For the past few months, I’ve been spending more and more time with an old friend of mine from high school. We’d been close back then, he being a prominent part of our nerdy, wonderful little group. College pulled us apart, though, and save for one or two dinners in the interim years, we really hadn’t seen each other since graduation.

It was Friday evening after a particularly boring week, when I was surprised to see the familiar name on my cell caller ID.

“So it seems that your blog has requested my friendship on MySpace,” he told me with a bit of a laugh in his voice.

“I didn’t even know that inanimate objects could create profiles!”

I cracked up and after chatting for a while, we made those tentative usually never actually happen “let’s grab drinks soon” kind of plans and hung up. Minutes later, the phone rang and it was him again.

“Actually,” he asked. “What are you doing now?”

Somehow, he convinced me out of my pajamas and into the shower, and two hours later we were sitting in a coffee shop downtown, enthusiastically catching each other up on the last several years of our lives. We spent a lot of time marveling over the way the hobbies and extra-curricular activities we had each been obsessed with at age 16 had now, nearly ten years later, become our careers. It was hours before I got home, coffee having turned into a movie followed by drinks and then a couple hours of just wandering around West Village side streets. Morning light was just starting to creep into the sky when I finally crawled into my bed, feeling happy at having found my old friend and still relishing in that familiar comfort of being around someone who knew you when your hair was always frizzy and your stupid knee socks would never stay up.

We found ourselves telling bits of that story again this past weekend as we dined and drank and dined and drank again with some of his friends and coworkers—a vibrant circle of clever, intelligent people that I’ve been openly coveting as my own for the past couple months. I was chatting with a girl sitting across from me when I heard him mention going to a concert I would have loved.

“Wait…wait…and you went without me?!” I exclaimed, a bit offended at the thought.

“No, no,” he said quickly. “This was a couple years ago. It was after/before!”

“After/before?” I asked, the sangria/blueberry stoli/wine combination I’d been imbibing all night lending obvious fuel to my confusion.

“Yeah,” he said with a smile, “after we met but before we met again.” My smile broke through then as I understood. “Ohhh…” I said with a boozy whisper. “I call those dark ages…”

Labels: friends, memories, New York

I rushed past that spot again today on my way home from work. It was probably about the 10th or 11th time since, but it was only today that I realized it as I walked by, heels clicking quickly where they once were content to stand perfectly still.

It felt like fallout; space imbued with so much weight. The rush of dizziness and heat as intense as the moment rising, then disappearing just as suddenly.

It didn't even look the same. A mass of people: police officers, officeworkers, shouting prophets, highschool kids with low-slung backpacks. A little boy tried to jump the turnstile--his dad stopped him.

That night felt silent, but this seems more familiar--less terrifying. This I understand. I swipe my card. I lift my purse to pass.

The dizziness comes and goes, and (as the facts fade into memory) I wonder if perhaps it wasn't ever really even that strong to begin with.

Labels: memories, Moments, New York, The Subway

I ask him to join me outside for a cigarette and he obliges gallantly, unenthusiastically. We stand outside the rope and watch the cars and our breath mingling seductively with the smoke.

I note the slight step back he takes when I move closer, the way his muscles tense when I lay fingertips lightly on his chest. But he laughs at my stories and looks at me in that way... searchingly. (Quizzically?) I match his glance with my own, wondering if he can see the screams streaming out of my eyes. In my head they're like lightning bolts, razor-edged and fiery. In my head they knock him down hard. In reality, I'm the one that is falling.

In an hour or so he'll press me against a wall at the next bar; hands searching familiar territory, mouths pulling and devouring. We'll lose our friends and make our escape into the cold night, conspiratorial laughter and whispers echoing into the near-empty street. We'll sleep soundly, after, and in the morning will fall into each other once again without question.

In a few hours, this moment will seem irrelevant. This panic, unnecessary. But for now, I continue to talk too quickly. I bite my lip. I ash nervously. Because for now, he hesitates.

Labels: memories, New York, Smoking

I was going through some old notebooks from college this weekend and came across this journal entry that I wrote after a trip that a group of friends and I took to Guatemala during the spring of my sophomore year. It's another unpolished piece and a few of the cliche descriptions make me want to cringe, but I was taken by the underlying sentiment of indignant idealism that could only come from the pen of 19-year-old.


