Primitive Studies of a Day Off

Sincerest apologies for the brief hiatus. I have been fairly preoccupied with several hurdles including taking an entire week off from work, UGH it was sooo difficult. Regardless I thought my 3 loyal followers would understand as there was really not much to report. Starting a new job has been a simultaneously relaxing and taxing feat so far. My week off from work has been spent taking an anthropological look at the various species that make up Manhattan's non corporate world. I always wondered how certain parts of the city can be so teeming and populated during the 9 to 5 hours. Besides the very obvious free lancer and service industry employee which you can't typically distinguish from a homeless person, who are the rest of these people?? Yes, perhaps my years spent being a tool of corporate oppression made me a little jealous of their chosen lifestyle. The days of vacation whizzed by and was frenzied with the accumulated pastime that these tiny observations became. I dissected the trust fund kids, from the ladies who lunch, from the self made entrepreneur. I felt like the great anthropologist Napolean Chagnon, venturing into the Amazon to establish himself among the Yanamamo tribe... but with a lot more bull shitting.

My impression was that all of these people must have an entirely different perspective on the city. A vast part of why I love to live here originates from my struggle to be able to stay here and survive. I never take anything for granted from the umpteenth greasy Shake Shack burger to reading the AM in the morning. What if I were to remove that element and unplug myself from the matrix as this strange breed of New Yorker has chosen to do. Extract myself from the nameless rabble of thousands that pump through the veins of the subway tunnels every morning, bringing the city to life. Would I appreciate living here the same or would become desensitized? If my day to day decisions were not motivated by money, would the city become a blur of ennui and loneliness?

While tanning along the East River I was subtle in my observation of a middle aged woman who was very blatantly staring at me as I pretended to read . She startled me with how ill equipped she was for our mutually chosen activity. She had no towel, water or tanning lotion and her skin resembled a rumpled old suede bean bag. She seemed highly territorial of her chosen spot and she exhibited this threatened nature by barking random bits of conversation at a woman across the lawn. Damn, I was Sigourney Weaver chilling with the Gorillas in the mist and all was humorous until this old silver back began to wear thin on my nerves. I backed off and left quietly as not distress the natives. Without a dispensable income, I discovered that I wasn't really missing out on a whole lot. Although there are countless things to do on a limited budget including museums and parks, I found my days were betters spent plotting my next move and handling all the impending changes that my life is going through...again.

perks of the PEN15 club

I know everyone says this but the traumas of childhood really made me the type of woman I am today. If I was not tortured on a daily basis at such an impressionable age, I could have totally turned out to be one messed up bitch. I suppose there are limits or a mental threshold that's different for everyone, a not so fine line that separates those of us who will grow and find peace with our experiences from those that will probably end up maladjusted, picking off people at random with an M-16 on top of a building or even worse co-dependent blah!

I was a late bloomer, one of those dirty little kids for which adolescence would be a questionable experience. I recall often feeling at odds with the girl that I was and the woman that I wanted to be. I played sports and climbed trees but my favorite show was Fashion Television with Jeanne Beker on VH1. I was teased and betrayed a lot by girls growing up and I came to the conclusion that women make horrible friends. After you recover from the shock of how misogynistic that last statement was, take a moment to absorb the logic. The textbook chick is heightened emotionally, competitive, protective, idealistic, fiercely loyal and steadfast in her conviction. All characteristics the may serve you well in a relationship but not so much in a friendship.

My perspective on how most people conduct their friendships in life is with the mantra of "take it or leave it". As long as you serve MY needs, we can be friends...sad but true. Unless you gave someone your kidney, friendships are NOT unconditional. So I feel like MY needs have been best served lately by seeking out male friends. The textbook dude is generally non-committal, easily forgiving, and lax. Let's not forget that to them almost anything you wear is couture and the raucous laughter that ensues from a lifestyle of low brow humor and heavy drinking is unparalleled. Downsides? Being single and hanging out with a bunch of dudes. Your not getting many numbers when your weekends are spent rolling deep with the snake ranch.

