Soft

I lost someone close to me this week. 

Not lost in they've died but lost in the "well, that was an unforgivable betrayal of my trust" kind of way. 

I've been through so many relationship implosions over the years that it took a little while for this one to hit me. I did all the automatic stuff that I do--blocked them from my phone and social media, put away the things they've given me until I'm less emotional, activated my support group. I thought to myself "Well, that was unexpected" and went on with my day. 

We all know where this is going. 

That evening, after I held it together all day I tried to pickle myself in bourbon (it takes less now than it used to). I got into a horrible fight with David. I cried at a bus stop. I self-harmed in a more intentional way and screamed with grief and sobbed for hours. I've said it before, but going through life with big feelings is a constant fight.

Friday night I lost that fight.

* * *

My favorite Mary Oliver poem is only four lines long. 

"The Uses of Sorrow"

(In my sleep I dreamed this poem)

Someone I loved once gave me

a box full of darkness. 

It took me years to understand

that this, too, was a gift. 

* * * 

I have fallen a little in love with most of the people I have met and liked over the years. 

What can I say? I have a lot of feelings, sloppy boundaries, and a soft heart. 

Each time someone lets me down in a big way I tell myself that this is it. This is the time that I'm going to put up taller walls, keep people at an arm's length, stop calling that one friend who never wants to hang out. 

Then the next time I meet someone with the same obscure interest, the same favorite book, hell, just someone who looks cute and smiles at me I lose myself all over again. 

I am grateful to have such a loving, supportive partner in David. Every time I get excited about some new friend (or, frankly, crush) he's patient and kind. He gently reminds me that not everyone in the world is worth my time. I laugh and say "Yeah, but this person is."

He throws up metaphorical hands and I let myself be disappointed all over again. 

* * *

I am a walking trope: 

The person who walks around with ohmygodsomuchlovetogive and who gives it to all the wrong people and ohgodsomeonejustloveme. 

Kind of. 

I'm also the person who left her divorce with the determination to keep a soft heart and I've worked really fucking hard to keep it that way. I'm also a person who believes that the more love you let into your life, the more your love grows and reflects in the world. More than that, I believe--no, I know that loving people, even the ones who do not deserve it, has made me a better person.  

So what the fuck am I supposed to do? 

* * *

It isn't until Monday morning that I can really even begin to contemplate my most recent box full of darkness. 

I spend much of the weekend in an emotional and actual hangover, tinged with just a delightful soupçon of self-recrimination and disgust. I manage to pull myself out of it long enough to spend some time with friends on Saturday and go to church on Sunday, but I make sure to make myself feel worse at every opportunity (saddest shoutout to people who use food as punishment, too).

There isn't anything special about Monday. I went outside and felt the ground under my feet and the sun on my face. I went to the park and walked the gravel paths. I observed the mallards, finally home for summer, as they fed and played. I saw a cardinal--a bird that always reminds me of David--and took a short video of its song with him later. 

The whole time I carried that box of darkness with me and thought about how fucking fragile we all are. How stupid and frustrating and maddening we can be when we're hurt and want to hurt someone else. And then I did what I always do, what I hope I will always continue to do. 

I reminded my heart to stay soft and went home.

Beginning

This apartment is different in so many ways.

To start, it's full of my stuff. My books, my art, and my mother's rocking chair are all out in the open again. Shelves of DVDs are not considered decoration. While it's certainly lived-in, it's also tidy and cozy.

I've only been here for a few weeks, but it already feels more like home than the apartment my ex and I shared for three years.

The biggest change is that there's music in the house again.

It's been over three years since I've been able to turn on an album without first having the check with my ex about whether or not it would overstimulate him. (it would) Or ask if he was planning to turn on television or a video game (he was). Or inquire about whether or not he wanted to talk about anything (he never did).

Granted, a lot of it is Patsy Cline, Billie Holiday, and with the occasional interlude into The Smiths when I'm feeling really awful.

It's a start.

* * *

Dating is a wasteland of human sadness. 

It's the same and not the same as it was before I met the ex. The apps are similar enough. The performative woke-ness is excruciatingly worse. Dick pics and gross men still abound. But I'm more comfortable with my sexuality and myself this time through. 

It's a long string of pleasant but not right dates until a friend introduces me to a friend. 

It is the perfect rebound relationship. 

Here's what makes it perfect. It's friendly and has some of of the best and most open communication I've ever had about expectations and sex and feelings. The conversations veer between flirting and arguing, and it's good to stretch those muscles again. The sex is intense and affirmative and helps me start to get over a lot of hurtful things my ex said. The bourbon is plentiful and high-quality. 

And when it's over, it's just . . . over. Friendly notes about Star Trek or careers occasionally, but there's no pining or long-term sadness.

It's a midpoint.

* * *

 I come home after a long and emotionally exhausting day to a clean house, reasonably calm and fed cats, and dinner on the stove. Amy Winehouse is on the radio singing the blues.

The new boyfriend is everything you'd want a new boyfriend to be. He's whattheheck silly and holyshit handsome and ohmygodareyoureal? kind. He tells me I'm gorgeous when I'm running errands in my old baseball hat and a grubby t-shirt. He tells me I'm gorgeous other times, too. He treats my parents to breakfast when they meet him. 

Every moment that I spend with him feels precious.

He gets me a glass of tea and does something to make me laugh. On the radio, Amy is singing about love being a losing game and in this moment, I don't even care if she's right. This doesn't feel like losing game. It doesn't feel like an ending.

It feels like a really good beginning.

Fat

It's 10:00AM. I'm covered in sweat, hot, and regretting every decision I've made that's brought me to this point.

I'm running a 5K on a treadmill as the final leg of a practice indoor triathlon, something I got up at 6:00 to prep for. It's not the actual indoor triathlon I signed up for--that's three weeks away. I got up early on a Sunday to do a practice triathlon.

I'm being a little dramatic. I was regretting the decisions I had made, but only because running a treadmill is the most boring thing in the world. While I'm running I'll cope by texting bad selfies to friends, asking if they know that treadmills were originally designed as a punishment, and generally being a whiny little bitch.

At the end of the run I'll hop off the treadmill and get hit by a rush of euphoria.

While I didn't win the genetic lottery in . . . basically any other way I'm lucky enough to be a person who gets a runner's high almost every time I work out, regardless of the activity.

I'm feeling even better when I check my watch stats and see I've cut an entire minute off my normal swim time. I've been working really hard since November, cross and strength training and it's nice to see that hard work paying off.

I trade my sweaty workout clothes for a towel and decide to hop on the scale before getting in the shower.

That's exactly the place where the bottom falls out.

"I deserve this" I think, tearing up in the shower. "I had that extra drink on Friday night and ohmygod refined pasta? You slob, what were you thinking?"

"I deserve this."

* * *

I am in the best shape of my life. 

I've lost three dress sizes, my mile times are faster than they've ever been, and my last doctor was thrilled with my progress. When people ask me my secret, I laugh and say "Oh, you know, diet and exercise." 

