CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE - ROCK BOTTOM
Dearest Nurse, I don’t have a lot of regrets in this life, but I would pay just about anything to have the month of December surgically removed from my life.
So, there are two wine bars we can go to. One is down to earth and trendy with great ambiance, and the other one is super pretentious and I hate it and I’ve never had a date go well there.
After returning from my crappy visit to New York and the Little Italy debacle, like an addict, I was right back on Tinder. But this time, I was leaving nothing to chance. And so, I vetted this one thoroughly - or, as thoroughly as anyone can vet someone in an hour, using only what is readily available on the internet. His dating profile was linked to his social media, which is always a good sign. Nothing to hide, right? And so I studied every picture of him I could find, looking at this decently handsome, in shape, proudly Jewish man to 1. Compare him to his surroundings to account for size and height. (I adored Little Italy and I always will, but good God, I wanted a big boy.) 2. Assess his personality based on what he surrounded himself with. And 3, to scope for weird shit, like an abundance of cats, or potential fetishes I don’t want to be a part of, like foot stuff or world cup soccer. But everything checked out.
What I didn’t do, however, was take more than a cursory glance at the contents of the actual messages he had sent me. If I had, I don’t know how I would have missed that this boy was completely, unwittingly, and fabulously gay.
I told him I wanted to go to the pretentious place. If he’d never had a date go well there, then I damn well wanted to be the first. It felt like a challenge, and by now your know your Juliet can’t resist a good one. Plus, I think I’m fucking sunshine, remember?
And so, to match the apparently uppity establishment in question, I straightened my hair, and pieced together the most pseudo-upscale, hipster, Imma-act-like-I-give-a-shit-about-you-but-I-don’t outfit, complete with high-heeled boots - because this one was gonna be tall. I could feel it in my bones.
I walked in to the little wine bar - which was not so pretentious, just kinda nice - and saw the face I recognized from a handful of Instagram posts sitting at the bar. And huzzah! It was just as good a face in person! He stood up to greet me… or at least, I thought he did… but somehow in getting up, he had gotten down…
I wobbled a bit on my heels. What was happening? Was it a trick of the light? Was the bar disproportionately large, creating some optical illusion that made everyone look like Hobbits? Or conversely, was it that this man just knew how to properly curate an Insta-feed? Well, fuck me if the latter didn’t turn out to be true. But unlike Little Italy, who was short, but stocky and big where it counts, this man was just all-around dainty. A pixie, if you will.
“Hey!” I chirped, trying to sound as not flagrantly disappointed as I was. So much for online vetting. Apparently this guy only took pictures of himself inside of a doll house.
“He-ey! Omigod! So nice to meet you!”
Wait… what? I inadvertently turned to the bartender to see if she heard what I heard. But for all she knew, we were just a couple of old college buds catching up. In fact, had she known I was an Oberlin grad, that’s almost certainly what she would have thought, because my Tinder date had just loudly greeted me like RuPaul might Elton John.
But here’s the thing, I love gay guys. Growing up in the New York City theater scene, they were part of my family. At 12, I was a regular volunteer at the GMHC, wore Kieth Herring sweatshirts, and O.G. crowdsourced for the AIDS Walk every year. Clearly Wine Snob either didn’t know he was gay, or - more likely - knew very well, and for whatever reason, was expending A LOT of energy trying to deflect from that.
Oh, why Wine Snob, you ask? Because…
“Omigod, ew! I’m sorry, miss? Miss! Yeah… I can’t drink this wine. It smells like old cheese and garbage.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. Primarily because I wasn’t sure if there could be a more “gay” way to send back a glass of wine, but also because smelling like “old cheese” is actually the sign of a really good French wine. But, I digress.
Because even though Wine Snob was a wine snob, gay, and weirdly sneaking details into the conversation, like how much he loved eating pussy, or how big his dick was - which seemed like a distinct improbability outside of his doll house - he was really fun. I realized in that moment - laughing about his kid’s antics, previous terrible dates, and his struggle to find a bland California red in an upscale, French wine bar - that dating didn’t have to be a thing that went anywhere. I mean, that’s obviously the goal, but that doesn’t mean one can’t enjoy a perfectly nice evening with a perfectly nice human that you aren’t going to have sex with. (And by the way, I don’t say that because Wine Snob is gay. I grew up in New York City in the 90s. I’ve slept with plenty of gay guys - just not pint-sized ones with extremely questionable taste in wine.)
