Just Say No to Tourists

"You don't have to go home but you can't stay here."
- "Closing Time"
Semisonic

I have a love-hate relationship with Long Beach, where I live, especially at this time of year.

I love waking up and not hearing horns and sirens outside my window. I love getting home at night when it's dark and humid and the only thing you can smell is the ocean. I love walking on the boardwalk and running on the beach. I love deciding on a minute's notice that I want to walk across the street and camp out on the beach with a book for half an hour and not having to drive to do so.

What ruins my town are the people who don't legitimately live here.

My favorite place I ever lived was Charleston. Sad but true, I grew to acknowledge that tourism was what kept the City alive - and more than once, kept me employed. While it never became any less frustrating to get stuck behind a horse carriage when you were already running late for work, the tourists mostly stayed downtown. In other words, they were somewhat avoidable.

I acknowledge that it's Memorial Day and that it is, indeed, a beautiful day outside (a true rarity these days). My morning started off with a run on the boardwalk - while the boardwalk was slightly crowded, it wasn't problematic. After discovering that I had no milk to make cereal for breakfast, I decided to go food shopping, among other errands.

I went to Starbucks and CVS. I washed my car (which was covered in an entire winter's worth of grime and fresh spring pollen) and headed to Waldbaum's (the one supermarket in Long Beach) to buy food. First, I heard a man asking where they sell "goat" in the store. Last I checked, goat isn't commonly found among chicken and steak - at least not in Long Beach. I tried my best to get through the store as quickly as possible, dodging people and dirty looks from people who stood on their phones with carts blocking the aisles.

Every line was terrible. I chose a line in the u-scan section and tried my best to be patient with the two people ahead of me. The first woman finished scanning - I even stayed patient while she let her sub-10-year-old son run her credit card and press the buttons. Then the next woman began scanning. She had scanned roughly 1/4 of her items when her husband joined her on line with seriously an entire cardboard box full of chicken. Time to switch lines.

I move to the line next to me, which seems to be moving at a decent speed. The people in front of me begin scanning their items, which mostly seem to be those probably less than $1 each containers of generic iced tea. Then, she begins to peel a 30 cent off coupon from each one and try to scan it, unsuccessfully. But no, she will not give up without a fight. After all, there is money to save when you are buying 70 containers of generic iced tea.

To the right of me, there are kids from the City who are proclaiming loudly, "Wow, you know you're not in the City when you can stretch your arms out and not touch both sides of the aisle in the store!" Yes. Waldbaums is like Disney World, isn't it.

I finally leave the supermarket and head home. By this point, all of the decent parking spaces are taken. I see someone getting ready to pull out of a space on the opposite side of the median ... which means you have to hit two lights to get over there. I made the first light and watched the person get ready to pull out of the spot. Then, as I waited at the light, I watched this magnificent cougar in a Mercedes convertible run the light to steal the spot. Nothing like parking a freshly washed car in the sand "parking lot."

Oh, and I forgot to buy milk - the one thing I went to the store for.

My parents invited me out for dinner tonight which seemed like a good plan. Then I remembered I will get stuck in beach traffic driving out there and Hamptons traffic driving back.

FML.

What You Wish For

I turned 30 exactly one month ago to the day. While I felt the usual frustrations with turning a year older, I was trying not to succumb to the feelings of "what does 30 really mean?" In other words, I told myself that I wasn't going to ruminate about marriage, kids, and the whole concept of a future any more than I had at 29, 25 or 21.

When I first moved back to N.Y. from Charleston in 2005, I told myself that it was a temporary stop, a layover, if you will. After being back a year, I created a new master plan for myself. I would go back to school and get my Master's degree to teach English. While I certainly wouldn't make the money teaching elsewhere that I would teaching here (no, I'm not referring to the City schools), a teaching degree would be versatile. I wouldn't get stuck in New York.

