Romance has always been something that has intrigued me.
I would say that has consumed me...but I would have to say that it is more the IDEA than actual romance.
And maybe it's because I have always kept it on this pedestal.
Which has brought me so many highs and lows that I am like the Alps. Peaks and valleys. Thoughout my life.
I am now in a place I have never been.
An apathetic place.
My therapist asked me how I feel about the apathy.
And not to sound cliche, but I shrugged my shoulders and answered..."Okay, I guess".
Everyone I know is in a good place but in a funk.
It's like everyone is muted.
Is it because with everything at our fingertips (music, googleicous information, items on ebay, etc...) that we are none the happier?
And what about these relationship things?
I recently got back in touch with someone I once had a 24 hour date with.
And we had a really nice time.
And by nice, I don't mean tea and crumpets. But it was exactly what I ordered. I wondered how I would react afterwards since I am not really emotionally built for the one night stand or the friend with benefits.
Strangely, I was fine.
Then another guy that I dated last year has recently been in touch with me.
And we have been going on dates and messing around too.
And I am attracted to him.
A lot.
But I just don't seem to care about it.
On the career front, I am getting an opportunity to perform someone else's monologue all throughout december and part of Jan in a show of monologues. I met with the director much calmer than I have ever met with someone who will most likely critique me. I left wondering if I had the chops to pull off what he wanted from me. But whereas in the past, I would have belabored the fact and tried to win him over, this time, I just smiled and said I will work on it.
Is this a better, more mature me?
Is Apathy the thing I have been seeking on my way towards peace and enlightenment? And let's be honest...I am not sure how enlightened and peaceful I really wanted to be in the first place. I am quite a gossip and would love to only fly first class and have someone cook for me. That is really the road I was heading for...and of course...happiness (1st class flights and a chef would make me VERY happy).
Or am I just done being disappointed with hoping and with feeling sooo much passion, that something inside of me just snapped and decided to cut off all ties with emotions?
Is this how the rest of the world lives?
I have always felt overly sensitive to EVERYTHING around me and felt that it hindered me from living. So isn't this a better way?
It's not like I don't laugh.
It's not like I am walking around in a stupor. I just feel very muted.
Like my colors have been subdued.
I know something is askew because I am not reading my horoscopes.
I saw the Darjeeling Limited (which had mixed reviews) and really really liked it. I felt a kinship with the quirky characters.
But even in my liking it...I felt very quiet.
Is this how the rest of the world lives?
I also feel like I am losing a little bit of a hold on the things i used to really feel were important. Which isn't a bad thing because I am kind of a control freak. Like, worrying about making sure that I am not misunderstood with EVERYONE I meet, or that every man I smile at thinks I have a crush on them because maybe I do.
On the other hand, I have no control over all the things that are slipping from my mind. I bought dog food for my cat (granted, it was mixed in with the cat food at the store, but I somehow missed the picture of the french bulldog on the front). She loved it, but it got me rushing to the internet to find out if it would kill her. (*sidenote: It did not. And I have since bought the correct food.)
It might have to do with me trying to heal my ankle (plagued with tendonitis) thereby making me wear tennis shoes ALL the time (instead of my cute flats or boots) leaving me feeling a little ugly coupled with the fact that I can't dance for a little bit to rest it, so I am in week 2 of not exercising.
It might be that I am done with the hum-drum-ness of my job (the longest one I have ever had) even though the security of it brings me a pleasure I wouldn't want to readily admit to many people.
It might be the fact that this year has been a very changing year for me and for those around me. Like 2007 has been a final exam before moving on to the new us.
And since we're not quite finished with this year, neither are some of the lessons.
Time will tell if Apathy is my friend or foe. It seems a strange thing to not already know the answer...but maybe that is the lesson.
Roll the dice, folks, at this point, it really is a game of chance.
I am so dramatic sometimes...even in my apathy.
I got a text message from Nat on Thursday that read: "What are you doing tomorrow night?"
My reply was: "I am avail. What's going on?"
"Something you will love. I will call you later"
I have never been to the Upright Citizen's Brigade Theater. I have lied to people and told them I have because I know a lot about the troupe and I live pretty close to the theater.
But the truth is that I have never seen a show there.
Nat's plan was for us to go see a special Friday showing of "The Worst Laid Plans" which is a show by women about their worst sex stories. It's funny. Combining my two favorite things: sex and comedy and making it even more my favorite thing...humiliating sex stories which are funny when you share them with an audience.
I was so ready to see this show.
Nat and I have known each other for 8 years. We had a rough patch and didn't talk for awhile but now we hang out together with our friends on a pretty regular basis. A couple of weeks ago, we planned to see "Dan in Real Life" together. Just the two of us. I got to her house. We opened some wine and gabbed for the next several hours. We hadn't caught up one on one in years and it was so comfortable and fun that the time escaped us and we missed the movie and walked to Lala's and continued talking.
