Alice Grew Up. Again.

For as long as I can remember I've been imagining how grand life could be if only I had the balls to move outside central Ohio, away from the only home I've known for all of my 26 years.

I'd be a carefree little Midwestern bird with cute boots and an even cuter attitude. I'd spend years as a student sipping lattes and contemplating the secret of life. I'd drink too much beer, sleep with too many men and study too hard for my exams. All the while racking up student loans I wouldn't be able to pay off until I was years and years into my glam career.

I'd be consciously building what would turn out to be my life long favorite photo album containing a montage of my care free days. Photos of me wearing outfits that would make the me-in-my-30's cringe. Photos of me with my arms around friends who's names I wouldn't be able to remember and possibly never knew in the first place. Photos where there was never a lack of cigarette smoke lingering in the air. Photos of me playing air guitar and singing into the bristle end of a hairbrush at house parties and attending sporting games of a college I was only barely accepted to attend.

Oh how I would have cherished that photo album.

I'm sure that you can see where this is going. In fact you probably would have seen where this was going years ago and I could have used you then.

Folks, I could have used you then.

I stayed, people.

I stayed right here in Ohio and that's not all. I stayed in a relationship with a man that should have only been the first on my list of the too many men I'd slept with. I stayed away from the classes I should have been attending. I stayed in a job I should have left. I stayed, in general, away from myself, away from the me I wanted to become but knew I wasn't.

And then I  got pregnant, got married, had the baby (it's a boy) and got divorced.

Which landed me in an apartment in a trendy downtown neighborhood with a baby, a Chihuahua, a job that I loved and more dates than I could handle. I hadn't moved away to a new city but I had, I thought, figured out the aforementioned secret of life. And I had done so without racking up any student loans or sipping any lattes with my classmates.

The secret, of course, was staying forever single.

Oh, how I vowed to stay single. And single I stayed. For almost a year. 

That almost-year was a great year, too. I lived alone (without other adults anyhow) for the first time in my life. I controlled my check book, the grocery list, the remote control, the stereo, the how and when of all the household chores. And most importantly my datebook. I did what I wanted, when I wanted, with who I wanted and it was the most liberating feeling ever.

If this single life wasn't the secret to life, well then, I just couldn't imagine what was.

Except on the Saturday nights when the kid is with his Dad and you have no plans and no desire to sit at home and read whatever you've just picked up from the library. Except when your kid is teething and all you can think is where the hell is someone else to help me with the parenting??? Except when you realize that while cohabitation at times really blows, it is kind of nice having someone around to do the laundry once in a while, not to mention to be there when you're sick or injured. Because not being felt sorry for is just depressing.

Not that I realized these things and set out to find a mate. I was nowhere near that level of awareness. Nor was I willingly going to let go of my recently declared forever single status. I just walked into my favorite bar and was introduced to my now fiance and the rest as they say --and I sincerely hope--is all history. 

It's funny now how all of the seemingly short-sighted decisions I've managed to make--in a fairly brief bout of adulthood--seem to fade out of the Mistake category and into the Live And Learn category. How instead of discussing the secret of life over lattes I've accidentally discovered it through simply living--and please don't confuse that with living simply.

I know now that family is the key.

Your partner, your kids, your life long friends, your brothers and sisters, your parents - whatever form your family comes in - they are the secret to a happy life. I know now that single is nothing short of knock-down-drag-out fun but that I'm much better suited to being part of a family.

The best part of not being single anymore is that my new fiance, through a series of not so unfortunate events, had to move to Colorado recently.

So.

After years of daydreaming of a new city, I, with a toddler and a Chihuahua in tow am packing my nail polish collection, my favorite pillows, the snow skis that haven't been touched since 1999 and moving to Colorado.

I'm finally getting my wish and, despite my inability to live life without a care in the world, I do have quite an adorable pair of boots and for the second time in my young life, the possibilities seem endless...

Comments

[Polly Poppins]

I want to see the boots.

[The Dol]

Me too.

And just wow. Are you scared?

[Diosa]

Life is definitely what happens while you're busy making plans. I wish you the best with the big move and hope you love Colorado.

