Tag Archives: New York City

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Good Time Guys

This summer was an odd one for me. It challenged me to sincerely examine myself and what I want, and gave me the bittersweet opportunity to take a step back and reevaluate my life. Though I was terrified to see what was under all that bright spunk that gave me the alter-ego of someone totally together, I knew if I wanted to succeed, if I wanted to be happy – I had to look under my own hood.

Somewhere between working at a business magazine that wasn’t my thing and being in a relationship that wasn’t exactly healthy, I not only forgot where I stood but where I wanted to go. So when a buzzing and wonderful new job opened the door for me to be happily content in my career – the boyfriend started to lose his luster. Sure, it’s impossible to have all parts of the JAM secure at one time but you can’t have something at home keeping you from being able to pay your bills so you have that lovely home.

So for the last month or so, I’ve been pulling away from what I had to figure out what I wanted. And more importantly, to find that sassy confidence, that style that captures attention, that talk that makes the walk special, that certain something I’ve always had. But what I found wasn’t that something, but a challenge: Lindsay needed to get her groove back. I felt it slipping away because I was spending countless weekends wrapped up in two very burly, studly handsome arms that made me feel good but also felt quite suffocating, too. I didn’t want to be tucked away in Brooklyn – I wanted to be in the city, in my city, with my friends or even by myself. Just as long as I wasn’t wasting away with someone who gave up on gumption and was slowly, bitterly wasting away already.

Maybe it was the sudden upswing of my career or maybe my bulls**** meter just finally boiled over – but about a month ago, I developed a new perspective. The relationship didn’t change, I did. I started becoming more demanding and quicker to complain. I asserted what I needed and if it wasn’t met, I with held my company and found the company of my best friends instead. I made a short list of what I no longer wanted to hear about (like ex-girlfriends, maybe?) and if the conversation developed toward that genre, I turned my head in defiance until it shifted. I stopped being the fixer-upper who made dinner, folded clothes and made sure all was well and satisfied, and I started doing whatever I wanted to do. I took on the role of Mr. P, basically, to see if he would do some role playing with me.

Could he be understanding and doting? Pick up the slack when I relaxed? Give me those things I needed to find happiness and security? Grant my wishes because I felt disrespected when they were ignored? Step up to the plate because I had been holding it with one hand, with even one finger, for far too long now?

And the answer has been ringing loud and clear in the silence of my voicemail, the emptiness of my inbox and the hole that’s growing in my stomach – he may not be a guy for the long haul. He could just be a Good Time Guy.

The always seem like the best kind – don’t they? When you’re in the beginning stages of dating, when you’re first getting to know each other personally and sexually – they are so much fun. You let yourself go, you dance on tables and you stay out later than you normally would because their attention is just so intoxicating. Just being around them makes you feel sexy and beautiful, like this wild little thing who was alluring enough to hold his glance just a second more. You can really talk to them about anything because everything they say just feels so good. Their words and especially their touch make you feel alive, make you feel like you could…

…really fall in love with them. But it’s in that pivotal stage that they become dangerous. Good Time Guys are good times until times aren’t good anymore. When you start to feel stronger than they do, when you begin to need more than what they can offer, when your vulnerability becomes more tender than they can handle – they want you to go back to your Good Time Girl self. They want you to slow down and stop having such deep feelings that they can’t latch onto. They want to pretend the aching elephant in the corner of your relationship isn’t there, and more so, they want you to admit that any type of anything isn’t progressing more than they are comfortable with.

Good Time Guys may want more than the good time – but only if it is on their terms.

And the problem when a Good Time Guy meets a girl trying to get her groove back is that they clash. She’s turning back into the hell on heels she once was, the good time girl that he fell in love with but because she witnessed what he was like when she wasn’t at her hottest…that Good Time Guy stride isn’t as magnetic. Instead when the girl gets in her groove, he starts to look quite pathetic.