For more than two hundred years, the walled city of Antigua served as the military seat of the Spanish colony of Guatemala, which encompassed most of present-day Central America. Situated in a narrow valley at the base of the volcano Agua, the original city was destroyed twice before someone realized that walls or no walls, a capital city at the base of a volcano is, strategically speaking, never a good idea. In 1773 it was moved to what is now Guatemala City, but the missions and many of the Spanish style buildings still stand. For Agua, more than 250 years have passed in silence, and the volcano is believed to be dormant, but constant rumblings and daily bursts of steam from the menacing cone-shaped mountain seem to threaten otherwise.

But for now, the only strategy in Antigua is tourism. The streets are crowded with accents. Well-to-do Europeans, red like cooked lobsters, mix in with dread-locked college students in their natural fibers and Birkenstocks. And of course, Americans, heaving their weight around the bins of the marketplace, knocking over piles of coffee grounds with their nylon fanny packs. On my second day there, my friend Toby and I try to use a public phone to call home, only to realize that we've forgotten the US country code.

"Quick," I joke. "Find a fanny pack!" Spotting one around the corner I wave to the woman and ask, "Are you American? Do you know the country code?"

Turns out that it's "one."

"Well I wonder who decided that," snickers Toby.

__________

I'm in the town center and I'm alone today. The rest of the group left around five in the morning for a day trip to Panahatchetel, a village on Lake Atitlan, an impossibly beautiful body of water occupying the crater of an extinct volcano. Being one of the only students fluent in Spanish, I volunteered to stay behind to serve as a translator for the two students whose stomach's didn't agree with the Guatemalan food and who were now spending the day retching in an Antiguan clinic.

Around noon I walked them back to their hotel rooms and left them with water and strict instructions to take the Cipro I'd acquired from a nearby pharmacy where, interestingly enough, a smile seemed to serve just as effectively as an actual doctor's prescription. I wander in the direction of the town center, where the locals gather daily to pawn their wares on the tourists that fill the streets. The city also serves as the market center for the surrounding villages and so each morning families ride in on bright green and red buses, packed to the nines with piles of textiles, coffee, and crates full of live chickens.

Male and female, hovering around five feet, the natives quickly run amongst the clusters of foreigners proffering their goods. "Senor, senor! Solo Cien Quetzales!" The men carry bundles of hand-woven blankets strapped onto their backs. The women balance large baskets of coffee beans on their heads. Even the children, no older than ten, walk around with plastic bags filled with sliced mangoes, popcorn or coconut candy tied to sticks carried on their shoulders. It's the "15 cents a day" kids from the commercials. The ones that look at you while flies buzz around their faces and John Lennon imagines in the background.

A little boy gazes up at me with his giant eyes and even though I know he's been pulled out of school and sent here precisely to make me feel this way, I hand him a coin and take a bag of mango slices. There's history in these round almond eyes, the cafe con leche skin, the silver-capped teeth that reflect the sun--smiles that literally beam, I note.

I continue to wander around the market, touching blankets and smelling bags of coffee. I come across a display of large wooden salad bowls complete with eight small salad plates and serving utensils. I think about how back home the set would probably only come with four plates and wonder if that really means anything.

A woman walks over to me and smiles. She's missing a tooth in front and long black hair is wrapped in a woven scarf. "They are all carved by hand," she tells me in Spanish. I smile back at her and tell her that I think they're beautiful. Her smile widens when she realizes that I speak her language. She comes closer and asks me where I'm from. I tell her that I'm Puerto Rican but that I was born and live in the US. She nods her head and says, "I thought so, you are too pretty to be from Guatemala. The best-looking Latinas are from the Caribbean." When she says this, she touches her own face and I'm not quite sure what to say. Instead I look down at the bowl and ask her how much for the set.

"300 Quetzales," about 30 dollars. "But for you, since you are Latina, only 250." I know that I can get it down to 200, but I don't try. I tell her that I'll take it and she starts wrapping it in newspaper.

While she wraps she asks me questions about what I do and where I live. I tell her that I'm a student and that I live in Washington, DC. She asks me if I've ever been to the White House and gets excited when I tell her that yes, I have. She raises one of the sheets she's using to wrap the bowls. We declared war on Iraq yesterday and President Bush's face is on the page. "Have you met him?"