I'm not saying that there are not exceptions to this, I have a few choice women that I am very privileged to know but as far as meeting any new ones...I can take it or leave it.

Don't Mess with Text-Ass

So here's the thing, I'm a klutz. A HUGE klutz. I am that horribly uncoordinated girl to which a football or a frisbee anywhere within the vicinity will always make contact with my face. My tendencies to publicly humiliate myself has not decreased whatsoever over time but evolved. Of course, all the aspects in which I have bumbled my way through existence would also include my dating life. To make a long story short, my time in the New York City "dating pool" has been until now relatively disastrous and mortifying. Over 4 years later and I'm not sure you can refer to it as a dating pool, it's more like a "shark tank", there is only casual sex or intense monogamy in New York. Although I have grown out of being rejected via a note taped to my locker, this high tech digital age has allowed for much more immediate means by which to "handle your scandal". Maybe it's just my slightly delusional yet heavily narcissistic nature but I have happily convinced myself that my clumsiness as well as various other faults are a defense mechanism to ward off horrible men.

Case in point.... 6 months after a heinous break up with what can only be referred to as the Hindenburg disaster of all relationships (topic to be reserved for a completely different blog). I found myself feeling as if my only shot at a normal, stable, functional life would be to dip my toe in the shark tank but only seek men that had absolutely no similarities in characteristics as my previous foray...(translation, rebound) and the "perfect storm" of disappointment. Feeling already that I don't give the "average Joe" a fair chance, I allowed myself to be set up on a date with a compulsive "texter"...(translation, man who is self conscious about how stupid he sounds when he talks, so he texts ALL the time). At first Tex as I will refer to him was great, awesome sense of humor, interesting occupation and prone to excessive compliments. I thought he was REALLY different and exciting, which meant that I needed to overlook the fact that he was too short, not so eloquent in his manners and worst of all a compulsive texter. EVERYTHING was a text from meeting plans to sweet nothings.

Ladies, no matter how vulnerable you feel and how fantastic he seems don't compromise for a man who's chosen form of communication was pioneered by a 13 year old girl. True to form for me our differences came to light in the most mortifying of circumstances. I was invited to dinner with his "married couple" his #1 guy friend and his wife both flew in from Texas to have dinner and to meet yours truly. I guess I was a little nervous and played the saboteur by polishing off a bottle of wine at dinner, needless to say by the time we were having our nightcap, I was trashed. Later that evening, after everyone went to bed for the night I must have decided to get a little frisky first, then drunkingly argumentative with Tex. I recall very few details but much to my chagrin, the next morning I managed to recount with extreme clarity the most horrifying points of that evening. I put on a robe and went to the bathroom to collect myself after getting into a short verbal tiff with Tex, at that moment I was determined to march in guns blazing and tell him that I was done with his evasive little texting games. It was pitch dark, I stumbled down the hall, marched into the bedroom, removed the robe and immediately expressed my discontent...to which the response was complete silence, "DON'T YOU HAVE ANYTHING TO SAY"!!! I screamed. There was a soft male voice..."uhhhh, I think you are in the wrong bedroom". My hands felt around lightly and my eyes focused enough in the soft darkness to see that there was the silhouette of a man.. and a woman ..and my naked form sitting on the guest bed. whooops!!

Not much was said to Tex early the next morning. The next day, true to form we decided to never speak again and dissolve the entire mishap that was our short lived acquaintance via text. In this case my tendency toward public displays of clumsiness and humility gave me the realization that I never needed to settle for less than perfection. It's o.k. to date someone with the whole sizzling hot package, no matter how shallow that seems. Although this realization was at the cost of traumatizing a strange couple from Texas with my drunken rant and creepy slow sodomizing caress, I would say it was well worth it. Now I am dating again, although Darwin has suggested I enter the institution with some trepidation. The truth is, a great guy will see your stumbling bumbling ways and care for you all the more and when you find him, yesterdays idiotic embarrassing mishaps become doorways to today's fantastic, ecstatic love affairs.

