Scared.

I wish I wasn't so scared. Of everything. But mostly I'm afraid of the unknown, which in my opinion is the worst type of fear. How do you overcome something that you haven't even faced yet, really. That doesn't make any sense but that's how I feel. 

I'm finally doing it, putting my house on the market and selling it. My plan? Move back in with my parents for a year (ugh) to save money. While I am there I plan to do some research looking for jobs in any state besides Rhode Island. Hopefully either Florida or California. I need a change and I need a new job. As much as my current job affords me some perks...working for my dad, extra vacation days etc., I am slowly fading away into oblivion with the stress and unhappiness I feel on a day to day basis working here. The dread of going into work begins the day before and I am drowning. 

Hopefully this change works and I find something I like. But I'm again, scared. I don't know what I want to do. Work in a book publishing company? But books are sadly becoming obsolete. Work at Disney or Universal Studios? But in which department? I miss the days of things being decided for me. 

Simple

Here’s what simple and happy looks like. We are shown this when we are kids. Do you see it? Can you feel it? Sit with it? Hold it? Don't let go, because the older you get the harder it is to recognize it. And when it’s gone it’s more complicated because we are adult, if we are lucky. Maybe we are still kids, battered from the reality of what life is, before it’s ever even fair. What is fair? So you pick up the phone, and you talk to someone who can remind you of who you were before everyone who never mattered told you who you should be.

The Worst Of Him

The worst of him will kill you before you get the best of him. I keep telling myself that. I learned that lesson once before. Better to have gotten out now, maybe the universe was secretly doing me a favor. You think you’re filling a glass up with something, and then you pick it up and everything you’ve been pouring into it comes out the bottom. There’s a hole. 

I don’t want to be on your time, Lindsay said.

I don’t either. Put me in another time, I replied.

I’ve always been crazy but it kept me from going insane.

Life is filled with moments where you have to sit alone with yourself.

I miss you already, was the last thing I said to myself. And that was all so unfortunately true. Sometimes people get lost, I get lost, from time to time. Probably more than one should.

 Sometimes people find there way home again.

Brother and Sister

What if I forgive myself? What if I’m not sorry? What if I did the right thing, and still it didn’t matter? What if I told you I don’t like my brother and sister? You would think of me as the bad guy, this is a truth we are not allowed to say out loud. I didn’t use the word hate, there’s no hating here. This isn’t a rant from a sixteen year-old. I have sat with this feeling for many years, repressed it, denied it. There’s the simple truth that there is no relationship. And looking back at my life, there never has been. You could blame the age difference, but I don’t want to place blame on anyone. I simply can’t lie anymore, so cast me as the villain. I wish I could lie, but holding onto a lie eats the inside of my stomach up. Do I want to be estranged from them? Are we already estranged? There’s nothing to fix. Try again. I don’t want too. Is that selfish? Maybe. Is this being written in anger? No, I’m not even angry. I’ve been angry before with them, but I settled that with myself on my terms. And I cried tonight, a little bit, thinking about the fact that I don’t care. I’m looking at pictures of us, younger, on my wall, trying to feel a connection. The memory that says stop. You do care. You’re suppose to care, but I just don’t. My tears weren’t tears of sadness, but of relief. For I’ve never really admitted this, for fear that I would burn in hell. Maybe now I really will, but this is my truth. And the truth is a bitch that’s hard to swallow, but when you do swallow it, you feel a fearlessness that can’t be duplicated by any other action.

Another One Bites the Dust

Remember when I told you he still liked me? I was wrong. We were sitting in his car on the fourth of the July after spending all day together. It was two thirty in the morning. I went to kiss him, and he turned his cheek. I asked him, “you don’t want to kiss me?” and he shrugged his shoulders and said, “I think just friends. I think friends is best.” I paused, and thought of course, the signs were there. But there were mixed signals. It wasn’t just my infatuation for a summer romance. I guess I was suppose to ask him why, but it felt desperate and inconsequential. He just wasn’t into me. Anything he said, I wouldn’t believe. I would believe something even worse, and does anyone tell you the truth? The truth is as I sit here with a heavy heart, he is relieved, happy, it’s probably the best he’s felt in two months. He doesn’t have to spend anymore time with me, see me ever again, even though he still owes me three hundred and sixty dollars. Yes, I really did lend someone five hundred dollars that I knew for a month and a half. But I don’t regret it, I was happy to help, it’s who I am. I helped make his first show happen. And maybe years from now, even though he told me once that he never looks back, he will be reminded of me in some way, and appreciate my kindness and generosity. Because I am, kind and generous. I have to believe that. 