I am on my way last night to meet her on Franklin and perhaps get a drink before the show. She texts me that she will be at La Poubelle. Then I get another text that there are no avail seats, no cute guys and a lot of attitude. So she would let me know where she ended up.
I met her at Prizzi's Pizza. We both had never been there before.
When I got there, she was in mid-conversartion with two gay guys, B and N.
They weren't a couple. They were both pretty young. They introduced us to the bartender whose name is Sunshine. They called her the best mixologist around. B lived up the street and had tried to coerce N to go out for a drink so they could go dancing. N is the "mistress" in a long distance relationsuip and is the seemingly more cynical of the two. B has a friendly innocent face. N has a slightly haughty expression. They are both hilarious and Nat and I are laughing and decide to grab a quick bite before going to the show next door.
Sunshine lets Nat and me order our food without butter and flour and swears you won't miss it because the flavor is so good, since they still use olive oil. Our food arrives. And Sunshine wasn't lying. It was great. I had the chicken marsala.
We finish our meal a little too late. It is 8:05. The show started at 8. So we decide to stay a little longer.
A woman walks up to the bar and sits down next to me.
She is blond and thin and is wearing a fur stoll along with some jeans. She has a very strange energy of being friendly but then deciding she may kill you for the pleasure of it.
She is drinking wine and letting us know she has been on a drinking lockdown.
"Self imposed?" I ask
"Yeah. I needed to drink...after not being allowed to"
"Do they know you got away" I joke and then realize that I don't know her and it could sound like I think she escaped from rehab, a mental institution of something even more nefarious.
Thankfully, she thinks it was funny and said, "Yeah, you mean like from the trunk of a car?"
"Yeah" I giggle nervously. How did I end up next to her? I have no idea what we are talking about anymore.
She talks to Sunshine a little bit.
As I am in the bathroom, B whispers something about her fur stoll to Nat but the woman overheard him and went off. I come back from the bathroom while they are in the middle of it. I am confused as to what happened. She is saying things like, "I am a good person. I don't judge. Out of all the people I know, I am the most nice." How am I STILL sitting nex to her?
The boys eventually leave as well but not after exchanging numbers with Nat and convincing Sunshine to go dancing wtih them the next night.
The woman, A, is still sitting next to me and now that she has calmed down from her altercation with the fresh faced innocent looking B, she tells Nat and me how fat she has gotten and that she has gained 22 pounds. I look at her and say, "what did you look like before? A skeleton?"
She starts to show us areas on her leg that are big (in her opinion).
"Now I have an ass" she says.
"That's a good thing." I say
"I like white boys." she says without blinking. Nat and I look at each other and can't believe how easily she says things like that.
"Do you live around here?" nat asks her
She pauses like she didn't hear the question. And then says, "you mean, is the house I am selling around here? yeah. I am getting a divorce. I am losing a house, a plane, a boat and a car."
"Wow"
"I miss my things. I am not superficial. But I like things. And I miss them. At least I am honest."
Honesty, in my opinion, is when you admit that you ARE superficial because you like your things. And she kept emphasizing the fact that she missed THINGS...not love or sex or the husband. Just her things.
I tell her that I would miss really good beauty products. She says she will too. And her amazing sheets and towels. And her sportscar.
"Oh, that really wouldn't interest me. I have dated guys with sports cars and i could care less," I tell her.
"Have you ever driven a sports car?"
"No"
"Have you ever been behind the wheel, peeling out like you own the road and know that you are in full control?"
"No"
"Then you would feel it. Once you have driven one....you would know. Once you have crashed your first one, you would know. Then you would get it."
CRASHED!!! I thought we were talking about driving one. And she is talking about CRASHING! HER FIRST ONE!?!?!?! How many has this woman crashed?
She starts talking about rap music. She likes east coast since she keeps mentioning she is from Manhattan. Nat is west coast - she is from Beverly Hills. A looks at me and asks me a question about what I like. I tell her I don't know much about rap and hip hop.
She then laments that it is tough going back to live in an apartment when you are 36.
"Trust me. When you get to be my age, you will understand. You can't live in an apartment at 36."
I smile.
"I am 38!"
I love doing this to people. I love when it works. Because some day it won't. I will be thinking I still look young and no one will agree with me. But on this occasion it was amazing.
"You're 38?"
"yeah"
"hmmm...I need another cigarette."
Nat and I pay our bill and people watch a little bit outside the theater where we didn't see our show. Matthew Perry walked by. Nat and I chatted about A and how crazy she was and what her husband must be like. And why he married her and what made him divorce her.
