There's No Place Like Home

So, I spent the week in NH for a theatre conference. I was so excited to come back up -- just 3 weeks after I moved away as it would be a great chance for me to see my mom and friends and originally the now-ex would come up to the hotel for that kind of sex you can only get when you don't have to clean the room or sheets yourself. Instead, I learned that age old lesson - you can't go home again.

Each day at the conference I was busy going to workshops and seeing performances but at night I was alone. Obviously I wasn't going to hang out with my students and without my kitties and stuff even the flatscreen TV couldn't keep my mind from wandering and my heart from aching. No man was going to come up -- even though I broke down and invited him up -- he said he had signed up for extra shifts since he thought he wouldn't be coming up -- okay, but God, I'm only an hour away -- like drive up and stay for a couple of hours and go home -- but no, not this guy -- he never could go out of his way or give me what I wanted -- esp. in the sack -- so one more disappointment from him. He said he'd call on Monday to talk about coming down to Newport -- but that's not what I wanted -- I wanted him here - in the hotel - in NH.

I also had plans for Saturday with a galpal of mine. We were super close and then her life started to break apart with stress at work and her fiance calling it off (tho they still live together - as roommates). I know I should cut her slack but I feel like I've been cutting her slack for 2 months now. She would tell me how people would drop her and she'd be hurt but I understand how they feel -- she's been completely unreliable and unavailable -- doesn't answer phone calls or texts or emails, doesn't show up for plans etc etc. Sure we had it out in December about this lack of consideration on her part but since then we've had plans 3 times and she hasn't made it twice. And today was time number 2. There was a very elaborate story and tears but still I waited and waited and didn't eat lunch and had to call twice and text before she called me to let me know what was going on.

Tomorrow I see another great friend of mine -- she's always there and on time but completely overscheduled with a boyfriend, high stress job and lots of friends. So, I know I'll see her tomorrow but it's not spontaneous ever with her -- she'll be there for me when we schedule it but not if I'm sad or lonely. Like being up here in NH but not really belonging here anymore has made me feel.

My life is now somewhere else but I'm not sure where yet.

Staying in on a Saturday Night

Actually got to spend some time in Newport this weekend - just chillin' And that's what I did. I was basically a coach potato all weekend. Sure it was free yoga weekend so I did a yoga and pilates class and can feel my abs for the first time in weeks but other than that . . .

My favorite point of the weekend was walking down Thames Street and running into my Newport friend Charles. He is the Special Events Mgr at the Int'l Tennis Hall of Fame and sought me out on Facebook. We had drinks my first week in town to get to know each other as we'll be working together closely once the Casino Theatre gets up and running. I like him -- he's funny and seems really nice. It feels like a really small town when you see the one person you know dropping off his laundry on a Saturday afternoon.

But then I went home and crashed. That Tom Stoppard - he's like a sleeping pill, man -- and I had my phone off because I'm ducking calls from my old landlord (she called me at 7AM the other day -- I mean, really??). I thought Charles was going to email me about a planned dinner party at his place -- this was supposed to happen last weekend and was cancelled via Facebook and when I saw him at 2pm he didn't say anything about it so I thought it might not happen again. I checked my email at 5:30 and saw nothing so settled in for my Stoppard induced coma. When I woke up a little before 7 I saw that Charles had actually texted me at 5 with his address and a time. Oops! It's now 7 and I haven't showered and I'm in one of those moods I get when it's dark and cold and I'm tired and lonely -- oh, yea, it's called self-pity. So, I texted him back and cancelled.

I know I should've gone and I hope it won't be my only opportunity to hang out with him and meet other local folks. Sometimes my only-child I want to be alone tendencies are detrimental to my social life but I've been so busy since I got here -- working, working, working that on my one free night I just wanted to hang in. I'm not sure why I feel so guilty about that.

Calling the Expert

So I did something today I swore I would never do. I called my Ex#2. Back when we were together and living in a dream world where we would create theatre together and run the artistic world - we used to talk about the type of theatre we'd run -- not just the programs but the physical building. One of the many ironies of my new job is that I'm on the ground floor of renovating an old vaudeville house - and I'm not doing it with him.

This morning I'm freezing my ass off in the non-heated theatre sitting in on the weekly 9AM construction meeting. This is where the facility folks, the architects and any other interested parties (i.e. me) meet and discuss fire lanes, dumpsters, windows, door handles and today electricity. Should we pay $11,000 to upgrade from 750 amps to 1000 amps to the building which will give us 400 amps for the stage lighting as opposed to 200. And the decision must be made now - and I had no idea there was a decision to be made. The current tech guy who some people claim is a genius and some people claim doesn't know what he's talking about weighed in way back when and said 200 amps would be enough. Now he's not at this meeting so I can't ask why he would say this but I can only assume that he felt he had to say this to prove he's all for cost saving measures. Now that's not really the way I think -- I think if we need it, we pay for it and we dump something that's cosmetic.

