magicbeans. nothing if not awkward.

chair shopping for millionaire. yes, they have me working my first saturday. i'm headed out to ikea in jersey this afternoon, which might be my best bet. office depot and staples were a bust. there was some really nice stuff at lee's studio and jensen-lewis, the sort of modern, designer furniture that stef and i would always covet, but nothing that quite fit what they were looking for. crate & barrel, like ikea, is full of the more affordable, but still modern, stuff that stef and i actually owned. it didn't hit me until i was walking around the store that it is where she bought my valentine's day gift last year.

as a digression, it was two years ago on valentine's day that i took her photo down from above my bed. 'it will never be that same way again,' i wrote. it had been two months since she had told me that she wanted to take a break. two weeks since she told me that she missed me and wanted to be with me. and then a week without contact. i woke up on valentine's day and something inside of me said that things were really over. i haven't even come close to letting go in that way this time, although i have made the best effort yet in getting the rest of my life on track.

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sometimes you get distracted from your normal sensory perception of the world and find yourself somewhere else temporarily. something a little stronger than a memory. i don't think that it's a particularly uncommon phenomenon, but it happens to me quite frequently, and vividly. usually i find myself flashing back to specific things, sometimes things i haven't thought about since they happened, but generally they did actually happen to me.

sitting in the subway station just now, waiting for a train, i found myself entirely somewhere else. somewhere so odd, so different from my own experience, that on flashing back to this life i was disoriented for a moment, physically here, but mentally somewhere between worlds. it was only seconds, but it felt like waking bolt-upright from the deepest and strangest of dreams.

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there is apparently a free bus that will take you to the new jersey ikea. at 3.30 the woman in the information booth at port authority told me that the last bus of the day left half an hour ago. she didn't sound terribly convincing, but i guess she had no real reason to lie to me. unless she simply hates ikea. or the trendy kids who shop there.

so it was back out to the ikea in hicksville. the subway to penn station. the search for the right lirr train. diving between the closing doors as it left the platform. ikea's a bustling place on the weekend

more chair shopping. a phone conversation about my findings. and then some shopping for myself.

they were sold out of the lamp i wanted. i couldn't find the cool chair i had seen on the website. i did get a shaving mirror though. and some funky stuff for my room.

the actuality of being in ikea wasn't as painful as it was a week ago. but those little pangs were certainly still there. things we had talked about buying for our apartment. the same thing had happened at crate & barrel this morning. a rug. some dishes. a kitchen table.

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this is only directed metaphysically at stef, as it is only going to be emailed to a dozen or so people, none of them her, but i've been saying it just barely out loud a lot today: 'i miss you so fucking much.'

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i came back to the city. met chris in manhattan. we got falafels. i think that they are the first falafels i've had since the last time that stef and i ate at east side pockets before leaving providence.

'i've been fighting with the urge to buy a pack of cigarettes all day,' he told me after eating.

'i fought the urge to bum a cigarette from a stranger on the street earlier.'

'i want to smoke when i'm miserable. but the fact that it's valentine's day is a stupid excuse for being miserable.'

'i agree. this year really kind of sucks for me. and two years ago, for the same reason. but that's pretty much it for really bad ones. the one in between was the one really good one i've had. the rest were all just sort of blah.'

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there was a message on my voicemail when i got off the subway at home. 'hey it's robin. i was just calling to invite you to our anti-valentine's recovery party tonight. so if you don't have a hot, sultry date you should come over here and drink malt liquor with us. okay, bye.' i called her back. there were a bunch of people at her apartment. drinking, yes, malt liquor. they were planning on going to a roller-disco party in my neighborhood later later.

chris and i headed over there. it was a large group of people that i didn't know, one of the situations in which i find myself most uncomfortable. i had a couple of beers (not malt liquor, although there is a drink-related low point coming up in a bit). we received word that the rollerskating thing had ended early, so we headed to a nearby bar, and dancing.

i hadn't really had nearly enough to drink to get into it. i ordered another beer at the bar. and another. at this point was pretty loosened up, but also out of money. i wanted one more drink. sitting on the table next to where we were standing was a half empty bottle of corona. it seemed to have been abandoned. 'what's the worse thing that could happen if i drink it?' i asked chris, 'i could get mono.' which yes, would suck, but the chances of that are pretty slim. so i drank it. and a big swig of someone else's beer. and danced with robin. some random girl on the dance floor. a crazy french boy named thibault.

and then people dispersed. 'i'm at just the right level of drunk,' i told chris in the subway station. 'i'm not falling over drunk, but drunk enough that i probably would have made out with a complete stranger. i'm still going home alone, though.'