Author: Melanie

God made the world round so we would never be able to see too far down the road.
— from Out of Africa, by Isak Dinesen

Today’s Writing Group prompt:  If there was a tattoo ink that disappeared after exactly one year, what tattoo would you get today?

I don’t have any tattoos.  When I studied in Spain in college, my friend Lisa and I had appointments to each get a tattoo on her birthday.  We had gone in a few days beforehand to check the place out (on a recommendation from a local) and look through the books.  Lisa decided to draw her own, but I found the most perfect one ever for me.  It was two dolphins, one larger than the other.  The larger dolphin made the top of a half-circle and the smaller one was underneath, facing the other way with its nose close to the other’s belly. To me, it looked like a mother and baby.  Dolphins, to me, are nearly perfect creatures, and at the time, I thought, the most important (although not the only) thing a woman could be is a mother, so the tattoo seemed to marry those two ideas perfectly to my 19-year-old self.  I showed the owner the picture I’d chosen and she quoted me a price equivalent to about $60.  Then she marked us down in her book for a few days later with a notation about what I had picked.

When we came back, she went about her business, then pulled my picture out and said, “Ok, so this will be $110.”  I was basically broke all the time in Spain, and at nearly double the price she’d originally quoted me, I balked.  Lisa and I told her that’s not the price she’d said a few days before and it turned into an argument (in Spanish, because we were awesome) about how she only wrote down  “dolphin” instead of “dolphins,” and so obviously we were wrong.  Whatever.  In the end, I refused to pay what she was asking and she got nasty with us, so we both left tattoo-less.  It was a sad day (until we went out drinking and dancing that night).

A little more than  a year later, I had an appointment to get a very similar tattoo, drawn by a friend, at noon on my 21st birthday, but we all went out drinking at midnight the night before and I ended up sleeping through it and never rescheduled.

Since then, I’ve never really seriously considered getting a tattoo.  The only thing I can  ever see myself getting at some point in the (knock on wood) way distant future is a memorial tattoo in my Dad’s writing.

But, if I could get something that would disappear in one year?  Based on the madness I feel creeping in more and more often lately since I went off my anti-depressants in September to try to get pregnant, I’d pick “Hold on.”

She knows she’s more
than just a little misunderstood
She has trouble acting normal when she’s nervous
— The Counting Crows, Round Here

Today’s Writing Group prompt: What do you think people misunderstand the most about you?

I cannot count the number of times that friends of mine, after we’ve known each other for a while, have said to me some variation of “When I first met you, I thought you were mean.”  Intimidating is another word I hear a lot, as in, “When we first met, I was afraid of you, you intimidated me.”  This boggles my mind.

Sure, sometimes I have mean thoughts and say snarky (or even mean) things, but at heart, I really don’t believe I’m a mean person.  In fact, I think I’m soft-hearted in the extreme, often to my detriment.

And intimidating?  Me?  I do not get it at all.  I assume it comes from the fact that I don’t often let people get too close to me too quickly.  I guess maybe when we first meet I’m too busy sizing you up to be super friendly.  More likely, though, I’m frantically trying to figure out how to say the right thing and not spill my drink and trip over myself and generally how to not be my usual awkward self.  Maybe I’m working too hard at that and it’s coming across as indifference or superiority.  I promise, in no world are you more intimidated by me than I am by you.

“There are moments, Jeeves, when one asks oneself, ‘Do trousers matter?'”

“The mood will pass, sir.”

— from The Code of the Woosters, by P.G. Wodehouse

Today’s Writing Group prompt: If you had to (or could!) wear the same thing every single day, what would you want it to be?

I’m not a girl who loves stalking around in heels, though I love shoes, and I hate the days when I have to wear suits for my job (I . . . may be in the wrong line of work).  I see girls in D.C. every day who are super put together and fashionable, and I envy them, but I accept that I’ll never be one of them.  Instead, I’m a big, big fan of great-fitting jeans with a short-sleeved t-shirt over a long-sleeved t-shirt.  So comfy.

