That's What Girls Do, Keep You Guessing The Whole Day Through, Play With Your Emotions, Push All Your Buttons, It's True, That's What Girls Do

--"That's What Girls Do", No Secrets

We were both tired from a long day out on the streets of Memphis. I know I've mentioned it before, but there is no better spot for great music and great eats than that little 'ole town. However, there is one downside to basically frittering the day away on nothing but eating and merriment. It leaves you plum tuckered and aching to crawl into bed. That's how Greg and I felt coming back to the hotel. We were ready for someone to push us over onto the mattress and yell "timber!"

I had only recently turned twenty-five and the conversation that night had turned to the fact that I was getting up in years. Greg had told me that he had noticed that my once wanton ways had seemed to mellow and how the change had looked good on me. I expressed mild disappointment at the assertion. In my heart of hearts I thought I had managed to hold onto the fire and grit that had always been a hallmark of my character. Yet the more I rationalized over it, the more I turned over exactly what he had said, I saw that my honey was only trying to pay me a compliment. What was he going to say? That I'd gotten stale in my old age and that it was time for me to be thrown out with the other moldy lumps? I don't think so. It's a facet of married life to accept the other individual not only for what they are, but also for what they are destined to become. If Breanne's lot in life is to become as stagnant as the waterpail after a Spring shower then it was her husband's lot in life to compliment her on her willingness to accept it. That is basically his only job when it comes to our marriage.

It isn't my job to accept it, though.

"What are you doing?" I heard Greg ask as I ran into the elevator without him. He should have ran with me, but he was too pooped to pursue so I was left alone in the carriage of the elevator. I watched as the doors close upon him as he came within five feet of getting in.

I pressed the twenty-third floor button where our room was located, giggling to myself for still having the ability to be the burr in the britches of my husband. Not as wicked as I was before? Hah! I was determined to show him that I still had a few aces up my sleeve when it came to being playful and fun. At first my thoughts turned to going back to the room and locking him out as I had been charged with the responsibility of holding onto the key. Then another more delicious idea crept up into the keen head of mine.

I pressed about four more buttons on the elevator. If he wanted to figure out which floor I had gotten off of, then he would have to do some leg work.

As soon as I had stepped off the elevator onto the floor I had picked, I felt my phone ring.

"Hello?"

"Breasy, dear, this isn't funny. I'm standing outside the room. Where are you?"

"Who is this?" I asked.

"What do you mean 'who is this?' You know good and well who this is."

"Who are you? I don't know you. Prank caller, prank caller..."

"Come on now. Just come open the room so we can go to sleep. We have to get to the airport tomorrow, Bre."

"If you want me, come and claim me, sugar," I said, hanging up.

I went back into the elevator and headed back down to the lobby. Part of me believed that he would really wait outside the hotel room all night until I finally tired. It would be exactly like him to not indulge me in my reindeer games. But, as tired as he was, he knew who would always win when it came to a stubborness contest. If I'm determined to do something, God in all His might is what it would take for me to be dissuaded from it. And I was mightily determined to put my poor husband through his paces just for having the audacity to even consider I was losing my touch. He would eventually come looking for me since he knew better than to believe that mere begging would work.

When I made it down to the lobby, I half-expected to find him waiting. I was relieved to make it out of the elevator relatively undetected. There was, however, a fifteen-year-old girl sitting by herself in the hotel lobby who did think it was rather odd the way I sprung out of the doors in an effort to surprise my husband had he been waiting. She laughed when I explained very simply that I was playing keep away from my rather befuddled husband. She found it very amusing that someone my age (Ha!) still played such games.

I took the seat next to her and waited for my husband to come downstairs, at which point I would have bolted out the front doors until he I finally let him catch up with me. We both knew who would win in a fair foot race. These puppies were built for two things, dancing and racing, and woe betide any and all who think they can outlast me in either event.

He never did come down, though. I started to think I should have given him more credit. He was, in fact, determined to wait me out upstairs. That's when the second phase of my plan fell into place. I asked my new friend, Paula, if he would help me out and ten minutes later my evil genius was certified.

I called my husband.

"Okay, you win, I'm coming up now. Meet me outside the elevator."

"It's about time. I was thinking you were never going to give up."

I don't exactly know what kind of look my husband had on his face when those elevator doors opened up and out stepped Paula dressed in my clothes, but I do remember receiving the phone call down in the lobby. I was a tad uncomfortable draped in Paula's rather tight blouse and shorts. Ah, the price we pay for a well-executed practical joke. I picked up the phone and was greeted by a couple beats of silence. Then I heard it--all the frustration, the anguish, and the unmitigating frailty in his voice.

"I just want to sleep, Breanne. That's all I want."

I laughed and asked him the question that had been bugging me all night.

"So, mister, do you still think I've mellowed in my old age or are you prepared to go all night?"

I finally got him to chuckle.

Eventually, after I'd made my way back up, we did go all night, but that's another tale I shall leave untold.

Breanne

So Hard To Find My Way, Now That I'm All On My Own, I Saw You Just The Other Day, My How You Have Grown

--"Brown-Eyed Girl", Van Morrison

From tonight...

Hey there,

So first off, I have no idea if I have the right guy. Mostly because of my crazy ignorance. Basically I googled "Patrick Taroc," I got what looked like a blog, I clicked on what looked like a profile, and then I wound up in this bizarre alternate universe called MySpace... Don't get me wrong. I know this is the new thing for the cool kids; I read the bad feature articles on "the new IT thing," too. But I've never been one of the cool kids, and I'm lost.

Anyway, the point is, having read nothing of said blog (I don't really do blogs) but putting the name and the state (Oh, California) together, I'm thinking maybe I found the guy who has like hundreds of pages penned in my youth...

Which is actually the point of my having googled you and all. I was recently home for the first time in a long time, packing up some stuff I want to keep and trashing other stuff, and found a huge stack of letters from you--none of them dated, mind you (damn you, in fact). It was so much fun to read them again... (Do you still have the ones I sent? It's been awhile, I know. If you do, I'd love to find a way to get copies or something, so I could read them, and I'd be happy to copy the old ones for you...could be fun.) I'm wondering what in the world you are doing now, and what in the world I was like then...and all the stuff in between.

Remember that I'm a dunce at all this MySpace stuff, so if I've got the right person, and if you're not totally freaked out, might you email me in the standard way? ---------.com That goes to my inbox, which is a technology I can handle.

Okay, so... I hope I found you, I hope you're well, and I hope you'll tell me what you've been up to in these, what, ten years?

In other words, I look forward to your next correspondence.
-jina

I honestly don't know what to think right now. Gracious Halifax, I don't even know if I can think right now.

I am utterly surprised at this very moment... and kind of happy.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

People Take What They Need, Then They Tell You "Get Lost", Kindly Leading You On, While They're Ripping You Off

--"Out Here All Night", Damone

Normally, this would be the space where I describe what a fantastic show Paramore puts on since it's my usual m.o. to give a report of every concert I go to. While Hayley and the boys did put on a tight, albeit too short, set at The House of Blues tonight, something substantially more far-reaching occurred earlier this morning.

I met someone who, if all signs are correct, could be my future roommate.

And, wouldn't you know it, she's actually a decent individual.

I don't know if it says more of the company I keep or more about me, but I meet few people that I am not immediately suspicious of. Usually, when I'm first introduced to someone I'm trying to figure out their angle or trying to decipher what their agenda is. Most people I come across, fair or unfair, I can normally peg into easily defined stereotypes that then assists me in how I deal with them. Rule number one in interpersonal relationships is to ascertain someone's motivations. Once you understand that, you can understand how to get what you want or how to stifle that other person.

As recent as Sunday, people have told me that I'm suspicious by nature. I'm always curious as to why people ask me questions about myself. I'm always trying to know how they plan to use said information against me. I think that's why it's harder for me than most to get really close with people, because I don't see most of them as capable of unselfish behavior.

That's why it's refreshing when, from the very inception, I meet a person that doesn't seem to be only interested in themselves. When somebody doesn't immediately raise my guard by asking seemingly intrusive questions and/or overriding my sense of propriety, and instead puts me at ease, it is a cause for celebration. That's what this potential roomie did. From the outset, I thought she sounded very coherent, very assertive, and very personable. It's startling to think that we share a common taste for films, shows, and, apparently, sense of humor. Not only does it appear we shall get along swimmingly, but it seems that, verily, I couldn't ask for a better set of conditions under which to live. This really does seem like the best of all possibilities I could have picked out in terms of moving--perfection location, perfect roommate, for a good price.

I don't want to jinx it so I shan't count on anything, but, knock on wood, I look forward to starting this new chapter in my life with, hopefully, a new supporting character in it.

Hmmm... maybe the wacky sidekick.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

But God, Didn't We Have Some Fun? When We Made Love In The Van, And I Drove With Your Hand On My Lap

--"It Was Love", The Elected

Emily once wrote that "Happiness is found in the frozen food section where they keep the ice cream." While that might very well put a smile on my face, I think another visceral experience leaps to mind when I think of where I might find happiness. I think for me happiness is found next to the person I know that loves me. I don't know if I've ever written before about what I miss the most whenever a relationship can't seem to work itself out, but it's the feeling of waking up next to someone. That sensation, that particular moment in time, is when I feel the most connected to another human being. Sharing a bed is pretty much the pinnacle for me when it comes to solidifying my feelings about a person. So while ice cream may, indeed, bring about momentary satisfaction, that touch of human skin next to mine is a pleasure that transcends joy. It is a sensation unlike no other.