I actually declared a major in education my freshman year of college. By the time I finished my lackluster freshman year, I had vaguely switched over to journalism, unsure of what I really wanted. I dug myself a hole, selecting a degree that all but guaranteed I would have to live near a major city to find a job - N.Y., Chicago or Los Angeles. Going back to teach would allow me to go west, move back to Charleston ... the opportunities seemed endless as long as a position was available.

Fortunately but unfortunately, I gave up the idea of pursuing teaching when my current job came my way, offering money and opportunity. At the time, the plan was to "give New York a fair shot" and then consider transferring to Los Angeles within the organization. Last year when I renewed my lease, I told myself that would be my last year in New York. I was ready to go to California to pursue the life I had always dreamed of, this July.

Over the past six months, I temporarily sidelined my plan to move cross-country. I felt like the current state of the economy made it an irresponsible time to make sweeping changes. After all, I could still move out west in another year. While I wasn't happy pushing my dream aside, I felt like I was making a responsible choice for my future.

I planned to move closer to the City this July when my lease was up. After all, I generally spend a portion of all seven days in the City - commuting was no longer worth the headache. I started looking and found (by N.Y. standards) a dream apartment. The apartment boasted amenities atypical of N.Y-area rentals - central air, a washer/dryer and even better, it was brand new. I was content to pay a broker fee, even at a time when everyone insists I should be getting more for my money. For a moment, I felt okay with my decision to stay in New York.

Then, in typical New York fashion, I inexplicably lost the apartment before I even got to sign the lease or pay the deposit, due to a shady broker. All at once, it reminded me how difficult and unreasonable things are here, such as finding housing. Not only do we pay exorbitant rents that are completely not in line with our salaries, we also accept the idea that we will not have air conditioning, more than one closet or a dishwasher for that price. Why should I pay a fee equivalent to one month's rent to a broker when I find an apartment on Craigslist?

Losing the apartment unearthed a wave of emotions, mostly reminding me how much I didn't want to be here. After all, it hardly seems worth it to get so little for so much work and money when I don't even want to live here in the first place. It reminded me that, at 30, I'm not getting more opportunities - I'm getting fewer. Honestly, it feels like a waste of time to be practical and stay somewhere that I don't want to be because I am "thinking of my future." Really, what am I thinking about? How much I don't want to spend another year here, let alone the rest of my life. Every year that I spend here makes it seem less and less likely that I'll ever leave.

Unfortunately, bad thoughts snowball. You start off feeling negative about one thing in your life and it brings to the surface everything that isn't going how you hoped it would. Before you know it, you're having one of those days where everything sucks.

"Woke up today, to everything grey
And all that I saw, just kept goin' on and on
Sweep all the pieces under the bed
Close all the curtains and cover my head
And what you wish for won't come true
You aren't surprised, love, are you"
- "What You Wish For"
Guster

Spring Cleaning

I have exactly seven weeks left in my current apartment - aside from finding a new place, getting movers and remembering exactly how many companies I need to submit a change of address form to, the most daunting task ahead is packing and cleaning.

I just discovered (for the sake of this post) that I have moved 15 times in 13 years. I've had ten addresses. Needless to say, I should be an expert at this packing up and moving gig. Here's where I fail, though - I always wait until the last minute to tackle packing and cleaning, at which point I have amassed enough clutter and mess to cause a total meltdown.

In thinking about this, I've realized that the same can apply, metaphorically, to my life.

An apartment is easier to clean and organize when you tackle it one room at a time, before it becomes a total disaster. By letting go of unnecessary things that clutter my living space before they become overwhelming, I surely can cut down on the time I spend trying to correct it.

My friend Beth and I have had a number of discussions about "toxic people" - everyone has them - whether it's the friend who only calls you when he needs a favor, the ex who likes to flirt with you (even though he is with someone else) or the guy who only comes around on weeknights after midnight. Much like house clutter, toxic people don't go away until you choose to rid your life of them. By waiting to take control of people and situations that make your life feel cluttered and out of control, situations only tend to worsen.

