Born a blonde, staying that way

When I was about 15, my mom told me that she thought my naturally blonde hair was starting to get darker, maybe even a little brown. My exact response was “I would rather die than have that happen,” followed by tears. After that, she took me to the salon where I got my first-ever batch of highlights. My flaxen locks were restored — until three months later when I had dark roots, blonde tips and looked like a mess.

I don’t know why I so heavily identify with being blonde. I think, most likely, it’s because I’m the only one in my family with this hue. No, there was no mailman or milkman or delivery man involved…

For most of my life, I didn’t really feel unique besides my hair. Now, I’m aware of my quirks that make me me, but before I thought “well, I’ve got this hair thing going for me.” Throughout college, I’d either dye my hair myself or wait until my birthday, Christmas or some other random trip home to have my parents pay the roughly $170 to get my hair done. Yes, my hair is naturally blonde. And yes, it is silly to pay THAT much to have it be more blonde. I get it what it sounds like from the outside. But when you feel like ALL you have going for you is that one thing, you kinda cling to it. Eventually, it got way too expensive. A journalist’s salary plus graduate student loans generally do not afford me the chance to blow that much money on my hair. So my hair, over the past year or so, has become a kind of dull blonde/light brown. It sort of bummed me out, but I have so many other things going for me now (FINALLY!) that it didn’t really kill me.

Secretly, however, I’ve really always wanted to dye my hair brown. Just to see what it felt like. When I told my coworkers, they were ecstatic. Completely on board. One of them came to CVS with me to pick out the dye.

Now, I’m a pro when it comes to dying my hair. I’ve gotten it down to a science. Gloves on. Hair combed. Slap that stuff on. Wait 20 minutes. Rinse. Regret immediately. This time around, I stared at the box for 20 minutes. Would this be the worst thing ever? Would I ruin my hair? How much would it cost to fix?

I finally screwed my courage to its sticking point and just did it. My head looked black by the time I was done. The wet, chemical-smelling mop of hair on the top of my head just looked awful. But I decided to wait it out because I was going to trust that the good people at L’Oreal would not set me astray.

When I dried my hair, it was brown. A lovely soft shade of brown. I stood before the mirror and flipped my hair back and forth (not Willow Smith style). It felt like a commercial.

My coworkers loved it. Darling fiance (who was darling bf at the time) loved it. Heck, I even loved it. But then here’s where things get weird.

Two days later, it was noticeably lighter. Less brown and more…dishwater blonde. A week later, it was completely blonde again. I didn’t *do* anything. There was no extra hairwashing. No heavy-duty shampooing. Nothing. It just faded away. I checked the box (I saved it in case I really liked the color and wanted to go back and get it again). It said it was permanent. I had followed all the directions and even kept it on for five minutes longer than recommended (don’t do that. I’m bad). What gives???

I think my follicles just want to be a blonde. Clearly that doesn’t make me unique or special or anything besides a blonde (I’ve got other stuff for that), but at least I gave it a shot. And NEVER AGAIN will I do it, dang it.

Just say yes

No, this is not a post about being engaged. (Darling fiance just blogged about stage one of Operation: Proposal). It’s actually about how I’ve recently discovered that I have a fear of saying “yes.” I’ve also had a fear of saying no to people — that’s certainly a work in process. But sometimes saying “yes” is even scarier.

Darling fiance and I decided to throw a potluck party last night — something that used to terrify me but that I’m slowly getting used to. It’s nice to have so many people that love us come over and it gives us a great excuse to clean up the place. I was nervous about inviting one of my friends. She tends to be…well…a downer. When you have good news, she turns it back so that it’s on her and how nothing good ever happens to her. For example, when we called her to talk about our engagement, she said “yayyyyyy….(trail off). If you become a bridezilla, I’ll kill you.” Not exactly the enthusiasm I was craving. When I got promoted, she said “Man, a raise right now would be so nice. I’m broke.” In any case, I’m a big fan of second chances and I thought *maybe* she would be a little more upbeat.

