summer starts in new york

Oh, all I know is that it's summer in new york city and that I live a block away from central park and that i HAVE to get there and to do those things that in the past, it would have been difficult for me to do. Only in terms of hours and stuff like that. But I have to change my paradigm and say, hell, little LM, you have to see the next few weeks here when you have ONE major paper due (and only one? what?) as a vacation in new york.

Because seriously, why the hell not? I can do it; I have the time to do it; all I have to do is keep my energy up to do it. I woke up today ridiculously (yeah I just butchered that spelling; it's too early for me to even care) early and I looked at the pile of Time Out New York and New York magazines in my oh-so-svelte magazine rack and, moreover, both last night and the night before I had dinner / drinks with friends - oh, very different friends - who were randomly visiting new york.

Different perspectives, and one that I think I'd like to take in the next few weeks. A "vacation in New York." Hell, yeah, especially when I have somewhere free to stay every night. Ah, if you could consider a 1600 per month rent as free. Morning, all, and loving loving loving the sunshine - finally!

Seeing Petey

Despite the fact that I've had the culmiinating paper of one of my courses due none other than tonight, I've managed to watch the last two days of SNY (for non-NY'ers, that's the Mets channel, for all intents and purposes) to follow the adventures of one Mr. Pedro Martinez as he returns to Boston. I had to tape the game tonight, because I was in class (and thank you KB for giving me the advice as to which channel to tape, and which might be blacked out, as I generally tape the wrong channel when a game is being broadcast on multiple stations. I took your counsel as the word, and I did not even question it, and it was correct.)

In any case, by the time I got home from class, Petey had been chased out of the game. I didn't want that to happen. I think the majority of Red Sox fans didn't, either. In so many ways, Pedro was a person who initially hooked me into becoming what was an average Sox fan to being obsessed with watcing his every start, with watching his every pitch knowing that I was seeing something incredible. And along with thousands - millions - who knows - I'm not a numbers girl - of Sox fans, he was an icon to me. He was someone who didn't just physically pitch well, but who mentally was so much more astute and intelligent than most people I have encountered in my life. To be cliche, this man is a legend.

When I came home from class tonight, the score was 8-1, Sox. And I knew most of those runs had to have been off of Pedro. In retrospect, even though this game is still going on right now, I wish those runs had come off of a reliever. But the box score doesn't lie. And you know what, I'm glad I didn't have to see that shit first hand. Because I would have been conflicted. I would have felt like I was watching an ex-great love, whom I still loved but who had moved on because of circumstances, fight against a current love. This is a bad analogy, not because it's inaccurate, but because it doesn't convey the depth of what I would have felt. I would have probably had to drink myself under the table... oh, I don't have a real table, maybe the side table... in order to see it. Pedro vs. Manny in an at-bat? My two most loved Sox of all time facing one another? I haven't seen the tape yet, so I haven't seen how it (or they) transpired, but if I were either of those two I would not have been able to concentrate on my job.

Because sometimes jobs transcend the job itself. Sometimes you become so loyal to those with whom that you are working; sometimes you become close, close friends with those whom you are working. Especially when you overcome such obstacles in the face of adversity and personal stress (the MFY's series, circa 2004, and circa 2003 to precede that) that you form a bond that cannot be split no matter what. I can maybe better compare it to two war buddies who fought together - and won - at one time having to fight against each other at a later time.

God damn - I hope, I hope, and I hope that when I watch the beginning of this game that Pedro was so palpably received by the Boston fans that he KNOWS how much he meant to us. I didn't want to know that he got blown out tonight; I want to think it could easily be chalked up to emotion, or something. No matter what, in my mind, Pedro will always be Pedro. The guy who sparked so many people's love for the Sox again, who rejuvenated hope in the team, who made me love baseball again. (And fuck yeah, it's fucked up to see him in another uniform when there are Sox uniforms in the picture.)

