I got off the train, climbed into the Land Rover, turned on the satellite radio to find Dexy’s Midnight Runners’ “Come on Eileen” blasting on the 80’s station. I pulled out of the station, turned the first corner and the moon was rising just to my left- a low, long, lazy crescent moon. And I felt great. Two hours before, I sat my manager down at my restaurant, and said, “I’m giving you my two weeks.” “Where are you going?” he asked, confusion spreading over his face. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m going to write my book.”

Now that is not the only reason for quitting my job, but it was the first thing out my mouth, so I’m going to go with it. This is one of the scariest things I have ever done. My restaurant has been a part of my New York life since the moment I settled. It was there, on 9/12/2001 that I realized I could galvanize large groups of people to give their time and goods for service. It was there that they rearranged my schedule so I could train to be an EMT. I’ve met a handful of people on the staff that I hope to carry with me always. It was there that I learned that it was okay not be loved by everyone. It was that place that allowed me to become more of who I am.

But it is also the kind of place where people got a job at 21, thinking it would support an acting career, and yet TEN YEARS LATER they are still there, having giving up even saying they were an actor. It is a place where you have just enough fun and make just enough money to break even, while actually going nowhere. It is a place where I am wildly successful doing something I don’t want to be doing. It is a place that, post 9/11, the money does not come close to justifying the excessively hard work. And more so now than ever, it is fractured, divided, leaderless, and yet resistant to change. I could stay. I was only casually thinking about leaving. And then somehow ended up speaking the words that cut me loose from the only sure thing in my life.

Will I like this new job? Will the place even hit? Is there real money to be made? Will I hate the hours? In the end, it doesn’t matter. I will give it a shot, try my best, and if it doesn’t work, do something else. It is going to be a hard month both emotionally and financially, and were it not for a windfall earlier in the month I would already be out on the street. I can make this work, I will make this work. Dammit.

As for my book… it’s time. Weird to even write about writing a book but… but I’m going to create a new writing space in my apartment, and as soon as my schedule calms down, dedicate some time to spend in that place. I lose a double tomorrow, which is two shifts gone from next week’s paycheck. But… so many other things to do. My mind is spinning. I think I’ll go drown it in cable.

Fall is here in Hillsdale. Today was cool and breezy, filtered sun through soft gray clouds, cool enough that we wore pants and brought a sweater. Just after I woke up I took another walk up into the barn, and then headed up the hill.

I cooked lasagna for dinner. It’s probably the weakest lasagna I’ve ever made, but it’s a mistake from which I can learn: too little sauce means not so good lasagna. After dinner, and after a long discussion about our city’s preparedness for another disaster (and our personal levels of preparation) we went outside to the stairs on the barn to look at Mars. And it was COLD. Way too cold for the sandals strapped on our feet, cold enough for a sweater AND a jacket zipped all the way up. In fact, after half an hour it was too cold and we came back inside. I’m not ready for this. The summer was way too hot and the winter before way too frigid to suddenly be able to see my breath.

I have half a shift that I requires my presence tomorrow. I’ll be on the 10 AM train, at work by 1, and then I’ll try to catch the 6 PM train to take me right back here. It may sound absurd, but I’m not going to let my job get me down, nor let it interfere too much with my weekend. And… and… when I get back, I will give notice. It’s a frightening and wonderful thought.

I’m glad I didn’t write last night like I was planning to. I got home at 5 AM and I had plenty of thoughts ripping through me that screamed to be made public. Thankfully, I fell into bed and didn’t wake up until noon. That’s probably the best choice I made last night.

At 7 PM I was at Rocco’s, waiting for my friends Kellie and Liam to show up for Kellie’s birthday dinner. Liam was an hour late, but as soon as he got there, other people from my restaurant started filtering in. It was supposed to be just the three of us, but at one point there was ten people sucking off the $75 bottle of wine we’d ordered. Also, Kellie didn’t love all of the people who showed, and it was her night. By the time everyone left, it was 11 PM, and the three of us decided to get serious. Six hours and four bars later, I was on the Lower East Side at Kellie’s apartment, talking long and deeply about things lost to me today. I know our conversation was fraught with depth and courage and secrets but all I remember today was her pink silk skirt and the smell of the street.

After I crawled out of bed, I lunched with my friend Val who will be my manager at my new job. She is startlingly giving and gracious, and talks at great length about the people in her life. I’ve yet to meet even one of her friends, and I know more about them than I do some of my own. She’s really excited about the new bar, and I hope that I will be able to hold up my end of the bargain. I hope I can take the hours, and the drunks, and the lifestyle, if it means I have time to write and weekends to see my brothers.

