Wednesdays With Maureen

I was walking on the beach last week. It was a cold/overcast evening, but Abby loves to run in the sand, so we went.
As we walk we come across an older woman, who I later learned was"58 years young".
She wore a winter jacket, hat and boots. She had a small black bag around her neck and a walking stick.

I planned to keep going on my way, but Abby thought it would be a good idea to run right up to this lady, with one of those "look how cute I am" faces.
I ran up to grab Abbs and apologize to this woman, but she looked at me and said
"Animals love me!"
Then asked if it would be ok to take a picture of my dog. I said sure, and she asked me to help her take her camera out of the bag around her neck.

Turns out this lady (who finally introduced herself as Maureen) is a wonderful photographer. She went on to tell me her life story.
From childhood, (abusive)
to her young adult years, (married young, and had a son and daughter)
to her later years (discovered she was gay, divorced, and her kids disowned her)
all the way up to the life she lives today (missing her kids, and her only grand daughter, but living her life true to herself, and helping others.)
The pictures she takes, she prints out and gives to the elderly who can't afford their own artwork.

Keep in mind we are the only two people on the beach at his point.
Out of the corner of my eye I see someone walk onto the sand not far from us, with a surfboard making an attempt to wiggle into a wetsuit.

Maureen sees me glance at him, and asks me "If I think he's cute".
I kind of didn't know what to say, so she proceeded to whistle and call him over.
She asked if she could take pictures of him while he was on the water, and he was more than polite to her.

I, meanwhile am standing there, slack-jawed with my out of control puppy running circles around me.
This guy was probably one of the most beautiful individuals I have ever laid eyes on.
Stunning.
Maureen introduced us, made small talk, then she shoo-ed him away to go play in the water so she could take a picture.

She smirked at me, and said "Yeah, he is cute. Has a girlfriend though".
I rolled my eyes and said something along the lines of "Mmmhmm, don't they always..."
Right then she dropped everything she was doing, and looked me dead in the eyes with a serious tone of voice.
"Don't you rush yourself. You don't know what's in store for you. Live your life, and the perfect one for you will come along when you least expect it. Some crazy lady on the beach could introduce you to the boy of your dreams, you can't plan something like that."

She smiled and continued clicking away at that camera.
After an hour or so, it was time for me to get home, I said goodbye to Maureen, who simply said, "I'll be seeing you".

The next morning I thought maybe I had dreamed the whole thing, but I hadn't. And I'm pretty sure that her stories and her advice will stay with me for a very long time.

Meet Abby

For those of you who have yet to meet Abby Road- here she is!
Abby is a Corgi, an Irish sheep-hearding dog bred to chase things (try to run from her sometime- it's hilarious)
She is such a good girl, and it is so nice to have a little company.
We go to the beach every day, rain or shine.
She loves her stuffed piggy and carries it around like a little girl carries a doll.
She loves to play tug of war, but knows who's in charge ;)
I will teach her how to skateboard if it kills me.
She licks her lips when she sees a treat, and grunts when she poops.
She has the strangest habit of taking any food I give her and bringing it to one specific spot in my living room. Same spot. Every time. OCD babe.
And she loves to fall asleep in my lap when I read on the couch late at night.
She pretty much has my heart.

Was it you who spoke the words, that things would happen, but not to me?

In a dream the other night, I was sitting by the ocean with my mom asking how things were back home. I asked her about somebody specifically, and told her I had loved him for years, and we were supposed to get married.

In my dream, she held my gaze with an almost confused look, and said
"But if you had married that boy, you would have never breathed the air of the Pacific."

And when I woke up, I had one of those moments of clarity.
It seems so simple.
Funny how dreams speaking truth can bring peace to a heart that's been broken for years.

I thought it slightly unfortunate that time I found my phone in the freezer. Or the time my car keys were hiding in plain view after I spent twenty minutes of commute time ripping the place apart to find them.
No, no my friends.
NOTHING compares to finding your iPod in the washing machine.
That is balls.
Hopefully that trick used for wet cell phones (throwing it in a baggie of rice) will be my saving grace today. Let's keep our fingers crossed!

By the way, can I just say I love Sundays?
Even if my electronic devices commit suicide, there are few things better than having the windows open, clean laundry, Jason Mraz serenading me, and the scent of homemade soup simmering away on the stove-top.

