four years/first anniversary

It will be February 29th here in just under two hours; it already is the 29th where most of you are.

It's been four years since the last February 29th, and those of you with extremely sharp memories (or maybe too little on your minds) might remember the last one. I do. I remember waking up so nervous I thought I would be sick, and chugging peppermint tea; I remember a huge fuck-up with the cab we'd booked that meant that we ended up being seven minutes late for our 10:00 appointment; I remember that it was a 10:00 appointment and that seven minutes late seemed like the end of the world.

I remember sitting and waiting to be called, trying to keep my shit together with that big, fat binder in my lap. I remember sitting in front of a nameless but kindly clerk, nervously sharing the details of my life and trying to make him understand why it was important that I got to stay there forever. Not just that I wanted to, but that it was important. I remember how pleased he seemed with all of the paperwork, and listening to Bel explain how hard it would be for her if we were separated, and hearing him say, 'You're not going to be separated.' With that sentence, those six words, I knew I would get my residency. I had it. I was one of the few who would have it granted on the spot, and it was going to happen, and I would be safe. I would be safe, finally safe.

But as we all know, I wasn't. And in one of those small but inescapable ironies of life, that same kindly clerk was working on the day I went back, about eight months later, to declare that the relationship was over and that I was no longer eligible for that residency. I remember smiling at him in a no doubt fairly desperate fashion; he didn't remember me.

I don't remember the date of that day; I do remember maintaining so hard the whole time I was in the office, and buckling afterwards when I was waiting for the elevator. I remember Tim helping me walk out, and how quietly but deeply angry he was that this was happening to me, that it was just done, that fast. I remember being told I had 28 days to leave the country; I remember sitting on that little built-up patch of grass outside and filling out a tourist visa application so that I could ostensibly buy myself a bit more time, but really so that I could apply for another student visa. I remember feeling like I could fill out immigration paperwork in my sleep, which was a fucking blessing because I was so checked out of my life by that point that don't remember a single other goddamn thing for about a month in either direction, apart from the week in Samoa with Jac that has all blended into one warm, coconut-tasting memory. I actually don't remember much of anything of about a year there, from roughly mid-July until around the following September.

But I remember February 29th. I remember booking the appointment over the phone with a nice young man who clearly thought I was batty but laughed conscientiously along with me when I said that we thought Leap Day would be fortuitous. And it was; it just didn't play out in the long run like I thought it would.

I think the worst legacy of the last few years is my complete inability to trust that anything good can last. I realise that sounds overwrought, but have the rug pulled out from under you enough times, even just in little ways, and I promise you'll end up feeling the same. And I look at the girl sleeping next to me as I type this, with her ridiculously beautiful lashes and her hair all messed up, who smells like warm and dreams out loud, a girl whom I love more than I know what to do with, and I can't help but feel scared to my bones that she'll go the same way as everything else has. I want to grab her and hold on and never, ever let her out of my sight, and maybe if we stay perfectly still everything else will happen around us and we'll be safe. (Again and always, safe.)

But that, of course, is not how the world works. We may last 50 more years or five more minutes, but I'm not going to make a difference in that by trying to keep everything else out. And while a lot of what I do remember was fractures and lacerations, I also remember the hard hard work done by people who loved me, who tried to make my dream come true by holding my hand and writing essays and making me tea and beating me at Scrabble, and who helped me put my life back together by picking me up when I fell and being endlessly patient and making me eat and beating me at Scrabble. So all in all it's a push, but I'll probably still get really drunk tomorrow.

Happy anniversary; now please fuck off for another four years.

An update.

(With apologies and gratitude to Anthony, who received an e-mail suspiciously similar to the text below just a few moments ago. Whatever, I'm sick and feel like a jerk for having fallen off. I'm trying to catch up, y'all.)

The Political

I saw this BBC article a couple of months ago, and I wish to god he had named the person quoted in this exchange:

A leading Republican, who was in Congress for more than 10 years, answered my question: "Who can beat Obama?" with a casual, "a mammal". Then he added sadly: "But they are all reptiles."

We're all hoping that they destroy each other and don't end up putting up someone who looks moderate enough to lure away disenchanted Dems. In the meantime, I'm usually too focused on keeping down my food anytime one of their god-awful faces is on my tele to pay much attention to what they're saying, and that's probably preserving my sanity.

The Personal

I had an interesting four-day weekend: I went to Florida to meet Colleen's family. They're in the suburbs of Tampa - which is to say, Tampa; the whole bloody city's one big suburb - and they are hardcore Republicans with Christian overtones and Tea Party inclinations. They've long since made their peace with their gay daughter, but loving her deeply and wanting a good and safe life for her somehow does not equal choosing not to vote for people who want her miserable or preferably dead. It's a conundrum.

I had been warned of their political leanings and Colleen had pleaded with me repeatedly not to get involved in any kind of political discussion with them, mostly because a) I'm obviously not going to change their minds, and b) her Dad is a... fucking fucking fuck, I've lost one of my Australian words... he likes to start trouble because he thinks it's funny... AUGH. I get really upset when that happens. I've started forgetting words and street names; I couldn't come up with the name of the Annandale a while back and I drove myself crazy with it. Stupid and unimportant, except that it isn't at all. Anyway, whatever the word is (and please post in the comments if you know what it is)*, that's what he is, so the only way to avoid getting into an ugly and unwinnable argument is to refuse to bite in the first place. But it's hard when you're pottering around in the kitchen and notice the Obama countdown clock prominently displayed on the counter, and when politics keeps coming up in conversations going on around me, and also, well, have you met me?

Fortunately I managed to keep well out of it, and it all went swimmingly and they liked me very much. But it was weird being in that environment. In some ways it felt almost disturbingly familiar - the beaches; the crazy flora I've never seen Stateside, including a bottle-brush tree in their front yard! - and in others it felt so completely unrelatable. The place has no soul, and that's a big part of it - it's all planned/gated communities and strip malls and chains, not an independent anything to be found anywhere - but the other was definitely the people. You'll hear that Southerners are much friendlier, but I don't think that's correct: it's warm, but it's automatic; it's manners, not friendliness. With the people, as with the city, there's no there there. It's dead inside. And the politics are effing terrifying. I really do fear for this country.

But I'm trying to focus on the good of the trip, which was that her family really did seem to like me. I was so fucking terrified: it's been a long time since I dated someone who cared what her family thought. It's a lot more nerve-wracking this way (even though it probably says some very good things about Colleen and the choices I'm making these days. Look at me, growing up).

The Patriots

Didn't happen. Did not happen. Don't know what you're talking about.

XOXO

* EDIT: The word is stirrer. Which I remembered while brushing my teeth, because why not.