I also wish I'd spent more time in my life single. But I happened to meet the love of my life at seventeen. Of course, I should be careful what I wish for. No promises I won't end up single again. Well, there are promises, but I know better than to bet my life on them. Any man or woman can have a mid-life crisis and end what was a wonderful decade or two of marriage.

[Pandora]

I'm with Polly. I want to see the boots. When I first met my midwestern friends from Ohio, I was shocked to see not one bit of hay stuck in their hair or a pair of boots on their feet. I mean, I fit the Californian stereotype, sorta, so why couldn't they? They were all dressed preppier than any guy I had ever met. So, a pair of boots would complete the way I think the ideal Ohioan should look.

I almost feel like I could be where you were at. I'm 20 and kind of just slipping lattes with my friends and more so making out with too many boys to count. I have no idea what I want to do in life-supposedly I graduate in 2 1/2 years (lets see if that really happens on time). But that's the thing; I love sipping lattes and making out with boys (well, only one right now....and it's just lovely).

Alice, you've inspired my next post, I decided. My other one isn't coming along as I had hoped and I feel like I can now write something more fitting about myself. Thanks, dahling.

[The Model]

Oh Alice, how very much we have in common.
Although I did get married and have kids (and then get divorced) ultra young, I actually did spend some time beforehand sipping cappuccinos in little cafes in Milan or Tokyo or the like, and partying like a rock star (and with rock stars). But I never found it very fulfilling. I actually have that photo album, and it's fun to walk down memory lane sometimes, but it's not my favorite by any stretch. The family life is for me too, and I still have no regrets.
I was super excited about doing the single independant woman thing too. But I just moved to a new state (I had just gotten back to L.A., but moved away again a couple weeks ago) with my spawn and my cat and into a whole new life with a wonderful new(ish) guy and the possibilities ahead of me seem endless. And so far it's even better than I thought it was going to be.

[Alice]

The Model - wow. I had no idea that we had quite a bit in common. Except that you're mega hot and your boots are probably way cooler. But still, we should talk, compare, etc, for real.

Polly, The Dol and Pandora - the boots may or may not exist.

Pandora - you are so living the life I had imagined. Although to be perfectly honest as much as I wish I had done what you are doing - college etc, I don't think I could do it now. I could go to school and just might but I couldn't do the partying etc.

Diosa - I love how realistic you are.

Bookgirl - I don't know where you are but this entire post is basically how I wish I would have been you. I like to live vicariously through Bookie, who doesn't?

[Bookgirl]

I'm here! The whole full-time job thing is seriously impeding my ability to play on the interweb.

Alice, I wouldn't change my life, or the past 12 years in New York, for anything in the world. And yes, you pretty much described my twenties. But there comes a time when all your partners in crime are married and parents and in bed by 10 on a Saturday, and you look around and go, huh? When did that happen??

I worry sometimes that I've been on my own for so long that I wouldn't even know how to fit someone else in my life. (Enter Polly's theory that my ideal husband is an airline pilot.)

When I was in my 20s, I used to always say that I could get married and have babies at 40, but I would never get to go back and be a 20-something single girl clubbing in London. Or New Orleans. Or LA. So I had to soak in every bit of the fun while I could.

Now I'm 34 and worry that I'm still not ready for those things, and what if I never am?

Like you said, the secret is family. I was lucky enough to be born into an absolutely amazing family. My sisters are my best friends. And then I met Polly and my godbaby mamma, who are every bit as much my sisters as the ones I was born with. Here in the city, I've cultivated my "urban family." We celebrate birthdays and births and mourn deaths together just like any other family, and I know that even if I can't make it back to my family of origin, I'll never have to spend a holiday alone.

Sometimes I get sick of being responsible. I want to be ABLE to take care of myself. I just don't always want to HAVE to. So when I'm overwhelmed, I call a friend or my mom, and say, "If I lived close enough, would you cook me dinner?" Or come over and take care of me? Or come help me with this?Invariably, the answer is yes, and that's enough to remind me that my choices got me where I am. And where I am is pretty great.