“Sometimes I wish I had learned everything earlier and that my real life could have started sooner. Other times, I’m glad that the first part of my life lasted as long as it did. It doesn’t really matter, though. None of it could have been any different.
As for fate – or not-fate – I’m still not sure about it, but it’s not something that keeps me up at night. I’ve lived it, and the people who still wonder about that kind of thing can call it whatever they want.”
An all time favorite..dare to do unimaginable things.
It is not the critic who counts; nor the one who points out how the strong person stumbled, or where the doer of a deed could have done better.
The credit belongs to the person who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; who does actually strive to do deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotion, spends oneself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; and who at worst, if he or she fails, at least fails while daring greatly.
Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those timid spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.
Today’s Mood Ingredients: Contemplative, Introspective, Grateful. Hi! It’s been a while. Life suddenly leaped out at me & bit me in the rear. However, in the time that pretty much everything was happening all at once, I did realize a few things. I live a pretty good life. It’s not perfect by any means (& obviously no one’s lives are), it’s absurdly stressful, I’m ridiculously worried 20/7 (which is a spectacular upwards movement from 26/7, congrats to me), I want to do 9 million things with the time to do only 30, and I get frustrated that all of the above is occurring. I do, however, have working (albeit mildly arthritic-sadly, not a joke) legs, mobile arms (wing span situation notwithstanding), a functioning brain (up for debate), and a plenitude of opportunity (which I abashedly admit to not taking advantage of enough).
Ok, so don’t close this blog yet! I promise it’s not a preachy post on how we should all be thankful for what we have (even though we should) & how what we have in this life is enough (even though it is). This is a post about how I realized that the words “average” & “normal” have two different meanings and depths with respect to my life. I was always the person who would get incredibly annoyed when people would tell me to think of those less fortunate than me when I was having a bad day. I mean..I am aware that there are people who have no food & no water & no families, & no one feels for them more than me & my over-empathetic self does, but sometimes, I just wanted to wallow in my own misery. COULD I LIVE!? Over time though, I realized that as much as my most terrifying fear was to be “normal” or “average” in the achievement sense, I have never been more grateful to be “average” & “normal” in the life sense. I have an immediate family of 11 that loves me unconditionally & whom I love obsessively back. I have amazing friends who have seen me through some morose times and some euphoric times. I have my health, my family (even through everything as of late) has theirs, we have a roof over our heads, we have food on our tables, and although we are wanting in many other ways, the most important thing is that we have a support system that people would literally kill for (seriously, they’ve creepily told me so). So although I want my business to succeed more, my dreams to be fulfilled more, my worries to be calmed more..I’m truly grateful that on my way to hopefully being able to realize all of those things, I have the ability and the resources that allow me to excel..& all I have to put in is the work.
If you follow this blog, you’ve heard me say this plenty of times, & I’m clearly still going through some form of PTSD from it, but I will never ever be more grateful to whomever, wherever, whatever, that my parents are still with me. To have my greatest fear nearly realized within a short span of 7 months, & to have us all restored to an almost normal (for us, anyway) level is something that I will never be able to express enough thanks for. And for better or for worse, that heavy emotional trauma was the catalyst for me to realize that I have enough. In fact, I have a lot. In fact, I have the most. I know I said this wouldn’t be a preachy post, but honestly, I just wanted you to keep reading because if a self-admitted, everyone-proclaimed pessimistic wallower can find a way to revel in all that she has, you guys can do it eeeaaasily! The point is, sometimes, shit is gonna suck. A lot. And sometimes, things are going to be so amazing, you can’t imagine them getting any better..& then they do. But if you want to get through the roller coaster labrynth & come out unscathed on the other side, find ways to be appreciative of the things you have, and even of the things that you don’t. A new perspective never hurt anybody!
**For those who want some ideas on how to get the ball rolling, check out these two links below which have helped me become less of a negative person.
