by Jen Glantz
I couldn’t handle it all, okay? But who were the right people to admit that to if not the strangers at DTW airport before 9:00 a.m.?
“You’re not a superhero,” the bread lady said, boarding a plane at the gate next to mine. “You are just Jen Glantz.”
I sat down in 9B, in between two men in business suits. I’m just Jen Glantz. I puffed up the layers of my tattered bridesmaid dress and slipped my feet into a fresh pair of socks, realizing, for the first time in 456 days, that I was okay with that.
chapter twenty-two
Good-Bye, Cold Feet
I am no good at good-byes. It’s my tragic character flaw and my own personal kryptonite. It’s also what makes me a prime candidate for the show Hoarders. I stuff my dresser drawers, kitchen cabinets, and empty suitcases with things that no longer serve a purpose in my life. Things like a clown costume I wore for Halloween in 2010, twenty bottles of Shout stain remover that I won years ago through an online opt-in contest, and about twelve rolls of wrapping paper, though I can’t remember the last time I bought somebody something that needed to be covered in shiny paper with a print of little elephants swimming in a pool. (That roll was only fifteen cents at CVS—I had to grab it.)
I’m even worse at saying good-bye to people, even when it’s casual, mutual, or forced by an expired parking meter. The second I feel the phone call leaning toward pregnant pauses or the coffee date beginning to stall out over empty mugs, I try to keep things going as long as I can. I rattle on as if I’m on autopilot and watch as the other person fiddles with the crumbs of a long-gone croissant or stifles a yawn. But the very second I feel an, “All right, well . . .” or an “Okay, I’m taking off . . .” about to come out of their mouth, I wrestle on my coat, smile wide, and bolt toward the exit door. Or if I’m at home, blabbing on the couch, I keep things easy: I just hang up.
By now, my good friends know to tread lightly around me. Even their reaching for the handle of their purse and giving me a blasé, “This was great . . .” is enough to make me dine and dash. But for those lucky victims who meet me or call me for the first time, they always send a follow-up text that asks, “Did I say the wrong thing?” or “Did you just lose service?” I always reply with the truth: I am not good at lingering good-byes.
I’ve been known to leave jobs in the most jaw-dropping and infamous way possible, whether or not the leaving is on my terms or theirs. I left my first job in New York City by telling my boss, who, I was fully convinced was the brother of Cruella de Vil, that I loved him with every ounce of my beating heart before handing him my resignation letter and sneaking down the fire escape. At my second job, when rumors of layoffs were floating through the air, my boss called me into his office, shut the door, and told me he had some bad news for me. That’s when I got my tush off the bright yellow chair, went straight to my desk, shoved the stapler and the family-sized jar of peanuts into my purse, and saw myself out of that place before he had the chance to tap into his inner Donald Trump and announce that I was fired.
But saying good-bye on dates is its own cup of tea—the aggressive, overly brewed, undrinkable kind, in my opinion. Whether he’s someone I’m Thanksgiving thankful that I’ll never see again, or someone I’m finger-crossing will text me the second I get home, my response at the end of the night is always the same: as soon as he starts talking about how much fun he had, or how those were quite possibly two of the oddest hours of his life, I pull back and run in the opposite direction, sending an air hug his way as I race down the stairs toward the rat-infested subway station. If a guy wants to give me a smooch or a warm bear hug, it needs to be done at the spur of the moment, at the most nonsensical time—say, right as I’m buttering my third dinner roll of the night or getting all hot and heavy over my stance on global warming. If he waits for the end of the date, it’s always too late. I’ll be all the way on the other side of Manhattan island by the time he figures out what the heck just happened.
