“A ring?” Slow down, Mom. I did think I wanted to marry Ryan, but not quite yet.
“Yes. A ring. He’s been getting the milk for free for months and now it’s time to buy the cow.”
“And I’m the cow?”
“Oh hush. You know what I mean.”
“I just want to move in together for now. I don’t think I’m ready for a ring yet. We have to find out if we can live under the same roof.”
“As your mother, I’d like to say that that is backwards, and that you’re supposed to live together after you get married. But as your friend, I’m going to say that it isn’t a bad idea to do a test run.”
“Thanks, Mom. I am going to meet him. But … I won’t wear the dress. I’ll let you know what happens.” I felt I had made a good compromise. Obviously when it came to Ryan, I had my weaknesses.
At dinner, Ryan kept trying to make small talk. I wasn’t having it.
“Tell me why we’re here,” I said flatly. I was holding on to my brave front as best I could.
“Okay. No time for catch-up, I guess?”
“No, I don’t want to sit through an entire meal, especially since I know how much we both love appetizers, only to find out you just wanted to know what I’ve been up to.”
Ryan ended up saying what I wanted to hear. He said that he’d missed me, that he’d done a lot of thinking, and that he was ready to move forward. He told me how scared he was.
“So am I, Ryan. I’ve never lived with someone I was dating, either. In fact, I’ve lived alone a long time now. The thought of having to share my space with someone else, to have to watch a show on TV that I don’t want to watch … the thought of someone else eating the leftover pizza that I was counting on having for breakfast the next day. It all pisses me off to even think about.”
“Then why are you so dead set on doing it?” he asked.
“Because I’m finally willing to figure out if the good can outweigh that fear.”
“So am I. That’s why we’re here,” he responded. We finished our meal, went to his place and had sex, and then I made him take me home.
I didn’t talk the whole ride back to my place. I was afraid I’d screwed up. That I was caving in too soon. I was afraid he wasn’t going to follow through.
He called me the next afternoon. “You just have sex with a guy and don’t call the next day?” he tried to joke.
“You’re the man. You’re supposed to call.” I read that in a book in the early nineties.
He laughed. I didn’t. I was mad at him for taking me to his place. I was mad at myself for going. I wondered why he didn’t drive me home and come in and spend the night with me. That had been such a sticking point in the past. That move would have been a nice way to show me he was serious about the future, and that he was listening.
“Okay, Sarah. I know you are skeptical. But don’t be. I meant everything that I said.”
The next week we started looking for apartments, which took a couple of months. If he didn’t like a place, I worried that it was just his way of stalling things, but I could tell he was at least trying. It was a step in the right direction, or so I thought.
ALONE TIME
During the prior year, Chelsea had gotten her own show. Our lives had gone off in different directions. We were still friends, we just didn’t see each other as much as we used to. A few months into it she’d invited me to come and do what comics did on the show, which was the roundtable. It went really well so they continued to have me on. It was a lot of fun to be sitting next to my friend of twelve years while she hosted her own show.
One afternoon Ryan and I had an appointment to look at a place that we were both really excited about. I was going to meet him there straight from shooting an episode of Chelsea Lately. The executive producer asked me to stick around after the show, and he and Chelsea offered me a full-time writing job. They told me to think about it for a couple of days, so I pretended to. I’m going to set my black bartending pants on fire, I thought as I drove to meet Ryan. Then I remembered how long it took with those fucking jeans Jackie made me burn and decided maybe I would just give them to Goodwill.
It felt like the job came out of nowhere, but I guess it didn’t. It’s just how it works. You keep going, trying, getting jobs here and there and then finally one day you get the job that changes everything. I suppose it’s the same way with dating.
When I got to the apartment, I told Ryan about the offer. We were both so excited. Then we went in to look at the apartment and we both loved it. I couldn’t believe all of this was happening at the same time.
When the time came for us to move in, I said goodbye to the apartment I’d lived in for almost eight years, only weeks after saying goodbye to the bar I had worked in for seven. Everything was finally coming together.
