Jenna's House of Idiosyncrasies Version 10.0 [Focus.]

If you have a complicated relationship with someone, an unexpected but pernicious reminder of this fact can be had, of all places, in the greeting card aisle. Here is a place where relationships are neatly divided and categorized, and none so much as in the birthday cards. There are cards for mothers and fathers, brother and sisters, and every other member of the family. There are cards for husbands and wives, and cards filed “Birthday with Romance” for that specific sentiment, when such heavy handed gems as, “It’s your birthday and I’m thinking of you... Naked”. There are “Birthday for Him” and “Birthday for Her”, some meant to be given to close friends and some meant to hand to someone in the office after the whole floor has signed it.

There is a card for everyone in your life that has a defined role, which often people do. People who you have fuzzy relationships with are either still on their way to being important enough to get a card, or on their way out of your life. In Greeting Card Land, someone is your friend, or they’re not. Someone is your boyfriend or fiance or husband, or they’re not. There is no birthday card for the man who you met when a new friend started dating him, the man who then drew you into a bizarre triangle where you provided all the abstract elements of a girlfriend—the long nights talking, the emotional support, the understanding—and the actual girlfriend bought the sex. There isn’t a card for this man who you threw yourself at while he was still dating your friend, and then again and again after they broke up, getting rejected each time. No card for someone who initiates deep kisses when they’re drunk, knowing full well your deep, abiding feelings, and then when you bring it up a day later abruptly changes the subject. There isn’t a card for the man who, despite rejecting you, expresses romantic feelings and actions to you constantly in the space of well over a year, orchestrating candle lit dinners, posing as your boyfriend at weddings, asking you to dance in bars and in his kitchen, insisting you stay over and sleep next to him, rubbing your shoulders when you don’t feel well. And there is not a good card for someone who, after being out of touch for months, starts a letter with “Jenna Baby,” and in the next sentence refers to you as his “dear old pal”. Read More »

I do this every year, (or, at least, every year since 2003) and it is absolutely compulsory.

As in years past, I must preface this with a warning to not proceed if you have delicate sensibilities. I would say, though, that overall, I've been especially good this year. Read More »

Loooooong, slightly masturbatory essay. I apologize in advance.

“Jenna,” He stuck his chin out and whined with faux exasperation, “why do you hate me so much?”

Everyone's got that one friend who uses some variation on this phrase as a way to tell you to just lighten up when you are trying to get them to do something completely reasonable. Like stop drinking when they've clearly had enough. Or get in the car when it's 5 in the morning and obviously time to head home. Or to please, just put some clothes on. While you're just trying to get through to the end of the night, your friend basically says to you, Stop being so uptight. You're totally harshing my mellow. Read More »

People have asked me many times how I could write about my whole life on the Internet. Anyone could read it! Dire consequences might follow! They want to know how I keep it safe, keep it secret: a website bearing my real name.

My answer is always the same; honestly, I have nothing to hide. I'm an adult, I'm responsible for myself, and I own my mistakes. For many years I've been the type to give direct answers to direct questions, and while there have been times where I might imply that I have more (or less) experience with certain things, on these pages I've been pretty straight with the ethereal out there. There never seemed to be any point in hiding that I'm a drunk, or overweight, or sometimes pretty fucking lonely. Besides, I believe that reading about my life is probably like watching Nascar: no one really wants to see anyone get hurt, but if it happens, no one wants to miss it either. Having to run across a university quad in broad daylight wearing only a bathrobe? Fantastic! Walking home alone, drunk, in the middle of the night? Well, it was a close call, but I got home okay. Finally being painfully rejected by a longtime crush? Learning experience. Hungover and puking on a public intersection at high noon, with cars all around? Comedy gold.

My humanity and ability to err are the things that have made my life interesting. In the past couple of years or so, however, things have gotten much less compelling on paper. Not bad, per se, but not as riveting as things might have been in my younger days. I spend much more time just chilling out, or talking to my friends, or working, and not getting into anything really resembling trouble. On the one hand it can be comforting to have things be so constant, on the other I've almost been waiting for something to happen to me, because while I can go back to many times in my adult life and read about how things were, I feel like I'm going to go back to this time in my life and find an empty hole, resembling in that way my life before high school, of which I remember very little.

And yet.

The past couple of weeks have been different. I've felt like someone else, and that Jenna is totally irresponsible, blows off work, doesn't keep in touch with family, and is at times dishonest. That Jenna does things that draw blood. This person that I am not has felt more alive than I ever feel, but also manic, crazy, and fantastically selfish. On the one hand I want to be more like this woman, and on the other, I wonder how long I might live if I let her truly run wild.

