"I think you're just what I needed!" (Sorta)

12:30am: just a few minutes more and the phone will ring. I’m not waiting for it. OK I’m waiting for it, but not in a fingernail biting sort of way - I just know its coming.

12:34am: the phone rings. It’s my “Mr. Sixteen Minutes”. There are precisely sixteen minutes between the time I answer the phone and the time the train arrives to take him to his language school in Germany. What will we do with today’s precious sixteen “tick-talking” minutes? Tread water seems to be the surest answer. I’m not complaining. I’m grateful for every moment I have with him, even if those moments are spent at the deep end of a pool, they are happy ones.

Lately I seem to have developed a case of immedicable worrying. I worry about everything. And although it’s new to my personality it feels completely natural! I mean I can now have anxiety attacks with little to no effort from my cognizance! Be jealous.

I wouldn’t say it’s gotten out of hand quite yet. It doesn’t keep me up nights, my eating habits are fairly consistent and my hair is still intact despite what excessive bleaching has done to it. All in all I would say I got the long end of the worry-stick. Although I’m fairly certain “Mr. Sixteen” would politely disagree, but that’s why he isn’t being interviewed for this particular blog. I’ve given him the night off of disagreeing with me.

Frankly, I’m afraid what my new nemesis is going to do to my new(er) relationship. There certainly doesn’t appear to be room for both of them and although I would gladly show worry to the door – she’s a stubborn broad who is more inclined to nest than to venture out into the world and meet new people. That offer would have easily worked on me. Apparently my new enemy can’t be bought quite so quickly. (I guess I’m cheap & easy?)

2:55am: So maybe my sleep pattern is a little off – but it isn’t because I’m up the night worrying! I get some of my best work done at late hours. It’s when I feel my calmest and most focused. I can reflect on the day and begin my planning for the next and then after I’m satisfied and completely exhausted from pointless planning – I sleep. Tonight, however, I read - I avoided making any sort of plans. In fact, I’m taking a vacation from plans. A hiatus, as it were, from jotting down little reminders to myself. Because honestly, it stresses me the fuck out and my pores just can’t handle it right now.

I’m thinking of writing again. Although, I should mention that I lack the patience to commit to such a task. All the storyboarding, plot and character development blah blah blah. I’d rather just string together a series of incoherent thoughts and then call it “The Works of Tina Ayden Vargas”. Seems to be profitable for Sedaris and Vonnegut*…so maybe?

(*Note: I make no personal comparison, merely draw personal inspiration. End Note*).

Maybe.

Perhaps I should start with poetry. I’m considering doing a free-verse called something like “fire & ice” that will casually reveal the details of my often smoky-communication-impaired conversations with “Mr. Sixteen”. On paper, we’re a recipe for disaster. I meet his often reserved yet surprisingly vocal disposition with Latin feist and octaves. Neither one of us are submissive and both posses a misguided passion toward things we haven’t and perhaps can’t ever fully understand. But then when is passion ever fully given a scholarly explanation?

I’m crazy about the guy. He can do no wrong – even when he’s wrong – he can do no wrong. I’d forgive him anything. I know more than a few people who would protest this sort of star treatment, but all I can say is – I can’t help it. If the man wants snow in July, he’ll get snow in July.

You would think this type of “anything you want baby, it’s yours” attitude would make me quite fortuitous in my current relationship. Well, somewhere between the English, the Spanish, the Korean, the Atlantic Ocean and the Berlin Wall…something is lost. I only wish it were my cell phone bill.

3:52am: Good morning optimistic side. If such a side of me exists (I was born a cynic, I will die a cynic…only with more validation), this is as close as it will ever get: it is possible that nothing is lost, that really over an average amount of time and a generous amount of patience and understanding that all the elements will gel into a sort of cement. I appreciate the fact that we are not one of those “we just clicked” couples and that it took a couple drinks, a couple convincing conversations, a diversion, a good night sleep and a hangover to get us to be on the same page. A page that I look back fondly on and laugh at the absurdity of our unlikely encounter and our even more unlikely union. Yet here we are, and here we plan to stay.