“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband & a happy home & children, & another fig was a famous poet & another fig was a brilliant professor, & another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, & another fig was Europe & Africa & South America, & another fig was Constantin & Socrates & Attila & a pack of other lovers with queer names & offbeat professions, & another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, & beyond & above these figs were many more figs I couldn’t quite make out. I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each & every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle & go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”
Today is a good day. It’s the first day in over 6 months that I actually have the desire to go out and reconnect with people without having a constant frenetic worry in my head about my family & their health & whereabouts. The sun is bronzing our front yard, the mild breeze feels like snuggling with newborns, & my endorphin levels are at some unprecedented high. I used to scoff (until it affected me..sorry about that) at the whole seasonal depression thing. I figured that if people in London weren’t all down & depressed their entire lives considering their lack of natural Vitamin D providers, then weather really wasn’t what was affecting your mood. Just kidding. The past couple of weeks have made me realize that Mother Nature, that little vengeful woman, has had my head in a vice all winter long. Blizzards, gray skies, polar vortexes, & gloomy rain, combined with family health issues, had me downer than Debbie and more negative than Nancy.
I don’t know if it’s the weather, I don’t know if it’s the fact that (knock on wood) my family is feeling better, I don’t know if it’s because I’m starting to (excruciatingly slowly) get my shit together, & I don’t know if it’s because I absolutely refuse to have to take any anxiety medication (I have no stigma against it, it’s just a personal preference that I would rather not take anything), but I’m stage 5 clinging to whatever is causing this upswing in my mood & positivity & general infatuation with the good and happy in the world. Next winter, I’m flying south with the winged & this summer, I’m absorbing rays like I’m a God damn human greenhouse (wearing SPF 100), but as for the present moment, “it’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new life..for me. And I’m feelin’ good.” 😎
MY.NY. I’ve called it that for the past 8 years, lived in it for the past 32. It’s home, it’s always been home, I’m pretty sure it’ll always be home. I’ve been in love with the whole state, but mostly my city, my whole life & when people speak of their excitement or their “dream” to visit NYC one day, I get it. I feel lucky that I’ve lived in the center of the chaos; I feel lucky that now I’m only tens of minutes away on the outskirts of the hubbub. However, recently, things have had a subtle shift. The geographical love of my life has begun to fray at the edges, blurring my vision from behind my rose-colored glasses, adding an anxious thrum to the usually enthralled pulse that runs through me at just the sight of the concrete jungle.
New York, NYC, MY.NY., The Big Apple, The City That Never Sleeps is..amazing. It’s awesome. It’s incredible. It’s a world of its own with the population of the city being so diverse, you might as well have a passport for the island. You can be proffered a taste of a little bit of everything, a little bit of something, but sometimes that can transform into a little bit of nothing. New York has an inherent electricity far different from the literal Times Square sense. Even the subways have an energy, even the sidewalks have a story. New York, the emotional oxymoron; a place with over 8 million people that struggle to find just one or two true connections. The palpable nature of the city can either be arousing or overwhelming, sometimes both. Opportunities call kindly to you from every neon sign, from every sky-scraping window, from every glittering marquis; but they also dangle temptingly in front of you like a carrot, making you walk blindly & aimlessly that one extra step after another in the hopes that you’ll be allowed to take a bite someday. Someday. Nightfall in NYC can be a startlingly different experience from one 12 hour gap to the next. One night you’re out at a restaurant, a jazz bar, a club, & life is good and jubilant and you’re a firecracker about the town without a burden to shoulder. The next, you’re home in your shoebox studio that’s costing you your pension eating Ramen noodles & watching Sex & The City’s glossy glammed up version of a very different reality, & wondering why you feel alone in a city full of promised promise.