Saying good-bye means that something is over. Even if that something is temporary, like the end of an afternoon shopping trip to Target with your best college girlfriends, or something permanent, like an unexpected phone call in which your boyfriend of three years tells you he just doesn’t love you anymore, saying good-bye leads to heartbreak. And I am not a masochist. I don’t enjoy the pain of wondering when and if I’ll see a person, a place, or a thing ever again. So I avoid the final hug, the see-you-soon closing statements, and turn the finality of a period into an ellipsis. If someone says good-bye and nobody hears it, does the good-bye really count? I am on team No Way, José with that one.
My therapist, also known as a couple of deep-diving Google searches and a scroll through WebMD, has told me that I hold on to things longer than I should, which is a nice way of saying that I have something called separation anxiety. Dogs have this, which is why they whimper when you leave them behind and go about your day. I don’t whimper; I just don’t let the person leave. That is why I’ve never successfully been able to break up with someone before. I’ve tried and failed miserably, approaching the conversation with an outlined script of how to tell him it’s time for us to part ways. Instead, I jabber on about how I think we should spend even more time together and suggest that maybe Taco Tuesday can become a real, consistent thing with us.
I guess it’s because I’m scared that I’m wrong. They might not be the best match for me, they might be above average in the lazy department, and they might revel in pushing my buttons when I’m already coming to the table with my hair on fire, but what if they change? Or maybe I can be the one to change? What if it’s too soon to know? What if they’re the one, my one, my one and only, and I’m about to prematurely kick them to the curb with a be-all and end-all good-bye?
The last time I found myself in dire need of pulling the plug on a three-month stint with a guy I could no longer stomach sitting beside, even in a dark movie theater while stuffing my face with popcorn and a large cup of Diet Coke, the guy beat me to it. Thank God. But it wasn’t that simple; he didn’t just leave me a voice mail detailing how this thing between us was coming to an end, or send me a Facebook message that said he would have to defriend me on social media and in real life. He texted me, saying he didn’t think he could do this anymore, and asked if we could meet that night to talk. Normally I wouldn’t go, knowing that the in-person conversation would end with me being Ms. Fix It, a tool belt full of promises buckled around my waist, or him slapping me in the face with verbal good-byes. But right as I went to swipe left and permanently delete the history of our text messages, a new message appeared on my phone from one of my brides. She asked if we could talk because she couldn’t do this anymore.
“Listen, I just wanted to set boundaries with you.” I called her on the way to meet my guy for our own dreaded good-bye. “I just wanted to put a stop to 4:00 a.m. texts about which style of garter you should buy. We can work this out!”
“No, no, Jen,” she jumped in. “This isn’t about you. This is about Matt and me. I just don’t know anymore. I don’t know if he’s the one I want to marry.”
This wouldn’t be too alarming if, say, this conversation were happening any time but two days before her wedding. Tricia had hired me almost eleven months ago, and we’d spoken once a week since then. This was the first time she was telling me about her second thoughts, her ice-cold feet, her plans to perhaps call this whole wedding off. “What if there’s somebody better out there for me? What if my real soul mate is sitting at a coffee shop, wearing a plaid long-sleeve shirt and unwrinkled khakis, coding a website, waiting for me to sit down next to him with my double-shot espresso and ask him for the Wi-Fi password?”
Little did she know she was talking to a loveless disaster. The kind of girl who breaks everything she touches, even poor guys’ hearts. I was starting to believe I wouldn’t know who the love of my life was even if his arms were wrapped around me and he was whispering the intimate details of our future together. How was I supposed to help her when half of th
e time I confused the feeling of falling in love with acid reflux?
But it was easy. It’s always easier when someone else plays the role of fickle princess and you get to be her talking animal sidekick.
“I think,” I began, trying to be a notch more credible than Google and a notch less credible than a licensed therapist, “there’s no such thing as just one soul mate. There are a lot of people who could be really great for us, who could make our world shake. But if you have someone in your life you thoroughly enjoy and can put up with most of the time, maybe that’s worth the risk of taking yourself off the market.”