And all told, it was a great night. I had fun, Wine Snob had his first good date in the “pretentious” wine bar (that’s actually just a good wine bar), and I found the perfect aprés first date rejection line:
I’m sorry. I had a great time, and I think you’re awesome. I just didn’t feel a romantic connection.
OMG, no worries. Good luck out there, girl.
And that was that. Clean. Normal. Nice, and nothing crazy. I was healed, by God, and ready for more!
But just when I thought I was finally getting a grip on this whole dating-after-marriage thing, enter Santa.
Okay, Nurse. I know it’s never nice to call a NoHo hipster in his late 30’s Santa - or maybe anyone, for that matter - but in my defense, it was December, he was wearing a cable knit cardigan, and he really and truly resembled Kurt Russell in the Christmas Chronicles. In fact, it’s all I could think of when I looked at him. Even when he found out I was a writer, gave me his whole spiel about wanting to be a writer too, and asked me to read his screenplay, all I could think was, Damn. Did Santa really just Hollywood me on a first date?
But he was nice, tall - thank goodness - well-educated, and part Sicilian, so I knew he probably had a pretty nice package. And that was all I needed to agree to a second date.
There was just one thing bugging me about Santa, and in retrospect, it should have ended things before they ever began. Because right there on his dating profile, under “likes to snuggle”, “long talks by the fire”, and all that other Santa shit, he had written one word in all caps: CLEAN.
But I’m human sparkle, remember? So what if a guy prides himself on not having any STDs? One night with me and he’ll realize how superficial a distinction that is, and fall head over heels for me.
Maybe that’s why I did it - went out with him after reading that. To prove to myself that I was better than my condition. That I was lovable and worth it, even to someone weirdly gross enough to stamp CLEAN on their dating profile, like some badge of sexual honor. Because, shit, if Santa would still screw me, that would mean in some backwards way, I had overcome the herpes beast, right? It didn’t matter that I wasn’t attracted to Santa, and I certainly didn’t want to read his fucking screenplay. He was a conquest, and - though I was hiding from it like a terrified house rat - I was still woefully emotionally twisted, and did not have this dating thing under control. In fact, Dearest Nurse, I was headed straight for disaster.
We busted in through the door of my bedroom and flopped down the bed, our faces latched on to one another’s the whole time. I whipped my shirt off - leaving my bra on, of course. Pants were next… I’m not sure when his clothes came off, but they did… and let’s just say, he wasn’t any less Santa without them. But I hadn’t invited him up here for his bowlful of jelly, or his dimples so merry. This was about one word and one word only: CLEAN.
And so, I waited until the last possible moment - Santa nearing a well-deserved heart attack - to tell him my unequivocal unclean truth.
And wouldn’t you know it, that great Sicilian package turned into a cocktail weenie.
“Yeah… I’m really sorry. That’s just… I think that’s a little too much for me.”
He was heartbroken. His face pale. The whole night since I had kissed him in his favorite karaoke bar, he had been on cloud nine. I was a hot, cool, professional writer, drooling over him like a Christmas ham. He thought he had hit the jackpot, and now, he was crushed, and trying to be as nice as he could be about it.
I, however, was humiliated.
“Okay, then. Get out.”
Wow… that feels bad to see on the page…
I have always regretted this moment… truth be told, I avoided writing about this in the first draft of this blog-turned-memoire, mostly because of how ashamed I’ve been of how I acted. But hell… it wouldn’t be a true account of my journey without it, so here goes.
“But… you’re so cool, and you’re so hot.” He said as if grappling with the Gods of an unfair world, all the while looking at me with such pity that I felt physically ill. “You deserve—“
He said something after that, but I wasn’t listening anymore. I was twitching with rage.
I absolutely hate it when people feel badly for me. Pity me. See me as anything less than a badass bitch who could eat them for breakfast if I wanted. These, of course, are fierce self defense mechanisms - I know that, okay!? - but it lights me on fire. That, on top of the sheer embarrassment… it was too much.
But I had asked for this.
