"Hey, it's me." he said when I picked up the phone.
"What's up?" I replied, with no small amount of trepidation. It was, after all, only a month after I had broken up with him over the phone.
"Can you get away for lunch today? I haven't seen you and want to catch up."
"Um, okay I guess. Where were you thinking? I don't have a whole lot of time." I was already worried about where this was going to go.
"I'll pick you up."
It was a Friday afternoon in October 2005. He arrived in a car I'd never seen before. I hopped in and we sped off to: Mimi's Cafe. Take note, this location is important.
Once there, the servers seated us in a remote corner in the back. We ordered some lemonade and asked for a few minutes to order. Then he placed a dark blue jewelry box on the table and told me to open it.
"What's this?" I asked him laughing, thinking this was a joke. We had broken up. You don't give exes jewelry.
"Open it." he replied. I opened the box to find a piece of duct tape where one might expect to find a tennis bracelet. As I looked up at him, I remembered something he used to say, an analogy of love, and I felt the color leave my face as the bile worked it's way up.
"I need to give you this duct tape. It represents me. I have given this duct tape to only one person before, and it stayed for awhile until she gave it back to me. It still has a lot of stick. I still have a lot of stick."
I had no reply to that. What does one even say? Then he handed me a smaller box. "Open it." he said, waiting.
"This had better have a pair of earrings in it, or I'm going to be pissed," I told him, hoping to god it wasn't what I thought it was. I was horribly wrong. Nestled in that blue box was a princess cut diamond solitaire. The urge to throw up was equally strong as the urge to run. I remember thinking that this was not the reaction a girl was supposed to have at her first proposal. At the same time, everything else was wrong: Mimi's Cafe on a Friday afternoon with my ex.
I didn't know what to say to him. I tried to be gentle. "I can't accept this," I said, closing the box and handing it back. "I don't know what to say. We're not together. There are reasons for this. I hope you can return it." Okay, so maybe I wasn't that gentle.
"I had them inscribe our initials next to the EGL number."
"Why are you telling me this? Why would you do that? Shouldn't you have waited? Did you actually think I would say 'yes' after everything? You lied to me, you let your daughter move to Sweden without a second thought, you told me YOU were moving. No. This is not happening, I don't think you actually thought this through," I railed at him.
We got up quickly, never having touched our drinks, never having ordered our food. We paid the $4 plus tip and walked out. On the way back to my office he asked me not to tell anyone. I made no promises. I had just said no to unhappily ever after, and I have to say, it felt good.
24.9.10
Fuck Cancer
2009 was a rough year for my family. And boy, do I mean ROUGH.
In January of 09 my uncle, my favorite uncle, the guy whom I called my 2nd dad was diagnosed with terminal stage 5 cancer. See, it started in '08 when he found out he had a tumor on his kidney. They removed the kidney and told him the cancer was gone. They never did a bone scan, and it turns out, they were wrong. By the time he found out the following January that the cancer wasn't gone, the tumors were in his bones and all over his body. They tried one round of an aggressive chemo/radiation cocktail. It caused his remaining kidney to fail. That landed him in the hospital for 3 months so that he could receive dialysis treatment twice a day, 5 days a week. He was finally able to go home, and that's where he passed away a month after. July 2, 2009 was the first time I was able to say 'fuck cancer'.
It wasn't the first time cancer had touched my life: my godfather's wife successfully beat breast cancer. However, it was the first time cancer had taken someone from me. Then in September of '09 my mother was diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer. In December, she had surgery and had the pea sized tumor removed. She was lucky, it was caught early in her annual mammogram, and it was small. She's in remission, but I will always worry. Thus ended 2009, it began and ended in cancer. Fuck that.
This August, my friend Dave's wife passed after a long painful bout with Stage 5 metastasized cancer. It began in her breasts nearly 6 years ago. She had a double mastectomy and beating the odds, won another 5 years with her family. But the cancer fought harder, and it won. My friend is a widower at 30. He was only married a year. Fuck that.
Last fall, my dear friend J's father was diagnosed with brain cancer. A tumor had decided to wrap itself around his brain stem, and was deemed inoperable. The past year has had the family taking him to and from chemo treatments, waiting, watching...but not hoping. Instead, they learned to grieve in advance. Pre-emptive grieving. Learning to put things in perspective for the inevitable. The inevitable should have been old age. But in this case, as it is with so many others, it was cancer.
J's dad passed away this morning. She and her family have been a part of my life since 1994. She was the first person I met in high school orientation. We used to joke that our fathers were personality twins. He leaves behind a wife, two daughters, 5 grandchildren and countless friends and relatives. Like my uncle, and Dave's wife, Mr. D touched many lives before his own was taken before those of us left were ready.
I don't believe in the 'cure' for cancer. But I do believe in research and better treatment. I walk for various charities that donate the proceeds to companies that are researching treatment. So that one day, the word 'cancer' won't sound like the gavel on a death sentence. I ask that anyone reading this do the same. Walk, get sponsors, make a donation. Because cancer touches everyone's life in one way or another. It's only a matter of time before you too can say FUCK CANCER.
