Things to Remember

When I was wistfully daydreaming about making out with boys in bands, I never thought it would be like this...Bearded. Bespecaled. Tender.

I thought for sure it would be...Long-haired. Nicotine-stained. Rough.

Melons, Cheese and Alcohol

Summertime seemed to be a great time for me and family reunion barbecues. From ages 6 to 10, when I wasn't yet to the point where I had to impress anyone with my looks or intelligence or any other supposedly redeemable skill other than being the best at making the merry-go-round whip your cousins faster and faster until they're on the verge of spraying the surrounding area with vomit confetti, it was something I counted down on the calendar. You know, the slow and cinematic "red-X" drawn carefully on each day-block moving towards the inevitable "________ Today!!!" before a dance celebrating the arrival? It was on a certain reunion when I discovered a strange food allergy: watermelon. Watermelon is almost 100% water, by its weight, but for some reason the most pocket-book ready of fruits left me decorating the picnic tables with my very own brand of that previously-mentioned confetti. I wasn't mortified for more than a few minutes, thanks to still being a little too young. My parents wrote it off to a flu bug, but I was perfectly fine the next day. When I tried again to slurp up the summer fruit, it was even worse than it'd been the last time. And there it was; my first food allergy that I wore with semi-pride.

When I lived on by own at age 26, my diet was seriously sporadic because of a tight "work during the day, attend classes at night" schedule. I'd get home after not being able to eat anything for 6-7 hours, flip open a whole-wheat tortilla, place 2 slices of fat-free velveeta cheese and 'roast' it on the open flame of a burner on the stove, dolloped with a huge spoonful of sour cream as a garnish. That was my dinner three nights out of the week, and my boyfriend at the time and I would order pizza or make cheesy pasta often. I should also note that I was snacking on fat-free yogurt and eating cereal with skim milk for breakfast on most days.

After awhile, I started feeling incredibly exhausted all of the time. Part of it had to be blamed on my schedule, sure, but it didn't explain the extreme bloating, the excessive sweating, the suddenly bad skin, or my first experience with constipation. It isn't fun to recount such things, but at the time I was obsessed with how often I did 'that.' I'd take fiber supplements, laxatives and sprinkle wheat germ over my fruit and yogurt snacks to try and force it to happen. No dice. I mentioned this to a friend of a friend and she explained that she had to see a nutritionist for some of the same symptoms. "It *might* be different," she said, "but it was lactose-intolerance for me." I ticked through all of the dairy products in my head that I ate on a daily basis. I was getting at least four servings a day, which was just one more than the recommended amount for a healthy diet. I trudged all the way up to the north side, in a relatively scary section of the city, and waited patiently at the section of the clinic that was for general patients before being whisked off to the nutritional wing. An older man took my blood pressure, then went on to take down some strange statistics:

a) color of my eyes
b) length and quality of my fingernails
c) the color and texture of my tongue
d) breath odor

The 'Nutritionist' wasn't quite a college graduate. This was part of her *rotation* of sorts, but she was focusing on the non-profit section of health care and had her eyes open to all sorts of wacky dietary practices in this city that's regularly in the "Top Five Fattest Cities In the Nation." I had to keep a food diary, report back to her, and then we'd go through this huge dictionary-type book that was full of ways to heal myself with good food. Writing down what I ate on a daily basis was part a ritual in self-mortification and denial. "This is just a stressful week," I told myself. "I don't REALLY eat this poorly."

When I sheepishly trudged back into the office and slipped the sheets of the food diary across the table to her, she inhaled right away. Then, she went through and highlighted patterns for me. Dairy. Yes, dairy. While it could be other things, she had a feeling that it was dairy as people develop this allergy as adults. So, I was to remove dairy from my diet for two weeks, see how I felt, then add it back at various times to see how my body would react. Yeah, my body hated dairy. Pure vitriol against the lovely thing. No more ice cream, no more lasagna or any parmesan-esque dishes, and definitely no more pizza. I could take the over-the-counter lactase-enzyme products to help me digest the foods, but they don't always help. I still dabble in pizza with help of the enzyme, and thankfully yogurt helps combat the digestive issues I have with dairy (I mean, I had to have SOMETHING to hold onto my dairy past), but if I cut it out all together, I feel and look so much better.

Recently, I'm starting to believe an allergic reaction to either wheat or alcohol. When I drink beer, my face hurts, I wake up puffy and swollen the next day and I have a temporary beer gut that makes it hard to look svelte in the corporate attire I wear every day. But, then there are times when I drink certain types of red wine that I wake up feeling congested and unable to taste or smell until I've had at least five glasses of water to clear it all out of my system. This last allergic could either be the last straw to me just becoming an *all-natural* lady in that fruits, veggies, lean protein, organic teas and water will be my only sustenance or I will jump back into the vat of food that creates all of my body woes and wallow in misery.

It's so hard to say which seems more appealing at this point. This means at family reunions or get-togethers I will either be the girl who shovels the naughtiest of the naughty foods in my mouth as fast as possible or the perceived finnicky eater who is too obsessed with her diet. Luckily, this is at a point in my life where I could honestly care less about what people think of me and more about what makes me happy. At least THAT coincidence isn't so terrible to consider.