Here's my actual secret. 

Every morning I get up and weight myself, often more than once. Depending on what the scale says, I'll have Breakfast A (70 calories) or Breakfast B (an indulgent 140 calories). I will go to work and try to keep my total calorie consumption throughout the day to around 700 calories, mostly eaten two hours before I go to the gym, which I visit six days a week. I'll spend 90 minutes Spinning, will shower, and will walk the 1.5 miles back to my house. I'll eat a carefully portioned dinner, ensure that I haven't had more than 1,200 calories in a day and will skip eating back most of the calories burned during my workout. More often than not, I'll halve my dinner so I can have a beer to help me sleep. 

If, say, I've done something egregious like go to dinner at a friend's house and eat more than the calories I have allotted, I will get home, put on my running clothes, and run until I'm at my calorie limit for the day. 

I do this every day for nine months.

At the end of it, a new doctor will ask how I made such progress. When I detail my diet and exercise routine for her, she looks me dead in the face and tells me "That's not a lifestyle change. That's an eating disorder."

"No, it's not. Fat girls don't have those."

She almost slaps me.

I would have deserved it. 

* * *

"I mean, for someone who works out so much, I don't understand how you put on so much weight."

I've heard no fewer than 17 variations of this comment throughout my dating life. 

This particular time I lock myself in the bathroom and cry for hours. 

I am three years and thirty pounds from the best shape of my life. I fell in love and stopped working out so much because I was so happy. I fell out of love and drank too much and ate too much comfort food as a method of coping. Everything about my life feels so out of control at the moment that the constant refrain in my head is "You deserve this. You let yourself go. You're an ugly fat monster."

"You deserve this." 

* * *

It's 10:00PM. I'm covered in sweat, hot, and regretting absolutely none of the decisions that brought me to this place. 

I'm sleeping with someone new. It's the first someone new since my ex-husband and while it's nothing serious, it's been incredibly meaningful for me. He's a genuinely funny, kind, and warm person and I couldn't have written a better first-since-my-ex-husband.

I can't get out of my own head. 

The second my clothes come off, all I can think about is the stretch marks on my boobs, the cellulite on my ass, my disgusting belly. I'm convinced that this is a pity fuck or a meh-I-have-nothing-better-to-do fuck or a I-haven't-had-sex-in-awhile-and-I-can-close-my-eyes-and-imagine-Scarlett-Johansson fuck.

It's not. 

I get a little bit better the more I get used to him (see previous comments about funny, kind, and warm), but I still can't settle down. Every time we eat together he comments on how little appetite I seem to have (It's one of those unspoken fat girl rules. Eat less than you want and try not to enjoy it). Based on the number of times I've said "Oh, I got busy and had a late lunch" he must think I'm the most overworked employee in the place. 

I make a lot of jokes to him about how I'm the incarnation of a goddess of sex, here for his adoration and awe, but the truth is that I'm five years and ten pounds from the best shape of my life. And for as much as I'd like to be proud (and am proud, if I'm being honest) of the fact that I can do an indoor tri for practice on a Sunday morning, there's an extremely loud voice in my head talking about how maybe my fat ass should walk the two miles home and I can probably skip that post-workout bagel and oh, by the way, maybe you should cancel your plans with funny-kind-warm tonight.

Afterall, it's not like I deserve it. 

Men are From . . .

"Oh my goodness, what a cute puppy! Is she yours?"

"If I say yes, will you pull my pants down?"

"Um, I just found out that I have to wait until April for the new Game of Thrones season, so that feels like enough disappointment for one day."

* * *

"This is the song Magic Cock Cake from our new album Smush 25:8."

I'm laughing so hard I'm almost peeing my pants. 

I'm grateful for a lot of things about my divorce. It was reasonably amicable, I got the cats, I lost twenty pounds, and I don't live in a house with anime scrolls and swords on the wall anymore. 

What I am most grateful for is that I seem to have won custody of my ex-husband's ex-girlfriend. 

He introduced us early on and we got on like a house on fire. She's well-read, likes to yell about feminism, loves to drink gin while yelling about feminism, and is a real weirdo. 

Oh, she also makes me laugh so hard I nearly pee my pants. 

I'm hanging out with her while she's on a lunch break and have been talking waaaaaay too loudly about my sex life. She decides to turn a recent story of my misadventures into a death metal album and launches into a rendition of the song on the spot.  

When I can finally stand up again she gets quietly serious. 

"Kel, you seem really happy. Like, really happy." She pauses. "I'm glad." 

Me too. 

* * *

"hey luv the black lipstick like my fav color cuz noone uses it"

"Thanks. It's actually a dark purple. I like my gothiness to be within the bell curve of work appropriate."

"u into latex?"

"I'm sorry?" 

"rubber?"

". . ."

"u goin 2 rubberball 2019? come suck my cock its so gooooood"

"Dude, if I wanted a mediocre dining experience, I'd just go to West End."

* * *

"You don't sound like yourself."

"I agree."

"Me too. "

Over the months, my makeup group chat has evolved into a lot more than makeup. 

It's become a place to talk about work and sex and relationships. I mean, it's also a lot of photos of me trying (and mostly failing, hilariously) to get the perfect cut crease, but it's more than that. 

"You sound mopey."

"^This."

"And most of the time you walk around like 'GIRLS I AM A BADASS AVENGING GODDESS WHO'S GOING TO CHANGE THE WORLD."

"She's right. So stop being so fucking hard on yourself."

"Yeah, mope if you need to, but tomorrow get up and be your BADASS SELF."

"And stop being so fucking had on yourself."

* * *

"hey girl. you look so sexxxxxy."

". . ."

"i'm looking for a virgin so we can para-bond without any drama."

"Well, unless you have a time machine, I'm afraid I'm not your girl." 

"well, your sexual partners shouldn't exceed three people."

". . ."

"you look like you'd be good at fucking."

"Know how I got that way?"

"yessssssssssss." 

"By fucking more than three people." 

* * *

There are six different women in four different timezones howling with laughter. 

I've just sent a screenshot of a text that a guy has sent me after ghosting on me two months ago, apologizing for ghosting on me and (we're pretty sure) trying to make a booty call. 

"Honestly," I say, "I'd have more respect if he just came out and said "Hey, I didn't want to date you, but wanna fuck?""

There's a lot more laughter and I am not the only one who decides to pour myself a gin and tonic. 

It's a pretty stereotypical divorcee thing to say, but for the most part I am so over men right now. 

There's a lot about life that is going really well. This is the happiest I've been in probably two years. My life feels like my own again, and almost none of that has to do with men. 

It does have a lot to do with women.

I've always known that female friendships are powerful as fuck. Women in my life have served as mentors and friends and unpaid therapists (sorry for the extra emotional labor).  I thought I knew how special they were and that I valued them enough. 

Yeah, right. 

