A Fresh Infusion of Gratitude
I may have already covered this, but in my former (soul-sucking) job, I worked with people in various stages of homelessness. During my tenure, my organization created ten apartments for low-income individuals. When word got out about the project, I was swamped with calls, despite the fact that the future tenants would be selected by a government agency. People defended their place on the waiting list. They called repeatedly to check on the progress of the building. Several of them hobbled to our office and pleaded for a spot. One woman tried to bribe me.
When the building was finished, many of these people (through luck and their own tenacity) ended up getting placed. I walked them through their new homes; apartments in a beautifully renovated historic house, for which they would pay less than $300 a month (most one-bedroom apartments in this area cost well over $1,200/month). Most of the people were moving out of really substandard conditions. And yet the
instant they signed the least, they started complaining about the color of the carpet, the noisy street outside, or the fact that the unit they
really wanted was already taken. I was so proud of the building and so disappointed at their sudden change in outlook.
I just got off the phone with my mom, to whom I bitched about the fact that it's Saturday, and I am swamped with work with my consulting project (
still not finished) and the class I am teaching. I'm tired, I whined. My foster job is so
tiring. I need to chill over the weekend, not be tied up with this stuff.
My brilliant mom reminded me how terrified I was when I left my former soul-sucking position. How worried I was about
not having work. How
grateful I was to be teaching and consulting. How much I wanted this foster job.
So I hung up the phone and sat my ass down in front of the computer and have been procrastinating for the last hour, but I fully intend to get work done really soon (really), and to infuse my tasks with a thankful attitude. At least I will try.
Posted by Dori at 1:55 PM
Tricky Business
So I definitely can't get into work stuff here, but I will say that (at least outwardly), Friday night's incident has been resolved. We checked in on Monday morning, exchanged explanations, and agreed to move on.
Navigating these work/life relationships is new territory. For the last three years, I supervised a cool guy very close to my age, and I drew very clear boundaries around my social/work life. I knew that if we hung out we would become friends (
just friends, in case you were going there--he is extremely hot, but also in an extremely committed relationship). And I wanted to avoid befriending him because (despite his consistently stellar performance), it would have been really awful if I ever had to address problems in his work. So I rebuffed his kind invitations for the first six months of his employment, and then he stopped asking me to socialize after hours. During his annual review, he suggested tactfully that perhaps my boundaries were too rigid.
In my foster job, everyone hangs out together constantly. People routinely go out to lunch together, and sometimes have dinner together, and almost always get together at least once during the weekend. My co-workers are incredibly warm and kind, and interested in one another's personal lives. It is a total sea change and I am trying to be social and friendly without spilling too much; to be funny and fun
and avoid emotional land mines.
Wish me luck.
Posted by Dori at 7:34 AM
Some Cool and Not-So-Cool Things I'd Like to Discuss
Cool:
1) My subway pass. After 3 years of daily driving to a (soul-sucking) suburban workplace, and then a summer of "commuting" from my bedroom to my home office, it brings me great joy to be a member of the Greater Metro Area Workforce. I bought a pass for October and it feels luxurious to get into the station and zip through the turnstiles knowing I can ride
as much as I want. During the summer, when money worries were extreme, it was sad to see the balance on my pre-paid card drop with every trip. Sometimes I walked to save cash.
2) Some damn good reads. I just finished Allegra Goodman's
Intuition, which is about politics in an academic cancer research lab. It is riveting and I loved, it especially since so many of my friends/friends' loved ones are scientists working in these settings. I also read T.C. Boyle's somewhat creepy
Inner Circle (also about researchers--this time about Kinsey's people). And also Elizabeth Berg's
We are all Welcome Here. Which made me cry.
3) The fact that I have finished writing
all of the profiles (more than 55 of them--about 200 single spaced pages!) for the
trade association consulting project that has brought me such trials. On Friday, I rewarded myself with some Key Lime pie. When the profiles are completely edited, and I have written an introduction, I will be getting a massage.
Not So Cool:
1) My main email account (yahoo) has become overrun with spam. Every day, I get maybe 15 spam messages in my in-box, in addition to dozens of messages that get appropriately diverted to "bulk mail". I have had this account since college and really do not want to part with it, but the situation is grim. The other problem is that I now have eight email accounts. There's the "main" yahoo one (now spam-infested), the dating/shopping one, the blog one, two teaching ones (official university account and gmail account), the "applying for jobs" one, the foster job one, and the consulting project one. I definitely do not want to open another account.
2) I have offended my new boss. At my foster job, there is a lot of socializing after hours, which I relish after three years of working with a single 50-ish co-worker. However, I have made a gaffe. Last night a bunch of us went out for dinner, and my boss said something about himself which struck me as funny, and I giggled, which then caused everyone else at the table to start giggling, and then someone else made a well-meaning joke at the boss' expense, and then the boss stormed out and vanished into the night. When I called to apologize, he didn't pick up.
