One thing I learned while having psychological problems a decade ago is, I don't have to think about the bad shit until it becomes a waking nightmare. My psychologist said, "Just don't think about it." And I was like, "I can do that?" She said, "Think about something else." That poor woman. I'd laid a book's worth of terrible angsty poetry on her and expected her to weep into her palms over my poignant misery, or at least to tell me I had tapped into the human experience like no one else ever had, and I needed to turn that writing into someone so they could give me millions of dollars... but I digress. Anyway, this is how I learned to self-medicate with comedy.
For a couple of years, I didn't watch one drama on TV or in the theaters. I listened only to upbeat music, and I worked out every single day, even if it was just a walk around the house or two trips up and down the stairs. That's how I got well, or at least well enough to get back in step with my life. She'd been waiting patiently on the front porch swing of my psyche, popping gum and checking her watch, but when I finally peeked my head out the front door, she didn't give me any shit. She just cocked her head to one side, took my arm, and said, "Let's go. I left the engine running."
I wasn't cured. These bad feelings still tackle me. The difference now is, I believe I have to fight them. So today I popped in "Superbad," because I've been hella whiny lately. And I got the message I needed, though it wasn't what I expected. The message was: "I am McLovin."
There's this pivotal point where the guy asks him, who're you going to be? And he answers, "I am McLovin." From that point on, he is McLovin. He buys the alcohol, he fraternizes with the cops, he parties with the popular kids, he gets the hottest girl into bed, and he shoots a flaming police cruiser. At the end, the cops tell him they knew all along he wasn't really McLovin, but it doesn't matter.
So I'm thinking, if I can get up in the morning and say, "I am McLovin," and go forth, the rest will fall into place. And even though people might know I'm really not, they'll still prefer McLovin.
I always wanted to be able to do this. There's something about bellies.
One of my mini goals is to be able to go through class without a shirt. It's cumbersome to adjust a tank top every few minutes.
Whenever I start cutting some weight, the first thing I look at is my belly. In the morning, the light is just right in my bedroom to shadow correctly and make my belly look nice. I lift my arms up, stretch back, twist, and it almost looks good.
*
I've been running sprints at the gym once or twice a week to mimic the kind of cardio I need for sparring. Last time, I really pushed it. Knocked out a better time than I have in years. It required Static X and Slipknot, and I had to talk to myself the entire time. People start sliding away from me when I do it: "C'mon girl, you got this, push, thirty seconds, c'mon!" But it works. I also mouth the lyrics to those songs, so if anyone cared to watch me, it would look pretty scary. Beet-red face, tendrils of hair flying, ass bouncing, talking to myself and occasionally lip syncing, "You can't kill me cause I'm already inside you." And those are the nice lyrics.
I reward myself mid-workout with things. Sips of water, the fan on the cardio machine. So last time, I told myself I'd take off my tee-shirt on the last sprint. I did, ripping it off fast during my minute of fast walking, readjusting the headphones just in time to catch (sic) by Slipknot, and I ran my butt off, making better time than I did on the first sprint. I felt utterly ridiculous, but free and cool, and very thirty years old, giving nary one shit about whether people thought I should be shirtless. But it was so contrived and silly. In that picture up there, Brandi just let it fly. I planned it out for ten minutes.
*
I almost don't want to give the P.S. to my last blog entry because it was so ridiculous, but I believe in writing it down, I put something out into the universe that created a solution. But it wasn't the solution I was looking for. It reminded me of Bedazzled, when the guy finally was witty, charming, successful and gorgeous, with a huge penis. The girl was interested in him, but he was gay.
I told Mister Aran about how I am in class. Shy, my head down, not talking to people, always the last kid picked for dodgeball. He straight up told me I should quit. I figured that might not be a bad idea, that I'd wait a month.
So I got to class, head down, there's one of the big instructors against the wall chatting some guy. I jumprope and we pair off and I'm last. Instructor barks out, "Everyone get down and do pushups," which means we've done something wrong. I start getting down and he amends: "Everyone except her."
I looked around in horror. My tactic was to be as small as possible in that class, humble but harder working than anyone. Invisible would have been better. But the guy goes on, "Every time she's here, she's the last one without a partner. She's here to train just like the rest of you, and she's better than fricking ninety percent of you. So every time she's the last one without a partner, you all do pushups. And I'm sending [Mister Aran] in to kick all your asses."
I held my glove up against my face and hid. I could feel the tears in my throat.
Yes, it worked, and the guys were very chill about it. I always had a partner. It wasn't brought up again. Some people have asked me what I would have done in his position instead to fix the problem and I don't know. Just not that.
I put on my jeans a couple weeks ago and said, "Oh, shit."
It's time again.