The past year has been all of the best and all of the worst of my life. I have sobbed over tea and snuggled my goddaughters and vowed that I was never going to date again. I've screamed with laughter over terrible pickup lines and toasted to XX chromosomes and made another woman a cake as a thank you for getting me laid. 

The women in my life have gotten me through the hardest moments of my life. If I could I would bake every one of them a cake.

These dudes, though. 

What the Living Do

“So what have you been doing?”

“What?”

“With all the time you have now that you’re not regularly . . .”

“Oh.” I try to decide if I want to have this conversation, if I have any interest in what’s being offered on the other side of it. I don’t. We’ve been down this road together so many times. After years, I’m finally okay turning it down.

I believe that there's something better, that I'm worth something better.

“Oh, you know, Lost a lot of weight. Cut two minutes off my tri time. I’m kicking ass at work and taking care of myself.”

“I can’t even imagine going that long . . .”

I indulge myself in one long eyeroll before writing back. “Yeah. I know.”

* * *

I’m riding the bus when the first poem comes to mind.

I’m tired, my muscles are sore, and it’s been a long day. The bus is crowded and hot and I usually I would be carsick and annoyed. Today, I open an app on my cell phone and listen to my favorite reading of a Jane Kenyon poem.

There’s just no accounting for happiness,
or the way it turns up like a prodigal
who comes back to the dust at your feet
having squandered a fortune far away.

I’m a little afraid to say it out loud. I don’t want to jinx it, but 2019 has started well. I don’t know if it was the straight up witch cleansing ritual I did on December 31st or (more likely) the fact that a new year just feels like a chance to start over, but I’ve been doing really well for the past few months. Anxiety and depression are still always in the background, but they’re easier to mute than they’ve been in years.

I feel content. Grounded. Happy.

The happiness catches me by surprise, because it doesn’t come as the result of anything tangible. The guy I thought I met ended up being a dud. I’m doing well at work, but that’s certainly never been the root cause of my happiness. I haven’t seen any shattering art or spent time in state parks or even seen my nieces lately.

Regardless, here it is, back at my feet.

Hello, happiness. I remember you.

* * *

“What’s most important to you in a relationship?”

“What?”

“What do you value? What are your goals? What are characteristics you’d like to find in another person?”

These may not standard first date questions, but I’m not really into baffing around these days. I’m trying this new thing where I’m being the person I am and fuck whatever happens.

In shorthand that means that I text when I feel like it, I dress and do my makeup for myself, and I am generally every bit as intense as I am in my work and personal relationships up front.

I go on a lot of first dates.

* * *

I’m half-asleep when the second poem wakes me up.


I’m tired, my muscles are sore, and it’s been a long day. My brain constantly wakes me up with trivia, so it’s not entirely surprising. Usually I’d be annoyed and would pull the covers over my head. Tonight, I let the guy next to me pull me in closer and think about the poem.

What you called that yearning. What you finally gave up.

I’m a little afraid to move, to breathe, to acknowledge my existence or his. This moment feels impossibly fragile. In a few minutes he will get up to leave. In a few days, I will decide that I don’t need this to be anything more than what it was, a moment of kindness and genuine warmth between two people. In a few months, we will have likely forgotten about it and each other. But for now, all that’s in the background. This, perhaps, was my something better.

I feel satisfied. Tranquil. Grateful.

The gratitude is the most striking. When it comes to intimacy I usually, um, give as good as I get. It’s something deeper that makes me think of the poem. It has been so easy to unreflectively give things up over the past years. Standards. Happiness. Independence and satisfaction and tranquility. Warmth and kindness. But more than any of those things, it’s been so easy to give up yearning for them.

Here, in this impossibly fragile moment, I feel it again. And with that feeling comes deep gratitude for the person next to me.

Hello, yearning. I remember you.

That One Summer

I’m crossing the street when Spotify betrays me.

I’ve been listening to a playlist they’ve made for me of songs I’ve listened to in summers past. Music has always served as an extra-sense kind of diary for me. I can picture the bar where I first heard the song Wagon Wheel, or feel the heat of summer night when I played Blackbird for my husband. This particular playlist has a lot of songs I was listening to prior to our wedding and it’s causing a lot of pleasant memories. 

The song that catches me off guard is one that I listened to a lot the summer before I met my husband. A few months before meeting him a friendship became something stickier than a friendship, and I played that song a lot while it was going on. When I met the husband I took the song off my playlists and eventually ghosted on the man. I miss the man involved from time to time but I never really looked back. Hearing this particular song on this particular summer day everything I felt that summer hits, and hits hard. 

The feelings are partially wistfulness for the friendship, but also desire for the person I was that summer. In the stickiness between friendship and sex and not-dating, I was constantly trying to be my most interesting, beautiful, desirable self.

It was amazing.

I was constantly reading and looking for odd bits of interesting news, so I was an excellent conversationalist. Sexual tension is a great incentive to buy new clothes and work out, so I always looked great. Dopamine is a terrific short-term replacement for serotonin, so I felt incredible.

It was terrible.

I was always trying to be witty and I stopped being fun. I was in shape, but worked out and monitored my food to the point of obsession. I was constantly high on the rushes I would get from the guy, but they were always followed by deep sadness when I realized he would never be able to give me what I needed. He left me breathless, in so many ways.

Hearing the song that stops me in the crosswalk leaves me breathless again.

***

Marriage is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Before the husband, all of my relationships were disposable things. They were opportunities to to try on parts of myself: The Has it All Together Career Woman, The Homemaker, The Wanna-Be Urban Farmer. My marriage is where I can have it mostly together, but I can also have a Saturday where I rewatch Archer and laugh like an idiot. I can whip up coq-au-vin after I set my cookbook on fire.

I can also be the complicated person that my mental health and extreme empathy make me. Usually that’s not a bad person, but we’re playing our marriage on an higher difficulty setting. My mental health issues combined with my husband’s autism mean that our capacity for misunderstanding and hurt feelings is nearly limitless.

But even with that limitless capacity, he’s the one sitting next to me laughing at television, putting out my small fires, and helping me learn to be the beautiful, desirable person that can still be herself.  

***

When I get home, it’s one of the few nights the husband has beat me back to the apartment. He’s cooking something that smells delicious, has fed the cats, and has a bottle of of cold champagne. His day hasn’t left him so overstimulated that he needs quiet in the house, so I turn on the speakers and start writing him a love letter in a language he won’t understand.

I play the song I’ve been listening to since our vacation in North Carolina, a week that felt like a honeymoon we never got to take. I play songs from our wedding and we dance a little in the living room. I play the song that I listen to when I’m mad at him.

I also play him the song from the summer before I met him, so he can know that part of me, too.

I’m sweaty from public transit and stopped wearing makeup after our first date. I’m still getting used to my different body and I don’t have a single interesting thing to tell him about the news or my work.

I accept a cold glass of champagne from him, happy in the knowledge that in this moment I am beautiful, desirable, and, finally, me.

History is a Nightmare

"You all right?"

