I still feel guilt about that March 1997 spring break afternoon.
Coach Willie had arranged for a practice regatta against two other schools (lingua Indiana: scrimmage). Looking back I recognize the coordination that must have gone into organizing the row. Which schools were training down in Tampa? Which ones had the same spring break schedule as us? Which ones were also bringing down novice boats? Willie must have done all of this behind the scenes.
But that wasn’t on my mind as we started paddling towards the starting line. What was on my mind was that I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t row, there was no way in hell I was going to race that day. I buried myself somewhere deep within and completely shut down. Maybe it was a panic attack but all I can remember is telling Maggie in front of me that I didn’t feel well, that I was sick, I couldn’t row, I couldn’t do it.
Had Willie been more like the chair-throwing basketball coach I had in middle school, he might’ve raised his voice and told me snap out of it. “Quit your lollygaggin’, Patrick!” was what Coach Hutton used to bellow, all the more amusing since I was a record-setting sprinter. And who knows, maybe yelling would have helped. Maybe if Mags had been able to turn around in the boat and put her hands on my shoulders and talk me off the ledge, that could’ve helped. Who knows.
But Willie had the mild demeanor of an ultra marathoner, so he simply stated, “It’s too bad I didn’t know sooner. I could have brought an extra rower out on the launch to swap you out.” And so I curled down into my oar, head into my knees, the five seat behind me likely watching her oar flap and bounce and slap along the water as the rest of the team paddled back to the boathouse. Willie looked quietly on from the launch.
I crashed onto a couch at the boathouse and passed into blackness for a few hours, not knowing why I’d shut down and certainly unable to switch myself back on. The bright Florida sunshine and boisterousness of the rowers buzzed around me, but there I was, a lump on the couch. Broken. Down.
I had disappointed my entire boat. And to this day I am not entirely sure how or why that happened.
* * *
The Sunday after New Year’s Day, I broke one of Pablo’s wine glasses while washing dishes at his apartment. When he returned home from the gym, I stood up with mock seriousness and announced, “I have some bad news to report.”
He blinked at me with expectation. He looked nervous. My acting chops must be better than I thought!
I reported the broken glass, but assured him, “Don’t worry, I have dozens of wine glasses so it shouldn’t be a problem once we theoretically cohabitate.” He’d been talking about getting married and having babies and moving in together since practically the moment we met, after all, and we’d recently agreed to move in together when his lease expired in March.
“Well,” he said, turning to put down his bag, blinking, “I have some bad news too.” He paused, and suddenly the air felt like gravy. “I renewed my lease. I’m not ready to move in with you.”
And so there it was. We were at the starting line, and yet, he couldn’t row.
And so I looked down at my luggage, opened it up, filled it with my belongings, and rolled away.
* * *
“Well, there go my 2010 goals!” I thought, huffing the six blocks or so to my own studio. “And damn, I just blogged about them, and then published the post to my open Facebook feed. Argh!”
And then, “This is what I get for trusting someone!” But I quickly batted that mosquito-thought away. Humans are humans; they’re not predictable lines of IF THEN code, and just as I discover new and interesting things about myself each day, so too does everyone else about themselves. So what if he had claimed he wanted to get me pregnant? Man, every dude with half a brain probably “thinks”, on some level, that he wants to get me pregnant.
But the river moves, and the moment you try and freeze-frame it, it ceases to be a river.
I was sifting through some papers in my office the other day, attempting to declutter that thing so I can open up a think tank co-op of sorts, when I happened upon a print-out of a blog post from a few years ago.
But now the streets of Brooklyn, once pure, have been tainted with the sour hue of failed relationships. The Park Slope photographer, the Park Slope film director, the unemployed guy in Greenpoint, the social worker in Prospect Heights: fits and starts, the engine stalls, fifth gear is never reached.
I’m a high octane woman. I can do better than this.
“Wow,” I thought. “What a bitch.” Better than? And the only data points provided are the careers of the men in question?
Good gravy. It made me squirm to face up to those words I’d written just two and a half years ago. And yet those were mine, and there’s the time stamp, and, ugh.
Of course, the lens through which you see other people illuminates the lens through which you see yourself. Of course I would say something obnoxious about being “better than” a man of “insert job title here.” Because my value as a human being was woven into my job title. So his was, too. QED.
* * *
And then this weekend I heard myself telling the story of the night I lost my virginity. I said the nickname of the V-card bandit – a name that had easily rolled off my tongue for years – and something inside me recoiled as I said it. Now I heard a derisiveness in the moniker, a cutting tone to which I’d been deaf before. I don’t think I’ll ever say those words again, not like that, and it’s curious to me that I once used to toss them around like a softball. Cherry Poppin’ Jew. Egads, even typing it makes me itch. Of course, Cherry Poppin’ Philosopher doesn’t have quite the same poetry to it, but hey, perhaps I no longer need to bundle humans up into tidy, clever bows. Perhaps he can simply be the guy in college that introduced me to Brad Mehldau, Ravel’s La Mer, and actual Webster’s definition sex.
But how interesting that I’m sensitive to my jerky ways of yore, and yet, I’m simply not feeling mope-a-dope as expected about the end of the “most serious” healthy relationship I’ve had in my adult life. It isn’t to say that we didn’t share good times and warm feelings for one another. But perhaps, too, already in the weeks apart I can enjoy a clarity that front-and-center does not always afford. Maybe I can see the 6H pencil sketch of a pattern around the edges of certain behaviors, certain comments. The pattern of someone not unlike the woman I used to be – a little bit angry, a lotta big judgy, and always. With. The clever.
Well, I know how I feel about some of the things I used to say back in the day. They make me blush, and not in a good way.
And so maybe this is why, when my friends ask how I’m doing, I can honestly tell them, “I’m doing great. I feel really content.”
* * *
Of course, there remains the pesky matter of 2010 goals! Fortunately, I am never lacking with things to do and schemes to execute. And so here we have my top five goals for February:
- Cook nutritious meals!
- Stay on top of the day to day, e.g., bills and clean socks and plenty of toilet paper!
- Chuck it!
- Meditate, downward dog, warrior 72.6, sudarshan kriya, etc.
- Sublet the apartment for when I’m out of town
So there you have it, folks. I guess I won’t be marrying that boy from Ohio after all. And while I’m deeply at peace with this …
I still feel a little guilty about depriving my teammates of an opportunity to scrimmage in Tampa against those two other schools oh so many years ago.
I’m sorry, ladies. Let me know if you want me to cook you up a nutrient-dense dinner.
xo
Posted by Anittah Patrick -
February 1, 2010