*
This happened during the worst PMS I've had in years. It was like a monster had moved into my gut and was sitting around watching LA Law, eating everything I swallowed and screaming for a fight in between bites. I couldn't get enough food. I couldn't choke down a Dixie cup of water. I sloshed when I walked, literally. And I couldn't get my jeans on.
Finally, I let go. The period happened, and I went back to Weight Watchers expecting the worst. But I was only two pounds over goal, eleven pounds over my personal goal. Totally doable, I decided. I left triumphant and had a kickass week. Trained almost every day. Tracked all my food like a good little Weight Watcher. All week I practiced a speech in my head I was sure they'd ask me to give once they discovered I'd taken the entire eleven pounds off in one week. "Gosh, you know," I'd say softly, shrugging, "I'm a little different than most of you. I'm an athlete. A kickboxer, actually." Pausing, I'd let the audience ooh and ahh while I cocked out my right knee - I'd be wearing a miniskirt to show off the lean muscle in my toned legs - and then say, "Obviously not a very good one, though, see?" A little self-deprecating humor; my right knee and shin are littered with spreading purple bruises.
From there I'd go on to flippantly say something like, "Well, I'm 'Lifetime' so I've done this all before, and I know what works for me. First of all, I drank lots of water - Crystal Light works beautifully - and I have Lean Cuisines for lunch. I track every single bite and if I want a little dessert, I make sure to get my activity points in so I can indulge in one of those Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches. Say, did you hear they have cookies and cream now? Oh, and don't forget those zero point Progresso soups."
I went to the meeting yesterday and remembered why the Lifetimers do not give speeches, do not get bookmarks and keychains and bravos. Because we are a bitter bunch, and our speeches would most likely be, "I miss cupcakes. I miss them so fucking much. Yeah, sure, you can have anything, but if you decide on that cupcake, you give up lunch and dinner. Seriously, fuck my life." We're supposed to be there in our workout capris and streaked hair, giving hope and uplifting stories to the new kids, but really we're sitting in the back, feeding off fresh blood like lonely old vampires, rolling our eyes when they say, "At parties, I keep all of my little toothpicks so I know how many h'ors d'oeuvres I had, so I can track them!"
"One point eight?" I yelled to the lady behind the counter. "That's it?"
"It's so good that you came back before it got out of hand," she said, her voice practiced and calm, soothing. "This is nothing. It's going to come right off. You'll be free next week."
*
It doesn't help that my kickboxing classes are such ego dumps. I never look forward to class. I downright dread it in the car on the way and by the time I'm there, holding my gloves and watching the jiu jitsu class finishing up, I'm sick. I'm the only female in the class, and I make the boys uncomfortable. They do not want to partner with me, so I get the leftovers. The frightened looking sixteen year old, 5'4 with the reach of a man a foot taller. The huge, overweight guy who slams punches into my face until I see stars. Jogging or jumproping in the beginning, I feel my ass and thighs jiggling and I know they're watching, disgusted. Celeste puts my hair into beautiful braids that keep my hair from flying all over the place, but I know they make me look a bit butch, and my wide shoulders don't help that either. The instructors generally avoid me, sometimes stepping in with a helpful hint, but most of the time I'm left with the oldest lesson in the book: "If it hurts when you do that, don't do that." I go into class with a couple of things I want to fix: turning my hip over on kicks, keeping my elbows tight so I won't eat uppercuts, for example. If I manage to fix those things, and I don't come out injured, I feel like it was a good class. Of course, then I got nailed with rapidfire punches that seemed to leave no holes, so I tell myself next time I'm going to circle off, and snap my front kicks back.
And maybe that's why I still go. It certainly isn't because I'm a badass. I don't even think I want to fight. When I'm feeling very honest, I know I just want to be respected. I don't get it in that class. There's little more ego draining than being punched in the face. But when Mr. Aran's cousins came over I pulled up my pant leg, casually, showed them my spattering of bruises. "It's nothing," I said while they flipped out.
I'm thinking on Brendan lately, cause he spawned. I got the pictures in email and the kid looks a little like her, a little like him. Mister Aran noted that Mrs. Brendan probably has phenomenal knockers now - the one time we met her, on accident, outside the Gypsy Den, we were both taken back by her beautiful glittery breasts, and she wasn't even pregnant then - and the baby herself looks pretty much like most new babies. Like a... like something that just cracked out of a shell. Like a pea, or a weird little fruit. Like a shriveled miracle.
They're probably doing the tiptoe dance around this new chick in their lives now. Like trying to walk after going blind, every step going out into black space. I hope one or the other of them have been around babies before, like a sibling, so they're not so terrified. I know Brendan mostly has older siblings, though, and younger siblings seem to come together. I don't know why. Being an older or younger sibling must be a profoundly different experience. I know Mister Aran and I are oldest siblings, and there's something about it. A tendency to get out of the way, to not be the center of attention, to share, if begrudgingly, to know that this is life.
Anyway, congratulations, my adopted little brother.
