Numbing Nostalgia a la November

There were more than just tears shed that night ...

It was an unassuming Wednesday...the 13th day in November...unremarkable on all accounts but one. The morning had passed....in an unstable but familiar pattern of marked highs and terrible lows. 

Swinging back and forth, feeling invincible then vulnerable, in utter bliss then endless despair.  Unrivaled clarity to frozen with uncertainty ... Showing uninhibited love to feeling grave abandonment ... It was in this way that I had spent the last several months... in a state of constant suspense, in anticipation of what the next turn would yield, would it change how I feel, would the search for love lose its appeal.  
It was the very exact type of roller coaster ride that I had vowed, only three months prior, not to take.... And yet as the polarized emotions diluted my thoughts, I let myself believe in the half-truths. I slowly surrendered to the insanity. I was planning a future I knew could never be. 

Am I better off now that I've let go of a crutch disguised as love .... 
My mood was labile...my heart was in overdrive and my mind was in the clouds. Ever so often, between the "high then low and even lower then higher" ... I traversed a level of exhaustion that terrified me... For it had an element of afterlife that shook me.

What I perceived as the tormented bliss of forbidden love .... was simply a scattered array of fleeting unsustainable chaos from the search for love in all the wrong places. that was not love. It was desperation. That filled voids transiently. 

Dreadful Trance

They had spent the morning arguing....pausing only to answer the telephone - jumping back & forth between the romantic facade played-out for the outside world and the sobering reality of their present misfortune.  

The pain was still too raw for words - so in place of words, Hannah threw dishes, passionately & without mercy - she was spiraling towards emotional hysteria. Occasionally, amidst the outbursts of yelling, Hannah would suddenly breakdown...and her anger would dissolve into sadness. The magnitude of her loss, the depth of her suffering - it was more than she could endure. And with each haunting flashback, she died a little more inside. 

In the backdrop of flying china and loud wailing, Peter was himself struggling, albeit silently. Since relapsing a couple months ago, he had started distancing himself from Hannah. Too preoccupied with his own demons, he hadn't taken notice of the subtle changes in Hannah's behavior. Most nights he would come home already buzzed by the half-pint of stoli he had finished on the car ride over - mindlessly yelling out "Baby, I'm home..." - and passing out unaware if she had responded, or if she was even home.

**********************

Now here they were, this morning, with the truth revealed, their lies exposed, and their love lost. The both of them knew there was no going back to their old lives, and yet almost in a state of shock, they were keeping up appearances - for the sake of their family & friends. On the phone with his parents, Hannah watched Peter agree to a family brunch as he picked up broken glass that she had shattered during her last outburst of rage...he lied without hesitance, even volunteering to bring Hannah's infamous red velvet cupcakes -  it was a bizarre conversation. Portraying an image of love felt painfully natural. If only things could go back to the ignorance of yesterday...

**********************

Yesterday, Peter didn't know that Hannah had been pregnant the night of their fateful crash several months ago. Yesterday, Hannah didn't know that the night of their fateful crash, Peter's blood alcohol level was three times the legal limit. Thanks to an undiscovered file of medical bills and hospital documents, they were both made aware of the truth in all its entirety...and no matter which way they looked at it, the truth did not set either of them free. 

**********************

It was storming outside…rain and hail thrashing about, mercilessly. The gusts of wind had knocked over the furniture on the patio….trashcans had rolled onto the road with garbage strewn about. the figure-8 streetlamps were flickering on-and-off, a warning to all around – take shelter, mother nature hath no fury. The sun had retired early that day.  Except for the bursts of lightening, the sky looked dull and lifeless...an eerie shade of grey.

The storm outside mirrored Hannah’s insides. Everything she had known to be good was taken from her. Tears blurring her sight, she fumbled with the lock…her head throbbed from all the crying and shouting. Peter had tried to help but she was inconsolable. As he watched her leaving, he felt the numbing despair of irreparable damage..he had destroyed their future. the loss was insurmountable, the guilt was too powerful.

Hannah stepped out onto the porch, she begged God for an explanation…she needed a reason…why had this happened....how could she find hope in death?

Fog Clears but Fire Burns

As long as there is fire, there will be smoke .... Smoke unshields your heart, it fogs your judgment. And in the daze, you fall in love ... you feel what you've never felt before and it's so special you can't imagine life without it. 

And then reality invades your fantasy ... The fire begins to fade .... The dream of happy slowly dissipates. Yet the love remains. Like a rock, the love remains. And a delusional sliver of hope, it desperately lingers. Too proud and too vulnerable to let go. The ensuing imbalance wreaks havoc.

Without a spark to light your match, you simply drift in an air of lonely. It's a nauseating, haunting loneliness. After all, the perception of broken love is not a simple idea to swallow. You live with the aftermath, the numbing emptiness, the dysfunctional days followed by restless nights... The world is shouting at you to pull it together ... You force your mind to start picking up the pieces of the shattered past...hoping your heart will follow ... But your heart only weakens ... Unable to regrow what it once had: stability, strength, spirit. 

