I'm living the long distnce life right now. Most of my friends graduated and moved on to bigger and better things, including my two besties. My boyfriend lives in Pittsburgh and my sister is in bootcamp and will soon be stationed in Virginia. My Friday nights are spent in front of the computer, on the phone, or writing letters instead of out on the town like most women my age.

I don't mind this, though. I rather like staying at home, and now that I have a new laptop I never have to leave the comfort of my couch to spend a great evening with my pals.

However, there are a few days when doing the long distance thing with everybody in your llife sucks. Like on your birthday.

I'm usually broke so when my mom gave me an extra ten bucks in my birthday card (in addition to my real gift which was a weekend with the boyfriend earlier this month) I decided that I'd buy myself a decent lunch. You know, a place without a drive thru. This brought me to a Chinese buffet, because when I think of a nice meal I think of an all you can eat hog troft.

The food was good and I felt satisfied, even though I had nobody to talk to as I gorged on General Tso's. I was getting ready to leave when the waitress handed me my fortune cookie. I opened it up to find this:

"You will always be surrounded by true friends"

Oh Fortune Cookie Gods! Why do you mock me so?

There is something about a dead body that sucks all the warmth out of a room.

The day before we sat at his bedside, four different people held together by blood and only anchored to reality by the sound of his laborious breathing.

Grandma held on to his hand, occasionally pulling us into shallow small talk by retelling stories we’ve heard only a few hours before. I took her understanding of the situation as a sign that her Alzheimer’s had not progressed as much as we had originally thought, but I couldn’t help but wonder how steep the slippery slope would get once she lost her biggest tie to the present and the future. It would only be a matter of time before she created a world where Jerry was still alive and her 7 children were still teenagers. It wouldn’t be long before one of us would be holding her hand, listening to her breath and counting on the rhythmic beeps of her life line.

Dad was to my right, reading a book and occasionally touching Granddad’s feet over the thin hospital blanket. I’m sure he must have been cold, clad only in a paper thin gown that kept slipping off his shoulders and a tiny blanket tossed casually over his legs, but when somebody is unresponsive and has no hope of snapping out of it you often forget the considerate little things that make a person comfortable.

Mom was to my left, leaning against a window that featured a view of the recent hospital sprawl. It would have been nice to look out and see a tree or even a patch of blue sky, but a view of families and doctors shuffling from one wing to another was a less cheery but more dynamic replacement. Of course mom ignored the scene in favor of a puzzle book she acquired in the gift shop. Nobody in the room was interested in what was going on around them, only in the diversions they created for themselves.

Even I was wrapped up in a dream. I knew I was in store for hours of sitting, so I packed an oversized purse full of distractions. A book, a notepad, an mp3 player, and a deck of cards rendered almost useless when I discovered that the 9 of hearts had accidentally been replaced by a 3 of spades from a different deck. The book was tossed aside after one too many interruptions ruined the effect of the smooth flowing prose, and the notepad didn’t make it past the zipper of my purse, blocked just as my mind was from any type of verbal expression. The music served me well in filtering out the hospital noise but failed at disconnecting me from the scene that was taking place all around me. I was left with an incomplete deck, so I improvised by building a house of cards.

As nurses and orderlies (but never a doctor) passed through the room, the four of us continued our lives in our bubbles. Grandma stuck in the past, father engrossed in fiction, mother solving puzzles, and me. Precariously stacking thin sheets of card board.

The day passed slowly as I never made it past a second story. Every new card compromised those around it. No matter how careful I was to gently lean the queen of clubs against the six of spades, one unsteady breath or a slight lapse in concentration would send them all crashing down.
Patience was the theme of the day.

I packed up my cards around 6 o’clock, picking several off the floor. We drove an hour and a half home, prepared to drive back again in a day or two to continue the death watch.

We got the call at 4 am.

Pulling on the clothes we wore only hours before we made the trek back to the hospital to face the truth. By 6 am I was back in the same room I wasted precious hours in only twelve hours before, only this time all the warmth was gone and my personal bubble had been popped.

Hours ticked by as family filled the room, spilling into the adjacent waiting area. We took turns next to Grandma who refused to leave her husband. All 7 children and most of the grandchildren came together to give support in this time of need, like a bunch of flimsy cards all balanced against one another.

