Category: San Fran Girl

Migrate Love Story

This morning, I heard the honkings of the first geese of the season returning to their northern homes after a winter spent vacationing in the southern sun. Their appearance is one rung in the ladder that leads my community from the desolate depths of winter up and out to our long-awaited Vermont summer reward. After brunch with my friend, Gina, I ventured downtown to Uncommon Migrate Love StoryGrounds, navigating through a flock of college kids who had migrated down the hill after a winter spent in their dorms. I even saw the obligatory fraternity brother wearing his shorts approximately two weeks too early, which is yet another rung in that ladder.

I’m now sitting in the back of the coffee shop at a table at which, 6 years earlier, I awkwardly made conversation with a blind date. The blind date didn’t lead to anything (as was often the case back then in that infamous 2003) except a string of more blind dates at other Burlington establishments. In fact, if hard-pressed, I’m sure I could think of a date for 90% of the restaurants, bars, theatres, parks, and barns in the area. Let’s face it: the longer you live somewhere, the easier it is for you to find the remains of past heartaches splattered like graffiti love poems on the walls of businesses. If you add in the heartaches of all of your friends, you’ll find every inch of town covered with the tags of exes.

Migrate Love StoryLast summer, while she and I were experiencing our respective relationship heartaches, Sarah the L and I noticed what seemed to be a trend in our generation: all around us (i.e., friends, relatives, coworkers, friends of friends, new roommates, etc.), couples were breaking up. Even Ms. Darling and I bonded over our respective break-ups. There was no overlooking it; the Summer of 2008 was the Summer of Lovesickness. I asked Sarah the L recently if she had any theories as to why this happened. Jokingly (I think), she blamed Barack Obama. She said in a “year riddled with messages of ‘change’ and ‘hope,’” … people couldn’t help but wonder if they should upgrade their Bush for an Obama. She also thought the Summer of Lovesickness could be explained by a person’s reasonable tendency to respond to a friend’s “personal growth through trial” by reflecting on needed growth in his/her own life. Humans are impressionable creatures and for the same reasons a floor of college girls ends up on the same menstrual cycle by the end of a semester, a group of close friends most likely travels similar emotional-growth routes.

I posed this question to Sarah after a quick glimpse at an ex’s Facebook page (you do it, too) confirmed what I had long-before assumed: Hypothetical was now married (thus making her boyfriend’s Hypothetical now her husband’s Factual) and consequently, had become yet another in a long line of exes who had married the first serious boyfriend she dated after me (an ever-expanding sorority of women that also includes Widget, The Redhead, Stalker Girl, and The PT [it’s also worth noting that San Fran Girl and I never officially dated, but after our falling-out, she started dating the man to whom she’s now engaged]). This confirmed my long-standing belief that at some point in my life I had become Penultimate Man, the noble super-hero doomed to a life of boosting various women’s self esteems just enough for them to spread their wings and fly off to their future husbands. Considering I boosted Ms. Darling’s self esteem before sending her back to her stripper-loving ex, I wouldn’t be surprised if she got engaged to him within the year.

After spending a day contemplating my curse (aka, my exgirlfriends’ blessing), I asked Sarah what she thought it would take to become Ultimate Man. She wasn’t entirely sure because she has been dealing with similar demons, but she hoped one day soon she could rip open her shirt to show the world the blaze of UW (Ultimate Woman) across her chest, thus confirming my long-standing belief that she’s an exhibitionist.

Because I’m convinced that it is the perfect metaphor for every situation in life (including concerns about one’s penultimate tendencies), I’m yet again reminded of rock climbing. I haven’t talked about my adventures with rock climbing recently because after steadily improving for two months, my climbing skills have frustratingly hit a plateau. I should have known my progress would eventually decelerate: I have a history of excelling at a learned skill (e.g., guitar playing; mathematics; chess) only to reach my natural limit beyond which I can’t improve without prolonged resolute training, something my Benchly-of-Many-Skills, Master-of-None will-power has prohibited me from ever accomplishing. I’m determined to excel at this sport, though, and so I’m doing the only things in my control to ensure that that happens: consistent practice, and learning from other climbers. And as I direct my climbing questions to more experienced climbers, because I’m terrified of being Penultimate Man forever, I pose my relationship questions to my friends.

In addition to Sarah, I solicited love advice from CP and she responded with disbelief that I had asked her; she doesn’t consider herself an expert on relationships, though, she noted, her relationship had thus far survived 10 years. But truthfully, as much time as Sarah and I spend pondering how to keep love afloat, and as painfully educational as our break-ups have been, and as much success as CP has had at cultivating her love, and as much unsolicited Migrate Love Storyadvice as I’ve received in the last year, I honestly don’t think any of us have any idea of how to succeed at love with or without really trying. If you think I’m wrong, just look at our society’s divorce rates.

