Simplicity by Sunny

I consider pumpkins one of the earth’s greatest accomplishments.  Pumpkin spice lattes.  Pumpkin pie.  Pumpkin muffins, preferably with cream cheese frosting.  Pumpkin bread.  Pumpkin bars.   Despite my passion for all pumpkin-related edibles (scented candles, too), I’d never before carved a pumpkin.  Until recently. 

A few months ago I met my friend Coco for lunch.  Coco is a fellow Midwesterner, but she could easily claim Brooklyn as her ‘hood.  She’s sassy, New York style.  She never hesitates in saying what she wants.  She exudes authority.  When she tells me I shouldn’t do something, then I do it anyway – knowing that she’ll discover my disobedience  because, well, she knows everything - I’m afraid of her.  But, afraid or not, I love her.  Her laugh is infectious.  I’ve tried not to laugh when she laughs, just to see if I could do it….and I can’t.  She makes life fun, even when she’s yelling at me for being a fool.  And if she ever reads this post, I hope she knows how much I admire and appreciate her .

I arrived before Coco at our lunch date and took the nearest available table.  I gazed, with an expression somewhere between dreamy and zombie-like, out the window.  To keep my head from crashing into the table, I propped my chin onto my hand. 

Coco arrived, the dimple in her right cheek glowing as it always does when she’s smiling.  She took a look at me.  The dimple crashed.  She slid into the opposite chair, staring intently at my face.  “What the hell happened to you?”

“Do I really look that bad?”

“Uh, yeah.”  She’s not one to mince words.  “Your eyes are bloodshot.  I’m pretty sure you’re about five minutes from passing out, and – hate to break this to ya – but your shirt’s inside out.”

I looked down, unconcerned.  “Oh.” 

“Are you hung over?  Did you spend the night in jail?  I mean…,” she paused to gesture at my disasterous appearance.  “What happened…?” 

I grinned.  “I met a man.”

Then I told her my story.

Several weeks ago I was strolling downtown when my stomach itched for pizza.  As luck would have it, half a block up was Poor Richard’s, where they serve pizza by the slice.  Not the Chicago-style that my Midwestern heart beats for, but good nonetheless.

I entered the small bistro, basil and oregano dusting the air.  Chefs threw dough up, way up, dangerously close to the ceiling, before letting it land back onto their dancing fingers.  I didn’t need to peruse the menu.  I have a favorite pizza combination and consider deviating from it Pizza Adultery.  Anxious, then, I went to the counter … reached out to ring the silver bell on the counter to signal a chef.  Wrist about to snap, someone grabbed my forearm.  Startled, arm dangling in mid-air, I swung around.

I don’t know what I expected to find – so quickly it happened – but a handsome, six-foot cowboy wouldn’t have been on my list of guesses.

“Hey, pretty lady,” he said.

I raised an eyebrow and pointedly looked down at his hand around my arm.  My treacherous arm, tingling under the heat of his grasp.

He pulled away, but not quickly.

“Lookin’ to get your nose broken, cowboy?” I asked, brow still raised.

He stepped toward me, audacity in every inch of that movement.  “Wouldn’t be the first time.”  He grinned.  “And I wouldn’t mind if you did it.”

I did my best to scowl at him, but some things are uncontrollable.  Like blushing. 

He leaned across me, not touching, yet I could feel the vibration of him.  All my will power struggled against leaning into him.   

“I’ll forgive you, though,” he said, dinging the bell while steal leaning dangerously close.  ”If you let me buy you pizza.”

I stepped back.  “I’d rather we just punch each other and go our separate ways.” 

A white hat rushed over, ready to take an order.  “Two slices,” Cowboy said.  “Pineapple and ham.”

Clearly Cowboy suffered a listening problem.

Then it registered and I shook my head.  “What did you order?”

“Pineapple and ham.  I took a guess.  It’s my favorite.”

My jaw dropped. 

