What Goes On

It’s almost my birthday! That means my Power Year is almost over. Let me just say that I did NOT meet all of my goals. Sewing? Two handkerchiefs- by hand, but still. Guitar? Well, once my teacher started going on tour all the time I just quit practicing. Reading? I wanted to read eighteen books and I think I read ten. Yoga? I wanted 52 classes under my belt and I made it less than halfway there. I can touch my toes at will now though!

Other goals went better. I ended up overnighting outside of Portland more than I’d planned! Same with hiking! And I definitely connected and reconnected with lots of friends. Music goal was met, opportunities were seized. I’ll do a digest post after my birthday with the final count, but I think it averages out pretty well.

I mean, the main goal was to raise my median level of happiness through doing things I enjoy but procrastinate on. I am happier than I was a year ago, but I don’t know if my Power Year can be held responsible. I think I would have reached out to friends, explored neglected hobbies and taken some chances whether I’d set these goals or not- that’s how you manage a big ass life change. In my 31st year I lost my partner and I had to try to fill up that vast gaping space. So I hiked around and read The Hunger Games n’ stuff.

Oh, and I also fell in love.

Remember in October when I wrote about how I was done with dating for a while? And I said that dating at 31 is actually pretty fun, but really I wasn’t ready for anything serious? Well, apparently I was full of it. Because right after that the colleague I mentioned in that post, the one I confessed to having a little crush on, became my full on boyfriend (even though I hate that word) and I totally love him. This is what happened:

I have frequent access to a pretty sweet beach house out in Lincoln City. I was chatting with some work friends about it when we had a long weekend coming up, and they encouraged me to book the house. See my cute colleague, who I’ll dub Vincent since he looks (to me) very much like Vincent Cassel, is a surfer and is always looking for an excuse to get out to the coast.

He looks like this but younger. And possibly handsomer.

So the way it all worked out was that two of my girlfriends from work came out on Friday with their babies just to hang for the day. Vincent came Friday afternoon, but his surf buddy, also from work, couldn’t make it out until Saturday. So Vince and I had one whole evening at the beach to ourselves. Now remember, I definitely had feelings for him, but he is very active and I had it in my mind that he liked fit, woodsy, hippie girls. I thought that because over the years we would to go to happy hour and he would tell me all about how much he loved paddling and biking all day with whatever fit girl he was dating at the time. And yes, I do like to bike and paddle too, but I’d just as soon go to estate sales all day and then drink a bottle of wine by myself watching Gilmore Girls reruns.

So we’re at the coast, and we’re walking on the beach and talking about our weird new agey parents, and then Vince is making dinner and I’ve got a buzz on and so finally I say, “Hey, do people at work ever give you a hard time about how we should be dating? Because they always give me a hard time about that.” I admit I was fishing a little, but I fully expected him to say, “Yeah, they give me a hard time too,” and then we could laugh about how old people always think any two young single people should be dating. But he didn’t say that. Instead he paused for a really long time and then told me that he’d had a crush on me for years. To which I very romantically replied, “But I thought you liked super active girls!” And then I told him that I didn’t think he would ever even consider making out with me because he knows I have a big mouth and would probably go and tell everyone at work. And he told me that he didn’t care about that- he’d be proud to be with me and wouldn’t want to keep it a secret. And then I told him I liked him too.

And that’s how that happened. Now he’s my boyfriend. Everyone at work knows. I told them right away with my big fat mouth. I didn’t even give Vincent a chance to tell his grade level teammates. I gave it like two days and then I told them. Because I was so excited!!! Poor Vince. He got to tell one person and she kind of suspected already. Oh, and we flew all across the country for winter break so we could meet each other’s families and we didn’t have a single fight! That was good. And now we’re back and sometimes I do active stuff with him like go to heated yoga and hike around, and sometimes he does urban stuff with me like look at mid-century housewares online and attend lesbian dance parties. He is a good sport.