On Turning 31

Well.  I turned 31 last week.

I suppose this now makes me an old maid.  Certainly past my prime.  Or some kind of bullshit like that.

31 isn't that exciting of a number, really.  It's not sweet 16, or 21, or even 30 (that somehow dreaded societal milestone of being "old").  It is, if anything, just another step closer to the more-dreaded 40, when you might as well just give up and die.  Or something.

It doesn't seem that dire to me.  Sure, I'm 31 and divorced.  But it could be worse.  (I could still be married!)

Maybe I'm just lucky in that I've always had friends who were older than me.  I'm currently the youngest person in my close friend group.  Most of my friends are 40 or close to it.  And, shockingly, they haven't all become hunched-over crones and cranky old men.  They're all still awesome and gorgeous and amazing.  My boyfriend is 13 years older than me.  It doesn't seem to matter in the least, except when I haven't seen a major 80s cult classic and his jaw drops.

Getting older isn't a bad thing at all, in my opinion.  If anything, I like to think think I've improved with age (or at least gotten more full of myself).

Sure, I have more aches and pains when I don't get enough sleep.  I'm more susceptible to hangovers.  I can no longer sleep solidly for 12 hours at a stretch.  My metabolism isn't what it used to be.  Late-night events are the bane of my existence.  There may be the beginning of wrinkles.  Smile lines.  Whatever.

But my life has certainly improved.  I'm more comfortable with who I am.  My birthdays have gotten better, if less elaborate and more chill.

This year, I essentially threw together a birthday party in a few days.  It was low-key.  I made cake.  People wore onesies.  We colored.  It was awesome.

And I had Fish Eye Fun. Of course.

I spent my actual birthday with Mark, for the second year in a row.  We both took the day off, had lunch, did some shopping on Delmar, went to the Mid-Century Modern exhibit at the Art Museum, browsed my favorite vintage store, and finished the day off with tacos.  It wasn't much, but it was perfect nonetheless.

I still have a childlike love of my birthday, in spite of all my old-maid-ness.  Do I care that I'm 31 and should therefore resign myself the the drudgery of middle-age adulthood?  Hell, no.  I still want to take the day off work and do fun things.  I want to have a party and wear a tiara make myself cake and have total jerks put trick candles on said cake (I'm looking at you, Sandi).

I want to be continually thrilled at life and all it's brought me.  And I certainly don't think that's a bad thing.

Bonus 10-year-old footage of me on my 21st birthday.  Some things never change.
Except my hair color.

In Which I Vow to Never Spend Money Again

Last time, on The Pretty Vintage Girl, our redheaded heroine bravely faced a broken furnace, a broken dryer, incompetent repairmen, freezing temperatures, and vowed to escape to Mexico and sunshine.

Did she come back?

Is she still freezing?

Does she have a way to do her laundry?

Has her January gotten even worse?

Well.

In short, Mexico was lovely and warm.  The three of us drank a lot, ate a lot, and walked a lot, so I'm pretty sure that all balanced out.  Really.

We explored all over the resort, tried as many drinks as possible, and managed to fit in some time on the beach.

We had a regrettably long layover in Atlanta and got home late Monday night.

On Tuesday, after work, Mark and I went to go pick up Thunder.  On the way, I bought a new washer and dryer.

This is notable because it's the first time I've ever bought a brand new major appliance.  Between renting and inheriting friends' used washers and dryers, the need for buying my own had never come up.  There was a brief period when I was married when I had to go to the laundromat because either a washer or dryer broke and we somehow didn't have the money to buy new ones, in spite of having two decent incomes.  But then friends moved and gave us their old set, so that was the end of that.

And, just in case I didn't feel like enough of an adult, we bought a brand new mattress this week.  Because why not.  And because the one we have (which my friend Katie so kindly gave us for free after my old one was rendered completely unusable) is getting increasingly uncomfortable.  I think this new one is going to be the nicest mattress either of us has ever owned, and I'm pretty excited about it being delivered tonight.