Don’t get me wrong, I am still thoroughly obsessed with my town. I love the “melting pot,” the variety, the camaraderie (it does happen sometimes!). I live for feeling alive when I walk through Central Park in the summer or 5th Avenue in the winter, Union Square in the fall, The Met in the spring. The sparkling lights still set something ablaze in the pit of my stomach (that is not attributed to the spices from an NY slice), my colorful memories leap out at me from every psychic-resided corner. I roam my undergraduate hallways of Washington & Waverly, gazing at the billowing purple NYU flags that are now ubiquitous at every turn from FiDi to SoHo to The Village to Midtown, reminiscing about that first day that my address read “New York, NY 10003” & how I was ready to embrace the place like a long lost love that I never knew I had. The creativity, the individuality, the temperament that is solely New York still tugs at my heartstrings like a child determinedly pulling a mother into a candy store. But now & again, I wonder if “MY.NY.” will forever be in the throes of a lifelong identity crisis.
“I carry the place around the world in my heart but sometimes I try to shake it off in my dreams.”-F.Scott Fitzgerald
Today’s Interlude(s): “New York, New York” by Frank Sinatra & “Empire State Of Mind” by Jay-Z & Alicia Keys
ARTS: JUST DANCE, GONNA BE OK, DA DA DOO DOO; THE SIMPLEST SOLUTION TO STRESS
Today’s Mood Ingredients: Euphoric, Free, Alive.
Stress. Overwhelming stress. It’s very rare that people today don’t have it. It varies in levels depending on a number of factors; career, family, emotions, personality, lifestyle, income, desires, etcetera, but it’s there. Silently waiting to attack when you least expect it, rendering you manic or crazed or depressed or angry. Let’s say you can’t quit your job to own a farm in California or live a spa life in Arizona. You can’t quit your family, you can’t shirk your responsibilities, you can’t overcome your sporadic but prevalent emotional tsunamis. So, what do you do? Release it. For me, the greatest and truest inanimate, intangible passion of my life is dance. Any form. Drunken, choreographed, impromptu, rehearsed, performed, jumping & booty-bumping with my 2.5 year old nephew, ballroom dancing with the puppy. ANY. If it was possible to bottle the feeling that radiates within and out of me when I’m dancing, I would be in direct competition with the Onassis family as wealthiest around. However, I cherish the fact that the feeling is so inexpressible for me because I get to have a sense of public privacy.
The audience sees a performer on stage expressing lyrics and movements to given music, but much of the time, the performer is in a whole different secret world. I have literally been brought to tears or euphoria on stage depending on the day of performance, & the people, who I don’t even register in my consciousness, applaud. They applaud for a technical performance that hopefully connected with them in some way. What they don’t realize is that the emotion that’s coming off in waves from the stage to the audience at such a high frequency is the tumultuous collage of my innermost fears, happinesses, struggles, tears, accomplishments, sadness, & stress being released. They are privy to something they don’t even know of, & for a hyper-private person like me, it’s my way of “talking about my feelings.” Dancing has saved me from a lot in life. It has protected me from a lot in life. It has given me a lot in life. It is the only outlet that still serves to shatter my anxiety, my founded & unfounded worries, & my fears. The best way to describe it, I suppose, is by using my favorite quote, also tattooed on my ankle: “In life, as in dance; grace glides on blistered feet.” When I’m dancing, I’m at my most euphoric. When I’m dancing, I’m at my most tranquil. When I’m dancing, I’m at my most giving. It’s a blind & frozen moment in time where everything is nothing and nothing is everything & I’m spinning along with the world in harmony.
Everyone deserves this. You deserve to feel this way about something in your life, if not necessarily dance. When things are piling up & suffocating you under their deadweight, find your own outlet. You don’t have to be good at it. Contrary to popular & incorrect belief, NO ONE CARES.