Family was the theme of the day.

The adults distracted themselves with plans for the funeral, concerns about Grandma’s care and deteriorating state, and heated debates about the will. The children remained in the lobby, numb to the gravity of the situation. And me who was in between? Without my pack of cards I was forced to face reality and do what I put off the day before.

Replacing is with was and will visit with should have gone.

Just beyond our empty pitchers, spent Jell-o shots, and array of plastic cups a handful of twenty-somethings were having a Bachelorette party. As Jesse and Cortney matched cup for cup on beer, I entertained myself with the Desperate Housewives wannabes.

My favorite of the foursome was the obligatory ogre. It seems that there is an unwritten rule that every flock of femmes has to tote around an ugly chick to lower the beauty curve just enough so the others can score free drinks and make-out sessions with beer-goggle clad men. With what can only be best described as an unfortunate combination of features, the wide hipped and frizzy haired insult to the human race helped bring down the curve for the entire bar. Although I couldn't see her hand through the veil of bar smoke, I had a feeling that she was the married one of the group. There is a myth in our culture that the beautiful girls are snatched up by handsome men as soon as their pubes come in, but fairy tales never translate into reality, especially in Portsmouth. It has been in my experience that the homeliest of women are often the first to get married, usually to make up for the years of going to high school dances with a group of fat girls and spending most of college being a fag-hag. I guessed that she met some poor schmoe during her sophomore year of college and instead of cutting back on the jelly donuts and combing her hair she settled for the discards of girls who strive for more.

Next to the beast was a slender brunette with a pretty smile and a beak like nose that she managed to make becoming in profile. From her shoulder length locks to her snugly fit but still modest garb she had the look of the High School Homecoming Queen all over her. She was by far the pretty one in the group, the freak of nature that is only in the flock to serve as a fishing lure. She's unobtainable to every guy in the bar, but with a belly full of beer the 5 will hit on the 9 without giving a thought to the four integers of attractiveness that separate the two. Once the unsuspecting sap has been snagged the remaining two of the flock jump on him like he's the last Twinkie in the box. I had a feeling that the bride-to-be met her ball-and-chain that way.

On the other side of Nessie was the slut of the group. The heavily high lighted hair, the heavily made up face, and the heavily bloated beer belly gave away her true nature as the promiscuous priss. Beauty products gave the illusion of doablity from a distance but underneath it all she was only a step a head of the gargoyle to her left. She's the girl that sleeps with guys not because she likes them but because she wants them to like her. She's the girl with warted genitalia. She's the girl that should be avoided at all cost, yet with desperation and beer residue in the air, she's the girl your penis wants to take home.

Armed with a bride-to-be t-shirt layered under a Miss Bachelorette sash, the prospective Mrs. was the most interesting of the group. Big hair, big personality, and (to say the least) a big body, our bachelorette certainly proved that her future hubby bought the cow. Her intrigue increased when I got a glimpse of her groom as he passed through the bar, an asshole I went to high school with who tortured my sister and cheated off of me in math class. That explained my immediate dislike of the loud and overly made up bridezilla, just like ugly sticks to ugly, assholes stick to assholes.

It wouldn't be a night in a Portsmouth dive if a table full of semi-attractive, however mostly-attached, females wasn't staked out by a couple of creepy old men. Twenty to thirty years the girls' senior, the lecherous losers settled in between the whore and the pre-matrimonial maiden, obviously schooled in the rules of the flock. Just like a flock of femmes, packs of pricks have roles and rules. The leader of the twosome was a gregarious geek in his forties. Sleek, silver wire frames failed at adding dignity to his nondescript features and paired with denim shorts and a tucked in polo only made him look like an eternal Boy Scout. He dominated the conversation, which was unfortunately drowned out by horrible bar music. He focused his energy on the bride-to-be, a smart move seeing as the only way he was going to get any pussy was if big hair wanted one last go on the casual sex merry-go-round.

The submissive of the two was scarily quiet. Skinny as fuck and weird as hell I secretly nick-named him Skeletor. He sat next to the slut and silently observed as his shrimpy little buddy made an ass of himself in front of girls young enough to be his daughters. Boy Scout and Skeletor had the get-laid-game down to a science. It was a trick I assumed they often pulled, the loud one kept the girls laughing as the weird one scared the girls into staying. I could not imagine that their sex scam actually worked, but knowing Portsmouth and the loose girls that prowl the bars looking for validation of their femininity in the form of anonymous sex, I have to assume that at least one of them gets a little plastered poon.

