On The Road

Every so often, as I’m sitting in some variety of hated traffic, I think back to my life in Long Island. Where I lived two miles from my job (well – my office job, my job at Crate and Barrel was a considerably longer drive, about 15 miles), and I lived in the middle of a town and could walk to anything from movie theaters to the grocery store to about 50 restaurants and bars to my hair salon. My drive to work took less than 10 minutes, and that’s if I hit all the red lights and had to wait for the cars heading into the daycare/nursery school I used to refer to as SUV Heaven, since it was on the road to my job. My apartment building was kind of like a DMZ, but I didn’t care because at the age of 22, I had my own place, a great car that ran beautifully (despite a couple of accidents in its early life), and a real job that didn’t involve wearing any kind of a uniform. (Although it did need to be supplemented with retail work for which an apron was required.)

*sigh*

I would roll into work at about 9:20 on most days because I was most likely out at some bar or club with friends the night before and hadn’t gotten to sleep until 2 am, on a good night. If I left any earlier than 1, no matter what night of the week, I was on the receiving end of a liberal dose of crap because I was leaving “soooo early”. That was back in the days when I didn’t leave the house to go out before 10:30 pm. When I thought that body glitter was “fun” and would draw focus to key areas. When my biggest concern about accidentally dyeing my hair Circus Freak Burgundy had nothing to do with looking unprofessional. Now, by the time 10:30 rolls around, I’m often as not sacked out on the couch, on the verge of falling asleep, if not already in deep REM stages. I think my last tube of body glitter bit the dust when I hit 25. And fortunately I haven’t turned up anywhere with burgundy hair in many, many years.

Now, I actually like getting to work early. And if I do happen to roll up at 9:20, it’s because of traffic or a delay on Metro or something like that. I feel so….grown up sometimes, it’s weird.

About 99% of the time, or even 99.9%, it’s really fine. I’m glad that I did my crazy club/bar time in my early 20s, I am glad that I don’t feel like I ever missed out on anything, and every so often I have a vague nostalgia for it and would like to go out to dance with my girls at a club where the music is too loud and the drinks are too expensive. Although, I don’t think many of my girls (if I can even really use that term anymore) feel that same nostalgia, and I know it’s definitely not K’s scene, so it is very rarely indulged. I’m glad that I took the better part of a year to travel around the world on my own, which was scary and hard and one of the best things I’ve ever done for myself. When I look back over my almost-32 years on this planet, there’s not much I would change. I think my life has gotten better as I’ve gotten older, and I try to really embrace whatever stage of life I happen to find myself in – even if I don’t succeed all the time.

But dammit, I really wish I could have that commute again.