That, alone, was the scariest thing I’d learned about love, after finding it and losing it, and finding it again. Just because we’ve fallen in love, doesn’t mean we have to stick with that person if that love turns into a mere and morbid uggghh. We don’t get just one shot at love; I truly believe we get many. The trick is to recognize when we’re really happy with someone and when it’s time to move on.
“Have you found your person, Jen?”
In that moment, as I was crossing over to Third Avenue, it hit me. I had been talking to Tricia for almost a year now, and I knew everything about her: the kind of polyester sweaters she likes to wear from Express and the type of birth control she’s on that regulates her cycles and her mood swings. But she didn’t know much about me. To her, I was just this voice pumping advice over the phone. A buttoned-up professional who seemed to have it all figured out. But really, I was just good at helping other people make decisions, say their good-byes, decide when to hire a DJ and fire a caterer. Behind the phone, whenever I looked in the mirror, I was just a complete and utter disaster.
Isn’t that just the way it is? We give Dear Abby–worthy advice to our friends, but for ourselves, we ignore the warning signs; we lay face-down on our beds and kick our legs up and down as we decide what to do and what not to do, when to stick around and when to pack up our bags and head west.
“Quite the opposite.” I decided to tell Tricia the truth. “I’m on my way to get broken up with by a guy I was too scared to break up with myself.”
“We’re very different,” she said.
“I hang on too long,” I added, finishing her sentence.
“And maybe I run away too fast.”
I remember a lady I used to work with once told me that the first time she got married, she walked down the aisle muttering under her breath, “Man, this is going to suck if I have to do this again.” She had known weeks earlier that marrying this guy was not a good idea.
“How did you know?” I asked her, curiously.
“Because I never missed him when I left.”
That was another thing about good-byes: either they were suffocating, like sitting inside of a helium balloon, or they were nothing at all. If you ever wanted to know how you really felt about someone or something, say good-bye to it.
“Matt makes me happy,” she said, though both of us were old and mistake-riddled enough to know that happiness is never enough. “But what if I can find someone who makes me happier?”
“I can’t help you decide whether you should marry Matt,” I told her, because that was the truth. Even if she told me everything about their relationship, I would still not know enough. She was the only one who knew whether she was just having cold feet or listening to the rumblings of her gut. “But I do think, right now, you should jump into your car and drive somewhere far away, just for a little bit. See how you feel. Do you want to go back home, or do you want to keep driving until you reach the Arctic Circle?”
Outside, the air still carried a dense chill. It wasn’t quite summer yet, though everyone was breaking out the flip-flops and jean shorts, hoping that it was. Mike was waiting for me, tapping his toes against the battered sidewalk and leaning against the scaffolding just outside the bar. I had just hung up with Tricia, unsure if her car would be parked back in her driveway tonight or on a boat to Santorini, but now it was time to figure out my own love life.
“Hey, there,” he said, leaning in for a hug. I let him have one.
“Listen, I know what you’re about to say.” For the first time in the history of my good-byes, I didn’t run away. I curled my toes, looked into his eyes, and stood there, like a child awaiting punishment.
“I just don’t know what happened, Jen. But I don’t feel like you’re into this anymore.”
Almost as bad as my breakup skills were my pretending skills. It was written all over my face for weeks that I was holding on to something I wished would let me go.
“I’m really sorry,” I said, grabbing his arm and keeping my mouth shut. I wasn’t going to try to make things better between us. I wasn’t going to promise Monday Movie Nights or Smoothie Saturdays. I was going to end this like a mature, wanna-be grown-up I was hoping I’d be for real someday.
Sometimes people make decisions for us. They break our hearts before we have the chance to break theirs. Sometimes that’s what we need them to do.
As we started walking away from our ninety-day romance, I turned around and shouted his name.
“Hey, Mike,” I called out. “Good-bye.”
“Good-bye, Jen.” He waved, and just like that, it was over and done.