I asked people to come around 7:30 so that we could get things together and then eat at a semi-reasonable time. Many people were late — this whole “fashionably late” thing annoys the heck out of me. But I got a call at 8:15 from this negative friend. At this point, if we’re following along, she was 45 minutes late. She then said that she felt sick and thought she ate something funny. She thought she may have eaten something that didn’t agree with her. I said “I’m sorry you’re not feeling well, but I wish you would have called me sooner. You’re 45 minutes late.” She said “wait, you never even gave a time in your invite.” I replied telling her that I had sent out an e-mail the previous day asking people to come at 7:30. She replied with “No, you said between 8:30 and 9. I’m 15 minutes early.” Now, keep in mind that I have the e-mail that I sent and I KNOW that I said 7:30.

Finally she said “you sound mad. Are you mad?”

Here is the moment of truth for me. Normally, I would say “Oh gosh, of course not. You just go take care of yourself and feel better. We’ll hang out another time. Don’t worry about it.” It’s just easier to keep the peace sometimes — easier for other people. Meanwhile, I sit and let my anger fester.

In that split second, I knew I had to seize the moment.

This time I said “Yes, a little.” Which was entirely true. I wasn’t going to blow a gasket, but I was mad that she constantly bails and thinks it’s nothing.

She sounded only nominally taken aback. That’s fine. I ended up having an amazing time last night and, you know what? I didn’t really miss her negativity. So yes, I am mad at you, but no, I don’t really care that you don’t think I should be mad at you.

Let’s see how long I can keep this one up….

Going to the chapel…

…or the non-denominational banquet hall, as it were. I guess this is breaking news for all 10 people that read this: Darling bf is no more. Now he’s DARLING FIANCE, or my 2011 Toyota Fiance, as we like to say, because fiance is the most ridiculous sounding word on the planet. Say it out loud. See? It sounds like a kind of car. “A FULLY LOADED 2011 TOYOTA FIANCE!”

Anyway, I digress.

Getting engaged has, so far, been blissfully wonderful. Yes, I have moments of “fiance, do we have to decide on wedding stuff now?” and he reassures me and says “No. stop. AHHHHHH…” and runs into the other room. Kidding. Being engaged is fun although, and not to look a gift horse in the mouth, it’s kind of stressful. I loathe being the center of attention (it’s why I’m an editor now and not a reporter…also the whole money thing, but whatevs). And now it’s all “Can we see your ring? Have you set a date? Where will it be? Do you know approximately how many children and/or pets you will have and whether they will have terrible vision just like you and darling fiance?” And if one more person asks me what my colors will be….I’m going to scream. I’ll figure out those later and frankly, a lot of those teensy details aren’t even going to be important to me. Here’s what I want in a wedding: a killer cake, awesome food and darling fiance to show up. Maybe I will care about my dress and nominaly about the flowers. But that’s it.

Darling fiance is going to write about all the hoops he jumped through for the proposal, so I’ll spare you the details for now.

At this point, you’re probably saying “what the h does this have to do with forgetting fears??” Oh well, let me explain.

I have a fear of failure. I also have a fear of success. This means that usually, while I *generally* succeed, I tend to try to stay somewhere in the middle, not getting noticed. But when the ball dropped at midnight on the start of 2011, I decided to drop that attitude. I decided to push myself at work. To attempt not to sweat the small stuff and to focus on the big picture. To take a compliment. To allow myself to be happy without feeling guilty.

And when I decided that I deserve happiness and that I am going to welcome it and embrace being happy, all these happy little things happened. I got a promotion at work — one that included a 53 percent raise and a huge bump in the masthead. Then I reconnected with some friends that I had lost touch with. And finally I got engaged. Now, I’m not sure I believe in kismet or whatever, but I do think that none of these things wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t been ready and willing. It’s sort of like what girls in relationships say to their sometimes-desperate single friends “oh, you’ll find a relationship when you stop looking.” I stopped looking for reasons why I shouldn’t or couldn’t be happy and just allowed myself to be happy.

This is getting a little esoteric, so I hope you’re following along.

In any case, I don’t know being happy was my greatest fear, but it was up there. There’s still this feeling of “oh hey, I’m really happy and have just about everything I want. Uh, now what?” But I guess I’ll take that as it comes — and THAT’S something I never could have said before. And I’ll take it as it comes while picking out floral arrangements and colors. Oh God.

