I often wish I was one of those people who, when faced with a period of uncertainty, would make it a point to get extra sleep, eat nourishing, empowering meals and meditate quietly on how everything happens for a reason and so therefore, there is no reason to worry.
But as we all know, I’m not.
I don’t really know what turned things around for My Ex. Actually, that’s not true, I do know. But that is not my story to tell, so I won’t. But I will say this. Ever since that call in July, he has never wavered. Not even once. There was no back and forth or indecision.
But as we’ve all seen, I’m not the easiest person to “date.” I can be insecure, needy. I can get paranoid, I can drink too much. Sometimes all those things at once. In the beginning of the three months before his visit, I was so nervous he would change his mind that I would regularly get hysterical and freak out and and accuse him of ‘playing me’ and shriek things like, “I won’t tolerate this! I won’t!!”
Then, the next morning I would call him up and say in a meek voice, “I’m sorry.” And then in an even meeker voice, “Are you still coming?”
And his response was always the same: “I’m still coming, Tracey.”
“Okay. I have to stop you right there.”
“Yeah,” I said with a laugh. “I figured as much, Kanye.”
“I need a glass of wine for this.”
“Yeah, I figured that too.”
“Or a bottle,” she muttered.
I sighed. I’d just revealed to Tina that My Ex had come to visit.
And she was not happy.
At least, I had been ready. That morning.
Now that evening, I was sick with anxiety.
I’d spent the day cleaning my apartment, getting a much needed, much resented manicure, and drinking an exorbitant amount of coffee to keep me going. I was too nervous to eat but by 9pm, I was becoming dizzy from lack of nourishment and excessive caffeine, so I shoveled in a handful of Fritos.
Of course, that was when the downstairs buzzer went off.
Continue reading …One.
Thalia and Sean laughed lightly together as they hung the NQAC banner on the back wall of the Overlook second-floor patio for our One Year Anniversary Party. Sean was balanced on a chair and Thalia was unspooling wire to him as he fastened it around the nails they’d pounded into the wood.
Marlie and Bea chatted amiably at one of the tables. Marlie was folding the table-tents that Thalia had created which displayed our specialty drinks and announced our prizes. The graphics looked so professional and perfect, it made me shake my head in bewilderment. Bea was unfolding the white paper flowers which were to be placed in the pink cubed vases that would then be set out on the ten or so tables that scattered the space.
Jack and his team from Solerno and Lillet were calmly setting up the the two reception tables. White table cloths floated in the breeze and they weighed them down with their cute tote bags, which were to be gifts for all our guests. They then set up a red-framed chalkboard on which one of the girls carefully wrote out the drink specials.
The mood was serene yet festive, and filled with measured anticipation.
Clearly, no one but me could see the obvious:
WE WERE IN CRISIS MODE.
“Um, hi,” I said and cleared my throat. I clasped my hands in my lap to steady them. “Thank you guys for coming.” I took a deep breath. “I’ve asked you all here today because – ”
“Hold up,” Floyd interjected. He was typing away on his laptop. “Every good meeting needs a soundtrack. Okay…okay,” He continued clicking. “And…BAM.” He hit a key definitively and looked up at me. “Now, we can start.” The room filled with House music.
“Okay,” I said slowly. “Thank you. Anyway…,” I started and looked over the group. I realized then how incredibly nervous I was.
Continue reading August 9th, 2013. Part One.
Her message flashed at the bottom of my screen. “Why don’t you just make something up?”
“Hmm…,” I typed back. “I don’t know about that.”
“Why not?” she wrote. “It could be the kind of thing where the blog is based in truth but that some details have been altered.”
It was Saturday night and I was supposed to be working on the Venice Book. Instead, I was Facebook messaging with Tina. Continue reading Wrapping It Up.
“So what’s going on with The Crush, Trace?”
“Oh that,” I replied, as I pulled a rumpled denim shirt from my suitcase.
“Yeah, that.” His voice was tinny, as I had him on speaker. It was New Year’s Eve and Zeke had called to check in. He and Boomer were visiting his family in Oregon and I was in NYC unpacking from my California Hometown Holiday trip. “You seemed so into it. And then we never heard about him again.”
“I found out he was seeing someone.” I smelled the armpit of the shirt. Had I worn this? I couldn’t remember. Continue reading Sometimes, It Just Is What It Is.
“So, when it snows we don’t come to work, right?”
Stan gave me a quizzical look. “No,” he said slowly. “We still come to work.”
“Oh,” I said and offered a strangled, fake laugh. “I know. I was just joking.”
He frowned.
Fuck! What was I thinking?! How could I ask such a stupid question?! This was New York City! Of course people went to work when it snowed. It wasn’t like Los Angeles where a light sprinkling of rain would shut down the city and you would break your dinner plans. Continue reading Beware of the Wordsmith. Part Four.
Not Quite A Cougar 