Time

So, there aren’t many ways in which I am a girlie girl. But one of the few ways in which I am a typical lady, I happily embrace: The Sex and the City franchise…yup, I’m in. Can’t get enough. The writing is funny and smart. The situations are real(ish) and the relationships, especially between those four leading ladies, are inspiring and spot-on. You got me. Hook. Line. Sinker. All of it.

Because I was without a television for about five years (1998- 2003ish) I missed out on the show the first time around in *real* time. But as a 29^th birthday gift one of my best friends purchased for me Season One on DVD (not able to believe that I hadn’t actually already seen it myself) and since then I haven’t looked back. I rented (old school, Blockbuster, go-to-the-video-store style) each season in turn, and like every other women in American between the ages of say, 20 and 35 did long about 2004 when the show actually ended, I cried my ever-loving-face off as I completed the last DVD and for me the series finally drew to a close.

When the first of the movies came out two years ago, I was over-the-moon excited about the story continuing…catching up with my girlfriends that I had missed oh-so-much since that fateful night I popped the last DVD out of the player, tears streaming down my face, feeling quite justified in my hatred of all things Parisian. These women had become almost like real friends. You learned their lives and their quirks; their hopes and their dreams. You were really pulling for them all to get their lives together and be happy. You could identify with parts of all of them (I’m soo Miranda). Somehow, you found yourself actually caring. And when that was over, you missed them and wondered where they were and what they were doing- like friends from summer camp you promised you’d write to, but never did. (p.s. it is for this very SAME reason that I have not watched the final season of The West Wing. Missed it in real time. Purchased all 7 seasons after the fact. And have watched Seasons 1-4 until the DVDs are almost worn out (if that’s even possible.) Season 5 is watched…Season 6, almost complete. But I just can’t make myself even take the wrapping off the box for Season 7, because that would be acknowledging that it was over. And I’m not ready to say goodbye to that White House. Not yet. [Denial is a highly effective coping technique.]

It was two year ago when that first Sex and the City movie came out. And at the time, I was a personal disaster. The man I had been dating for over two years and I had just split in spectacular fashion. J and I, while still close friends and beginning to really talk in a “hey, this could be a relationship” sort of way, hadn’t begun (officially) our whirlwind romance. And I was in a dark place. The break-up place. The place where you sleep too much, eat too little, cry too often and just generally feel like someone is punching you in the gut…repeatedly. You parcel out your friends. You split the stuff. You cross landmarks and restaurants off the list of places you can ever go again because they were *your* places. You have to find new routines and different paths and just generally start all over from scratch. The weeks directly after the epic breakup suck, even if said breakup was the best possible thing you could ever do for you and for him (and for the good of all humanity, as it turns out).

That was Sex and the City, 2008. And in classic girlfriend form, my ladies all turned out to see the show with me. All of them. Literally, I saw the movie three times in the three opening days with three different sets of people who all wanted to get me out of the house and help to raise my spirits.

For those of you who have seen the movie, I can identify that there is one scene, or actually about a 5 minute sequence of scenes that does a better job than any other medium has ever done for me to encapsulate the aftermath feelings of the epic breakup. Carrie is taken on her pre-paid honeymoon by her best girlfriends. She is not talking. She walks into the lady’s room and takes off her sunglasses to assess herself in the mirror. And she looks devastated. She has dark circles and bags under her eyes. She looks completely exhausted and just so sad. It is clear she has not had a good night’s sleep in a long long time. There is no makeup. There is no care. And as she goes to splash water on her face, she catches a glimpse of herself in the mirror looking back with an utterly blank stare.

Oh that stare.

I started crying uncontrollably at that stare. Because it so accurately summed up exactly my feelings in that moment. Complete and utter nothing, wondering who that woman was staring back from the mirror. Was that me? Numbness and sadness. (And embarrassment?) And dread. And not enough will to even put one foot in front of the other at that exact moment in time. She is, in fact, a mere shell of her former self. To say that I needed to see that movie…or maybe even just that one movie moment at that particular time in my life is a gross understatement. Somebody got it: someone truly understood what that kind of sadness and loss felt like. It was like the big screen was my mirror- I was finally able to see what I looked like from the outside. And it wasn’t pretty.

Tonight, I went to a pre-screening party for the movie Sex and the City 2. The theme of the movie was basically this: what a difference two years can make in a person’s life and in the life of a relationship. Another important and timely message I needed to hear.

Two years ago, I was in epic breakup land fearing I would never get out. Today, I don’t know what that guy is up to, but I know he doesn’t really cause me pause anymore. I grew. I changed. Time moved on.

Two years ago, I was just beginning to see glimpses of my dear friend J as someone who could be oh-so-much-more to me. Today, I am happier than I ever thought I could possibly be, in love with my best friend. Time has been our friend, too.

Two years ago, I was just truly getting into the meat of writing a dissertation. Today I have a PhD and an academic career. Two years of hard time well spent.

