1 2 3 GO

So now that I went a month without kissing anyone, I need a date as soon as possible. Everything else is all set, I just need to start back.

1 2 3 Go.

I was thinking about it anyway, and there was a poster for one of those free dating sites in the subway. I decided to look into it.

I had looked at the other free one, but there was a little too much of a Kid Rock vibe there: too much waist length hair and shirtless-ness.

This other free one? Too much of a desperate vibe.

You have to write approximately four sentences about yourself while you are signing up. Mine was filler garbage. I just wanted to have a look at the boys before I made an effort to be clever and flirty.

Within seconds, I got an instant message from a guy telling me, “Nice profile.”

What? Did you even read it?

And I didn’t post a picture, so it wasn’t that.

The boys on that site aren’t from Manhattan or even boroughs. They’re from suburbs. Gross.

I guess I’ll have to go back to free internet dating the old-fashioned way: making up new email addresses and doing free 3-day trials on Match.com .

~beatrix

home?

I really had no idea where I was. Somewhere between Boston and New York, but that’s not saying much. I knew the general geography, but here on the highway, on a bus, I couldn’t tell where I was. There were generic things on the sides of the highway: Bed Bath & Beyond, Kohl’s. I saw a store named Romantic Depot which sat directly in front of one named Screws & More. (No kidding.)

I was between places. Nowhere.

I don’t really fit in in Boston. I like to visit Evie, but I’d never want to live there. Georgia will always be home, but I never quite fit there either. And sitting on the bus, I wondered if I fit in in New York. I wondered if it felt like home or if it ever would.



As the suburban landscape shifted, and we were surrounded by boxy buildings with light-square windows, I tried to gauge my emotions, just as I do every time I fly in or out of the city and crane as long as possible to see the Manhattan skyline. To see if it feels a part of me.

Do I feel ownership of the old Yankee stadium or even the new one? How does it feel to be in Harlem, where the streets become numbered and orderly? I’ve bought a sandwich at that grocery store, is that comforting? How does Columbus Circle make me feel?

I reached no conclusion. Home is a slippery concept.

But I can’t help thinking that if I can just make sure I’m in the right place everything else will just work out.


~beatrix