I also spent some money recently on improving my winter wardrobe, as I was getting tired of pants, T-shirts, and cardigans.  Most things I own are much more warm-weather appropriate, as I have an innate fondness for sundresses and rompers, and none of those work well when it's snowing.

In related news, I'm never spending money again.  It's been an incredibly expensive January.  And, while I don't regret any of our purchases, I do need some time for the bank account to recover.  Now, if the rest of my life and apartment would just cooperate with that, I'd greatly appreciate it.

It's all been extremely exciting and terrifying, which I suppose accurately sums up being an adult.  You make choices and weigh decisions and hope you made the right choice, whether it be about a washer and dryer, a job, or a person.  You might not know for a week, a month, a year, or a decade if it was the right one or not.

I like to think I've made a lot of good decisions in the past year and a half (hopefully enough to balance out the bad ones).  I chose to leave a terribly unhealthy relationship, wherein I made some very bad decisions indeed.  I chose to instead be with someone who I've always loved in some strange way from the moment I met him, regardless of how little sense it made.  I chose to take a job with a small business I believed in over a "safer" corporate position like my parents would have preferred.  I chose to go on vacation to Mexico with two of my best friends.  I chose to be more honest about my life and who I am.  I chose to join a gym and start doing yoga regularly.  And I chose to spend a lot of money on new and much-needed stuff this month.

I could be wrong about any of the above decisions.  I hope I'm not, but only time with tell.

And even though this year has been stressful and expensive and the first month is only just past halfway over, I still wouldn't change anything (except for my rental company).  So I think that's a sign that I'm doing at least something right.

But really.  I'm not spending any more money.

New Year, New... Everything?

So, 2016 started out great.  I worked a gorgeous New Year's Eve wedding at the History Museum, kissed the love of my life at midnight for the second year in a row, and had a really lovely and lazy first two days of the year.  I actually had the thought driving around on Sunday that it had been a wonderful two days.  I joined a gym (more on that later), I relaxed, I had dinner with my parents.  I read and knit and watched Netflix.

Clearly, I jinxed myself.  Because then January 3rd came. And everything fell apart.  Literally.

It was Sunday night, and Mark and I were sitting on the couch watching Netflix after dinner when he asks why it's so cold in the apartment.  Not-so-surprising answer?  Because the furnace isn't working.  It kicks on but the gas never lights.  So we break out all the space heaters and blankets for the night.

We also discovered that my upstairs neighbors' tub is leaking, both into my bathroom and into the basement.

On top of that, here's some more backstory: my dishwasher crapped out a while ago, possibly thanks to a minor mouse problem.  This hasn't really bothered me, because I hand wash most dishes unless I've done a full day of baking.  But the rental company scheduled the new dishwasher to be put in on Monday.  "First thing in the morning." Ha. Ha. Ha.

So on Monday morning I call and tell the constantly-beleaguered maintenance request woman that a) I have no heat and b) the upstairs neighbors' tub is leaking.  Then I put on my Eeyore onesie and sit by one of the space heaters to wait for my new dishwasher to arrive.

And I wait.

And wait.

And then I get annoyed with waiting, because it is now noon, three hours after a repairman was supposed to be here.  I've gotten no calls about him arriving.  So I get dressed and leave to start running the errands I need to do.

And as soon as I get to my first stop, the repairman calls to say he's on the way with my dishwasher.

Of course.

Long story short, Monday version: this guy spends four hours trying unsuccessfully to fix the furnace, does not install dishwasher, does not look at leak.

Long story short, Tuesday version: repairman returns, "fixes" furnace, installs dishwasher and leaves a note saying it doesn't work and someone will be back tomorrow, does not look at leak. Furnace works until 5:30, when it stops working again.

(In the meantime on Monday, my dryer breaks.  Unfortunately, that's all on me.  Mark attempts to fix it but is, thus far, unsuccessful.)

Moving forward to this morning.

I call the rental company again to tell them the furnace is still broken and that I'm now on my third day of no heat. They finally do the smart thing and arrange for an actual furnace repairman to come out (which won't, of course, happen until tomorrow morning).  Meanwhile, a second repairman comes to look at the dishwasher and informs me that it does work, but the first repairman just didn't know how to turn it on.

