September 12, 2011
"You have the gift for life.....The rest of us, we’re just looking for a place to hide and watch it all go by" -Arthur Miller, The Misfits
If someone were to ask me what I thought the two, five, ten or fifty different approaches to life are, I would answer that they could be narrowed down to these two: those who live it, and those who watch it being lived. Now that being said, we must acknowledge that being a woman is hard. Period. Full Stop. We work, wash, dye our hair, feed our kids, wash our dogs, wax our well....everything, and even make time for the occasional blow job; all this and we’re supposed to maintain the gift for life?! Given the options: Gift for life, or bystander in my own play, I choose the former. But with everyone running around touting the idea of Carpe Diem for the last 1000 years or so, the question is: As a twenty-something living in LA, how the hell do you manage to seize the day when there simply isn’t the time?
I spoke to a good friend of mine today. She is a dynamic, 28 year old admin at a property management company. She had posted in her Facebook status that she was “living in her own personal hell, needs a new life.” I, of course (led by the Facebook gods) called her immediately to see what on earth could have happened to make her post something so tragic in such a public forum. We met for lunch and she related to me the unpleasant story of she and her on-again, off-again fiancee/boyfriend’s breakup; the final death knell of a relationship that should have passed long, long ago. We sat over pad Thai, and sweet calorie-crazy coffee drinks and talked and listened, and laughed, and enjoyed that the light of the day was still shining on our table despite the ugliness that had occurred. And through our conversation, realized that we had found the time, that her hell was passing, and that she has chosen her new life and all the beautiful parts that make up this gift.
In the end, when dealing with the stress and uncertainty mid-twenties can bring, we don’t have to make some drastic life change. We find what makes us happy, what brings us joy, what makes our souls shine, we give that gift to ourselves and eventually share it with others. Sometimes the simplest things are what keep life at its best. So rather than finding a place to hide, Go, grab Carpe Diem by the balls!. . . . or in this case, by your bad-ass capable lady parts.