Sex Or Not

We haven’t had sex yet, but he’ll put his arm around me and kiss me in public. Every friend I’m introduced to knows my name, my story. He told me he liked me two weeks into dating. I never had a guy do that to me before. He is a gentlemen, and this is turning into a perfect summer romance. But we haven’t had sex yet, he is old fashioned. He once went nearly a year without sex. He says he sometimes puts those he likes on a pedestal and the sex can knock them down. Is he talking about me? He said sex can sometimes, most of the time, taint that perfect feeling of love. It can create lust and jealously. I didn’t disagree, my only argument was simple : but sex is good. I thought this was all a sweet way of telling me he knows I am must be frustrated. When I told him once he could spend the night, he then started inviting me to spend the night. Everything else between us worked, so why not be patient? It could make it all better. I mean, we see each other three times a week now. He must still like me.

The rush of not breathing

Seussical Jr. is over. The show went up two weeks ago. I had feared it, dreaded it, thought for sure it would be terrible. But it wasn't...it went so incredibly well! Afterwards I had so many people come up to me and compliment me on a job well done. Nobody could believe how fantastic it was. I had a conversation with the Godparents of one of my kids Emilia...who played JoJo on Sunday. They said they had recently seen another children's production, which was torture to sit through and as they drove up from Manhattan to see Emi in Seussical they dreaded sitting through another show but they were floored, they shook my hand and congratulated me saying "It was AMAZING!" I went to Stop & Shop to get the flowers for my 8th graders and the florist said to me "Oh, Seussical! I have had a lot of people coming in for flowers for that show, they said it was incredible." 

I have never had the reaction after a show as I got from Seussical. Yes, everyone is always saying how great the shows are, and how much they loved them, and with each passing year it gets better and better. But this was a whole other level. I was so proud of all of my kids. They definitely pulled it together and it all turned out incredible. 

The day following the performance I hopped on a plane with family and friends to Italy. It was a much needed two week vacation. I sat on the beach, I ate a lot of gelato, walked up a number of stairs, basked in the glow of the gorgeous Mediterranean. It was a magical trip. We spent one night in Naples before traveling by boat to an island off of Naples, Ischia. It was beautiful, and our hotel suite that Carrie and I were in had a loft and it overlooked the Mediterranean. Breathtaking. We stayed there four nights, eating delicious food and spending quality time with each other. 

Following Ischia we made our way to Positano, where we had rented a villa for seven nights. WOW! The villa was incredible!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Three floors, again overlooking the Mediterranean. A beautiful terrace on the first floor and the third. It was so nice to relax. So nice to spend time with my friend Carrie, who I never get to see since her move to DC. 

The best part of my trip was a trip to the Thermal Spa Poseidon in Ischia. I can't even describe in words how beautiful this place was. It was an outdoor spa basically, pools of varying degrees of thermal waters, which were naturally pooled into the basins from the center of the mountain. Starting off at a cooler temperature until you reach 40 degrees Celsius (which I believe is around 80 degrees Fahrenheit).  The hot pools were alongside an ice cold pool...from 40 celsius to 15 celsius (80 fahrenheit to 45 fahrenheit I believe. Going from the hot to the extreme cold was an incredible feeling. You step into the cold and you feel it immediately, the nerves under your skin tingle and as you immerse yourself fully into the water the coldness constricts your breathing and your lungs. It's difficult to take a breath. But it's invigorating, and it leaves you with this amazing feeling. You only stay in the cold for at the most 30 seconds, and that's all you need. It's a rush. And it's addicting. 

Oh and also...we met Denzel Washington.