My 20s in Sentence Fragments

This post was inspired by this.

I turn 30 four weeks from today.

***

Drag queens. London. Busted lip and tits out. Acting in a garden. Grateful. Berkeley. Apartment 8. Making out all night. Walk of shame. Fiona Apple and scraping paint. Flappers to Rappers. Call the cops. Climb up my balcony. Shots shots shots shotsshotsshots. Cacophony. Splattered walls. Best friends. Going to class hungover. He told me he was sad and I was the only person who would understand. Falling in love with the wrong person. Writing songs. Running away. Smoking weed and listening to Jeff Buckley. Food poisoning stoned. I need him. Breaking down over the sink because I felt ugly. Hooking up with a freshman. Making art and graduating. 

New York City. Is this still home? Sublet in Brooklyn. Unemployment saga #1. Soliciting for the North Shore Animal League for two weeks. Iced coffee with half and half and sugar. 12 hour days on my feet outside in August. Quitting. 23 interviews in 4 months. Chinese food for lunch and dinner. Living on Luna bars. Dripping sweat under a skylight. Watching Starting Over with Iyanla Vanzant and Garden State. Bleeding out money. Storms, dripping ceiling, fly infestation. Soho loft. Commuting on the F train. East 66^th Street and York Avenue. Filing for hours and ordering pizza for office lunches. Reading blogs. Mom leaving 2^nd  husband. Sobbing on a train platform. Frequenting Off the Wagon near NYU specifically to make out with boys in corners. None called. Smoking cigarettes on lunch breaks and my commute. Convinced I needed to go to a mental institution. First and only black out on New Year's Eve. 

Apartment in Park Slope. Bar up the street. Within walking distance of childhood home but feeling a world away. Starting a blog. Heavy heart. Self-hate. Feeling lost and alone. Writing to soothe. Crying on the train home from a bar. Deciding to leave New York. There is nothing for me here. Grad school? Revelation of future. Volunteering with kids, and I can breathe. Quitting my job. Moving across the country. Again.

San Luis Obispo. No money. Living with mom. White wine and American Idol. Three productions in eight months. Fast and furious connections. Becoming a gym rat. Feeling hot. Grad school! Boston! Is this home? Apartment down the street from my cousin. Who are your people? Why are you here? What is your work? Joining Facebook. Breakdowns in class; I don't know if I can do this. Debilitating anxiety. Talks about race and age and sex. Letting go. Teaching at camp, which fulfills a decade-long dream. Teachers drink. Student teachers drink more. Writing a play. Revealing a wish to be myself. Crying in despair and grief over chicken nuggets. Champagne and cookies to console me. Graduation and tattoos. Another summer at camp. The room changes when I am in it.

Unemployment saga #2. Hours-long interviews. Commiserating at McDonald’s. Chin hairs and lactose intolerance. Elle is born. Defending my work experience. Feeling proud but frustrated. Writing a novel. Fighting for a dream job and getting it. Online dating. Falling for an alcoholic. Redhead. Gaining confidence in my work. Getting a smartphone. Heartbreak and heart full of kids. Discovering and gaining pride in my body.  Hooking up with a cheater. And then another one. Living with an alcoholic. Kicking both alcoholics out of my life. Brunette. Trampolining. Yoga. Excelling in my work. Finding my voice. Always learning. Feet on the ground and head up. Moving forward steadily. 

Overheard at Work, vol. LXXV

This was the first week in over a month where I felt like I could breathe for part of it. I got a lot done but also spent a lot of time with the kiddoes.

Even though it's currently under 60 degrees out and raining, we are beginning to plan summer in earnest. Too weird that it is almost June.

Also, I was chosen to chaperone a trip to Disney World with seven teens at the end of August.

NO BIG DEAL!

11-year-old girl: What's kudos? Is that a kind of booger?

8-year-old boy: I can't use the phone. It keeps making distraction noises!

10-year-old boy: LOOK, ANNIE! *sniffs* I'm sick!

Me: What are you doing?
16-year-old boy: Standing on a chair. Acting like George Bush.

14-year-old girl, to 12-year-old friend: You know what ROD stands for?
12-year-old girl: Ride or Die.
14-year-old girl: You know what SOS means?
(silence)

16-year-old boy, to his friend, who was complaining about not getting chosen to go to Florida: You need some bricks to build a bridge and get over it.

Colleage, about me: She will find what ever problem is happening in my brain with her eyes.

Overheard at Work, vol. LXXIV

All I want after this week is to run away for a weekend, hide in a hotel in a town I've never been, turn my phone off, and have quiet time.

I didn't expect it to be such a breakneck-speed week AT ALL, and that's the hardest kind of week to get through. The unexpectedly busy one.

It was a week of long meetings, frantic phone calls, catching up on paper work, planning final projects, and one special event.

Fewf.

My 11-year-old twin wrote a story this week:

"The Amazing Life of Annie Kee"

(In yellow marker) On a warm summer day, Annie likes to cuddle with friends.

(In green marker) On a cool winter night, Annie likes to sing Christmas songs.

(In red marker) On a warm spring day, Annie loves to sing Backstreet Boys.

(In purple marker) On cold falls, Annie likes to eat chow mein.

Me, commenting on a colleague's relationship status: I don't think he's ready for marriage.

11-year-old girl: I'm not either.

11-year-old girl: I don't want to turn 12! I want to be 11-teen.

9-year-old boy, as I made faces at him on the bus: You look like you're getting beat up by an elephant...You look like you're beating up an elephant...Just with your face...Strong enough to fight a lion!

Overheard at Work, vol. LXXIII

Well. We all survived the week after the event.

It was actually remarkably quiet and relaxed. I spent most of it reconnecting with my office mates and spending time with the teenagers, as they prepared their applications for summer employment.

That's right.

I said SUMMER.

Itissoclose.

12-year-old boy: OW! My kidneys! (as he falls on the stairs)
Me: Your kidneys are in your back.
8-year-old boy: I got kidneys in my back. (flops onto the floor)

Me, to a 7-year-old girl, who was throwing her body around the office: What's wrong with you?
Girl: I like to dance!

8-year-old boy: (after an epically long story about bugs) I had to stay calm so the bee wouldn't smell me.

8-year-old boy: (quietly and to himself) I'm a buttface.

16-year-old boy: Who's Franklin Duh-LEE-no?
Me: Franklin Delano? He was President of the United States?
Boy: Oh! I thought it was some Spanish dude!

Me, as we were discussing (jokingly) whether a 16-year-old boy (who was present) was autistic: He has everything else neurologically wrong with him.
Boy: And everything else neurologically RIGHT!