We're out. I'm picking through my dinner and taking small sips out of my glass of beer.

"Yes. Why?"

"You're just quieter than normal."

"Oh." I shake my head and smile at him. "No. I'm sorry. Caught up in my own head."

"Anything in particular?"

"The show. It was good. I'd like to see more. But . . ."

He waits for me to finish. It's one of the things I like best about him, this ability to ask questions without asking them.

I flip the program over and tap the advert for the next show. The Woodsman.

"I don't think I'll be seeing this one with you."

He scans the synopsis. "Oh. Oh. Yeah. I can see where that might have some triggers for you."

I open my mouth to say something, to give him more than the one sentence explanation I stammered out the first time we were together.

I pick up my fork instead.

***

"So what's the problem?"

"I'm sorry?"

"It sounds like there's a problem."

"No. Problem isn't the right word. It's that I haven't figured out a way to say "I'm not entirely certain you aren't going to murder me in my sleep" yet. 

"Huh?"

"I know it's not actually going to happen." I see the look on her face. "No. I'm serious. I know it's not likely, but it's the only shorthand I know for "my lizard brain panics every time I leave because I'm really happy and it doesn't know how to deal."

"You don't think that's a better thing to say than "I'm not entirely certain you aren't going to murder me in my sleep"?"

"Oh, shut up."

We're quiet for awhile.

"You know that everything you're describing sounds really textbook for victims of trauma, right?"

"I know."

***

"Oh, here, You'd like this one too."

We're lounging. It's a brilliant, blue-sky autumn morning after days of rain, but I'm disinclined to venture out. This, being alternately wrapped up in someone's arms and his button-down shirt, is exactly what I want out of this slow, sleepy morning.  I read comics and my bookclub book. He makes me coffee and messes around on his computer.  We talk, intermittently, about anime and books and video games. He explains how he's making some piece of software run better. I tell him a long, funny story about my mother. And in between I read. He messes around on his computer. 

Even my best Saturday mornings have never been this good. 

I start, a few times, to tell him why I woke up crying the night before. Why I always wake up crying when I stay over. More than that, I want to tell him how big and different and terrifying this is for me. Just this. Just this sleepy, quiet morning together. I want to tell him that it scares the hell out of me and why it scares the hell out of me and why I'm having nightmares that wake both of us up, and I come close, so close, a time or three.

But he looks up from his computer and smiles at me and asks if I want more coffee or comes and sits next to me on the couch and we read a comic together and all I can think is:

I can't. 

This, the coffee, the comics, the smell of his shirt and my perfume, this long, lovely Saturday morning is wonderful. And completely, entirely, ridiculously unexpected. It's the kind of thing I've wanted for years and never thought I was going to get. 

"Hey, we should walk to the grocery store if I'm going to cook for you."

"Yeah. It's a really beautiful day. I suppose we should take advantage of it."

I go to the bedroom and slip out of his shirt and into my own clothes, holding the soft black and white cloth to my face for one more deep breath. 

What would be the purpose in talking about nightmares now? Better to enjoy the sunshine while we've got it.  

Some Conversations, with Family

"C'mon, Kels. I want to drink wine and make doughnuts."

"Oh. That sounds like fun!"

I should know better than to trust my mother. Halfway through an incredibly finicky recipe, I push my flour-filled hair out of my face, spin around, and see her contentedly drinking a glass of wine at the kitchen table.

"Hey! I thought we were supposed to be making doughnuts together!"

She laughs. "By "making doughnuts together" I really meant "I'm going to read the recipe out loud to you and drink wine while you do all the work.""

I take off my apron, grumbling, and remove my scarf. "It's too damn hot in this kitchen." I observe, twisting my hair up out of my eyes. These days I'm wearing it past my shoulders and it gets in the way of almost everything. As I'm fussing with the last pin, I look up and see my mother snickering.

"What's so funny?"

"Well, Kel." Her eyes are sparkling. "Bite marks are just so retro, don't you think?"

I remember why I've been wearing my hair down all day and blush. She cackles.

***

"What are you doing with that?!"

"What?" I've picked up a power drill from the workbench and am carrying it out to my car. 

"What are you doing with the drill?"

"I got new plates for my car because Minnesota makes no sense. I'm going to go put them on."

"Put it down!"

I've never been very good with power tools, but for goodness sake, this is the limit.

"Daddy, I am perfectly capable of . . ."

"I know. But the tools here are all pretty greasy and you're in good clothes." He snatches the drill from my hands and gives me a half hug. "I don't want you to get gunked up. I'll do them for you."

"Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine." 

On the way out of the shop I take a deep breath and think about how the smell of Lava Soap, engine oil, and diesel will always remind me of my father.

"Kel!"

I turn around. "Yeah, Daddy?"

"I mean, I also don't trust you to use it. You do call it an electric screwdriver."

"That was, like, six years ago."

He raises his eyebrows to indicate that it doesn't matter. I roll my eyes to indicate he's out of his mind.

***

"You look like hell."

"Well, you know." He gestures to the infant, snuggled up in my lap. "Newborn and all. We're not sleeping much."

"Yeah. Mom says he's fussy between eight and midnight?"

"Yup."

"What does "fussy" mean?"

"It means he screams his head off from eight until midnight."

"What?"

"He cries. Just cries."

"For four hours?"

"He's a baby, Kel."

"How have you not, you know, left him at a local police station?"

He just stares at me. "You're never baby-sitting. You can take him for a weekend after his 21st birthday."

"I mean, I was joking, but I think we both know that until he's capable of verbalizing, it's probably not a great idea." 

"Yeah, it's almost like I suffered through years of having you as a baby-sitter."

I snort derisively. "It wasn't that bad." 

My snort wakes up the baby, who immediately starts bawling. I pass him back to his father who gives me a "see what I mean" look of exasperation and retires to the rocking chair. 

Unbearable

"I was actually going to order you that other sake."

"Oh. Okay." I turn back to the waitress. "Then we'll take a glass of the first sake you talked about." When the she leaves I lean across the table and stage-whisper "Are you trying to get me drunk?"

He smiles. I melt.

"No! I'm just trying to expand your horizons a little. Like you're doing for me."

I swear, they're going to need to mop me up off the floor.

***

"I'm just saying. I was offered a month's free trial to Steve Harvey's dating site, based on his book Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man."

"Well, that just sounds like blog click bait. You gotta do it."

"Yeah. I'm not really looking."

"Oh, right you're ohmygodsohappy and boring these days."

"We still talk about video games and writing and history!"

"Whatever. OMGOD, soooooo happy."

"Yes. And, if you and, like, one other person are to be believed, a shittier person because of it."

"Maybe you could start writing about how your relationship is slowly driving you crazy with insecurity."

"But it's not."

"Oh. Well then."

***

I like the little things. 

The way someone's t-shirt smells. When someone buys you a book that they loved because they know that you'll love too. Being able to get incredibly excited about something in front of them without feeling self-conscious about it. Their taste, when they kiss you. How they laugh at all your jokes, even the ones that aren't very good. The sometimes breathless way they have of saying your name. 

