twenty-something

Ally McBeal. Ever seen it? Now that was, at one time, once upon a time, a quality television show. Recently, I caught one of its season finales in reruns, one I caught first run back in 1999. The episode spotlighted the disillusionment of the titular character and the deterioration of her long-held dream of finding the man of her dreams, her soulmate, "The One." Will she ever find him, or will she have to settle for less, like the rest of her world is telling her to do? That question doesn't limit itself to a season finale cliffhanger or a TV show premise -- it's a bigger question, for my own life, if not the lives of every human being on this planet.

Seeing the show transplanted me to 1999, when I saw myself the nineteen-year-old gay male counterpart to Ms. McBeal. In my head, I was young and optimistic in the face of great adversity and disappointment. Hoping, wishing, praying that there's someone out there for you, made for you, and yet knowing, deep down, that it's an unlikelihood. I thought, like all nineteen year olds, that I knew everything.

Now I sit here, a twenty-something, who, like all twenty-somethings, pretends that I don't think I know everything. I sit here and say that I'm lost and directionless, a fool, but still, I look back at 19 and think that I am so much older, so much wiser, so much better due to the passing of just five years.

I didn't know shit then, I don't know shit now.

I write a lot, here and in my "unpublished" works, about life and love, and sometimes I think I'm smart and I get it. But overall, in the pit of the hole that is me, I know I don't. And maybe I never will.

A few nights ago, I had a dream, one in a series of very vivid, memorable dreams that came to me over a few nights. But this particular dream lingered more than the other. None of it will make sense to you, of course, but someone impersonating writer Augusten Burroughs was there, and he was lecturing me on my mistakes. About not having kids or something. I woke up feeling kind of shitty. Augusten was just as much of a dick as he comes off in his new book, and it wasn't really him. But still, the Ally-in-my-soul was affected. Or something.

It's been a long time since I've thought about baby names or a wedding guest list. In fact, in rummaging through old files on my old computer, I found an actual wedding guest list I started when I was 20, maybe 21. It's so silly I just wanted to delete it and never mention it to another person. But there it was, a list of these people that were part of that life with that other guy. There were a lot of people on it, and I didn't immediately recognize at least a dozen names. But there was everybody I knew in my life back then, and I do mean everybody. It was like a desperate person's Friendster or Facebook profile, lots of acquaintances, few real connections. And I wanted all these people to share in the day when I was to become --"Mr. Patrick Kelleher"?

If that wasn't enough to make me want to send a cyborg back in time to shoot my 20yo self in the head, I also found a Word Doc with baby names:
Boys: Riley Andrew, Liam Marcus, Noel Phillip, Noah Benjamin, Ira Allen
Girls: Susan Martha, Serena Anne, Jillian Emily

...How fucking gay.

In-group. It's OK.

*ahem* Well, it was 2001 the last time I changed either file. And it was probably late 2002 the last time I seriously thought about getting hitched or naming babies.

I remember one fall day in '02, strolling along the Waterfront with my friend Dan. I was still pretty shattered by the break up, but I was keeping it in. There was a gay couple, kid in a stroller, and it just triggered me to open up, just a little, to my friend. "I have less than three years to get married," my then-22 self said. "And then I have to have kids by the time I'm thirty. How's that going to happen without Joe?"

Dan, in his gay bitch sort of way, verbally slapped me in the face and back to reality. "Are you kidding me?" he said. And we talked. And I dealt. And, seriously, I think that was the last time I really thought about that whole timeline. Last time I thought, "Hey, I'm gonna get hitched! Hey I'm gonna have babies!" The last time I was a Charlotte.

God, I have changed. I'm still neurotic and needy, just like Ally. But do I still believe in love? Abso-fucking-lutely. I'm just more realistic about it. And much less "Civil Unions and Chinese Baby."

But, God, I do have this thing that pops into my head every once in a while. It's silly, maybe more embarrassing than those lists. Whenever I hear "In My Life" by the Beatles, I picture my wedding reception. And it's not Joe there, I don't know who it is.

I'm such a fucking girl.