she moves she

Last year on my birthday I decided to treat myself to a massage.  This place called Thousand Waves Spa in Chicago.  It seemed like a great idea.  You get to indulge in the spa facilities before your massage, drink tea and hang out in this big Relax Room that has lots of flowy curtains hanging from the ceiling.  That part was nice but the actual massage was terrible.  I told the chic to go with heavy pressure.  She took me seriously.  It hurt like hell.  I kept thinking that every painful knead was the last one so I never did tell her to back off. I was in pain for most of the hour that I had to pay $95 for.  After that I felt strange.  Massages release toxins into your blood stream and she must have released some demon toxins because I felt depressed, irritable and I was in mucho pain.  So I’m toxified and in pain wandering around Lakeview trying to get a cab.  Finally, I nab one and we’re on Southport, about eight blocks from my place when it rear ends a Mini Cooper.  Crash.  Bang.  Zap.  Depressed, irritated and hurtin’ I throw some money at the cabbie and walk the rest of the way home. 

I try to take a nap but I feel terrible.  Odd.  Off.  Toxic!  I decide to order a pizza just for myself.  An hour and two liters of water later the pizza arrives.  I go out to get the thing and lock myself out of my apartment. I’m holding a hot pizza, I’m starving and my keys and cell phone are behind two very thick locked doors.  I can’t help it, I let a few tears spring up and out in front of the Mexican delivery guy.  “I locked myself out of my apartment,” I say as I’m holding the pizza.  “Oh…that’s bad,” he says.  I cry some more then say, “You’re gonna have to help me crawl through the window.”  He looks at me dead pan either because he didn’t understand what I said or because he’s suddenly found himself in a Made for TV Movie situation…actually it seems more like a Made for Cinemax situation.  Either way, he’s a little freaked out. 

I end up getting back into the apartment by banging on the back windows in hope that my roommate’s slumbering bear of a boyfriend might be there to open the door.  Turns out he was, he’d been there all day sleeping off the flu.  I thanked the delivery man for waiting for me, then go in and cry a little more while eating some pizza alone.  I blame it all on the toxic massage.

This year, I spent some time up in Blue Ridge, Georgia.  It’s one of my favorite places in all the world.  A little cabin just an hour north of Atlanta, nestled in some mountain trees, with a porch overlooking a river.  It is heaven.  Being there means ultimate laziness and nature.  River romps and apple pie and bargain shopping in downtown Blue Ridge. 

While there, I got the phone call I’d been waiting for.  Last week I interviewed for the Marketing and PR Manager at The Birmingham Zoo.  On Friday they called and offered me the job.  It was described to me as a “high profile” job.  Meaning that I’m the media contact for all zoo business.  TV interviews?  Radio spots?  That’s me.  Plus lots of other things like website maintainence and newsletter and magazine production.  All this goes on at the zoo.  Outside my office: parrots, peacocks, ducks, camels, etc. etc.  This is a huge deal. 

This year, my birthday (and the days surrounding it) is remarkably better than the last one.  Except for one of my crowns breaking while eating lunch today.  Now when I smile, I have a huge black hole in one of my molars.  It’s so very sexy. 

And for the birthday dinner?  I had my choice of anything.  This past summer having provided me–in abundance–with literally every food I could possibly ever want (thank you Adam) I made a simple choice for the Bday Dinner:  Pizza & Wine.  A damn fine combo. 

Cheers to me.  Cheers to 27.

It has been three weeks since I loaded all my belongings into a trailer and headed south to Alabama.  I’m living in a little cottage in a town called Mount Olive, which is fifteen minutes north of Birmingham.  It’s strange to find myself back in a place so familiar after living in Chicago for four years.  I grew up in Mount Olive (population 3,000).  I’m literally driving down roads that lead to my elementary school, high school, the house I grew up in.  In a sense I’m closer to the Past than I have ever been, which blurs the lines of identity and time.  Exactly where do the past and present meet?  And how does the Me From the Present adjust to the surroundings of the Present-Past?  It’s the Me of Today meeting the Me of Years Gone By.  Neither can be ignored and neither can exist on its own.  I suppose nature will take its course and out of this blurriness will evolve a newness that can only result from two entities accepting one another.

Only as you age can the Past become a word deserving of a capital letter.  I have only now realized that.  Up until now I do not think I had a Past.  Bringing a different Me home to my roots feels like it caused a rift in my space-time continuum.  Driving into the city during week one, I said out loud with the utmost sincerity, and concern for my mental well-being, “When am I?”  For a brief moment I felt all at once that I was on my way to class or rehearsal at UAB, that I was home from Chicago visiting for the holidays, and headed to meet a friend for lunch after moving back home.  Three very different stages of my life.  I suppose when you attach a setting to a point in time, there will be confusion when you go back to that setting.  Or when you have a strong emotional attachment to a time or place then you attach identifiers to them.  For example, Fall in Chicago always reminded me of beginnings because it was Fall when I moved there and certain temperatures mean love and electricity because I fell in love one January.

So now, the timid scent of Alabama and all the rolling hills are becoming something other than the Past.  It is now the Now.  I’m loving it more than I thought I would.  I’ve been eating lots of milk and cookies.  I’ve been reading lots of books.  I’ve adopted the rouge, neighborhood cat and named her “Detective.”  I’ve reconnected with familiar faces.  I’ve watched all of Planet Earth and have moved on to The Blue Planet.  I’ve painted my front door.  I’ve bought new shoes.  It’s a new life but an old life.  It’s wacky-colored, unusual, refreshing.  It’s a new, wild perspective.  It’s a Picasso.