Posted November 1st, 2003 by Michelle

It’s now 8 at night, nearing bedtime for little ‘ol nine-to-fiver me. I got to bed at midnight last night (oooh! so late!) and was up before 7 so I’m plum tuckered. I’m out in my dad’s office, fighting through the dial-up war that goes on every evening in this valley. Dial-up is obviously slow all on its own, but when everyone in the valley is checking their email or the paper or whatever it is they do, it takes almost twice as long to load a page. Also, it’s so damn cold now at night that I have to talk myself into taking the ten-second walk from the house to the office. These two factors have been keeping me away from the internet. That and cable TV. Oh, what I’ve been missing. (Although, I should add that I just blew an hour watching the end of Dances With Wolves, a movie not only that I’ve seen forty times but also one that lives in the cuboard by the TV. I’m telling you, I simply cannot be trusted around moving pictures.)

Another reason I’ve not been drawn to writing every night is that my life, right now, is simply routine. I get up early, I drive to Dean and Deluca, I get a soy sugar-free vanilla latte, I go to work, I come home from work, I make dinner, I watch some tele, I go to bed with a book and fall asleep early. And you know what’s weird? I’m loving it, a little. It feels sane and nice and once in a blue moon I run into my dad or Carole. I know I’ll need to start mixing it up soon, I know that I’m dying to get into a writing schedule, but I’m being pretty good to myself, not beating myself up over what I should or should not be doing with any given minute.

A couple of my nights have been a little more interesting, both spent with friends from work. Last night I went to a restaurant in downtown Napa to see one of my coworkers at this second job. Another guy from my tasting room went with me and it was fascinating how different both of these guys are away from work. The one eating with me is a really neat and strange guy, always with some odd joke about whatever it is I’m doing, but at dinner he was pretty serious and a little intense. The one waiting on us, also from the tasting room, has proved to be one of those guys who is weird the morning after. This latter one and I hung out for an evening last week, had a great time, but I don’t think the evening ended exactly how he was hoping it would. Not that he wanted anything unreasonable or extraordinary or icky but I’m climbing very, very slowly back into the romantic saddle and that leaves me cautious and determined.

Sadly, he’s a little put off. He’s been, if not rude, certainly standoffish and closed and not nearly the funny jokester he was all last week. So, unable to help myself, I called tonight and left him a message. “Hey, listen, so you seem a little put off. I was wondering if I could, you know, do something about that. I moved here, what, eight days ago? And I know exactly no one in the valley? And I’d really like to avoid any situation that would alienate a potential friend, like you, particularly since we work together. So if I’ve done or said something confusing or wrong, I hope you’ll let me make it right, and if you are just feeling weird, well, okay, but I’m hoping and inviting you to, well, get over it. Okay? Okay. Thanks.” I simply could not have slept tonight if I hadn’t done this. I want my side of the street to not just be clean, but to be whitewashed, spotless, and with all my recyclables sorted in their proper bins.

Beyond that, well, I’m looking forward to… what, I don’t know exactly, but to whatever seems to be just around the bend here. I have learned a couple unsettling things. The scariest is that most people my age here work two jobs just to afford the rent. If I get in that trap, I might as well never left New York. The second job is invariably waiting tables in a restaurant somewhere, and again, that would be a hopeless, awful thing for me to have to do. Again, I might as well be working at the #1 restaurant in New York if all I want to be in life is a server. Secondly, any writing opportunities I thought I might have at my new job are clearly spoken for by MY BOSS, who is also a writer, and who expressly asked me not to muscle in on his favorite part of his job. So I will have to pursue writing jobs out-of-house, and I’ll have to create some sort of living arrangement that will not put me right back into the hole.

But I do have hopes, and ideas, of what I want to do with my time here, be it another month or ten years. I want to live in the hills somewhere, Calistoga or Anguin or anywhere, in a cabin or cottage on a dirt road with nothing around it. I’ve lived in cities my entire life and I want to change that. I don’t care if it’s run-down as long as it’s sweet and safe. I want to have my cat out there with me, and roommates if I must, and I want to be able to have a bunch of people over for dinner. I know I’m not asking for too much. (Oh, wait, and high-speed internet).

I came home last night to dinner waiting on the stove, polenta and mushrooms and tomato sauce. It may seem like a small thing but I’ve been doing this, all of this, all on my own for a long, long time. I don’t remember the last time I came home to find dinner waiting. I can’t even express what that means to me.