What can I say? I'm a simple girl.

***

"You've been having too few misadventures lately."

"What?"

"Seriously. We need you embarrassed and confessional about something, and how."

"Why are all my friends saying this?"

"Because you're at your wittiest when you're mortified about something."

"What an asshole."

"At some point you're going to have to pull it together. I'm sick of talking to you."

***

"Reality check. On a scale of 1-10 how annoying am I lately?"

"Uh. Not even."

"Are you sure?"

"Right at this moment you're being more neurotic than usual. But other than that, you're fine."

"Someone called me unbearable earlier today." 

"Any annoyance I would have (and I assure you, it's none) would be counteracted by the following A) I love you. B) I've never seen you this happy. C) By virtue of A&B, I must be happy for you."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. If this were a Lamborghini, you could crow for a week. Being what it is, I don't care if you gush forever." 

"I'm happy. Just . . . happy."

"Oh, honey. I know."

***

"You smile in your sleep."

"I think I probably only do it while you're here with me."

"Oh my God."

"What?"

"What a line. I'm already here, do you really think you need say things like that?"

"You do that a lot."

"What?"

"Act like I don't mean the things I say." 

I'm quiet for a long time. "I'm not used to people meaning them."

"I guess I'm just going to have to keep saying them until you realize that I do."

I lean in and kiss him. I'm so happy it's almost, well.

Unbearable. 

Happiness is My Default

"So anyway, there's this physics professor at the U who wrote a book about the physics of superheroes." 

"Oh! Yeah, I heard him interviewed on NPR. And he has another book. . ."

"Yes! I've read it. It's called . . ."

"The Amazing Story of Quantum Mechanics."

It takes all of my self control not to reach across the table and kiss him, in full view of everyone on the street. First of all, because he's read a book on quantum mechanics just for the hell of it. Second, because we've finished one another's sentences twice over the course of the evening.

When the check comes and I reach for my credit card he waves me off. "I'd like to see you again. How about I get this and you get the next?"

I'm smiling so much I can't even reply.

***

"What the hell is the matter with you?"

"What?"

"You're out. In Dinkytown. At 12:30AM. In a club. And you're smiling. What the shit?"

"Happiness is my default."

"She's texting."

The couch we're sitting on doesn't really have room for a third, but he squishes in anyway.

"That can't be it. Nobody smiles that much while they're texting."

"She found someone who laughs at her grammar jokes." 

There's a collective groan. 

"You guys are a bunch of assholes."

"Just make sure that if you eventually bring him around, you bring him to our house first. We're the least judgmental of this whole group."

"What? Who are you kidding?"

I'm grateful to let the conversation devolve around me. It gives me a(nother) reason to be on my phone.

***

"Hey, are you all right?"

"Yes. I'm fine."

"Are you sure? You're shaking."

I take a deep breath. "Call it an involuntary stress response." 

"Bad exes?" 

"Bad exes." I shiver. "I'm sorry. That ruined what could have been a really nice goodnight." 

He smiles at me, reaches over and pushes the hair out of my eyes. "We all have something."

I bury my face in his shoulder. "That was the exact right thing to say."

I can't see his face, but I can feel him smile.

***

"Oh, God. I'm so sorry. I'd be annoying myself if I wasn't so dopamined out of my mind."

"Yeah, you're pretty disgusting. But, really. How did it go?"

"You mean, aside from the panic attack?"

"Yes. I mean aside from the panic attack."

"Well, first of all, I think everyone should have a panic attack on their second date. How the person responds to it is a good barometer for what kind of a person they are."

"Oh, for fuck's sake."

"Seriously, though. I might understand why people do this now." 

"Wow."

"Yeah. It feels kinda weird to be this happy."

"I think it's a pretty good default place to be, Kels." 

"Yeah. I think so too."

OK, Stupid

"This is going to end in with me stuffed in the trunk of a car somewhere."

"You're being dramatic."

"Or, best case scenario, it's going to be a repeat of BDF."

"You never did tell me what that meant. I resorted to Urban Dictionary."

I cackle. "Yeah, that's not the right definition. It's just shorthand that . . . one of my more ruthless friends came up with to describe that whooooooole situation."

"Oh. Oh. Oh. "

"Got it?"

"Yeah."

We're quiet for a little while before she says, "Seriously, though. So you have one more BDF adventure, so what? Although, I really think that made you learn your lesson."

"Don't be such a slut?"

"Yeah, you hussy. And, what happens if it does happen again? You go off dating for another few months, you settle down. You get back into it again. The law of large numbers means you have to find someone you don't dislike eventually."

"The fact that you just invoked the law of large numbers to demonstrate your point makes me want to date you."

"Yeah, well. That's your classic Catch-22. The amount of alcohol it would get me to agree to that is greater than the amount of alcohol that would cause me to pass out. So stop equivocating and just do it."

"I hate when you're right."

"Just don't be stupid."

***

It's official.

I now have a pickup line. An actual, honest-to-goodness, I think you're cute and would like to get to know you better line. And, somewhat weirder, it actually seems to be effective.

"Can you tell me how a warp drive works?"

First of all, let's get one thing straight. I know how a warp drive works. I'm neither an idiot nor a scifi newbie.

I've also only used it a couple times, in situations where I can be reasonably certain of success (The Source, tabletop game nights, online dating), and while I haven't met anyone to date long term as a result of it, it has started some interesting conversations about physics (if I'm really lucky), comic books, and the merits of the various Trek franchises.

Mildly disingenuous? Yeah, okay. A good way to start a conversation when you're shy and the chances of that cute, skinny guy in the Picard vs. Kirk shirt also being shy are pretty high? Absolutely.

There are worse approaches.

***

"Is that a mush . . .OHMYGOD WHAT?"

She peeks over my shoulder and starts laughing.

"You should start a Tumblr of these."

"WHY WOULD YOU THINK ANYONE WOULD WANT TO SEE THAT?"

"Do I need to get your paper bag?"

"Okay. So. One gross photo. Fine. Whatever. Maybe this doesn't have to be soul-crushing."

"Are you pep-talking yourself?"

"Yes, fuck you, I am. Did you see that thing? It was like The Spooky Old Tree!"

"You realize you're the only person in the world who has to pep-talk themselves into filling out an online dating profile? And that you've ruined that beloved book for me, right?"

"IT'S AN ACCURATE DESCRIPTION. And, screw you. I'm a shy introvert who's scared of serial killers. What do you want from my life?"

"Seriously. Get some therapy about the serial killer thing."

***

It takes an hour and a half back on OkCupid before I get my first "Ew, gross" message. 

In fewer than twenty-four hours before I receive one invitation for a FFM, four messages that are, shall we say, forward, and a surprising number of offers for explicit pictures. 

Oh, OkCupid. I really didn't miss you at all. 

Right. So. I'm back to online dating. 