Once upon a time I knew the love that breaks your falls, breaks through your blues, breaks down the walls, and loves you for you.

But alas some things cannot be salvaged. And we must choose to bury the pain or burn the end of what remains . What we must never do is try to fix what was never ours. 

xoxo
ElyVas

Sequelae of ...

I haven't been good to myself. and in subtle ways, slowly but surely, it's catching up to me. Some nights I wish I could take a break. Being alive in the circumstances of my life feels like I'm dying a slow death. It would be far less painful to speed this up. I'm in no shape to help the world...I cannot even help myself. The contrast between who we are in a crowd and how we feel in solitude - it's telling of our happiness.

I'm so afraid I can't do it anymore. I can't keep pretending. It's not a part of who i am. I'm a fucking mess with no drive to clean myself up...just fear of my own demise - the long-term sequelae of abuse and misuse.

The Mexican Mashup

I am in a serious state of shock. this is what natural disaster survivors and war refugees go through...it's post-traumatic stress and it's no joke at all. The near-death event that I speak of justified popping a few xanny tabs - on the spot...and will probably warrant at least half-a-dozen emergency (unannounced) trips to my shrink. He better clear his schedule because I've got a lot of debriefing to do.

What happened was that a clan of Mexicans - overcrowding a 1996 Chevy Impala - didn't put the foot-to-the-pedal fast enough as I drove up to the traffic light. Or maybe the one-three-many Mexicans in the backseat impeded the car's acceleration. Whatever the case, I ended up gently love-tapping them. Yea, that's right, it's called a LOVE-tap, my people. And guess what...love makes the world go round. Love is the reason you have an extra baby sister... Love is the reason your baby sister looks kinda white ... Or wait that's a different speech ... Ignore the last part ... But like....

Does nobody hear the gospel coming out of my mouth right now? Can you not feel the truth emanating from my body?

Clearly they couldn't...because next thing I know, Mama Sanchez is cursing me to "el diablo's hands." For fuck's sake, a little harsh, don't you think? Devil or no devil, all I could fathom in that moment was how my premium would wrongfully, unlawfully, unjustly skyrocket after this micro-level incident...that would get blown out of proportion, most definitely. So, with all that in mind, you do understand why I did what I did next...

They demanded I show them my "información"...they wanted to know my "identificación"...like WHO DAT IZ AND WHAT IT BE. Oh I will tell you who the fuck I am. Me llamo es Britney Spears, ya'll.

My impromptu disguise gave me a rush I was long overdue to experience ...  And jst like the crashes from..... cocoa puffs (?!) ...my short-lived incognito-induced high was followed by an overwhelming sensation of "my life is shit." Mostly because mamí from south-of-the-border had enough wits about her to know that Britney Jean Spears was a blonde-haired white girl who had a wardrobe consisting only of crop-tops circa "I wore this when I was eight."  I did myself no favors wearing a high-low shirt-dress with leather-sleeves. (Midriff obvi unseen). Not to mention that the only "blonde" in me came in the form of occasional one-liners that were one-half ditzel ("did she really just say that?") and one-half dynamite ("Brilliant satire, encore!").

But enough with all the geometry (?) references...

I was truly one Spanish prayer (or curse?) away from stat-paging my private jet to come rescue me from the outskirts of the mainland. Like, fuck, my goodness, ayuda me, ayuda me. I may be real but I'm no "Jenny from the Block" real.

Come to think of it, only "bloc" I know is the legendary music group "bloc party." (I stiiiiilll run to the song "2-More-Years" ... 9 years later!) Oh and like "blocks" of cheese ... from France...no, wait, from Fraaahnsay...you know, the ones that smell like shit but sound trés stylish & are innately snobbish. You drop one of those names at a dinner party and it's like instant dose of culture. People start bowing down to you as if you created the cheese with your own god-damn hands. No thanks to the fat ass cows churning butter somewhere in Asia.

What the fuck am I even talking about? Anyhow....after the last time I called airway services, I was strictly warned by father dearest to only call for the jet in true emergencies .  I'm not sure what on earth he means by that because trying to get to SAKS when you know driving might not get you there before it closes....is like more than enough reason if not an absolute indication.

I can't even find enough kami sutrah or whatever the hell my Malaysian dog-walker is always raving about ... To complete this blog post with a dignified ending. Life is just too much sometimes, you know.

Until the next crisis,
ElyVas

qué será, será

The only day of the year I celebrate without holding back....is my birthday. I have no qualms, no apologies, no regrets ... and it's always unforgettable.

All the other "special" occasions throughout the year only bring anxiety and fuel my baseline cynicism. Any "celebration" that I participate in is forced and half-hearted at best.