----

I awoke in the hotel room with the memory of what it was like inside of you still imprinted upon me. It was like waking up from a dream only to find out the dream is miraculously real. I recalled all of it--the impetuous drive down to San Diego, the talking to dawn while we laid next to each other on the bed, and, finally, the blissful release from guilt and over-thinking any consequences that may arise. You said that sometimes there are experiences worth getting in trouble for. And that's all that it took. We fell into the familiar playfulness of the couple we were always meant to be. It wasn't like the other times--the fumbling, the nervousness--this time we explored the dynamic of what we were like together like seasoned guides, making sure to hit every hidden spot, every summit, that we had missed before or, possibly, hadn't even known to look for.

I must say it was beautiful. You were beautiful. And you were made all the more beautiful with the knowledge that we made love with full intent and permission.

When I awoke, I didn't immediately think of how I'd done wrong by you and how that night should have never happened. I didn't think about all that I would be losing. All that sprung to mind was the foolish indulgence of it all. All I could think about was how you were still there and how I should be celebrating that fact. There would be plenty of time to contemplate whether or not this "one last time" was going to kill me as soon as you left again. All I wanted to do at that moment is run my hand up your lily-white skin. I spooned in behind you, felt the warmth of a body that was both intimate and familiar. I draped my arm around you and left my fingers across the flat of your stomach. Deciding to let you sleep, I carefully placed my head just behind your chestnut brown hair. Not daring to breathe even a decibel too loudly, I just watched the back of your head, feeling you sleep more than hearing it. I wanted to have you awake, to tell you how lovely you were, and how special the whole evening was to me.

We laid like that for awhile, clothed in our affection for one another above our nakedness. I couldn't fall asleep. Inside of me were expressions of thought and emotion that just being there was evoking in me. Outside the bed, the room, the hotel, the world may have been stock-still, but inside my head were racing a dozen threads of how I was coming to grips with all of it. It's one thing to have fooled around with you, going into each time as if they were fortunate accidents that beared never repeating. But this time was different. We both knew this would probably be it for us, "one last time" as they say. Armed with that knowledge, the whole night took on far-reaching implications. It became not only a celebration of our friendship, our relationship with one another. It became a celebration of the miracle it is to find someone in this world when everybody else seems so hidden away. That's what I wanted to tell you that day. That, and maybe to say how very much I treasured you.

That's when I felt you waken with a start. I felt you turn your body over to face. I looked into those great oceanic eyes of yours. I saw into your smile. That's when I decided that maybe the experience was best captured without words. What I was feeling and what you were feeling didn't need any long, drawn-out explanations. It was what it was. I was still me and you were still little 'ole you. That hadn't changed between us. We were different people and I don't think anything of how we felt about one another changed. That night wasn't something we did out of lust or hormones or impulsiveness. I liked to think we had sex again that night out of the respect we felt for one another. There's only so much you can do with a person to show them how much you care about them before it turns to physically showing them. It may not have originated from amorous feelings of wanted to get married and settling down that the first few times had. It may not have been born out of that type of love, but it was born out of nonetheless.

You kissed me and wrapped your arms around me. I reciprocated your motions, brushed the bangs out of your eyes, and gave you a knowing wink. Then you closed your eyes again to fall asleep. And I held you, wanting to never let you go, not for anything.

That's what I think of when I think of happiness.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

And I Stand Here With My Arms Out, Now Some Days, They Last Longer Than Others, But This Day By The Lake Went Too Fast

--"With Arms Outstretched", Rilo Kiley

I gave Torry her glass of water and sat back down on the deck chair. I breathed a sigh of relief as I once more too my position in the cool shade of the grove above us. I looked over at my sunning friend and smiled. I caught a hint of grin from her before I turned back to gaze at the water's edge. I wanted to tell her that I couldn't remember a time when I was more happy or more relaxed, but that would have, I feared, ruined the moment. Times like this deserved silence, to soak up any distractions like a sponge any distraction which might spoil the tranquility of the moment. It's always been my way of thinking that certain moments call for festive celebration, where anything short of a hoot and a half is a letdown. Then, there are other times where any little twitch would ruin the resplendent stillness of the moment. I could tell Torry had the same thought as it had been nearly thirty minute since either one had uttered a word. Now you could say we were duffing it on our lily white asses when Providence only knows there were a cavalcade of places we should have been reminescing at, activities we should have been engaging in for the very last time, and, most of all, words and words we should have been pouring out to one another.

All that could wait, however. What we were doing at the time was the most important thing we could have been doing at that moment.

Our parents had taken us back up to the cabin up near the Cartecay River to give us some time together in a place that didn't remind us so very much of what would be gone when we got back. Down there, it'd be For Sale signs and the business of packing up. Up here, there were only cool breezes and good friends. Down there, it would be the tears of last good-byes. Up here, there would be no such talk. I wouldn't allow it.

----

The day I met Torry was the day I really think I opened myself up to the possibility of being happy. I don't mean the puppy dogs and ice cream happy that my parents thought I needed, but the day to day happiness of being loved by another human being my own age. We got along famously from the very beginning. She had spied me walking with my parents one day from or to school--the details have never been clear as to exactly where she took notice of me. We were both seven at the time. After that, it was just a matter of gravity doing its thing. It wasn't too long before she was asking her mother to take her nearby to my house. Her mother already knew my mother so it wasn't before long we were playing together almost everyday. It was destiny, I believe. There were other girls in our class. There were other girls that wanted to be her friend that probably had more to offer than I did. But yet out of everyone she picked me. There was something about us that simply brought out the best in each other. I always believed that.

I was always busy with paegeants and dance classes that I never thought I was giving enough time to doing what she wanted to do. I always felt plain awful that when she could have been going to a classmate's birthday party, she got stuck watching me in yet another performance. Yet she took it on the chin as someone who knew the value of loyalty. It would have been very easy for her to raise a fuss and complain that I wasn't paying enough attention to her because the truth was I never did make her my number one priority when I should have. There were times when I wish she would have. Nope, instead she was the strong one. We used to joke that she was the Hillary to my CC Bloom. Then we'd launch into "Wind Beneath My Wings" and that would be that. She would never say one jealous word about how talented I was or how pretty I was. Nope, she was always the one building me up and complimenting me when I got down on myself. It would have been easier to take her if she was more like me. When I got upset, she's the first one I would take it on and she would always do her best to calm me down. Maybe if she'd been more like me I could have been there for her more often. As it was, I always thought she got the raw end of the deal, having to deal with my impatient, stubborn, and wicked ways. All I had to do was show up and she immediately made me feel better. I always wanted to return more of the favor. I would have done that for her--any time, anywhere.

Six years might not seem like a long time to feel like you've known someone forever, but to me and her it seemed like a lifetime. There wasn't a day I didn't hear from her--wishing me good luck, crying with me with every disappointment, laughing at me about the latest pickle I'd landed myself in, eating up every ghost story I ever retold for her. For those six years, she was my lifeblood. I don't think I would've came out the other side of growing up without her as my constant companion. It isn't easy being a kid. And it certainly wasn't easy being my mother's kid. She kept me sane when I very well could have turned out horribly wrong and even more wicked than I already am.

When I started running away, hers was the first home that I started running to. And when my parents caught onto my foolproof escape route, she was the only one I ever told where I was hiding out at. And when it came time to come home, she was the one they would always bring to talk me back home. My running away, of course, didn't stop when she left, but I somehow get the feeling that the only reason I continued to run away after she'd gone was to somehow find her.

It wasn't like I didn't know where she'd moved to. Of course, she'd given me everything she possibly could so I could stay in contact with her--phone numbers and addresses.

But we'd both agreed that it would have been too hard to continue the friendship when we were going to be several states apart. It wouldn't have been the same. It would've been weakened somehow. And when you've been used to full-blown handmade lemonade, to be served restaurant watered-down juice would have been an insult.

I lost touch with her with no regrets save that I will always wonder what the two of us would have been like if she had stayed put.

This is not to say I do not miss her. Hell's bells, I miss her every day of my life, but what we had was special and it will never be forgotten for as long as I live. She's my first greatest friend and always will be. She was too good for words and definitely too good for me.

----

When I finally did speak, it was barely a whisper. We were both starting to slip off to sleep; napping came easy amidst the heat and humidity of the Georgian summers. I reached out for her hand, feeling fingertip for fingertip, and told her what had been in my heart ever since I found out she was leaving that July. I didn't look at her and I didn't embellish my words with any outpouring of outward emotion. I said it plainly so that she would know how deeply I felt the sentiment.

All I said was, "I know if I don't see you in the future, I'll see you in the past."

Breanne

And You'll Teach Me About Tomorrow, And All The Pain And Sorrow Running Free?, 'Cause Tomorrow's Just Another Day, And I Don't Believe In Time

"Time", Hootie and the Blowfish

As long as I've lived I've had a fairly unique connection to the beach. I hate the sun, I hate huge crowds most of the time, and trying to find parking at the beach can often stresses me out. Yet, despite all that, it's still one of my favorite places to go, especially at night. Some of my most memorable times have taken place when most of the people have gone and the moon is the only light one can see out over the water. It's very serene and I have found lends itself to moments of startling contemplation and discourse. I believe that's why the opportunity to somehow closeby one is more than tempting; it's, of late, become an obsession of mine.

