her concern).

It just aggravates me now. Last night when she pulled me aside to confront me about my so-called flirtation (which was a conversation with him about something completely non-sexual, during which I had my arms folded across my chest, and generally most "don't touch me" looking body language I could muster), I hit her.

I meant it as a "stop being so silly" tap on the shoulder, but I guess my frustration with her manifested itself in something more ferocious than that, and I actually hurt her.

We talked about it today, and she's still upset. And even sober, she's convinced that I'm trying to steal this guy from her. WHICH I AM NOT. I DO NOT WANT HIM. I HAVE NO INTEREST IN HIM. WE ARE FRIENDS. Or, at least, we keep trying to be; she makes it difficult.

I'm not the only one she's accused of flirting with him, of course. It's just, usually, she comes complaining to me about him flirting with other girls, as opposed to confronting the girls (or him) about it. But I'm a person she feels like she can confront.

(Full disclosure: last month, on a night when he had been drinking, he did make a comment about wanting to have sex with me. But, being as how everyone down here is aware of the fact that I don't have sex, we both just kind of laughed it off. I assumed he was joking, at least partially. But it felt like I was skipping part of the story if I didn't at least mention that.)

A couple of months ago, he did something that upset her, and she brought up the problem by teasing him about it (by the way, I hate it when girls do that "drop a hint about an issue and act like it's a joke" thing. Do they really think anyone gets it? Because they generally don't). The moment she chose to do it? She interrupted a conversation that I was having at him. And then she walked away.

So he looks at me, makes a joke about it, and then says, "Do you think she's actually upset?" Knowing her, I said yes. We discussed it for a bit longer, and a little about how he might be able to put out the fire. And that was the end of our conversation that night.

About a week after that, the same situation was arising in which he had previously made the wrong decision that had upset her so much. So I sent him a text message (which I thought was a nudge-poke-light-hearted-half-joking thing) reminding him what night it was, and what action he might want to take to avoid another fire.

He was furious.

He sent me 4 angry text messages saying never to say anything like that to him again.

I apologized, and said that I meant no harm.

He sent a text apologizing for jumping on me.

When I saw him later that night, I apologized again in person. He said it wasn't my fault, that he got upset over nothing, and implied that she had already been giving him a hard time (about both that error and other things).

I feel like she's making requests (well, demands) of him that shouldn't be made unless they're in a relationship... which they're not. And I think the only reason she keeps jumping on me is just because she's more possessive than she should be.

She also once told me that he ditched her at a party to go make out with a mutual friend (which, of course, pegged several people against him for being a jerk to her), and then later admitted that she didn't actually know whether he had gone to make out with the other girl or not, but she thought he might have. (Turns out, he didn't. He went to call a drunk friend whom he'd lost track of at the party to make sure she was okay. In other words, he was being a perfectly nice person.)

I hate being made to feel like I'm the bad guy when I don't think I am. And part of me wants to get in a fight with her and tell her all the things I think she's doing wrong with this guy, but I can't. We're packed like sardines down here. You can't give anyone a piece of your mind without unpleasant ramifications.

And I know I should be the mature one. And I should just stay away from the whole situation. In my conversation with her this morning, I even offered not to talk to him anymore.

But honestly, I'm in a program of 30 people, 21 of whom I see multiple times a day, and he's one of them. I'm going to talk to him again.

****************************************************************

I took a break (i.e. about 12 hours away) from this post. In the meanwhile, I told three classmates about the conversation. Their reactions:

#1. "She needs to get over being such a controlling bitch." (And other things that were very supportive of me and very negative about her)

#2. "I can't believe she would do that to both of you. Or that she's so possessive over him." (And other supportive things.)

#3. "Seems like something that would happen to you." (And other statements about how things that I don't intend to be flirtatious are taken that way, and I need to watch my step more.)

So the jury is still apparently out on whether the problem is with me or her. I'm going to stay on my own side. I didn't do anything wrong, and I don't feel like I have anything for which to be sorry. And frankly, I'm still pretty offended.

May you stand your ground.

~A~

P.S. Hey 3rd-Year GA. If you ever read this, now you know about why I left the house last night. You were right. I did need to blog about it.