It's time to spring clean - to figure out who I really need in my life and who is still there because, much like the plastic box of "sentimental t-shirts" in my closet, I have yet to figure out how to truly let go. I need to re-evaluate what it is that I really want - I think that I know, but then I see myself making decisions that are in complete opposition to those goals. I need to figure out which people and choices are getting me closer to who and where I want to be ... and which ones are pushing me further away.

It's time to re-arrange.

"And if you really want to shake it off
You gotta re-arrange"
- "The Re-Arranger"
Mates of State

30 Years with Mom

My brother was born in the heat of July, 1976. Although my mom, at nearly 25, looks just as good as any woman who just gave birth to an 8 pound, 10 ounce/slightly late boy, she knew when I came around that those hospital photos would be picture perfect. Fast forward two years and nine months – mom goes into labor with me, decides to style her hair and fix her makeup before I am born. She looks like a supermodel in the photos holding me.

Every time I see a baby or toddler in an uncomfortable itchy lace dress, I am grateful that my mom always let me be comfortable. While she put me in the requisite dresses, tights and Mary Janes for photos and at holidays, she also let me rock a t-shirt with a giant panda on it for the first day of school. To this day, I tease her about forcing me into an Easter bonnet with a massively uncomfortable chin strap when I was probably about seven years old. I thank her for letting me take off my Communion dress less than ten minutes after we got home from church to let me play baseball in the street with my brother and cousin.

I remember as a child, playing hours of games with my mom, countless matches of Rack-O, Memory, Uno and Chinese checkers. I remember laughing until our sides split fast-forwarding the scene in “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” when the mother sings that crappy song while doing laundry. I remember my mom making my brother and I absolutely delicious breakfast for dinner, and alongside her many great culinary successes, her entertaining failures. There was the time when she attempted to poach fish for Chris in wine cooler (sort of like wine, but not really … hey, this was the 80s) and foam billowed out of the pan. I remember that microwaves were going to revolutionize convenient dinner-making as we knew it … but the chicken didn’t need to be cooked for an hour. We could have bounced it off the wall and never let her hear the end of it.

Mom and I have always enjoyed shopping together, even when I was younger, and all I wanted to do was wear my brother’s hand-me-downs. While she admits that she couldn’t have handled a prissy girl, I don’t think she asked for a total and utter tomboy who didn’t willingly wear dresses until the 10th grade, either. One of my favorite moments came when she was in a dressing room with me and we were eavesdropping on another mother-daughter pair in the room next to us. The mother and daughter must have not been seeing eye-to-eye about a clothing choice, as the mom yelled, “This isn’t a democracy, it’s a dictatorship!” Mom and I burst into laughter – to this day, it remains one of our favorite quotes and moments. Years later, we realize it is difficult for us to shop with anyone else because we love to make fun of clothes in the store. It’s never quite as funny laughing at a pair of shoes, only to find out that your shopping companion really thinks they’re hot.

My parents worked opposite schedules – my dad was home with us in the morning and mom was home with us after-school, dinnertime and nighttime, for the most part. To this day, I’m not entirely sure if my dad just really believed in mandatory school attendance or he didn’t want to be home with us during his time off (frankly, I don’t blame him either way), but we were almost never allowed to stay home from school. While I credit this to making me a much better worker who has to be at death’s door to take off sick, I remember feeling slighted by senior year that I never got my requisite “cuts” that everyone else was taking. The year was almost over and mom knew I was antsy. Even though she threatened on a daily basis that college would rescind my acceptance, (does anyone know anyone this have ever happened to?) I remember one day that mom chose to make me very happy. It was probably late spring – before I turned 17 and had my full driver’s license. She and my dad were going into the City that day, probably to see a show. She called the school and had me released at 11. I was able to finally enjoy an almost full skip day. Oh, she also let me take off a day at the end of the year to work at my retail job, too. I think she was just tired of arguing with me by then.