I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move.
— from Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes, by Robert Louis Stevenson

Yesterday’s Writing Group prompt: Tell us about the smallest plane you’ve ever been on, the largest boat, and the most interesting train.

The biggest boat? That’s easy:

In October, David and I took our first cruise. We boarded Royal Caribbean’s Enchantment of the Seas in Baltimore for a 6-night cruise to Bermuda to celebrate our first anniversary. Neither of us was sure how we’d like it, but after we got our sea legs, which is a real thing, it was pretty great.

I think the smallest plane I’ve ever been on was in law school. I was an Admissions Ambassador, so I got to travel to different places, usually undergraduate universities, for education fairs where I would talk about how awesome my school was and why you should totally come here.

I had been dying to go to Boston for a long time, so I asked the dean in charge of the trips if she’d save that one for me, and she did. I flew out of JFK on a puddle jumper. We had to walk out on the tarmac and climb the ladder, because I don’t think it was even tall enough to reach the gate. I’m not a great flyer, and take-offs are the scariest for me. Of course, take-offs in little planes are even worse, usually, and it was raining, so I wasn’t that excited. I just buckled in, leaned back, closed my eyes, and hoped for the best. Luckily, it’s a very quick flight from New York City to Boston.

The most interesting train is the one we took from Chicago to Seattle in late August 2010. When I made my 101 in 1001 list, one of the list items was “take a train somewhere far enough away that I have to book a sleeper car.” And that’s just what we did. We booked a two-person sleeper on the Empire Builder (are you kidding me with that name?) and flew to Chicago to start our adventure.

The trip was amazing. We left at around 2:30 in the afternoon on Wednesday and arrived in Seattle at around 9:00 Friday morning. Along the way, we crossed the Mississippi (which is mighty, but starts in Minnesota at a place that you can walk across with five steps down, as you may have heard), crossed North Dakota, the mythical land of my birth (and a place I left before I was old enough to make memories), saw tons of horses in Montana, and unbelievable scenery in the Cascades.

I would do another trip like that in a heartbeat. It’s an unbeatable way to see some of the best parts of the country.

And most of my memories have escaped me
or confused themselves with dreams
If heaven’s all they want it to be
send your prayers to me, care of 1983
— John Mayer, 83

Today’s Writing Group prompt: What were the 3 most significant or pivotal years in your life so far, excluding the year of your birth?  Why?

1993: I meet J in August at our summer job. We spend hours in his car, just talking (honest!). I’m his first kiss. I will love him, in some way, for the rest of my life.  I spend the fall semester of my senior year of high school living in Barcelona with my family. At first I hate it – it’s taken me away from everything I know and all the experiences of senior year. After I enroll in school there, everything changes – I’m surrounded by kids my own age who are eager to befriend “la americana,” and we wander the city together for hours on end. I spend four months falling in love with a country, a city, and its people, in a love affair that continues to this day. I cry endlessly when it’s time to come home.

2002: Say it with me: I lose my hearing overnight at age 25; chaos, depression, anger, madness, and, ultimately, acceptance, ensue. Two weeks later, I fall and tear my rotator cuff, ultimately requiring surgery.  Two weeks after that, I come out to the parking lot to find my car with a flat. When I can’t get the lug nuts off I sink to the pavement and cry in defeat until someone drives by and takes pity on me. It is not a good year.

2007: I turn 30 and celebrate in Richmond with a wonderful, intimate dinner with friends and family. I earn my 50-pounds magnet from Weight Watchers. I graduate law school 15th in my class and earn a scholarship selected by the faculty. I move to D.C. to start a somewhat prestigious job, and sometime in my first week on the job, I meet David.  I sack up and ask a man out for the first time in my life – he turns me down, but it doesn’t matter. I buy a new car and then get in an accident five weeks later. In December, David and I have drinks outside work for the first time, and I realize that I am in deep, deep trouble.