Thank you, Petey, for your seven years with us. If we see you again in the World Series (something I have contemplated in the back of my mind since about 20 games into this season) then I will love you the same. You were honorable, you were charismatic, you were inspiring. I'll still root for the Sox, but I will always love what you did for Boston, even if you are not here any longer.

Me again

I kept my best journals during junior high. That was when I felt that I had no one I could connect with, like I was adrift, so alone, with a mind running through my head that was completely disattached to everything else, with a mouth that couldn't speak anything that I thought, within a body that physically couldn't actually go anywhere beyond the immediate area because I was like a prisoner in the lovely home in which I lived and in which my father ruled with an iron fist. Literally.

And so, this January, when I felt trapped again inside of my own mind, albeit without those external constraints, I began to write, but fifteen years later, it came in the form of a blog. Again, I needed to make connections with people, and I felt like my external life was a facade. And yes, I didn't want to worry anybody I knew by telling them , because if I did, then in my head, I would be a burden, and I would not be "easy" to be friends with. (Or "worthy" of being friends with???) Everyone has challenges; why would I add to those of my friends? Of course, my very special friends deserve every inkling of support and humor and comfort and fun that is humanly possible and I wish I could have been a person to bring that for them over this past winter. I have no idea whether I did; for in truth, I was miserable in my own mind. Interestingly, most people bought my happy act. I tried to hide my own personal misery. And I tried to act a-okay. Yet this was some a-okay that I didn't feel at fucking all. The only ACTUAL spots of being a-okay were while I was spending time with the very few people who - for lack of a better term - "got me" - yet they were the same people I wanted to least feel like a burden upon, the same people I cared about most, so ironically, I wouldn't talk about how fucking miserable I actually was.

So my second best journals have been from January to, say, March of this year. Before I escaped from the confines of my own mind, before I felt real again. And DAMN, does feeling real again feel good. And then, by large, I stopped writing in this blog. (Is that why so many great writers are tortured souls and all that? Because without effort, they get down to the depths of human emotions, emotions to which other people can relate, to a lesser extent? No - not to a lesser extent - to the extent of what they can see lingering on the skirt hems of their dark sides, of what they conceptually can see happening, happening on the side which they won't tip to, but that sometimes lurks there, in the subconcious, and then creates the attraction to the writing of those who actually put it out there?)

Anyway. This hiatus from blogging has just been another step in my life that I had to take. I had to re-enter the world of the real, of ME. And maybe this whole entry makes no sense, because it's veered in a few different directions, but it makes perfect sense to me. And also, for the next month and a half, I will have a lot of time to reflect and - yeah, to play (summer in new york city - there is nothing better). I AM SO READY FOR THAT!!! (Please rain stop, too!) I feel good! But I don't want to ignore the continual process of self-reflection in which this journal allows me to engage. I have to write during the good times and not just during the bad times.

Thank god I am not that junior high girl any more who wrote in her journals simply to validate her own identity. But you know what? I love that junior high girl, and I love her a lot. And if I could sit with her right now, I would hug her, and I would tell her - "hey, LM, You're going to be okay." Because she will. Because she is. She so is.

On today's 7 hour drive from Vermont to NYC

12:30 pm - get in rental car after brunch that followed the wedding of my freshman year of college last night, slightly hungover. Tear up at leaving old friends whom I don't know when I will see again. Tear up because it is amazing that my freshman year of college roommate is now married. Tear up because the weekend was too short and I should have gone up Friday night but I couldn't afford to rent a car for three days and stay at a hotel for two nights.

12:35 pm. Play with the radio. Get incredibly lost in the hills of Vermont (um, it's not like I hadn't driven there just yesterday). Should have been able to retrace the steps, but my sense of direction, in a word, SUCKS. Have no clue where I am, but Game 1 of the doubleheader is on. As soon as one AM station with the Trupiano broadcast fades out, change the station and find the game elsewhere. Finally get going in the right direction.

