I opened my eyes and looked up. The red digital angles of time stared back at me from above and across. 3:12am.

“Hey, weren’t we supposed to see the meteor shower and the phosphorescent algae?” I elbowed Nick who was snoring next to me. A series of onslaughts and complaints about missing cosmic events eventually led to a role-reversal. Suddenly I was expected to get up and walk to the beach too. In the corner, a planetary solar system was lit up like a diorama. I didn’t look too closely at the glowing orbs. They were remnants of an art installation for the Venice Art Crawl in September. Welcome, fall.

The bathroom had been turned into a “Cosmic Bathroom” with black lights, painted wallpaper strips, and paper mache planets hanging from above. Now a pared down version had been transferred to Nick’s room. I was too tired to decide whether I approved or disapproved.

I put on my wedges, demanded a hoodie, and we walked down Venice Way, through Windward Circle, past the iconic Venice sign, cut through the boardwalk, and then we were there.

“I don’t see anything. Don’t we need to actually be on the beach…like the shore to see something?”
Continue reading Cosmic beaching →

When I was 14, I used to get letters in the mail every day from my boyfriend Gabe who lived in San Jose, CA. In response, I dutifully snail mailed long letters back to him, replete with professions of love and probably some immature doodles.

“I feel floaty,” he would write back.

I don’t know if this was a form of first love. I seemed to always be falling into intense passionate love scenarios, probably dating back to kindergarten if I had to guess. In any case, not to belittle it because it was real.

We talked on the phone (landline) almost daily. This was on top of our handwritten communiques, which traveled between San Jose and Massachusetts, arriving every three days. I know we would both run excitedly to the mailbox every day to see what we had written each other, the drawings and cryptic encoded love euphemisms that would be on the cover to evade parental monitoring.

I met Gabe at a summer camp called Center for Talented Youth (always referred to as CTY). The criteria was passing a certain score on the SAT. Looking back, it seems preposterous that we as 6th graders took the SAT, but that’s what happened without even my real comprehension of how or why. I remember entering that room full of big kids and sitting down in the back, filling out bubbles in number 2 pencil. Do people still do that? I’m pretty sure my brain wouldn’t be able to handle thinking electronically, so I’m glad I grew up in the age of number 2 pencils and non-adaptive test-taking. Continue reading Floaty →

It was the last week of freshman year of college, and I found myself screaming at the top of my lungs in the quad in front of John Jay Hall at Columbia University. My boyfriend had just left my expensive camera in a taxi, and I completely lost it. Looking back, I now realize that it was not this event alone but the accumulation of events dosed with heavy immaturity that led to this outburst. Our friends looked at us agape, feeling awkward, and likely thinking that I was some monster. At the time, I think I must have imagined that they were on my side and that I was yelling and proving my case so obviously.

When we are young, arguing can feel so real and potent. A necessary component of passion and love, so raw and so real. He would always beg us not to fight, and I would argue that it was healthy to fight.

Now I see it as being somewhere in the middle. It is necessary to figure out the best way to be honest and express yourself without being destructive.

My last night in Seoul reminded me of many other poignant endings and moments in my life. I sometimes try to find things that are wrong, so I can be upset…maybe it makes me feel more in control. Maybe it’s a cry for help. Continue reading Is fighting in a relationship healthy? →

I was in an 11-year relationship (age 18-29). In the first relationship I got into after that, my new “boyfriend” (in retrospect, it’s pretty hard to think of him that way) was needless to say pretty insecure. I was banned from talking to my ex. He also referred to the 50% rule – apparently, it takes 1/2 the time you were in a relationship to get over that relationship. So…by my calculations, this March, I will be ready for love lol. I am starting to believe in this ridiculously crude metric. I’m starting to feel a bit more ready.

I try not to think too much about the moments we had together (with the 11-year domestic partnership), and when I do think about it, I tend to be a bit dismissive. But as I looked back on some of our old emails, I can see how loving we were with each other, even through the breakup. I don’t want to get back together with him, but it would be nice to be with someone like him. He made me laugh always, never for a minute throughout our 11 years did I feel anything less than loved and adored (even when I was a nightmare, which I often was), and being heard and listened to in that way. Reading these old emails, I do realize what I have been compromising. It is a big burden though to carry the weight of someone else’s love. It’s definitely easier to crush people when there are reasons to crush them.

Miss you, B! Of all the things I’m most grateful for in my life, you’ve gotta be near the top, if not straight up there as #1. Come back to us…