Hello, everyone. In typical Becky fashion, I am back to write my ritualistic annual recap of the last year. While it doesn’t need to be stated, I will say anyway that it always blows my mind how much changes from month to month, let alone year to year. In an effort to make this bad boy legit, I skimmed through last year’s post to gauge where I am now vs. where I was back then. I didn’t, however, read everything verbatim because I didn’t want to give bias to my thoughts. So sit back, relax, turn on “Pills and Potions” by Nicki Minaj, and take a thorough peek inside my world.
Buckle up. Shit’s about to get real.
- Simply putting some Hispanic music on your headphones will have you shaking it like Shakira on your walk home from work.
No joke. I am the whitest white girl that ever lived on the upper east side. But when Daddy Yankee comes on my “Pitbull” pandora, you’d think I was Jenny from the block. I mean I guess it doesn’t totally hurt that I’m 60 percent boobs, hips and ass, but don’t get it twisted, boo boo. Girlfriend knows how to move it.
If it’s good, he’ll be back. I learned that the “hard” way.
- Sometimes, sex is just sex.
I know I have some friends and/or motherly figures who will hate what I’m about to say. But the funny thing is that all that really matters to me at this point in my life is that I’M OK with what I’m about to say. I’ll be honest; I haven’t mastered this one completely, but Lord knows I’m as close as I ever have been. Am I a girl and do I get emotional? Hell yes. But in the last year I have done an excellent job (if I do say so myself) of learning how to let things be what they need to be. And sometimes, they just need to be the guy that knows you inside and out (yep) coming over and taking care of business. Because let’s be serious – no one showers and shaves faster than a woman who is about to get laid. Is this what I want forever? Of course not. But really, have you seen this 2014 body? Miguel knows what I’m talking about. I’ll riff off of a great piece of advice that my best friend gave me a few years ago that I hold near and dear to my heart: “get your cookies while you can.” As it turns out, eating less cookies has gotten me more cookies than it has any other year of my life. ::snap:: Which leads me to my next words of wisdom…
- Pregnancy scares are real.
Like real to the 11th power. You ever wake up late for work and start to panic? Nerve-wracking, right? Well guess what? It’s nothing like that. Not even a little bit. Now if you could envision waking up to a bunch of tigers hovering over you with steak knives and a ticking time-bomb in the background that will go off unless you can make a 7-layer lasagna from your bed with balloons for hands, it’s a little like that. And I’d still take the former scenario over a pregnancy scare any damn day. I thankfully haven’t had too many close calls of this degree in my life, but that wrinkle you see over my left eyebrow is a result of this section.
Buy the shoes.
- Keep the people in your life who treat you as a priority a priority in yours, or you’ll lose them. Sometimes, forever.
Last year I think I touched upon this in a different sort of way. I knew at that time that I wasn’t exactly on track for the “best friend/daughter/anything else of the year” award. But this year I actually started taking the necessary steps to make that better. Admittedly, this is a recent improvement in my life and it’s a far cry from being where it should be. But the results have been liberating. I’m really trying. And by “trying”, I don’t mean “doing what someone else thinks I should be doing to make them happy.” I can’t stress enough about how important I think that last sentence is. If you know who you are and you are genuinely happy with that… be that! The people who love you for who you are will appreciate every little bit of it. I’m not everyone’s cup of tea (some days I’m not even my own cup of tea), and as people grow and change, the friendships that last are the ones that make room for growing pains.
In addition, I have been trying to be better about making plans with people (mostly to get out of the house and push myself outside of my comfort zone). I recently reconnected with maybe the oldest friend I have. For whatever reason, though the years have come and gone, he’s always been there. And we joked at dinner the other night about how the two of us together are the most offensive and judgmental people that ever existed, but we have never, ever, applied that to one other. It was eye-opening for both of us when we said it out loud, and it really put a lot of things into perspective for me. It was always amazing to me that the guy who took me to my prom, watched me go off to college five hours away, and lives an hour and a half away from me could still be so supportive and quietly constant in my life. Yet, while I was catching up with his wife and parents and rocking his youngest to sleep, it felt like there would always be a place for me in his life, and for that, I will always have a place for him in mine. I didn’t deserve the faith he has had in me all of these years, and it’s gifts like that that make me want to be a better Becky.
- Learn to forgive and put it to bed.
I struggle with this one constantly. Not because I’m not compassionate or understanding, I just think I am both to a fault sometimes. There’s a really fine line between being taken advantage of and allowing someone to mess up. I’ve had this terrible reaction to things that I learned about from mistakes I’ve made, and I am thankfully able to quickly squash when it comes over me now, but I’ve spent a lot of time this last year trying to understand why the initial feeling exists. I think that the real problem lies within me not being strong enough to remove people from my life early on when they are not worth keeping around. And then I act surprised that I’m routinely disappointed, when I’ve known from jump that it was a mess. So then I end up months or years into a situation that feels great when it feels great, and fucks me up when it doesn’t. And because I hate that I’ve let it get as far as it has, I become stupid hard on myself because I did it to myself. So after writing this, maybe it’s more about forgiving myself for shitty judgement in some cases.
I’ve also learned in the past few months that forgiveness can also ease some tension in situations that can’t be any other way. As I mentioned above, people are who they are. It’s hard enough to change yourself, so you really have zero chance in changing someone else. Me expecting anyone else to think like me or be a decent human being like me is like expecting it to be sunny every day and getting mad at the sky when it rains. Even worse, I tend to think that there’s a higher percentage of people who are just anything but self-aware, so it’s just smarter and healthier all-around to let people just be, and if they aren’t capable of more than that, it’s just what it is. Focus on you and what you can control, and life will make a whole lot more sense.