For someone who hates small talk, I sure love discussions with people with something actually to say. It's weird, but people who normally are very reserved and introverted out in the "real" world I've seen open up remarkably once they've sat down and just stared out into the deep blue. Chalk it up to the lack of distractions or the "getting back to nature" vibe, but the talk usually turns to weightier issues. When it comes to getting down to the nitty-gritty, the ocean is the first place I think of taking someone.

Or, I guess, where somebody thinks of taking me.

----

"Don't apologize," Jennifer said as the two of us sat down on the coarse sand.

I had had one job to do. Bring the roll, she had said, referring to the green and white camel-imprinted rug that I had used as a beach blanket for as long as I can remember. As soon as she had said that over the phone, I knew where we were headed, but still managed to forget it anyway. Let it never be said after I die that I wasn't absent-minded at times.

The sand didn't bother me as much as I thought it would. It would have been very hard to complain since it was a perfectly lovely night out, filled with unyielding draw of the thrumming waves. I would've settled back and stared out at the horizon all night if I didn't know better than to allow myself to relax. There's only one reason Jennifer came out to the ocean with anyone at night and that was to discuss something that had been troubling her. She too had a particular fondness for the sea, but, unlike me, she dared tempt the lion's den during the daylight hours and had more than ample opportunity to do so since she lived mere miles from Huntington. Nope, whenever she called one of her friends to come meet her where the spray met the sand it was to take and give advice. That's what bothered me the most, not knowing to what I owed the occasion.

"Suppose you only had one night to live, where would you spend it?" she asked me after we'd been lazily staring at the sky's reflection in the water.

"Anywhere?"

"Anywhere."

"Here's kind of nice."

"You haven't ever wanted to travel the world, see things you can't see here?"

"Not really. It's kind of nice going back East once a year, but I don't think I was built for international travel."

"Not me, I think my problem's always been that I've wanted to do it all, see it all, be it all."

She was always like that. She always dreamed enough for two people and it wasn't some fanciful quest of world domination, insane fame, or disgusting riches. It was always something practical, but nonetheless spectacular. If she said she wanted to travel the world, it wouldn't be to merely brag about her experiences to everyone she knew to make them jealous. Indeed, it'd be a miracle if she ever brought it up to anyone. Hers was a private soul with a public heart. She didn't want to necessarily give away all her secrets to you, but did want you to know that was a somewhat good person.

"Not me. Call me an idiot, but I like what I like. If I don't know something is going to be better than I'd rather never know. Disappointing, huh?"

"Nah, I always knew being a man of the world wasn't going to be a source of pride for you, Patrick."

"What can I say? I'm a Californian, born and bred."

"I'm probably the same. Try as I might to deny it, I don't think I'm ever going to go anywhere fantastic. I'm simply going to have to make due with what's before me."

People get shattered in many ways. Sometimes it's the all-or-nothing crash of tragedy, where you're left speechless, breathless, and damaged beyond all repair. And sometimes it's like a slow fade, where you realize the opportunities you had were all that you were ever going to get. It doesn't mean you don't have bright times ahead, but there comes a point where you realize they'll never be as bright as they once were. I think that's what she was going through that day.

I'd like to think that it had to do with her finding out she was sick and not because she felt herself slowly dying. In the case of the former, it would have been a kind of blessing to have that certainty at your disposal. If a doctor had said to her that she was only getting worse and that there was no hope of recovery, she could at least make some sort of peace with herself. She wouldn't have to fight because someone else would have basically given her escape route. In the case of the latter, if she could feel her days winding down, it almost would have been worse. There's something to be said of having too much hope in a tenuous situation. One almost would rather not be able to fight if it only leads to tears.

Then again, I don't know if she knew anything about what was wracking her body at the time. She may have just been experiencing a crisis of faith or responsibility. Whatever it was, it led her to a pretty startling announcement from her.

It'd been after we'd allowed a lull in the conversation to develop. Suddenly she said the following very simply.

"You hear it. You feel it. And you can't rise above it. There's something about tomorrow that catches us all. Even just sitting here it feels like I'm being chased around and around some table, playing keep away with some invisible monster. I never get anywhere and yet he never seems able to catch me. But there comes a point when you're running around the table, when you realize you're at a stalemate with that monster, that you start to question why you're even still playing. It's a game you can never win. It's then you realize that maybe losing is the only you'll ever get to stop playing, to stop being so tired and mentally fatigued out of your skull. You don't want to give up, but you question how you're ever going to sustain enough energy to keep playing. And you wonder, if you were to ever leave the little circle you've made around the table, if you could ever truly get away from the demon chasing you."

I watched as she buried her head in her chest, more from the cold than the actual sting of her words. I inched in closer to her. I debated whether this was an instant where a physical response was called for. In the end, I decided she wasn't really asking for that type of comfort and that the tact I had to take was more verbal in substance.

"I know what you mean, Jennifer. Sometimes I feel I'm barely getting by and other times I feel like I haven't progressed at all. We're not moving forward at all. We're just standing still while it's the world that's moving so quickly around us."


now only lasts for one second, one second

"Maybe the question isn't how how empty or how full our life is. Maybe it's just a question of whether we're all like that glass of water, stagnant but serene, or if we should even attempt to be like a wave, thrashing in constant motion. Water all the same, but which one should we strive to emulate?"

"Silence is golden, as they say."

"Can I ask you something?"

"Fire away."

"It's kind of similar to the last question. If you could stop, just stop, at any one age in your life, when would you stop?"

"Here's kind of nice."

"Exactly. People always talk about going back in time to some better time and place or talk about going in the future to see what it's like. I don't see what's so bad about wanting to be where you are, being content with all that you already have, and why, given the option, you'd ever think there was a better time for you than the one you're already in."

I looked at her in a type of aimless confusion. Wasn't she the same person who sat lamenting that she didn't have enough time to see it all, to do it all? I placed my arm around her in a meek attempt at support, keenly aware that something more than spiritual angst was bothering my friend. I asked her about the discrepancy between what she had just said and her earlier statement.

"So I'm not sure I get it. Do you want to do it all and see it all, or do you want to stay here?"

She looked at me with a sheepish grin. There are many people I could tell you had a definitiveness about them. They came painted either black or white in certain areas of their life. Not Jennifer. She is the only one I have ever known who could argue both sides of an argument and still leave you wondering which she truly believed in. She was very mercurial like that. It was part of her seemingly secretive nature. People that didn't know her always attributed it as a guarded personality. They said that she never quite stuck to her guns because she didn't want you to know how she really felt about anything. I always thought that was the most intimate aspect about her, that she was so unsure of how she felt from moment and moment, and was generous enough to allow people to see this insecurity about her.

"Don't mind me. I want some type of the blending of the two. I want to have done everything I set out to do already so that I can feel like where I am now is some type of milestone. I'm feeling like I'm getting to old to still be dreaming about somewhere else, sometime else, you know?"

"It is a type of milestone. It's not like you've ever reached this point before in your life, have you? This same day, this same set of circumstances?"

"No, but I've had similar experiences to this."

"What you're asking for is impossible, I think. You want the big sign planted on the sand saying this day is going to be special for you. All you see is what apparently you've seen before. But perhaps you reached where you were meant to be long ago, long before most of us even knew where we were going. Maybe this is the pinnacle of your trek."

"Here? Now?"

"Here and now. Maybe this is all there is to this happiness thing. Sitting by the beach at night with close friends."

"If it were only that simple, Patrick."

"It is simple if you believe, Jennifer."

She gave me a look to see if I was putting her on. When she saw that I quite possibly believed what I was saying, she turned back to the sea.

"I don't believe yet, but in time... maybe."

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

When Explanations Make No Sense, When Every Answer's Wrong, You're Fighting With Less Confidence, All Expectations Gone

--"Breakout", Swing Out Sister



Sometimes I feel like I'm less on a journey along a winding road as much as travelling through some city where I'm passing intersection after intersection. It isn't a matter of not knowing where the road I'm travelling is going as much as it is a matter of being presented so many opportunities to know what to do with. Sometimes, yes, it ia a little much to take, this life where I'm supposed to be well on my way towards something. It's akin to the time I was a freshman in college, still undecided as to what I want to major in, what I want to be. Damn it all, I've been alive for over three decades now. I'm supposed to have at least a bit of my life figured out already. Yet most of the time I still feel like I'm just winging it.

I don't so much live my life as let life happen to me. About the only assertive thing I do is travel. That's possibly the only arena in my life where I display a carefree attitude. I don't ask earthly questions like if I can afford it, is there something else I could use the money for, or do I really need to go on yet another trip. I just go. If I could only transfer such courage and confidence to other aspects of my life, I'd be all set.

For instance, career-wise I am so far removed from where I thought I would be at this point in my life. Not only am I not doing what I went to school for, what I dreamed of, and what everybody thought I was going to be; I'm working in a completely different field. If writing was Boston, I wouldn't say I was in New York or Los Angeles. I'd say I was in Bangkok job-wise. And it isn't like I want to complain about what I do. Especially with my new position, it's been mentally and financially rewarding working in the field that I do. I simply know that it's always going to be one of those dreams that I felt I quit on too soon. Like everything else that once was important to me, I didn't put in the hard work to see it through. I assumed wanting something was the same thing as going out and getting it. I let way too many opportunities pass me by.