In the unfathomable event that I don’t know everything there is to know about love, life and the universe there is this: maybe we aren’t the people we thought we wanted but as far as I can tell we’re the people we need. And if I may excuse myself from the carnage fest that is my never-quite-satisfied gluttony for “want” and “desire” I will instead support the “need” cause. I’m beginning to think that if we can take stock of our life, kiss off everything that’s holding us back from happiness, and start the long, hard process of deciding what we need and what we truly want that we’ll learn that “want” and “need” are just one of many harmonic 4-letter words.

So here’s to enjoying the ride and the loopier the better. So long as there are proper body restraints and multilingual safety instructions.

“For your safety, remain seated and keep your hands, arms, feet and legs inside.”

“Para su seguridad, permanezca sentado con las manos, brazos, pies, y piernas dentro de vehiculo.

Thank you. Gracias. Danke. Komawoyo.

Fuzzy Pantry.

(I Define)

*To be stagnant (adj.): to be stale - to be hard, crusty and moments away from developing an eye watering odor. To be so still (and not in meditative efforts but because of absolutely NO effort) that you grow a fuzzy blanketed layer that's comfortable at first and then fatal at last.

(I Bellyache) or (I Piss & Moan)

This state of being does not sound especially appealing. I am not comfortable with being fuzzy.

But every now and again I'll imagine myself as a giant Puerto Rican peach: extra fuzz, prim for picking but instead stagnant and molding; predestined to find my niche and then pigeonholing myself so that I can live out my glory days in harmonious fruity ravenousness.

I want to look back to this place in 5, 10, 20, 30 years and be completely dissolved.

Yes, obliterated. I'll build upon my ever concentrated pith and make it the bedrock of my being, (with slightly more esprit) but the rest of me...let it explode! I want to rub elbows with the constellations without dragging my aging dispositions along with me, clouding the atmosphere.

(I Dramatize)

Somehow I envy Drew Barrymore's charachter in 50 first dates - to wake up each morning and be completely vacant of who you were or what you did the day before. What freedom! What excitement! What terror!

In essence she was the same person she'd always been - if she hadn't it would have made it impossible for Adam Sandlers, albeit tenacious character, to fall in love with her, not just once, but daily. Her memory was damaged but her spirit, her core, her pith - remained unchanged. Relentlessly, he pursued her heart and she chose to surrender it.

The balls it took to surrender her life, her mind, her entire composition with just a gentle reminder that she was exactly where she was supposed to be, exactly where she WANTED to be, with who she wanted to be. I envy her faith, I envy her courage, her marrow. But more than that I envy the consistency of her spirit. To be, despite all obstacles, to be. And in "being" it wasn't the forgotten argument the day before (although I'm sure she would have loved to remember it strictly for score keeping purposes) that was recorded and replayed - it was her, it was her relationships. She woke up each day in panic not knowing where she was, who she was or how she got there (I can relate), but everything that happened the day before didn't matter. She accepted her position, processed the sudden change and moved forward. BRAVA MADAME, BRAVA!

(I Digest)

1. "It is not good for man to be alone." Genesis 2:18

2. Change: it's inevitable. Go with it why don't you.

*definition found at the bottom of my iced tea cup and a vanilla pudding "snack pack" - won't hold up to Webster's.

tick, tock - why'd your heart stop?

I need to say something. I need to say something right now, and I need to say it as loud and as clear as I possibly can. I need you to hear it coming through your speakers, I need you to see it come alive from your screen & I need you to feel it from across the room.

You are breathtaking & intriguing. Please stop trying to fix everything about yourself. It bores me.

Whatever it is that you just find so repulsive about yourself that makes you feel the need to hide in a protective shell, WHATEVER IT IS - you are not broken. You do not need fixing. There is a purpose to everything you have and will go through.

Why are we hiding ourselves from people? What are we hiding from? Shame, guilt, embarrassment, fear, rejection, a reality tv comparison?

Stop hiding! Stop covering yourself up! We're all messy in one way or another - but this should bring us together not make us go into isolation. I can't tell you how many people I've lost in my life because they felt they needed to hide away the things that made them unique, the things that they went through - their hurt. When an opportunity came for them to share the deepest part of themselves they ran in the other direction. We don't hide our success or joy so why do we hide our disappointments and pain?

