today i was alexander with his terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. except, well, my name isn’t alexander. but it was a cranky-baby kind of day.
so when i stood in line at the deli to get the BLT i was convinced would fix everything, and i checked my wallet to see if i had the requisite four dollars and twenty-five cents and found myself lacking by a dollar … well, i did what any tough street-smart gal does:
i burst into tears and ran into the street with my face buried in my hair.
i’m not sure where the tears came from. as kate said, when you’re broke, tiny troubles look like monster trucks. i’m only hormonal one day a month and kids, today was it.
so what did i do with my measly three dollars? well, i defiantly bought a frappaccino at starbucks. i knew this wasn’t a BLT. hell, it wasn’t even lunch. but damnit, i sat outside and sucked it down and sniffled my way through a number of depressing ed harcourt songs. the sunny patch i sat in managed to become shady within three minutes of sitting down and this made me cry again. reasons i kept crying:
even the sun thinks i’m a brat and has run away… ed harcourt makes me think of stuart… stuart could make me stop crying… stuart isn’t here… i hate my outfit… the sun hates me… ed harcourt would probably hate me…
etc etc.
it’s amazing what nonsense reasons you can find to silently wail about behind sunglasses when you’re looking for them. but after i drowned my tears in fake chocolate coffee products, i pulled myself together enough to go back into work. a few phone calls with mom and stuart later, i’d sorted out my waily weeping idiocy enough to laugh at myself.
but when i tried to leave the office after work, i discovered i could barely walk. the newspaper i was holding on the elevator was trembling in my hands. i needed to eat. immediately. or i’d faint. shaking, i walked to the quik-e-rob in my building. shaking, i bought a candy bar. shaking, i dialed up the Boyfriend for Life.
chatting and eating a candy bar five minutes later, i realized nothing is really as bad as it seems in the heat of a hormonal, hungry, mini-meltdown. the sun doesn’t hate me, i don’t hate my outfit, ed harcourt doesn’t even know me and a BLT wasn’t going to make or break my day.
of course, going over to a certain fishbowl to munch on delicious bacon sandwiches, juicy mushrooms, and an entire bottle of reisling? helped too.
the lesson? it seems all those greek grandmamas were right. nothing gets solved on an empty stomach. when it gets bad … eat something. it’ll get better.

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