We Were The Kings and Queens of Promise

Ahhh nothing better than spending tonight having dinner with the fam, then coming home to comfy pants, Third Eye Blind, and blogging in the study, window open, with Abby chillin by my side.
What better way to spend a Friday?

Ok, so to begin with a disclaimer, I am going to say that I don't enjoy Rochester-bashing. I think it's lame when people convince themselves that this town has nothing good.
There are definitely some parts of Rochester that are great.
We are steeped in history, have pockets of awesome culture, and plenty of decent places to raise a family.

However...

I am busting out of this town.
My goal is to move away from this place within the next eighteen months.
There are so many reasons that I have come to this decision, and it's something I have been considering for a while.

My reasons are all across the board, ranging from our high crime rate, (a triple homicide last week down the street is the straw that broke the camels back) high taxes, shitty education system, the slow death of what we used to be, and the constant realization that this city is entirely too small.
I want a fresh start away from it all.

Yes, I have friends and family, and it will break my heart not to be able to see them everyday.
(Although with the wonderful invention of Skype, even that won't be so much of an issue)

But honestly, when else am I going to be able to do this? I have nothing holding me back now. No real roots have been laid down in this place.
If I want to go, I can. And that is an incredibly empowering feeling.
A friend of mine moved to Seattle, and when I asked him why he chose to go there, out of anywhere else in the country, he sparked my intrigue.
We shall see.

The Adventures of Liz and The Epic Date From Hell.

OK, so, for those of you who have already heard this story, you thought it was tragically amusing. I must share with the rest of you.

Last weekend I found myself sitting at one of my fave little downtown cafes, waiting for a "semi-blind date" to show up. What I knew was that he was tall dark and handsome, 30-ish, very intelligent, liked good music, and just happened to be a doctor. Yahoo! Right? Yeah, I'm never that lucky.

I knew I was in trouble when I saw him walking to my table.

Short, chubby, and hadn't brushed the tumbleweed of hair on his scalp or shaved in about a week. The god-awful cargo pants he wore were tucked into his snow boots (yes, legit snow boots) and the laces were undone.

Now to make matters worse, he sat down and said nothing.

I decided to get the ball rolling with

"Tell me a little bit about yourself."

Apparently he took that as

"Please tell me all about your seventy year-old fathers vasectomy, your half sisters- one of whom is a 'recovered' meth addict, and the other a raging alcoholic."

Conversation also included stories from his residency- like this one time during surgery a fellow doctor passed out (face-first) into an open patient on the operating table.

How he was featured on a science mag as an infant, because he is a "miracle" of science, due to his fathers aforementioned snip-and-clip.

There is more, but you get the idea.

To put a little icing on the cake, he had the odd habit of breaking out into random song, and bouts of air-drums. His favorite Seal song happened to come on the radio, and he HAD to sing along with that one as well.

At this point, I am making a visual plea with the waitress, that if she takes pity on any tortured soul today, please let it be mine.

She quickly brought over the check.

To add insult to injury, we were walking out, (ok ok i was pretty much tripping over my own feet to get away.) But as I'm making good ground to get back to my car (Alone!) I hear him say "Would you like a kiss?"

Many probable retorts were dancing around in my brain, including but not limited to-

"Would you like a face-full of pepper spray?"

I managed as polite a "NO THANK YOU!" as I could, and bolted.

It's times like these that make me thankful for the little things.

Like being single.

Like my apartment, and my dog, and my free time that I can spend not going on anymore terrible dates.

I'm Back

I seriously considered starting a new blog. I look back at some of my older entries and see that I've grown so much as a person since I started writing here, and I'm very different. But that's the best part! I'm going to keep this blog, and I'm going to keep posting, and I want to look back in another few years and see how much I've grown and changed all over again.

I've decided to open this space up to the people I know. They can read my mind's overflow if they feel so led. I didn't realize that I'm intriguing and deep, and sometimes profound, until someone point-blank told me. I've got stories to tell, and writing to share, but I never thought anybody cared enough to know that side of me. I'm glad she pushed me to open up. I'm glad she saw something more to me than what I let everyone see. So here it is, my world. Welcome.