Two years ago, I had just met the crazy woman K who had an office next to mine at our summer job. And tonight, she now stands proudly as one of my closest girlfriends—the kind of girlfriend like from the movie- who shares her ups and downs, her laughs, her drinks, and her tickets to advanced screenings of sold out movies, just because she knows that I’ll love it. Time has cultivated that relationship as well.

There are so many other changes that have happened to me and my friends over the course of the last two years. Marriages. Engagements. Babies. Degrees earned. Moves made. Jobs acquired. Dreams fulfilled. And what the movie did for me tonight was make me look back to what a dark place I was in two years ago, and look at my progress, and be so grateful. I am not the girl I was two years ago. But what it also made me realize is that all my current craziness, two years from now, will be just another blip on life’s radar screen. Two years from now, I’ll be married to J and we’ll be beginning our beautiful lives together. It doesn’t seem possible. An eternity from now…and right around the corner. Time, it is a funny thing.

As we’ve already established, I have a soundtrack running through my head pretty much all the time. This evening, as I go to sleep, it’s not a song from the movie that’s stuck in my head, it’s the first verse of a song by Andrew Lloyd Weber from his show “Aspects of Love.”

Love, love changes everything:
Hands and faces, Earth and sky,
Love, Love changes everything:
How you live and how you die
Love can make the summer fly,
Or a night seem like a lifetime.
Yes love, love changes everything,
Now I tremble at your name.
Nothing in the world will ever be the same.

Whether it’s getting rid of bad love or finding new love; whether its having the love of a good man, or the love of your dearest friends; whether it’s that time has been excruciating to you, or that it has been your dear friend (like it has been for me these last two years), I fall asleep tonight comforted by the fact that time and love do in fact have the power to change everything.

I don't even care

43 weeks left
4 pounds lost (22 total)
16(ish) months until the wedding

(Just to be clear…I have no idea how I lost 4 pounds this week. I didn’t do anything different or special. And I swear I ate. Maybe my body is just getting into the Atkins/ South Beach diet groove. Believe me, I’m not complaining, it’s just... wow.)

There’s a standup comedian named Dane Cook (I’m sure most of you already know this guy…and if you don’t, now is probably not really the time to pick him up.) At any rate he’s very funny and very vulgar and a bit of an acquired taste in comedy. I’m not a huge fan overall, but he does one stand-up bit that I think is hysterical. It’s about a couple who is having a “nothing” fight, that is, a fight about absolutely nothing at all. Basically, they are to the hating-each-other point in the relationship and really just want an excuse to scream at one another in public (in his stand-up it’s about a couple at the grocery store trying to decide whether or not to purchase jam. Hilarity ensues.)

This whole bit is about how the woman keeps asking for the man’s opinion and he keeps saying “I don’t care. I don’t even care.” (Though to be accurate, and much funnier, you should know that the word “care” is dragged out as long as possible and is pronounced like “kerr”, and is said in the *most* exasperated voice one could muster. i.e. long, deep exhale of breath followed by “I don’t even kerrrrrrr.”)

This tagline has made its way into J’s and my vocabulary, mostly when one of us asks for the other’s opinion on something and we truly have no preference. “What do you want for dinner tonight honey?” “I don’t…. kerrrr… I don’t even kerrrrrrrrrr.” And it makes us laugh and we move on.

I found that this week at work, this was the phrase that occupied my head space. And just like if J was there saying it to me, I laughed every time it came and went through my head.

When I first realized that the ol’ 3-year plan had gone to hell in a handbasket, I was pretty angry (I believe the phrase “sold a bill of goods” crossed my lips…several times.) And then I was offended (how dare they!?) And then I was sad (because I really do like my job and I love my students.) And then I was sympathetic (because honestly, the people delivering this information to me really were caught in the middle- great people who were frustrated on my behalf but who had very little power or say over the outcome of it all…and I knew that.) And then I got desperate and felt anxious and trapped. I HAD to find a new job NOW! And I was cranky and scared and not very nice to people (sorry friends.) And man did I miss J. I just wanted him here to tell me it was all going to be ok (or at least to be able to tell me where he thought we’d be located next so I could begin to readjust said 3- year plan accordingly.)

But then somehow, at some point, for no particular reason at all, I just kinda let it all go. Maybe it was that I realized I didn’t really have any control over the situation anyway and that worry wasn’t getting me anywhere or doing anyone any good. Maybe it’s that I found my faith again-- faith in the universe unfolding as it should and being lead in the right direction for something bigger and better. (I realized I was going to be totally fine. I would land on my feet. I always do.) Maybe it was hearing J tell me that I could do anything and go anywhere and that I would be fine, and that (more importantly) we would be fine no matter what. (I’m not sure what I’ve done to deserve someone as kind and good and supportive and unconditional in his love…but, wow.) Maybe it was my friends and family so readily rallying behind me, supporting me as I went forth and started pounding the pavement (I had three different sets of friends who all live nowhere close to me offer to come here with big trucks and help me move if I had to do it.) It’s hard to say what finally forced my paradigm shift, but man, am I glad it happened.