I’m now upstate at the farmhouse, seeing this place for the first time since the wedding.

I’m conflicted about leaving my job. I’m conflicted about Africa, about where I want to live, about my cervix, about everything. The only thing I know for sure is I want change, and so that is what I will create.

Also, I’m not at all conflicted about popping “The Two Towers” into Ian and Tessa’s DVD player. It came in the mail minutes before I left my house. I’m going to go spend some quality time with the King of Men. And then think about what I’ve learned.

I would just like to give a shout out to the Gods of Weather. Perhaps it is Mars, perhaps it is just that the folks in charge decided that New Yorkers derserved just one, tiny, itty-bitty break. Whatever it is, I’d to call it by name, and say it’s about freaking time.

One of the people I met walking home after the blackout was an English professor who lives here in Park Slope. I bummed $3 from him to grab some soy milk and a box of Cheerios, and got his number so I could pay him back. As is my way, I forgot to call, but yesterday during my Coop shift he waltzed in to buy some tomatoes. We spoke for a while, and we talked about having a cup of coffee, and I gave him my phone number, and it wasn’t until later that day that I realized he had asked me out and I had accepted. Again, as my way, I wasn’t going to call him back, but I’m trying to be better about this so I called him this morning. We made plans to go to a gallery a week from Friday and possibly have a drink (he mentioned only tea or coffee, so I might have to get through this one sober). We’ll see if it all actually happens. It’s just hard to imagine, but I guess I should give it a shot.

It’s my friend Kellie’s birthday today, and we have plans to eat at Rocco’s, the restaurant from that reality show (which I avoided like the plauge). My friend Steve is the wine director there, and he promises to push us through the crowd so we can actually have dinner. Before I go, though, I’m going to take my much-ignored Casati for a spin around the park. Strange how easy it is to forget the things that bring you pure joy when you are busy being miserable.

The Q train decided to stop running at Pacific Street tonight, two stops before my stop, and as the people filed out to transfer to the “new” Q train, I fought my way against the crowd and walked up to the street. 1 AM in Brooklyn, on Flatbush, is not my perfect idea of safe, but I needed to be out in the air and didn’t want to wait for another train. It reminded me of the joke about the guy who parachuted out of an airplane. When he had fallen the appropriate distance, he heard his leader screaming into his headphone from the plane: “Pull the cord! Pull the cord!” “Okay, but hold on,” says the jumper. This repeats three more times when the leader screams “PULL THE CORD!!!” and the jumper says, “It’s okay, I can jump from here”.

Not the funniest joke, but I decided I would walk from there, safe or no.

I went into work tonight doubly miserable because of how bad the night was before. It got worse when I saw who I was working with, and by the time I started my sidework I was inventing reasons why I could leave. And then I made a decision. I approached a woman there who hasn’t been very nice to me the last few days and I confronted her. She was upset about me leaving the other day. I immediately started bawling, since I am a kind or mean word away from tears all the time lately, and I told her that I didn’t make a good choice but that passive aggression and meanness weren’t good either. In three minutes she had her arms around me and said she was so, so sorry. I tried to compose myself and went to another server who was acting the same way. He immediately put his arms around me and said, “I know you are having a hard time. But you should come to us when you are having a hard time. Don’t leave. Honey, we love you. We love you.”

So though it was a crazy, busy night, and we had some awful people unleashing their miseries on us poor servers, it was a much better night. Much, much better, and it reminded me why I’ve stayed there for so long. Was it enough to convince me to stay? Not nearly. But the night was bearable, and that right there is a victory.

I got a very sweet email tonight from a blog reader. Seems she has been going through a rough patch as well, for similar reasons. It meant the world to me because I’ve felt rather mixed about writing about what I’m really feeling, but I’ve also been unable to censor myself. It makes me feel like less like a big loser and more like a human if even one person out there is relating to my whining, my woes. She mentioned the difficulty and pain of unrequited love.

I’m hoping to get one last shift covered, and then I could run back to the farmhouse for the entire Labor Day weekend. It will be strange and hard to be there, but it would also be really great. I think. I don’t know. At the very least, I won’t be at work, and the very most is I get to actually hang out with Ian and Tessa without 200 other people.

