Saturday, July 25, 2009

I've Been Looking so Long, at These Pictures of You

I'm on the brink of an aneurysm because I can't change my font to my usual "courier" setting. I can't change it to any font or text size for that matter. PERFECTION CAN'T BE REACHED grrrrrrrrrr. I will have to overcome this, and forge through the river and write in my blog anyway. Annoying font and all. Sigh. Why must life be so cruel and difficult? Universe, what did I ever do to you?

Saturday nights have become my "stay at home" time. After working three long, late nights in a row I want nothing more than to sit on my couch and watch movies. Which for the past three weekends I've done. It's wonderful. Although I should be productive and write or clean up my room or something else less wonderful like that. Hey, at least I haven't been drinking! Just saucy and sober. Bam! Now that I've watched three movies in a row I figured it would be a good time to do something on my computer. Not write, not look at porn, oh no. First I had to catch up on the news (i.e. gossip blogs), and then look through all the pictures on my computer to pick out my favorites. I remembered to buy printer ink, so I can continue my soccer mom project of printing out pictures to frame and cover my living room wall with. Old lady-hood here I come! Not only am I lame, but I border on mild/raging narcissist, so I like to be able to look at myself as much as possible without having to strap a neck brace around my neck with a mirror attached to it (Sketch idea!).

There are so, so many pictures saved on my computer. Six years worth of drunken nights, parties, holidays, random get togethers, impromptu photo shoots and everything else. There are a lot of wigs too. Which makes me happy. I started young. There are tons of pictures I completely forgot about too. Some featuring people I completely forgot about. I have Mr. Big shots from four or five years ago, some I took and others he must have e-mailed me...before cell phones had camera capabilities I suppose. He looks the same. Seeing pictures of myself when I was 17, 18, is so strange to me. That was the very near past, yet I feel as though I can't relate to the person in those pictures. At the same time though, the only thing that truly changed is my hair and style (to an extent). Meaning I finally learned how to look good. Yikes. I wore red lipstick back then like I do now, I pose that same. I was as much as a camera whore then as I am now. Seeing the progress I've made as a human being is satisfying. I don't look at these pictures and realize that I haven't done anything with my life (not yet at least). Where I'm at today is a lot better than where I was three years ago, and I think things will continue to get better. My hair used to be so light! Progress! And I have pictures of most of the guys I've slept with. Which is hilarious and weird. I guess that's what happens when you're not into picking up strangers at bars. I should make an album so when I'm old I can look back and not only remember how, er, awesome (yeah, that's the word I'll go with) I was but I can show my daughter, Stella/Darla, the pictures and she can judge me. "Ew Mom, how could you!" or, "Wow he's hot, I bet he's a DILF now." I'd like to think it'll be the latter, because my daughter will obviously be cool and open to such a conversation since she will inherently have the slut gene herself. Or she'll be a raging lesbian and dispise me her entire life because I forced her to wear dresses as a child and I'll never get to share with her all the people I shared my body with. I'll have to get a cat. That's neither here nor there....ANYWAY.

How did people live before digital cameras? I remember it then, developing film, taking only 12 at a time. Now I can't keep up because I have thousands of pictures saved on my computer thanks to my own and all my friend's digital cameras. Good, bad, embarassing, all those pictures get uploaded, and I'm lazy and don't delete any of them. That's probably a good thing. Although the thought of, "What if I die tomorrow?" occasionally pops into my head and I think of the proverbial "people" going through all my notebooks and reading what a twisted individual I am. And then "they" (as if the "they" isn't my family, but strangers) go onto my computer and look at all my pictures and laugh and laugh and laugh because I look bad in a lot of my pictures and they think I'm ugly. Meanwhile I'm dead and can't do anything about it. In fact, maybe they'll be glad I'm dead because of the weirdo faces I've made. I'm only human! These are the thoughts that plague my existence for seconds at a time. I've also decided I'm going to grow my bangs out. I saw Zooey Deschanel on the cover of Self magazine, and her bangs are kind of long, and I'm impressionable when it comes to hair, so that's why I'll stop trimming my bangs. Worse comes to worst I can cut them and everything will be Katy fucking Perry again. Ugh.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Everything's Coming Up Roses

At this moment that I am typing this, I am happy. I've felt this way since Monday night and the feeling keeps on going. I was terrified that once back at work today the happiness would be ruined. Anger and bitterness would return, and I would start drinking again. Nope. It was funny too. Before our shift started my co-workers were making fun of me, all making guesses on how long it would take me to get into a bad mood, since I was in a good one. Well they must have reversed-jinxed me, because I had a great night at work. Now those last four words very, VERY rarely exist in the same sentence together, at least when said (typed) by me. All my tables sat for hours, ordering constantly, and tipping 20% if not more. That means little work for Dana, but a nice pay out at the end of the night. Not one single person annoyed me while there. Not one. I thought I was going to get hit by a bus as soon as I left because it was that easy of a night. Sure everyone on the sidewalk on my way to work was in my way, but that was nothing more than an itchy mosquito bite. One more to add to the numerous ones covering my legs. Even the bites aren't getting me down! Until I find out I have West Nile or some other headline disease. I really am trying to keep the happiness and positive energy going.