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My New York Skin

Standing, waiting, wishing for the train to come after work today, I tapped my heel in frustration. Why does mass transit in Manhattan come to a stammering halt when there is even the smallest trickle of water outside? 

There are always delays with rain for the MTA, and though I know this, it never fails to irritate me. Sometimes as I’m impatiently pacing the platform, I dream of the days when I could just hop in my car, drive myself home while poorly singing along to the radio with the wind whipping through my hair, and not having to depend on anything but my gas tank to get me from the office to my bed. But then I think how the city looks – even from the streets – in rush hour traffic and I count the simple blessing of a MetroCard.

Nevertheless, with my feet soaking wet and lugging around a gym bag and a purse that’s obnoxiously large for a 5’4″ petite woman, all I wanted to do was zone out, listen to guilty-pleasure playlists on my iPod and arrive at my stop promptly. After five minutes or so of glancing at the arrival screen, casually returning flirty glances with a foreign straphanger and triple-checking that I had my wallet, keys and phone, I heard the announcement I dread: Signal delays are affecting train service, no express service uptown, thank you. 

Without the threat of bar soap or penalties for my actions, I let one-four letter word that rhymes with luck (yet is the opposite of it) slip out of my mouth…several times.

I immediately bowed my head and avoided eye contact with anyone around me, while praying the little girl near me didn’t hear my profanity. I casually walked to the other side of the station, feeling guilty for cursing. It was one of my personal commitments after all – I vowed to never let New York change me into the stereotypical, angry city person who casually dropped the Fbomb in every day conversations. I didn’t want to lose any of that sweet Southern charm or dispose of the class I was brought up believing in. My mother always reminded me that a lady’s language doesn’t include “naughty” words of any form, so if I wanted to be treated with respect, I best respect that advice.

But ya know – New York has a way of making profanity sound eloquent. You’re having a great night out with your friends, sharing champagne and appetizers with the streets buzzing within your view, sometimes there is no better way to describe what you’re feeling than f***ing brilliant. Or when the city gives you these amazing nights, these moments that blow any elegant event North Carolina can serve up. I thought for the longest time that interjecting prohibited words into my vocabulary would make me less attractive and would come across as crass – but really, it’s just part of growing up. And frankly, it’s part of New York.

So I lifted my head up high and straightened out the black dress I was sporting – another rule I broke. A few months after I moved, my friend J said I needed more black in my wardrobe, to which I replied: “I love color! I don’t want to be like every other boring New Yorker that wears one shade.” I thought the same thing about my friend K before she was my friend, when she was still a figment of Mr. Unavailable’s imagination before he became Mr. Possibility – she is proud of her dark closet and the dress I happened to wear today is a K Exclusive Hand-Me-Down. Turns out, just like dirty words aren’t as dirty but can be insightful, black isn’t as black as I thought, but rather reliable, sophisticated and rather sexy.

I’ve ditched my sugary phrases for words that have more of an impact, my flowery high-waisted skirts for sleek, fitted, stylish pieces that give me an extra shine – and I’m not ashamed, I thought as the train arrived, finally. As I went to step up, a woman in a hurry pushed me into the side of the cart, spilling her bottled water all over my outfit, and there that word came again, but instead of shying away from it, I let it slide:

Fuck, my dress! 

She noticed what she did and turned around quickly and responded in true Manhattan fashion: Fuck, honey. I’m sorry! Let me get you somethin’. I shooed her away while thanking her for her concern but a little spill never hurt anyone, and really there’s nothing else she could get me – I’ve finally accepted my New York skin.

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I Put My Heart to Sleep

When Mr. Fire and I parted ways, I was sincerely shocked.

He became ancy and distant in the matter of a weekend, and within a week or so, all was finished. He ended everything outside of the library on our campus and it’s been the only time I’ve been thankful for bug-eyed sunglasses. I never wanted him to see my tears. I believe I would have been fine, I would have overcome the split easier and with a bit more class if he wouldn’t have started dating someone the very next day. Facebook displayed pictures as a nice slap in the face to his “I just don’t want a relationship” excuse and I spent the weekend down by the North Carolina shore, drinking and talking to God on the beach.