Service without a smile

My grandma — whom I’m named after — is a total firestarter. She knows exactly what she wants and what she thinks and she’s not afraid to tell you a thing or two. Or 20. For example, once she bought a 20 lb turkey for a Sunday dinner (yeah, that’s normal. A 20-pound turkey just for family dinner…). It was…just OK. She’s a superb cook. My grandpa too. The used to own restaurants in the Chicagoland area. Now they just cook for fun (and always for 40).

The turkey in question was pretty dry and kind of bony. It wasn’t inedible, but it definitely wasn’t the best. And after we had finished eating it, my grandma wrapped up all the bones in an aluminum foil pan. Then she brought it back to the store and complained that it was bad. That it had too many bones and she paid for 20 pounds of bones and not turkey.

And you know what happened? They gave her back her money. In full. My theory is that they wanted the crazy, red-haired, four-foot-tall woman to leave them alone, rather than them admitting that they made a mistake. Either way, she got her money back. I have never been able to do this. Sometimes I’ll get a meal at a restaurant that is, for example, too salty. But I’ll eat it and soak up the free water in the meantime. Then I’ll wince and whine and complain about the pain that I’m in from the sodium overdose. I’ve actually eaten something that — at the time — was making me feel sick from the spice. And afterword I felt sevenfold worse. But why send it back? What will that do? Darling bf, on the other hand, once ate an entire plate of fries and then complained that they were advertised as “seasoned” but were really just “plain fries.” The waiter took them off our check. Many times, I stop him from complaining about something because I don’t want us to cause a scene or be in trouble or whatever weird thing that won’t happen that I happen to be worried about at the time.

Well not this time, folks. Darling bf and I went to a wine tasting at a somewhat snooty coffee shop/grocery store/pit of hell. We had to pre-pay and it seemed like an excellent thing to do on a Friday evening after work. The Friday part is important; my office is pretty casual all week, but especially on Fridays. I had on jeans and had changed out of my boots and into my Converses. I already look young, but this, of course, makes me look even younger. I have busy days. I kind of don’t care so long as my bosses don’t care (and I just got promoted, so you can save the “Dress for the job you want, not the job you have” stuff. I have the job I want).

In any case, the lovely snooty folks at this wine tasting decided that they were going to give me crappy service because I looked so young (I’m guessing, but I’m sure this is right). They barely poured me any wine, didn’t give me the wine list to look at until I asked twice, misidentified food that they were serving, including one item that had an ingredient in it that darling bf can’t eat. Then, insult of all insults, they didn’t give us a discount on the bottle of wine that we bought. (Discounts were promised as part of the promotional deal.) The sommelier was stingy with his explanations of the wines and basically just kind of surly.

Darling bf and I left more than an hour and a half early from the event. We went next door to a pizza place and had a fantastic dinner. All in all, our night was not bad. But the cost of the wine event was still wearing on me.

So I did something I have never done before. I e-mailed a very long, but very firm complaint to the sommelier and the event coordinator. This was on Friday at 11:30 p.m. On Sunday, I had an e-mail back.

I sat and stared at that e-mail for a solid 30 minutes. I have no clue what I was afraid of. But there was something. I think I was worried that I had angered someone who had darling bf’s credit card number and would do something outrageous.

Nope. He actually said that he would refund my money. And give me a discount on wine. No muss, no fuss. Then I had to ponder what would happen if I were to take him up on his offer? If I got my money back, what would that accomplish?

Oh wait, it’d be change back in darling bf’s pocket. So I said sure and thank you and that I appreciated his time. Three days later, darling bf got the money back in his account.

And I was afraid of what again? LET THE COMPLAINING BEGIN! Kidding. I may just be a little more discerning from now on.

I’m wrong?

You betcha. I’ve been wrong before and I’m likely to be wrong again. That’s my attitude now. But even as recently as a few months ago, I was very “I am always right and you are always wrong and that’s just how it is.” I would like to blame it on being an only child for 13 years, but that’s weak since the past 14 have had a sibling.