I'm just... done.  I'm done.  I'm ready for my vacation this weekend.  I'm ready to not worry about what all is broken in my apartment and when it will all be fixed and when I need to buy a new dryer.  I'm ready to be somewhere warm for a few days.

Those short first blissful two days of 2016 seem like a long time ago, as everything has gone downhill from there.  I'm trying to be my usual positive self, but right now I'm just frustrated.  I'm frustrated with my rental company, with the apparently incompetent repairmen they send out, and with appliances in general.

(We actually got to the point last night of wondering what I'd done to deserve this.  And then we stopped wondering that, because the list would be appallingly long.)

In other, un-appliance-related news, Mark is convinced that it's my New Year's resolution to get in shape.

Except he's wrong.  Really.  Totally.  It has nothing to do with being a New Year's resolution. He doesn't believe me, and I guess I can't blame him, seeing as how it all started right around New Year's.  I joined a gym on January 2nd.  I started doing yoga.  I went back to pole class for the first time in ages last night.

The evidence is pretty damning, really.  I admit it.

But it wasn't a New Year's resolution.  It's just me being finally fed up with feeling fat and out-of-shape and missing the way I used to feel and look, and missing being able to do cool things like flip upside down on a pole.  And after the craziness of December, I actually have time to do things like go to the gym, go to pole class, and do yoga.

Plus, I'm 30 (almost 31), and my ex-husband told me a few years ago that I was past my prime.  And I really, really love proving him wrong as much as humanly possible.

So yes.  It's the beginning of January and I'm starting to exercise.  Judge me if you will.  But if all goes well, I'll totally be able to kick your ass in a few months.  If I don't freeze to death from a broken furnace first.

So there.

And a Happy New Year

I missed another week of blogging, thanks to Christmas.  I'm not really complaining, and I'm not going to beat myself up for it.  It was another wonderful Christmas, in spite of everything being way more complicated than originally planned.  But I spent time with family, my boyfriend, and got a Grinch onesie, among many other things.  So I'm not complaining at all.

And now it's New Year's Eve.  In just a few more hours, I will have officially survived December.  I made it.  You made it.  Congratulations!

I don't even know where the year went.  It feels like I was just ringing in 2015, yet so much has happened since then.

I know a lot of people had a rough year.  So I'm not bragging when I say that mine was pretty great.  I'm actually thrilled to be able to say it because, as Mark and I discussed the other day, any year that's not a repeat of 2014 is a good one in my book.  If I survived that, and my crazy ex-husband, I'm pretty sure everything else is a cakewalk.

And it's not like 2015 has been the easiest.  As I've discussed, I'm far more prone to crying this year than ever before.  I spent the first three months of 2015 being mostly unemployed and vaguely depressed.  And now I'm busier and more sleep-deprived than ever before.  I owe my parents a significant amount of money.  I spent Christmas Eve helping my boyfriend take pictures of his ex-girlfriend's surprise wedding, at her request.  (Yes, you read that right.)  My apartment looks like a bomb went off in it.

But it's been a full year of freedom and love and happiness.  Freedom to make my own decisions.  Freedom to not feel guilty for having fun.  Freedom from second-guessing my sanity.  Freedom from being told that my memories were wrong.  Freedom from being stalked and controlled and manipulated and abused.  Freedom to be completely and ridiculously in love.  I own my car.  I pay my bills.  I have my old name back.  I wrecked my wedding dress in the best photoshoot ever.

It seems like it's been longer than a year, in many ways.  Mostly in that I find it almost impossible to believe that it's only been a little over a year since I've been divorced.  That part of my life seems no more tangible anymore than a bad dream.  After all, there's no way I could have spent seven years that way.

But there's still proof that I did, in spite of throwing away or replacing nearly everything I could from when I was married.  There's still a hole in my bedroom wall from when I flinched away from him touching me.  There's still the fluttering panic when I think about him ever being near me again.  There's the memories I don't quite remember and don't want to about nights I was encouraged to drink too much so that I wouldn't say no.  There's the shame that I was weak enough to be manipulated so easily and for so long.  There's the fear that everything he said about me was right.  There's the fear that my honesty about my life will have consequences.