This new years eve was no exception. From a missed flight to misunderstandings to a freak accident on a ghetto bus.....I ended up stranded at ny penn station. To make matters worse, I had lost my signature fur hat on the subway, lost a glove to the wind as I was texting with frozen fingers, and had almost lost a limb trying to hail a taxi during rush hour. It's not easy whistling & howling while keeping your balance...only a few minutes of flailing my arm at curbside and I was winded. Like "just lit a pipe & ran a marathon" winded. Cabbies speeding by had splashed enough ice/rain/dirt to give me that city stench of liquor & tar mixed with urine. Not even the succulent blend of nectarine & acacia honey could overcome the filthy smell. Apparently Chanel isn't shit-proof. In any case, I tried my best not to inhale...but ummm oxygen is liiiike soooo important to....staying alive.

And at some point during the hell-trek through the north east, I had managed to cut holes into my brand new tights exposing fresh blood that I had been too numb to even notice until now. Recalling the painful fall I had endured earlier (when i basically jumped out of a moving train & landed in all sorts of wrong)...suddenly the blood & the holes made sense. Walking through Manhattan with bloody kneecaps, ripped tights, half-a-glove, and the residue of a banana peel still stuck on my ass, I was the epitome of a moving train-wreck. Not to mention the streaks of eyeliner that had frozen half-way down my cheeks. Shivering as I marched along - muttering profanities with intermittent outbursts of sobbing loudly - I felt utterly insane and dreadfully alone.

It wasn't supposed to be this way!

Perhaps i should catch you up on the events that led to such a shittastic nye.

Monday at work was a hectic scene...Tying up loose ends and finishing last-minute tasks. Half the staff had already started drinking by mid-morning. Had I not been scheduled for a fitting immediately after work, I think I would have been the drunkest fool in the building. I swear no matter how far you get from your adolescent insecurities....there is something about getting measured that brings unwarranted anxiety...especially when the tailor has known you for ten or so years & seen you through thick & thin (literally)...and lets you know if "il culo è grasso...and you've aged a decade...ma le curve - meraviglioso!" If his hands weren't so magical...and his old-italian grin wasn't so endearing, i would've left him years ago. Although, I must say, his honesty is quite refreshing.

Upon leaving Anzio's studio, I headed to a sushi bar to meet a few friends from work. We were celebrating a birthday, an engagement, and the luxury of an entire three days away from the office. It was only supposed to be a dinner...but 3 martinis later it's 2 AM...and I am doing my best to keep it together in front of my co-workers. I had vowed never to let them see me so drunk and so vulnerable. I was determined to get home, catch up on sleep, and pack for my flight the following day! And so I attempted to hail a cab. But I was met with resistance. I kept hearing "there are no taxis on this street.."...."let me take you home." Something about that last line must have triggered a panic button inside my brain...because i panicked. And when I panic, I reflexively do stupid things. I dialed 911 and requested a taxi...stat.

"Where is the emergency?" 

"Operator...officer? Mr. 9-1-1, the emergency is in the streets of this grey city. I need a taxi ... can you help a sister out?"

Needless to say, that conversation ended abruptly. Humiliated and a little confused, I had no idea what I was doing (.... both in that moment and with my life). As exhaustion set in, I eventually yielded to my co-workers suggestions and let them take me home. By the time we all got to Kyle's apt, I was far more sober than I wanted to be...and far more upset than I had imagined I'd be. As the party of five slowly dwindled to a party of two it became increasingly obvious what I was setting myself up for....Although Kyle is the very essence of a gentleman, I was not prepared to become the office drunk & slut ... all in one night. So I convinced him I was alright to drive home with the intent of actually checking into the hotel next door. After securing a room for the evening and requesting a late wake-up call (just in time for that flight I had to catch), I walked into the dimly lit hotel lounge and took a seat by the fireplace. Oh i usually love hotels.... except every once in a while, they do frighten me ... they bring me back to my 10 year old self and the memories .... yes the memories, they haunt me still.... the loneliness bellows around me ... and all I can think to do is run ... run from my emotions, run from my past, all in hopes that one day I will wake up without all the baggage.

And so 3 AM turned into 7 am... and next thing you know I'm waking up to a group of people huddled around me. I had fallen asleep on the couch with the television still on and a host of incriminating things strewn about. God bless the members of that hotel staff....because they turned a blind eye to all that they saw...but oh god it was 4 pm. I had missed my flight.

So we've come full circle. I missed my flight. Followed by the disastrous few hours of traveling (but not traveling). Ending with me checking into another hotel in a different city. But before you all pop a xanax for my sake, rest assured, the last hour of new-years-eve was magical beyond...and all the prior nonsense dissolved into nothingness.

Sparkles & Fairy Dust. Until next time.

ElyVas