The same could go for personal relationships and friendships. I look back on the people in my life and I realize every so often that there were many people I could have taken the time to know better and there were many people I should have cut loose sooner. It's like I'm Ryoga Hibiki when it comes to picking out and keeping quality people. I just don't have the sense God gave geese as a wise person once said.

I think the main reason I'm writing this tonight is that tomorrow I begin in earnest to look for a new residence to coincide with my new employment. I should have been combing the classifieds, calling everyone I know, and researching the best route to getting that perfect place to rent or lease. Yet I have the nagging feeling that in this area I have slacked off and left it, once again, to the vagaries of fate to decide what's best for me. I don't have a plan as to where and when I'm going to visit tomorrow. I have basically two ads that I'm going to check out, but no real clue as to the kinds of questions I want to ask, what kind of amenities I require, or any real sense as to how go about switching locales. The last time I had to move came on the heels of a crushing blow life-wise and I was in no shape to be picky. This time, however, I have both the opportunity and the wherewithal to root out exactly the cream of the crop. I have no compelling need to settle for anything less than perfect. I have no desire to be stuck in a place that is in the least bit annoying or unsatisfactory. But, just because I can afford to wait for the perfect wave, doesn't mean I won't take the first ride in that comes my way. It's just my nature to be impulsive, undisciplined, and, most of all, lazy. The truth is I just want to be moved out as soon as possible. I just want all the stress and agony of lugging all my stuff to be done with. I want all the pangs of being surrounded by unfamiliar surroundings to be behind me already. I just want to be able to establish a new routine wherever it is I've relocated.

That means the following will come to pass. I'll committ myself to the first decent place that comes my way and be always the least bit miffed about the particulars I never bothered to ascertain beforehand. It'll pass muster, may be be above average, but it won't be perfect. I just know it.

Such is my curse in life, to be nitpicky about the aspects of life most people can decide in an instant and to be blase about the life-and-death issues. I know I have screwed-up priorities, but today is an eye-opener as to the degree I go into major situations ill-prepared to handle them.

Oh 'twell! We shall see how tomorrow unfolds and where I stand once I come to the other side of it.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

You're The Reason For My Laughter And My Sorrow, Blow Out The Candle, I Will Burn Again Tomorrow, No Man On Earth Can Stand Between My Love and I

--"Love You Inside Out", The Bee Gees

Based on a true story

She was a woman pretending to be a girl. At least that's how she felt. She was more than capable of making her own decisions now and what she had decided was that the two of them should be together. In her heart of hearts she knew she was right despite what her parents believed. She was right about him. She was right about the two of them. She was right about everything.

Not that it mattered now. Her whole family had been resolute in their attempts to prevent him from having anything to do with her. At first, it'd be the disdainful looks and subtle attacks against his ambition, his class, his intelligence, and everywhere else they felt he failed to measure up. Soon it had progressed into outright threats and bribery. He had told her that her own dad had offered him a thousand dollars if he just walked away now. He had refused. Her dad then offered to double the amount. Yet it wasn't until her own brother Sam had gone and picked a fight with him on the eve of their six month anniversary that she began to form a complete picture of how intent they were on breaking the two of them up.

Sam had thrown the first punch. That much she was sure of. Nothing on Earth could compel her beloved to hostility. Once it began, though, it didn't finish until there were two individuals barely left standing. Her family had found Sam barely breathing on the side of the road. She immediately went looking for him, for the man she loved.

It wasn't more than ten minutes later that she found him further down the road, looking none too good himself. Yet the amazing part was that he was still thinking of her, still thinking of what state she was in.

"You need to get out of here. You need to get out of here now," she told him, trying not to cry. Somewhere it had all gone so terribly wrong and the situation was even beyond her ability to mediate. She couldn't think of any advice that could help him except for him to run.

"I want to stay with you. I'm not afraid of your family," he answered her back, blood still dripping from three or four gashes above his right eye. She felt him grab her hand and squeeze tightly. He probably would have stayed despite her warnings, but she couldn't allow that.

She told him it was better for him to go now before the real trouble began. What was the point of him facing her father's ire now when she could work on him and attempt to calm him down, she told him. It was better to be apart now, for a short time, than to face her father's final word and be apart for eternity. Hesitatingly, he left her. He told her one last thing before going, though.

"If I haven't heard from you two weeks from today, I'm coming to get you. No matter the obstacles, wait for me. Don't give up hope on us."

And that was the last she had seen of him.

It had been the longest and worst two weeks of her life. Not only had she failed in placating her father's anger, but he had only seemed to grow more upset. Sam had landed in the hospital with problems with his breathing. Her father, seeing his only son, immobile and suffering, had decided to go to the police. With no one to contradict his story, the police had believed him and had immediately been scouring the city to find where the culprit was hiding out. Her house was now under constant surveillance. If it wasn't for the police just "dropping by" to check up on her and her dad, it was her dad's friends coming over to discuss what they were going to do once they caught the boy. Even her mother got in on the act. Her mother had started to call her whenever she went out, asking who she was with, asking to speak to her friends, questioning if he had tried to contact her. She felt trapped. Two weeks had come and gone, and she almost had no hope he would ever make it to her. She almost had no hope that the two of them would be together.

As she sat on her second story bedrom, she tried to recall the way he had phrased his last words to her. "No matter the obstacles," he had said. Well, she thought, it truly does seem impossible. Her father had also decided to upgrade the alarm system on the house. He had made sure to include her only bedroom window as a possible entryway. Now, anytime she even cracked the window, she had to march downstairs and punch in the code lest the whole house be alerted that either someone was trying to exit through the opening or, heaven forbid, someone was trying to enter through it. There was no coming and going from her room without going through the house. And, because of the fact the master bedroom was located at the head of the stairs, there was little chance she could sneak in or out without their knowledge.

The only thing she had going for him was the fact Sam still was still holed up in the hospital. Otherwise, he too would have acted as a warden, keeping an eye out for his charge.

She wanted to give up. She wanted to tell her father that he had won. It was already ten at night and he still hadn't come for her. There had been no word at his parents' place, at his friends' houses, not at any of his other relatives. He hadn't called anyone, not even her. It was almost as if he had disappeared. Maybe he had decided to give it a couple of more weeks. Maybe he had seen the odds and decided that he could adjust the timetable, that it wasn't worth risking their life together for. Not that she could blame him. It's what she would do in this situation. It wasn't the why that made her sad. The silly fact of it all was it was that this would be the first promise he had ever broken to her that troubled her. He had told her that he wasn't the kind of man to break promises and, so far, he hadn't. She wanted to believe that it was possible to go through her whole life without him letting her down. She wanted to believe that he that kind of power. The silly wishes of a silly girl, she thought. She was better than believing in a promise made in a moment of tension. She had to believe in practicality. She had to believe that he would do what was best for both of them, even if it meant breaking a promise to her. That's what the mature woman in her told her was the plain beans of the situation.


I ain't no vision,
I am the man who loves you inside out

She was just about to go to sleep, still missing him, when something startled her. Unbelievably, it was him, standing right next to her bed and offering his hand to take her away from all this.

"You're coming with me," is all he said.

"Are you real? Is it really you?" she asked him, not believing she could be alone one moment and with him the next.

"I told you I would come to get you."

She could only nod as she began to pack her things. The smile on her face was only matched by that of his. They were finally going to be together.

----

When her parents woke up the next morning they found their daughter missing. Inexplicably, her door was still locked from the inside and the only key they knew to be safely hidden away where the two of them could get at it, in a plastic sandwich bag inside their toilet. They found the alarm system still active. It hadn't been touched all night and it was still reporting that no one had come or gone in the hours they had been asleep--not one window ajar, not one door jimmied, nothing. Even more strangely, they found that their truck had apparently been driven fifty miles and yet had also been returned to inside the garage, which too the alarm system reported had never been opened.

They couldn't figure out what had happened. But their daughter knew the underlying truth of all she had witnessed in his company.

He had kept his promise.

Breanne

Watched By Empty Silhouettes, Who Close Their Eyes, But Still Can See, No One Taught Them Etiquette, I Will Show Another Me

--"Solsbury Hill", Peter Gabriel

When I was in fourth grade I made a conscious decision to be weird.

I didn't exactly have a firm definition of what weird meant, but, due to the fact that that was a label which seemed to follow me around from grade to grade, I decided to go with it. I lacked the mental acuity then to put it into terms which I could understand, but I think I've reached a point where I can at last take a stab at it. When I say I'm weird I don't mean to say that I choose my action to intentionally creep people out or piss them off or to do a half dozen other things. I think my "weirdness" stems from that basic human desire to differentiate myself from everyone else. No one wants to be a carbon copy of everyone else and I am no different. However, whereas most people find small ways to assert their uniqueness, I am prone to grand gestures and acts. I think this personality choice comes into play on more than just average run-of-the-mill decisions; I think it comes into play into the bigger moral decisions as well. Oft times I and other people have noticed that I don't weigh my options between right and wrong as much as what everyone else would do and what everyone else wouldn't do. For instance, when I used to walk home from school I often chose routes that had nothing to do with being the fastest or the most scenic, or even what would get me close to stores where I could browse. Most times I chose routes that I had never taken before which often meant taking the most roundabout route imaginable.