To what gain do we do these things? To pretend we have it altogether? To pretend we don't need anything or anyone? To prove that we are self sufficient?

Well let me be the first to give up the jig: I don't have it all together, I need people, and I am not nearly as self sufficient as I would like others to believe. I am a mess and in my messy state it would be nice to be among the human race that at one time had emotions, feelings...imperfections just like me.

What planet is this? We were created as emotional beings. No not just women, people. People were created as emotional beings. I don't care on what point you fall on the emotional graph - that doesn't change the simple fact that emotions are not a source of shame, weakness or femininity, but of a higher capacity to be alive than any other creature on earth.

Where are you oh people who feel? Why have we abandoned our heart for the sake of our face? Why have we detached ourselves from the very thing that gives us life? Too painful? Too difficult? Too distracting? Too crippling? Too weak? Too humiliating?

Deal with it. "This is your pain, This is your burning hand, it's right here! Stay with the pain, don't shut this out. The first soap was made from the ashes of heroes, like the first monkey shot into space. Without pain, without sacrifice, we would have nothing." Don't go hiding into your cave..."Don't deal with it like those dead people do, come on! What you're feeling is premature enlightenment - this is the greatest moment of your life and your off somewhere missing it. Our fathers were models for God, If our fathers bailed - what does that tell you about God." - Fight Club

Stop cheating yourself out of the experience of life. The greater your capacity to feel, the greater your capacity to love, and therefore the greater your capacity to feel pain. Why is this bad? What kind of life would I have if I couldn't feel extreme love and therefore extreme pain? What would it all have been for? This isn't a pleasure cruise - this is a dangerous adventure, full of twists and turns and nausea. Stop with the precautions, the curtains, and the charade.

I need you, people, I need you. I need to see that what makes us different from other living things is our ability to feel. Your heart is the most beautiful thing about you. The hell it went through, the joy it's felt - that's beautiful. That's unique. And it is needed.

We can put up pictures of people who have our face, but we can never put up a picture of someone who has our ticker. Doesn’t that mean anything? That your experiences, your life, your triumphs, your failures, everything you’ve gone through has lead up to this moment where you finally realize that the world needs you, people need you, we need your perspective.

I am woman, I am invincible, I am tired and I refuse to give up on the human race and all that it is capable of, all that makes it beautiful. I need to believe that there are broken hearts out there just like mine seeking repair and comfort in knowing that it’s okay to “come as you are”. This isn’t a black tie affair, leave the ball gowns and the tuxes in the closet and join my ranks among the searching, the lost, the desperate, the needy, the starving, the imperfect, the loveless…the beautiful.

This is an invitation to life. Don’t just do a coat check, bring the boxes, the baggage, the ugly furniture, come in, unload, unpack, stay awhile and we’ll throw out the bull shit together.

A lyric that bares repeating is from The Postal Service: “I am a visitor here, I am not permanent.” My life without you, without people, is meaningless. There’s a shortage of feeling, emoting people out there. And there’s an intangible amount of moments for each of us. Without you I would be living for myself - breathing in life and breathing out toxins. I wish to create not destroy. I want to be apart of something bigger than myself and that something is all of you. My heart is open and full of all sorts of things, but it is still going, and as long as that’s true – I know I am worth something.

We recite catchy sayings about love, life, the universe and everything else to help us escape the pain and suffering in the moment; some nice little ditty that helps us cope with the choices we've made and the things that we choose not to deal with in the moment. But I reject the boomerang theory: that if you let something/someone go and it comes back to you – it’s yours for keeps. What you let go of is exactly that. It is gone – and if it comes back it’s so that it can whack you in the head with increased velocity. We can’t take for granted the people in our lives, we need to show our truest selves to each other, we need to say the things we mean and need to say. We need to be loved and give love. And we need to do it now. If there’s a road we need to travel alone – we need to not destroy the bridges that help us along the way.

While I’m here I mean to live on purpose - with purpose and exposed as the truest version of myself. Anything else would be a waste of time.