If you want long hair, stop cutting it.
- Real men fix shit.
No, real men are not mystical, unicorn-like creatures. (Although in NYC, it’s hard to market otherwise). When my girlfriends and I were in college, we would always say that the “perfect guy” was a creation of our group of guy friends combined. “This one’s looks with this one’s sense of humor, adding that one’s ability to fix computers without hitting CTRL, ALT, DEL, and the other one’s kindness mixed with this one’s sex appeal.” Oddly enough, I ended up dating and marrying one of them, and he was missing pieces that made the “whole” man. Maybe it’s an unfair evaluation, but I still insist that there are several qualities about a guy that absolutely have to be present in order for me to get the juices flowing. Can he kill bugs? Yes. Can he do it without screaming like a little bitch or getting a lucky swing of the broomstick? Hell. Yes. He palms the wheel (none of that right over left bullshit or two-arm action. If you can’t navigate a steering wheel, I’m not providing you a GPS in the bedroom). Changes lightbulbs? Get in line. A real man lets you order first, opens your car door without setting a reminder on his phone, and even walks on the outside of the sidewalk because it’s the gentlemanly thing to do. He knows how to take control, and doesn’t wait for his girl to tell him what the next move is. Listen up, guys. I might be independent, self-sufficient, career-minded and opinionated. But one thing I don’t need is to feel like a mom in my relationship. I need to know that if I’m getting out of line that I’m with someone who can say reassuringly, “calm down. You’ll be fine.” Or better yet, who can make me laugh hysterically if I’m really, really angry. The guy who can turn it around in 5 seconds flat. Girls need to feel like girls around their guys. They need to feel cute and protected (even if we don’t need protecting…), feminine and desirable. Equality in the workplace, sure. But leave that shit at work and push me up against the wall and remind me of how bad you want me when you walk through the door.
I wrote something a bunch of months back that I think perfectly describes how I need my romantic relationships to be (whether it’s just sexual or otherwise…).
“In the best way imaginable, I have completely fallen victim to the type of human being I’ve known for years I needed. If we were two cutouts of construction paper in a kindergarten classroom, he would be blue and I would be pink, and there would be no mistaking one for the other because I am exactly who I am supposed to be when he’s next to me, and he is exactly who he is supposed to be when I am next to him: a girl and a boy. A girl and a boy who are the epitome of classic girl and boy gender roles, with the biggest differentiating factor being my safety-scissored shape, which dons a sassy triangular skirt, standing proudly next to my hunky parallel-o-man.”
So to sum it up, if you’re one of the whiny types who can’t think for himself or express his thoughts and feelings confidently, I’m just gonna be honest – I’m going to walk right the hell all over you. Just lay down, now. It’s over. You don’t stand a chance.
- Take risks. Lots of them. Or die wondering.
Typically, I analyze the crap out of things before I make any real decisions. It can be a blessing and a curse, but I’m so proud to say that this year, most of the conclusions I came to were far outside of my comfort-zone. “But what if I leave my job and I hate the new one?” “What if I have my car in the city for the summer and get a shit-ton of tickets?” “What if I join the gym and fail miserably?” “What if we have sex and things change?” The answer to all of these questions and more is “You won’t know until you know.” Speculation and comparing to the past won’t do you any good, because no two situations will ever be alike.
I had a bad habit for a while of comparing guys around me to a relationship that ended in divorce. But what I started to realize is a couple of things: first of all, the guy I divorced will always be the guy I divorced. Lucky for me, he is not the guy sitting next to me on the bus, or the guy making my sandwich at the deli. He is not even the guy who was born in the same place, works in the same industry, has the same first name and wears the same jacket. He is the guy I divorced, and he has that status so I could give everyone else real chance. So how much of a real chance am I giving other guys if I’m saying “I can’t do this because I got fucked up in my past?” Of course I got fucked up. Past tense. Over. Done. Not by you or you or you… by him. I’ve learned to do what feels right to me in the moment, because if I don’t take these risks, I’m still being held hostage by the person who hurt me in the first place.
So I happily answer the above questions with real answers – what happened when I left a job that was making me miserable? I moved on to a new role, where I am supported by my peers and respected and recognized by my managers. What happened when I brought my car into the city for the summer? A few tickets, sure – but maybe the best summer of my life because I got to spend it on the beach most weekends. What about the gym? Still working out regularly twice a week since APRIL. Nine months of not giving up, getting strong, and staying invested in my health. I could have said “this guy won’t understand my medical condition because no one ever does.” Instead I gained a real support system and someone who is dedicated to keeping me motivated. And the sex? Of course things change when people have sex. But that’s the point. That’s what’s so exciting about that and all of the other great things I’ve gained this year from taking the risks I took. I could either determine before trying that it won’t work, or I could give myself the chance to build an intense connection with someone (or at the very least, have some really amazing sex).
The one thing that I’ve been living by for the past few years that has consistently given me the strength to take the chances that made me better was this: “If you stick with what you know, it’s all you’ll ever have.” The idea is to look at what you want and just go after it. There is a 50/50 chance it won’t go the way you wanted, but there’s a 100 percent chance it won’t go the way you wanted if you don’t try at all. So just go for it. Get yours.
And finally…
- If you’re ugly, you won’t make money as a personal trainer.
This one is the TRUTH. I am admittedly the product of someone who was getting a good deal at work for a general gym membership who got sucked into the charms of a fitness manager trying to sell me his personal training package (you read that right). While I’ve accomplished a complete lifestyle 180, and I know it was the best thing that ever happened to me, I can say wholeheartedly that my trainer could have told me to jump off the empire state building and I would have done it.
The Four Eleven 