I’m no psychologist, Nurse - and thank God, because I would have committed myself ages ago - but I think there’s something sadly masochistic about a woman with herpes throwing herself at a man whose biggest bragging right is being STD free. In some way, I wanted this to happen. I must have, or I never would have put myself in that position.
Yikes… this is hard to write also… but I’m coming to terms with the fact that I judge myself pretty harshly. I hold myself to very high standards, and just because I have herpes, doesn’t mean I don’t carry many of the same stigmas everyone else does. I’ve always felt this was a shitty, gross virus to have, and maybe there was a part of me that wanted to be rejected for it. Wanted someone to finally not pretend it was nothing, and then avoid going down on me. Or worse, say it’s not an issue for them, and mean it. Because fuck, dear Nurse. If that’s true and they still reject me, then it’s just me, isn’t it? Then I’m not human sparkle, not sunshine, and not Zoe Deschanel. I’m just a human who’s awkward, moves too fast, and doesn’t know who she is yet or what she’s doing. And to be rejected for that… for me… is infinitely worse. I mean, can you imagine?
I’m fine with potentially getting herpes, but your personality? Deal breaker.
But regardless of the hard, self-destructive truth that was staring me in the face - along with a stunned and slightly terrified Santa - I pulled on my pants, pushed by him to the front door, and opened it.
“I said, get out.”
Santa threw on as many articles of clothing as he could, and - I shit you not - as he staggered out, said, “But, what about my screenplay?”
Fuck you, Hollywood. And you didn’t deserve that, Santa, but fuck you, too, and your jolly CLEAN ass.
And then I spent the next few days sobbing, cleaning up my act in front of the girls, and then sobbing some more. I wanted to crawl into a deep hole of self-hatred and flagellate myself until I looked like the aching, pulverized hamburger meat my insides felt like … and so in a way, that’s precisely what I did.
* * *
“You didn’t exactly set yourself up for success, [Jules]. Waiting to tell him like that? You can’t spring that on people.” Old Boss said haughtily, laying nude in my bed. His stocky, overly-muscular frame and receding hairline a testament to decades of HGH.
For some supremely stupid reason - most definitely attributed to the downward spiral into self-loathing I was fiercely denying - I decided it would be a good idea to start sleeping with a guy I used to work for back in my twenties. An ex club owner who had so many DUIs he needed a personal assistant to drive him to Bikram yoga, California Chicken Cafe, and seedy spots around L.A. to pick up large wads of cash from sweaty, red-faced, dickwads in silk, floral shirts. I shit you not, dear Nurse, it was quite the scene.
But Old Boss had apparently mended his ways in the sixteen years since he would call me at 4 AM to scrape his coked-out ass off the floor of whatever hotel room he found himself in. He had embraced Amma - the “hugging saint” - as his God, cut out drugs completely, and had a desire to experiment with tantric sex.
Hey, I’ll try that with you. I texted after the two of us had lunch at the Melrose Trading Post one Sunday afternoon. What the actual fuck was I thinking?
I mean, he did look great for his age, and, in spite of his bad habits, the two of us had always gotten along. So what if he had some fanatical spiritual awakening? Surely if we were just messing around, I wouldn’t have to hear too much about it, right?
Wrong. Dead fucking wrong. After a “lingam massage” that reduced him to tears, I was subjected to a three-hour diatribe on the love of Amma, how anything that isn’t in service of God is blasphemous, and how I’m basically wasting my life on my career, trying to make money to support my family. Eew and fucking YAWN. But if you thought becoming a fake, Hindu zealot would at least make someone nice, you’d be - you guessed it! - wrong again.
“At least I came.” He said, scowling at me after I had driven him to Ojai, taken him to Meditation Mount, (where he had a tantrum about the heat) followed by a three-hundred dollar dinner (during which he barely spoke to me). Double eew, and fuck off. After a week or two of that nonsense, I told Old Boss I had met someone I was interested in pursuing exclusively.
But I just ordered this cock ring. He had texted back. Can we just try it once? After that, I’ll wish you all the best.
I seriously want that three-hundred dollars back.
But I had met someone… or, at least, I thought I had. A sweet, half-Mexican, commercial photographer who - for all intents and purposes - seemed SUPER into me.
