so here it is: the eve of rosh hashanah, the jewish new year, and it occurs to me that i’ve done absolutely no soul-searching. no evaluation of the year gone by (the lunar year; the jewish calendar is way ancient and goes by the moon). no resolutions, no commitments to do better, to be better. nothing. b/c my head is full of wedding plans and wedding drama (some of which is quite heartbreaking; something i’ll never go into on this space). we’ll say blessings over apples and honey tonight and tomorrow and the next day, a tradition as we wish for a a “sweet” new year.
it’s crazy what goes on in a year. i sit in services each fall with a prayer book in my lap, trying to think back on what’s happened since the last high holidays…and then i think of the year to come and all the challenges i’m sure to face and hopefully the blessings and we as a congregation pray for the best. who’d have imagined everything that’s gone on this past year?? getting engaged, planning a wedding, preparing to start a whole new chapter in my life. and also turning 30 (!). also that. (but it’s not like i didn’t know that one was coming!)
i named this entry “full circle” b/c of something that happened over the weekend. ok, first a little history. almost eight years ago (eight!!!), the night holly and i met, i went to a sandra bernhard performance on the campus of my alma mater. afterwards (fresh outta college and riproarin’ready to stay out late), i went out to a bar w/a group of friends (we’ve long since lost touch). holly and i met at that bar by chance, we really did. and thank G-d for that. b/c that night in early april 2001 was perhaps one of *the* most important of my life. so, yes, i went out that night, buoyed by ms. bernhard’s rowdy humor, ready for a good time. holly’s friends dragged her from baltimore, where she was living at the time (i was living in what you might call a…roach motel…in takoma park/silver spring). and so we met. and then emailed. and then talked on the phone. and here were are, all these years later, planning our wedding.
so over the weekend, we went to our ceremony site. we’re renting the theatre and honestly, we’ve barely spent any time there. (see this entry for an explanation) so we were excited and a little anxious to finally see the place where we’re going to get (woah) married. we walk into the theatre and it’s chilly and echo-y and the stage is set up down below with band equipment and there’s black tables and chairs off to the side of the stage, the kind you’d see in a comedy club. a woman who works at the facility whispers to us that none other than ms. bernhard would be performing there in a few hours–and i couldn’t help but get a little vaklempt, to think that almost eight years ago i saw her perform and then met holly. and here we are, all these years later, standing here at the top of the theatre (about four blocks from where we originally met), looking down at the very spot we’ll be getting married, the very spot where she’d be performing that night. “oh, i’m sure she’d love that story,” the woman told us, smiling widely. i think she would, too.
full circle.
here’s to a shana tova umetukah “a good and sweet year.” b/c no matter who you are, where you are, what you’re doing, we all could certainly use one.
i will now take a break from sharing the perpetual crisis that is my life to introduce a couple of my very very favorite ANIMALS!
i am a huuuuuge fan of dogs. i want a puppy sooooo badly, but, as holly constantly reminds me, “now isn’t the right time.” (at which point i sigh loudly and say i knoooooooooow.) in the meantime, i shower love on the wonderful dogs of others.
first, there is Thunder. he belongs to the fabulous danielle, and i swear he’s part human! this dog has a soul, i tell you. he should work in a hospital, that’s how sweet he is. he loves everyone (esp. me, i like to think! but he generally just loves ppl who love him). we saw him last night, while eating a ridiculously delicious vegan (!? i know, right?? sooooooo good) feast. he greeted me with lots of kisses and presented me w/his paw numerous times w/out me even asking! he also rested his adorable head on my lap, and generally made me feel awesome and loved. and there is nothing in the world like true-blue doggie love.
here he is:
(taken with my cellphone camera, which doesn’t have a flash.)
awwww *thunder*
also there is Lex, dog of andrew. this dog (a long-haired mini dachshund) is so cute ICED (i can’t even deal). i was lucky enough to meet him as a puppy, and hearing his little paws taptaptap on andrew’s wooden floors was just…sigh. unbearably cute. and seeing proud daddy andrew hold him under one arm, omg. again, can’t deal.
andrew recently recorded a quick game of fetch w/lex and posted it on youtube for folks like me to watch ten times over. turn up your volume!
