observing and living the second and incredibly unexpected coming of age…the 30’s
FATHER
you can’t use that word. a father bandages scraped knees, let’s you stay up later than mom would and gives you your first sip of beer. it’s donor. the word is donor.
– 32
A STROLLER
i can’t leave the condo. i had 9 months to plan and i still haven’t bought a stroller. potentially a subliminal choice to not admit that i am now a mother, i am not quite ready yet even though you are already here.
– 35
PLAN THE REST OF YOUR LIFE
life has become a plan. a decision tree. all things considered and calculated. the future, the next career move, the savings, the family, the house….all of which is completely void of two key things. life and living it right now.
– 32
HOLIDAY
my father offered me the money for a plane ticket to come home for the holidays. i asked if i declined could i please have the money to put against my debt.
– 38
PERSPECTIVE
my mother once said, think what you want but if you decide to write it down it makes it true, open and available to anyone that finds it. this was directly after she had found a canvas pencil case with marker drawings, friends signatures and doodles all over the outside – such an individual.
this pencil case was full of notes. small notes, nice notes, complicated origami notes, notes that had text spiralling into the centre and amongst these…mean notes, the type that 12 year old girls send about other girls to girls that wish they never opened them as they would pretend to agree but melting broken heartedly did not. every little thing seemed huge.
that’s the fear of writing something down. upon reflection things are never that huge, a moment, an embarrassment, a victory or failure – all living in that time.
these things are no longer huge. a few other things, now things, these moments things do feel huge although writing it down seems like a risk of minimizing later. hold.
– 32
CASUAL LOOK
i spent a lot of time working on a casual look. trying hard to not look as though i had tried at all. i wanted to just walk by. see the flowers, the guests, imaging that i was awaiting the photographer and the marriage.
walking proudly to the coffee shop across from the downtown church. i looked great. i looked like i felt great. ordering a coffee, staring aimlessly at the tea and carafe selections, hoping maybe someone would run in before the next scheduled event.
i couldn’t hold the staged intelligent gaze at my surrounding for much longer, i had seen nothing and no one. i was set to walk home. noticing a bench across from the cafe and feeling the cool autumn breeze i crossed the street and sat down. i needed a minute, to think, to mourn, to be here right now knowing that i was just here and you were there. the photographers moved in as the doors of the church now beside me opened.
embarrassment hit me in the core, pathetic, sad, lonely and searching. head down, so far down as i got up quickly and walked as fast as i could in the other direction. no one saw me. if they did, i am so sorry.
– 38
THE OCEAN
her apartment was covered in framed pictures of the ocean.
she had never been. i felt like leaving as soon as i got there.
– 30
I QUIT
i quit my super high paying job because i didn’t like it. strike that “like” is an understatement, loath is more accurate.
suits and egos and conversations about working all while avoiding the actual task.
here i sit in a cabin in the woods with a stack of harvard business reviews and other sorted business editorials wishing that i could just absorb them, avoiding the actual work.
have i become the exact people that i victoriously left behind. maybe. but i feel like i care more. maybe not at this exact moment. but in general, in a bit i will again.
hemingway might not advance my career, but i am happy to pause. for now.
– 32
thailand
this rolling suitcase won’t do. i needed a backpack, the type a flag is sewn onto. i told everyone. travelling alone was admired and respected. i promised to write and account every fantastic moment that most others as admitted would be too scared to journey alone to experience. guts.
upon arrival i knew the backpack with the canadian flag proudly featured made people wonder how far i would be travelling, what was driving me, would i be meeting up with someone part way…it was playing the role as anticipated. we were playing that role together.
i mostly sat in the hotel room drinking small bottles of beer and smoking fake american brand cigarettes. it was a long flight for that. it was hot. really hot.
– 33
FIFTH FLOOR APARTMENT
i wake up and want to start over. a cyclical bi-monthly feeling. this is it. garbage bags out. before i even have time to wash my face or brush my teeth or pour a coffee furniture is moving, things are being thrown out and the art is being pulled off of the walls. i hate this place.
everyone else is sitting with their families on sectional sofa’s in a semi-detached picture of perfect before they mow the lawn on a saturday and here i am moving around the same hand me down table and chairs that i loathed upon arrival. hours pass. coffee is made. dirty and exhausted i start scrubbing. everything at once until it is all done feeling like it is someone else’s dirt, years of it and then myself.
warm clean clothes and luke warm coffee as a reward. i don’t need that life, i have this life. these classic books perfectly organized, reimagined art spaces giving hope to overpainted but now opposite walls – this new layout is perfection, a new place. i now am back in love with this apartment.
waking up to my fifth floor apartment, bleach aroma, yesterday’s cold coffee in the carafe and the same table and chairs in the corner. i hate this place.
– 39
the30years 