"I shook his hand once."

She looks down at the page and sighs, "I think he looks like a good man."

This catches me by surprise. Most of my friends hate the President and many are angry about the war. "Why do you say this?"

"His eyes. He has the eyes of a good person. Here the politicians don't look like that..."

From the little I've read about the country's political history I think I know what she means, but I know that I don't really understand--and I'm thankful for that. As I take my bag and turn to leave I remember what she'd said earlier. "You know," I start. "The Guatemaltecos have the most beautiful eyes that I have ever seen." I bend down to give her a kiss good-bye and she says, "Es el dolor de la gente." It's the pain of the people.

I feel like I'm bridging something, or maybe it's more like a scale and I'm somewhere in between the cooked lobsters and the cafe con leche. I feel it every time I talk to someone. This morning, the man at the bakery asked me where I'm from and I told him. Just like the woman in the market he told me that Puerto Ricans are more beautiful than the Guatemalans. I protested and told him that I'd seen many beautiful women during my time in the country. "Muy India," too native, he said, wrinkling his own Mayan nose. Again, I don't know how to respond.


__________

A few days pass and we're back in Guatemala City. The group is together and we're in the van heading for the airport. On the main highway we pass a billboard advertising a local newscast. The team of anchors smile broadly in coordinated suits. They look strangely American. Their fair skin and Anglo features contrast starkly with the faces I saw in the marketplace. I point this out to the friend sitting next to me.

"What does 'La Voz' mean?" He asks, referring to the slogan printed in bright yellow letters across the billboard.

"The Voice," I say. It says, 'The Voice of Guatemala."

He looks at it and rolls his eyes. "Doesn't really look like it..."

Labels: conversations, Guatemala, memories, travel

Intuition can be a funny thing sometimes. The way that tiny instincts can sometimes lead to the completely and utterly unexpected. That feeling, for example, of being drawn at the very, very last second to a party that I was really tempted--and really quite determined--to skip. Or the pull that lifted me out of my chair, led me to walk across the bar, and gave me the courage to talk to the stranger who'd been silently watching me all night.

"I was waiting for you to introduce yourself," I said to him with a confidence that scared me a little bit. And he smiled and nervously ran his fingers through his boyish sandy blond hair and admitted that he was shy, that he hadn't been sure quite what to say. "I fell in love," he said later, and I laughed and let the words fall over me all warm and dreamlike and impossible, but still...maybe? And for those brief moments I ignored the cynical bits that usually gnaw at me--the disappointments, tears, and unmet expectations—and let myself feel the fairytale that had seemed to be slipping further and further away with each passing month.

“Will you disappear if I bring you home tonight?” I asked him a couple weeks later as we stood near a cab, my voice suddenly hesitant with a mix of fear and drunken honesty. He thought before replying, his eyes darkening a bit, a hand on my cheek as he looked at me and told me exactly what I wanted—and needed—to hear.

“Princess,” he whispered, later, when I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled him down towards me again. "Yeah, baby?" I said, my eyes looking up at his, our mouths just seconds away. “We should wait to get home...” he murmured unconvincingly as I slipped my hand over his chest and buried my face in his neck. "OK," I sighed, pulling away for seconds before he drew me towards him again. I could hear someone speaking German, the rush of cars as we drove by, a honk, a siren, it all seemed to blur into the background...

There would be no waiting.

In the orange glow of the morning I counted the freckles, chocolate brown specks clustered along the smooth white expanse of his back. Funny how natural it seemed, this semi-stranger in my bed. The muscles in his arms curved like sand dunes and my stomach fluttered as I traced them with my eyes. He rolled over slowly,and I wondered if he'd felt me watching him. I noticed that our hands had somehow found each other in the night. Our eyes locked for a moment and he wrapped the rest of his body around me. Together, we drifted back into sleep, me nestled tightly in those increasingly familiar arms.

We spent the entire morning and part of the afternoon like this, with breaks for water, more kisses, falling in and out of sleep. I dreamt about him and he about me and when we woke we laughed to discover this, both of us slightly confused as to how much we’d dreamt and how much we’d actually lived. “Did you kiss my forehead just a second ago?” I thought about asking, but didn't because I knew that at that very specific moment, dreams and reality and yesterday and tomorrow really just wouldn't mean anything at all.