Why am I in such a good mood? Well for starters I got laid, after a month of nothing. It's amazing how that one act can change your entire mood. It only does it to such an extreme though after I go without it for a long period of time. A month is a long time. I went to New Jersey for a few days too, and it was great getting to see my family and to get a break from the city. Mr. Big visited on Monday, which I know had the biggest impact on my newfound mental and emotional state. Yes, I can thank him for the sexy times, but see him was so much more than that. While he was there I almost convinced myself I would have been okay with hanging out with him and not sleeping together. HA. We were having that great of a time talking and just being with each other. I won't go into details, because there's way too many, but I honestly had one of the best times I've ever had with him. Everything was different. We've been building towards "this," for a year and a half now, and Monday was the first time everything seemed to be coming to light. I feel like I'm in high school again, when you find out the guy you've had a huge crush on forever might like you back. Except we've done everything backwards by being friends, sleeping with each other most of our friendship, and telling each other about the other people we're sleeping with. Oh, and only seeing each other once every few months. Yeah. After years of this, I think things are changing. And I'm so, so, so happy. I only hope the feeling lasts and everything continues to change for the better. Right now, I feel like nothing but good things will happen, and that goes for every aspect of my life. Who knows what will happen tomorrow...

Thursday, July 16, 2009

It was the Summer of '09

Around this time every year while in high school, and my freshman year of college, my family would rent a house in Lavallette, New Jersey for two weeks, or a month. Lately, I've grown incredibly nostalgic for that time. It most likely has to do with the fact that I have yet to go to the beach this summer. My parents live down the shore now, and unfortunately I haven't been able to make it down there. I went in the middle of June, but it was raining, so the closest I got to being on the beach was at a boardwalk bar overlooking the ocean. And it rained. I used to always be super stoked for the shore vacation, with the exception of the last year. Horribly depressing. Back then we had to sneak alcohol into water bottles and try to stay out on the beach as late as possible before my mom would call me, screaming. I used t work on getting a tan back then. That was when we would lie to the boys we met about how old we were. Making up stories about how even though we were "17" we didn't have our licenses yet. That's something I forgot about! I lied about my age A LOT. My height and the way I acted always helped, but wow. I guess this is why my boyfriend in high school was 22 when I was 17. And Mr. Big still talks to me even though I met him when I was 15 and he was 22. They found out my real age eventually, when I got my license. That's when the shore sucked, we were old enough to drive, but not old enough to go to bars. That's when there was nothing to do. Up until you're 21 you can't wait to be older, than after that all you want to do is stop growing up. Milestones happen more frequently when you're young. After 21 all you have to look forward to or fear is each new decade you hit-30's, 40's, 50's. Ugh.

Anyway, I could also be feeling this way because I haven't gone on vacation yet this summer either, nor is there one planned. Week after week it's the same thing and I can't seem to change it. Time sure does fly. Being broke it the main cause of this. Before I know it Summer will be over, and it'll be Fall (even though I love, love, love Fall in the city). While I'm keeping busy and trying to be creative, I feel like I'm wasting my life. That I'm currently not "making the most of it." A day at the beach would probably cure this. It would be a nice little escape. Then after a day or two in Jersey I can't wait to get back to the city. Vicious. I don't know where else to go with this. My weekends are booked until August, I have no plans for my birthday yet, and hopefully I can make it to Jersey one Monday? Good grief, I have to figure something out.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Dream a little dream of you. But I'd rather not.

The past two nights I've remained alcohol free. I'm doing this Shotgun Theater Festival that required me to write a 10 minute play in 24 hours. Well I have to work so I really wrote it in three hours. Talk about satisfying. I needed my mind to be in pristine condition to let all the creative juices flow, and it worked. But because of it I had two nights full of really depressing dreams. Ugh. And now, due to my past few entries and talking about these dreams it's going to seem like all I ever think about it boys. Really, only half of my thoughts are dedicated to thinking about boys. I'm not going to go into detail, just a short summary of the dream and how sad of a reflection they are on me.