I didn't stick around long enough to see if one of the creepy guys scored with the wide bride or any of the other members of the pussy party, which was disappointing. Just like each woman around the table did her part to complete the Circle of Strife that is Southern Ohio, I had my role as well. I was the Jeff Corwin observing the urban hornies. The pretentious snob with too much cleavage that would be drinking if she could trust the people around her. The girl who doesn't feel bad about judging everybody else so harshly because she is hardest on herself.

The girl who isn't invited to Bachelorette parties.

Fuck You. I’m gorgeous.

At least that’s always been my mentality. Or at least it was until recently, when I was forced to pick my self esteem, brush off the beer and ash, hand it to some dick hole, and allow him to lock it in a place where I’ll never find it.

Allow me to explain...

I’ve become a frequenter of the gay bar. Many of my friends are gay and it’s a fun place for me to dance and be my loud, over-bearing self without feeling the burning gaze of conservatives eyes. More than that, gay men find me very, very attractive. I can’t wade through the sea of way-too-pretty men without hearing how gorgeous I am, as opposed to the straight bar where I can hang out all night and not so much get a hello from the opposite sex. I go to the gay bar when I need a confidence boost.

Let me rephrase that. I USED to go to the gay bar when I needed a confidence boost.

I was the designated last night and I was feeling pretty lonely because I was in the midst of a long streak of rejection. Sobriety and loneliness are never a good combination, in fact neither mixes well with anything, so I was begging anybody who would listen to find me a stray straight guy (or lipstick lesbian, but that’s another story entirely).

Ask and you shall receive... Sort of.

The designated drinker in my party took it upon himself to ask the first guy HE found attractive if he was straight or gay. Seeing as it was a gay bar, he also had to ask the second, third, fourthfithsixandseventh attractive passerby his sexual orientation. After quite a few turn downs and one pretty aggressive (and dumb as a rock) stripper (who coincidently has dollar covered in my spit nestled somewhere in his underwear. Blame the designated drinker) one finally took the bait and I was locked into conversation with an overly muscular blond with an Ambercrombie and Bitch t-shirt.

But I was lonely. And he had an accent.

The conversation was weird, the vibes were weirder, and he was definitely more than a little bit gay. I high tailed it out of there, but not before he swapped numbers with one of my... gay... male... friends.

More rejection. Couldn’t drink away my sorrows. It gets worse.

On the way home, doing my sober duty, my friend gets a text from another friend who got a text from Mr. Accent who wanted me to text him.

Did I mention that I was lonely?

I’ll spare you the hilarity that ensued when one drunk person and one occupied driver tried to send a flirty, yet sexy, text message.

A few texts later ("do i kno u?" "who" "o big tits") I got the kicker. I got the life altering text.

"wats in ur pants?"

At first I was not sure how to describe my crotch. It’s a good crotch, as crotches go. It has served me well for 22 years, but I’ve never come up with any descripters for it, nor would I share those descripters with a virtual stranger.

And then it hit me. It wasn’t an open ended question. It was an either or question.

Penis. Or Vagina.

Did you hear that? That was my self esteem crashing to the floor.

It was like the ending of a M. Night. Shamalamdingdong movie. Scenes from the evening were flashing before my eyes, each in part hinting to the twist ending that I was experiencing.

He was a tranorexic. And he must have thought the cell phone in my pocket was a hint of a penis.

And suddenly the string of rejection started to make sense. Why some guys would never call me... Why others stopped after sufficient groppage...

No wonder they called me "Man Hands" in high school....

I treat my life like a series of mini stories. A trip to the grocery store can be an adventure, an evening at the bar can be a psychological thriller, and a night on my friend's couch can be down right triple X.
I've experienced every kind of story, with the help of embellishment. From sad to inspirational, to dramatic to offbeat, I have a story for every mood. Well, except for one.

That's right, I haven't quite experienced the love story.

Oh, I've had a few near misses. Stories that start out romantic until a twist ending sends them spiraling into a different genre. My first stab of romance was really a coming of age story, the second was horror, the third was the epitome of tragedy, and the fourth became a comedy.