Lately I've done enthralling things, actions and thoughts that make for compelling, if not necessarily happy or comedic, reading. I composed the essays in my head one million times, tossing and turning in my bed, trying to wrap my head around who I might become if I don't keep this all in check. Then it hit me: I finally have some things that I need to hide. I can't, at this time, live my life in public the way I used to, so I can't vent, I can't work it all out for myself in essay form and publish it for the world to see. Let me tell you, for someone who has a years-old habit of living her life out in the open, having secrets is actually pretty fucking stressful.

This morning, on the way to my car, I was approached by two gentlemen slightly older than myself, wielding a small hand held camera with a large, red-carpet-at-the-oscars microphone wired to it. They asked if I could help them with a project, and ask me “some questions about the birds and the bees.” Usually, I would laugh and brush off anyone trying to interview me on the street—I have walked past a fair number of petitioners, student film makers and news anchors in my short life—but something about these guys made me rethink just saying that I was in a hurry and dashing past. They smiled genuinely and asked politely. They just seemed so damn sincere.

I relented, and the camera started to roll. I immediately went into panic mode, as if I was addressing an entire room. Not good. Definitely not good.

“Did anyone ever sit you down and tell you about the birds and the bees?”

Well, I got a extremely weird speech from my mother when I was about 10? I think? The only thing I really remember about it was that she kept referring to my potential future husband—a person who was completely mythical at the time and moreover, I could not care less about at ten years old—as my “mate”. As in, “One day you will grow up and choose a mate.” Like the only thing my life was good for was growing up and popping out more little Jennas, to ensure the survival of the species. As if I were endangered, like a panda. She gave me the speech after cornering me while I was taking a bath, so I'm sitting in the tub naked, and I remember trying to disappear under the water so she would just leave me alone. She droned on for so long that the water got cold around me but I wouldn't get out because it felt safer than standing and getting even colder. I'm pretty sure that incident fucked me up for life.

“No.” Read More »

I. Dig Your Own Hole.

Due to my especially caustic and matter-of-fact nature, I outright insulted the music taste of a dear friend on Saturday, calling him, as I recall, “a type”, protesting that he only enjoyed pretentious alternative rock, and pinning down that he is obviously a big Radiohead fan. Which is all true. So why do I feel bad about saying it?

II. Kissing Cousins.

Besides the inherent way you relate to them, I think this is the big difference between having men for best friends (read: family without blood relation) instead of women:

You don't have very sexy dreams about one of your female friends that, while pleasant (read: hot.) at the time, upon awaking leave you feeling quite uncomfortable and possibly incestuous. At least, I don't have those kinds of dreams about my female friends.

I'm going to blame it on the drunk sleep and never speak of it again.

III. Vanilla Caramel Cologne

Even though it was Monday morning, 8 am class, I was excited about going to class this morning. I felt that the week was rich with possibility. I sat at one of the ridiculous constructed desk-and-chair-in-ones in the classroom and waited, taking out my new spiral notebook and pen, eager to learn.

We had a paper to hand back, and instead of having us pass them to the front from where we sat (which would have made so much sense and which I so wished had happened), my teacher invited us to walk up and hand them them in.

Standing from one of these previously mentioned desk-and-chairs has never been a very easy feat for me. It seems I possess the grace of a baby elephant in these circumstances, and today was no exception.

I made movements to stand. The desk wobbled. The coffee which sat on my desk wobbled, and tipped. Verona blend coffee and Vanilla Caramel coffee mate went all over my desk, all over my new notebook, but worst of all, all over the right side of my person.

I exclaimed “Shit!” at what I believe was a clearly audible level no doubt heard throughout campus, and stood completely, attempting to keep my cool. Covered in coffee, I approached my teacher, handed him my paper, and promptly left the room in search of paper towels.

I returned and attempted to clean up, but no matter how much I cleaned more coffee seemed to come from somewhere. Even when I did get everything up, the desk where I sat was sticky, and worse, I was sticky. And I smelled like coffee, an increasing unpleasant odor that begin to fill the room, or at least permeate the air around me in a way in which I couldn't escape it.

I had to pretend that this was a completely normal day for me, and when I left to go to my next class, I had to calmly walk down Baldwin Street, sunglasses and headphones on, smoking a cigarette, pretending that the coffee stain covering the right side of my torso was the new cool thing.

I can only hope that the school year will go up from here.

This morning I woke up the first time my alarm went off.

This never happens.

I'm fairly certain it worked this time because I've replaced the squawk! squawk! squawk! of my clock radio with my new mobile phone alarm, playing my Love in an Elevator ringtone.

I climbed out of bed, did the morning thing. I had time to make French bread pizza for breakfast, take a lot of vitamins to combat the cold I am suffering from, and give some clear thought to my goals for the day. I wasn't feeling terribly chipper about going to class, but I was making good time, and if I booked it I'd only be about a minute late.

