The crisis at 30 continues…

Finding self…

You may wonder why, at age 54, I am writing about what happened when I was thirty. You may think, time is the great eraser. Get over it. Move on. And you may be right. It may be a healthy way to go, or it may be unhealthy. Everyone’s journey is different. The thing is, I haven’t really thought much, about that time in my life. The thing is, I am revising a memoir manuscript and have realized I need to evaluate this part of my life in order to understand where I am in the story I’m telling – which happens ten years later and during my second midlife crisis.

My last post, described the shaking and stirring happening during my thirtieth year. How my internal life mirrored the external. The emergency landing in Houston, an earthquake, almost sinking (I forgot to mention I was on a research cruise on a piece of shit vessel – I knew it, my colleague a former seasoned fisherman knew it but the folks approving the contract decided the vessel passed muster. The true worth of the vessel and crew was found out when we were in the middle of the Aleutian Chain, a 24-hour steam to the nearest port of Dutch Harbor…), and then the terrorist attack of 9/11.

Internally, perhaps because of these events, I reevaluated my life. I woke up from slumbering in a fantasy world. One that wished for a Sunset Magazine type of life. Wine parties with gobs of friends while sitting outside under a canopy of grape vines, the glow of sunset on our faces. I was in love with this California dream. A dream I had had since a teenager. A dream I achieved when I moved out there when I was 21-years old. A dream I achieved when I got into graduate school to study marine biology. A dream I achieved when I met a guy who was born in this fantasy world, drove a motorcycle and had sexy bicycle rider legs. A guy who opened my eyes to the cuisine of Northern California. The world of baked brie, roasted garlic, red wine, and crusty bread. A guy who enjoyed watching waves crash on Carmel beach or at Asilomar. A guy who loved cats.

I was in love with the fantasy. Not that there is anything wrong with a fantasy or dreaming. In my case, the fantasy didn’t survive reality. Why? Maybe it is because I lost trust in him when he didn’t tell me he was moving to Albuquerque. Maybe it is because I followed him, and postponed my dream of becoming a marine biologist. Maybe it is because he caused an unwanted pregnancy by using his promised pull-out method. Maybe it is because we moved to Seattle and got married because we thought that was the next thing our relationship required.

It was all of the above. We humans crave simple answers. We crave the binary. The black or white. The right or wrong. Let me tell you now, if you don’t already know, it isn’t that simple. A woman doesn’t follow a guy from her dream place to Albuquerque because of love. She also moves there because she has always loved the indigenous culture of the southwest. Because the southwest was a place she also dreamed of living. A woman doesn’t abort a pregnancy because she is anti-child. She does so because she had other dreams than becoming a mother. A woman doesn’t always get married because of love. She may marry because she doesn’t know any better.

On my thirty-first birthday, at almost 12,000 feet above sea level, I sipped a martini from a champagne glass, in a jazz club called Thelonius in the capital city of Bolivia, I was beginning to know better. The eve of my thirty-second birthday I jammed to Koko Taylor at Jazz Alley in Seattle. I was separated from my marriage. I was with my best friend, Sarah.

In my journal [11/24/2002] I wrote:

“The last few days of my 31st year of life have been ones of reconciliation. Days of total depression, some more intense than others. Days of trying to figure out what is it that I want out of life and why am I depressed, and not happy to be alive healthy and beautiful and free…”

I continued…

“I still don’t quite understand why I was so depressed. Maybe it was wanting this death dance w/ [husband] to be over. So I can move on but needing the strength to do it. I have been weak, I have allowed my emotions to go crazy, my thoughts insane irrational.”

Then…

“This weekend, beginning on Friday, I began to realize I needed to let go of any expectations, to love life, embrace it and have fun. No bones about it. Last night was a great start at just doing that. Dancing all night, having fun, not being ashamed of my sexuality but embracing it. I feel alive again, I feel a part of the people.”

I remind myself that on that eve of my 32nd birthday, I went to see the Diego Rivera/Frida Kahlo exhibit at the Seattle Art Museum. Dear reader – let me add that my married life lacked color, lacked vibrancy, lacked music, lacked dance. Yes, I ate well because my husband was a sous-chef in one of Monterey Bay’s fine dining restaurants (where I worked as a hostess and where we met). But that was the only thing going for him. He didn’t like my music – salsa, reggae, house. He didn’t like me dressing up – calling me a clown.

The movie Monsoon Wedding helped me see what was missing in my life. I cried with joy at the music, the color, the dancing, the beautiful Bollywood actors. Everything I did was to recapture a spirit I lost in that relationship. A spirit I lost after high school. High school, the last time and place I felt like myself. Confident yearbook editor, basketball player, and AP student. Where I lost myself dancing to house music at school dances. A spirit that began to wither when I went to college at a school in the Hyde Park neighborhood, a place where the Chicago I knew and loved didn’t exist. Although I made up for it during my summers as a life guard at North Ave Beach. I’ll save those stories for another time.

Needless to say, the relationship that became my first marriage zapped me of who I am. The aftermath of my leaving the marriage was not all smooth-sailing. Nope. It was a rollercoaster. One of those that not only goes straight up (high-highs) and straight down (low-lows), but twists, turns, goes up-side-down. One moment you feel weightless, high on adrenaline, then the next you are fighting the G-forces of depression. It was a moment in time where I had the time of my life. Except I didn’t know with each high there would be a low. Friends only saw the highs. If there were social media back then I would have posted pictures of me dancing at nightclubs with my new batch of friends. The lows, those unphotogenic lows, I kept to myself, alone, in my bachelorette apartment.

Reading my journal from that time. A journal I haven’t read in more than a decade. I am astonished at my resilience. Or was it my survival mechanism? Or was it inner-strength? A time when I was at my lowest, but I kept fighting for me. A time when I looked for, asked, and received a connection to the Universal life force of love. Love of self. Where I heard:

“Be true to the love in your heart and the feelings it emits. Love life to her fullest, don’t take her for granted, have fun, be spontaneous and do what you feel is best for your. Nothing is impossible if you are being true to yourself and your heart…”

Funny thing is, I need to hear these words today. Perhaps going back and revisiting what we have survived over our lives is because we need reminding. Reminding of where we have been, what we have accomplished. I don’t remember the good or the bad from that time. I remember the relief of leaving a relationship that didn’t fit. The wounds that were ripped open in my heart during that time allowed me to grow. The lessons I learned at that time, I am relearning today as I share them with you.