The worst of it at the time, though wasn’t the weekend that followed. It was the next few weeks that just happened to be during exams and my final weeks before I moved to New York for a summer internship. If I was going to be on my A-game for Cosmopolitan, I had better get over this dude and get over him fast – I couldn’t let my career be in jeopardy over a rugby player, now could I?

And so I did what every girl does when she’s mulling over a man: I defriended him on Facebook (only to add him back a year later when we could entertain a friendship), I rekindled a workout regimen to get my mind off of things (and to look super-duper sexy), I used what was left of my meal plan to buy far too much candy and ice cream (so much for those miles logged at the gym) and I avoided him (and her) at all costs. I threw myself into the school newspaper and I prepared for my summer away like a crazy woman, setting up networking lunches, making lists of all I wanted to see and do while I was there, and sending my friends incredibly long emails that now, I just write on these pages.

All of these tactics worked in my favor and throughout the day, I appeared fine. I didn’t miss deadlines and I didn’t tear-up in class. I didn’t curse his name or their relationship (they are still going strong and from what I can tell from frozen faces on Facebook, they are happy) and I did all that I could to build up the confidence that’s always smashed when someone decides to pass you up.

But then night would come.

I’m not sure what it is about darkness that makes you retreat back into the darkness within yourself, but going to sleep was hell. After a few restless nights, I invested in Tylonel PM and my mom sent me calcium tablets which apparently make you relax. My body quickly rejected both of these methods and I was left again, tossing and turning, trying to calm my mind so my spirit would ease. This was one of the first times in my adult life that I experienced what it was like to go without sleep, yet be haunted by dreams that wouldn’t come true. But it wasn’t really my racing mind or my sore body that kept me awake, it wasn’t even missing Mr. Fire really. What kept me from falling asleep was my own heart. Now, I know that it was beating so hard I could hear it out of anxiety (normal reaction to a breakup) but at the time, I thought:

This must be what it sounds and feels like when your heart literally breaks.

No matter if I laid on my stomach or my side, my back or curled up as tightly as my 5’4″ frame would allow, my heart would pound out of my chest so vibrantly that I couldn’t catch a good breath. Finally, after a week or so of un-sleep, I decided to hold my own heart. It was almost like a motherly reaction, an instinctive move to place my palms on top of my chest, as if I’m soothing something fragile: Hush now, it’s going to be okay. You’re going to be okay. Calm down. 

It didn’t surrender easily. It put up a strong opposition, continuing to race and threaten to bring tears to my eyes, though at that point, I was too tired to really cry anymore. But eventually, with some real effort on my end, I put my heart so sleep.

And once it gave in, once it relaxed and allowed me to sincerely get the rest I needed, I started feeling much better. I started sleeping regularly again, placing my palms on my chest nightly to insure it didn’t feel alone or abandoned. Like I needed to be reminded that I would love again, my heart needed to know that it could rest now, that it didn’t need to worry anymore, that the past person it loved was gone, but there would be more. It needed to know it was alright to let go, it was okay to sleep.

I got through those initial first weeks by holding my heart, and that’s how I get through anything that really upsets me now. Anytime I’m feeling anxiety or I’m really upset, I just hold my heart. I say soothing words until my body releases, my mind stops churning and my heart gives up its fearful rhythm. That was the first time I realized how much power I have over my own body. That no matter how much trouble it felt or how much pain I was going through, I could cope.

And I could do it alone with my own two hands.

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If Memory Serves Me Right

They say when one part of your life starts to excel, another part will ultimately crumble. Maybe it’s the way the universe stays aligned and keeps its perfect order that never seems to satisfy anyone for very long. We can’t have all of the things we want just as we want them or we’d never strive for anything, there would be no reason to have a furious fight inside of you. He who is handed it all will never learn what it feels like to work for something, so therefore, he must struggle.