I joke about it a lot.  He's become more of a caricature for me now, but I suppose it's how I deal.  I make him less threatening, less real, and it helps.  Maybe it's not the healthiest way of dealing.  But it works.  I think.  Maybe.  Obviously, it's not foolproof, since I'm still talking about it, still finding ways to deal with what I went through.  I still have nightmares.  I still question my memories.  I still wonder if I made it all up.  That's when I'm grateful for the proof I have, and for those who tell me I'm not just crazy, for every person who told me they didn't like how he treated me and that I deserved better.

At the very least, it makes me so much more grateful for what I have now, for the past year, and for all the years to come.

2015 has brought me stronger friendships and support groups, more time with my family, a job I love, random spontaneous adventures, countless brunches, and more happiness than I feel I possibly deserve.  I couldn't ask for a better year, ups and downs included, because it's still all so wonderful.  I know I gush a lot about my life (on here and in person), but it's because I'm still in awe at how great it all can be.  I honestly had no idea.  I feel like one of those videos of dogs or babies experiencing grass or snow or bacon for the first time.  I feel like Dorothy seeing all the technicolor wonder of Oz for the first time.  Why did no one ever tell me there was something so marvelous?  Why did it take me so long to get here?

I don't ever want to go back to the girl I was before this year.  And I don't think that's even possible anymore.  I like to think I've learned my lessons.  At least a few.  I like to think that things are going to continue to be better and better.

I'm not perfect.  2015 wasn't perfect.  2016, for all the future as-yet-unsullied potential it holds, won't be perfect either.  I'll cry.  I'll be stressed.  Things will be bad, and good, and everything in between.  It will be life.

And I think that life sounds just about as perfect as it's going to get.

December Status Update

December is officially half over.  And how am I doing, you ask?

Well.

I joked with Mark back in November that I could give myself gold stars for all the days in December when I didn't cry. Luckily I didn't follow through on this, because I would have fewer gold stars than I would like.  Between holiday stress, too-litle sleep, and my continuing efforts to deal with past emotional damage, there have been more tears this month than intended.

Operation: Drinking through December, on the other hand, is going much better.  I should probably have decided to give myself gold stars for that instead.  I would have way more stars.  Hindsight, right?

I actually have accomplished a decent amount, though not nearly as much as intended.  I successfully acquired/finished birthday present for both of my parents, who have the nerve to both have birthdays in December.  I crossed Missouri two times in as many days this past weekend for a Fish Eye Fun job in Kansas City.  (On that same trip, I spent my very first night ever alone in a hotel.) I only have four books left to read to hit my goal of 50 books, and I'm halfway through both a book and an audiobook. I managed to get my new passport in time to go to Mexico at the beginning of January.  I've attended a few family events and even socialized with several friends, including making it to the Garden Glow at the Missouri Botanical Gardens.

On the other hand, I still have several presents to acquire/finish in about a week.  There's one more big weekend of holiday parties to get through, and then the night of 7 New Year's Eve parties.  I haven't done nearly the writing I should have for my Project: Sketchbook.  And I have four books to finish reading in 15 days (notice how that one made the good and bad list?).

I think I need another drink.

I'm not sure if it's just the hectic pace of the past few months, but I'm having a harder time getting into the "holiday spirit."  I know I talked a lot previously about how I'm traditionally more of a Scrooge, but I do generally get a bit more into the Christmas spirit midway through December.  To be fair, I suppose it's not that I'm dreading Christmas itself.  I'm dreading everything that needs to be done.  I don't have the hours.  I don't have the budget.  I don't have the expedited shipping option.  Like the Grinch, I want to keep Christmas from coming.  But at least only until I can find a few more gifts.

I know that Christmas isn't about the gifts.  I know this, even though one of my stronger love languages is gifts and I love finding or making the perfect present for someone.  I know my parents don't even want me to spend money on them.  I know my boyfriend doesn't want me to buy him too much.  I know that I don't want him to buy me too much.  I know my friends will still love me if I don't get their presents done by the 25th (sorry, guys).