And that is the story you are about to hear. Er, read.

New Years Eve was mere minutes from becoming New Years Day. Armed with hats and noise makers, we crowded into the section of the bar with a stage and a few big screens broadcasting the view of Time Square. Hundreds of colorful balloons filled with money hung above our heads in nets, set to drop when our ten integer countdown brought us to 2008.

As the year came to an end I stood, clad in knee-high boots and hot pants, with my arms above my head waiting for a cash filled balloon to give me my first drink of the new year.

10... 9... 8...

I was poised on my tippy-tippy toes awaiting my prize and too busy to notice that my friend, who had promised to give me my first kiss of the year, was lost in the crowd.

3... 2... 1...

Instead of yelling out the obligatory phrase I jumped up like a cat to claim a balloon, only to come down empty handed. Even in sky-high heels I came up short.

The room was a blur of floating balloons and kissing couples. I turned in circles a few times looking for my friend, a balloon, or a lonely alcoholic, anything with which to spend my first few seconds of the new year.

And that's when the crowd started to part.

My oscillating love search came to a halt when a line of balloon carcasses pointed to one of the most beautiful humans I had ever seen.

My love sick brain morphed Auld Lang Syne into Right Here Right Now and time slowed to a crawl. The soft but raspy stylings of Jesus Jones prompted me to do what I did next.

"Hey! Kiss me."

And so he did.

There was that awkwardness that is common in a first kiss, (Where do I put my hands? Should I tilt my head to the left or right? Oh shit, is that his tongue?) but it was short lived, and by the end of Auld Lang Syne my leg was lifted off the ground and I was in the midst of a very sweet kiss.

Until the drag queens reclaimed the stage and a lesbian tripped over my elevated foot.

Back to reality.

I turned away from my newest BFF just in time to kiss my friend before he locked lips with three to ten other guys strewn about the bar.

I only had myself to blame. I was the one that suggested New Years at the gay bar.

Unusual characters are never unusual at a pharmacy.

Her body was tired and covered in large, black tattoos that only accentuated the years of wear and tear to which she'd been subjected. The blondish curls that halfheartedly clung to her scalp as if one more hit would send them falling out in clumps was hacked short and her eyes had settled into a dark fog and had lost all human warmth and intensity. One arm hung in a sling but the way she carried herself it seemed like every bone in her body was broken and she was resting on an invisible sling that was hanging on by a thread.

A thread that was about to break.

My shift had only begun and I was happy to start the day slow by counting pills. I let another tech, a blond who was Amazonian in build but sweet in nature, take care of the stranger behind the counter.

5...10...15

I counted purple pills in fives as my coworker struggled with her customer. Behind the safety of the filling station's counter a fellow technician and I stifled giggles as Blondie tried to decipher the woman's shaky and broken words. Portsmouth is full of these creatures and when the bars are closed the pharmacy is their favorite haunt.

25...30

I slid the pills across my tray and kept one eye on my coworker as she gave up on her peculiar patron and sought help from a senior tech.

40...45...50

I let a little air escape from my lips emitting a horse-like sound as I slowly made progress on the 120 pills I had to count.

60...65...70...75

My concentration was broken by a streak of flaming red hair that I immediately recognized as the pharmacy manager's. The strange woman had begun convulsing and half the pharmacy ran to her aid.

My body instinctively gave up what it was doing and my mind worked overtime trying to process the horrific scene that was happening lighting fast only ten feet away. The woman sunk lower and lower behind the counter, her head bobbing violently the entire way. In the midst of it all, somebody had the sense to slide a chair under her failing body. With the exception of Blondie, everybody's face lacked a certain compassion that one would expect in a situation like this. Something told me as I studied the hard lines of the woman's face that if it had been a beautiful young housewife drooling on the counter the mood would have been more frantic.

Blondie phoned an ambulance and I forced my mind and body to return to work. There was nothing I could do but fill the prescription for the next character.

5...10

Not trusting my brain after witnessing such a display I began recounting the candy-like purple pills. Blondie towered wearied eyed next to me, keeping her worried gaze on the woman.

"I didn't know what to do... I mean, I didn't know what she wanted..."

