Mr. Burns

Sometimes all I need in life is to know that someone wants me.  That is about all that I can honestly take right now, which is why these last few months have been pleasantly satifying.  You see, Mr. Burns has a crush on me.

Okay, so it is not Mr. Burns.  It is a sweet, awkward 25 year-old intern who is skinny and bald enough for me to make the connection.  Before telling you this story, let me make some clarifications:

I am not, in fact Bill Clinton.  I am not interested in dating or receiving any kind of physical favors from an intern.  There is no flirting and I am not encouraging any confused happy feelings that he may have.  I learned my lesson with both 1) dating someone at work and 2) dating much younger men. 

Clarification made, I still enjoyed the summer.  A smalll dose of witnessing a crush was all it took to wake me up.  I have not thought of love or boys or crushes in a very long time.  As a matter of fact, so many of my friends are getting divorced and I am so jaded from work stuff that I have a hard time believing in love.

I think that I why God sent me Mr. Burns intern.  Not to fall in love, but to be reminded that I am, in fact, a woman who could be loved by someone one day.  That is easy to forget when you are neck-high in senior citizens, meetings, a dysfunctional family, and an uncertain future.

So here is what woke me up:

Mr. Burns doesn't know how to say goodbye or leave any meeting or interaction.  This means that when it was time to go, he lingered.  A lot.  He sat on the couch in my office and asked question after question about me.  That isn't much of anything except for when...

Someone asked him what he wanted to do with his life, and he said "I think I'll just marry a minister so that I can sit on her couch and talk about ministry."  We all acted like no one heard him.  I, however, was very flattered.

And then there was...

I made a joke in a meeting about how sexy it is when men know how to dance.  He immediately said "Gee, I need to learn how to dance" and practiced dancing to himself.  We just laughed it off and kinda ignored it.  Again, I was flattered.

That was all it took.  A summer with a sweet, awkward intern passively flirting with me.  Now I remember that I am, in fact, a woman.  It is strange to think that this is how far I have come from two years ago when the sexy latino janitor was asking me to dinner when I was still dating the sexy funk musician.

For now, I'll take what I can get.  Thank you, Mr. Burns. 

Texas, My Texas!

Texas will always be home.  I am a Texan.  I love Texas and its many quirks.  I love that it is such a large state that we have at LEAST four disctinct accents and cultures.  I love the arrogance and self-importance of Texas.  When I moved away from Texas, I enjoyed discovering just how much the rest of the nation thinks about and brands things around Texas.  We get a lot more air time than, say, Pennsylvania.

I love Texas unless we are talking politics or religion.  Election season is a brutal time for me.  Even from the comfort of the East Coast (although my present state of residence is not getting great air time either), I can't escape the stupidity and staunch Republican Southern Baptist White Unapologetic views from my home state.

They voted to do away with all Planned Parenthood in Texas, finding a loophole that lets them ignore federal mandate.

REALLY????

The damned anti-Obama movie that is feeding the fear of uneducated masses came from Houston.

FUUUCKKK!!!

A judge in Texas has threatened Civil War if Obama is re-elected and is preparing folks for the fight.

Even in Texas, that is BATSHIT CRAZY!!!!!

Those were just the news stories from one afternoon.  It will be a long three months between now and the election...

She is sad because she has no place to get a free papsmear or breast exam... the bull is worried about her impending cervical cancer that will go untreated.

Oh Texas.  I realize that I am your wayward child.  I've left your strong borders and lived outside of the conservative bubble for too long.  I no longer belong.  You will always be my home, but I guess there is no going home, is there?  I am sorry for moving away and learning that there is a bigger, wider, and more liberal world out there. 

The Bitter Break-up

It wasn't a serious relationship, but I had to end things.  Yes, we'd been together since I met them in the mall in 1992.  I haven't always been loyal, but they got me through some really rough and lonely months back in 2005.  It was a relationship that I could always count on- something different and reliable. 

And what did they do?  They fucked up.  There were hints in the years past that we were growing apart.  I sensed that their values did not always reflect mine.  But they had to throw it in my face.  I had no choice.

I broke up with Chic-fil-a. 

It was a resentful break-up on my part.  If I wrote a note to Chic-fil-a, it would say:

Dear Chic-fil-a,

I still love you and your breakfast sandwiches, but your complete lack of morals is too much for me to handle.  I hate you for making me love you!  Why do you have to be so stupid?  Why did you align yourself with every backwoods, angry, ignorant, self-righteous, and bigoted Christian in America? 

Why do you make me walk away from you?  It isn't me, it's you.  This IS personal.  We are over.  Call me when you do something to redeem this hate you spread in the name of Jesus.

Regrettfully,
Your ex-lover

p.s. If you need me, you can find me at Zaxby's.  Their nibblers are growing on me and they don't hate gays and lesbians.