The first night I dreamt about Mr. Big*, and how we're supposed to go to Atlantic City together. He arrives at my parent's house, says he too tired to go and doesn't really feel like going with me anyway. Frustration ensues. I don't know why he bothered driving there to begin with then, to just lay around on the couch.

Second night, I dreamt I was at Berger's* friend's house, for a party. At one point we were being all cuddly, and then he pushes me away. He says something like, "I don't actually want to be with you." I'm confused, since we had just been all cuddly. Then he says, "And I do have my beautiful, but spoiled, girlfriend. My suicide girl Lucide." (Pronouced Lou-cede. Which is weird in itself. It sounds like lucid...dreams...yeah.) I freak out, per usual, because I don't understand why he wants to be with someone spoiled and why there was no meantion of her on his Facebook (ugh). And that he's capable of being in a relationship. Really? I think the dream ended with me screaming "I hate you. I never want to speak to you again!" Or something to that extent. I probably cried too.

Hi self esteem, it's me, Dana, where the heck did you go? I woke up both mornings with the sads. I quickly got over them, but still felt it necessary to write about these dreams. Both dreams are somewhat based on truth and reality. Mr. Big having a tendency to be tired a lot, and Berger not wanting to be with me (circa 2006). I can understand why I had the Mr. Big dream, but the Berger one? Not sure. Merely talking to someone makes you have frustrating dreams about them? I guess so. But really, who dates a girl name Lucide? Who's a suicide girl...how 2001! I can't believe I'm judging dream girlfriends. Why couldn't either of these dreams involved said guys and had been happy? Or at least sexual? You know, the fun kind of dreams. I would have taken one good dream with Mr. Big and one bad dream with Berger. Thanks.

Actually, I know why this happened. I'm annoyed with both of them at the moment. Maybe even always. Our relationships with each other is always frustrating and annoying and difficult. Fuck. (Well, that's generally being the only good thing to come out of them.) And they have the same name. Go figure. What a cruel world. So this all has to do with men being lame and making me have undesirable dreams and my dryspell and that I hate everyone. AHHHH. End scene.

Seth Meyers, when are you going to sweep me into your nerdy arms and take me away from it all??? We can go on dates, and then write about it! And you can confide in me that you're the rumored "SNL" sex addict. Weeeeeee!


* Even I am not immune to comparing my life to "Sex and the City." The Mr. Big in my life has had that nickname for years, used mainly in the blogoshpere. The Berger comparitive came into realization this past weekend, because this person both looks like Ron Livingston, and acts like Berger. Thank goodness Adian is long out of the picture.

Monday, July 6, 2009

Memories, All Alone in the Moonlight

For some odd reason (sobriety), I had a random sequence of thoughts happen tonight. It involved me hearing about something and a person I hadn't talked to in years being part of it. There's no need to go into details, I know what I'm referring to (but in two months, I wont') and that's all that matters. It was one of those, "I totally forgot about that person," sort of moments. A person who years ago I cared reseasonably about. Strange how things work out I suppose. It made me wonder if people who were once part of my life, and I theirs, ever randomly think of me. Perhaps a memory is brought back by seeing something that remind them of me, or the thought of me randomly popping into their head. If it happens to me, why not them? I wonder why it happens to me. A lot of times no outside forces play a part, only a little thought, a snapshot of them and who they once were to me. I guess I find it strange, but in no way shocking, that someone who once played a huge role in your life can years later be obsolete. As if they were never there to begin with. There was once a time when I couldn't remember what life was like before I met my ex-boyfriend. When we finally broke up, for real real, I was devastated. This devastation lasted for a year and a half or something pathetic, I mean calling my mom at 2 a.m., hysterical because I would never have another him, blah, blah, emo girl crap, blah. And now, three years after everything I'm fine. Finally. Yet he still manages to pop into my head at least once a day. For no reason. WHY? Residual thoughts? My brain is now programmed to allow one millisecond of him thrive in my neurosystem? The problem is there are days I realize I haven't thought him yet that day, therefore ruining the little bit of progress made. This is getting completely off topic...AND I PROVED MY OWN POINT. That I'm both slightly insane and sad because I started writing about that. Ughh.