Before the Spidey-Senses of my female relatives start tingling, let me be very clear about something. I'll own up to a few "lady protesting too much" moments in my life. I will. But everything I wrote during July and August about being happy being single, that still holds. I freaking love being single. Yesterday I went for an impromptu dinner with a close friend. Then I came home, opened a beer, and played Civ IV for three hours and then watched the Lizzie Bennett Diaries until I fell asleep straight down the middle of my bed, with my rattley fan in the window and snuggled in with all the blankets. 

It was great. 

I'm not just whistling in the dark. I take a lot of pleasure in my life the way it is. It's full of people I love, work I find meaningful, passtimes I enjoy. My life is better than I ever imagined it was going to be. But at the same time, I recognize that it might be nice to surprise someone on Saturday morning with scones and have someone with whom I can talk about books and play video games and have sex afterwards. It's possible to love being single and acknowledge that my life could be a richer place with a partner in it. 

I'm the Schrodinger's Cat of relationships. 

Shot at the Night

"So, you know, just don't get clingy. You aren't the only egg in my basket."

I sit up, mouth hanging open.

It takes a special kind of arrogance to tell the woman lying next to you, after having performance related issues all night but before telling her "Yeah I don't care. That sounds like a personal problem," not to be clingy.

He continues. "Well, I mean, right now you're the only egg in my basket. I'm having trouble meeting people."

"I'm pretty shocked to hear that."

He doesn't hear the sarcasm.

"I know, it's really hard, isn't it? But I'm just trying to to be honest with you."

I'm no longer in the mood to pull any punches.

"Well. While we're being honest. My parents' thirty-third wedding anniversary is coming up, two of my best friends are marrying one another tomorrow, I just had my heart stomped on about two months ago, and I'm coming off a five year intimacy hiatus, so . . ."

"You're using me?"

"Merely assuring you that I have no intention of becoming clingy."

***

"Give me my fucking cell phone back." 

I am pretty clearly displeased with what's been happening.

I seem to have finally made myself clear.

Someone has installed Tinder on my phone. Not only installed Tinder on my phone, but has also set up a profile and started looking for hookups for me. Against my express "Haha, funny. Knock it off. I don't want you to do that." 

It takes about a second and a half for me to uninstall Tinder. Once it's off, I slam out of the party I'm at, sit down in a lawn chair out back, and start crying.

I don't know how many different ways I can say "I'm not interested in this."

I never thought it would have to be more than one.

***

We're in a bar off Bourbon St. when Michelle checks her phone, smirks, and tells me:

"Your friends are trying to convince me to get you laid while you're here."

I give her a nuclear eye roll. "Yeah, I can guess which one wants you to set me up with a one night stand." I take a drink of my beer. "I'm an emotional trainwreck right now. This trip is a gift and I fucking hate one night stands under the best circumstances. So, really, I appreciate the thought, I really wish people would be actually helpful instead of stupid helpful right now."

She snickers. "I would have been shocked if you would have taken me up on it." She finishes her own beer. "And it would have made sharing our bed complicated." 

"Yeah. Sorry. I'm really not interested."

"Why are you apologizing for not being a whore?" 

We get the giggles so badly we momentarily drown out the band.

Conversations with Men

"Oh my God!"

I have the breath crushed out of me by an intense hug. Right when I think I may pass out from oxygen deprivation I get pushed back to arm's length and examined. He's giving me the kind of once over that automatically makes me straighten my spine, push my shoulders back, and lift my chin.

"You. Look. Amazing." 

I smile and blush a little.  

"You're awfully sweet." 

"I'm serious, Kels. That dress, your breasts, that cute little blush you've got going on?  Delicious. And how much are you running? Your legs have gotten so skinny! And just between us, with however many miles you're logging, that short skirt, and those high heels, You. Are. Killing. It."

At this point I can't stop laughing. Despite the high heels, I still have to stand up on tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek. 

"It's starting to worry me that the only men who ever tell me how nice I look are gay." 

"The straight ones are all so thunderstruck by your beauty, wit, and charm, that's why." 

"Oh, hush."

***

"The version of me you write about in your blog is a complete fiction."

"What do you mean?"

"It's a complete fiction! You make me act like I'm really nice and that I care about you and that I'm looking out for you." 

I start laughing so hard I choke on my lemonade.

"Hasn't it ever occurred to you that that's how I see you?"

"No! Because in real life, I'm just an asshole who likes to be the center of attention."

"Oh, honey." 

"I am!"

"Oh, hush." 

***

"Can you play darts?" 

I slid into the passenger seat approximately a second earlier. "Nope."

"Excellent. We're going to drink cheap beer and throw darts." 

"Is it even any fun winning against me?"

"Yes, because you get so competitive despite being so bad." 

When I realize the bar we're going to I reach across the car and punch him in the arm. "Is this a bros night?"

"Well." He's equivocating. "It's just you and me."

I groan.

"Kels, you're the closest thing I have to a bro!" 

"I'm wearing a pink sundress." 

"Bro." 

"Oh, hush." 

***

"Let me be very clear about this."

I have my finger in his face and I'm pissed. 

"I'm not saying that Marvel's doing shitty work. I'm not saying that DC is better. What I am saying is that Image, Dark Horse, and Titan have all announced/are currently printing titles that sound or are an excellent departure from capes and spandex. And I think it's stupid to get wrapped up in things like Lady Thor and ignore all the spectacular work that's being done by smaller presses." I pause and take a drink of my beer. "I also think that's why conversations about Who has the better superheroes between DC and Marvel  are kind of idiotic." 

The fellow I'm with rolls his eyes so hard I suspect it may have changed my DNA. 

"The issue" he pontificates "is that superhero comics define the genre. They are comics. What you're talking about" here, he actually waves his hand dismissively at me, "are graphic novels." 

I concentrate on draining my beer. "A graphic novel is a one-off story told and illustrated in a single volume. Comics are serialized and need not include tights and a cape. And narrow-minded jerkoffs like you are what keep comics from going mainstream." 

"You're in quite the mood tonight."

"Oh, hush." 

***

"Kelly?"

If I were in my right mind, I'd notice the edge to his voice. 

I'm not entirely in my right mind. 

"Kelly." 

"Hmm?" 

"Just let it go. Now. For me."

I say something rather inappropriate, rather loudly, and then am quiet for what feels like a very long time. Eventually, I'm just flustered. "Did I? I mean . . .um. Did . . . Shit." 

It's the kind of smile you can hear in someone's voice. 

"Oh, hush." 

The Downsides are Obvious

"So I was wondering if . . . maybe . . . I mean, if you'e comfortable with it . . ."

"Jesus, Kels. Out with it."

My college friends don't stand for a lot of prevarication.

I take a deep breath. "I haven't been sleeping well. I was wondering if we could snuggle a little bit before we fell asleep."

She starts laughing and pulls a pillow into her lap. "Yeah, you weirdo. Come on over."

