A Weekend Off

Day 21: Forget it’s a Friday night.

As a single girl, my social life has a lot to do with what evening of the week it is. Fridays are big. Saturdays are bigger. I decided to forfeit my social self for one evening to see what it would yield.

I listened as my peers discussed their weekend plans. I declined invitations to join them. I was surprised to feel as much anxiety as I did while my uneventful evening crept nearer to reality.

I reiterate again my “go go go” approach to my social life. I never slow down and I have a feeling this has been a detriment to me in some way. I can’t pinpoint it. The notion or the reasoning behind it. It just felt important to do this.

Slowing down through all of this has been good. I’ve had to slow down to think of and execute as well as record these happenings. I don’t honestly know yet what I will harvest from this.

I left work and meandered to my friend, A’s, home. She’s been like a sister to me for as long as I’ve known her, which has been the better part of ten years. So I had to laugh when upon entering her living room at 2:30pm, she asked, “Again?”

This last month of emotional turmoil for me has generated quite a few of these half-workday tearful afternoons.

Thankfully, this was not like that. I smiled at her and sat on her couch talking to a girl I have stayed up with late on many nights. Even though our late nights have evolved into afternoons with her kids, she is family to me and I knew how I wanted to spend my Friday evening.

I left A and went home to my apartment. This place produces mixed emotions for me. I ascended the stairs to my room, closed the door, slipped into bed and pulled up my laptop.

Chapter one of the evening. Catch up on an episode, any missed episode.

Chapter two. Take a nap. While everyone else in the city is getting gussied up, sleep off the anxiety.

Chapter three. Wake up and smile at the daylight.

Chapter four. Contact the brother who wanted the New Moon dvd the previous night and see if he and the wife still want to borrow it.

Chapter five. Score an invite to the only place in the valley you want to be on your technical evening off. With family.

I decided to forfeit my social self for one evening to see what it would yield. I imagine I’m not surprised to see it involved the people who usually are around to see you fall and still regularly are the ones to help you back up.