Even so, when things fall apart the heavens have a simple way of keeping us sane – they never let everything that’s important to us to falter at once. Lighting rarely strikes in the same place twice and there is always something, even if it is a tiny unremarkable thing, to help us maintain our dignity and confidence in the world. Sometimes they are in the comforting words of friends ever-so-dear or in the soothing touch of crisp, cold, linen sheets against your bare body. It comes in the form of unexpected billowing winds inside the subway platform or in the support you depend on from someone you may have not known very long, but feel as if you’ve known them forever.

For me lately, my peace has been found in all of the above along with some magical New York moments I can only accredit as blessings sent from places higher than the Empire State, but most significantly, my calm has been instilled by the power of memories.

Mr. Possibility and I have been going through a very difficult period the last month. With our age difference and the fact that we’re at opposing stages of our lives, we’ve been riding the rough waters, attempting to find an anchor to hold us steady so we can sail into bay safely. Anchors aren’t always to be found though, and sometimes taking a breather and some much-needed space is the best thing any couple can do. And so while my career has been flourishing and I couldn’t be more thankful to finally be doing exactly what I always dreamed of doing, the man who helped me through the ups and downs of the last year, isn’t as sturdy as he appeared.

But I do remember when he was. I can recall the exact moment I knew I loved him – way back in January, while talking on Gchat following the Dubai disaster, and something just clicked. We waited a while after that before we made anything officially exclusive but in those times we spent building up our relationship, building up our connection, he couldn’t have been more beautiful to me. He was attractive in a way that made him human – I saw his shortcomings and I knew his downfalls but I chose to love him anyway, to trust him against my better judgement. Time will only tell if my grandiose hopes about him will ring trite-and-true and prove all of those against us, wrong. And maybe, prove myself wrong too.

It isn’t memories of us that grant me a sweet stillness, though. It’s rather in memories of myself.

I remember those weeks when he was far away overseas, only available to me through the wonderous webs of the Internet, where I had no responsibility to him but to reply to an email or arrive on time to a Skype date. I remember when this city was my dating playground, when though I wasn’t very good at disconnecting my expectations from my emotions, I enjoyed seeing New York from various points of view. I remember when I would dream about a love I couldn’t imagine, about having a man admire me just as my father admires my mother. I dreamed of a great love story, of something that wasn’t complicated or difficult, of something that brought me that easy, peaceful feeling instead of making my heart beat so uncontrollably I couldn’t fall asleep until well into dawn. I remember these moments during this journey itself, even when I knew Mr. Possibility, even when he was sitting next to me as I typed, where I longed to be single, where I finally found that strength to throw caution to the wind and take a chance on finding something great – in a man or in myself. I remember taking myself to dinner and to the movies, to the museum and to the cafe, just to sit in the company of myself, watching the city circulate its people with car horns and buses serenading the developing scenes.

I remember when this city was like Spring to me and I, still without my toughness or doubtfulness, believed in the best of people, the best of Mr. Possibility, and the best of myself. It’s realistic now but it will always be closer to extraordinary in my eyes and far from ordinary. Because even with all that’s happened, all that I’ve given that I can’t get back, all the attempts I’ve made that may not turn into anything of significance, I have those memories of what make me me to recall.

And if I can do it all alone once, of course I can do it again. Only this time, I’ll be a little stronger, a little brighter and have more hope for what’s to come. After all, if memory serves me right, I’ve always had the ability to believe that falling in love isn’t limited to the man who lives on the corner of Hope Street and is ripe of possibilities. Love indeed, begins inside of me and because of that, I can find it anywhere I go.