Labels: dating, memories, New York

"The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say."
-Anais Nin

Something about it felt illicit. After all, I wasn’t supposed to be there. I’d run away (again) from the bells and schedules, slipping down the halls unnoticed, hiding amongst the oft-ignored shelves.

He knew that I was there. I could feel him watching me from his desk as he stamped and catalogued. “You’re different because you love it here,” he’d told me the first time he deliberately “forgot” to ask me for my pass. I sat curled-up in a corner of the quiet library, lost in the pages that the others saw as obligation.

I had an odd bond with this man. Mr. Spear (“like the thing you throw,” he’d always say and chuckle proudly at his little joke) was the stereotypical embodiment of his occupation: bespectacled, quiet, he had a few stories that he routinely told me. My favorite being the one about a friend who owned 6 cats, each named for one of Jane Austen’s novels. “I’d hate to be Northanger Abbey,” he always added at the end. He was a friendly man who let me hide out among the stacks on the days when I wanted to skip biology, concert choir, or Phys-Ed (my three least favorite courses).

It was on one of those afternoons that I discovered her. I’d been looking for something else, when my eyes happened to stop on the fading, nearly illegible words: In Favor of the Sensitive Man and other essays. I placed my forefinger on top of the book and tilted it out slightly. Anais Nin. The name reminded me of the flowery perfume favored by several of my aunts. I pulled it out completely and studied the black and white picture on the cover. It was of an older woman with a childish face. Her long, graying hair was twisted around her head in an intricate braid, and her slim figure was wrapped in an embroidered kimono. There was an aura about her that was at once inviting and exotic. I immediately wanted to know who this woman was.

I brought it back to my chair where the book released a tender sigh as I cracked its spine for seemingly the first time in years. A turn to the faded names and dates on the brittle card in the back revealed that it had indeed been nearly two decades since it had been read. Library books are memento mori; relics read and left by students past. I thought of the others that once rummaged through these stacks—uniformed ghosts that had long since left their adolescence behind. I gently turned the pages, at first pausing randomly over the paragraphs, then hungrily going back and devouring each of the essays. The writing was dreamlike, erotic, and completely out of place within the crucifix-studded walls of my Catholic high school library. In those passages I recognized the feelings I’d long been unable to explain.

I worked my way through her words until Mr. Spear gave me the look that meant that he could no longer afford to hide me. There was something about it, though. I was loath to return it to its spot, and yet I didn’t want to check it out for the maximum two weeks. I wanted it. And not just that title, I wanted that very same book. I wanted to take home the musty pages, the fading cover. It was love at first read and I didn’t want to let go. And so, with only a slight hint of guilt, I slipped it into my black nylon book bag and walked out with the broken eighth commandment hung casually over my shoulder.

That afternoon marked the beginning of a love affair that has spanned a decade. After that moment I sought out Nin’s work in whatever form it appeared. I amassed every volume of her revolutionary diary, as well as the many volumes of fiction, erotica, and literary criticism. My favorite of these was—and still is—the intimate collection of letters she exchanged with Henry Miller, her long-time lover, friend, and literary colleague.

I was fascinated by her ethereal use of language and intrigued by her life. She was brilliant, damaged, and brazenly naked. Her work is a stunning juxtaposition of aching fragility and unapologetic strength. I find comfort in her words, often seeing bits and pieces of myself as she details her struggle as a writer, her desire for passion, her constant need to transcend reality by imagination.

Today, as I searched for a book among my own collection, I came across that well-worn copy. The catalog number is still printed in a typewritten font along the yellowed spine. Holding it in my hands, the scent of the pages transported me back to Mr. Spear’s library. Once I again I was that 14-year-old girl in droopy kneesocks and pleated plaid, escaping from the tedium of required classes in an attempt to find something bigger. It’s far from my favorite of her books, but it’s one that I hold dear for it introduced me to a world that I might have otherwise missed.

