Lessons Learned

Well, it’s Friday. Which, in my office, means it’s probably a slowww day. (And today is.) So, I thought I’d be productive and write a bunch of boring crap to entertain myself mostly – so, sorry, whoever you are.

The last couple of weeks (which is about as far back in time as I can usually remember on any given day) have been pretty eventful. Not in any meaningful way, really, but…just eventful. Well, actually there have been a couple of life-changing things going on, but I’ll get to those later.

First, let’s start off with the lovely twelve-hour period during which my building caught on fire not once, but twice. The first time, it was late at night and I was relaxing on the couch, probably watching Dance Moms or whatever awful crap I watch, letting my hair air dry from the shower I’d just taken. Suddenly, the fire alarm goes off. At first, I don’t even really acknowledge it. I figure it’s nothing. And it takes me a good two minutes or so to realize that this is actually happening and what should I do, oh right, LEAVE NOW OR DIE, and I immediately start panicking. My calm, rational roommate isn’t home to prevent my imminent meltdown and instruct me to stop being a lunatic pacing around our apartment trying to figure out what I should take with me. Oh, and I had to remember to put on clothes.

I throw my towel somewhere (I still can’t find it) and put on leggings, a zip-up hoodie, and flats, completely forgetting the whole undergarment situation. So, goodbye bras and underwear, you will die in this flaming mess (literally). I keep scanning my room for things to take. Finally, I decide on my mother’s pearls (they’ve always been my go-to answer for questions like ‘What would you do if you could only take one thing with you to a deserted island or like, if your house was on FIRE’) and my purse, seeing as it’s a gorgeous new pink leather Coach purse and it contains a bunch of important shit.

Pillbox I saved from the fire

As I posted on Facebook after I was allowed to return to my (thankfully, unharmed) apartment:

The things you learn about yourself when your apartment building is going up in flames and you have to evacuate immediately... I saved: the purse I carried today, the bottle of Adderall in my purse, the pillbox in my purse, my FitBit, 2 tampons, a hair elastic, oh, and my mother's pearls. See? I'm not materialistic. (The diamonds Kev gave me were already in my ears.) And clearly not as bad of an alcoholic as I thought. Addicted to drugs? Legally...yes. Oh, and I forgot to bring any underwear...whatever that says about me...

Sometime around 7:00 a.m. or so the next morning, I wake up, groggy and confused, to my roommate banging on my door and yelling my name and the sound of the fire alarms, yet again. Just as I start to get out of bed, Whitney finally throws open my door to see little ol’ naked me freaking out, trying to wrap my blanket – something, anything – around me. Lesson learned: stop being naked all the time.

Anyway, we trek down the nine flights of stairs…oh, right. I forgot to mention I have an irrational but very significant and debilitating fear of stairs. I don’t know how to explain it. I think it has something to do with my immense fear of heights. Staircases with more than like, ten stairs just give me vertigo, and I become convinced I will fall to a painful and bloody death. People have asked me if something happened to me in my past, but no. I don’t even get to use that excuse. I’m just a strange, stair-avoiding weirdo.

So, two times in less than a twelve-hour span, I had to buck up and face one of my worst fears, as I held my breath and gripped the stair railing for dear life. The second time, I hadn’t even taken the time to gulp down my morning meds before fleeing my apartment. This was a critical lapse in judgment. I was cranky, disoriented, hazy, and seriously jonesing, being the crackbaby that I am. I had my pill organizer in my purse, but I was too embarrassed to effortlessly down 10+ pills in front of such a large crowd. Other lesson learned: screw what everyone else thinks; not taking my meds will cause an emergency of the same magnitude as a building set on fire.

So, that’s my story about how I sort of kind of a little bit got over my fear of stairs. Oh, and how I survived two fires.

Other negative things in my life recently: I bought a water filter for my apartment and it doesn’t work on my faucet model, so that was a complete waste of money and excitement from the anticipation of receiving it from Amazon; I spent last Friday night doing my taxes – meaning I am an old hag with no life…can’t really think of anything else. So, I guess life is going pretty well, all things considered. Oh! Well…I’m getting a “fishycure” after work today with my friend, Megan, and I’m already terrified and grossed out. It’s like a normal pedicure EXCEPT for the whole part where fish eat the dead skin cells off your feet. Ew. Poor fish. At least it’s free (Megan had two Groupons) and I get to see Megan. </negative crap>

This picture alone is already really scaring me.