when summer finally comes to an end, it’s like i can’t believe i made it thru. the heat. the humidity (oy, the humidity). the bright sun. constantly. beating down. on my. bangs. (bangs? brow. brow, i mean, brow. haha.) at least in the baltimore/dc area, it’s like i’m in a state of perpetual sweating from may thru september. this is THE main reason i chose november for our wedding. golden sun! crunchy leaves! and most importantly, coolness. cold, even. bring it, baby! this is MY season. this is it right here. fall.
oh fall, magical fall. so many feelings bubble up in me around this time of year. i think no matter how old you are, fall always seems to get one nostalgic for the start of the school year. pink erasers (mmm! they always smelled sooo good to me). fresh notebooks. new pencils (that you couldn’t get sharp enough for the first day of class). the creak of brand new folders as you opened them for the very first time and the gentle whoosh they made as you flipped thru them in your new binder. (and the crrrrrrrruuuuunch of that trapper keeper velcro back in the day!) seeing friends you hadn’t seen all summer (as if the summer was so long!) and how much everyone had changed over the summer, omG! crispy new jeans you couldn’t wait to break in, and clean, white sneakers you stared at under your desk as the clock inched near recess (when you could finally try them out and magically run faster).
ah, fall. for us jews, the start of a new year. a fresh start. suddenly i’m counting down the days til my birthday in early october (yes, even as i inch towards 30; that would be 11 days, not counting today, yikes!). so much excitement, so much to look forward to. i still feel as excited for fall as i did when i was a kid. some ppl dread this time of year b/c, as the sun wanes, the days shorten and the leaves fall, they see it as the end–the end of the warmth, the end of green. but to me, it’s a brand new beginning. it’s like i come alive again. i can’t wait to pull on a hoodie and step on crunchy leaves! welcome, fall! i am your biggest fan.
fitting’s been postponed due to a broken sewing machine. (d’oh!) this is actually ok, as it gives me more time to work off said fries. mmmmmm….*fries*……
and i have a sneaking suspicion that i shouldn’t have eaten all those fries last night. oops. (and i suppose the fact that i ate them w/cheese sauce makes it even worse. but c’mon! i’ve been *so good* for so long! and even a bride-to-be’s gotta live a little…)
[i guess it's more accurate to say that this will be my last fitting until a week or two before the wedding. and hopefully said fabulous dressmaker will need to take it in a tad more by then. (note to self: no more cheese fries!)]
in other news, i really appreciate the turning-30 support that all my buds sent via comments on yesterday’s entry. i’m also happy to report that my two+ day migraine has broken. i don’t even know how i wrote that entry yesterday! the power of copious amount of coffee. never, ever underestimate the power of coffee.
i remember sitting on the fourth floor of the national press building (next to the wonderful andrew, now one of my “best ppl”–hi andrew!!), shortly after i started a job there as a reporter. i’m not exactly sure if i had actually turned 25 yet, but i thought something along the lines of “oh my GOSH. ohmygoshohmygoshohmyGOSH in five years i’ll be 30! what does that MEAN?” i couldn’t even think about it. thirty to me meant…gosh, i mean, i guess what it still means to me now: grown up. together. a(gulp)dult. adult. (adult??!)
the thing i know now that i didn’t know back then is that very few of us have it “together” at 30. or are “grown up.” (what IS that anyway???) and, “adult,” well i think that’s in the eye of the beholder. if all of those labels mean having a mortgage, a partner, paying your bills, a job, then sure, i’m “grown up,” “together” and an (ahem) “adult.” the thing is, that i feel none of those things. what i do feel–and my regular readers are keenly aware of this, i’m sure–is about 15. perpetually 15. yes, i’m wiser. and have better hair. and don’t wear sneakers nearly as much. but i just feel like such a kid inside that it makes absolutely no sense to me that i’m less than two weeks away (omG that’s the first time i actually counted the days) from being on this earth three decades.
three decades! thirty whole years. i just can’t wrap my mind around it. i’m not really in denial anymore, i suppose. i sort of convinced myself i was already 30 about a year ago so it wouldn’t come as such as shock when it actually happened. (haha. i know. it sounds funny but it worked!) i also convinced myself of a really good tactic to employ when i do start feeling like i’m gonna freak out: turning 30 is better than the alternative. which is not turning 30. and trust me, i want to be around for a long time. so the big, incredibly, impossibly bright silver lining is that i’ve made it. and i hear things are going to get even better.
