I was a little crabby last week. Heck, I’ve been a train wreck for quite a while but that shouldn’t come as any surprise to anyone that knows me. My birthday was last week and it was a really nice day but it just didn’t seem all that “birthday-like.” I really appreciated all of the emails, texts, and comments on my pages but to a certain extent that just added to the distant nature of the day. There were no gifts, no real birthday cake, no party, no silly hats… nothing like that. It was a great day, don’t get me wrong, but it just didn’t seem like my birthday. A great friend took me out for dinner and that was nice, she even drew a table length crayon birthday mural for me and we split 8 tiny beers and lots of great food!
I think I was mostly disappointed with my family. My mom has always gone out of her way to make sure I have a birthday cake and some sort of gift on my birthday. I remember one year where she knew most of my friends were going to be out of town so she mailed half a dozen tiny gifts to me just so I would have something to open and then last year she ordered a cake for me and had me stop by the bakery to pick it up. But this year… I got a card and that was it. It had a check in it so it’s not like I didn’t get anything and I hate to complain but it’s hard to go from having “super-amazing-thoughtful mom” to “here is a crappy card.”
I thought maybe they would make up for the lack of thoughtfulness when I went home the day after my birthday but that sort of just made things worse. I planned on going home Friday afternoon but there was this big random fire outside of town that closed the road I needed. So I called to tell my mom and of course she was disappointed. It seems my grandma was planning this birthday dinner for me that night and I felt horrible that I couldn’t go. Then my mom told me she got me a cheesecake for my birthday. (You know that vaguely gross kind that has four different flavors in it that you get from the grocery store?) I was less than impressed with a crappy cheesecake but when she asked me what I wanted I didn’t specify so I had no room to complain. But… then she told me she had promised to bring dessert to dinner and that she would save me a piece of the cheesecake. So… basically… my mom got me about the least personal and thoughtful birthday dessert possible and then gave it away before I could even have any. I was less than impressed and spent the rest of the evening bitching about it to anyone unfortunate enough to ask about my facebook status.
I woke up Saturday morning and all I wanted to do was to sleep in. I was tired, I was grumpy, I was still upset about the job fiasco from the previous week, I was upset about my lack of birthday and I was not looking forward to driving 4 ½ hours home to help clean out the old house. But I got my ass out of bed, packed a couple things, dropped my dog off at the kennel, and left for home. I got there around mid afternoon and I was tired and grumpy. I hate getting home and being grumpy since I see my family so rarely, I hate to be a jerk for that short amount of time. Everyone was in the old house making the last push to empty it out and get it clean before it’s rented out next month. Most of it was done with the exception of my room, my brother’s room, and the utility room. My brother was sitting in his room unhappily sorting his childhood toys into big trash bags and boxes and I went to my room and did the same. After about 2 hours we decided to call it a day so we could start dinner for my dad since he had to work that night. And that’s when I had my 4 year old style “no cake” hissy fit. I went to the grocery store with my mom and grandma and somehow I just boiled over and complained about the stupid cheesecake my family ate without me and the lack of any actual birthday cake. My mom humored me and had me pick out a flavor and some frosting and somehow that made everything all better. We had dinner in the new house and later that night, even though she was tired and her back hurt, my mommy made a cake for me.
The next morning I woke up and somehow everything just seemed better. I wasn’t upset about all the work drama, I didn’t feel displaced about having to pack away all of my things and sleeping in the guest room, I just felt better in general.
The rest of the weekend I was reasonably pleasant to my family and I finished emptying out my old room. It was a little odd seeing it empty since I was 4 years old the last time I saw it empty. Shutting the lights off and leaving for the last time was sort of weird, but not really in a bad way. It was somehow very liberating to have that chapter of my life over.
When I woke up in the guest room on Monday morning, I felt nervous. I felt like I had some big important meeting coming up or an interview or a date or like something big and exciting was about to happen to me. I had no idea why. Since I had such a weird feeling I almost decided to extend my stay at home for another day since I am really trying to trust my instincts these days. But my instincts told me that it was a good thing that I was nervous about and that I needed to skedaddle back home right away. So, I packed my stuff, took a shower, hugged everyone goodbye and made the 4 ½ hour drive back home.