3:30 pm. Somewhere in Massachusetts. Hear the Papi walk off. Nearly crash my rental car into other Massachussetts-ites who are evidently listening to the game too, evidenced by the amount of swerving cars on the road at this exact time. Text my brother. Realize that the law that prohibits talking on a cell phone while driving a car is actually quite ineffective, because now, I am texting while driving the car. Obviously, this is far worse.

3:35 pm. Switch the channel to the Yankees game. Admit to myself that I would rather have Jeter get on base in the 9th with ARod on deck so I could hear him make the last out of the game. Wonder if that's fucked up. Hear the Yankees lose.

4:10 pm. Brief interlude. Channel my interior Steven Tyler, and, scarily, Mariah Carey, and... well... I've already admitted the rest, so... the singers from the Dirty Dancing theme song whose names I can't remember. However, they're all great songs to belt out when you think no one can hear you.

4:40 pm. Listen to the beginning of the Mets game. Am glad that Pedro is actually getting some run support.

5:10 pm. Miraculously, as I am now deep into Connecticut and close to NYC, find Sox game two of the doubleheader on some am station. Get annoyed but not entirely devoid of hope after the first few innings.

5:45 pm. Hear a mysterious noise in the rental car as I am on the Cross-Bronx Expressway. It is the gas light warning. As the gas light subsequently goes on, panic because I am not just in stop and go traffic - I am in stop-stop traffic.

6:00 pm. Call my godfather who has lived in the Bronx his entire life, imagining that I was soon to be that girl in the right lane with the stopped car with no gas and no cash while thousands of cars cursed me out and nearly hit me. There is no shoulder of the road at this point, so yes, I would have been in the road. Say "I need your help." Describe to him my exact location and he immediately directs me to the nearest gas station.

6:30 pm. Finally get off the VERY NEXT EXIT (4B) (due to the traffic, this is a half an hour later) and careen into the gas station which is located exactly where my godfather directed me. Realize once again that I have no cash, as the last dollar was used to tip the valet parker at the brunch I'd left at 12:30 pm. Realize there is no ATM there and begin to wonder whether there is a toll to get back into NYC via the highway and, if so, how I could get around this. Deludedly think I can possibly combine my minimal knowledge of the Bronx with my abhorrent sense of direction to drive through the Bronx back to my apartment and avert the stop-stop traffic on the expressway. End up in the middle of a neighborhood which is clearly in celebratory mode, after today's Puerto Rican day parade. Briefly feel envious at the amount of fun everyone seems to be having and flash back to how much fun I had last night. Realize that I am entirely lost in a car that I can barely drive somewhere around east 174th street and other streets I had never heard of and that I should really figure out how to get back on the highway if I ever want to get home.

7:00 pm. Find my way back to the highway. Give up on the Sox game but still, masochistically, listen. (OK I can't spell that word.) Cannot believe I'm getting coverage here in the city. Sporadically change the station to the Mets game for the latter half of each inning so I can hear Pedro pitch.

7:30 pm. Locate the source of the stop-stop traffic, a horrible accident just by exit 2. Fly home, and miraculously, there is no charge for re-entering the city. Guess it's just on the way out? Cannot believe how wonderful I feel going down the West Side Highway, with the window down and the river on my right and families picnicking in the parks on each side of me. From Vermont to NYC in 7 hours.

8:00 pm. Having returned the car, walk the few blocks to my apartment, and pick up the Sox game on Gameday (ESPN Sunday night black out, I guess, on EI?) Get annoyed with Francona for giving up on the game too early. Wonder why Manny hasn't PH. Or Tek for Mirabelli, for that matter.

9:00 pm. Upload my pics from this weekend's wedding. Again, can't believe how wonderful it was.

And now, it's time to fall asleep... Monday is quickly looming in front of me.