like our teenagehood, i think the great majority of us spend most of our 20s bumbling around trying to “find” ourselves. most women i’ve talked to about turning 30 (many of them way past it themselves), say their 30s were way better than their 20s. my mom tells me that life just keeps on getting better. and i have to say that i believe her. (she also has great skin and looks impossibly young, so that helps.)
one of the best things about this wedding is that it’s completely, 100 percent distracting me from my 30th. honestly, we have absolutely no plans for my birthday (on the 6th, for the record). i kinda wish we did, but holly’ll be in class. it’s the lame-est day of the week (a monday) and we have more important things to spend our money on (uh, this wedding). (also a plus that it’s not on Yom Kippur this year. a few years ago it was, and MAN! fasting on your birthday? notsofun!) but if you’re, um, free, call me! b/c i think i still ought to toast to another 30–hell, make it 60!–years. i’m not sure if i’ll still have this blog by then (come to think of it, i hope so!), but i know one thing for sure: i’ll still be eating lunch at 11:30. and, from the elderly folks that i know/have known, my guess is it’ll be even earlier. way earlier. i’ll have to rename this blog…lunch at 10:05. haha. doesn’t have quite the same ring, but doggone, it’s funny.
txt msg
to: bff/MOH
when: 6:20 p.m. wed.sept. 17
from: parked car behind dressmaker’s, somewheresville, baltimore
me: omg. nicole, its so perfect. i cried when i put it on. i cant believe it…
five minutes later, my cellphone’s ringing and i see an unfamiliar area code. it’s nicolina, calling cross-country from her city by the bay. and altho she’s exhausted from weeks of travel, she manages a giant HIIIIII and the gushing commences.
it finally happened. what i thought would never, ever happen to a big-mouthed jersey girl like me. even w/all my crying over the past few months, i never thought a dress–or any single piece of clothing–could make me cry. but yesterday, in an almost-secret shop in baltimore, it happened. and i’ve been walking on air ever since.
i’ve heard from friends (and in magazines and on tv and in the movies), “as soon as i put the dress on, i started crying. and that’s how i knew it was the one.” secretly i always thought, man. no way that’s ever happening to me. i’m just not that type of girl. i’ve never been that type of girl. but i tried my dress on last night and it happened: i started to cry.
there i was, in this heartwarming little hole-in-the-wall shop, crammed into in a stuffy woodpaneled dressing room. i get it halfway zipped (i need help to get the zipper all the way up; i was excited that it actually had a zipper, b/c thus far it’s just been a bunch of sharp pins) and i turn around and look at myself. and i look…really nice. different than i’ve ever looked before.
i open the folding door and sorta shuffle out (the slit isn’t quite finished yet). my pointy workshoes click-clack against the tile floor, and, lump in throat, silently enter the shop where the dressmaker and her assistant are waiting for me. their eyes widen and they start coo-ing, half-russian, half-english. seeing their faces, i just can’t hold it in anymore. i start crying and we all hug. suddenly, they’re my family. she’s my stand-in mother and her assistant’s an aunt or an old family friend (that i can’t speak to in english, but we didn’t need words). i’ve just been so heavy-hearted the past year or so as we’ve planned this wedding, with my mom so far away (and so busy with her job) in new jersey. and of course, my MOH is in san francisco. so it’s just been little ol clueless me researching dresses, going to buy material, stopping by the dressmaker’s on my way home from work. as we looked at each other–me, standing there in this elegant dress and these two women, starry-eyed, with their hands over their mouths–i just felt so loved. and to know that they finally know who i’m marrying (i.e. not a man) and don’t give a hoot made me love them even more.
they did some more pinning, and i changed back into my usual workclothes (black button-down, dark jeans, aforementioned clickety-clack pointy-toed shoes). we agreed that once the dress is complete (next week, after one more fitting), i would leave it there for safekeeping (and to keep holly from even getting close to it). “dis is a secret,” the dressmaker told me. don’t tell anyone what the dress looks like. surprise everyone. i wonder if she realized the person most likely to be surprised was right there standing in front of her: me.
fitting #3 is tonight, and the big question remains: how low should i go? i mean, c’mon, this is my wedding, i might as well, right? but then again, this is my wedding. and i want to look classy. but cleavage can be classy, i think. (i think)
in other news, thanks to cousin J [not my actual cousin, mind you. but 2nd cousin of mrs. S aka hottie social worker (HSW)], i am much closer to finding shoes. trial up-do appt. has been set. must also set up trial make-up session. and figure out when i should have my overgrown bangs trimmed so they’re perfect for november (of course, i’m wondering: what are perfect bangs anyway?? my perpetually 15 bang-loving self doesn’t even know).
