New Year’s Eve: Part 1

My very close friend invited me to her place for a party for New Year’s. I realized I wouldn’t know anyone besides her there, so I called one of my oldest and closest friends, Drew. Drew and I grew up together and I consider him one of the best people in my life. I was happy to bring him along because he knows the hostess and he’s also a blast to party with.

However.

He invited along a very close friend of his, Walter. I have no issue with Walter as a person. He’s incredibly good-looking, a really nice guy, a fun person to be around. However, Walter is very close to one of my exes and I’m sure has heard all sorts of horrible things – true and untrue – about me. We’ve been to a lot of the same parties, but we’ve never really talked or made an effort to get to know each other.

But, the three of us looked smashing and we headed over to my friend’s to get the party on.

The Holiday Party, Part 8

The top five moments of the night, according to Ren’s boyfriend:

5. Septum hooking up with the Ryan Gosling DJ.

4. Septum hooking up with Ren’s little sister and later declaring, as Ren tucked her into bed, “sorry, but your sister’s just so pretty”. (It was apparently a noodle kind of night. Septum’s totally straight.)

3. Noodlegirl’s boyfriend saying I was out to perform some “crazy lesbian ritual”.

2. Smoking with the neighbor.

1. My unabashed pursuit of Noodlegirl, which was, in his words, “noteworthy and something to aspire to”.

Oh, and Noodlegirl and I have spoken since. Take that.

The Holiday Party, Part 7

Ren soon came upstairs to add some levity to Noodlegirl’s date breathing down my neck and we all wound up having a nice smoke together. The issue of my host’s sexuality was settled: he’s straight! We all had a good laugh about it as Ren struggled between apologizing and dying of laughter over the situation.

Eventually, Noodlegirl’s date tried to drag her away, but she made him wait so she could write down her information for me and hand it over. I gave her a long hug and flashed him a million-dollar smile over her shoulder. Because you don’t screw around with us crazy ritualistic lesbians.

After they left, Ren looked over to me and said, “so, Septum’s asleep in my bed right now. You want to come downstairs and handle these munchies?”

It was an evening well-spent.

The Holiday Party, Part 1

Saturday night, my good friend hosted a holiday party at her apartment down where she goes to school. Originally, I wasn’t going to go because of the issue of travel and the like, but my good friend, Septum – who I have mentioned a bit on here without naming her – decided she was down, too. So, the two of us left our respective universities to head down and party it up with my friend. Let’s call her Ren.

We got down a little earlier and helped Ren, her boyfriend, and her roommates set up. The DJ she’d hired looked a lot like Ryan Gosling. It was a little uncanny.

“Does anybody else live in this building?” I asked. It was a smaller complex.

Ren’s boyfriend nodded, “yeah, two of the nicest gay guys ever live upstairs. I invited them. Maybe you’ll see them later.”

Septum was already hard at work on mixing some drinks when the first guests came and was being a little more than liberal with the rum. I joined her, but tried to pace myself. It was going to be a long night, in the best way possible.

Oh, tumblr.

I finally finish recounting the tale of last Saturday and now I have one of this Saturday to tell. But, instead, I’m going to go spend the evening with a close friend.

Bear with me. I promise not to leave you hanging too long.

<3, Ivy

The Winter Formal, Part 2

We were all having a blast before we knew it. Wine was poured out, laughter bounced around the room, and the impending threat of finals was – for the night – left back at our dorm rooms. It was a nice change to see everyone dressed up and amidst the formality of the event, there was definitely a pervading sense of ease.

“I would like to propose a toast…”

I raised my glass and started roasting my friends. It was in good spirit, maybe a bit acerbic, but never hurtful. We laughed, we clinked glasses, we cracked jokes. It was nice to just relax, to just enjoy each other. The evening was off to a great start.

theropeview:

Top Hat and Tush

http://www.tumblr.com/blog/theropeview

The Winter Formal, Part 1: A text to my best friend from home before heading out

Me: Thank you for making me buy that dress over Thanksgiving. I look like a sexy dinner napkin.
My friend: Insert perverted joke here about people wiping their mouths.

So, it’s been a little bit of a tough semester for me and things are starting to wrap up. I have one of more spike as far as work goes, but I should be seeing some calmer waters soon.