Anyone who knows me knows that I sometimes get swept up in random hilarity. In sixth grade, someone mentioned the Dead Milkmen (an 80s band) during class, and I couldn't stop laughing. I was asked to leave the classroom. I have a quirky sense of humor. Sometimes it gets set off randomly. But the boss at my foster job doesn't know this. And he is way influential and I really want his help in getting a real job. And of course I feel bad for hurting his feelings.
Posted by Dori at 12:20 PM
Party Like It's 2007
So remember how last year, my extremely popular friend E. turned 30, and we had a
birthday party in her honor? And approximately 8 million of her friends came to my apartment for an excellent celebration?
Well, time flies. It's her birthday again and this time her brother (a gregarious host) offered up
his apartment for the festivities. I was charged with "set-up and aesthetics"; I put cheese on platters and arranged the snacks and decor.
I have come to understand that I don't really like parties. I'd rather bond with small groups of friends, and I prefer sitting at a table/couch to standing in a hallway clutching a plastic cup and finger food.
But there are many good reasons to have parties. There's the brie, of course. And you get to see lovely people like A.D., who live in the suburbs and have new babies that prevent them from getting out as much as they used to. Another reason is that you have a chance to meet people you may have heard about at length, such as "Pirate", a guy E. met last year at a Halloween party, and to whom she has referred since then by his costume. Both A.D. and Pirate are readers of my blog, and gave me kind feedback, which boosted my self-esteem. Yet another good reason to have a party is that you really do get to know new people (if the party is cool and people are actually friendly). I had a great talk about Maine and organic produce with my beloved friend R. and two very nice women we just met. And finally, parties provide opportunities to get to know people you sort of--but don't really--know already, such as the friendly and gracious C., who lives in D.C. and is going to Zimbabwe next week to deal with the supply chain issues surrounding health care products. Somehow she still flew in to celebrate with us, and she even helped clean out the fridge.
And for all these reasons, I say: party on.
Posted by Dori at 11:18 AM
Banter Boy Comes Back
So remember Banter Boy? The guy I dated in the spring? Who built me an
ergonomic desk, helped
paint my living room, and is the self-designated middle linebacker of
Team Dori?
Despite our regular google-chats, BB has been out of the picture lately. I've attributed this to his protracted bronchitis, and also to the appearance of a woman in his life. I think he has met someone, but I don't want to ask because I don't want to know. I hate it when my exes find love; I am jealous that way. It is my nastiest quality.
Anyway. So yesterday I was full of stress and I was google-chatting with BB, with whom I was borderline pissed. I made him soup for his protracted bronchitis and he forgot to pick it up (I left it in a mutually convenient pick-up location) over a four-day period. So we were chatting and he asked if I was home. Of course I was home. Where else would I be?
I made the colossal mistake of asking where
he was. His response: "Out."
I got all furious. Because "Out" clearly means: "lolling around in the bed of my hot new girlfriend while she showers and washes her long red wavy hair [he has a thing for redheads] after our marathon night/morning of passionate sex."
"Out" is a very inappropriate place from which to be emailing a former love interest. I got all snarky and wrote that I had to go; I was on my way to the gym. BB entreated me not to leave.
Why? Because he was
stuck in traffic on his way to
surprise me and cheer me up and distract me from my stress.
My mind is a dark and scary place, my friends.
Posted by Dori at 3:35 PM
UpDATE #501,217.5 and #501,217.75
I am so damned evolved. You truly have no idea.
I thought a lot about the situation with "Mark", and concluded that despite the appalling failure of our last encounter, he is a cool guy. Not only does he personally know
Nate from Girlyman, but he is funny and brilliant and artistic. If we fell in love, maybe I'd be immortalized in art. (Plus, as I've mentioned at least once, he has sexy glasses and he smells good.)
Given the scarcity of Jewish guys with the aforementioned qualities, I decided that if Love is trying to find me, I'm going to give it every single chance, and if that means emailing a guy after a hideous date just on the off chance that it might be an incident we laugh about on our honeymoon, well then--by golly--I will do it.
Approximately 47 hours ago I penned a delightful (and carefully thought-out) message to "Mark", suggesting we give ourselves another shot, and asking him to let me know
either way if he is so inclined. I requested a response because I want to
know if he's not into it, and not be checking my email constantly and wondering if he never got my message and if the yahoo spam filter is the one thing standing between me and Happily Married Life.
But you know how all of you said he sounded jerky? And I was all open minded? Well, not replying after 47 hours--
after a response has been specifically requested--is fairly jerky, is it not?
I will be moving on with my life now.
BREAKING NEWS: He emailed very soon after I posted this. Commented on how I am "adorably cute" and "a wee bit quirky", and yet regardless he's just not in a dating space at this time. As I said, I will be moving on with my life now.
Posted by Dori at 9:39 PM
UpDATE #501,217
So "Mark" and I went on our third date yesterday and it was excruciating.
Post-museum-date #2, he sent me a cute follow-up message to which I promptly responded. We both alluded to Saturday plans.