all this timing! ugh. i am not used to this. and i’m kind of terrible at it. but a wedding happens only once (if you’re lucky), so i think i’m willing to suck it up and deal. i mean, just this once.
i didn’t anticipate crying the way i did this weekend. all weekend. at the indian restaurant when we first got into rochester (and upon hearing some wonderful, wonderful news). in the lobby the next morning, as nicolina (bff/MOH) and i sipped overpriced coffee on puffy couches. in the driveway of the happy couple’s home as Mrs. S (formerly Ms. JG, aka hottie social worker) and n. put their sweet arms around me, and kept reassuring me that yes, everything’s going to be ok, the wedding will be amazing and you will look spectacular and yes, you’re normal and no, don’t feel bad you’re crying. then again in the restaurant as we gathered for a post-wedding breakfast and said farewell (til november). and again (this time really badly) about a half-hour later on nicole’s shoulder at the rochester airport before she headed back to her beautiful city by the bay…
to be honest, two of those instances (indian restaurant and hotel lobby) i managed to keep the tears in–but just barely. and i’m not even mentioning all the times over the weekend i teared up privately w/holly. and now, as i write this, i’m crying again. these days, i seem to be a bottomless well of emotions. literally. i’ve never felt this way before. it’s almost like my feelings have formed this tight ball deep in my chest– somewhere between my heart and my throat–and it’s constantly unravelling and winding back up again.
it’s so hard to explain exactly why i’m crying. and when i try to start explaining–or even start thinking about it–i get emotional all over again. but after seeing some of my very best friends this weekend, i think it boils down to the following:
i love my friends. i love them more than ever. i loved them before but i love them more and more every single day. and when i think about their participation in this wedding, i swear, i just start losing it. see, the great majority of these friends i met in college. and i spent a lot of college joking around and having fun and doing crazy things to my hair. but, (like a lot of other ppl, i imagine) i also spent a lot of time in college holding things in, too afraid to let the tough jersey-girl guard down. nearly a decade later and seven+ yrs into a relationship, the tough-girl act is long gone. sure, i still do my share of trash talkin, still wear lots of black and yeeees, still rock the spiky belts pretty much every day. but anyone who knows me knows that i just might be one of the most sensitive ppl in the universe. some days i honestly feel like an open wound. like, i can barely even watch tv news. and i’m so used to showing holly that side of me, of not holding anything back, that–as odd as it sounds–showing it to my oldest friends–the ones who knew me way back when–is tough for me. but i finally let ‘er rip this weekend. and it felt good. so, as we reach the official two-month mark til our wedding (today; gulp), i just want to say to my friends: thank you. i love you. and thank you for loving me. looking into your eyes (but mostly looking down, i suppose, considering all the tears and nose-blowing) in simos’ driveway, under the gray skies of rochester, receiving your hugs on his stoop, was more than i could have ever asked for. i’ll see you girls soon. xxo.
and you know what she did? she hugged me. and then hugged me again and gave me a kiss. i’d love to write more but it’s late and i need to pack up for our trip tomorrow (wedding in upstate ny). but i just had to write a little something while i had the chance and things were still fresh in my mind.
when i told her that i was afraid to tell her to begin with, b/c i needed her help so badly and i didn’t want to jeopardize anything (this was very hard for me to verbalize; lump in throat reappeared), she hugged me more.
i’ll tell you, love sometimes comes from the unlikeliest of places–but that can be the very best kind. ppl are just being so kind to me (a certain cousin of a good friend who’s helping clueless me find shoes and accessories; the salesgirl in the nordstrom lingerie dept. who gave me her card and told me she’d personally take me around the store whenever i’m ready; a certain newscaster who shall remain nameless that went out of her way to dress shop online for a girl she hardly knew; a team, literally (ok, three! but still, that’s a lot) of hairdressers who are taking the entire day of our wedding off to devote to us. all that love, those warm feelings, it really counts, it means something. and it sort of washes away the muck we’ve gone thru(that i think by this point, fingers crossed, is behind us) to get where we are today. i guess what i’m trying to say is that i’m not feeling so alone anymore. ppl want to help. all you have to do is ask–and then let them.