The first night in our new place I cooked dinner. We ate really dry chicken and watched TV. The next morning I got up and went to work, leaving extra early since I hadn’t yet timed my morning commute from the new place. I had my Sirius radio tuned in to Howard Stern and thought about what an adult I was now. For the first time since I moved away, I couldn’t wait to go home for Christmas and run into someone from high school.
I drove home that night, wondering what had happened on General Hospital. I was ready for my glass of wine and TiVo when I walked in the door about an hour later. I threw my purse down and went upstairs to settle in. There was Ryan, on the couch, watching SportsCenter.
“Hey,” he said, smiling. “How was your day?”
I stared at him. Oh great, I thought. I was really hoping to have some time to myself.
It turns out that I’m not very good at sharing a place with someone else. I don’t know if it’s from fear, or from years of living alone, or if I’m just an asshole. Maybe it’s all three.
For the almost two years that we lived together, we definitely had some fun. Ryan’s a great cook, and I’m a great eater. We had our favorite local spots for dinner, coffee, drinks. We had people over to watch our favorite show, 24, on Monday nights. We were playing the parts we thought we were supposed to be playing. And I knew that I loved him, so why wasn’t it working?
I’m not sure what shifted, but something did. I became really busy with work. Between the show and the new, improved world of stand-up gigs it was opening me up to, I wasn’t home very often. I worked all day, then went away on the weekends to perform. And when I was available, I wasn’t really available to him. I was loving what I was doing, but in turn I wasn’t spending the time I needed to spend with my partner. It wasn’t fair. But I also felt he didn’t like me anymore. He loved me, but I didn’t feel like he liked me. I was growing comfortable in my own skin, finally okay with who I had and have become. I wanted him to like who I was now. Yet I could feel him judging me for allowing myself to finally be me. Here I go again. We were growing apart.
It was really confusing for me to consider that I might not want to be with the man I wanted to be with for so long. I couldn’t tell if that was a real feeling or if I was just tired of the push and pull. I threatened to move out a couple of times, not even sure if I wanted to or what I wanted his reaction to be. It was just clear that a square peg was trying to fit into a round hole. And I used to really love his peg.
I found myself filling my free time with plans that didn’t involve him. My career was finally fulfilling and I was focused on keeping that going, so in turn maybe I was losing focus on my relationship. I’m sure there’s a way to balance it. There has to be—people do it all the time. Maybe I haven’t found the balance, or maybe I just hadn’t found the right person to balance with me.
After all of the heartache and the pushing, we finally decided to part ways. We were both heartbroken. We were both losing our best friends.
“We tried,” I reminded him over and over. “We really tried.”
I was so afraid he was going to yell at me for making him move in with me in the first place. I probably would have, had the situation been reve
rsed. But he didn’t. He’s more mature than me. I do believe we had to take that step. We could have kept on the way that we were going, creeping along, and eventually I’d have been getting my Depends out of my pathetic little “drawer” and taking out my teeth in his roommate’s bathroom. We did the right thing; it just didn’t work.
It’s a funny feeling when you break up with someone in your thirties. In my twenties, the reaction was always to go have sex with someone else. That will fix it. It never did. I mean it was fun, but it didn’t fix anything.
Now, in my thirties, once Ryan and I broke up, the last thing on my mind was touching another man. The thought made me physically ill. It felt like cheating. For quite some time I had only let Ryan touch me that way, and I didn’t want to betray that.
A few months later, something woke up. My vagina reminded me that it was still there, and that it didn’t want to be ignored. The weight of what Ryan and I carried was lifting. It still hurt, but it was lifting.
Now I’m just trying to figure out the next step and I’m wondering what it will be like to date again after four years. Clearly I’m not going to join eHarmony again. I’m still pissed off about those assholes not giving me a refund.
CLOSING ARGUMENT
So I’m sitting alone in that same apartment that I once shared with Ryan. I have a big glass of vodka next to me. I’ve filled it four times so far and it’s 8 P.M. I’ve only been home since six. Whatever, it’s Monday.
