here's an internet poem - it's called, "my ipod/feelings on shuffle"

the first feminist I ever knew of

by your side

Growing Out

Yesterday I learned that no one grows up. 

The party that my werewolf counterpart previous mentioned was probably the most necessary experience I’ve ever needed to have, because I always forget, for whatever reason, that there are 40 year old people out there who aren’t my parents. 

My parents are 55 years old, but when they turned 40, they forever remained 40.  I still think they’re 40.  They look 40.  They feel 40 to me, and they laugh at me when I tell them that.

But I forget that there is an actual generation composed of actual 40 year olds.  I’m so used to interacting with people who are either my age (ish), or people who could be my parents (i.e. professors, doctors, my parents) that I forgot there are people who were 25 when I was 10 and that they have kids now. 

And this is probably the reason why I’ve been so scared of “growing up”, or whatever.  Because I never saw the transition between 25 and 55.  I would look at my parents in awe – “How did you… get here?  You’re so smart. You have things and kids and an RRSP and you don’t hate me and you know what a mortgage is.” (note:  I don’t know what an RRSP is and I had to spellcheck “mortgage”)

But there is so much life in between!  There are so many years and our 20s and our teens are not these fleeting moments that we will forever long for when they’re “gone”.  We do not shed these years.  We do not lose these years.  Because we do not grow up – we grow out.

We expand and we learn and we build on ourselves as we keep living and moving through the world.  This is why three 23-year-old women can dance alongside 40 year olds to Lauryn Hill’s That Thing, all of them singing along to every single word and knowing every inflection.  They are still us, and we will become them, and it isn’t as scary as we think.

Our experiences are always happening.  I am always the girl that heard that song for the first time and didn’t get it, I am always the girl that gave it another listen and did, and I’m always the girl that will be a mother.  But I’m also always the girl that doesn’t know how to spell morgage mortgage. 

i'm okay, you're okay.

first world privilege of self-reflection.  that'll be the title of my novel.

since i last left you, i was in a pit of despair, from having seduced a man with a girlfriend, and simultaneously feeling like a sex goddess for the first time in my life, to accepting the consequences of i don't know what, after.  lauren, and anna, and i have abused her couches and drugs with contemplations, and it doesn't get bettered summed up, then when we were all sitting on that couch last night - stoned, sure.  and lauren and i are trying to break down the psychological whatever, between male and female interplay in this fucking city - and we turn over, and anna, anna, on her 23rd birthday, with her black pencil skirt, and 23rd curved thighs, and crossed legs, says to us, "oh god, we'll just never understand why men are the way they are."

but we'll sure keep trying.  those fascinating providers, and their warm, firm arms, that hold us, even when we 21st train to hold ourselves.  oh smart, funny, werewolves, when will you learn?  inner happiness won't cuddle you late at night.

so we diagnose both ourselves and them, and we laugh at how stupid everybody is.  and during the intervals in which nothing happens, we get sad.  when life isn't exciting, and complicating, and we're not with each other, we get sad.

and then we drink.

to beyonce.

brevity.

is.

fun.

and it's been years, right?  everyone's been yelling at me. be her, because she's not another, they say.  be her, because she's you.  so a boy from out of town, tries to dance with me, and at the end of the night, of the usual night, when i am well and prepared to walk out, with my head low, accepting yet another failed interaction with the opposite gender, i am overwhelmed with the quintessential feeling and moment that overcomes every individual when they just fucking do it.  storm out, storm in, jump out, jump in, quit, or start - every beginning moment that takes courage in the form of being fucking fed the fuck up.  it's not brave, it's rock bottom.  it's, "not this again.  different.  now."  so you reluctantly say bye to the boy who didn't work enough to win you over, and you stop, step back, grab him, and show him exactly what's at risk of being lost.

what i'm trying to say is, i was in the woods last sunday.  and consequently still floating on the remnants of a rare feeling that suggests everything that could be, could still be.  a portion of the impossible has been realized.
and then!

oh well, then, there's last night!  oh john, john, john, john!  john and his phenomenal queen of a woman!  those two are my posts in life.  i want to grow up and be them, but in a sari.  that sums up my existence to a T.  everything i value in life will be fulfilled if i can grow up to have a beautiful house, with those shelves of conceptual books, and novels.  and how kind people can be!  lauren said it was interesting, because we either interacted with people from our age bracket, or with people from our parents age brackets, or professors, and thus missed out on the in-between part.  the new parents, 30-40 year old, crowd.  and they're just like us!  but in the future!  and i'm so excited for the future.  because i'm really good at this now, so imagine then.

i smoked a j with one 30ish man, and one 40ish lawyer.

and then there was the part, where we had a dance party with 40 year old women - 40 year old, cool, strong, smart, funny, women.  the future us.  and we were them.  and they were us.  but not at the same time. they were us with careers and children, as mothers, and wives.  but we were them as undergrads, and single, and so very naive.  and we shook it.  together.


and two minutes upon my entrance, his goddess of a wife, the current clinical psychologist, ex-rock journalist, calls me up from the stairs, to curl her hair.  so there she is, standing in front of a mirror, in heels, a beyonce dress, in her beautiful home. and as i stare at her in awe, she looks at me in the eye, and says, "you're so pretty!"  on my way out, she will cup my face, and embrace me with loving kisses.  i'm doing that hyperbolic thing i do, that annoys people, because they end up getting put on pedestals.  but no one ever seems to understand, how grand the very real, imperfect, kind of, "cool" that awes me.  she's just. cool, guys.

so i step out, john.  and he says thanks for coming, and i say thanks for trying to help my friends and i with boys, and i try to explain that they caught a bit of the magic i'm always in awe of, and in his very serious face, he says, "that is good, then."  and i give him a look, that over the years, we have determined, demands his emotional reaction, and he curls that half-smile i am so fond of, silly hero.

amidst drugs and alcohol, the werewolves took a moment to browse through the bookshelf of a house occupied by two phd-having scholars.  and i found this:

one word. beyonce. make some noise.

hey, june