2006-06-12
Just Be Yourself
Holy awesome commenter!
Tom totally rules.
I actually like it when people disagree but do it in a way that doesn't put the other side of the debate down.
It's easy in writing an essay to be condescending and to take on a voice that is a little louder and a little wiser than the one I have when I actually open my mouth, and not to French kiss Coffee Man.
Which, regrettably has not happened.
Yet.
It's also easy to forget that I put together an essay and people read it and some of them might not agree. The tricky part about hearing someone disagree with you is to not take it personally.
I have a really hard time with that because I'm a spoiled white girl. I'm not saying that to be funny. I 100% know that any complaint I have is nothing that can't be fixed by getting my head on straight.
Except for my vile neighbor, who I think might be practicing witchcraft on me. I swear to god, I am not making this up. She looks the type and lately, I've come home to rocks in weird positions, things hanging in the branches, and candles on the picnic table where my friend Sarah and I sometimes drink sweating and weak margaritas. This is Arizona and it's summertime... you can't light candles outside this time of year. What seems ambient can very quickly catch a tree which will very quickly incinerate, especially in my mid-town ghetto where "tree service" isn't a totally understood concept and where dead dry palm fronds fall into the courtyards ALL THE TIME.
So anyway, outside candles are either the act of dumbasses or witches and nobody can be so stupid as to spark up and open flame in Arizona in June. Last night was a full moon and I TOTALLY smelled fire, surprisingly not coming from my house where I often leave a home made pizza bagel in the toaster oven too long. I don't know what kind of hoo-doo she's up to but I will tell you that I totally spread out some garlic and some salt water to keep away the ju-ju.
Quit laughing.
You never know and you can't be too careful. I'm down with Occam's Razor but sometimes, I have to suspend it and think about the fact that those rocks laid out to make an arrow shape pointing directly to my door might not be natural phenomena, especially considering they weren't there when I left, earlier in the evening.
Speaking of not taking the easy way, it's possible that I should start thinking about dudes again, and not really in a comedic or slutty way.
I really, really have it bad for Coffee Man. Yesterday, I found myself dragging my doglet on a walk, so that I could seem more legit when I walked up to the pedestrian window. The way I see it, at the winodw, I would have more time to talk to him, since no cars would be behind me.
It was awesome.
I touched him.
Sadly, not in a naughty way but we did shake hands after officially exchanging names.
He's so beautiful, I can't even stand it.
Things have gotten to the point where I am reduced to being a weird little high schooler, hanging out at my crush's work without knowing any better. I was literally fidgeting around at the coffee window and talking with him and I realized that in my mini-skirt, sandals, and with my unwilling companion (thanks a lot Roseanne Rosannadannadog), I looked more like the not-quite-cool kid I was in 1990 than the educated and self-possessed adult that I am Monday-Friday. Well, through most Friday mornings, anyway.
I told him I had an enormous crush on him.
What else am I going to do? I don't have game and I know it.
I don't really drink so I can't reasonably ply him with alcohol because to do that, you have to be willing to go the distance and out-drink your prey. These days, I can out-drink nobody because I kind of don't care for drinking with the intention of getting drunk. But I mean... I REALLY don't care for it.
I don't really go out so I can't pretend to be into something cool and take him to see some hipster band or whatever. Too bad about that because not only do I not really go out but I don't too much care to do so unless I am working the merch table at a Girl's Gotta Eat function. How many times can I see the same stereotypes doing the same things? I'd rather be home reading something I've never read before or watching The Real World Key West.
I don't think about dudes creatively anymore.
I would rather send my creative energy into Girl's Gotta Eat Records and Derby and into here and into my real job than into macking some guy. I have like 17 tee-shirts from when I could mack a guy and be that cool chick or whatever.
I'm over it.
I want to be cool in a different way; not so much cool for drinking and hooking up as cool for being a strong and committed Derby skater, for being involved with a record lable, and for being a dedicated Corporate 'Ho with a big imagingation.
So by recognizing my moment, which I did, and by taking it to be honest.... what have I got to lose?
Nothing, really.
I just can't think of any other way to not be fake but to get the weight of unrequited love off of my chest.
And believe it when I say that it's totally cool if I am told by Coffee Man that I must never speak of this again and that I must either get my coffee elsewhere or be prepared to keep my coffee fires burning privately, verily when his car is NOT in the parking lot.
At no point do I expect him to come running out of the coffee shop and pick me up and swing me around while we're kissing in the rain. Not that I haven't thought about it... but I don't expect it.
I don't expect anything.
At the very least, I made his day by being a cute girl who he's noticed and by being totally straight up but not invulnerable.
At the very most, I can never go get coffee there again and will have to wear a wig at Derby until I start skating for a team, at which time I'll be wearing a helmet and a stage name, so it's all good in the anonymity department.
And no, I'm not telling anyone what he said about my nerdilicious confession; nor am I giving any facial expression information or making any comments about how I felt when I was walking away, dragging my possibly over-heated dog (it's for a great cause, so suck it up Rosie and be my goddamn companion) back across the parking lot and into the ghetto toward home.
It's all just from my side today and from my imagination.
I can't help it.
I gaze into his beautiful blue eyes and all I can see are the skies over New Mexico where, as I've mentioned, I am going to kidnap him and build a life above a drive-thru coffee shop that's full of Derby and dogs and being happily socially awkward together forever but with really good tans and in the wonderfully sweaty, meaty shape that we are in right now.
I've never been happier.
Seriously.
I was at this yo-gay thing I do last night and I was thinking that I've got work and my figure and my house and my creative outlets. This is a golden age for me, you know?
One of those times in life where, for a little stretch of days, there isn't anything beyond the normal amount of trying that is waiting to fuck me up. All systems are go for the moment and there are back-up plans in place.
Right now, the only thing I have to work at is my problems with love, with men. Since I have fallen into the trap of expecting a certain response - good, bad, or indifferent, I have totally been avoiding the issue or avoiding it by being a princessy bitch, avoiding it by not being myself at all.
The best things come to me when I am admittedly and unapologetically myself, when I am doing things and not explaining them unless I'm asked to do so. You know like, "Did you sleep huddled outside my coffee shop last night or are you just the first customer today?"
If I don't expect one reaction or another form someone, I don't have to explain myself to me, or to the would-be object of my affection.
I have less heartbreak when he sleeps with a more loyal customer but more elation when we break into a Broadway-style duet, staged loosely but accurately to recall the balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet, since when I am in my car, he's kind of up on the balcony in the window of his coffee shop.
arizonasarah at 10:13 a.m.