In any case, I had to tell someone I was wrong. In front of darling bf. I have roughly titled it “The dinner that gave me acid reflux for four days in advance.” A friend (frienemy? enemy? I don’t even know at this point) moved to the area recently. Darling bf and I went to grad school with her and I’ve mentioned her before on my blog. In that post, I basically demanded an apology from her and forgave her for what SHE did. Now, stay with me, here’s where it gets tricky: I did some bad shit, too. And I think I may have just put that part of my memory into a lockbox, Al Gore style.

So when she offered to have dinner with darling bf and I, I thought “GOOD, she’s going to apologize to MY FACE.” No. No. No. She wanted to make amends, but she also wanted an apology out of me. I knew this going into the dinner. I went willingly because I actually faced the fact that I did some things wrong. I wasn’t very nice to her. I wasn’t a good friend. I wasn’t a good person in general. I had insecurities and was not in a healthy mindset when we were friends/roommates/whatever. I got possessive, territorial and bitchy. There’s no excuse for it. Sometimes darling bf will come home from work and be really hungry. He gets irrational and kinda stupid and says things he doesn’t mean. I always say, “You can’t take that out on me. Just have a snack and gather yourself.” You know what? I should have taken my own advice. I took a lot of stuff out on her. It’s only been the past few months that I’ve been able to put on my big-girl pants and really face that.

The dinner started off something like this:

Her: So I think we can still be friends. But what the hell happened?

Me: I have no idea. I like to black out that part of my memory.

Her: You were kinda bad.

Me: Yes. I’m sorry. Let’s order friend green tomatoes.

Her: No, but really, you were a little bad and it confused me a lot at the time. It was really hurtful.

Me: Wah wah wah wah…..long drawn out speech where I come to the realization that I’m sometimes wrong.

The thing is that I’m not the same person that I was at 24. Thank God (or some other non-denominational god). It did feel a little weird apologizing for someone that I wouldn’t really even recognize today. But I was. It felt good to make amends. It felt good to see another person’s side of the story. I’m sure it was little solace for her. I do hope that it was at least a little consolation that I realized the error of my ways. Maybe not. But I tried.

 

Pardon me, is that kosher? No? OK. Thanks.

I’m Catholic. But I’m Catholic in the “Hey, sometimes I go to church, like when my grandma makes me. Once a year.” It’s pretty much always been that way, and now at 27, I think I’m OK with that. Here’s what I believe: We should be good to each other. We should treat each other with respect and apologize for when we stumble. That’s not exactly Catholic, but it’s what I’m comfortable with.

Darling bf is Jewish. And Jewish in a somewhat similar way to my Catholicism. His family, on the other hand, is very religious. His mom is modern orthodox, which means she adheres to some of the strictest rules of Judaism. No mixing of meat and milk; no shellfish; no electricity on Shabbos; and definitely an aversion to “interfaith” relationships.

I had never heard of “interfaith relationships” until I got into one. And then I discovered that the whole “interfaith” part of it was a huge issue. For me, and I think for darling bf as well, I fell in love with the person, not with the religion specifically. I understand it’s a part of him and sometimes it’s at cross purposes with my beliefs. I’ve had a tumultuous relationship with his family. Some are not too keen that I’m not Jewish and that I don’t have plans to convert. Others are warm and loving and accept me just as I am.

So when darling bf said that we had been invited to a Bat Mitzvah, I thought “which side?” Turns out it’s the side that isn’t sure of how to feel about me. And it was in Cleveland. In winter. For three days. Oh, this just keeps getting better.

I agreed to go because it was something that was important to darling bf. His mom and sister would be there and I want so badly to get closer to them and to show them that I’m a good person regardless of religion.

In list form, here’s what I had to contend with on this trip:

-Sitting through a 3-hour service at a local temple, with darling bf on the opposite side of the room. Men and women were kept separate and couldn’t talk during services. 3-hour services. All in Hebrew. No, I don’t speak it.

-Dressing “inappropriately.” I took great pains to find out what would be considered respectable and modest for this orthodox crowd. The mother of the Bat Mitzvah celebrant said that pants were OK. Guess how many women wore pants? One. This one. Everybody else wore knee-length skirts or longer. Guess how many were blond? One. This one. Guess how many felt like a sore thumb? Yeah, you get it.