My mom is my best friend. The reason it works as well as it does is because she is my parent first and my best friend second. I talk to her every single day, sometimes multiple times a day, and this has always been the case – whether I lived at home or in Georgia. There was only one time in my life that we didn’t get along well, during my senior year of high school. I think this is a hard time for anyone, as I was trying to exert independence at that age and I was mostly just pissing my parents off. My mom was frustrated by the slacker guy I was dating – to the point that she called my brother at school, begging him to come home and knock some sense into me. I was whiny, defiant and difficult – in retrospect, I’m sure I generally sucked to be around. Once I went away to college, everything changed. We both gained the space we needed and I was able to recognize when I needed her for support, advice or just a good figurative smack upside the head.

I couldn’t count the number of times my mom bailed me out of things – an unaffordable phone bill at college, letting me charge a pair of jeans to her my freshman year, paying for groceries when I couldn’t afford decent food. My sophomore year of college, I got the bright idea to try to “touch up” my own hair, since I couldn’t afford highlights at the time. Two days before I was due to attend a formal event with my boyfriend, (photos galore) I turned my hair highlighter yellow. If you’ve ever done something like this, corrective color is not cheap. I called her late at night in hysterics. She called her hairdresser who offered me advice to hold me over until I could get into a hairdresser the next day. My mom then offered to pay to get my hair fixed and never expected a penny back.

My mom is always there to dispense advice, whether I ask for it or not. Although it is always well-intentioned, sometimes it’s not well-received. One example was when she sent me a copy of that oh-so-awesome mid-90’s cult classic book, “The Rules.” Thanks, mom. Nowadays, it tends to be in the form of news clippings and articles from Oprah.com. My mom used to write me letters in college when they didn’t own a computer and people were just beginning to e-mail. I have every single letter or card she ever sent me. My freshman year, I continued to spiral. My grades were total crap and I lacked direction. She wrote me a seven page letter, detailing her hopes and dreams for me (which clearly did not include a 2.3 GPA and hooking up with frat boys). One thing that stood out the most was when she said that she wanted more for me, that she didn’t want me working a “dead-end retail job.” Coincidentally, I happened upon this letter when I was about 24 and I was working in retail. I wasn’t sure if I should laugh or cry at the time.

My mom had major spine surgery the summer after my junior year, which required round-the-clock care. Due to my dad’s work schedule, it made the most sense for me to be home with her during the day and for dad to be home with her at night. The first weeks when she was bedridden, we adopted a fabulous theme of watching movies where people die. I don’t know how I came upon this great idea, but there are many movies that fit it – “Love Story” and “Beaches” were two of our favorites. My dad came home one day to find us sniffling and sobbing in bed – “Enough of the movies where people die!” Once I switched cinematic themes, she did enjoy “Swingers”, though. By the end of the summer, she was well enough to go see The Cure with me at Jones Beach.

Every time my mom and dad take a vacation, my mom would come home, show me photos and recount what I would have enjoyed. Finally, my dad decided that she and I would benefit from a girls’ weekend away – loosely translated, a girls’ weekend equaled an eight-day cruise to Mexico out of California. It was the first and only time that we have spent that much time together, just the two of us, and we had so much fun. I will always remember trying to make towel animals together on the cruise ship (unsuccessfully) and freezing in Cabo during one of the coldest days in its history. The unsuccessful creation of towel animal sculptures reinforced our lack of arts and crafts talents. For as long as I can remember, my mom and I took on a variety of art projects that always looked like they were done by a four-year-old. Yes, I had a Bedazzler.

I look back on 30 years of memories of time spent with my mom. I remember the things we’ve laughed at when they happened and the things we laugh at in retrospect. I think of all the movies we’ve watched, the hours we’ve clocked shopping and the hundreds of thousands of phone conversations we’ve had. I am always grateful for the close relationship we share and know that wouldn’t be possible if she wasn’t exactly the person that she is. I love my mom for her endless patience with me (I know it can’t be easy), her unconditional love and support, her selfless nature and her way of always making me smile. I love the advice she gives me; she can be opinionated but not judgmental.

Mom - I would never be the person I am today without you to learn from. I would never be where I am today without your constant encouragement and help every time I fall. I am so lucky to have you as my mom and cherish all of the time we spend together.

On this Mother’s Day, I thank you.