Positive things: I got to see my friend Chelsea (we go waaay back to elementary school) for happy hour on Wednesday. Don’t remember all of it, but it sure was fun, minus the huge band-aid covering the mysterious wound near my elbow. No matter how many times vodka does me wrong, I just keep going back…maybe it’s worse that I’m categorizing all of this under “positive things.” Whatever.

More positive stuff. Two weeks ago, I made a bunch of lifestyle changes. It started with this FitBit thing I won at work. It’s this itty bitty little gadget that I clip onto a wristlet or the center of my bra, and it tracks how many steps I take, how many floors I climb, how many miles I’ve traveled in a day, and it even detects how many minutes it takes for me to fall asleep, how many times I wake up in the night, and it gives me a percentage of my “sleep efficiency.” It wirelessly syncs with my computer whenever I’m within fifteen feet of it, and the FitBit dashboard on my computer shows me how many points I’ve racked up for my “Active Score” and other stuff like how many calories left I can eat that particular day and a pie chart of how many hours/minutes I’ve spent being either ‘very active,’ ‘fairly active,’ ‘lightly active,’ or ‘sedentary’ – minus the time I’ve been asleep. Needless to say, it’s addictive. And it makes trying to be healthy addictive, which is convenient, since I’ve decided I want to lose twenty-five pounds. According to the plan I’ve set myself on with my FitBit, I’ll get there sometime around August-ish. So much for being ready for bikini season. Oh, well. I’m eating healthily, drinking a whole hell of a lot less (except for Wednesday – that doesn’t count), and exercising like crazy.

In more exciting and sensational news (well, sensational for those of you who are closest to me), I’m friends with Marlena again. For those of you not in the know, let’s just say we had a pretty ugly falling out one night exactly a year ago, after a decade of close friendship. We didn’t speak at all for the entire year; I had blocked her on Facebook and done basically everything I could to completely cut her out of my life. But just a few days ago, we started talking again, and we finally put together all the puzzle pieces of that fateful night.

Once we got an opportunity to air out each side of the story, it finally made sense. And it made no sense that we couldn’t be friends.

Lesson learned: value the real friendships you have – with the ones who have stuck by your side for years through everything…and I mean everything. Know the difference between a real friend and one who isn’t, who doesn’t value your relationship enough to tell you the truth. And, finally, stop being so trusting. It’ll save a whole hell of a lot of heartbreak. As the old, clichéd Shakespearean quote goes: “Love all, trust a few. Do wrong to none.” Also, no matter how angry you get, there’s always another side to the story. Listen.

Marlena and me

Lesson remembered: stay with the ones who make you laugh. I had almost forgotten how utterly hilarious Marlena is and how much she makes me smile and laugh (which burns calories, yay!). Read either one of her blogs and you’ll see what I mean (the first one is my favorite): http://askaninsomniac.blogspot.com/ and http://www.rillitho.com/.

Oh, and this photo she sent me is my new desktop background at work (I figured it was more interesting than the ballerina I had there before):

Other than that, not much else is going on. I’m wearing my pink “Have you hugged a ballerina today?” tee-shirt today and my beautiful, comfy new Coach rain boots. Kevin is insanely busy, but we’re happy and doing well, and I can’t wait to see him tonight. Work is work. Pinterest has consumed my life. Et al whatever-else-crap-no-one-cares-about-anyway.

Wish me luck that I don’t puke everywhere at my fishycure date this afternoon…

(I have a bad feeling that’s going to be another lesson learned. In the unpleasant way. Lesson I haven’t learned yet: stop throwing caution to the wind all the damn time. Even when we’re just talking about fish, you know, eating your feet.)

I always seem to have to learn things the hard way. But hey, you live, you learn, blah blah blah…

xoxo,

Elizabeth Alida