No Great Illusion

The things is, by the time I was twenty-two, I was so used to being with boys who couldn’t live without me that I could hardly fathom a man who would pick up his newspaper and hardly blink when I curled up beside him.

Now I am twenty-three and you tilt your head toward me for a kiss on the cheek without lifting your eyes from an article about the stock market (or something comparably dense). I flutter around and I find things to do, but in the back of my mind I’m still curiously surprised by all the flowers you’re not sending me.

You have no idea how many times you’ve told me the same stories, or that you’re the first person that I let get away with that. Partly it’s because I like the way you tell them, partly it’s because I’m committing things to memory. I’m using things against you or for you, it can be hard to say which.

More than twice you told me about the girl in the peasant blouse, and I recognized that the blouse was more than a blouse now. It was you and your eighteen year old hormones and ideas about breasts, half-concealed by white cotton. So when I saw that filmy white fabric in the shop, I bought it and wore it and knew you’d react, though you wouldn’t remember why. And I blushed, feeling sneaky and pretty, and like an eighteen year old someone else, which I think is what you’re missing after all.

Stop, please?

Quasimoto-ing my way around the apartment blows. I kind of wish I had medical insurance so I could get a prescription or at least a pair of crutches, but no way in hell am I hauling my gimpy self to a doctor just to have him say “Yup! Sunburn! Come back and see me when it’s cancer!”

I’m sorry I keep talking about this, but while I was limping home from work in a sundress at half past midnight, I noticed I was being hollered and leered at more often than usual. I started thinking about that scene in The Lion King where there’s a stampede and the hyenas are waiting to pounce on the weakest animal (I may be conflating The Lion King with various Animal Planet documentaries). That’s when I started to get panicky. I’m the injured wildebeast! I can’t run away! Why is my dress suddenly so short?  I hobbled across the crosswalk a little more swiftly after that.

I made it home just fine (a few nice people even asked if I was ok), but it bothers me that I had to feel that way at all.

Anyway, this injured wildebeast is on her way to bed. Sweet dreams, jungle.

I’m back in Brooklyn!

It’s sunshiney here and it feels good to be back, except for the fact that I have to leave for work in a couple of hours.

Oh, and one other little problem: the sunburn from hell.

Trust me when I say I’ve been sunburned before. Like all pale people, I’m accustomed to the occasional bad burn, and I stopped being a baby about them by the time I could toddle around Cape Cod.

This sunburn is different.

My legs currently feel like they’re being roasted atop a giant pit of fire. I burned them four days ago. I am so beyond the healing effects of aloe. I’ve been taking Vicodin and it has little to no effect. That’s… troubling.

If my legs are in one position for too long, I will almost certainly be limping for the next few hours. I can’t use stairs. I took a picture of the madness, but I’m not sure if I should post it. Wouldn’t want to scare off all my pale readers (what up, pale readers!).

So other than that, feelin’ good!

I… have done something terrible.

Listen, I know my limitations. I recognize that I am pretty much the palest person I know. If I were a redhead, I might enter into albino territory. My face has a tendency to get burned if I spend four minutes outdoors in mostly cloudy weather. I was very careful with my face this week, slathering on the SPF 55, despite how greasy it makes my bangs. But. (Oh there’s always a but!)

I neglected to put a significant amount of sunscreen on the backs of my legs yesterday, and then I lay on the beach on my stomach and finished my book. Let me tell you something: the book was not worth it.

I can barely walk. Trying to sleep is miserable. I roll around on the couch like a beached whale, trying to get comfortable. The idea of pants is horrifying.

I’m still going back to the beach today.

It’s been a gray day, here in Virginia Beach. We spent most of it indoors, lying on the bed, looking out the giant window in the bedroom. On days like this, everything turns the same color. The sand fades into the waves. The waves fade into the sky. The surfers fade into the fog. It’s mesmerizing.

I’m sipping a whiskey sour and wearing a new silk shirt.

This place is decorated exactly how you would expect it might be - lighthouse wallpaper border, oversized seashells, heron lamps. That seems to be the major constant in my vacations - themed decorating. I grew up staying in cottages in Cape Cod each summer - sea glass, dried starfish, thirty year old board games. Here, there is air conditioning, which seems like cheating. The carpets are newer, the light fixtures too modern. But there’s still that salty smell, traces of sand in the tub no matter how many outdoor showers you take.

I’m craving the sunshine, but for now I’m content with getting acquainted with my souvenir shot glass. “It’s vacation!” makes a good excuse for anything.

I leave early tomorrow morning for Virginia Beach. My suitcase is half packed. I’ll be there for seven days. I’ve packed eight dresses.

The weather forecast predicts a lot of thunderstorms, but I won’t even mind. I just want to get out from under these buildings for a few days.

I’m bringing strawberries and chocolate chip cookies for the car ride.

I love New York, but there are some thoughts I need to leave behind. I want to use this trip to remember how to be thoughtless.

I will dive underwater. I will stop everything.

I have a new pair of sandals. Twelve dollars at H&M. I’m going to trot them out on the boardwalk and buy souvenir shot glasses.

I will forgive myself and forget myself and I will wear sunglasses. Even if it rains.