-Crossing my arms and keeping my hands under my armpits for the duration of the trip. Yes, this was self inflicted. But I wasn’t allowed to shake hands with men who were not related to me (so all of them) and as a journalist who constantly has to introduce herself, it’s a little tricky to stop that reflex. My solution was to shove my hands under my armpits. Gross, yes. But it gave me a moment’s pause before I lunged my hand out to someone who wouldn’t shake it.

-Dancing with darling bf’s female family members while he was away in another room listening to a service. Here’s something I didn’t know: Orthodox Jews believe opposite-sex dancing is immodest. And even for men to dance in one area and women to dance in another is immodest if they can see each other. Also, the Bat Mitzvah celebrant was singing a song to commemorate the day. For men to listen would also be immodest. Darling bf was away from me for about an hour. It might as well have been 10 years. I danced, I sang, I have no idea what happened. I had a wicked case of the flop sweats. Darling bf’s mom and sister went off to talk to family members they hadn’t seen in a while. I know I’m imagining it, but I swear to goodness the seas parted and I was left in the middle. Finally, after a lifetime, darling bf came back — and couldn’t hug me because it’d be immodest. Have you ever just REALLY needed a hug? Like, everything will be fine if I just get a 4-second embrace? Couldn’t get that because we’re not married and we were in temple.

At this point, I’d like to mention that I’m painfully Midwestern. By conventional standards, I dress incredibly modestly. Cleavage? No, no. A little leg? Probably not unless it’s summer and laundry day and I’m desperate. Flashy jewelry or make-up? No. I’ve never felt so incredibly…lost in my life. It sort of felt akin to someone saying “You know all that stuff that you knew about yourself? Yeah, guess what? You’re wrong.” Wha? Huh?

-SLEEPING IN THE SAME BED AS DARLING BF WHILE HIS MOM AND SISTER SLEPT IN THE BED NEXT TO US. Yeah. Wrap your brain around that puppy. His mom doesn’t let us sleep in the same bed when we stay at her house (even though we live together). I can respect that. It’s her house, her rules. And we’re not married and she’s old-fashioned. But since we all were in Cleveland, we shared a hotel room. So while darling bf’s mom and sister slept soundly, I laid in the bed, eyes wide open, trying desperately not to move at all, lest they should think something unsavory was happening. For someone who is a chronic tosser and turner, that was rough. I didn’t really sleep until we were on the plane.

-Listening to darling bf’s mom tell me that she hopes that I love darling bf. I can’t tell you how much this hurt. I’m over it now. And I know what she was trying to get at but that her words were poorly chosen. I’ve accepted that. And forgiven and moved on.

Now here’s the real kicker:

-I didn’t complain once. I kid you not. Darling bf will vouch for me. Here’s the real thing that I learned from all that meshugas (besides that word!): When you’re in a relationship and you’re in it for the long haul, it doesn’t matter what anybody else thinks about it. You can’t please them. And you’ll make yourself miserable trying. Make yourself happy. Make your partner happy and the rest will figure itself out in time.

AND ALWAYS GET SEPARATE ROOMS WHEN STAYING WITH YOUR SIGNIFICANT OTHER’S MOM.

Major backlog

Wow have I been a bad blogger. The thing I’ve learned about confronting your fears is that it keeps you REALLY busy. It’s also exhausting. And it means that by the time I’ve finished confronting them, all I really want is a nap — not an hour to blog about the whole experience. I’m going to try to pick back up shortly. And I’ve got some doozies….

Thanksgiving dinner, yes we can

(First off, holy guacamole people, this is practically a timely post!)

Thanksgiving has always been kind of a weird time for my family. Usually my dad visits his family and my mom visits hers and I’m left to decide. My parents aren’t divorced, but at Thanksgiving it sort of feels like they are. And I’m left in the middle to choose which parent I want to celebrate turkey day with. When I was younger, I’d always go up with my dad to Wisconsin because when you’re 4,  Wisconsin sounds downright exotic (it’s not…like, at all).

When I got older I either faked a sickness or flipped a coin. Most years I wound up with my mom’s family. But Thanksgiving, frankly, has never been fun. Delicious, yes. Fun, no.