We turn on a movie and she starts to stroke my hair. "Sorry." I mutter, sleepily. "It's the mild autism. I like to be touched when I'm upset."

She laughs again. "It's not mild autism, Kels. It's called being a human and living alone."

I'm asleep before I can smartmouth back.

***

I've got sex on the brain lately.

As if my writing from April to present left any question of what I'm spending my spare time thinking about.

It's the sudden confluence of a lot of factors, not the least of which is a cessation of hormonal birth control (which, for Christ's sake, can we find a birth control pill for men already?) and (if blogs for ladies are to be believed) the arrival of my 30s and ohmygodthebiologicalneedtopassonmydna. Regardless of the factors, the truth is, quite simply, that I've got sex on the brain. 

Given my current status as a single person and the fact that I literally cannot give it away, I've been a little edgy lately. The downsides are obvious. The upsides, if there are any, are that I'm currently ramping up training for a fall race, so I'm doubly motivated to spend five days a week at the gym or running in circles around the Twin Cities. 

Just in case you're wondering, running eight miles doesn't actually take the edge off. Neither do ice baths, conversations about baseball, or depressing television shows. 

I've never had as much empathy for 13 year old boys as I do right now. 

***

The high-pitched noises I'm making are crazy. 

Kelly Marie, you bourgeoisie,
The French Revolution was a near tragedy.
The peasants had no bread, 
The King lost his head, 
and under Maximillian saw forty-thousand dead. [. . .]

It's my annual Bastille Day party. I love holidays that celebrate the overthrow of tyranny in service of democracy, and my family is part French, so Bastille Day is a big one for me. Every year I get a group of friends together, make a huge meal, quaff a great deal of champagne, and talk at length about  . . . whatever. History. Art. Science.

It's one of my favorite parties, a long, lovely night in with the people I love most in the world. This year we outdid ourselves. Not to brag, but the food was superb, the conversation sparkling, the champagne in abundance. It was warm enough to eat in the garden and it was just a fantastic night.  We were going around the table making toasts to the evening, to the company, to the food, and when we arrived at the last person, he announced that he had written a special toast, in honor of my love of French history. He proceeded to give a toast to the French Revolution in rhyme, that he wrote specifically for me. 

Squee.

***

"Colin Firth's voice is like the Balm of Gilead." 

"You got the audiobook, didn't you?" 

"Yup. And it's fantastic."

"When are you listening to it?"

"Bedtime."

"Oh Lord." 

"No! that's not what I meant!"

I have a lot of issues with insomnia, and as a result have to be careful about what I do immediately preceding bedtime. Staying up with a book is nice, but I need to start shutting off lights at least a half an hour before I want to fall asleep. But, you know, just sitting in a dark apartment trying to unwind isn't particularly relaxing. Music keeps me awake because it isn't nearly monotonous enough. Inevitably while listening to podcasts, right as I'm falling asleep I hear an idea that catches me and pulls me back awake.

I had, for a few months in my early 20s, a boyfriend who like to read to me while I was falling asleep and it was the perfect solution. I could slip into one of his shirts, pull on my eye mask, curl up around my body pillow, and listen to him read. His voice was quiet and steady enough that I would be asleep in ten minutes. The next night we would talk about what I remembered hearing last and start again. 

I know. Blorch. I promise, that's as sweetly sentimental as you'll ever hear me get. 

Anyway, like an overstimulated child, I love being read to sleep. And I missed it. For years I looked for a suitable substitute to that guy. 

So when Audible introduced the Sleep function to their mobile app, I nearly cried with joy. 

 These days, around bedtime, I slip into the sheets, pull my eye mask over my eyes, wrap myself around my body pillow, and listen while Colin Firth reads me The End of the Affair. 

It's not perfect, but in a pinch, it'll do. 

***

"You've gotten really good at being alone."

"Um. Thanks? I mean, I've been at it for awhile. So, I suppose . . ." I trail off.

"No, I mean it. Between the body pillow, the audiobooks, the clever method of zipping up your own dresses, you've gotten really good at being alone. I don't think I could ever manage without my husband. Although" she smirks, "I imagine there are some things that are less enjoyable than you could wish."

She looks pointedly at my bedside drawer and I know she snooped while I was in the bathroom. 

Can we all agree that smug married people are the fucking worst? 

I nearly bite my tongue in half trying to keep from verbally skewering this woman. I'm better friends with her husband, and have often been invited out for long bro-y nights of throwing darts and drinking beer. I'm reasonably certain that despite being a solo act, my floor show is better than hers is ever going to be. 

But good manners and a desire not to send her crying home to her husband aren't the only things keeping me from unleashing the verbal harpoons.

I've become really good figuring out the other parts of relationships that I miss. I've got sleeping alone down to a science, I have friends who are intellectually stimulating and emotionally supportive. I'm living a life I love and find tremendously valuable and fulfilling.

I miss sex.

I do. I really, really miss it. I miss the sheer physicality of being with another person. I miss the way physical contact can grind your rational brain to a halt and keep you from being able to remember your own name, let alone how you look without your clothes on. I miss when you suddenly find yourself in an awkward or unanticipated moment and you both burst out laughing. I miss being left breathless and leaving someone else the same way.

Jesus. I even miss the nasty looks from the neighbors when I bump into them in the hallway. 

And regardless of whether or not it's simply the result of not having my body pumped full of artificial hormones or the fact that I may finally be tired of being alone (somehow I doubt it's the latter) for the first time in years I'm at a place where maybe what's in the bedside drawer isn't as satisfying as it used to be.  

Games

"Just tell me the title."

"I'd rather be flensed."

"It can't be that bad."

"It's horrible. You'll think less of me as a person."

"I thought the smutty parts were the embarrassing part of reading a trashy novel."

"Nope. It's the titles. Far and away. And I am never, ever telling you the name of this one."

I started a new romance novel series. 

They're Regency (of course), they came highly recommended by a friend (who has begged to remain anonymous), they have ludicrous, embarrassing titles, daft plot twists, and feature (among other things) chess, double entendre, fencing, duels, and games of strip dominoes. They're absurd. 

They're also delicious. 

***

Some friends of mine, newly single, are discussing a relationship advice book that they've both read. I'm drinking bourbon and doing the crossword on the other side of the room, eavesdropping and biting my tongue so hard that I'm afraid blood might start spurting out of my mouth. 

They intentionally started the conversation when I was preoccupied with something else. Given that my relationship advice comes almost exclusively from Dan Savage (to wit: communicate clearly about wants, needs, and expectations, be adventurous, treat your partners kindly and respectfully) I don't truck with a lot of books with titles like The Rules. 

The dating advice under discussion is one admonition over the dangers of employing polysyllabic words away from being a real Leave it to Beaver trip back to the 50s. 

Don't dress provocatively. Act like a lady. Don't cuss or make crass jokes. Don't have sex prior to four months into the relationship. 

What the book boils down to is: be an unobjectionable, boring, good girl. 