“Ah-ha!”  His triumph wasn’t subtle.  “I guessed right.”

I put both fists on my hips, refusing to acknowledge that he was, indeed, completely accurate.  “I don’t know where this nerve of yours comes from, but you’re creeping me out.”

His bravado instantly faded.  “Really?” He asked, boyish uncertainty making his face even more handsome.  “If you only knew how much my palms are sweating right now.”

I gave a satisfied nod at his humility.  “That’s better.”  I stuck out my hand.  “I’m Sunny.  Your nose, for now, is safe.”

We ate our pineapple pizza on the patio, laughing and talking.  He was like an old friend.  Well, except that every time he smiled, my heart thumped a little faster.  And I couldn’t take my eyes off him.  When we decided to go to an Irish pub another block up, I was so intent on staring at him that I actually stepped in front of a moving vehicle. 

Cowboy pulled me back onto the curb.  “Careful, Sunny, geesh.  I don’t want you to die on our first date.”

“We’re on a first date?”  I asked.  “Who authorized that, hm?”

“I did.”  Cowboy doesn’t lack confience.  “And I saved your life on this first date, so now you gotta kiss me.”

And after three whiskeys, a Black & Tan, and a leisurely walk back to my car - I did.

Our second date was mini-golf.  At the end of the night, he gave me Belgian chocolate, decorated with a sateen bow.  On our third date we strolled a neighborhood with big, old houses.  Fingers linked.  Dodging sprinklers.  We pointed at attics that were surely haunted.  When the street lamps were far away and dim, he’d pull me close, hands supporting the small of my back, curving my spine until it was almost parallel to the sidewalk, and then – finding myself bent and blanketed by him – he’d claim my lips for a kiss that, if not for his arms, would’ve left me falling into the concrete.

It was this third date that he presented me with a gift utterly sweet.

“I didn’t have the chance to wrap it,” he said.

“I don’t care,” I said with a laugh.  “Just gimmie!”  (I may be a minimalist, but I also possess the occasional greedy tendency.)

And, there in my eager hands, he placed a pumpkin carving kit.

“Oh, Cowboy,” I said with happiness.  “This is the best gift ever.”

Our fourth date, then, was carving pumpkins.  With his-n-hers pumpkins, he also brought me peach tulips, their edges carved in yellow.

There, in my empty kitchen, we stood side-by-side carving the pumpkins we’d affectionately named Harold & Kumar.  We scooped out seeds and pumpkin guts, the smell of fall – fresh and spicy – made my kichen the epitome of what the season is about.  Namely socks, chilly air, and warm kissing.

The beauty of the fall season enveloped me like he enveloped me. 

Thanksgiving came and went – uneventful and that was okay.  Christmas, though is the season.  When the world – streets, living rooms, hearts – are lit with excitement.  Excitement for gifts wrapped imperfectly.  For a kiss under the mistletoe – not just any kiss, but the meeting of lips, lips that tell you you’re loved, lips that know every inch of your skin.  Christmas is the season of love, family, and hope for the New Year so close ahead. 

For some of us, Christmas can be a lonely experience.  No kiss, no family. 

This past Christmas, I rolled over and awoke with a heavy chest.  I pulled the quilt over my head and cried noisy, embarrassing tears.  The kind where, if someone overheard you, they’d think you’re either being tortured or simply five years old.

I felt a little of both.  Like a self-centered grade schooler and a torture victim.  Alone and lonely.  Cowboy and I weren’t dating anymore.  I missed him.  My empty apartment housed no Christmas tree.  Or cookies.  No mistletoes.  No wreathes.  Definitely no lips to kiss. 

While blowing my nose, the view of my puffy face stared at me from the bathroom mirror.  “Wow, I haven’t looked this pathetic in a long time,” I said to myself, smiling at my absurdity and my selfishness.  I straightened my shoulders.  I scrubbed the sticky, salty dried tears from my cheeks. 