To be fair, I think a little piece of this choice may have to do with getting a reaction. It is rather funny to me to see people's face glaze over in perplexity when I spout a non-sequitir or relay a story of something that I did that no one else would ever do. I think I'm easily amused by how easy it is to throw off somebody's sense of balance by going against the grain. I think that's how the twin waterfalls story and the dinosaur vegetable story got their starts. I think it's also part and parcel of having reputation that you start acting like you have to live up to it. In the beginning it may have been a sore spot not fitting in, what with the pressures of growing up and being in school, but, the more I've grown, the more I've realized that one's identity is something to be flaunted and not flagged.

This brings me to the big reveal that prompted this whole post. Possibly the weirdest thing I do is that I have a habit that even I cannot explain. It all started about the time I began dating DeAnn. Around that time I chanced upon a new concoction at the confectionary stand by the name of Peanut Butter Twix. From the moment I put chocolate to lips I was enamored with them. I couldn't buy enough of them. That in itself would be weird, but it's the supplementary quirk that really draws attention.

I can't see myself ever throwing a wrapper away.

It started out as my attempt at tallying just how many bars I eat in a month. I used to place them all in a drawer in my apartment and amaze myself (and others) at the quantity of bars consumed in a given period. But soon it mutated into another beast altogether. I then began hiding the wrappers around the house just to get a reaction out of her. Soon DeAnn was finding wrappers in the strangest places. Dishwashers, coffee cans, and pillow cases were all fair game. I freely confess I was just trying to be cute and playful when I initiated this habit. However, when it migrated to my other friends' and family members' houses I knew it was almost bordering on an obsession. To me the fun comes in sneaking them into the most unlikely of places and seeing the reaction when someone I know comes across them.

I think it's the fact that no one "gets" why I do it that I persist. It'd be different if it caught on like some phase and all the neighborhood kids started doing it, but because, to the best of my knowledge, I am the sole individual on the planet to do it, I continue. Again, this is a choice that transcends right or wrong, but instead hinges on what would Patrick do and what would everyone else do?


i'll tell them what the smile on my face meant

Yes, I'm weird. But the way I look at it is that I'm normal, it's the whole world that's weird.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

There's Not A Bonnie Flower, That Springs, By A Fountain, Shaw, Or Green, There's Not A Bonnie Bird That Sings, But Minds Me O, My Jean

--"I Love My Jean", Camera Obscura



My daddy and I were sitting in the park when I was very young. He had me wrapped up in his Braves jacket with the sleeves coming off my arms like tentacles and had me sitting up on his shoulders on the park bench. We had stopped to rest after a brief walk in the park and, as unapologetic talkers oft do, we got to chatting about nothing in particular. I say chatting because, though I was too young to truly keep my end of the conversation, I fully intended to reply to my daddy's every utterance. It's no big secret that this particular Breanne is a big 'ole daddy's girl, but, for once, the topic for the day did not revolve around just how much I loved him or how much he love me. Rather, it centered around the other lady in his life.

"Who's my Little Miss Chipper?"

"Me," I said, trying to fold my arms around his head but only succeeding in veiling his eyes with the enormous length of my sleeves. I felt more than I heard him laughing through the cloth.

"And who do I love?"

"Me," I said.

"And who do you love?"

"You."

"And who else?"

"Mother?"

Normally I would be hesitant to put forth the idea that I disliked my mother since I was that young because that simply is not true. I didn't learn to dislike her until a few years later. However, one thing was very clear to me, even at that early age; I just loved my father more.

"You didn't sound too sure, Little Miss. Try again? Who else do you love?"

"Mother."

"And who else do I love?"

"Mother."

I felt him reach around to pull me off his shoulders. I fought like a wildcat to remain ensconced upon my perch, but it was to no avail. He placed me beside me, buttoned up the jacket, and stayed silent for a few minutes. The silence made me nervous, which caused me to smile in anticipation. I didn't know what was coming and--I don't know--when I'm faced with the unknown, I either react one of two way. I either start smiling uncontrollably or I move on. I'm glad to report, though, that I tend to do the former more than the latter. If there's one thing my daddy taught me it's that, more often than not, a smile should be the first step in anything you do. When I started to smile at that instant, it cause my father to reciprocate in kind. Finally, after what seemed an eternity, he continued speaking.

"I'm going to tell you a secret, my little Breanne, and you're going to have to promise me that word one does not leave your lips. Can you do that for daddy?"

I nodded my head not quite understanding everything he had just said, but getting the gist that he was asking me to do something for him.

"I'm going to tell you something you may not believe but is entirely true. What I have to tell you is this." He pulled me onto his lap to whisper in my ear.

"Your mother doesn't always wants you to know how much she loves you. She thinks that spoiling you would be a waste of the gift we'd been given. She thinks that the best thing we can do for you is to make sure you become everything you're destined to be. She doesn't think coddling you is the way to go. She doesn't think indulging you will make you anything but weak and presumptuous.

"But I happen to like spoiling you," he continued as he tickeled me for a bit. After I'd let out a squeal of delight, he resumed.

"But here are a few words to think about when you get older. You may not understand it now, but you will. Every time your mom raises her voice to you or reprimands you it's because she wants you to be strong. Every time your mom tells you to clean up your room or get dressed it's because she wants you to be hard-working. Every time your mom tells you to do something again or that you're not trying hard enough it's because she believes in you. Every time she makes you cry or upset, know that she's only trying to be your mom. She and I may have different ideas on what's best for you. I see you as someone we should cherish every day you choose to spend with us. I see you us my Little Miss Chipper with the big 'ole smile and the crooked teeth and the grace of an angel.

"She sees you as all that and more. And it's the more that pushes her to be how she is to you."

"You're saying mother loves me..."

"Very, very, very much."

"Mother loves me very much."

"Very, very, very much."

At the time my father explained all this to me, I didn't understand that he was preparing me for the trials I would have to endure while under her care. It's like the signs you see posted, children crossing. You may not see the children at that time, but eventually you'll run into the situation where the sign is going to come in handy. He wasn't so much warning me as instilling me with an understanding about something that I'm only recently coming to understand, or rather someone I only a few years back began to fully know. He was explaing what she couldn't, that there are some people who love by slices, inch by inch, telling you everything about you they adore.

Then there are people like my mother who loves from lashes to asses and can only admit to loving someone all at once. It's not that she didn't love every little bit of me. It was that she couldn't admit to herself or to me that I wasn't perfect yet. And that's alright. It only pushed me to be better for her and for myself, if only to prove her wrong. That's merely the way she is. My daddy's always been the one who nudged me along the path while my mother's always been the one pulling me along, even dragging me when she thought the circumstances warranted it. With her there was always this invisible line I had to cross before she'd done her duty as a good parent. Until that line she was never satisfied with anything I did. But after that line she too became one of my biggest supporters because she did what my daddy never could.

She pushed me to set my own lines and never to be satisfied until I'd passed those as well.

"Do you believe me?" my father asked me as he pulled me off that bench to go home.

"Kind of."

"Believe it when I say that there aren't two people alive who could ever love you more than we do. We're always proud of you. We're always going to love you."

"I know, I know."

But I didn't know. Not really. I always gave lip service to the fact that my parents loved me because that's what they're supposed to do. As I've grown up and seen how everybody else grew up, I've come to see that that necessarily isn't true, though. Parents have a choice whether or not they love their children. It isn't something they're born with. They must choose whether or not they really do give a damn what happens to their offspring. I used to think that my mother couldn't give a hoot and a half about me, that the only reason was she was trying to break me into being nothing worthwhile at all.

I now see she may have loved me more intently of all. My daddy, God bless him, loved me greatly and he still continues to do so, but having that kind of unconditional love can be misleading. Having someone who loves you when you're both a devil or an angel doesn't give you a true bearing on what kind of person you should grow up to be. It's only by having someone who both punishes and rewards that a true barometer of your character is established.

That's why my mother was and that's why I've only grown to appreciate her more over the years. And that's why I wouldn't trade my mother for anyone else in the world. I'm at least half the person I am because of her strictness or her sense of pride in me. She pushed me to be better than I thought I could be. She never let me slide on being anyone but the best Breanne I could be.

My father and I got home thirty minutes later than we were supposed to from our walk--thirty minutes I was supposed to be getting ready for bed as well as winding down from my day out with him. When I got home she had a stern look for my father and one word for me.

"You are nothing but wicked, keeping your father out like that, Breanne," she only half-joked while telling me to get upstairs and into the bath she had drawn for me. My daddy let me go with a kiss on the cheek and I proceeded upstairs to the bathroom. While my mother bathed me she nicely, but firmly told me how important it was to do what I was told to do and how important it was to listen to her all times. She wasn't really mad at me, but she wanted to nip the notion that disobeying her, even if it was sanctioned by my father, was something I could get away with time and time again. And as she tucked me into bed that night she too kissed me, but hers was with a slight shake of the head as if to say, "what am I going to do with this one, Lord?"

She may have been a tad disappointed with the six or seven-year-old version of me.

But you should see the smile the twenty-six-year-old version brings to her face and you should see the smile the twenty-six-year-old gets when she sees her.

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY, MRS. JEAN G. HOLINS

Breanne

I Go To School, I Write Exams, If I Pass, If I Fail, If I Drop Out, Does Anyone Give A Damn?

--"What A Good Boy", Barenaked Ladies

There was a time I could have actually made Boston my permanent residence and not just the city I tend to visit annually. The circumstances surrounding that tidbit are made all the more startling for two different reasons. One, I didn't even like the Red Sox that much at the time it could've happened and, two, it would have put me closer to someone I never thought I would see again.