This year, I decided that I was having Thanksgiving on my own terms. My first scary thing was telling my parents and grandparents that I would not be coming back to Chicago for the holiday. They were kinda understanding but mostly confused why I wouldn’t just love hopping on a plane, traveling for hours and getting a TSA pat-down just to eat turkey.

The second scary part was hosting my own version of Thanksgiving (with a HUGE assist from darling bf). About three weeks before Thanksgiving, we hosted a 12-person potluck Thanksgiving dinner. Yes, it was way early and yes it was a lot of people in our smallish apartment. This is the biggest number of people who I’ve ever had over and served a full dinner to. Darling bf was charged with making the turkeys and the stuffing (with some help from me). And I was in charge of making the apartment spotless. I’ve never had that many people over at one time and, being half Italian, my main concern was if we had enough food. Most people were bringing one dish or dessert and some wine. After two trips to the Safeway to get much-needed things like flowers (what am I even doing?) and extra rolls, I realized I was going too far.

So I resigned myself to the fact that I would just have to hope for the best and know that I had done as much preparing for the worst as I could.

During this time, my face started itching. Then it started burning. I chalked it up to using a boatload of chemicals to clean every inch of the house. I put an icepack on my face. I put anti-itch cream. I washed my face and my hands and even took a shower. Still burning, still itching. Then it turned into massive, massive pain. This warranted holding an ice pack in one hand while using my other one to push a vacuum. Blerg.

When I walked back into the kitchen after finishing up my marathon cleaning session, darling bf said “Whoa. Is that the herp?” He’s a gem usually, but he paid for that one. YES, I did get a cold sore from stressing out about hosting a giant dinner party. Hot, right? It should be noted that it’s almost exactly two weeks since we had the potluck and I still am dealing with “the herp.” Darling bf bought me flowers and Abreva, so we’ve made peace.

So to add to my stress, I had to do some makeup magic and make my face look presentable. It was a tall order and I wish that I didn’t have such a physical reaction to stress. But clearly my mind-body connection is way too strong.

I would shower you with details of Thanksgiving dinner, but there’s not much to say. Dinner was delicious; I learned to love Brussel sprouts. People had a good time. We played a game after eating. Everyone went home stuffed and happy. And afterward there wasn’t much of a mess.

Instead, here is an open letter from me to my brain:

Darling brain,

Chill the eff out. The universe has a natural tendency of working itself out. And that’s what has ALWAYS happened. So if you could stop stressing and telling other parts of the body to flip out, that’d be super.

xoxo,

D

P.S. Cold sore, if you’re listening: GO AWAY NOW. I AM SICK OF YOU.

This feels a lot like gym class

You may remember a while back that I registered for a 5K. Shortly thereafter, I wiped all memory of registering from my memory until I got an e-mail reminding me to pick up my runner’s packet. Surprise! It’s been a busy, busy time at work and I avoided thinking about the 5K. Truly. There were moments were I thought, “Boy, I should really go for a run. Got that 5K coming up.” But those were quickly trumped by, “mmm, nap.” I’ve got my priorities in order, clearly.

In any case, the day of the 5K arrived and I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to have to walk it. Considering my still mostly sedentary lifestyle, I, reasonably, thought I wouldn’t be able to run it. It wasn’t something I had planned, but I was OK with my decision, mostly. I’ve been eating way healthier, drinking more water and less Diet Coke and generally adopting a slightly healthier lifestyle. Good for me, right?

At about 7 a.m., on race day, I woke up with a jolt. Started getting myself ready and even at a high-protein oatmeal for endurance (because clearly I was in this to win it). Darling bf and I hopped into the car and started the roughly 30-minute drive to the race.

To say that we’re directionally challenged is such an understatement. We are clueless. Our GPS is our religion. But our GPS has been broken for a bit, so we were relying on Google maps. Google maps, you failed us. We were lost beyond belief. Turn left? Sure. Turn right? Well, OK. Make a U-turn and come back from whence you came? Odd, but sure. When we finally pulled into the race area, we were greeted by a moving wall of runners blocking our path. We found a way around them and couldn’t find parking. Anywhere.