It’s strange to me that one day can be good and awful. It started well and then got progressively icky. This morning was my last French class of the summer, not to begin again until the 22nd of September, and only then if I can find the money and if I think I’ll actually be going to Africa. My good friend Val is in class with me, and she is the one who has offered me this new job. I accepted. After class, we grabbed sushi and pannini and walked to Central Park. We talked about training for a marathon (she’ll run with me, I’ll cycle with her) and also tried to figure out my schedule at the new bar (most likely Tuesday night, Thursday day and Friday night). I missed my appointment with the personal trainer, but really, it never could have happened in the first place.

After this lovely lunch, I headed down to work, and was an unfortunate hour early. I bought a book and ducked into a coffee shop and called my mother, begging her to convince me to actually show up at my job. She was persuasive, and way too soon I walked through the door. Burn-out is something you can taste, something you can smell when you are in a situation that is not good for you. A place can become dark and ugly when it is in fact sunny and clean simply because it is dead to you. That is what my job is- dead. I met a lot of really nice people, made a lot of people happy, but I made myself miserable.

I wish, I wish I could go tomorrow and give my two weeks, but my new job doesn’t start until some time in September and I’m poor enough as it is. I know, I know, I’ve got a roof over my head and soy milk in the fridge and I don’t have to clean toilets or be on the line at Taco Bell. I know, I know. I’m trying my best to change my life, to do the best I can, but it’s slow, and it’s hard. And while I remember my rant from yesterday about how lucky I am to have such a great family, at the end of the day, I come home and I deal with this alone.

After September 1st, I only have two more months in this apartment, which means only two more months bleeding my bank account to pay my astronomical ridiculous rent. By October 1st, I hope to be settled in my new job. At the same time, I will know everything about my Peace Corps application, and it will be something I can either conceive, or something totally impossible for my frame of mind. By December 1st, well. I certainly hope to have even more achieved, but even as I continue to hope, I lose faith.

I just finished reading “A Million Little Pieces” by James Frey. It is a autobiography about his addictions and path to sobriety. It is amazing. Through it, he reads the Tao, and repeats the serenity prayer in every AA meeting:

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

It sounds so simple, doesn’t it? I mean, first you have to define “God” but after that, it’s very clear. The thing I’m lacking right now is the wisdom.

No sleep for me last night. Nary a wink. I turned the light off before midnight, fell into a daze by 1, but wide awake again until dawn. I almost got up and took melatonin; I also almost got out of bed to read, but I decided that either action was too proactive so instead I stared at the wall and bothered my cat with the tossing and the turning. I crawled out of bed at 9 but didn’t dare ride my bike into the city. I showed up at work at 10, announced I was going home, and turned around and by 11 was back in bed. I know, I know, I hardly need to miss more work, but I might have collapsed in the middle of the shift.

I slept until 2, an easy, blissful sleep where I dreamed not of, you know, the usual stuff, but about aquiring yet another bike. It was red and shiny, with a banana seat and tassels and long, curvy handlebars. It also had a huge balloon, about five feet by five feet, attached to the rear fender. In my dream, I went to a bike clinic because I couldn’t figure out how to blow up the ballon. I met this nutty old guy who waxed rhapsodic about how great my bike was, and we found some abrasions in the lining of the balloon. I knew I had to get it blown up, or something bad was going to happen, so I started putting scotch tape on it, but then I rememberd I had an audition today at 6. My watch read 5:55, and that’s when I woke with a start. It was only 3, but I did have an audition, and I had to get going.

I’m not even sure what the show is called, but I feel like I auditioned well, and really, the good part is simply going. A friend of mine at work is the director, and I’ve seen his work before. He’s good. I’d love to get cast but I’m not going to be the least disappointed if it doesn’t happen. It’s just good to get back in the saddle.

My mom called me today to apologize about complaining every time she calls me. I understand feeling that way, feeling as though you are a barrel of bad news, but I told her that things are hard now, for both of us, for different reasons, and that we have to talk about it. The reason my life is good, regardless of the situation of my heart, is because I can actually talk to my father, my mother, and all four of my brothers if I wanted to, about anything. Sean, Ian, Kent, and my dad are all really lucky because they have someone in love with them to talk to as well as the rest of us, but that doesn’t diminish my good fortune. They have tons of a good thing. The rest of us have a lot of a good thing.