It would have been in the third year at college. I was taking a full load of classes, working full-time at the bookstore, as well as trying to maintain what was a fairly new relationship with someone I had just met the previous summer. It was during this first semester for one of my hardest classes, a history class I believe, that I exercised poor judgment and fell back on one of my classic high school tricks.

I've always thought of myself as a fairly decent writer, even picking up recognition from classmates and friends about how my style lends itself to sounding intelligent even when lacking real intelligence. In high school I believe I got carried away with this attitude of invincibility when it came to my composition skills and started employing certain techniques that, while perfectly "legal", were not exactly kosher. I started utilizing longer words and phrases where simple phrases would have been just as effective. I never believed in the whole "KISS" philosophy, trusting in the notion that given the impression of sounding coherent and studied is half the battle in actually being coherent and studied. The minute you start becoming lacksadaisical in how you express yourself you start losing the trust of the audience that you actually know what you're talking about. If one were to look at my high school papers you would see a definite jump from how I wrote in my beginning years to how I finished off my high school career. Whereas I may have written something like, "I like to learn" in my freshman year, I started hurling away phrases like, "I have a voracious appetite for the academic process." I blame Avonlea and L.M. Montgomery. That one show is responsible for awakening my enamoration for wordplay and vocabulary. Thusly, because I so desperately wanted to give off the aura of being knowledgeable, I started utilizing the same quirks in my writing. I started to shy away from saying "you" and replacing it with "one" as in "one would be remiss if one were to merely glance over the curriculum" instead of "you would be wise to study harder." I started to NEVER use contractions. I started to write elliptically, whereas whatever I started a paper with, I was always sure to end something that called it to mind.

And, most dangerously, I started quoting myself. Whenever I got stuck for something witty and quote-like to start off a point I was trying to make, I'd fall back on starting off the sentence with the killer phrase, "a wise man once said, '....'" What only a select few knew was that I was that wise person and that I probably had made up whatever it was I was quoting at that instance.

That was all well and good in high school, but in college I got into trouble for doing just that in that one class. I suppose had over-utilized the technique by not only quoting myself but writing a majority of the paper on my own database of facts and figures and not necessarily from my research materials. However, my professor thought something was fishy about my paper and asked to see a complete bibliography, citing page numbers and such, rather than the title and author short-form he'd let the rest of the class get away with. If I could not provide a sensible and intelligent correlation between what I'd written and the materials I'd researched, he was fully intending me to be put up for expulsion, as plagarism and all its ilk was and still is severely frowned upon. Granted, my case would have been a case of anti-plagarism as I was far too little of other people's work and too much of my own, but it still felt like cheating to me too.

With that manner of stress hanging over me and while I was trying to mount a defense of my writing process, actually having to find books that backed up what I wrote as truth, I began to look at transferring to other schools "just in case." I was sure that I was going to be expelled because I'd been caught red-handed at basically writing an opinion piece and disguising it as a research paper.

That's how I began to look at Boston University. I fell in love with the school without ever having ventured into the city. I liked the way the classes were set up and taught. I liked the choice of majors. But I think what sold me on that being my new school was the fact it would have afforded me a much-needed change of scenery. I filled out the application and had it all ready to send out.

Had I gone to Boston two things would have probably happened, as hinted at in the opening to my post.

I probably would have fallen hard for the Red Sox sooner.

I probably would have bumped into Jina, my Jina, since, in a crazy, funky twist of fate, she started attending that school in the last years of my college career. How scary would that have been? To accidentally bump into "the girl," truly the one that got away. Don't get me wrong, I love Breanne to bits and pieces, and the fact that we never ended up married with kids does bother me, but I can't bemoan her as this huge regret. We probably make better friends than lovers, and the fact the way things ended up as they did, with us staying friends longer than some countries have been in existence, makes me think that I must have done something right. Jina, however, was honestly the girl I fucked everything up with. Not only did I tell her off... by letter... but I took up seventy pages to do it. Not only did I basically call her a waste of time, but I paid special attention to calling her entire family as well. And, just in case she harbored any thoughts of ever forgiving me, I burned almost everything she gave me and mailed it back to her, including birthday presents, video tapes, and pictures. The letters I kept, though, since that would have been like giving away a collection of Da Vinci's. I screwed her royally.

I never got my chance to patch things up with her. My professor saw my paper for what it was, a well-researched paper that was merely annotated incorrectly. I received full-credit for my paper on my way to passing the class on my way to graduating.

However, a piece of me always wonders what I lost by staying in school.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

Out Of My Mind, I Am Held By The Power Of You Love, Tell Me When Do We Try, Or Should We Say Goodbye, Why Do You Have To Be A Heartbreaker

--"Heartbreaker", The Bee Gees

continued from If You Think That I Don't Love You, You're Just Wrong, That Don't Matter Now Anyway, I Couldn't Bear To See You Up There, With A White Dress On

"I've got bad news, my Breannie."

That was your opening line--no "how are you faring?", no "congratulations". You didn't even try even buttering me up at all. You were the kid coming to the front of the class with his speech barely memorized in his head, itching to recite it before you lost it from your memory. You didn't care what you were saying. All that mattered was that you expelled it as quickly as possible from your memory or, more precisely, that I heard it.

Heard it, I did. Every word of it. The words came tumbling out of you in a unstoppable torrent.

"The thing is that I know I told you that I was all set to come out there for the next two weeks, but, the more I think about it, the more I realize that now's not the time I should be going. My mom's been going in and out of the hospital and my dad's been riding my ass to be here if it turns out to be something awful. And, well, you know how my family is. They already think I pay too much attention to my friends and not enough to them."

"You're not telling me what I think you're telling me, sugar. You're not seriously saying you can't make it out here at all, are you?"

"I know it sucks, but I'd feel horrible if it turns out bad, you know? I should stay. I want to go, believe me. I've been looking forward to coming out since you let me know the date six months ago. I honestly have been thinking about nothing else for the last couple of weeks. I don't want to disappoint you, especially not now during what's supposed to be some of your fondest times, but I think it's what I should do, don't you? I should stay."

"You can't come out for like the last couple of days? Make the ceremony at least? Tell me you can do that. They'd understand, I know they would."

"I know, I know. There's no really good excuse I can give you. I can only do what I think is best."

Hell's bells, it didn't take a genius to hear that all you were telling me was a lie. You may think that you're some master conniver and, to some degree, I've let you believe your own mystique over the years. But you've never been able to fool me all that well. I saw through the pretense of your having a family emergency. I saw the situation for what it was--namely, your opportunity to disappoint me yet again. Truly, I should have seen it coming. People have said that if you pick the one time, the one moment, when you are counting on Patrick to be there for you the most, that's the time he'll screw you the most. And it's true. There have been many times where having you as a friend truly hasn't been worth the breath it took to say it. More than once I've had to plead with you to act like a true friend acts. I've had to explain that there are just certain things that you're supposed to do in common situations. I should have remembered that you weren't born with the sense God gave geese. I should have remembered that, when it really comes down to it, you'll put yourself before anyone else. You would think that it could go unsaid that I was counting you of all people to be there and yet you still thought you had the option of even cancelling. That alone speaks volumes about the lengths you will go for your own agenda.

Greg once asked me why the two of us never quite made it. I told him that, unlike him, you lacked the follow-through and determination that a real man has. He's the kind of man that you could never be--sweet, gentle, laidback in both good times and bad. He's the kind of man who understands that you don't necessarily have to sacrifice who you are for the other person, but you do necessarily have to accommadate their wishes as well. He's the kind of person who places an emphasis on harmony and co-operation. He's not the type to cut you loose the instant his wishes are not carried out. He's not the type to break my heart like you are.

"I hope your mother is not sick, I really do. But you're basing your whole decision to stay on what might happen and how you think you should act. You even said, you swore, that they were wishing me well and that you were even bringing along a gift from them. If they really didn't want you to go I think they would have spoken up sooner. I'm asking you plainly to come be at my wedding. Aside from my parents, I don't think there's anyone else I want there as much as you. It simply wouldn't be the same without you, Eeyore.

"Are you sure there isn't something else going on? Something we can work out before you actually leave the airport?" I asked you.

"Just my mom, that's all."

"Swear to God, Holy Bible, nothing counts, if you lie, you go to Hell?"

"I swear, Breanne."

"You are so going to Hell."

"Am not. I'm not lying to you. I just can't come. I'll make this up to you somehow... I swear."

"The thing is there's no making up for this. It's not as if you can come to my second wedding. This is it. This is all she wrote for me. I don't plan on getting hitched again in my life and I sure as shit am going to know better than to invite you if I did--excuse my language. This is your one chance to be there for me where you're supposed to be, where I'm counting on you to be."

"You've come this far and to me you sound pretty composed. You're not going to fall apart if I'm not there."

"I might."

"Now who's lying?"

"I've got something to tell you, Mr. Patrick. A lot of what's been buoying me through this last month, amid all the preparations and planning, has been the thought I'd have you here to cheer me up and keep me strong. You've always been good at that. The thought of you bailing... well, let's just say I'm starting to feel like I'm doing this on my own."

"What have you got to be nervous about? From the sound of things Greg's perfect for you and the two of you sound deathly cute together."