“Times of general calamity and confusion have ever been productive of the greatest minds. The purest ore is produced from the hottest furnace, and the brightest thunderbolt is elicited from the darkest storms.”-Charles Caleb Colton
Is splattering paint across a canvas therapeutic? Do it. Listening to music? Blast it. Playing sports (not my forte!)? Kick it, pitch it, run it. Writing? Scribble it. No one is expected to be the next DaVinci, Stevie Wonder, Jackie Robinson, Ernest Hemingway, but you are expected to somehow be able to enjoy this life without needing an industrial-strength antacid twice a day. I’m lucky that I found my meditation at the age of 3, but “too late” is a phrase I’m just starting to eke out of my vernacular, & I suggest you do the same for “life is short, but sweet for certain.”
Today’s Interlude: “Dance Dance Dance” by Lykke Li
I’ve been single for 7 years. SEVEN. I haven’t been lonely for any of them, & it’s not for lack of interested parties or for lack of halfhearted attempts. I always figured I was single for this long because I was making a lot of changes in my life, switching careers, getting life in order, reconnecting with friends, etc. It was only a few months ago (apparently I’m slow on the uptake) that I realized the real reason why I’m single & never ready to mingle. Fear. It’s not a fear of commitment because I’m the most freakishly committed girlfriend you could ever have. Definitely not a fear of monogamy because cheaters makes me homicidal (in a good way?). Somehow, unbeknownst to me, I’ve developed a fear of intimacy (of all kinds) & a fear of loss of freedom. So, as a 32 year old woman who likes relationships & wants children, how do I make this work? Obviously by making my fears public to the world, thereby forcing me to make changes..or at least start by writing about making changes (everything’s a process, guys).
For whatever reason (exes, circumstances, experiences), over the years I’ve begun shying away from emotional & physical contact with people who may be potential mates. I don’t feel like re-telling my life story on a date (I mean, how many times can you go over your own life? I literally started boring myself), I run away like Phoebe Buffay in Central Park (you so remember that episode) at the first sign of someone trying to hold my hand or anything remotely physical (my aversion to PDAs are a long-standing thing so this isn’t really so surprising, but I suppose to recoil from a hand like it’s a mutant tarantula is a little much). Past relationships haven’t turned out for the best for a variety of reasons (infidelities-them, overanalysis/need to prove myself correct when Sherlocking the aforementioned infidelities-me, insecurities-us); & though I’m civil/friends with those little culprits now (which is something fabulous that I think everyone should do if feasible, because it removes a LOT..not all, but still..of emotional cargo & has lightened the load in my life significantly), they clearly impacted the relationship issues I face now. Currently, the thought of a boyfriend makes me break out into hives because I think of all of the weekends/evenings that would have to go into dinners and family meetings at some point and struggling to find my alone time which I so treasure right now. I worry that all of the grandiose dreams I have for myself & my life will end up playing second fiddle to my relationship & at my age, the problem (supposedly) is that I don’t have the luxury of time to delay either my life’s goal or my relationship future.
So, how does a person re-learn romantic love? I mean, I don’t have to start all over in the general love department because I love my friends in the adore kinda way & I love my family in the obsessed/don’t mess with them/they can never leave me kinda way (that’s an unhealthiness best explained in another post) & I love my dog in the you’re the best thing with 4 legs and a tongue ever created kinda way. But how do you re-learn the I’m-in-love-with-you-you’re-really-attractive-let’s-hang-out-a-lot-and-maybe-make-out kind of love? Trial and error. Perhaps being less cocooned will help, perhaps letting my guard down (SLOWLY) will help people to believe that I’m not, in fact, some intimidating unfeeling ice queen, but rather a vulnerable person with concerns and fears and aspirations and dreams. I’ve also learned that taking all of the pressures coming from other people around me & placing them on myself and the people I meet is not about to help make me open and available, it basically just overwhelms & drives you into a scared turtle state. I’ve also realized that though I have standards, and I refuse to compromise on some of them because I am well aware of what type of individual and what type of relationship I deserve, that some of them may be impossible for anyone to meet & maybe that’s the sole reason why I put them there; so I can say, “Oh well, you don’t meet this requirement of being a chest hair-less dancer who chews with his mouth closed and is sarcastic and doesn’t have a certain last name” & consequently not have to get to know those who don’t fit those standards. I suppose these “realizations” or epiphanies or whatever you want to call them are the first step to moving towards a life that I’m actually willing to share with someone else outside of my carefully & meticulously maintained world of weirdos. That, combined with a strange cocktail of minor narcissism/obsession with genetics/hyper-maternal instinct that makes me want to see more little me’s in the world, will hopefully be the propellors that catapult me into the arena of companionship and romantical love & stabilize me there while allowing me to revel with my own individual identity intact.