So think about the people you've slept with. Can you remember all of them? Remember what it was like? Does that person ever think of you, even if it was only a one time thing? Do you wonder if that person ever thinks of you? Do you even care? That person was inside of you...or you inside another person. Seems like a name meant remembering right? Not always. We are all that insignificant. You are not a beautiful flower. Seems as though there's no need for names or identities, right? Now I'm beginnning to sound like some liberal arts college chick. The horror. This must be why some people want to become famous. Your name, nay, your existence, will be remembered. And not only by family members, but by many! Why do some people stick in your life, and others unadhere so quickly? Why does the universe even throw them my way? Most of them don't serve a purpose. My conclusion is that everything must happen for a reason and have some meaning, no matter how small, to it. People come and go in and out of out lives for a reason and why their existence remains in our memories I don't know. They're just pesky little reminders of people who once annoyed us, or people we once loved. Or sort of liked.

Sunday, July 5, 2009

People are so Fickle

Last night something odd happened. For the first time in a very, very long time, an overwhelming feeling of loneliness came over me. It hit once the fireworks started. It seems completely silly but even once the celebration ended I couldn't shake that feeling. Everyone I was with on the hotel rooftop had someone, and when the fireworks started going off they got all cuddly and what not. Of course I've been in that position before, and it's nice. It wasn't so much me feeling jealous, it was more so a reminder of something I had once I guess. Deep down I probably just wanted to make out with someone. A fifteen year old emo girl all over again. At least I didn't cry.

Later on in the night I was on a rooftop in Brooklyn. This rooftop was huge and four different parties were going on simultaneously. There was a DJ, people were dancing. The view of the skyline was insane. I couldn't stop staring at it. That's what happens though when I see the skyline, I always know this is where I'm meant to me and that's really reassuring...to have one definitive thing to know and believe in. Everything else is always so unclear and up in the air, but I have and will always have the city. It was there for me in high school, to give me something to aspire to. And now it's there to remind me of that teenager, still filled with hope and dreams and ambition (cue the music). I remember my freshman year of college thinking that even being surrounded by a million people you can still feel lonely. I guess that's what made last night so strange to me. The feeling is usually brought upon for a specific reason, like breaking up with a boyfriend, but not last night. It just happened. I suppose I'm really curious to know (as seen in my last entry) when everything will finally come together. In every aspect of my life. And when it does, am I going to wish it didn't happen? That the chaos was a little bit more fun?

Friday, July 3, 2009

Oh, since the day I saw you, I have been waiting here for you...

This is something I've been meaning to write about for almost two months and for some reason I can't bring myself to do it. My friends and I talk about it ALL OF THE TIME, sometimes to the point where it borders on sad and we sit and sigh quietly to ourselves. After talking in circles about it forever blogging about it seemed unnecessary. But I want to write about it. And it's 2 a.m. and the Mexican restaurant is doing what it does best-annoy me with loud Mexican music. I already wrote five pages of my pilot (only 22 more to go! Sad.). Why not delve into this?


All we* do is talk about boys. It seems weird and silly to ever talk about marriage or who we're supposed to end up with, but that's what we do. Often. And it seems a lot of us think we know who that person is. That's what's freaking me out. Not so much that I think I know whom myself, but that others can relate to my experience with their own. Okay, it probably sounds hokey and ridiculous for me to believe there is this person in my life that I should be with/end up with. At the same time it's hard to ignore all the little things that add up making it seem right. This entry is so vague. A lot of this stems from one of my super close friends getting married this summer. She's the first person I know, in my age range, to get married. There are also a bunch of people I went to high school with who are now engaged (the boy who took my virginity included). Aren't we still too young for this? I think yes, but given the opportunity, I would totally be with this non-descript male entity I speak. It's as though the universe is saying to us that we are indeed too young. Not we, me, I'm too young. He's 30. That's also young to be married. I wouldn't dream of being married until at least then. Apparently most of my friends see me getting hitched sooner than that. UGH.

*It should be public knowledge/obvious
that 98% of my friends are gay men and girls.

The thing that is probably bothering me the most is the concept of being with him is so far implanted in my head now, and has been in certain variations for years that what if it doesn't happen? He was around to hear about the few boyfriends I've had, while in the relationship. I'm aware of the women in his life. Nothing is ever serious though, in either of our cases. The idea of him being romantically involved with someone else bothers me to no end. As though all these years meant nothing and that after waiting for him to be close enough physically (location wise), mentally and emotionally to be with someone, he chooses another girl. I feel like everyone I'm with is there to pass the time. Have some fun with and further prove that there is someone else out there I'd rather be with. Fortunately I know who that person is.

Only time will tell what will happen. On the other end of the spectrum how weird will it be if everything works out? That this person I randomly met when I was 15 was the person meant to be in my life forever? Stranger things have happened I suppose. Although our whole story is pretty odd. I'll look back on this entry and not understand what point I was trying to make. As I finish this I have no idea. It felt necessary to put it out in the universe though, more so than it already is.