But I'm an actor and director not a tech gal so I can't argue for one side or the other. So, I pull out my phone and text the one person who I trust will not only know the answer but be able to explain to me why in simple layman's terms: Ex#2. I can't reach him during the meeting and the money guy makes the decision that we'll go for the upgrade. But Ex#2 calls me later and I explain the dilemma and he clearly and patiently explains to me why we should do the upgrade while we're still in the building stage as opposed to five shows into our season. He's patient, logical, smart and folksy -- all the reasons I fell in love with him six years ago.

Surprisingly it's not painful. It's business. Sure for one minute during our phone call my mind starts to wander and I think, Should I ask him about his new baby girl? The one he didn't have with me. But I clear the thought from my mind, keep it professional and move on. It's what needed to be done and I did it. And I only had two or three handfuls of MMs afterwards to calm my nerves.

Breaking Up is Hard to Do

So part of this starting over is Starting Over. I had "the talk" today with Sorta-boyfriend Guy. Now I have a headache that even large quantities of Diet Coke can't seem to cure.

About 12 years ago I was in a bar in Manchester, NH with my ex-boyfriend's sister (we're still good friends) and she introduced me to a guy she knew from high school. Hello! Tall, former football player, handsome, brown eyes -- all around dreamy. As another friend of mine said when she met him, "don't go for him - he's too good looking for you". Ouch. But, okay, there's some truth to that. I've never really felt like I deserved him -- even though besides looks he's never had all that much to bring to the party.

Back in the day when we 'dated' on and off for 5 years, he was always high and couldn't get it up. But did I mention he was hot? Eight years goes by and I see him in August at the most popular restaurant in Manchester. I'm having lunch on a Thursday with my mom and he's having lunch with his mom. It MUST be fate! I walk over - he's happy to see me -- he asks me three times if I'm married (my first two simple No's don't seem to satisfy him so I have to come clean - Divorced!) - then he takes my telephone number. Now I tell him that I left my phone at home that day so I won't get any phone messages. None the less by the time I get home at 9pm that night (after running my first 5k) he has called twice. So it begins . . . Again.

This time I have high hopes. He doesn't seem to smoke dope anymore. Can mostly get it up and calls me all the time. Except he's pretty clear that he doesn't want a girlfriend. Oh, and he lives at home with his mom, and he's in the middle of an awful custody battle for his 14-year old son, and he gets fired, and there's a bench warrant out for his dad due to all the back alimony he hasn't paid etc etc. Yeah, there's a lot going on. A lot. But for the first time in my life someone says to me, Thank you for being so patient.

Unfortunately my patience wore out. I'm 2 hours away now and I'm not sure what I'm holding on to. The dream of what could be? But it's just a dream. Mr. Sorta-boyfriend is never going to commit to me. I've never been The One for him. That's not an easy thing to think or say or type because I want to think I'm a great catch and I am but just not for him. Sure he said today that it's the timing and The One could walk by but he wouldn't reel her in but I don't buy it. It's that old line from When Harry Met Sally: "It's not that he didn't want to get married. It's that he didn't want to marry me." I have never been this guy's idea of Girlfriend.

So, finished that chapter and putting away that book. Again. Sure he said maybe we'd pick it back up in the future once things fall into place for him but come on - if we all waited til our lives were in order to fall in love we'd all be ordering personal size pan pizzas. And I'm really looking for someone who'll let me pick off their plate.

Chapter Two

I'm known for starting over and moving on. My resume reads like a novella and it's more than a little embarrassing to be a double divorcee. Theatre's always been the perfect career for someone like me with a short attention span -- as soon as it starts to get the least bit boring the curtain comes down and it's time to start working on the next show. A friend recently said to me you've lived like four lives. And I guess I have but I'm hoping the fifth will stick.

After barely subsisting this past year and knowing that it was time to make the last big change, I got a job that takes me to Newport, RI. My Ex#2 used to argue with me that I had to decide: did I want to concentrate on being a college professor or a theatre producer because I couldn't expend my energy doing both. So this is me sticking my tongue out and wagging my fingers at him -- Nah! Nah! Nah! Nah! Nah! In my new job I get to do both. Ha! (I try not to be petty but sometimes it just feels good)

So, on January 2nd I paid the guy I've been dating (more about that situation later, I'm sure) to move me, my two cats and the few belongings I've accumulated down to Newport from my temporary/permanent home base in Nashua, NH. We're here now -- mostly unpacked (damn those last four boxes) and settling in. But that doesn't mean that I'm ready to settle.

I've decided to start this blog to explore this 2nd or 22nd chapter in my life. In September I turned 40 and since not much else was going right in my life except my great sustaining friendships I wanted a huge party to celebrate. Of course it was one of those freezing cold rainy days you sometimes get during the summer when you have to dig out your winter clothes and curse Mother Nature. Since I knew it was my 'surprise' party, I refused to do that and wore my cute, silk, flouncy skirt and froze my ass off at my outdoor minor league baseball themed party. My friend, Little Mommy, and I have this superstition about my birthday -- a candle must be blown out or fire will follow me all year -- this stems from 1999 when there was no party in '98 so both my hair and house caught fire and my nickname for awhile was Torch (yet another story for another time). So, when the cupcakes decorated like baseballs came out, I dutifully closed my eyes and wished.

I just opened my eyes and found myself here.