There’s no definitive answer on how to feel romantic love again, but there are definitive methods to the madness, and at this moment in time, in the melodic words of Alicia Keys, if you ask me, I’m ready.
Today’s Interlude(s): “Back In The High Life Again,” by Steve Winwood & “Not A Bad Thing” by Justin Timberlake
If you know me, you know I love her. Like, LOVEEE her. I’m not a person who gets starstruck or flustered when meeting celebrities, ever, but when I recently had the chance to meet writer/director/actor/producer/fashionista/hottie Mindy Kaling, albeit for a brief 12 second span where I gave her Easter candy in a hot pink bag, my body apparently knew something my brain wasn’t caught up on because I was shaking like a Californian in an Alaskan winter & it wasn’t because of the 50 mph gusts of wind outside.
People who follow me on social media are well aware of my adoration for her & they’ve asked me time & time again why she’s so awesome to me. There is a plenitude of reasons that we love or admire celebrities. Most of the time it’s their body of work & talent or because of whatever persona they (or their PR team) decide to show us, & since we’ll most likely never meet them, that’s how it stays. With Mindy (& I have a huge list of people who share my sentiment), it’s much more. It’s easy to pick her as the South Asian role model for women & entertainers and very easy to pick her as the spokesperson for every “Brown” person out there, but that’s actually last on my list of why I am awed by her in a non-creeper way. If you’ve read her book, “Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? And Other Concerns,” you’ll know what I mean (& if you haven’t read it, get on it ASAP. It’s a New York Times Bestseller & unless you’re a Jetsons-esque robot [but even Rosie had emotions], you’ll laugh until you ugly cry. I’ve read it 3 times, taking something new away from it every time, & highlighted about 80% of it). Mindy weaves humor & emotion seamlessly while telling her stories of being bullied about her weight, her childhood fears, unapologetically loving comedy early on in life, her botched Broadway audition, living in a shoebox apartment with her 2 best friends, her dating game, and so on. As she tells her stories, I don’t know if she realizes it or not, she connects with so many of us on a personal level. It’s easy to want to put those days behind you (& easily be able to) when you’re at nearly 3 million Twitter followers, over half a million Instagram followers, & being the star & show runner of your own network TV show, but the greatest thing about her is that she owns it & embraces it all. She’s never hidden from her roots or her history and that’s what makes her accessible to & adored by so many of us (her talent and hilarity help too, obv).
I have many celebrities I love, but I’ve never felt connected to them on a personal level like I do with Mindy Kaling. Perhaps it’s that we’re close in age, perhaps it’s that she is fiercely loyal in her close relationships & friendships, perhaps it’s that her greatest strength & love is the relationship she has (yes, present tense) with her mother, perhaps it’s that we’re both fashion freaks (her Instagram feed is to die for!), perhaps it’s that we had a similar childhood, & perhaps it’s just that she’s someone I aspire to be like; inspired, driven, sarcastic with a childlike exuberance but an iron work ethic. She’s a brilliant writer, an Ivy-League graduate, & has humorous self-deprecation down to a science. Someone somewhere (or at least definitely on Twitter) says that they wish they were Mindy Kaling’s BFF every day. And though I admit to having said that, I’m happy I’m not. Wait, what? Yes, I’m happy I’m not her BFF because I have my own group of BFFs (“it’s not a person, it’s a tier, Danny!”) who have been there for me through all of the winding roads of life & I love that she still has her core group of homies from college (& of course, BJ Novak from The Office) who have been there for her for the same. Don’t get me wrong though, had it been 2002 & I met Mindy & her friends (which was SO FEASIBLE since I was watching all of the Bombay Dreams auditions in real life & wish I’d gotten to know her when she auditioned!), I’d totally try & hang out with them.
