Run, Run, As Fast As You Can

Last week was my boss's birthday party. It was the same night as the Vassar Young Alum party in NYC (which I had already committed to go). I'm usually a little wary of hanging out with my bosses outside of work (especially since my bosses are so young) but he had graciously invited me to join and for the sake of cultivating a good working relationship with him, I agreed to go. I dressed nicely that day (my hair for once, cooperating in the heat) in a blue lace dress and dark cardigan - as the AP also came to the office to interview my friend and co-worker JS and he warned us beforehand that we might be in some of the b-roll shots. The usual fare of t-shirt and sandals would not fly. Not that I ever wear sandals, but that's mostly because I only own one pair and they're not that comfortable to go around in.
I was supposed to duck out of the office sometime around 6:15 and head up to Chelsea for the Vassar event then head back down to Flatbush Farm in Brooklyn at around 8:00 for my boss's thing. As it worked out, and as it usually works out, I ended up swamped with work and decided that I should just reverse it - go to my boss's thing first and then head up to Manhattan to attempt to look semi impressive around my college contemporaries. I figured it could provide a good exit strategy if I needed it. JS and I walked over to the party at around 7:00-ish as we had both been left to try to deal with our crazy workloads until late.
It wasn't a particularly memorable evening up until that point. The weather was ok, but not necessarily newsworthy. JS and I exchanged our usual grievances about work and life as we walked along the streets of Brooklyn. The humidity curled my hair a little more than I would have wanted it to.
The bar was nice - cozy and inviting with a bit of an old-school feel to it. It reminded me a little bit of The Beech Tree on Collegeview Ave in Poughkeepsie right across the street from the North Gate at Vassar. We went there a few times with J, who had cultivated a friendship with the barkeep, and it was always a good environment for a quiet drink or two. It was unfortunately also the site where my parents and my ex's parents went to have dinner together when they first met. I remember my ex being extremely uncomfortable that night.
I ordered a Brooklyn (bourbon, southern comfort, and bitters) to start it off. I was beginning to be in one of those moods when the intensely work-heavy week was starting to get to me and the prospect of facing what probably would be half of the hipster population in Williamsburg at the Vassar thing was troubling. Unfortunately the aptly-named Brooklyn cocktail wasn't as smooth as I would have liked it to be, which is why I downed it as fast as I could while I listened to some of my co-workers' stories. I followed the Brooklyn with a Pear Martini - an unusual choice as I usually can't really stomach most martinis (they're NOT WELL MADE okay?) but this one went down with unusual ease. JS left with one of our other co-workers at some point and I realized I was left with my boss and his friends from college.
It was also the point where I realized that heading up to Manhattan was just not happening.
Oh blerg.
I sat around there talking to people about who knows what for a while when I started feeling myself ease into that version of me that I kinda don't like. The version of me whose suaveness barely covers the thinly veiled arrogance that stems from my education as a liberal arts intellectual. Not that liberal arts intellectuals are douchebags or anything, but we can be. And that ugly side of me reared its ugly head out that night at the bar. When that happened, I decided it was time to leave.
I hobbled out of there in my high heels (which I have no recollection of switching into) and instantly called M in an effort to purge myself of my guilt about turning into intellectual douchebag E. She calmed me down somewhat. Enough to get on the subway and make it half a block from home.
It was then and there that the hole came back - the knawing, destructively empty black hole that exists somewhere in my upper digestive system. The same black hole that sent me to my knees when it was created - and sent me to my knees half a block away from my apartment alone in the streets of Brooklyn. I sat on a bench on the Prospect Park perimeter for half an hour as I teared up and did everything I could to not just sit there sobbing like a small child.

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