What I do enjoy writing about however, are all the fun little changes that are taking place as I move from my 20's to my 30's. Where once I could stay up until it was time to change clothes and go to class and still be lucid enough to take notes and figuratively kick a frat guy in the balls during open discussion; I now complain if my friends keep me out past 9:45 pm because my boss looks down on when he finds me asleep on my keyboard the next day with 5,000 pages of "d"s and plus signs in place of what should be my board report. The body that once lived on Totino's Party Pizza's (because they were a whole meal for 99 cents) and managed to stay within the same 10 lb. span for the whole four years of college has metamorphosed into something that swells like a blowfish if I even look at a Cadbury Cream Egg the wrong way. The financial aid fairy that used to bring me a check every three months in 2001, has, within a span of 10 years, become the grim reaper known as Sallie Mae who stalks me no matter where I move, demanding my pound of flesh, commanding no less than all of the horror of a music video narrated by Vincent Price.
I cannot cash out my retirement when I leave a job now because I KNOW I AM GOING TO EVENTUALLY NEED IT. I worry about whether I am getting enough Vitamin D. It would be patently ridiculous for me to wear a t-shirt that had any of my spunkier attributes written across my chest in glitter and utterly horrifying to have it emblazoned across the backside of my sweatpants. I no longer believe that I am going to change the world by having profound conversations with friends at any sort of Open Mic night, no matter how late it gets. Things are DIFFERENT now. I'm different.
My expectations for dating are different too. From the time that I was 14 to about 22, I fully expected that the man with whom I would crash into lust/love would be exactly like Chris Stevens, AKA "Chris in the Morning" from "Northern Exposure". That's right, my ideal man was 6'6", understood astrophysics on a level that rivaled Hawking, drove a Harley, lost his voice from witnessing my beauty, would read me Yeats as I fell asleep, wake me up with the soft lull of a bootleg vinyl Kinks album, would build me a catapult to fling my problems away, and top everything off with mind-blowing sex that women would apparently travel hundreds of miles to experience, given the right cycle of the moon.
Of course, I did not think that I would ACTUALLY marry Chris Stevens. He was a fictional character, and by the time that I was old enough to actually have any of my adolescent fantasies turn reality, John Corbett was looking long in the tooth and his turn in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" proved that he had absolutely nothing left to contribute to my sexual development. (In defense of Mr. Corbett as an actor, I will say that he is fabulous on "The United States of Tara".) I just thought it was completely reasonable that, given the person that I was, and what I had to offer (long hair, big boobs, and a big brain), it was not unreasonable to expect my very Oregonian version of a white knight. Without my knowledge though, my ideal was more or less the romantic equivalent of perceiving astronautics as a sound career choice- it actually happens only for a very few, and usually not without first being put through a lot of puking.
I grew though. I dated and not-dated guys that possessed various aspects of "Chris in the Morning". One revolutionary. One artist. One intellect. One with a super silky voice. One who had to stoop to enter older buildings. I flirted with the idea of going for a guy with a motorcycle but decided not to on the off-chance of it working out and becoming that larger woman that wears a leather jacket with fringe on it and terrifies small children when I walk into Mom and Pop diners.
From all these wonderful, hilarious, crazy, intelligent, messed-up men, I learned a truth that I should have learned from the parts of that show that featured Dr. Fleischman- men are riddled with insecurity, baggage, and idiosyncracies the same way that women are, and it seems worse because a lot of them seem to also lack a filter. If we are truly lucky though, the guy that we are with works to overcome those things so that (even it is just for a couple of minutes a day) he can show you that you matter to him through being selfless or profound or protective to you, and that is what helps you to fall for him. (I also learned that if it IS only for a few minutes a day, it does not last long.) If I got exactly what I wanted in exactly the way I want it, there would be no room to surprise me with a sudden burst of compassion, sweetness, or humanity, because it would all just come across as standard works. Portrayals of love do not deserve to turn into Salisbury steak.
I am not going to lie- remnants of Chris in the Morning will always maintain a dormant hold on my psyche that will unexpected manifest itself in the sudden urge to offensive tackle men with longish hair wearing a blue bandana, work boots, and a hawaiian shirt. Getting older though, has helped me to understand that much like the aforementioned Ms. Bradshaw, his off-the-cuff thoughts were also formulated with the help of a writing team- this one featuring art history and Russian literature majors that were just tickled pink to have post-collegiate work in the public sector- causing him to come to his own poignant conclusions at the end of each week.
. . . That said, what's The King of Queens' excuse?
Good night, Cicely.
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