Labels: books, memories, Nerdiness, Writing

Moe is one of my best friends. Three years apart to the day, we met when we were both employees of the same organization. To be exact, I was the administrative intern (read: jr. office bitch) and she was the Office Manager (read: sr. office bitch). In other words, she was my boss. She’ll probably be quick to regale you with stories about what a lousy intern I was. She’ll tell you that I hated filing, and spent much too much time blogging and Photoshopping* members of the Republican administration (and sometimes our bosses) into compromising, albeit amusing, positions.

It was my first “real” job, and the epitome of what a summer internship in Washington, DC should be. It was a sexy and silly blend of office politics and real politics, flirting and copious drinking. My memories of it are a blur of margaritas, late-night Metro rides, and men in navy blue blazers. I learned quite a bit that summer. I learned how to handle insurance claims, talk to senile Floridian donors, and score the coveted private back room at Capitol Grille. I learned how to mail merge, how to research and track Federal legislation, and that when a customer service rep reads you a confirmation code, he does not literally want you to write “Alpha, Bravo, Charlie,” on the envelope. I also learned that I hate administration, and that I will never, ever again take a job where I’m required to use Excel spreadsheets on a daily basis.

What I remember most, however, was the friendship I developed with Moe. The two lone girls in an organization dripping with Republican testosterone, ours was an easy and near-instant bond. We discovered our shared quirky humor one afternoon when our boss shut down the office so that we could all attend the premiere of Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (I should clarify that it was nerdy Republican testosterone). As we stood outside the Uptown waiting to get in, I glanced at a robin’s egg blue sign hanging above the store next door. “Moe, Moe!” I called to her while excited pulling at her arm. She followed my eyes to the sign and immediately burst out laughing.

Our boss rolled his eyes upon hearing our laughter (a familiar sound in the office). “What is so funny?” We didn’t even bother explain why we were laughing. We both understood that we were standing in front of the world’s most absurdly named establishment.

We were smart girls in ill-suited jobs. We were artists that stuck out from the Capitol Hill powersuit crowd. Moe is also a writer and a blogger, and it is her most recent post that provoked this bit of reminiscing. In it she recounts her awkward, youthful nerdiness. She writes:

"I had a specific outfit that I wore whenever we were going to the library. It involved a red, plaid, pleated skirt; penny loafers, a blazer, and a pair of my sister's old glasses that she used to read with. I didn't require corrective lenses at the time, but I desperately wanted them. They completed "the look" (I'm almost certain Alejandra will have a comment about this)."

She’s right. I do have a comment. An anecdote really:

Moe will probably note that in addition to my refusal to file things, I also liberally violated the accepted superior/subordinate relationship. Our bond was so close that I was never too shy to note when something she did didn’t quite meet my standards. “Moe,” I’d say to her as I walked into the office and saw her dressed in baggy jeans, platform flip-flops, and a t-shirt that said “Joe Mama” across the front. “You’re dressed like a 12-year-old boy! What the hell kind of a work outfit is that? I never want to see that shirt again.”

There were some days, however, when she would wear very cute suits to work. On these days, she would also wear a pair of very attractive black-rimmed glasses. They were impossibly cute, and when paired with the pencil in the hair bun, she looked like quite the stereotypical sexy secretary. All the men in the office agreed, and regularly complimented her on her choice of eyewear. One day, I wandered the four feet between my desk and hers and saw her sexy glasses on the desk. I picked them up, tried them on, and gasped.

"THESE ARE FAKE!!! YOU WEAR FAKE GLASSES!" I shouted at the top of my lungs, much to her chagrin. She scrambled to explain, but by then, all the men had come out of their offices and had learned the awful truth.

I still don’t think she ever forgave me for that one…

Check out The Garden State of Euphoria for more stories about the lovely Moe.


*activities for which I am actually handsomely paid to do today...

Labels: DC, friends, memories

The e-mail came in around mid-day. “Just driving thru London and listening to Volcano. Thought of you…”

It was my favorite song while I was with him. We listened to it over and over and again while spending lazy, boozy days in bed. At times, the lyrics felt uncomfortably familiar. Damien Rice's moody voice a constant reminder of the 14 years that separated us. It only bothered me because it bothered him. He’d go back and forth, joking that I was more mature than he, but then noting that in just 4 years he’d be turning 40. “Fourty…” he’d repeat, spitting out the word like a piece of sour candy. I’d stay silent and stroke the back of his head, watching him as he wrapped his mind around that reality.