In January of 09 my uncle, my favorite uncle, the guy whom I called my 2nd dad was diagnosed with terminal stage 5 cancer. See, it started in '08 when he found out he had a tumor on his kidney. They removed the kidney and told him the cancer was gone. They never did a bone scan, and it turns out, they were wrong. By the time he found out the following January that the cancer wasn't gone, the tumors were in his bones and all over his body. They tried one round of an aggressive chemo/radiation cocktail. It caused his remaining kidney to fail. That landed him in the hospital for 3 months so that he could receive dialysis treatment twice a day, 5 days a week. He was finally able to go home, and that's where he passed away a month after. July 2, 2009 was the first time I was able to say 'fuck cancer'.
It wasn't the first time cancer had touched my life: my godfather's wife successfully beat breast cancer. However, it was the first time cancer had taken someone from me. Then in September of '09 my mother was diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer. In December, she had surgery and had the pea sized tumor removed. She was lucky, it was caught early in her annual mammogram, and it was small. She's in remission, but I will always worry. Thus ended 2009, it began and ended in cancer. Fuck that.
This August, my friend Dave's wife passed after a long painful bout with Stage 5 metastasized cancer. It began in her breasts nearly 6 years ago. She had a double mastectomy and beating the odds, won another 5 years with her family. But the cancer fought harder, and it won. My friend is a widower at 30. He was only married a year. Fuck that.
Last fall, my dear friend J's father was diagnosed with brain cancer. A tumor had decided to wrap itself around his brain stem, and was deemed inoperable. The past year has had the family taking him to and from chemo treatments, waiting, watching...but not hoping. Instead, they learned to grieve in advance. Pre-emptive grieving. Learning to put things in perspective for the inevitable. The inevitable should have been old age. But in this case, as it is with so many others, it was cancer.
J's dad passed away this morning. She and her family have been a part of my life since 1994. She was the first person I met in high school orientation. We used to joke that our fathers were personality twins. He leaves behind a wife, two daughters, 5 grandchildren and countless friends and relatives. Like my uncle, and Dave's wife, Mr. D touched many lives before his own was taken before those of us left were ready.
I don't believe in the 'cure' for cancer. But I do believe in research and better treatment. I walk for various charities that donate the proceeds to companies that are researching treatment. So that one day, the word 'cancer' won't sound like the gavel on a death sentence. I ask that anyone reading this do the same. Walk, get sponsors, make a donation. Because cancer touches everyone's life in one way or another. It's only a matter of time before you too can say FUCK CANCER.
8.9.10
Pretty Sexy Things
I can delete someone from my life, almost like they never existed. Especially if no tears were shed. One minute there, the next minute gone and the past year is now just a warm memory. If I chose to think about it, which I don't. But it's funny how even though someone is deleted from my present, there are clues to their existence in my life that are left behind. That empty bottle of wine that is tucked behind the trash can that I keep forgetting to throw away. The toothbrush on the top shelf of my medicine cabinet. And then, my personal favorite, the underwear that I bought in the early days of the relationship.
Yep. The Victoria's Secret timeline of relationships. Single women should buy stock in Victoria's Secret (LTD, NASDAQ) so that we can at least have some sort of fiscal return on the investment. The VS timeline is a lace bordered reminder of every guy who got lucky enough to see the goods. It's also a reminder of how it felt buying that little scrap of nothing to wear for someone special. There's adrenaline involved when buying pretty sexy things for someone new to see. Along with a tinge of guilt when new guy sees something I've worn for someone else. But a girl is not about to throw away perfectly good panties just because of a breakup. We have way too much common sense for that. Consider it recycling.
Sometimes, it's a little baffling opening up the lingerie drawer and seeing the ghosts of boyfriends past staring at me through lace eyelets. Granted, since I'm all single mom and stuff, I have very few exes staring at me. They're all colors, black, white, pink, mauve...But the blue ones, those ones are for me. Along with all my sturdy cotton numbers. (Sorry boys, you get no credit for those) The nice thing is being able to close the drawer, and send those ghosts packing. Back to the deleted file.
Yep. The Victoria's Secret timeline of relationships. Single women should buy stock in Victoria's Secret (LTD, NASDAQ) so that we can at least have some sort of fiscal return on the investment. The VS timeline is a lace bordered reminder of every guy who got lucky enough to see the goods. It's also a reminder of how it felt buying that little scrap of nothing to wear for someone special. There's adrenaline involved when buying pretty sexy things for someone new to see. Along with a tinge of guilt when new guy sees something I've worn for someone else. But a girl is not about to throw away perfectly good panties just because of a breakup. We have way too much common sense for that. Consider it recycling.
Sometimes, it's a little baffling opening up the lingerie drawer and seeing the ghosts of boyfriends past staring at me through lace eyelets. Granted, since I'm all single mom and stuff, I have very few exes staring at me. They're all colors, black, white, pink, mauve...But the blue ones, those ones are for me. Along with all my sturdy cotton numbers. (Sorry boys, you get no credit for those) The nice thing is being able to close the drawer, and send those ghosts packing. Back to the deleted file.
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