"I'm not deciding where I should eat for lunch. I'm not picking out a dress from the store. I'm talking about my future here. I'm talking about choosing a path that I can't very easily come back from. The thought has occurred to me more than once that I may be making the biggest mistake of my life. You know me, I'm usually the first one to jump into the swimming hole, clothes and all, and be the one to mock everyone else for being scared little lillies. I don't want to jump head-first into this, though, and the trouble is I kind of have to. Getting married isn't something I can do halfway, you know? I don't have a trial period to return the merchandise if I don't like it. I'm not used to hesitating about anything, but this, this whole package has get me hesitating a lot."

"Is it something wrong with him?"

"No, he's great. He's superb. That's not the problem."

"Then what's the problem?"

"The problem is... there is no problem. Usually when I want to run away it's because I'm trying to run away from something. Now I want to run away because it's what I want to do. I usually run away from something that upsets me or angers me. This... feeling... is me wanting to run away because I'm...."

"Scared?"

"Exactly. And that's not something I normally am about anything. That's why I wanted to have you here in person, to talk me down from it. You're nothing if not rational, darling."

I couldn't have spelled it out to you any clearer. I needed you to be here for me, to be a friend, and you couldn't even do that little bit for me. I didn't want to beg you then. I didn't want to give off the impression that I was in over my head and that I was having serious thoughts about cancelling the whole shebang. It would have been nice to see one face who wasn't all determined to see me married is all. It would have been funny to joke with you about you being ready with the pink caddy the moment I gave you the word to skedaddle. Remember that? That's what we used to joke about when either of us got serious about anybody else. We had an unspoken vow to be that escape plan should the need ever arise. There wasn't any one guy or girl who was beyond reproach, every one of them was subject to being ditched at a moment's notice. We'd take off in that pink caddy, leaving them to wonder where exactly he or she had lost us. And that's when we'd drive off down the highway, the end credits would roll, and some Blake Babies song would carry us out.

That's what you would have been for me had you come. I would have still gotten married, but having you there would have been like an extra measure of security. Knowing I had plan B, to run away with you, would have only served to calm my already frantic nerves.

I know this isn't the forum to be dredging all this up again, but, remember, you started this.

"And you honestly think I'd have any reason to convince you to stay?" you asked.

"Wouldn't you?"

"I'm not so sure."

I laughed.

"You're not saying you'd want one more roll in the hay for old times sake are you?"

"That wouldn't be bad either," you laughed too. "But I was talking about you and I, and what you're not marrying him would mean."

"Not an option."

"I know that and you know that, but I don't think anybody's told my heart yet. When he finds out, boy, is he getting be pissed."

"Is that what this is? Is this some pathetic attempt to ransom out your company? Don't marry Greg or else?"

"No."

"Then what is it, sugar? Explain it to me."

"It is what it is. I feel what I feel. I've never stopped and I don't think you've either. I just can't... go. Can't be there when, you know."

"I knew it. You are holding yourself hostage, thinking that I'm going to decide to choose you over him. Let my Patrick go, I say."

I fully expected you to keep on joking with me. That's what we did, after all. We riffed on each other's crazy notion, adding to what was already there, until we'd both end up in hysterics. That was the basis for the majority of our conversations. In fact, it was the spirit by which our friendship was forged, the idea that the two of us could be so in sync that I didn't have to explain where I was headed with one non sequitir after another. I didn't have to explain to you what made a certain musing amusing (?!). You'd get it and you'd be right there to play off of it. It was the invisible tether that kept us tied to one another for so long, the fact that we always were of the same mind. If I was up, I brought you up with me eventually. Or if you were down, you brought me down with you. The concept of you not being right there with me, not empathizing with what I was going through, or vice-versa, was inconceivable. I took it for granted that we'd always be capable of seeing the other's viewpoint.

That was not the case in this situation.

"I'm being serious, Breanne. Don't marry him. Please."

"Not an option, darling, and it never will be."

"And that's why I can't fly over there. I can't see you with somebody else when I know that should be me up there."


why do you have to be a heartbreaker?
is it a lesson that I never knew?

I started to laugh again.

"It's not funny. I'm pouring out my heart to you and all you can do is laugh."

"I'm not meaning to, but how am I supposed to take what you're telling me seriously? It's ridiculous."

"Is it ridiculous that I care about you enough to not want to get hurt by seeing you with him?"

"No, it's not ridiculous. It's kind of sweet. It's unfortunate that you had to tell me because you know what my answer is going to be, Patrick. That's never going to change."

"Neither are my feelings for you."

"I'm sorry to hear that. But simply because you feel the need for a second chance doesn't give you the right to make up some flimsy excuse and lie to me. It also doesn't give you the right to abandon me."

"That's all you can say?"

"What should I say?"

"Tell me you understand where I'm coming from, Breanne. Tell me you wish it could be different somehow. Tell me that in another life, in other circumstances, it would be me there."

"I can't. I don't know where you're coming from. I don't. I don't live in this murky grey area of regret that you seem trapped in. I don't wallow in the choices I've made and the way life has unfolded for me. Yeah, there was a time where I did see the two of us finally making it to the altar someday. In fact, there were a couple of years there where I was sure it would happen for us. But, you know what, you're the one who screwed this up. You're the one who didn't believe in us. You're the one who fucked it all to hell. You. Asked. Her. First. Remember?

"It took me a long time to give up on that dream and start building one of my own... without you in it.

"And I don't wish it could be different because wishing doesn't get you anything but heartache. My daddy always says you till the land you own and nevermind what somebody else has got. I can't spend my time daydreaming about something that apparently was never meant to happen. I can't waste my days hoping things turn around. I couldn't then and I'm not about to start now.

"As for another life, maybe in another life you would have asked me is all I'm saying about that."

I wanted my life with Greg. That's all I understood at that point. It's taken a long time and a lot of conversations with you to be able to see your angle on the whole incident. It was very clear that you did what you thought you was right, but that still doesn't change the fact you were wrong. There is right and there is right, and that's all there is to it. You don't try and make somebody else's happiness about you, you just don't. And, when somebody who supposedly means the world to you tells you that she needs you to be there for her, you don't ask what you're going to get out of it. You ask how soon do you want me. I never meant to hurt you, but I don't think the same could be said of you. Because somebody who really had our best interests at heart, somebody who was truly interested in preserving our friendship, wouldn't have done what you did. They just wouldn't. And the fact you did broke my heart more than anything else.

"I think it's better if I don't come and maybe if we didn't talk for awhile, Breanne."

"If that's what you think is best. They'll still be a place for you if, you know, you change your mind."

"Don't hold your breath..."

I hung up the phone after you.

It was almost seven months before we spoke again after that, but I don't have to tell you that. You were there.

Or, more precisely, you weren't there.

Breanne

If You Think That I Don't Love You, You're Just Wrong, That Don't Matter Now Anyway, I Couldn't Bear To See You Up There, With A White Dress On

--"I Do", Jude

As I sat by the gate at LAX, waiting for my flight to board, I thought I was going to be sick. There was a feeling of nausea mixed with fear in the bottom of my stomach that I had never felt before. I'm sure to the passerbys I must have looked a sight. Hunched over, head down--they must have thought I was a first-time flyer anticipating the dwindling moments. I'm surprised nobody came by to offer my consolation, letting me know that I was going to make it through my flight fine. At least then I wouldn't have been alone in the airport. However, the truth was that it wasn't my first flight nor my second. While I was nervous about the flight as I always am whenever I'm on a plane that is going to be in the air for more than thirty minutes, that wasn't the reason I was experiencing bouts of absolute wretchedness. The truth was that there was no easy fix, no pills I could take for what I had.

There is no cure for the choking mist of love.

I had been dreading this trip the whole month leading up to my flight. I couldn't tell her that, though. What kind of friend would I be to say that to her? It was supposed to be the happiest day of her life and I was afraid that I was going to ruin it with my negative attitude as I have a penchant for doing just that. But this wasn't going to be the usual case of me feeling out of place or being bored; this was going to be a case of me actually being heartsick. I couldn't explain how I felt any more succinctly than that. I felt like my heart was dissolving inside my chest, eating away through my skin, the closer I came to getting on that plane. All I could think of was if I felt like this at the airport, a full two weeks before she actually got married, how was I going to handle spending the next few days being around her? I knew I wouldn't be able to abide having her talk about him every second of every day I spent with her, beam about how happy she was going to be, or tell me how glad she was that I was able to come. I didn't want to meet the lucky bastard and I definitely did not want to gain the confirmation that all her dreams were going to be coming true without me.

That's why I wanted to throw up. All of it was moving so quickly. One second it seemed we had been discussing how we were so perfect for one another and the next she had fell in love with somebody that wasn't me. I know it's very petty of me, but I couldn't help but take it to heart that something precious was being taken from me, something that I never even thought it was conceivable I could lose.

I sat in the airport going over my options.

I could be the bastard and just not go. I could chicken out and give her some excuse that I was feeling well. She would have never bought that, though. She wasn't anything if not perceptive. She'd want to know what was the matter and I'd have to eventually tell her that I just couldn't see her go through with it.

Or I could just get on the plane, land with a smile on my face, and then let it slowly dwindle away as I celebrated with her over the next few weeks. I could do that until I felt myself completely die inside. I could pretend that it didn't bother me in the least and try to be happy for her. That's what was expected of me. That's what I was supposed to do. That's what she wanted from me.

But all I wanted was her.

All I could think about was that time we parked on that hill and we talked the sun up from its hiding place. She made promises. I made promises. It's funny how we both were so sure everything was going to go smoothly from that point on.

"You're everything I'm looking for," she had said.