For someone who has high aspirations for making it as not only a woman, but a person in this world, I can think of no one better to look to as a guide. She didn’t glide up on a who-knows-who method & she doesn’t rest on her laurels. She worked her ass off & had conviction in her work, her intellect, her talent, & herself and that’s something I sometimes forget to do for myself. She’s constantly striving (look at me, weirdly talking about her as though I know her personally..here is that line between admirer & creeper, you guys..I’m toeing it :P) to better herself & hone her skills, but doesn’t seem to beat the shit out of herself if something falls short. And for all of the times that people come down on her for not being the token South Asian who apparently should be shouldering all of our historical burdens, a quote from Elle Magazine says it best, “She doesn’t rely on being Indian, but doesn’t deny it either.” That’s an amazing thing, especially in Hollywood! This is 2014. Be proud that a “f***ing Indian woman [has] her own f***ing show!” A network television show. That, for once, doesn’t stereotype an Indian woman (or man, for that matter) as an accent-harboring, oily haired nerd searching long & hard for an arranged marriage that will make the family happy all the while toiling away at a profession they hate. And for those who say, “Yeah, but she still plays a doctor! How Brown.” Yes, she plays an OB-GYN as an homage to her late mother’s profession, not because of the Indian generalization associated with it. Mindy’s created a show for us single 30-something women that shows the real, if sometimes exaggerated, colors of dating & working (especially for us New Yorkers). I have known people my whole life who, despite being Indian, have only dated non-Indian people. It’s not Mindy’s job to make sure that every South Asian actor has a job, or to make sure that Dr. Mindy Lahiri dates South Asian men just because she is South Asian. That’s a reality that people really need to get on board with. Her job was to create a show that is funny, that people will enjoy, & that she’s proud of, and in that, she has succeeded tenfold.
I think I may have been happier than Mindy Kaling & the cast and crew themselves when The Mindy Project was renewed (early) for a season 3. The show is my happy place. It’s found its groove (even though I personally have loved every episode since the pilot) & there are times you have to watch it twice to catch one-liners you may have missed because you were too busy laughing at something else that just happened. It makes me literally LOL (which only Friends & Gilmore Girls have done) with its quick witted dialogue, pop culture references, equally intelligent and silly humor, & incredibly individual characters; and to know that Mindy’s in charge of it all (with a great team, of course) just makes me wax poetic about her even more. I have been having quite a few shitty days lately & I’ll be damned if Morgan Tookers’ innocent creepiness or Danny Castellano’s curmudgeon-y behavior (red grandma glasses intact) or Mindy Lahiri’s insecure self-confidence don’t give me at least that full 21 minutes of reprieve from real life. If you haven’t given it a chance yet, I suggest you spend the next 9.5 hours watching season 1 & season 2 on YouTube in order to prep for the one hour return tonight at 9PM on FOX. I know I’m going to be sipping on strawberry ale in my TMP cup saying “HOW DARE YOU!?” to anyone that attempts to disturb my cloud 9 of comedy.