“Deep breath, Sunny,” I told myself, curling my hair and applying my mascara ever so carefully.  “Deep, deep breaths.”

I had somewhere to go this past Christmas, and for this I was very happy.  I’ve been to holiday parties over the past many years, but Christmas Day isn’t an actual day I get to celebrate often.  This year I did have that chance and I wasn’t going to allow my mascara to run beforehand.

I drove to my friend AW’s house, parking in the midst of the other cars meant for their gathering.  AW’s house is Christmas all year, actually.  Cookies and warmth.  Love inside its walls.  Ironically I usually housesit for them during Christmas, but now I was at their house – with them in it – on this particular 25^th of December.

This year they were home because they’d just had their baby in September.  The most gorgeous baby I’ve ever met.  I’d felt him kicking inside of AW’s extended stomach months earlier.  I’d seen him in his first ultrasound.  I got to meet him when he was days old in the hospital, where I saw the love of a brand new mother as AW – my beautiful, exhausted friend – kissed her newborn son on his forehead, and whispered to him, “I love you.”

That was one of  the coolest gifts 2011 presented me :)  .

I walked into AW’s warm house this Christmas and, like magic, no longer felt like crying.  First off, there were homemade cinnamon buns at the ready.  If AW’s cinnamon buns don’t make a person immediately happy, that person is simply not human.

I was the only single person there.  And, I can’t lie, it hurt at first.  It hurt because I was surrounded by amazing couples – best friends who happen to married, who elbow each other in the ribs, tease each other mercilessly, who love each other unconditionally – and I wanted so badly for myself what they had.

Then there were the babies everywhere!  That, too, hurt at first.  When you’re 30, your friends start having babies and no one warms you how hard that’s going to be when you’ve always wanted babies, too.  When you didn’t grow up with a family, but always told yourself that was okay, because you’d grow your own one day. 

Being in AW’s living room on Christmas day, though, made me realize that being me – alone, yet suddenly not lonely – was absolutely wonderful.  That your happiness can be defined, not by whether you are who you thought you’d be, but rather by how much you appreciate what you do have.  Seeing the beauty, recognizing the beauty, that’s around you.  And this Christmas I appreciated every moment of beauty.  AW icing cinnamon buns in her kitchen while wearing her husband’s slippers.  Mrs. B’s baby girl, who sat next to me while we played Catch Phrase, who smiled at me with abandon, and grasped my index finger when I couldn’t resist touching her translucent skin.  Of course, I got to hold AW’s son, too, who, in his baby exhaustion, dropped easily into my arms and molded to my chest.  Who sighed every couple of moments in his sleep.  Whose cheeks curve just like AW’s, but whose brow is exactly like Mr. W’s.

Yeah, being me means sitting on the sidelines.  I can tell you that I’ve got an amazing front row seat.  I get to contribute in my own way, too, by basking in their happiness.  Happiness is always compounded by sharing.  I get to provide awe and excitement.  That’s significant in its own unique way.

I must also admit, too, that after spending Christmas day surrounded by babies, I’m not meant to ever have them.  Love them?  Oh, yes.  But care for them without dropping them accidentally on their heads?  Um, no.  I’m too klutzy for that kind of responsibility!  My wilting philodendron would agree . 

Driving home later that night, smelling like babies and sugar and peppermint coffee, I felt Christmas for the first time.  I thought back to October, and of Cowboy, and pumpkin carving and remembered feeling Halloween for the first time.  The year had provided me with a true celebration of its seasons.

Celebrating seasons isn’t about following a cultural recipe.  It’s about simply feeling good as the year unfolds from summer barbeques to turkey dinners. 

So, for Valentine’s Day this year, single or not, tip toe into a red dress or knot a red tie, and go dancing.  For your birthday, get your favorite cake – party or not – and celebrate this brand new year.  Celebrate each season.  Celebrate your every season.  No matter who you are, where you’re at, or where you want to be.  Celebrate regardless.  Celebrate always.  Celebrate with abandon.