I pulled on my lucky hat, started up the iPod and bounded down the stairs.

At the second floor landing I nearly ran into a guy coming out of the hall right off the stairs. In a gentlemanly move he motioned me past him. I smiled and rushed down the steps.

I ended up going a little faster than I cared to.

I'm not sure what the liquid on the stairs was. It looked like water, but it could have been anything. Whatever it was, it was grimy and oily. I remember thinking—in the moment just before I stepped right into it, gliding across it, losing my footing and sliding down half a flight of stairs at a high speed—that I should maybe try to avoid the splotches of liquid, a trail leading down decorating a dozen steps.

The world swirled for a moment while I was airborne, and then I was swept back to reality by the pain. The lovely pain. I do know now that, despite habitual binge drinking, all my nerve endings are still working.

The young man who had ushered me past (and in light of this, I must say I feel especially terrible that I can't conjure up his face in my head for the life of me) came down the stairs and genuinely expressed concern.

“Are you okay?”

Gasp. Squint. “No—” I strained through gritted teeth, “—definitely not.”

I was still sitting where I had landed, contemplating what it was going to feel like to stand. He stood there in front of me, looking half-worried and half-obligated, and offered to stay there for a moment, presumably in case I couldn't get up on my own.

I insisted this was not necessary. “No—go ahead.” I spoke with a tightened chest and short, abbreviated breaths. I think I was trying not to cry.

The gentlemen left. I sat there for a moment, pondering blowing off class, walking back upstairs, laying down on the couch and sobbing for awhile. However, at this point, it seemed much less painful to go down stairs than climb back upstairs, so I took a deep breathe and stood.

It hurt even more than I thought it would.

Where I stood, I face a wall where someone had scrawled a too-late warning.

“Be Safe”

The final verdict? I twisted my shoulder when I grabbed for the rail, my right wrist is still throbbing from when I landed on it, and there are a few ungrateful spots on my back and spine that came into violent contact with the stairs when I flipped backwards. I'm a mess.

“Plus,” I told Neil later, “I probably have a bruise on my ass the size of Texas.”

Today at about noon, there was a woman walking down Clayton towards College Avenue. She was carrying a bottle of Powerade and looking uneasy. She walked very delicately.

At the corner, she suddenly stopped short. Her eyes got wide, and she put her hand to her mouth. It was a futile gesture; she vomited on the sidewalk, in full view of anyone near that intersection.

She turned her head away, wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her jean jacket, straightened herself, and kept walking as if nothing had happened.

Oh, I forgot to mention one thing. Read More »

I had a blast at The Company's Xmas party. I took the Indian as my date, and at 6:00 pm we got on the bus that would take most of the Athens attendees to the party in Gwinnett. The thing that is both cool and dangerous about taking a bus to this party is the drinking begins the moment you get on the bus. So, my estimate was totally off. Drinks included:

• Something Neil handed to me on the ride down, ordering me to “Drink this!” Even though it was pretty weak the Indian determined for me that it contained bourbon.
• three vodkas on the rocks from the bar at the party (where I had this classic exchange with the bartender):
  

  “Vodka on ice, please.”
  (Incredulous.) “Vodka on ice?”
  “Yessir.”
  (Smiling.) “I like it when people say that.”

• Something an unnamed manager came up and offered. Possibly gin with sprite.
• All of what was in my flask. (5-6 oz. vodka)
• About half of the whiskey in Neil's flask.
• and several hits off of Neil's bottle of Gentleman Jack.

An aside: while making this list, I have determined I owe Neil a bottle of something in the near future.

The party had a casino theme, and while I didn't gamble, I did stand at the end of the craps table for a little while, cheering and blowing on dice. I felt like an archetypal Vegas blonde and I loved it. I stayed off the dance floor but shook my hips to the music anyway. CB and I rapped along to Missy Elliot while Neil gave us his best faux look of stern dissapproval in our musical tastes. I didn't express it but I couldn't get over how hot everyone looked. We clean up very nicely, part timers especially.

Silliness abounded, which as it turns out, was only a precursor to the drunken melodrama that followed on the ride home. Read More »

It is always so freaking hot in the BLC. Even when it was still winter-y and cold it was always hot in here. And it makes me irritable and unable to work on things like essays and quizzes and blah!

Not in school mode I still am.

Q. How do you know that's it's going to be one of those days?
A. When you knock over your Pibb at lunch and it spills all over your barely eaten baked potato, which took five minutes of prep to get it the way you want it.

I am so ready to be off meal plan.

WA-BAM!

Everyone go to my bedroom (virtual bedroom, natch — off the main page) and read the most recent answers to the date app. Kyle's are fucking awesome.

Really.

Rock on, dude! You are Punk music!


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