So yes. I know Christmas isn't about the gifts.

I know Christmas isn't about the gifts.

I think.

So what is it about?

Is it about winning decorating contests, or getting plastered at company holiday parties, or looking at Christmas lights?  Is it about ugly sweaters?  Holiday cards?  Elves on shelves?  Whether or not Die Hard is a Christmas movie? (It is, by the way.)  Endless renditions of "Santa Baby"? Whether or not Love, Actually is a terrible movie? (Debatable, but I love it anyway.)

It's a hard question.

For someone who's struggled with her faith and with Christians in general the past two years, I can't say that Christmas is strictly about religious faith for me right now.  Not that it ever was, really.  I'm a girl whose parents let her believe in Santa Claus for an embarrassingly long time, so obviously Christmas was never explicitly religious in my family.  I will go to church at some point with my parents, and I do still love hymns and still have the Christmas story in John memorized.  I've been a Lutheran for a long time and there is still a special meaning in Christmas that is spiritual for me, about keeping all these things and pondering them in my heart.

But I think these days that The Muppets best sum up my feelings about Christmas spirit.  "Wherever you find love, it feels like Christmas."  Maybe that's a bit touchy-feely, everyone hold hands-y, but it covers a lot of bases for a lot of people: Christian, Jewish, agnostic, and otherwise.  And, at the very least, it takes away from the commercialization of Christmas.

So, for me, Christmas is about spending time with the people I love.  It's about making them happy and being grateful for a truly wonderful 2015 and for all the family, friends, and blessings I have in life.  It's about feeling love, be it romantic, platonic, spiritual, or otherwise.  It's about traditions.  It's about cookies and pies and hams.  Or it's about latkes and Chinese food and a Die Hard marathon.  It's about figuring out how to do two Christmases in one day because there are that many people that want you around for the holidays.  It's about having a Charlie Brown Christmas tree on your console.  Or it's about having a Christmas tree in every room.  It's about whatever you want it to be.

The Grinch figured it out.  I guess I can too.

Look at Me, Adulting!

I saw someone once state on Facebook that if you used the phrase "adulting" to describe your life then you weren't really an adult.

This is very possibly true.

Because really? I'm not sure I am an adult.  It's highly likely I'm only pretending, which seems to be the underlying implication of the word "adulting."  You're not really an adult; you're just faking it till you make it (or don't make it, as the case may be).  You changed a lightbulb.  You made dinner instead of eating chocolate.  You got up, walked the dog, and went to work instead of calling in sick.  

I'm not sure I'm fooling anyone with the whole adulting thing.  Without even counting my large failures at previous life decisions, there are several other signs that I might not be a "real adult."  For example, I've started wearing an Eeyore onesie around the house on more of my days off than I care to admit.  I bought a Doctor Who shower curtain.  I have coloring books.  I still consider my birthday to be a holiday.  I take way too many selfies.  I think pigtails are an acceptable hair style.  And I'm practically a teenager when it currently comes to being in love.

On the other hand, I've been paying all my own bills for a year and a half.  I signed up for health insurance (finally).  I worked events last Friday and Saturday, even though I had a cold, because, well, I had to.  We had six events Friday and seven on Saturday.  If I stayed home with Kleenex shoved up my nose watching Netflix, there would have been no one else to work.  (By the way: sincere apologies to anyone who got my germs along with their photos.  I tried to stay sanitized.)

To be honest, I feel more like an adult than I have in years, Eeyore onesie and all.  I'm adulting all over the place.  I'm adulting so much that I don't have time to do much else.  Which is fine.  It keeps me busy.  It keeps me out of trouble.  It keeps the bills paid.

And the weird thing is that still I'm enjoying my life more than ever before.  Being an adult shouldn't be so great, based on the bad rap it got when I was younger.  There are responsibilities and bills and broken appliances and divorce and too-little-sleep and a distinct lack of naps.  I drink less.  I'm fully accountable to another person for probably the first time ever, and I have no one to blame if I fail except myself.  And I'm stressed and tired and usually just want to stay home and introvert with my boyfriend.