I drive Nat to her car and we sit parked on Bronson talking some more. People are walking between the apartment building we are parked in front of and the Scientology building so many times you would think a concert had let out. There was never not a flux of people. It was very spooky. Suddenly, a guy on a bike in a cap that read SECURITY asked us to roll down our window.
"I do security for this building," he points to the residential building all the scienotologists keep walking in and out of, "We got a call that there are two females sitting outside the aparment in their car for a long time"
"This is a public street, right" I ask annoyed.
"Yes. It's just we got the call about a concern since you have been here so long."
"I am parked right there." Nat points to her car.
"Okay. thanks."
And he walked away. How creepy.
We decided it was probably time to leave that spot and head home if we were now starting to be noticed. I don't want the L. Ron's after me.
A second attempt with Nat to do something fun yet again yielded even more fun results in not doing the planned activity.
The best laid plans sometimes give way to meeting crazy women, flirty gay boys and alien lovers.
I mean that in a general sense...naturally.
October always signifies the partying season for me.
In my twenties, I always met my next boyfriend at a Halloween party. It usually didn't last out the year but Halloween was always filled with potential. Fall, in general, always does that to me anyway.
It's how the start of the new school year felt too.
That something good is just about to happen.
And October for the last 7 years in LA has always been an exciting time where that something good could begin.
Mads's birthday is in October and we would usually have a fabulous bash where we would meet new faces who would invariable introduce us to the Halloween bash where we would meet new people.
Until this year.
Things are different.
My friends and I are all in a funk. No matter how much sun alleviates Seasonal Affect Disorder, or how much we excercise or drink, the funk hit us all.
Add the unseasonal heat and nothing felt right.
Mads's birthday came and went with a wonderful dinner with all our friends.
It was fun. And it was great to see everyone.
But it threw me off in terms of getting ready for the party that will change my potential.
Which in turn, threw me off for Halloween. I didn't dress up at all.
And worse...I didn't care. D'oh!
I know. Halloween is sacred to many of you.
And it is to me too. That is why it was all so surreal to not be involved.
Last Saturday, Reb invited us to a party.
I wasn't much in the party mood (see previous funk listed above). But I went. With Zappy.
And honestly...it was entirely what the doctor ordered.
This house was amazing. Toby spinned like the dj-extraordinaire he is. I walked up to him and said, "You know people with homes with amazing views" as this wasn't the first time he had let me enter his world of people with homes with amazing views.
He nodded back to me from behind the dj booth. I don't know if he actually heard me. But he smiled and bebopped to the beat of the music.
This place was amazing. And being surrounded with all new faces was awesome.
Zappy and I were practically the only ones not in costume. Some gay guy with a boyfriend in tow fell pretty lusty hard for Zappy. Reb took pictures of him trying to kiss her good bye. Reb, no stranger to the odd and extreme, looked at me with the same look I had which was to say, "Oh my god...did you see that?" We looked like girls who had just seen a picture of a man's penis.
That made me giggle. There was another guy dressed as Fat Bastard who was also courting Zappy. She was less than interested.
I found myself to look stunning. Until I looked in the mirror. Not at all stunning. At which point, I decided I liked how it felt to feel like I looked stunning, so I vowed not to look in any more mirrors.
Gamby and her friend Mike showed up later and stayed for a bit. The house overlooked the valley and the firework shows at Universal were ours to see from a chaise lounge on a patio with a drink in one hand.
As we left the party, a guy dressed as Santa Claus walked towards the party. Zappy rolled down her window, "What do I get if I've been good?"
"Have you been good?"
"Yes"
"What do you want?"
"A Hippity Hop"
And then our skinny young santa proceeded to rap for us. He was a rapping santa. And he was pretty impressed with his own rap stylings so on the fly that he almost forgot he was talking to us.
That whole party started my week out well. But work and other health issues I am having began to knock me down.
Last night, I forewent a party that Jazzy, Mads and Tams went to and headed to Lala's with Zappy. She too felt that the world had kicked her ass.
After dinner, we drove around in Hancock Park, which if you are a trick or treater, this is where you want to go. And everyone seemed to know it. Norton Ave was besieged with all kinds of minivans with packs of costume clad children piling out.
Zappy and I laughed.
It brought our spirits up.
In fact, we started to relive some of our favorite childhood halloweens.
And some of our favorite costumes. Her first and favorite was when she was Snoopy. The next year (2nd grade), she was a punk rocker. Sounds about right if you know her.
It has been a bumpy start to the partying season. And maybe it won't be the same as it has been in years past. Many of my friends had kids this year, or they are getting married and aren't interested in the same Bacchanal festivities that I still am into.
That is okay.
Things change.
People evolve.
Parties come in different sizes.
But my hope in this season remains the same.
Something good is about to happen. I just know it.
It's just around the corner.