P.S. Mindy, if you ever end up reading this, I’m just kidding about the BFF thing. I love my tier, but I’m totally available, so call me! “Winky face.” 😉
We all have friends (this is a relatively secure assumption). We’ve made them over different times in our lives, on numerous journeys, at various ages. But how many of you still have them all? I know I don’t. Friendship is a funny thing in general. I mean, how do groups of people find each other & forge a bond that’s strong enough that makes them want to spend time together over & over again? I find myself wondering that all the time when I see people on the train or at restaurants or elsewhere; how did you all meet, where did you find each other, how did you connect? (Yes, I realize this makes me sound like a creeper, but I’m owning it, people.) Nevertheless, it happens & you go through life with these people who you’re connected to and when you’re young, you’re all BFFLS & BFFAES and when you’re in high school, you’re all about the cool kids & who’s wearing what to the pep rally if not a cheerleader uniform (btw, none of those were me because I was a bony little nerd, a fact I have finally accepted later in life). College comes around and you find like minded individuals with similar interests and passions (read: freedom & drinking, meant: poetry, dance, film, science). Real life finds you meeting people who are settling down, accepting responsibility, becoming “grown ups.” Now look back on all of those times in your life; how many of those BFFs are still around?
If you’re like me, you have numerous & varied circles of friends. If you’re like me, you also have had incidences & circumstances which rendered much change in those groups & relationships. I can honestly say I vividly remember & still keep in touch with many of my friends from elementary school through college (thanks, Mark Zuckerberg!). Are we close? No. But our lives are interwoven with fond memories of becoming adults, and now, social media milestones that still allow a thread of a connection both to each other & to our common pasts.
Unfortunately, time plays its part as do the growth and change of personalities & the people who have them. There are so many friends that cross my mind on a regular basis who I don’t think I’ve spoken to in months, & in some cases, years. So many of the girls from my college dance troupe who have witnessed many of my most catalytic moments, I don’t talk to much anymore, & this is after forming a close bond over 4-5 years of all night practices, 5 hour lunches, open bars, parties, performances, travel, tears, fears, laughter, girl talk, boy talk, & sleepovers. I admire them still & stalk lives via social media, but it’s a tentative connection, albeit based on true love for them. I can still say, however, when it so happens that we do meet, that core of friendship picks up quite quickly, & we will always be bound (in a non-criminal way) by the matching tattoo that 10 of us have depicting the passion that brought us together; dance. Medical school was a whole other story. We all became “family” very quickly (admittedly, due to me trying to make the best of an intimidating situation for all of us) and when you’re stuck on a tiny little island for 16 months (or more), studying instead of going to lay by the crystal clear turquoise waters that are right below your balcony, you become realllly close reallllly fast and things can get pretty dramatic pretty fast too. But what happens when you are back to reality (oops, there goes gravity..jk) and seeing your old pre-island friends and trying to readjust to non-island life? Some things can fall apart, and some things stay glued together. In my case, I was lucky to be able to hold on to some very true & real friendships with people who, although I’ve only really known for 7 years at this point, are some of the closest confidantes I have. They may not all be very good friends with each other, but they are very good friends to me, and that is probably the one thing I came away with from Caribbean Med that I treasure the most. Unfortunately, there are also some people who I was unable to stay connected to & although that gives me little pangs now & again, there is clarity in hindsight, and the reason for the disconnect was always valid.
At the end of the day, all of those little clichés about people coming in & out of your life whether for you to change them in some way or for them to change you (for better or worse) ring loud, ring clear, & ring true. I’ve had friends who have made me less trusting, friends who have made me more hopeful, friends who have made me more perceptive, friends who have made me more suspicious, friends who have made me brighter, and friends who have dulled my luster. But for a brief moment in the timeline of our lives, we intersected, we connected, and we loved; and sometimes, that’s just plain good enough.
To all of my own lost connections, be they by chance, choice, or circumstance, know that I think of you often. When a certain song comes on or when I smell something familiar or especially when I’m pondering on the past (which I do more often than I’d prefer), I wonder what you all are up to and hope that you are happy & well. There will forever be people and places that will own a sliver of your memory and a part of your heart. And to borrow from John, George, Paul, & Ringo, all these places had their moments, with lovers & friends I still can recall. In my life, I loved them all.
champagne & cookiedough 