As a lifelong employer of four-letter words and mini-dress aficionado, I'm infuriated by this advice, and by the fact that two smart, funny women I know are swallowing it. 

Another friend walks in during the midst of an animated discussion between the pair about what exactly counts as provocative dress, overhears fifteen seconds of the conversation, sees the look on my face, and pulls me out of the room, thrusting my Kindle into my hands. 

"Here. You look like you're about to slap someone. Go take a walk and read some of your trashy novels. They can't be anymore antiquated than the advice you're getting in there."

I start to laugh. 

***

I like games.

I'm not talking about the shitty I'm not returning your phone call until forty-eight hours later kind of games. I'm talking when you meet someone who's up for a little one-upsmanship. I like the process of finding something that will make the other person laugh, blush, or shiver. I like the feeling that comes when you know you're on your game and that your middle-of-the-afternoon response to their text was brilliant and a little sassy and just enough to keep them thinking about you until supper.

I like gamesmanship, I suppose. I always have.

It's exactly the kind of thing dating advice books advocate against. Avoid that dress that shows off the freckles on your decolletage. Under no circumstances should you send that coyly worded text. Good girls don't give it away, much less ask for it. 

Phhhhhhhhbt. 

***

I'm usually surprised by how progressive historical romance novels can be. 

I'm serious. They leave those shitty dating advice books in the dust. 

Not only do they celebrate asking for it, but they understand that half of the fun of getting to the smut is getting to play the game. Romance writers understand that there's something to be said for cheeky notes, for besting someone in a fencing bout, for sneaking away in the middle of a party for a little (verbal) harpooning. 

More than that gamesmanship, though, is the progressive secret at the heart of every romance novel: 

There's someone who's going to appreciate you for the person you are. 

Is it a little after-school special and simplistic? Yeah, a bit. But I'd rather think that there's someone out there who appreciates a carefully worded text and a little bit of sass than follow some ridiculous, tried-and-true rules about being a good girl. 

And besides, I've got all these mini-dresses. 

Repressed

My family is full of Repressed Irish Catholics.

When I was 14 my mother gave me The Talk. It consisted of the following:

"Kel, do you know how to keep from having a baby if you don't want one?"

As a good little Catholic girl, I quickly responded, "Abstinence!"

She nodded and said "Do you know the other ways?"

Uh, yes, theoretically? I was terrified to admit it that I even knew they existed. I whispered my answer. "Birth control?"

She nodded. "I think we're done here," and walked out of the room.

***

At 18 I was a precocious little shit.

The precociousness wouldn't have been as much of a problem if it was accompanied by some self-reflection. But I was my Tea-Party father's nightmare--the kind of kid who was ready to be molded and influenced by whatever I read and any adult who took an interest in me. So when I went to a college that encouraged us to read Millet, Dworkin, and Daly I soaked up their ideas without much reflection. Their opinions and theses became things that I would expound on a great length during dinner parties and classes. I did this not just as a first-year student, but all the way through my academic career.

My senior year in college I was in a Women's Lit class. It was taught by one of my favorite professors and I was confident enough to speak up in class.

By speak up in class, I mean intellectually eviscerate people who disagreed with me.

When the single guy taking the class dropped it because "There are too many man-haters in the room" I didn't take it as an opportunity to reexamine some of my more barbed remarks. I scoffed: "Typical guy."

***

I was 17 when I had my first boyfriend.

I don't doubt that we were really cute. A couple of nerds (Him: Math, music. Me: Sci-Fi, Fantasy. Both of us: LAN parties) who were ohmygodsoawkward together. My father, more accustomed to boys who played sports and were interested in cars wasn't quite sure what I saw in him. My mother kept trying to feed him.

I also don't doubt that we were completely revolting in that way that only sexually unsatisfied teenagers can be. We made out constantly, publicly, and really handsily. And not very well (So much tongue. Jesus). But I  still remember it with the kind of rosy-tinged fondness that accompanies your first love. Probably because it was the first time I realized "Oh. That's what that feels like."

There's one moment in particular that I remember with frightening clarity. Michelle and I had lifted weights after school and there was no part of my body that did not hurt. I went going to his house, ostensibly to watch an anime that he loved. He teased me the whole way downstairs because I had a hard time walking.

Once he got to the couch I, being a real empowered 17 year old, jumped him.

When we surfaced for air 90 minutes later he asked "What the hell was that about?"

I wasn't sure.

***

"What do you think left you more fucked up, Catholicism or radical feminism?"

I'm having a late-night Skype freakout to my old college roommate. The only good thing about her living in Thailand is that we're twelve hours apart and when I'm panicking at, say, 12:36am on a Saturday, she's awake and able to take a phone call.

We've been talking about sex and relationships for a few hours, in the open way you do with a very old friend. The bit of the conversation that leads to the question is about how, in our youngest days as feminists, if a partner asked us to do something (a bit of grooming, perhaps, or the dishes) our response, invariably, was "Fuck off." Do you know why?

Because our partner asked for it.

Trust me, the cuntiness of that mindset is not lost on me as an adult.

But for whatever reason, during my early 20s I thought that someone expressing a sexual or social desire was automatically stepping on my Rights as a Woman. How dare you ask me to shave! Women are supposed to have hair, that's why we haven't evolved to be hairless! (I know.) No I won't do the dishes because women to the lion's share of housework and I don't care that you made dinner! (I know.) You want me to put what, where? Noooooooooope. That's demeaning to the Sisterhood! (Trust me, I know.) I had some intense ideas about sex, relationships, and desire.

It's galling to think of the way I treated the men I met during that period of my life.

(It's also amazing to think that I managed to lose my virginity.)

And yeah, the feminism I was reading certainly outlined (or outright argued) some of those ideas. As intellectual exercises, they were interesting and led me to a lot of fascinating conversations. They're also part of the reason I work so damn hard in women's issues. I am indebted to a lot of those writers.

At the same time, they made me into a bit of a prude.

They wouldn't have done so if I wasn't also another Repressed Irish Catholic in a long line of Repressed Irish Catholics. Given little information on the particulars, sex (theoretically) was mystifying and a little bit scary. As a result of 18 years of Repressed Irish Catholic-ness, there was a right way to have sex (after marriage, on your back, with an openness to children). The little bit I knew about my own sexuality, the bits I knew about desire and what I found desirable, ran counter to that in startling ways that I didn't have the ability to articulate, but ways that I knew were bad, wrong, distasteful.

Mix up all that fear and guilt with a precocious shit of a young woman reading feminist theory by Andrea Dworkin and it's no wonder I had such messed up ideas about the way relationships were supposed to work, or that I was so blisteringly bitchy to men that they remained obsequious and zipped up around me.

It's taken six years to dig out of the hole created by that mindfuck of a cocktail, but if the recent uptick in my late-night dopamine production is any indication, it's been time well-spent. I still have my books of feminist theory. They're on the shelf next to a couple books by Dan Savage and a comic book called Sex Criminals.

I'm much less of a prude than I used to be.