Maybe good-byes can be quick and painless, like pulling off a Band-Aid or wiggling out a loose baby tooth, if you do it the right way. But maybe, if you do it and it hurts like heck, then you know that you need to retrace your steps back into that person’s arms as soon as you possibly can.
I didn’t run back to Mike because I knew that I didn’t want that. But I did stick around, on that street corner, right outside the bar, and cry. I was single again. Alone. Back to square one.
“What do you think is wrong with her?” a lady with a southern accent asked her husband in a shrill whisper.
There were taxis zooming by us, a guy announcing the next showing of a comedy club performance down the street, a group of fifty school kids passing by, slapping each other on the back and laughing like hyenas. Yet through it all, I could still hear them perfectly.
“I don’t know. Why don’t you ask her?”
I took a break from the waterworks and turned around to face them. She was what I imagined she’d look like: fanny pack, hair-sprayed bouffant. They seemed like the kind of people who gave really deep, intense hugs and kept rolls of Mentos in their pockets.
If you ever want to feel better about your problems, tell them to a stranger. That’s probably why Tricia turned to me forty-eight hours before she was supposed to zip herself into a lace wedding dress and a life of forever with Matt.
I told them about my breakup, about my first-ever good-bye.
They patted me on the back, and she pulled out a Hershey Kiss that was beginning to melt from the heat of her fanny pack. They tried to tell me everything would be just fine and dandy.
“Well hooey! There are other fish in the sea.”
And maybe where they’re from, there is a proper sea, and there are plenty of fish inside of it. But here in New York City, we have concrete, steel, glass, buses filled with tourists, and buildings that tower high above our heads. It would have made more sense for them to say something like, There will be other rats on the subway.
But I understood what they meant. And I even hugged them good-bye.
chapter twenty-three
Thirty Wedding Songs I Never Want to Dance To Again
1. “The Macarena.” You think this song retired with scrunchies and overalls? You’re wrong. It still comes out to haunt us during hour 3 of the wedding reception. And like zombies in our Saturday best, we bust out the moves that have been permanently engraved in our memories.
2. “Piano Man.” I once saw a groomsman strip down to his underpants during this song. The image of his beer gut shows up like a hologram on the dance floor whenever this song comes on.
3. “Wonderful Tonight.” I would look wonderful too if I wasn’t wearing a tapioca-colored bridesmaid dress that makes me look like a Cabbage Patch Doll.<
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4. “Sweet Caroline.” This song instantly sends me back to Friday nights drinking $1 shots and $2 Natty Lites at the local college bar. Let’s leave it there.
5. “The Electric Slide.” You can actually do these dance moves to any other song and they match the beat perfectly. This is a seasoned wedding vet and a midwestern grandma’s time to shine on the dance floor.
6. “New York, New York.” The song during which everyone locks arms and high-kicks, like they’re auditioning to become a Rockette.
7. “Happy.” I would be happy if I was dancing to this song with a plus-one.
8. “I Wanna Dance with Somebody.” This is what I say to myself in the mirror after I get a wedding invitation that is addressed only to my lonesome self.
9. “I Got a Feeling.” I enjoy this song only because they say “mazel tov” and sometimes people think they are saying “monotone.”
10. “Love Shack.” Once you dissect the lyrics to this song, you realize the four-year-old version of yourself singing it must have been terribly entertaining for the adults in the room.
11. “Don’t Stop Believing.” When everyone busts out their electric air guitar and sings like they’re an ’80s rock-and-roll superstar.
12. “Celebration.” I feel like I’m back at a bar mitzvah.
13. “Brick House.” It has been a lifelong goal of mine to have someone describe me saying, “She’s a brick . . . house.”
14. “Baby Got Back.” Nobody wants to know that your anaconda doesn’t want some unless you got buns, Hun.
15. “Living on a Prayer.” This is when I leave my dignity and my voice on the dance floor.
16. “We Are Family.” I never get the hint and depart from the dance floor when this beat drops, which always leaves me in the background of family photos, boogying alone.