But.  I wouldn't change much of anything.  

And maybe pretending to be an adult is the best way to do it.  It keeps you from being too serious, or from taking yourself too seriously.  It lets you wear pigtails and Eeyore onesies while taking selfies and coloring in coloring books.

And if that means I'm not a "real adult"?  Then fine.  I'm not.  But I'm getting pretty damned good at pretending.

I'm a Mean One...

Oh, Lord.  I missed a week.

I'm comforting myself with the knowledge that it was Thanksgiving week and I've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off.  And you didn't really need me to post a "things I'm thankful for" blog, did you?  I'm pretty sure most of my blogs already spill over with that a bit too much sometimes.  So let's go for the opposite: things I hate about Christmas!

I have a long-standing history of being a bit of a Scrooge. Possibly slightly Grinchy.  I mean, I've never set out to actually ruin Christmas, but I have been known to say "Bah, humbug!" and grumble about putting up a Christmas tree.

It's not Christmas itself.  I don't mind Christmas, especially when it's actually the week of Christmas.  It's the ever-expanding season of Christmas.  It's the fact that Christmas decorations are on sale before Halloween.  It's the fact that syrupy-sweet, overly vibratto-ed, drippingly sentimental Christmas music blasts inescapably from every store, restaurant, and radio station from the beginning of November on.

And it's the fact that I'm an introvert (this is getting to be a common theme, isn't it?).  Which combines poorly with the fact that everyone wants to get together all the time (mainly my parents).  And it's also the fact that we have over 40 Fish Eye Fun events in December.

Don't get me wrong: that's AMAZING and is absolutely not the problem.  I'm so beyond excited that we're busy and popular and even forced to turn away business because we're booked up solid for at least four days this month!

The problem is that some people (take a guess) don't seem to get that I'm busy and socially a bit overwhelmed, and that I probably don't want to come over every week from now until Christmas.  I may or may not have had a meltdown before Thanksgiving over all the social obligations that were suddenly presented to me, and may or may not have decided on my plan for surviving the holidays.  I call it "Drinking Through December." What could possibly go wrong?  (I've also decided that I get a gold star for every day in December that I don't stress cry.)

To be fair, this is the first year I can use the "I'm really busy" excuse as part of why I'm a Scrooge.  Before this year, Christmas was much easier in that aspect.  It was the dead-season at my old job.  I had at least a week and a half off of work most years.  But, I still grew to dread it.

Unintentionally or not, I felt overwhelming pressure from my ex to "compete" at Christmas presents.  If I didn't get his as many or as big or as expensive of presents as he got me, or if his Christmas stocking wasn't as full as mine was, I heard about it.  There would be hints about how much what he got me cost.  Or casual remarks asking if there would be more for him under the tree by Christmas.

Right now? My biggest problem is keeping my presents a secret from Mark until Christmas actually gets here.  We both have a terrible habit of buying each other things and just giving them to each other all year long.  So by the time the holidays/birthdays/etc roll around, we tend to realize that we've already given each other everything we thought the other person would like.  Whoops.

If I'm being honest (and apparently that's what I do now), I have to admit that I might be getting a bit less Scrooge-y in the past two years.  I still hate all the things I complained about above.  And I'm still panicked about getting everything done in time.  My ongoing mantra is that I'll have time in January (which is probably a lie, sure, but it's my current lifeline to sanity, so just let me have my delusions.)

But the intensity of my dislike seems to be abating with time (so long as it's actually the month of December).  Mark and I were running errands this week at stores where, of course, Christmas music was playing, and I didn't grumble and bitch about it.  I might even admit that I danced a little too it, but let's not get crazy.  And I want to go to the Garden Glow (though I contend that the Garden Glow is more of a winter festival than specifically Christmas - again, give me my delusions).

Also?  I have a confession: I kindof want to put up a tree and am a little disappointed that I really don't have space for one.  But don't tell anyone that, ok?