I got back and discovered the meeting I came back for had been canceled so I went to work for a while. My phone rang 3 times in the first 30 minutes, which is weird since it never rings. I answered a lot of questions and got some work done and was feeling good about my job for the first time in a long time. I forgot that I actually enjoy what I do.
I was chatting with a coworker about a project when my friend “S” beckoned to me from her office door. If I were a middle aged, divorced mother of 3, I would be “S.” So, I went into her office and she asked me to shut the door. We sometimes have little gab sessions in there so I indulged her and shut the door. She was all sorts of excited about something and pulled out a house flier from her desk drawer. I recognized it as a flier for a house about 5 blocks from mine since I had the same flier in my living room from a walk the previous week. It is a super cute 4 bedroom craftsman style bungalow in a great part of town and it was very reasonably priced, but still way out of my budget. Then she asked if I knew “such and such” person. I didn’t immediately recognize the name and she said he was the one selling the house and that she met him that weekend and he was just great. She then went on to list a couple dozen of his best qualities and she seemed genuinely smitten with him. I was all happy for her and asked her “aw, is someone smitten?” And she asked me again if I recognized his name, because he knew who I was. And then I started to get confused… She described him and told me that he was gay and I suddenly remembered meeting him at a reception several months ago. He had just moved to town from San Francisco after a horrible separation from his partner and his friend brought him to the party to meet other gay people. I remember thinking he was cute, I remember having a very short but very nice chat with him, and I decided to keep him on my radar even though I thought he might be a little bit older than me. And then that was it. I never ran into him again but I did worry about him from time to time since I know how hard it can be to move here and he just looked so lonely and something about his loneliness reminded me of myself. “S” suggested that I contact him since she really liked him and thought the two of us would get along really well. It was at this point that I finally realized she was trying to fix me up with him. Even the slowest train eventually gets to the station.
I was flattered but didn’t really know what to do. I had his phone number and email address from the flier and so I decided to just go ahead and send him a “remember me?” email. The next morning he replied and he did remember me, and he even remembered what I did. Somehow after a few quick emails back and forth we had agreed to have coffee that very afternoon. I was suddenly nervous. Was this a date? No, it couldn’t be a date… it’s just coffee. A middle of the afternoon coffee isn’t a date. Is it?
So, I went home at lunch and changed all of my clothes and then ended up putting the same clothes back on and put my contacts in. I have killer eyes, especially when wearing blue, which I was. ;-) We were both early for our coffee “thing.” I was nervous as hell for some reason. He got there a little after me and I was sitting there with a coffee pretending to be busy with my phone. He introduced himself, we shook hands, and he went to get some coffee and I babbled incoherently about my phone for a few seconds. (idiot!) He came back with his coffee and I was still nervously pretending to do something on my phone. I babbled on about my phone for a little longer. And then he just asked if I felt awkward about being there. I assured him that awkward was sort of my thing and that my normal everyday activities had a certain base line of awkwardness. He looked at me and said he didn’t feel awkward, and just like that everything was ok. We had a great conversation about our jobs, our goals, our pasts, art, cooking, pets, naked yoga, all sorts of stuff. Before we knew it, an hour had passed and I had to get back to work. He’s coming in for a tour next week and I will go on that with him and “S” and we sort of left the door open to do something on Sunday or Monday but didn’t make any plans yet. It was all very sudden and unexpected but wonderful. He is about 12 years older than me, which could be an issue but only if we make it one. I have friends far older than him and I am exhausted with dating younger immature guys so maybe this could work. Holy shit… maybe this could work! Weird. No matter what, I think I’ve made a new friend and that is always awesome!
So after our coffee thing I had to rush back to work to talk to someone about an exhibit I am going to curate this April as part of the Shepard Symposium on Social Justice. I’m so excited about it. I think it will be incredibly beautiful and powerful and everything is just magically coming together so far. I was given the last slot of the symposium so it will essentially be the closing reception for the symposium, and the opening reception for the show itself. And… to make matters even more exciting and wonderful… Sir Elton John will be giving a benefit concert that very night across the street and just a few hours after my opening! It was a day full of wonderfulness!
It’s funny… I’m not sure if it was the cake or what… but I suddenly feel good about life again. Everywhere I look I see opportunities, where a week ago all I could see was doors closing.
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