I really can’t believe how much of this was accomplished because of support from my friends. I’m sorry, it’s not a sexy post, but seeing this image just brought that feeling up for me. It’s like we’re all kind of on rollerskates, sliding around and falling over, but we’re all leaning on each other for support. And, sometimes it’s a mess and sometimes it’s funny. But, we’re in it together and from all our struggling there is somehow stability.

And that’s my two cents.

I have a very strong, very deep relationship with an ex-girlfriend of mine. Sometimes we get a little weird. Sometimes it greats unnecessary friction. But, then there are the points where it just keeps us close and there for each other. Like tonight.

We began the evening by catching the tail-end of the Black Friday madness and most of the stores had been long-plundered and cleared. We found it funny how, turning a corner and seeing a garment, we could predict that the other would gravitate toward it. I guess we’re just funny like that.

Afterwards, we wound up sitting around in her car and talking. She had bought a little piece of hooked metal that you put over your finger and run over peoples’ skin with. At first I thought it was silly, but feeling it on my own skin was amazing. I’ve been craving that sort of stuff lately and maybe it was a wrong move to let her show me, because it set me on edge a bit in terms of arousal. I guess it was partially the craving for something like that which made me so prone to vent about the current lifestyle-themed dramas I was experiencing.

As she showed it to me, we talked about being in the lifestyle, understanding ourselves, living this way. I told her how concerned I was about discovery and about my whole giving tree issue. Most of it was things she knew and had experienced first hand with me, but she listened nonetheless.

And then I got onto my growing insecurity about feeling like I was secondary to everyone. I almost started crying, I had not realized it bothered me so much. “It’s just, I feel like everyone has someone who would be there to get hit by a bus for them. And the thing is that I don’t feel like I have someone who would do that without thinking that taking the hit for me was less important than sticking around for someone else,” I told her. I shook my head, “I just sometimes can’t even picture myself being with someone.”

It wasn’t because of the issue of me not wanting to be with anyone. I almost feel like I’m not worthy of that sort of singular attention. It’s hard to explain the sort of inferiority complex I take on, and while it’s sometimes a deterrent from some potentially negative relationships, it can rear its head and be my worst enemy.

“I just don’t know anyone right now I’d honestly want to shack up with.” I knew I must have sounded silly. “And certainly none of them want to shack up with me. And I worry about being some lonely, slutty cat lady or just some sad case once my looks go.”

Even when I knew I was being foolish, she still listened. She was reassuring, comforting, understanding. For all the bravado, tumblr, sometimes I doubt and I worry. I fear I’ll stay too long at the fair and, when the lights go down and the rides stop and the music is cut, I’ll be left to walk home alone.

That guy from my frat. I still haven’t named him. I promise, I’ll get around to it. I just can’t figure it out.

Somehow, later on in the evening, he and I wound up separated from the rest of our friends, smoking a joint and talking. I simultaneously impress and scare myself sometimes when I consider how natural inhaling has gotten for me, especially since I don’t smoke tobacco. I have a lot of things about myself that leave that sort of impression. One of those things is my bravado, which it appears he’ll never see the bottom of.

I just have fun being a little mean to him. I made him wait outside of a crowded ladies room for me to stand in line for a stall then fix my hair and makeup just to get a dance with me. I tease mercilessly. It’s just bad.

So, I decided to be kind and gentle when we were alone. Because ever since I was a kid I’ve been told I intimidate the opposite sex for one reason or another. And, because I didn’t want to completely crack the poor boy’s ego to bits; he’s a nice guy.

Of course, I still bullied a bit. He has a long-distance girlfriend from back home and, when pressed about the terms of his relationship, he gets a little evasive. This is something called a red flag in my book. So, finally, I poked, “what’s going on with your lady then, Mr. Fidelity?”

“We’re trying,” he shrugged.

“Trying what?” I asked.

“Trying,” he sighed, “but she has a different definition of fidelity than I did.”

“And what’s that?” I pried.

After all the assumptions I’d made about him being the one making some poor little unknowing girlfriend cry and get into polyamory, he was the one who had been cheated on. I felt a little bad for all the mocking I’d done. Poor kid had his heart broken and was just trying to salvage something. How could I tease?

Our conversation jumped around a bit before I formally apologized a second time. It wasn’t my fault, he repeated. He brushed some ash from my joint off of my thigh. “I don’t know how to ash stuff,” I admitted, “I don’t know how to flick it right. I was really lame in high school. And boring.”

“You’re not lame anymore,” he smiled.

We went and grabbed some 3 am munchie-medicine-food afterwards. I think we’re going to be friends. For real.