So I did what any rational woman would do. I burst into tears and wailed about how I was an immeasurable failure and couldn’t even challenge myself properly. Darling bf did his best to calm me down while driving and not getting us killed, but I was entirely inconsolable. We couldn’t get into the race and we could leave the race area because the road we needed to be on was full of runners, walkers and smug women who were sprinting while pushing a stroller with perfect little twins. Bitches.

When we finally got back home, I got out of the car and just started walking. Darling bf followed me because, well, I probably seemed psychotic. At that moment, really, I was. I just kept walking toward Arlington Cemetery, across the bridge and finally to the Lincoln Memorial. I probably said about four words the whole time. When we got to the Lincoln Memorial, I asked, “How far did we just walk?” Darling bf guestimated a little more than a mile and a half. I turned around and started walking home. I didn’t care that it was 40 degrees. Or that my fingers were numb or that my knee was throbbing for no apparent reason.

When we finally got home, I declared that I had just completed a 5K. As far as I am concerned, I completed that race. Traffic, confusion and getting lost be damned. I registered for a 5K, wore the shirt and walked 5K. My funds went toward the cause. I don’t care if I wasn’t a part of the actual race. I ran my own race and I did what I set out to do: walked the full 5K.

So how ’bout that?

Houseguest? Yeah, sure why not

I was an only child for 13 years. (I may have mentioned this, oh, a few dozen times). But I have definite issues with personal space. As in, this is mine and that is mine and that too. And, I’m sorry, why are you touching my stuff? I’ve obviously gotten over some of this here and there over the years. I am a bit territorial when it comes to certain things. When I was about 10, my mom let me  have a sleepover. I was so excited because our house was the pristine palace that children were supposed to look at, admire, but do not freakin’ touch because Mom will go ballistic and Dad will have to take you to McDonald’s until she calms down. So when my gaggle of friends came to my house, I thought that we would have a blast. I had a total breakdown. They were in my toy room (yes, I had a toy room. I didn’t have a sibling or a puppy. They had to give me SOMETHING), playing with my Barbies, putting the WRONG outfits on them and just making a huge mess of my organized chaos. Even at 10, I realized this wasn’t healthy or normal. But I sort of went along on my merry way, not knowing how to change anything. Frankly, not particularly interested in changing anything.

But flash forward a few light years, I’ve been forced to get over much of this. I’ve lived with darling bf for more than two years now (Also a side note: Darling bf has gotten such an inflated ego from this blog. A couple of days ago he said “Hon, could you call me ‘Darling bf’ out loud? I’m lovin’ it.” Oy, the monster I’ve created! ) In the beginning it was rough. I didn’t want his books mingling with mine. I didn’t want his dishes left in the sink with oatmeal crusted on them. I really didn’t want to deal with his dirty laundry on the side of the bed (mind you, I was doing all these same things. I’m not a neat person. I’m just accepting of my mess.) Eventually, I had to just get over it. But that was easy. Because I love him and want to compromise with him.

Last weekend, Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert had their joint rally in the District this weekend. Darling bf’s best friend is a huge fan and wanted to come over — from Rhode Island. I’ve probably seen this person less than a handful of times in the time that darling bf and I have been dating. Normally, I would have taken my last penny of savings to pay for a hotel for him. Then I would have feigned an illness. Thrown a crying fit. And possibly thrown myself in front of a small, foreign vehicle: the kind that may hurt me significantly but nothing fatal (I jest, truly).

However this time, I said “SURE.” How about that? And you know what? It wasn’t even a thing that I had to think about and over think about and then come up with a solution. It was just a reflex. “Should we do this?” “Yes, yes we should.”

And what’s more, I was personable. I let darling bf and his bff have their boy time. I let them play video games for HOURS without so much as a peep. I put up with bff’s odd vegan lifestyle, which, for this Italian girl, is hard to fathom. I went and saw scary movie with them.

I know this sounds stupid — I kinda feel like most of my posts are about me becoming a normal person — but to have someone, who I haven’t known for very long, in personal space, it’s a big deal. Yes, he made a mess and cleaned it up. Yes, there were odd boy things, like video games and gunky razors in the bathroom. (I’m talking about darling bf here, not bff).  And I did it. That’s a big deal.