Dream All Day

I have never felt as connected to a moment in time than when I found myself tripping into a very wrong situation. I blame it on two CDs. To make it easier for me to feel a little more innocent than I actually was at the time I've stricken those CDs from my music collection and iPod. They help me think that it wasn’t a mistake in my head if I say it in this way to myself often enough. What is right in the way we explain it away to ourselves and what it sounds like when we actually tell other people makes it feel wrong, for sure, and no amount of explanation can take away the guilt. Yet, it adds a sense of the forbidden and that can only amplify the buzzing sound, along with the music, in your ears when *it* happens.

When you date someone over and over and over again (the curse of the first college boyfriend), you start to pick up on evil seduction tactics. There are ways to make it happen and they’re usually successful. So, when someone new arrives in his life, you back up and move on to your own “someone new” because if you don’t the ease of getting back into the compare-and-contrast mode is too quick and borderline obsessive. Only the latest isn’t so keen on the tactics and you have to change your repertoire. At this point, you consider general moves. Moves that are interchangeable from partner-to-partner are necessary. I can’t get myself to build up too much of a stockade of tricks, though, thanks to my monogamous nature. When you’re with someone for long periods of time, the moves that have grown dependable with that particular person stay on solid ground and you don’t have to worry about whether or not they work for him. They just do.

Then there’s the issue of getting back together with someone, after you’ve had some time with a different person, and feeling those previous moves work again is such a strange feeling. To switch back into that way of kissing, that way of moving your hips during this point in the foreplay, flicking your hair over your shoulder to the left and having him put his hand behind your head, at the base of the skull, to rub his thumb over the hollow there is exhilarating. There is no guessing. There is no uncertainty. Everything can be focused on the course, the progress, and the finish. You can concentrate on the person, on the way he reacts to what you’re doing to him, and see the delight behind his gaze from what he’s doing to you. It’s the equivalent of a wine bottle being popped open; the pressure-and-release, the working of his body to get a direct result: something you can enjoy completely. When the illicit nature of doing something you’re not supposed to be doing with the person you’re not ever supposed to be doing it with intensifies the way your ears buzz. It’s almost as if you can’t breathe. That you’re not supposed to breathe or it might ruin the moment. It adds to the head rush of the experience. There's a tremor in your voice and every nerve in your body.

“I cannot do this. I cannot do this.” You can’t even think straight it’s all happening so quickly, so the justifications come fast and loose and you can’t even remember them immediately after it happens. “Why did I do this again?” “What am I supposed to do now?” “I’m screwed.”

All of this, all of these little pauses in logic and time come rushing back to your head and to your loins whenever you hear any of the songs from these two CDs. It’s when you think fondly back on this dishonest moment when you should really start to worry. I’m almost to that point, so I am very anxious. I don't like feeling this way.

Ode to a Hamilton

I would never call myself superficial in the strict sense. Yes, I sometimes joke about how I'm looking for a sugar daddy; a guy to foot the bill every time I need him to and to spoil me with the toys and trinkets I deserve. But, I never thought I'd go so literal as to develop a crush on a person who physically graces a greenback I use almost daily.

It's been a joke for a couple of months now that I am a fan of the re-design of the $10 bill. When I get change back, it's disappointing if there are two-$5 bills or a $5 bill and five $1 bills instead. I take my time when using them, taking care to save them as long as possible since it is a rare occurrence that someone so pretty is tucked inside my wallet; someone who probably belongs on a wall somewhere tacked next to a page ripped out of an Abercromie & Fitch catalog or inside a young girls locker, next to a vanity mirror for compare-and-contrast purposes. What I'm trying to say is that the reason I'm a big fan of this re-design is because it's made Alexander Hamilton quite pretty. He's more than pretty, in all honesty, surpassing any of those lucky few who decorate American money, including the poignant and haunting representation of a Sacajaweia or the ruddy good looks of a JFK. Now possessing a stronger jaw-line, a less-pronounced brow, hollowed-out supermodel cheekbones, and a less, shall we say, frou-frou collar, Alexander is as close to breathtaking as a founding father could possibly be.

I'm so excited by this that even if I am with the snarkiest of friends (and trust me, I have quite a few of them) or even family members who I tend to keep all inklings of strange obsessions or personal idiosyncrasies from for fear that they'd use it as ammunition later, I have lost all traces of embarrassment during transactions. It takes a lot longer to buy a pack of gum or a six-pack of beer because I take time to smooth out the creases in the bill if it's grown particularly wrinkly. I sigh wistfully and stare longingly at dear Alex. I fiercely defend him when an especially vicious friend decides that it would be funny to point out he died in a duel. But, usually my defense of this falls upon deaf ears and people just look at me in a "oh, she cant be serious, can she?!?!" sort of way whenever I tuck the bill just inside my shirt and underneath the strap of my bra where it's closer to my heart for just a moment.

Generally, I get upset when people make fun of me. I tend to be a little too sensitive when my passion for a particular movie or television show or book goes unnoticed or if people make a joke of it. You'd think that I would get really upset when someone goes for the easy laugh like with those duel remarks, but it doesn't undermine my devotion. I can brush it off to confusion or pure misunderstanding. Obviously, it's gotten a little obsessive and I understand if you think I'm a little insane. Or, maybe I don't care because this level of fascination I have for Alexander Hamilton has surpassed the original shallow intentions of thinking he's just super dreamy into an Edith-Wharton-esque fixation on what I can never have but will always want.

Really, though, I just wonder why no one has thought to create a giant life-size incarnation of A.H. and present it to me, so I won't bother them anymore with my strange love and could keep it in the safety of my apartment. It's something I hope for every single day.