Uncommon Grounds is closing soon and I’m afraid, my dear readers (read: reader), that I don’t have an answer for you. I wonder if I ever will. And as I prepare to venture home against a gorgeous sunset backdrop (with views like this, can you blame the geese for coming back each spring?) while being serenaded with the sounds of college kids and geese, a bird that spends the majority of its life devoted to its “mate for life,” I can’t help but wonder if maybe I’m just looking for the answers in the wrong place.

It sucks to be me

I’m about to contradict the mood of my previous posting so bear with me…

Mama Benchly is a bit of a drama queen. And if you tell her I said that, I’ll forever deny it. She has a tendency to make situations in life seem more traumatic or intense than they really are. She’s the one who, during the Cold War, when asked if our family could build a bomb shelter, sat down on the porch with her two youngest children (I was 9 at the time) and said, “if there’s a third world war, life wouldn’t be worth living so our family will sit out here on the porch and wait to die.” She’s also the woman who treats every goodbye as the last goodbye, even if you’re just leaving the room to go to the kitchen. You’ve probably noticed by now, from the extremes of my blog postings, that I’ve inherited the same emotional genes as my mother.

A little over a year ago, I met a woman named San Fran Girl (long-term friends of mine will notice I’ve dropped a certain adjective from her nickname). Emotions between us became very intense very quickly, so much so that, within weeks, we had purchased plane tickets for a week-long vacation in San Francisco. And unfortunately, this trip turned disastrous when the pendulum of our emotions swung unexpectedly to the other extreme. When the roller coaster came to a complete stop, I was torn apart by what amounted to only a 3-month experience.

I took quite a bit away from my brief encounter with San Fran Girl, but what impacted me more than anything else was my new mindset that I plagiarized from a souvenir button I purchased while San Fran Girl and I were in New York City to see the Broadway show Avenue Q: “It Sucks to Be Me.” After our falling out, when I felt like life couldn’t possibly get any worse, this $5 button, purchased to support various charities, seemed to perfectly summarize my woes. She dumped me? It sucks to be me. My car died? It sucks to be me. I’m frustrated with my job? It sucks to be me. I ride the Loser Cruiser? It sucks to be me. I wore the button like my Scarlet Letter of Rejection. And for nearly a year, I believed its message.

Last month, I pinned my “It Sucks to Be Me” button on one my traveling bags and headed off to the airport for the first leg of my Ultimate Road Trip: New Orleans (URT 2). After numerous delays, no guarantee that the flight would take off, and the Near Death Experience airline representative saying “if the flight doesn’t take off tonight, we can’t get you on another one for 6 days,” I decided my only option was to get a full refund, rent a car, and drive to Long Island where the URT 2 was set to begin in just 12 hours. I drove the 6-hour trip on one cup of coffee, one cup of hot chocolate, two sodas, and one and a half tanks of gas. My thought at the time: it sucks to be me.

And then the URT 2. Our below-sea-level room flooded during the pseudo-tropical storm and drenched half of my clothing; halfway through the trip, my college friends and I all realized that maybe a week was too long to spend in each other’s company; half of my time-alone day was spent in the hotel room because of the rainstorm and the other half was spent outside and drenched because of the rainstorm; I ran out of money two days before the end of the trip; our swamp tour lacked all wildlife except the occasional and inaudible (English?) comments from our is-he-taking-a-nap? tour guide Glenn; we drove through the night to get home and I woke up in the backseat early in the morning fairly certain that I was the only person awake in our car; I was dropped off near the Brooklyn Bridge at 7 a.m. with no certain idea of how to get to Manhattan; I took the wrong train, which ultimately put me in Harlem; and my full refunded plane ticket meant I didn’t have a return flight home and thus, had no sure way of getting back to Vermont. But for the first time in nearly a year, my thought process wasn’t blinded by the easy-explanation-button. It didn’t suck to be me and here’s why:

Despite the room flooding, I had a roof over my head and (though dirty) dry clothes on my back; I realized that although my college friends and I were spending too much time together, we were dealing with it and making the best of the situation, thus showing the maturity we had gained since college; I spent a day alone in a big city, which is something I never would have had the courage to do a year ago; one of my friends lent me money trusting that I would pay her back in two days; unlike the obnoxiously loud motor boat rides, our swamp tour was in a canoe(!) and I got to paddle(!); we drove through the night to get home and how many people can say they drove from New Orleans to NYC in 23 hours?; despite the short detour, I ultimately arrived at Mia Wallace’s Manhattan apartment where I had a warm bed, a hot shower, and a great friend to keep me company for the day; my trip ended thanks to the 4X100 relay team of the Metro North, True, Sister #2, and Brother-in-Law #1 who all took time out of their days to ensure that I got home safely.

As the Metro North train approached the Connecticut station where my friend True was waiting to pick me up, and as I approached the exit, the traveling bag on my shoulder caught itself on a train seat. In my effort to free the bag, I ripped off the It Sucks to Be Me button, which fell to the floor. With enough time to pin the button back on my bag, I bent down, picked it up, and placed the souvenir in my pocket.