“Omigod…” He had giggled, coming up for air during our first date, “You have a beautiful vagina.”
I’m normally not a huge fan of dudes who say “vagina”. It’s strangely unnerving, like people who grow their toenails out, or walk their dog in a stroller. But for whatever reason, when The Photographer said the dreaded “v” word, I found it endearing. And that wasn’t the only thing he liked.
“Don’t you dare hide those from me.” He said to me about my breasts when he caught me changing.
And so I didn’t. I looked at his sweet face, with his big, dark eyes, took a deep breath, and dropped my hands.
“You’re perfect.” He said, shaking his head in disbelief.
Dear Nurse, it is insane how much a relative stranger can boost your confidence. After four months of hiding behind lacy accoutrements, determined never to let anyone see what breastfeeding had left me with, I was free. I tossed the bra aside, and never went back. Needless to say, I liked The Photographer a lot.
But El Fotografo had some issues of his own. His girlfriend of over eight years had just broken up with him, and in spite of what I believe were his best efforts, he was not over it. He talked about her every time we were together, his resentment glaring like LED headlights on a country road. To make matters worse, though she was currently in Napa, all of her belongings were still in the house they had shared.
“I thought you weren’t that into the holidays…” I said, looking around his Fa-la-l-awfully decorated living room on Christmas Eve. It was Paris’ night with the girls, and though my mother was in town, she had given me a free pass for the evening.
“Oh, yeah… [CL] came down randomly, decorated, and then left.” He said, talking about his ex yet again. And then he fell silent… both of us realizing all of this was a giant mistake.
El Fotografer is a good guy. I know that, and I’m pretty sure everyone who crosses his path is of the same mind. But, when we were together, he insisted on intimacy - deep conversation, eye contact during sex, the whole nine - attempting to make up for years of living with a glorified roommate. When we weren’t together? He barely texted, determined to avoid falling into another serious relationship, in spite of the feelings he was having for me. On my end, it was emotional whiplash, and during the worst possible time.
As I mentioned, Lady Capulet was in town, and things were tense. I had finally gotten my single mom act together with the girls, and it felt like any deviation from the evening schedule I had created would take what few threads of sanity I had left, and snap them. But here was mom, scooting around my little two bedroom apartment, insisting on making tea while I was preparing dinner. Making more tea while I was trying to clean up. Making tea while I was making tea. Making tea, making tea, making tea.
She could sense my tension, and it was making her increasingly uncomfortable. I couldn’t blame her. I was stressed. Very stressed, and it wasn’t just the incessant tea-making. It was the girls, it was work, it was having another person in my little apartment after I had gotten everyone out, and - while I didn’t know it then - it was pain. It was the first Christmas since the divorce, I was hosting, and I was determined to show the girls, my mother - and anyone else who was paying attention - how well I could pull it together. I spent way too much money on gifts, decorations, and food, that - because my mom eats like a bird, and Paris was beside himself - went largely uneaten. The pressure was mounting. I was acting like a jerk and I knew it, The Photographer wasn’t texting, and yet again, I was spinning.
To stop myself from contacting him, I deleted our text exchanges, and then his number. But, dear Nurse, I have a cell phone, two laptops and an iPad, all of which store my activity. Every time I had a meltdown, I was an idiot, I.T. disc jockey, juggling devices while crying like a fourteen-year-old at a Beiber concert. And then, invariably, I would have a meltdown on top of my meltdown, go back and retrieve his contact information so I could send some dumb ass GIF, and then promptly hate myself for it. And I wasn’t the only one.
“You’re checking your phone all the time, [Jules]. Who cares if he gets back to you? You need to relax.”
I knew she was right. Or rather, I had known she was right for a while. I had legitimately started despising myself for how I was handling the whole dating-text-exchange business, but I didn’t want to be judged. I wanted my mother to see me. To see her daughter in pain, ten pounds underweight, confused, and - in spite of her bravado - still wildly lost in the sea of post-separation identity crisis. I wanted to be held, to be told I was okay, that it was all going to be fine… but I didn’t. Instead, I ignored the comment.
“You gonna help me wrap these presents, or what?” It was an attempt at a joke. My mother had offered to help me wrap presents a few hours before, but I had been finishing up some work. Now that I was ready to wrap, I was pretending to give her flack for not helping. I really and truly meant it to be funny, but… it wasn’t.