I expected said plans to crystallize on Friday, but received no message from "Mark." And I checked email at 8:55, 8:57, 9:04, 9:17, 10:38, and approximately every 15 minutes for the remainder of the day. I had a raging internal debate about whether
I should contact
him. Eventually he did email me and propose that we get together "at some point" on Saturday, and he encouraged me to call "anytime" to set this up.
So on Saturday morning I went to the gym and did stuff and then waited for it to be appropriately late in the day to call a boy. I had afternoon and evening plans and a small window in which to squeeze him in. At 11:21, he was still half-asleep. He suggested that I call him in the afternoon. Which I did, at 3:17. At which point he said he'd like to meet up, but had to shower and finish a quick task, and he would call me immediately afterwards, and then we'd decide on a time. He called at 4:37, by which point I was angry, having wasted so much time literally waiting by the phone. But I acted chipper and hopped on the subway and continued to act chipper when he arrived late to the cafe, and then took two work-related cell phone calls.
Things did not improve. He was unhappy with his choice of coffee, which he suggested we drink while walking around, which spilled and splashed and generally offset whatever cozy and soothing feelings meeting at a cafe might have generated. Eventually we sat down on a bench, were attacked by a swarm of bugs, relocated to another bench, and he talked for 90% of the subsequent 20 minutes or so. We started talking about our (mainly his) married friends and how some of them misguidedly envy our fancy-free dating opportunities. After which "Mark" said, "they have no idea how much dating blows." I agreed wholeheartedly with this statement, but also felt somewhat wounded, thinking that he was having a bad time (
I was having a bad time, but this was less of a concern because I am so accustomed to it). Then "Mark" talked for a while about his gay family member, and how it is relatively easy for him to get laid, because there's a lot less mystery with men dating other men--they want the same outcome. In sharp contrast to "this kind of thing" - and here "Mark" waved his hand between the two of us - "which is totally mysterious."
This conversation was actually kind of cute and honest, and "Mark" was funny and self-deprecating in making these statements; it wasn't as bad as it sounds. But I still felt like he was
suffering. He got some takeout (he was on his way to meet a friend for a concert) and we sat on another bench in what was essentially a traffic island, and it occurred to me that perhaps the back-to-back social engagement was stressing him out. I expressed this sentiment and suggested that maybe he'd rather eat his takeout at home, and we both tried to be accommodating and failed, and he actually said "the more we fixate on this decision, the weirder things will get", and then he offered to walk me to the subway.
By this time, my own baseline anxiety was completely racked up by his anxiety (baseline or otherwise, who the hell knows), and I realized that if I didn't solicit some input, I'd be checking email every two minutes for the rest of my life, wondering if he would ever contact me again. So I pulled an E. (my friend E. is an expert at dating communication), and said "listen, I want to check in on our dating situation, where are you at?" Because I was getting a bad vibe
.He claimed that he enjoys spending time with me but is vexed because he would like there to be physical manifestation of this enjoyment, but that thus far there has been no window for it. I now suspect that he was stressing the whole time because it was the Third Date and he felt that therefore Kissing Needed to Occur.
Of course there was no way that any kissing was going to happen after that admission, so we hugged goodbye and I didn't stop cringing for the rest of the night. In fact, I am
still cringing, and firmly believe that if we are ever able to recover from yesterday, we'll have earned a Pulitzer Prize for dating. Which actually I suspect is due to me anyway.
Posted by Dori at 12:38 PM
UpDATEs #501,214.5, #501,215, and #501,216
#501,214.5: "Mark" followed up in a timely fashion after our delightful first encounter. He wrote a sweet message in which he apologized for talking so much and pledged to ask me more questions in the future. Subsequently he called and we set up the next date (see below).
#501,215: Date with Formal Guy, who emailed me last week using phrases like "Incidentally, your experience is identical to mine ... I find my work both stimulating and challenging ... I will elaborate further over coffee ... I presume Saturday still works?" Formal Guy and I met for coffee. He was just like his billions of uber-educated scientist counterparts, who work in "pharma" and live in fancy condos and are patronizing (there are billions of these guys around Cambridge; I understand that they are in shorter supply elsewhere). He was perfectly pleasant, but not in the least bit interesting. And yet he talked 95% of the time. Though Formal Guy has just asked me out again, I am not feeling it.
#501,216 (Second Date with "Mark"): We went to the art museum and "Mark" actually taught me some stuff, which I enjoyed (he was an art history major and is a graphic designer when not running his e-commerce startup). I really like Mark. He smells good, and I like the cadence of his speech, and he is funny. There are some objectively good things about him: he's close with his family, he's culturally literate, he has lots of friends, he has many interests, he is extremely smart and hard-working. However, despite his prior awareness about the lack of conversational equity, during this date, he talked 90% of the time. We are going to hang out this weekend, which I am genuinely pleased about, but this is vexing. WHY can't boys just LISTEN?
Posted by Dori at 5:35 PM