I’m trying to figure out how to finish this book. I’ve ended it, but I haven’t finished it. I suppose that’s what I did with Ryan. With Ira. Not really with Lo-Waisted, since he was finished before he started. But it’s always easier to end something than it is to finish it. You can end a relationship, but sometimes it’s still awhile before you’re really finished with it.
I’m still really busy with work. But I love it. To finally be able to say all of my career dreams are coming true feels pretty great. I work my ass off, then I go on fun trips and travel more than I ever thought that I would.
I feel like I’ve found my balance. I know how to enjoy my cocktails at the times that I have the freedom to do so. And how to work when I need to work. I don’t know if I’ll be able to balance my life with the next guy, or the guy after that, or the guy after that. Or maybe there’s just going to be one more guy and he’ll be the one who tips the scales in just the right direction. I don’t blame Ryan, or anyone else that things didn’t work out with. I’m just glad to know that I’m finally comfortable with the two personalities living inside me. They get along pretty well. I don’t have to keep them apart or hide them from their separate groups of friends. And now I just have to find the guy who loves them both, too.
So I’m open to finding someone new. I don’t know if it’s for sex, love, or both. I just know I’m open to it. I’m not pushing for it. What happens next happens next. I’d like to say that now that I’ve grown up, have my career in place, and like who I am, I’m going to handle being single with class. But I’m still capable of repeating mistakes, so I don’t want to end this with a lie. I just know that I’m excited and intrigued to find out what’s next.
Hopefully, I won’t blow it.
To my mom. You never even blinked when I told you
what I wanted to do with my life. You just believed in me.
Thank you.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I want to thank and acknowledge the following people:
Both of my sets of parents, Eric and Cheryl Henderson and Jim and Shirley Colonna, for always believing in me, and for the bonus Christmas presents one gets when one’s parents are divorced.
Jennifer Colonna-Quinton for being the best big sister I could ask for.
Chelsea Handler, for more reasons than I have room to list. I love you, girl.
My book agent, Robert Guinsler, whom I had never met before but who wrote me an email and said, “Why haven’t you written a book?” You made me do this—so this is your fault.
My editor Ryan Doherty, who not only gave me amazing notes and ideas, but didn’t judge me for the stories in this book—at least not out loud.
Jane von Mehren from Random House, for believing in this in the first place.
Chris Franjola, Jen Kirkman, Tom Brunelle, Sue Murphy, Dan Maurio, Heather McDonald, Brad Wollack, Jeff Wild, Josh Wolf, Steve Marmalstein, and Fortune Feimster. Thanks for loving me even when I’m acting like a bitch, and for making me laugh every day.
Everyone else at Chelsea Lately. You are all so important to me, individually and as a group.
Joe Mortimer, for putting up with me while I wrote this. And for much, much more.
Gina Wachtel, Beth Pearson, Ashley Gratz-Collier, Greg Mortimer, Leigh Merchant, Kelli Fillingim, and everyone at Random House for the work they contributed to this book.
The people who have believed in and continue to believe in my career and fight for it: Abbey MacDonald (all ninety pounds of her), Michael Pelmont, Lindsay Howard, Melissa Orton, Tim Scally, Joe Schwartz, Dan Baron, and everybody else at APA and New Wave. And Jeff Cohen and Cynthia Sohl, for standing behind me even when I was only able to pay them back by serving them cocktails.
Todd Gallopo and Zan Passante, for the amazing work they did on the cover. Who knew a photo shoot could be fun?
Amy Meyer, Gina Monaci, and Michele Bottarini, for making me look pretty for said shoot.
Lisa Perkins and Alex Martinetti.
All of my friends—you know who you are—thank you.
I love you and you’ve made my life better by being a part of it.
All of the Morgans and Colonnas, for being my family, supporting me, and providing me with a wealth of material.
Finally, my nephew, Nicholas, for not ratting me out to my sister every time I drop the F-bomb.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
SARAH COLONNA is a writer and roundtable regular on the hit late-night talk show Chelsea Lately, and a producer and star of After Lately. She has been performing stand-up in Los Angeles and across the country for several years and has appeared on various television shows. She used to drink bourbon, but now prefers vodka.
Life As I Blow It Page 20