After days of tip-toeing around me to make her requisite ten cups of tea a day, my mother had no sense of humor left to speak of. She laid into me, and then got upset. Very upset.
“You have no idea how badly you treat me. And I have nowhere to go! I’m stuck here with you, and I can tell you don’t want me here. Do you know how bad that feels?”
I did. I definitely did, and I tried to let her know as much. I tried to stay calm. To not say something I’d regret, while holding my ground… and then she said it.
“I don’t want to be here anymore. I’m just going to leave.”
And suddenly, all the hurt I’d been burying, pain of rejection, feeling lost and judged… All the punishments I had inflicted upon myself for reasons I couldn’t understand, all became real. I was suffering. I needed my mother. I had been working so hard on this fucking holiday, and just because I was having problems breathing, smiling past the tension, and being nice, she was going to leave? My mother wanted to leave me? Well, fuck her, then!
“Fine, leave. I have other friends.”
I will always regret those words. Always.
My mother had a very difficult childhood. She has problems trusting people, myself included, and feels safest protecting herself from the world. In spite of that, she has worked very hard to maintain a loving, trusting relationship with me, but I am alone in that. My mother is very much on her own in the world, always having admired my ability to make and keep friendships… and I had just thrown that directly into her face.
She didn’t respond, and I prayed she hadn’t heard. I had been wrapping gifts at the time… perhaps the crinkling of the paper had muffled my words? Maybe, just maybe, the Universe would let me off the hook for this…
No such luck.
“I just want you to know that the way you speak to me is horrible. What you said today was awful, and our relationship will be different from now on.”
“What?” I said groggily, sitting up in the dark. It was 10:30 at night, and I had just fallen asleep after working, wrapping gifts, making dinner, cleaning up dinner, and putting the girls to bed. The hell was this, now?
“I don’t know how, but I just want you to know that our relationship is never going to be the same, [Juliet].”
I had been teetering on the edge of the cliff for weeks. Probably months at this point. But now I felt myself flying. Swan diving off the precipice into the great unknown of complete and total defiant rage. I was livid.
“Are you crazy?” I stared at her, but it felt like I was staring at myself. I had never spoken to my mother like this. “You can’t do this to me! I am a single mom. I’ve been running around all day. I work my ass off, and I had finally fallen asleep!”
I watched her shrink. All the resolve she had gathered to come in here and punish me suddenly making her feel very, very small. She knew about the difficulties I’d been having sleeping since Little was born. Knew they’d gotten worse since the divorce. And somewhere, despite what I had said earlier that day, she knew there was some truth to my fury.
“That’s it. That’s all I had to tell you. You can go back to sleep now.”
“What? No I can’t! You just told me our relationship is never going to be the same. How do you expect me to sleep?”
“Just… Go back to sleep.”
“No. You want to talk, let’s talk.”
And so, I took a breath and got out of bed. I had said something awful. I had, and - in spite of how pissed I was - I was ready to apologize profusely for it, and listen. Just listen.
But it was already too late. I was spent, my mother was hurt, and the conversation devolved into past grievances, my mother heartbreakingly sobbing about how cruel I was to her in my late teens. Yet another thing I couldn’t fix. Couldn’t erase. Like the cruel words I had spoken that afternoon. How I’d let my stress ruin the Holidays. And how the lack of attention, kindness, and excitement I’d received in my disaster of a love life dictate how I felt about myself.
Dating was eating me alive, dearest Nurse, and I knew it. Work was a struggle, in spite of the fact that I had landed the gig of a lifetime and was working alongside some of the most respected writers in my medium. My mother was no longer speaking to me, and my own parenting was suffering; my half-in-half-out mind a constant jumble, and even breaking down and telling poor Big about my stupid boy problems. After all the time I had spent building myself up, here I was breaking down, and at breakneck speed. I felt awful, I was awful, and I knew if I sunk any lower the losses could be too high to recover from. If this wasn’t rock bottom, I had to make it rock bottom. Somehow, some way, I needed this to be as low as I could go. Dear Nurse, I needed nowhere but up.
Sincerely yours,
Juliet