It’s quite freeing, really; realizing you’re not in charge and giving up trying to control everything. Deciding to just let it all be what it is. And while I’m still actively looking for a new job (and secretly still a little sad and frustrated and angry and scared) I’m no longer worried. And I can look at all that’s happening here from the outside and appreciate it for what it is.

It’s not that I don’t care at all, because I do. And if I stay here next year, I will do my best and work hard as always. But somewhere in my head, I’ve given up the worry. And what that made me do all week, when things started to get tense, was to laugh and say “I don’t even kerrrrrrr.”

One of my co-workers commented this week that I seemed to be in a great mood. And I think that some of my other coworkers sorta thought I was being terse and insensitive or maybe just plain rude as I started shrugging things off so readily. But I have to be honest, right now, the way in which I’m making it through each day without losing my mind is by honestly being able to look the future in the face and say bring it on…I don’t even kerrrrrrrrr.

Rallying the troops

ral-ly (v) from the Old French ralier meaning “to unite”: To call together for a common purpose; assemble: To reassemble and restore to order: To recover abruptly from a setback or disadvantage: To show sudden improvement in health or spirits.

I’ve always loved the phrase “rally the troops.” I searched for the historical significance of the phrase- who the first person was to say it; what it meant originally; its first context. Alas, I couldn’t find anything super specific. But a Google search (what did we do before Google?) can tell you that it’s been used in political and motivational speeches from great leaders of the US military as far back as Washington, and as recently as last week in a Washington Post article describing Obama’s recent trip to Afghanistan. So all in all, a pretty oft used and heavily quoted little idiom. (Oooo, let’s add “idiom” to my list of favorite words.)

What it has come to mean over the course of the years is mostly the last of the definitions above: to show sudden improvement in health or spirits. That’s what presidents do when they go out and talk with the troops in the field. They are trying to renew the soldiers’ belief in the cause, raise their spirits, and motivate them to continue on the path. (Not that they really have a choice, mind you. But those of us who study educational psychology…or, you know, just have any common sense at all, know that if you believe in something and are passionate about something and feel that the end result is important and necessary, you’re gonna try harder and be more emotionally invested and thus usually be more successful. So, there’s my piece of educational wisdom for today: caring equals trying harder which equals greater success. [By the way, this will become an interesting little corollary to tomorrow’s posting which will be titled “I don’t even care.” More to come.])

So, as all my friends know, and as you readers could probably have guessed by now (subtlety-- not my strongest quality…or a quality I possess in any form…) I’m actively looking for a new job. Not necessarily because I want to, but because apparently having a PhD does not make your position any more recession-proof than anyone else’s. (One of the statistics that they use to scare you when you go into graduate school is that there are more PhDs driving cabs in New York City than exist at most small universities. I used to think that was urban legend…I’m starting to believe it. )

Relax, dear readers. I’m not jobless. I have signed a contract for this coming academic year… And as long as I don’t mind that I’ll be picking up some additional duties at a slightly reduced salary with the promise that this time NEXT year I *will* be jobless, then I’m just fine. Right. (Most innovative HR incentive plan ever? Nay.) And so, since all that seems like nonsense to me, I’m actively looking for something else, effective next year for certain, or even better, immediately.

Now because I’ve been very happy in my job and because “the plan” (what’s the old saying…if you want to make God laugh, make a plan? Touché, God. Touché.) was for me to stay in this position until J came home, when we would then know where his next assignment might be, and we would get married, and happily move wherever that next place might be…together… (sigh…could it please be that day? Please?) I have never spoken of leaving my job or looking for something else. Not yet at least. I have two more years before I have think about that, right? Wrong.

Man, let me tell you, though… Once I did even make *mention* of leaving here…my friends have shown up. Talk about rallying the troops! It seemed like once I started talking about finding something new, all my friends got totally behind me. Started looking for jobs for me. Started dropping my name and resume on people’s desks. They have definitely come together on my behalf…united in mission. And being so good to me.

What their support has done in turn for me is provide the feeling that comes with all those remaining definitions of the word “rally”. I have suddenly had a lift in spirits… a realignment of mission and focus…a recovery from what seemed a horrible setback. I had never before so directly felt the importance of rallying the troops! It’s amazing what a difference that can make to a person (thanks friends.)

I wish that I could do that for J right now. Provide that support and motivation. I feel like he’s a little down recently. He’s super busy. He’s super tired. And from his voice, I feel like he’s super frustrated. (Though honestly, I don’t get that kind of information right now. Between his feeling that he can’t really talk talk over the phone and his just natural inability to say anything overly negative about anything, especially as it relates to his job, I won’t ever really know the intricacies of his current frustrations- at least not for a long time.) This makes me sad. I so wish that I could serve as his rally point right now like all of my friends are doing for me.

What’s it gonna take to raise his spirits? I don’t know right now. But I can tell you this-- I’m committed to figuring that out.