every day keep hustlin'

Today I gave up my seat on the train for the first time ever. To an old Dominican woman schlepping way to many bags of crap. We awkwardly exchanged positions in the 6 train like two overly polite pedestrians fighting to give right of way on a sidewalk. I noticed that all momentary feelings of altruism immediately gave way to bitterness at the sight of WAY too many young able bodied men comfortably sitting. Assholes, nicely done you sphincter+rectum combination. I have moments occasionally where I feel such a slave to my embittered lot in life and I am truly shocked beyond comprehension at my abilities to mask this. Under the guise of prim pearls and business traditional lies a myriad of devilish thoughts. Nothing masochistic of course, just "damn that person is shockingly ugly" or "that woman's stupid accent and gay story makes me want to suffocate her with her Longchamp tote bag". I actually think it's amusing that my thoughts are still not a reflection of my moral character, just because they were not spoken aloud. Like that useless tree that falls in a forest which is never heard. Where does it come from? This feeling occasionally that if you stabbed my heart, black hot tar would ooze to the floor. Perhaps from a lifetime of telling people what they want to hear? I am 31 years old and that is literally my career. If my resume could only read "professional white liar" 2003 - 2010, with "complacent" and "placating" in bullet points highlighted by a Bachelors degree in bullshitting, the honesty might give my life a marginal level of increased direction. I departed an interview yesterday with this sentiment regarding my qualifications and still a sense of delusional pride. Just a finger snap from a panhandler, every day is a hustle and that's the truth. With each job, tested career path and interview this is the skill that I have truly perfected, a skill that defines half my life, 40 hours of each passing week. You wonder how the people that love you would react. Perhaps how they might react upon hearing every sinister thought that passed a brain wave if it then passed your lips.

4 Years~ 7 months~ 4 days

I am not really sure the direction these daily admissions will go, why I am choosing now to write it and what I can expect to find. Just that I currently feel a need to understand a decision that thousands of women contemplate taking and right now I have a perspective to convey...a story to tell.

I moved to New York 4 years, 7 months and 4 days ago and as all acts of desperation usually start, my reservations regarding the decision far outweighed the motivation. Little did I know then that I would find my choice to be exponentially far more difficult than I could ever imagine. Someday still I think that I may live to regret what I did. I left the comforts of family, friends and all that apparent prosperity in a place I never regarded as home for an alternative commonly known to be as inhospitable as the Serengeti. In New York if you stop to take a breath you are swallowed instantly by the pack. It was everything tragic and terrifying that I could have imagined and more. My semi-wise male friend once expressed a highly unoriginal observation to me and stated that, "every chick that moves here wants Carrie Bradshaw in Sex in the City". I suppose that could have been applied to a multitude of women, whether just a whiff of an idealistic dream or an actual motive. Then soon following there is always a point, if you are a sane rational woman you should realize all that idealism should regress and stay in that imaginary world of high end wardrobes and pinnacles of success all born from a dollar and a dream.

Truthfully, the city has loved me, seduced me and broke my impressionable heart. It witnessed my abject defeat with the coldest indifference. It lifts me from the abyss only to throw me back into a fiery chasms. Yet I want it, more and more with each passing year. I feel lost to it now futile against its allure and increasingly tolerant to the subtle ways it's cynicism insinuates itself in my character. Much like a drug and even with the passing interventions of consistent disappointments, it only takes one brief momentary high to bring me back. To any girl that reads this and perhaps dreams my fate, I wanna tell you how I have managed to survive my addiction. I want to start with dispelling that Manolo mind frame and embracing this paycheck to paycheck, penniless in Central Park independence for a moment and just see where it leads me. I've got one chance and one life to do this. Maybe it will be an epic cataclysmic disaster but so far 4 years, 7 months and 4 days later, I'm still strapping my sample sale find and happily going out to meet my dealer.