When I’m feeling extra crappy, I remind myself of that. I have a friend at work whose parents refuse to work, and she sends them part of her paycheck every week. Another friend got hit in the face when he told his brother he was gay. Another friend’s dad was abusive. Another friend’s parents died when he was 20. I mean, I know misery and happiness are all relative, but I also think it’s important to remind myself of the good things. What would I have done if I didn’t have my family during the last few weeks? Well, I would have coped, but largely because they have always been there.

I woke this morning without even the semblance of a hangover. This is strange. I suffer from terrible hangovers, without fail, if I’ve had more than two drinks on any given night. I woke before the alarm, and not only did I not have a hangover, I also was missing the usual sense of dread and loss that follows me from my dreams. In other words, I woke up feeling good. I went to work, still feeling good, and worked really hard for six hours before getting off work and riding to the West Side Highway. Feeling good. There were too many people, so I headed to my gym, feeling good about working out, and it was closed! Snow day! Instead, I rode home through the twilight, feeling good both because of and in spite of the fact that I still love and still hope.

I’m not sure how to feel about John J. Geoghan, the priest who was strangled to death in jail yesterday. This man was accused of molesting over 130 kids during his years as a parish priest, and that is only the number who actually came forward. He is said to have committed abuse even at a Red Sox game. Most of the people who he abused were upset that he was dead, since they wanted him to suffer through the rest of his life, and I have to wonder about the guy who killed him. That guy is going to be tried for murder and he’s already in prison.

I wonder if the little things I do that I know are wrong are the seeds of greater destruction. I know I have to count things and separate them into threes, and I wonder if I indulge this impulse if I will end up drooling in a cage somewhere, having OCD’ed myself into insanity. And if I do not allow myself to do these things, can I save myself from madness? This priest molested over 130 people. That means he had to find over 130 opportunities, over 130 situations and children that he could manipulate to his advantage. And I wonder if he believed in hell, and if he did, why he didn’t try to go to therapy, try to get some help. I wonder if he let this guy strangle him without putting up too much of a fight. I wonder if he thought he had done nothing wrong. I wonder if he had any kids.

This summer has been the shortest of my life, or so it seems. Next weekend is Labor Day, which, when I was a kid, meant that the pool was only open for a few more days. I’m not nearly ready to face any sort of cold weather.

I called my brother Sean today and I said, “Hey, so what do you do when you still feel like shit, even though you feel like you shouldn’t feel like shit anymore, and you are bored of feeling shitty and you don’t know what else to do?” I asked him this because he has been through a long, horrible, ridiculous divorce, and although my situation is nothing like his, I know he will empathize. “Well,” he said, “I got drunk for a year.” “Yeah,” I answered, ” I’m already working on that. What else? What else can I do to not feel like shit?” And he said, “Well, I don’t recommend getting drunk for a year, but just know that I don’t think it’s boring, and you can talk to me whenever you want.”

I went to a dinner party at my friend Carol’s apartment last night, way up on the West side. It was really fun, at least I think it was, because most of it is fuzzy. I slept at Ian and Tessa’s to avoid a party in my building, but before I crashed I apparently wrote a very angry and caustic blog for Ian. I’ll hold to it, though, since although the words were harsh the sentiment was true.

If I had my druthers, I’d go back to bed right now and sleep off this hangover and start fresh tomorrow. I’m ready to finally have a good day.

Yesterday I made a grand return to the gym. I haven’t actually worked out in months, or really in a year, preferring yoga and cycling. But I haven’t been able to motivate myself to get to yoga class, so I dragged myself back to the Bally’s on 6th Ave. I had a reasonably good workout, as my sore muscles today are telling me, but I know I am a far cry from getting back into shape. To that end, I wandered over to the Personal Trainer area in the basement of my gym and talked to a guy there for about fifteen minutes. He seemed to completely understand my plight- I’m in great shape, with a really healthy heart and really strong muscles but I’ve got a lovely layer of flub that won’t go away- and he told me what he’d do to help me tone. I have a meeting with him on Tuesday, but unless I can come up with a grillion dollars between now and then, I won’t be able to see him again. My trainer in Los Angeles cost me $20 a session. Here in New York, make it $65, most of it up front. If I want to work with this guy, I have to fork over $1582 over the next three months. For that money, I would get 24 sessions with him, meeting two or three times a week. I know that $65 is not that much cash for a meeting with a PT in New York, but really, how does anyone afford it?

I’m almost ready to give my two weeks at work, regardless if I have another job lined up. As my brother Kent always says, I’m going to do it wrong differently.