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You Can’t Screw Up What’s Meant to Be

Hard-to-get jobs and even harder-to-get men, high heels unintended for anyone but Ms. Lady Gaga herself, a city that allows few to make it before they break it, chances that have no reasonable shot in hell…. I tend to be pretty resilient and brave, a fighter who graces dresses and pearls while living up to the name I was born with.

But when it comes to gaining enough gumption to end a relationship…I suck.

Perhaps that’s not the most elegant of words to choose but it’s a pretty fair representation of how I view myself when a love affair turns sour. We all know when those boots should be made for walkin’, we know when the tension has turned from sexual to painful, and when nights are ruined by the presence of your partner, instead of brightened. The truth of any matters of the heart is that they are never easy. And if you’re anything like me, they are extended and lengthy, lingering around for far too long before they come to some immature, emotional and irrational head – leaving both parties destroyed and vulnerable, resenting each other for the past three hours of torture they endured. Not to mention, inflicted on one another. The end of a relationship is a great time-waster and mood killer. That’s when you know it is truly, completely over – when there is no hope for makeup sex because you just want…you need…to get away from one another.

God, it sucks.

My friends and family get to hear about this process the whole way through. They’re so lucky, aren’t they? As I wrangle with my exit strategy, make pro and con lists, go through periods of indescribable bliss that tease me into thinking things can change…only to be brought back down to reality the next day when the picture-perfect something I cooked up, boils over. It’s a nasty little ride I take myself on, a rollercoaster I not only pay for but add thrill to. Funny thing is though, it’s not thrilling but I entertain it anyway, waiting until the very last second before I finally push on the brakes. I barely miss a head-on collision each and every single time. My friend K says it’ll get easier as I date more New York men. I’ll grow accustomed to the process and it won’t be so difficult to turn on my heel and trot off. I’ll believe her when it happens, just as she had to experience it to believe it for herself.

For now though, I’m stubborn and falsely misled by fancy illusions of what a man could be, rather than really seeing, accepting and loving him for who he is. Possibility might as well be the middle name of any man I attempt to date -Lord knows I’ll be trying and trying again, until there is no more opportunity left to be found or piece of my heart to be shattered.

But when I get to that point, it is actually rather simple for me to cut my losses and tighten my ends. The decision becomes clear and my head stops spinning. I still experience the wallowing stages of misery that follow the death of love – after all, nothing dies more painfully or slowly than a dream, especially one that floated on Cloud 9 at one point. But when I decide it is time to leave, when there is no more fun to be had, no more fixing-up I’m capable of, no more squinting to try and visualize a future that never existed – I go. I swiftly get as far away as I can, severing contact and carefully tucking pictures with tattered, loved edges away for safe-keeping. For when it’s safe to look at them again without risking inexplicable sadness. And of course, without going up against the obsessive “What if” thoughts that attack the heartbroken spirit.

What if I would have tried harder? What if I wouldn’t have given up on him? On us? What if I would have been more understanding, more patient, kinder? What if I would have stayed around longer to see what could happen? What if I would have swallowed all of those things I wanted, just to be with him for a few more hours? Few days? What if we were at a turning point and I sealed our fate? What if all this is my fault? What if this is as good as it gets and I’m crazy for hoping for more? What if I walk away from him and he is my soulmate, and then I never find anyone else? What if I’m always alone?

What if I f***ed it all up?

When those thoughts disguised as fearful regrets won’t leave me alone, I remember my mother’s carefully selected words that she planted in my mind a decade ago when I felt so guilty for breaking up with Mr. Faithful after he had been so, well, faithful to me: Honey, you can’t screw up what’s meant to be. 

So tonight, with my two-piece fried chicken dinner from KFC because Southern food will always be my comfort food, a bottle of bubbly left over from ol’ Irene, a list of distracting movies from Netflix and some buttery, awfully bad for me popcorn for later on hand, I repeat her mantra in my head: Linds, you can’t screw up what’s meant to be. But I also add my own ending: you also can’t screw up what was never meant to be either.