little vignettes

New Years, Myspace, and an apology to that boy I accidentally proposed sex to at 18

I’ve thought about this post for a long time.

For the last twenty years, I’ve penned New Year’s lists that promise a better, more well-rounded me. Things like “learn French” and “be a better girlfriend/friend/entrepreneur” have topped my list. It’s not that I haven’t wanted those things. It’s just that I never cared as much as I pretended to.

Is that horrible?

Somehow, it always felt like these things only became real the moment I shared them with the world, and at the same time, the pressure to share them elevated the stakes. They weren’t real unless they were public and to be public created the need to emphasize and exaggerate any minor interests into full-blown resolutions.

It’s easy to blame the surge of online personas, whether or not that’s the cause. I was about nine when the internet came into our home, AIM chatrooms, and the wiry hum of AOL Mail. I was in my early teens when I joined Myspace, searching for scene boys in other states like maybe they could give me the attention the ones in my own town didn’t.

On an AIM chatroom about Catherine Zeta-Jones, probably.

The validation didn’t work by the way. The scene boys did not notice me, and my often embarrassing attempts to get them to still live rent-free in my mind.

I remember once in an effort to connect with a punk boy I liked and who I desperately wanted to hang out with outside of work, I quoted a song by a band I knew he liked. The song was “Teenage Kicks” by The Undertones and after messaging him to ask what he was up to that night, I added, “I need excitement, oh I need it bad.”

I thought I was being edgy, showing him how fun I thought he was. I probably even patted myself on the back for such an obscure musical reference. Only on reflection did I realize that the lyric, which continues “and it’s the best, I’ve ever had,” is actually about sex.

We did not hang out.

Lots of this vibe back in the ol’ Myspace days

By the time Instagram came around I was old enough to know better but I pined for a new iPhone anyway. Anything to post filtered photos of my english muffins and grainy photos of City Hall Plaza in the rain.

I’ve been taking photos of food and creating artistic images out of absolutely nothing my whole life. I was made for this.

Truly ahead of my time with this one

It’s silly, looking back.

But then again.

Those moments were special, weren’t they? They were nothing at the time but here they are, popping up for no reason other than, whether I realized it or not, they mean something to me. Good or bad, they left an impact and decades later, here they are.

Locked away beneath the struggles of daily life and trying to move forward in a world that can feel so cruel, they remind me that not all those memories were mortifying. Most of them are actually pretty nice.

Like this one.

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I am there in my champagne dress, nervous, but the good kind. The kind that comes from feeling confident in yourself for the first time in a long time.

Plus, I knew you’d be there.

Do you remember that dress? You probably don’t, it was such a long time ago. It was an old skating outfit I’d turned into my party dress. I didn’t go to parties, and this was evident to anyone with eyes. It wasn’t the right dress for the occasion, I know that now. I’m sure it had a few threads loose, falling apart at the seams; the irony is not lost on me.

But I felt so beautiful that night.

You must remember those upside-down chandeliers. Iconic. Or the way we watched each other all night, stolen glances and might-have-beens imagined through the haze of a New Year’s party and the glow of make-believe promises. When we finally met we had to shout over the noise and all I could smell was you.

Not cologne, not alcohol. Just you.

Then there was the time we ran through the woods, who knows how it even started. All I remember is you gasping for air through hiccuped laughs, me tripping over every rock as we rushed past dead leaves and fallen branches. When I finally stopped to catch my breath you gave in to a fit of laughter. I’ve never forgotten what you said next. You could barely get the words out, you were so happy.

“You make me feel young.”

I didn’t know what that meant. We were young, barely twenty-four. But it burned into me anyway. That I could make anyone feel that way when I’d struggled so long to feel it myself.

Free.

I have a million memories like these, all stored away. Brief moments that meant nothing at the time, are now all I have left of those years.

City Hall, champagne dress, chandeliers. None of these made my New Year’s Resolution lists over the years. I couldn’t have predicted all the things that would embed themselves in me. All the people who would entangle themselves in my story.

There they are though. There you are. Snapshots of youth that I’d sooner forget if not for those little vignettes. Of you and them, and all the rainy days that brought us here.

My very first Instagram post

I guess what I’m saying is, there’s no point in the list, is there? All that pretending and posturing, acting like we’re going to be someone we’re not.

There’s who we are and who we want to be and somewhere in between, if we’re very lucky, we get a glimpse of who we’re yet to be.

I know, it’s terribly cliche. Forgive me.

Even still, here I am. Sharing my resolutions knowing that they don’t make the memories, don’t even touch the things that shape me. I can’t help it. I’m a creature of habit.

So to end this very long post, here are my resolutions. The real ones — not the ones that make me look smart or hard-working or ambitious. Not the ones made for strangers on the internet (present company excluded) but ones that I actually want.

I hope this time around, I know enough to enjoy them as they’re happening.

Even if that isn’t really how it works. We’re human, after all.

2024 New Year’s Resolutions:

• Read more. My goal is 50 books, but wouldn’t 75 be amazing?!

• Write creatively every day. Take the pressure off and just enjoy it. Have fun.

and most importantly, above all.

• love, love, love (in all its brilliant forms)

Happy New Year,

Angela

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Suggested listening, if only because that last line fits so brilliantly with this one and because it’s from the era of rainy City Hall Plaza photos and champagne dresses 🥂