The irony is that he was such a boy. It’s what pulled me towards him; it’s what made me stay. Tall, clever, bookish, and handsome; ours was part-time relationship built on excess. He was never my boyfriend—he was just the one I thought about at night, the one I spent my weekends with. He was selfish, though. Arrogant too. He talked too much and listened little, but it was the way he looked at me that made it OK. He was fascinated by me. Continuously impressed by the way that I lobbed his clever comments right back at him. One morning, as I stood in the kitchen making breakfast in his t-shirt he looked at me from the bed.

“What?” I asked, noticing the bemused smile on his face. “You’re perfect,” he said, his accent drawing out the syllables. “What are you doing with an old man like me?”

“I’m making you tea,” I said as I poured water into the kettle.

He drank and smoked and partied too much. So much that it was a problem. He was like a volcano waiting to erupt. Slurred phone calls, cancelled dates, days when he went missing. I cried a few times. I hated that I’d let him get to me. And so I put up a wall, and slowly got over him.

He moved back to London. He got help for the drinking. The messages started again, but they were different. Friendly, but stilted. I just wasn’t sure what to make of it. I didn’t really want him as a friend, and I’d already shut down the other part.

“Come to London,” he asked me. “I’ll take care of everything…”

Three times he's offered over the course of the past year or so. Three times I've refused—the most recent being a few days ago.

It’s an offer that few would turn down. A trip abroad, to a city I’ve always loved, with a man I once thought I did. But I can never bring myself to accept.

When I got his message today, I searched for the song in my library and listened to it a few times. Memories and feelings rushed back like a wave. Strange how bad ideas can sometimes seem less so when you feel a little bit lonely, a little bit sad…

“I still love that song,” I finally replied. And then I wondered: and him?


The song.

Labels: life decisions, memories, music

I loved snow days growing up. Those unexpected holidays in the midst of the long gray months between Christmas and spring. At night I’d pay close attention to the weather report. I had a girlish crush on Sam Champion, the tanned, broad-shouldered local weatherman on Channel 4, and when the words “nor’easter” or “cold front” escaped from his lips, it was all I could do to keep from kissing the television screen.

Those were always sleepless nights. I’d slip out of bed every couple hours to check the progress of the snow accumulation on nearby rooftops, wondering whether it would be just enough for them to cancel school. Leaning against the radiator below my window, I’d press the tip of my nose against the cold glass panes and watch as the falling flakes danced and floated in the moonlight before gently settling down on our driveway.

The calls always came in early—just shortly before 6am—and without even waiting for my mom to tell me that classes had been cancelled, I’d shut off my alarm and finally settle into the deep sleep that had escaped me all night.

I loved the lazy mornings. My brother and I would wander down to the kitchen around noon, and pour ourselves bowls of sugary cereal. We’d bundle up in layers and tumble off the back porch into the snowdrifts that had piled on our lawn. After a couple hours of rolling about in the snow, we’d drag ourselves back in and drop our soggy clothing into a pile in the bathroom. The rest of the day was generally spent napping, watching cartoons, and sipping microwavable hot chocolate.

My dad usually had to go to work these days, and Gab and I would watch as he grumbled and braced himself for the bitter cold. He would blast 1010 WINS, the NY radio station, and try to determine the best route to his office.

“But it’s snowing!” My brother and I would protest as my dad kissed us good-bye, not understanding why he couldn’t stay home and play too.

What I think that I loved about these days was they way that they seemed to freeze time—if only momentarily. Work, school, practices—nearly everything was suspended by the snowy blanket. The cars stayed off the roads and most of the stores were closed. Life was quiet, and play seemed to be the only order of the day.

Yesterday they were predicting an awful storm for the area. Before leaving work, I received an e-mail announcing that if the storm took hold, we would be able to work from home at our discretion. For the first time in a long time, I felt that feeling of childish anticipation. Unlike most adults, who were praying that the storm would bypass New York and make the commute easier, I hoped that I’d wake to find piles of impenetrable precipitation on the ground.

Last night, just before getting into bed, I found myself as I’d done so many years ago—nose up against the glass, my breath fogging circles on the window panes, watching for the snowflakes, and praying for the unexpected break that only nature can bring.

Labels: memories, My Crazy Family, Winter