Category: Adventures in Daily Life

The Last Panic Attack of June

Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato Leave a comment

The last panic attack of June is pretty ho-hum. Almost embarrassingly so. I’m kind of rooting for it, to be honest. “Go out with a BANG,” I say, “not a whimper.” I truly expected better from the last panic attack of June.

If I had to pick a Hogwarts house for my panic attack, I’d toss it into Hufflepuff. It’s not strong enough, nor cruel enough, for Gryffindor or Slytherin. And due to its utter lack of brain fog, Ravenclaw is out. So it gets the leftover house. But when you’re a panic attack that resembles a lukewarm ham and pea soup, you’re lucky to get anything at all. It’s a letdown, really, this last panic attack of June.

If this panic attack were a dinner guest, he’d (yes, it’s a he) spend the whole evening picking his teeth with his not-so-clean fingernails and then flicking his treasure into the thick fibers of the shag carpeted floor when he thinks no one is looking—but, of course, everyone is looking.

If the panic attack were a lover, he’d be the type that struggles to unclasp your bra. He’d leave his socks on while you’re having sex. He’d still refer to sex as “doing it.” He’d be 43 and aspire to work as a CPA. Right now, he doesn’t work because reasons. You don’t want to hold his hand in public—or in private. It’s all very disappointing for the last panic attack of June.

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Be Less Polite

Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato Leave a comment

My therapist is constantly trying to get me to be less polite.

She says I need to open up, be more emotional, let it all out. I tell her she should hear me address a server after I’ve waited an hour for my food and it comes out cold. Or the screams of frustration when a customer service representative puts me on hold for the 10th time. That’s bad enough. No additional innocents need be subject to my wrath.

But she insists. And it’s been a theme in our chats for a while now. “What if you just let go,” she asks, “and tell me what you really think?”

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My Trip to Israel in 7 Patterns

Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato Leave a comment

I like finding patterns. Humans are programmed to look for order and structure among chaos, and I embrace my evolutionary heritage. I see faces in trees, cars and, yes, even grilled cheese. I know that Volkswagon bugs are not smiling at me, but it’s nice to give into the mind-bender and smile back. Patterns can be absolutely lovely. On this trip to Israel, I was lucky enough to make some of my own using the Adobe Capture cell phone app. See if you can find your own smiley faces:

Man at a café in Tel Aviv

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Chivay, Peru

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I caught Teresa at a bad time.

She was struggling to open an iron sluice. Irrigation ditches surrounded her, turning her house into a peninsula jutting out from the road. I strolled off the path and hopped over a channel, introducing myself as I ducked under a clothesline.

The Colca Canyon’s undulating hills are so green they made me wince; the breeze so disparate, my ears were inundated by nuance.

I’d just walked for several hours along a country road and seen far too many jagged mountain peaks, valleys of wildflowers and plentiful cropland. The place is a photography newb’s wet dream—close a shutter and develop a masterpiece.

The outskirts of Chivay are so beautiful, they’re almost disagreeable. I wanted the order of another human voice. My eyes clung to Teresa’s outfit, begging for anything other than #00ff00.

We took turns. Me fruitlessly tugging at metal and her, more productively, whacking the thing with a stone to try and jar it loose. After a few minutes, she stood and seamlessly transitioned into her next, more achievable, task.

Teresa and I walked and talked for a while. She was going to another house down the road to get some cheese. Along the way I asked her about different varieties of quinoa and discovered haba.

We talked about her hat, which is ornately embroidered with animals and symbols. This means she’s a descendant of the Cabanas, one of two tribes occupying the Colca Canyon. I asked her where she’d bought it. She gestured back the way I’d just come.

The brilliantly dressed woman and I parted ways at the edge of a field. She made her way through a forest of yellow flowers, and I kept pounding the pavement.

Teresa, Chivay, Peru

Teresa, Chivay, Peru

Perfecting the Eye Twitch

Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato Leave a comment

I excel at a lot of things, but I feel like one of my main strengths is the eye twitch. It’s usually accompanied by a grimace and a deep blush. I don’t want to brag, but I’ve gotten SO good at The Twitch that I can basically do it without thinking. Of course, I’m no fool. I know what they say—practice makes perfect! Luckily, I was able to get in a LOT of rehearsal time today…

This morning a hiring manager told me she hadn’t bothered reading my cover letter.

*eye twitch*

That’s cool, dude, no worries. I only poured my soul onto paper and then spent two, long, paranoid days obsessively combing through each sentence for typos. +48 hours

I might also consider the time I squandered complaining to my friends about said cover letter—asking for their advice, praying for their approval, ultimately fishing for compliments and happily settling for lies. “Gosh, Mollie, this is like the best cover letter I’veEVERread. They’re going to see this and BEG you to work for them.” That’s a lot of social currency I just wasted. But, for you, Hiring Manager, for this job… Psh, don’t even worry about it. +5 hours

Then there were the meals I monopolized, speaking ad nauseam about the difference between a “strong” verb and a “weak” verb and which ones, specifically, I was going to use in my beautiful cover letter. +4 hours -10 relationship points

*eye twitch*

Oh, yes! I forgot to mention the event I didn’t attend so I could stay home and perfectly manicure this cover letter—just for you. -Fun + FOMO + Stress

I mustn’t forget the half hour I spent attaching and re-attaching the cover letter + resume combo because *GASP* WHAT IF I ATTACHED THE WRONG THING? I mean, I have some photos of sloths on this computer. And, while adorable, sloths would definitely send the wrong message to Hiring Manager. What if, instead of .pdf I attached .jpg? WHAT IF?! *shudders* +30 min

And let’s pretend I didn’t waste an hour of my life after hitting “send,” hyperventilating over the notion that I might have accidentally used an Oxford comma. +1 hour

~48 hours spent writing the cover letter

~10 hours agonizing over the cover letter

Having Hiring Manager carelessly admit she didn’t read it? Priceless.

*eye twitch*

 

Photo Credit: Geoffrey Fairchild via Flickr Creative Commons