My Affliction

There are very few things that we can count on in this day and age. What with the tragic downfall of so many household names in the last year like Circuit City, Lehman Brothers, GMC, and... Cafe Intermezzo (apparently the Intermezzo that I knew and loved while a student at UC Berkeley got bought out and renamed to Cafe Mattina, but no worries, everything is still the same. Right down to the overly pierced and tattooed, transient delicatessens that man the sandwich counter. I swear the only differences between the people behind the counter and the bums sitting on the sidewalk are the blue aprons that they wear.) But in my life I've discovered a few things that I can definitely bank on. Math will never be fun, I'll always spill or splatter food on myself whenever I'm wearing white, my mom will invariably show my naked baby pictures to anybody I bring home, and... I'll always be crushing on some girl. It's as regular as clockwork. This week it's Miss Farrell from Mad Men. Last week it was the girl who helped me at Bloomingdales. The week before, Olivia Wilde.

This affliction started one crisp autumn day almost two decades ago when I was sitting at my little square desk listening attentively to Miss Kawaratani explain the difference between numerators and denominators. Then out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flash of gold disappear under the adjacent rows of polished maple. My curiosity piqued, I turned my head just in time to have my breath taken away by the vision in front of me. Goldilocks, sans porridge, was sitting not 6 feet away from me twirling the No. 2 pencil that she had just bent down to pick up. I was mesmerized by the simple motion of her agile fingers and sat there gaping at the blue-eyed maiden in wonderment for a full minute before a switch clicked on in the back of my head. I realized that girls, were different than boys. And not because they have long hair or because they can twirl and flip on the pullup bars during recess (I tried it once... but even in my undeveloped state, it still hurt to have a metal bar there). Girls, I realized, are pretty. Prettier than the way my mom tied the frilly ribbons around my birthday gifts. Prettier even, than the ninja turtle figurine perfectly sealed in its plastic case that was inside the box. Lauren, the little blond haired girl, captivated me, and, for the first time in my 8 years of life, I was 'in love'.

That was the moment I started liking girls. I started looking at the world through a completely different set of eyes. All girls intrigued me, but I paid special attention to the pretty ones. Though my bumbling advances weren't well received since I was 'Jason chubby fatso' (my nickname in middle school). Lauren told me to 'go away!' and broke my poor little prepubescent heart. But my recovery was swift and it didn't take long before I latched on to my next crush, Judy, a tomboy with a pretty smile and long flowing black hair. Since then, countless crushes have come and gone. And as the ladies around me drift in and out of my life, I've come to terms with their ephemeral presence. They thunder in like a 1,000 year storm and leave with but the trace of a fleeting kiss. Oh Alba... we could have been something wonderful together. But you, like all the others, left me to marry the rich guy.

And now, after a year of being single, I ask myself, am I in a rut? Two decades and a five year relationship later, I'm back splashing around in the same wading pool of love that I was in when I was 8 years old. The only difference is that I've shed my bright yellow water wings and replaced it with a sleek, slim-fitting black life vest (Dolce?). Is it time to once again tiptoe towards the deep end of the pool where the possibility of drowning is much higher? Diving head first into the murky depths of love is terrifying. I tried it once and barely made it out with my heart intact. But when are we ever 'ready' for love? Doesn't it just hit you when you're least aware and drag you away kicking and screaming? With all these uncertainties floating around in my head, I fell back on the reassuring lyrics of my favorite lullaby as a child. ‘Que sera, sera. Whatever will be, will be.’ All we can do is to take deep breaths and try not to be stressed out by life's problems. Settled, I decided that I’ll just have to wait and see what tomorrow... night brings.

Carpe Noctem Biatches!