Reassessing Part II

I think I may have written about this before, but recently, I have been reassessing my friendships. It was easy at first. There were obviously some people who were "wrong" for me to continue to give myself to as a friend. In my friendships, I give and I try, and I had been going through some hard times from - to be honest - January through early April - and during that time, I blamed myself for not having kept in contact with some people. But with good friends, they understand that; it was simple to say: "I'm going through a tough time, and I am not able to go out right now." However, from only a very few of my EXTREMELY close friends did I ask for help during that time, and I received it. God, I hope that those very few friends never encounter such hard times as I did, but if they ever do, I would do anything in the world to support them and help them and give whatever I can to them. No questions asked, period.

Now, however, it has become more complex. There's a fine line between the good friends who knew I was going through hard times but whom I did not ask for help, and now, when I am back to "me," I am thinking about those friends who have maybe always been "takers." For example: "I'm doing this tonight, LM, would like you to come along and watch me play at x show." The worst of them all came today. "Where have you been, are you still alive?" WHAT? YOU KNEW I WAS GOING THROUGH SHIT, WHY DIDN'T YOU CALL ME THEN??? The "still alive" message got to me, because she knew - via my attempted outreach to her - that I was definitely not feeling alive. Seriously, if you were that concerned, then don't say it sarcastically in a message like it's MY FAULT (because I did reach out to this friend and tried to talk to her, and I got no responses until, this weekend, she wanted to find out what was going on with a mutual friend of ours - well, perhaps a former mutual friend.) In the past, my natural inclination would be to just to automatically forgive and forget and to say, oh, sure, I'll join you. In YOUR life.

But I can't do that anymore. I will address this, but not now. I am angry. And it takes me a hell of a lot to admit that. So instead, I will say that I am upset. I was there for her, and them (here I am thinking of about three specific people) in their times of struggle, and I hate it that they are now people I'm thinking about as not such great friends. I can, and will, without a doubt give and give and give, but when people I've considered good friends will disappear if I can't partake in THEIR lives - my new perspective is - what about my life? Has it always been that way? That question is the most key thing I've said here, because if it HAS always been that way, then people expect those patterns to continue, so I guess I cannot blame them, but that's not what I need in a friend. I would rather have the very few great friends in my life whom I would put myself on the subway tracks for than have "good" friends who move in and move out of my life. That's just me. I haven't always been that aware that that's me, and to an extent, I absolutely admit that in my early 20's I took forgranted those people who grounded me to my essence and for whom I would do anything. These are sitll the very few friends I would lay down on the tracks for, again, without question. And that they have stuck with me, too - then that only says more about how fucking incredibly wonderfully amazing they are (AB, AA, you are the two I am thinking about here. Even if you never read this, THANK YOU). OK, I have never cried while I wrote a blog entry before; this is the first time.

OK I'm crying so I have to stop writing. But this is something I've been thinking a lot about lately, so please don't be surprised if Part III comes up soon.

Sunday Night Synopsis

Well, here I am, feeling like a senior in college again, physically surrounded by resources and notes and index cards and attempting to write the most all-encompassing paper since my ill-fated attempt at a senior thesis in March of 1998.

That year, I was supposed to go on spring break to my friend Sasha's house in Hawaii. Instead, I remained on campus, nearly alone save a few sports teams, because I was not even close to finishing the thesis that I had had two semesters to complete. I distinctly remember my friend Jill, just before getting into the car that I was supposed to be in, coming to my room and handing me a teddy bear - "to keep you company while you're here." I stood at my window, looking down three floors at the Vermont snow swirling around and feeling it fly into my face, in stark contrast to the hot tears of anger at myself that were sliding down my face, as the two cars with my friends inside pulled out of their parking spots and off to the airport. I cursed myself for having procrastinated to that extent.

I think I have learned some lessons since then, since this is not officially due until Thursday and since I feel that it is somewhat under control. Come Wednesday night, I'm sure I'll be up late, perhaps even all night, but at least it will be signed, sealed and delivered on time and in time for me to go up to, ironically, Vermont, for my college roommate's wedding.

We shall see.