I missed a day of blogging, which I haven’t done in a little while. I had gotten into a routine of sorts, of putting my voice out there each day, even if I had nothing special to say. I wanted to contribute. But yesterday I just couldn’t muster the enthusiasm.

I’ve been dealing with some personal stuff for the last couple of days. For the first time in my life, I wished I had a therapist - someone to take all these terrible things in my head and unburden me. I wished I was Catholic, so I could kneel at a confessional and talk until the words stopped coming. I’ve always had this extreme aversion to the idea of telling a stranger my problems, but here I was, imagining writing anonymous letters to celebrities (Kate Winslet came to mind…?) just to be rid of it all.

I know it’s a human thing - to feel guilty, to feel anxious, to feel anything at all. But I’m still surprising myself by how capable of mistakes I am. Perhaps I’d thought I’d grown out of that. Perhaps it’s good to be reminded?

meganfalley:

Years later,

did you look for my name on the bookshelves?

 

Flip to the back cover to see if I’m still pretty,

how many kids I have,

if I mentioned you?

 

I am not what I once was.

 

My spine, curlicue and scoliosis

from crescent moons you bent in to me.

 

My skin, sunset and jaundiced

from a daffodil you rubbed across my cheek.

 

My hair, silver as a daydream

from the cutlery we never owned.

 

In my rocking chair I let a teacup put its mouth on me,

try to fit your name into the crossword puzzle.

 

Your wife knows you have dreamt

of making love to me again.

In your sleep you have broken both hips.

 

You tip with nickels, lint, and lifesaver mints.

They are stale and brittle

like staircase and bone.

 

A waitress wears my name on her tag.

You repeat it endlessly to the sugar packets.

 

When you finally remember

it will be like replacing the faulty bulb

in a string of Christmas lights.

 

You bend a straw in Brooklyn,

my knuckle cracks in another continent.

 

I reach for dried apricots

and chew on your earlobes.

 

You coax dental floss from its plastic,

wedge my hair between your molars,

 

you will lose me one more time

in the sink drain.

 

When the doctors unlock my hospital gown

I hope your hands are unbuttoning my blouse,

 

that the chill in the morgue

is a long weekend snow day.

 

The autopsy is oblivious to how we lived.

 

The nurse drapes a sheet over my face,

I open my eyes to see you,

laughing in the bedclothes.

Megan Falley, this is beautiful! It makes me cold and tired. I like it very much.

I received a package from my dad yesterday - my first package since I moved in! It contained the following goodies:

- a copy of Empire magazine (British movie magazine)

- New York: The Growth of a City by MJ Howard

- New York Walks: An On Foot Guide by Jane Eggington

- a DVD of 42nd St., the 1933 musical, which I’ve never seen!

My dad is the best.

I’d feel too terrible posting it here, because, my god, that was one of the most painful things I’ve ever watched, and I agree with everything that Dave Holmes* said here.

But you know what? I suddenly have an overwhelming desire for Chris Klein to be my live-in boyfriend. We would stay up late on weeknights, performing our own out of tune musicals, making each other laugh, and generally not giving a fuck when our voices cracked. And yes, Chris, Mandy Moore IS an angel.

*How great is Dave Holmes, you guys? I love that he has a tumblr and keeps it real and posts pictures of his adorable bearded face.

So I went out again last night with a bunch of coworkers, back to the fantastic Irish pub. And it was the best. Again. Despite the fact that everyone likes to do shots of terrible, terrible things, and I was trying my damnedest not to get drunk. It just so happened that Mr. Chang - the creator of Chang Beer - was one of the (very few) other patrons hanging out at the bar on a Monday night, and he bought a bottle for everyone in the place. I’m telling you, this city is magical.

Afterward, we went back to the most delicious pizza joint ever, and I stopped thinking about bikinis for an hour and had two slices. And it felt really good.

Late at night, after work, I walk to the subway in Soho. There, the streets are cobbled and uneven, and I am constantly coming thisclose to breaking my neck in three inch heels. I pass the sleeping homeless in the park. They never stir. I always wish I had brought a jacket. I pass girls in tiny, expensive dresses, hailing cabs, and men who wear glasses and ties and travel in packs.

It doesn’t take long to get to my station, but for a few short minutes I am consumed with self-consciousness and curiosity. I wonder what they think of me. Do I blend in? Do I look like I belong here? Do the tourists catch a glimpse of me, striding down the sidewalk with my black tights and headphones, and feel a pang of jealousy? Do they wonder what I’m doing out so late? Do I look lost or lonely or green? I’m never sure.

All I know is that I’ve taken to this place. I don’t know my way around, but I don’t feel like a stranger. I’m at ease, even at midnight. Especially then. When the street vendors have disappeared and the bars have opened up, and spilled out onto the sidewalks, glowing and crowded in the warm night, I am making my way home. I am making my way.

I wait for my train to come, and if I’m not too worn out, I sometimes have to pace to keep from dancing on the platform. I tap my heels. I watch the couples, sleepy and in love. The train guides us above ground. I watch the night light up on the way to Brooklyn. I’m the only one who bothers to look, but it’s better that way. The view is all mine.

I am falling into a life here. I am smoothing out a routine. Steps from my apartment, I grow anxious. I fumble with my key. I find myself unintentionally holding my breath, until my fingers flip the light switch. There I sigh. There I lie down. I am home and I am learning what that means.