much

It doesn't take much. A bottle of red wine, a few camel lights, and re-watching the inimitable "Reality Bites." To remember 23. I was miserable at 23, waiting. Waiting for the next thing to begin, clear on what it was. Working at a software company for half of it, having faux dinner parties with mostly faux friends living a faux life in a real warehouse with murderers, crack whores, and the underclass for neighbors. Waiting to move to the dreaming spires, to start life as a capital G capital S graduate student. And here I am, having fulfilled desires I never quite articulated, professor of literature at the University of California. Bing. Check. And I'm in love. Love? Yes. Love. Bing. Check. Do I miss the passion? The uncertainty of the 20-something? Do I miss the drama? To the latter, to some extent, yes and no and no and no. And the former? Yes and no and no and yes. If you see what I mean and I think you do. Wellspring? Is that the word? What is this place in my heart that, drunk on red wine (or at least heavily buzzed) and the unique nicotine buzz that comes from smoking after 2 months not, while also wearing the nicotine patch, that throbs, that trembles, the cues not quite fallen tears in my eyes after a few episodes of My So-Called Life and a crap Winona Ryder and Ethan Hawke movie? That prompts the desire to be 23 again, not creeping up on 32, that makes me wonder whether I missed some incredible boat with Ethical Treatment or Made-Me-Want-To-Kill-My-Father-Today? I know I missed no boat. Fuck the boat, as Tone said, drunkenly, in a post or email or comment I can no longer find. There is no boat. I'm in love, sustainable, lasting, last me forever love, and I cherish that, as dull and boring as it may be. I'm employed, in sustainable, lasting, last me forever employment, assuming I get off my ass and write two books, 6 articles, and get my ass around to doing Anglo-Norman. So what is it? I spent dinner the other night, with an old drinking buddy and his girlfriend (English), my sister (no comment), and friend's brother and father. Explaining why I was just a critic, why that was all I needed. Written, somewhere, in pen rather than pencil, "Consistency is all I ask." Sung, "Consistency is all I ask and all I ever wanted." Yet having achieved all I set out to achieve, without ever having quite known I had set out to do so, having got what I want, what I suddenly want is a chance to do it all over again, without changing anything but merely to enjoy the ride. Or maybe to change everything. Or maybe just a week in the desert with my friend in Arizona on whom, clearly, the Ethan Hawke character was modeled, Being and Time and all, and drink and smoke and pontificate and be free of the burdens of being public. As privately public as I am. Or to have the seemingly effortless self-confidence of my junior high school classmate now colleague, a chicana from the wrong side of the tracks made fabulously good. My inner 13-year old polish drama queen girl screams. Costume, for halloween: A tragedy mask (you know, hand held, half mask, white), a rhinestone tiara, and an AIDS ribbon: drama queen....