I am a dangerous mix of no sleep, 3 cups of coffee, 2 beers and a slice of banana cream pie… and the night is still young.
Watch out!
Tonight started with a happy hour. Every once in a while I’ll field an invitation to tag along from my old co-workers. And while I never took them up on it when I worked there, ironically, I go along now.
My old boss was in tow. He and I are kindred spirits. We get each other. It wasn’t always that way. I use to be terrified of him. I remember being all shakey with my stomach in knots whenever I had to deliver some kind of proof that I actually DID something around there to collect my pleasantly plump paycheck. But eventually the nerves gave way to this understanding between us and we’ve lived happily ever after.
He could see that I am new now. My drinking and coy whisper in his ear that I’ve finally smoked pot and giggle like a madman when I’m high makes him smile and offer me a little something something, but then he remembers he has to go home and start his second shift as dad and husband soon. He tells me I’m a smart girl. That I’m welcome back. That there is a job for me. That it’ll all work out. And unlike when M or my mom or any other well meaning friend tells me those exact same words, I believe it this time. Because this time, it was said with an escape hatch. It came with a casual mention of a desk and a computer and health insurance and happy hours. A soft place for me to lay my head for a while.
I think I’ll take him up on it.
Leaving happy hour, I was, ironically, feeling more melancholy than the promised “happy.” My mind was lost in swirls of wondering why I had missed so many of these little get-togethers when I was part of the fold. WHAT WAS I THINKING?!? I was thinking that I was nothing much at all. I was plain jane me. Whip-up a casserole me. Drinking diet coke me. Watching Trading Spaces me. Afraid of people me. Consumed by my weight me. Happy on the outside me.
Thankfully, I am not that anymore. The girl I was and the girl I am are one in the same. Wholeness is the difference. I can be the girl at the bar with the easy laugh and I can be the girl who carries around a kick-ASS lasagna recipe in her head, too. I am not all one or all the other. I am a unique, weird and surprising balance of the two, thank you very much.
I don’t know how I would have ever gotten to this point if it weren’t for M and the terrible no good very bad summer. It makes the summer look not so very bad or terrible at all. But rather, worth it. Or at least kinda sorta worth it. Or at least not the WORST thing ever. That's something, right?
OH ALRIGHT, it's worth it. Gaaawd.
Take this afternoon. P came by, a good friend of M’s. I had met him way back, when I was a shrinking violet. Never said anything to him though. Friendly hellos, a nice to meet you surely - but that’s all. Nothing like today. Within 5 minutes we were sitting on the couches sharing weight loss revelations and how making the decision to think of your body as “good” changes your life. These are things I would have rather DIED than share with anyone 4 months ago. And here I was, smiling, eager and having a hard time shutting up because I had so much to say – and to a BOY nonetheless. DANG. I feel kinda proud of myself.
It’s nearly 10pm and I’m waiting on M to get back from a rehearsal dinner for a wedding he doesn’t much want to go to, much less be in. From his arrival on, we will surely embark on some sort of THC adventure where we most likely don’t even leave my room much less go to see the Midnight Evils at the Entry. We’ll fall asleep and not feel our feet and laugh at things that won’t seem NEARLY as funny the next day.
Oh! I hear his key in the door.
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