"I feel the same. It's like--I don't know--saying it aloud to you makes it feel real, like I'm putting my handprints in cement for you."

"It's about time you came around. It's what I've always said, these were never just words for me. I care about you fiercely."

"I needed to do my best to stay away from you, but you talked me into it."

"Good."

And then we just stayed up on that hill, sharing that moment of revelation for the few hours we had before her parents would start to worry. I thought there was a deal sealed that day, one that would never be broken as long as the two of us should live. I thought the way she felt about would never change. Fuck, I thought the way I felt about her would never change. But that wasn't true. It wasn't so much that I stopped caring about her as much as I stopped remembering just how much I did. It's sad to say that I took it for granted the two of us would just end up together and I never took the proper steps to get the ball rolling. It was like she was the army and I'd already signed off on my enlistment papers when the truth was that I should have taken it as the first of many steps to ensuring the future I wanted was the one I would end up with. That should have kicked my butt into gear. It reminded me of that scene in Swingers where Lorraine tells Mikey that she'll come him sometime after they meet. He tells her then and there that that wasn't good enough, that he wanted to make plans with her. That should have been have me. I shouldn't have been like "yeah, I've got her locked up." I should have started making plans and never stopped until it was she and I walking down that aisle.

The thing about not having definite plans that I've always been perturbed by is the fact that, without definite plans, distractions always seem to creep up. It's one thing to be able to tell someone that you couldn't go out with them because you already had a girlfriend you were saving up to move out with. It's another thing to say that you couldn't go out with someone because you were kind of seeing somebody. Even I felt foolish that we hadn't defined exactly what was going to happen from that point forward. We left it to fate to iron out the kinks and ended up without a goal in sight. I got cocky that a future with her forever was my destiny, when all I had to do was put one foot in front of the other to get us there. That way, when the distractions came, like other boyfriends and girlfriends, like school, like family and friends, we could have made it through somehow, lending each other strength.

My not appreciating what I could have had was my worst mistake and it cost me her.

I started seeing someone else, assuring her that it was only a temporary relationship. I even convinced her that it would be good for us because that way I could get it out of my system. I told her that I would never be tempted by anyone else if I had a semi-serious relationship with someone else. She didn't believe me, at first, but the nagging sense she and I were inevitable pushed aside any doubts either one of us may have had. I seriously went into that relationship that I would be in and out within the year. That one year turned into six years--six years of telling her that it wasn't going to last, then I'm pretty sure it wasn't going to last, then I'm not so sure anymore. Until finally I called her up one night, ironically inviting her to come out to see me in California, to celebrate the fact I was going to ask the "temporary" girl to marry me. The sadness in her voice reached a crescendo that night. I knew it was coming. Every step I got closer with the temp, the more the one I really wanted must have felt like I was pushing her away. I didn't care at that point was the bitter aspect of what developed. In my mind I was trading up. I thought the promises I made with her were spoken in a moment of youthful infatuation. I thought what I was getting myself into was the "real" thing. I thought three years of seeing somebody in person trumped knowing someone inside and out for eight years. I thought I had made the right choice.

And then, when that relationship tanked, it was my turn to discover she had moved on without me. The only difference was the two of them took actual steps to getting to that happily ever after that was supposed to be mine. From first date to marriage in less than 2 1/2 years. I told her it was some kind of land-speed record. I told her that I was happy for her. I told her that I'd taken my swing and struck out, but what I really wanted to tell her was that I desperately wanted another crack at her.

I was too late.

That's how I found myself in that airport awaiting the nightmare of watching my best friend in whole wide world marrying someone else. That's how I had worked myself up into the state I was in, on the verge of throwing up all over the airport. Yet nauseousness and vomit was the least of my worries. What concerned me the most was the idea that I would actually ruin her wedding. I pictured myself standing up in the middle of the ceremony and announcing to the wedding party that I objected to the wedding. I wanted that Hollywood ending where she would realize that she was supposed to end up with me and ditch her groom at the altar. I wanted that and I knew if I got on the plane that there was a good chance that that would be exactly what I would do. The only difference would be that she would be mortified in embarrassment and I really would lose her forever. That was my rationale. I knew I would never be capable of standing idly by and watching her go.

I went into the bathroom with my bags not truly believing I was contemplating giving up the rare opportunity to go and see her one more time. I looked in the mirror after throwing up in the toilet and saw the kind of person I'd become. I saw I was the kind of person that put his own well-being before that of those he considered closest to him. I felt kind of ashamed for myself. This was always the pattern with me. Any time I got the least bit uncomfortable I started to come up with a new way to extricate myself from the situation. Instead of just dealing with my fears or insecurities, instead of facing my jealousy and envy head-on, I was contemplating setting it aside for another time. I just couldn't deal.

On one hand she would be very upset that I didn't show up for the wedding. On the other hand I would never see her again. I had no choice really. It was either disappoint my best friend horribly or lose her entirely.

I walked out of the bathroom, playing around with the quarter in my pocket. I gave a moment's thought to flipping for it--heads I go, tails I stay. Then I realized that would be even too callous for me to do. The least I could do if I was going to take the coward's way out would be to own up to making the decision. She deserved that much consideration. I wouldn't excuse away the fact that the friend that had known her for half her life wasn't going to be at her wedding. I wasn't going to tell her many years down the line that the reason I didn't go was the fact that the coin had landed on the wrong side. I wanted to be able to tell her, when it came time for confessions, that I'd been the big boy and thought of this crappy idea myself.

Yes, it was selfish in a way. It was definitely immature of me. The thought that I couldn't keep my thoughts to myself for two weeks spoke little of my self-control. But I truly thought I was doing because I loved her so much. I loved her enough to stay away.

I picked up my cel phone, dialed her number, and started walking back to the parking lot.

"I've got bad news, my Breannie..."

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

We're All In This Together, And It Shows, When We Stand, Hand In Hand, Make Our Dreams Come True

--"We're All In This Together", High School Musical Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

Normally, I play up my girly side. I try not to be seen as anything of a tomboy. I like to be pampered by my husband. I like to be thought of as a delicate flower because that's why my mother told me is the proper way for a young woman to act. However, there are certain instances when I do things definitely not seen as genteel and graceful. Eating at my favorite barbeque place, for instance. Another exampe of this is when it comes to me and my favorite baseball team, The Braves. As anyone who has ever gone to a game with me can attest, I tend to get as rowdy as a pig in slop. I don't care. When I'm cheering them on or when I'm yelling at an umpire or a player when they're losing, one thing you can count on is that I'm always going to be vocal about how I'm feeling at that particular moment. It's just who I am. I'm just being little 'ole me.

Because of this affinity for the Braves and baseball in general, I am trying my hand at putting together a fantasy baseball team for only the third time in my life. The first two were done at the urging at high school and college friends, guys who thought it was cool that I was a gal who seemed to know her stuff. What they didn't count on was the fact that I simply didn't have the time or energy to keep up with the process. I'm all for putting a team together and tracking them how they're doing every once in a while, but, alas, I'm not a diehard nutcase that has to study every nuance and minutae of everyone on my team. I'm a fan, but I'd hardly call myself a fanatic. That is why I think those first two experiments in the world of fantasy baseball failed so fantastically. I lost interest and they lost interest in trying to get me to take it more seriously. The way I saw it and the way my daddy always explained it to me whenever he took my mother and I to a game, baseball should be fun. It shouldn't involve doing any actual work. It should be something you can sit back and relax. It's a great game when you don't try to overanalyze it too much. To me it's like a magic trick; it only succeeds when you don't try to figure out why it succeeds.

This said, I am giving it another shot because Eeyore asked me to and because the particular league he invited me to doesn't seem that difficult or time-consuming. It's been an interesting experience to say the least. Instead of having to change line-ups on a daily basis, I only have to track them on a weekly basis. And instead of having to evaluate players as if they were livestock, I'm actually getting behind the whole spirit of the thing and cheering them whenever they do well... even if they aren't on the Braves.

Instead of seeing them as merely their numbers, I actually find myself coming on-line during some free time and seeing how Carlos Delgado, my 1st Baseman, is doing or if I should put Bobby Crosby into the line-up. And you know what? When you stop think of it as a chore and start thinking about it as being an actual manager it begins to get fun. It's the whole aspect of putting together a team with some players you know you have to have--like my Chipper--some players you're only okay with, and some players you wonder how in ever you got stuck with them, and mold them into something you're proud to call you're in. To be sure, some players do better than others, but they all contribute. I didn't get that the first two times. Yes, sometimes, I can be a tad stubborn. I didn't comprehend why I had to have players who, in my opinion, just stank up to high heaven.

But now I understand. It's like a life lesson. Sometimes everything's going to go your way. Sometimes you'll actually get the players you want. Other times you may not get your first choice or second choice. And even other times you're going to get saddled with the guys you had no intention of getting to know. They're just like the people in your life. Some of my friends I knew from the very beginning that we were going to be like two roses in a bouquet; inseparable from one another and as close as possible. Other friends I took a liking to but had no idea that we'd ever be close. And then there were some people who I was positive I would never see eye-to-eye with, but through serendipity I came to establish a friendly rivalry with. That's how a circle of friends is, I suppose. Everyone can't be your first choice, but they all contribute to making you who you are. I can honestly say that I would not be the same person if anyone in my circle of friends wasn't there.

They're my team and, like any team, everyone contributes.

See, and they say baseball can't teach you anything.

Breanne