Her soft confession trailed off into mumbling leaving only guilty sentiments without words to touch my ears. My heart reached out to her and I felt compelled to console her. I took a moment to find some words, keeping my eyes fixed on the tiny tablets before me. I struggled to find something meaningful and helpful to say but being emotionally drained and faced with mounds of work I came up empty. I had to improvise.

"You did good. You know, what can you do?"

What can you do...

20...25...30

How long is too long to have an unrequited crush? A week, a month, 4 years?

How much wine is too much to have before talking to said crush? A glass, two glasses, half a bottle and your losses in wine pong?

How pathetic is too pathetic?

He was there with another girl, a tall blond with painstakingly perfect curls and a flat stomach. They had the kind of awkward chemistry that is only produced on a blind date when desperation and taste duke it out for the sake of getting laid. They were humoring each other out of principle, and probably would have made out if they had been drinking something harder than beer.

I used my friendship with his best friend as an excuse to approach. When he shunned my handshake in favor of a hug I knew he was fair game. No need for dirty tricks, Blondy was out.

Karaoke commenced and I impressed with my knowledge of classic rock lyrics. Blondy guarded the booth at the back of the bar, steering clear of the risk of any kind of embarrassment. I chose to take a gamble and make an ass out of myself.

I try to be the kind of girl I'd want to sleep with. I dance when music plays, sing when a microphone is available, and drink dark beer because I care more about taste than I do about my figure. I wear old jeans with holes in the ass because I like how the soft skin of my thigh peaks out when I bend over. I keep my hair short because I don't feel the need to hide behind my locks. I let the girls out in full force because I know that I can earn respect on the merit of my personality, regardless of my massive mammaries. I am imperfect and confident and just the type of girl I'd bang.

As I butchered some of the greatest songs in rock and roll history I couldn't help but wonder why girls like Blondy had any kind of sex appeal. She was beautiful, without a doubt. Her jeans were new and expensive, the only holes being ones strategically put there by the designer. Her shirt was demure, only showing a slither of her rock hard abdomen, tanned by several half hour sessions in the cancer coffin. She wasn't sweaty from hours of dancing and her voice wasn't horse from screeching every lyric to "Eye of the Tiger." She sat in the booth with her light beer, cool, perfect, and boring. And just the type of girl guys like to bang.

She left early. Possibly because of an early morning manicure or tanning bed appointment. Probably because she had a job. We hugged before she left, with real sincerity that rarely happens between pretty girls competing for a man. Even so, I was glad to be rid of her.

I was still drunk when he asked me to go to the store with them. I knew it was a dumb idea, my buddies were still in the bar and were prepared to take me home to crash on their couch. I knew leaving would leave my fate for the evening up in the air, with no ride home and no place to pass out. Yet I knew staying wasn't an option.

You never get lucky unless you take a gamble.

After years of crushing hard on this boy and countless rejections to my less than subtle flirting, I finally had my first real conversations with him. He was nice, laid back, funny, and original. He skirted around the issue of Blondy, making sure not to say that it was a blind date even though I knew better. He was leaving the door open for flirting, inviting me to come in for the first time since we met four years ago.

But I couldn't do it. I've been the same girl for four years. Loud, confident, brilliant, intimidating. My kind of girl, but not his. He was set up with Blondy because that was his type. Pretty, safe, acquiescent. He could have had me four years ago and was only letting me in now to humor my childish crush.

I knew if I tried something with him I would quickly be relegated to the back of the bar with light beer and a big purse full of make-up and hair products.

I got home safely that night and never got a call the next day. I'm willing to bet that Blondy did, despite the awkwardness of their first date.

I'll never understand why I get turned down for being "too much woman" (Their words, not mine), or why girls that won't join the conga line still have their dance cards full, but I don't need to understand. I'm used to it at this point. The very qualities I love in myself and have nurtured for the past 22 years are the very qualities that turn most guys away. Maybe I would have had a better chance with this guy if I had told him he was hot instead of complimenting him on his masculine pulchritude. Maybe if I sat out on a few dances he would have talked to me more. Maybe if I hadn't hit on him first he would have eventually hit on me. Maybe we would have dated for at least a month or two before my true nature shined through and he was scared away.

Fuck him. If I liked pussies I'd date girls.