The Dawn of the Millenium

Jana: Look everyone, it’s New Year’s Eve again! Or I’m sorry, the eve of New Year’s Eve, again. It just keeps happening.

You may remember that last year I told you, in no uncertain terms, that it’s best to STAY HOME on NYE. And I absolutely was not wrong. Odds are good that, if you do something, it will suck. Or, if it doesn’t suck, it will at best be entirely mediocre. Chances that you’ll meet someone you might fall in love with ON new year’s eve are shockingly small. Chances that you’ll just find someone to kiss who isn’t really gross or horrible are ALSO small. If you already have someone who you love and who loves you, it’s likely that you’ll get in a fight. I’m just saying. These are just the cold, hard, facts.

However, this year on NYEE, I wanted to provide you with a happy memory. I know that’s not characteristic of what we do here at DWDSTDT – and is, in fact, unprecedented –  but as I thought about New Year’s Eve’s past, I couldn’t help but remember this really nice one, and it seemed worth sharing.

It was NYE, 1999. The previous year, ’98, had been so brutally awful and sad for me that my parents were determined to make this one good. Plus, it was a big deal: the millenium, and all, and the excitement of a likely Y2K disaster. With these things in my mind, my parents organized a party for my entire 8th grade class. The parents would come too, and they would hang out in the kitchen while we, the teens, partied in the living room. We posed this to the class and people LOVED it because parents knew they’d be in the same house as their kids and everyone would be safe, and the kids were all nerdy like me and just wanted to soberly slow dance anyway. We were doing this!

My best friend Molly and I were elated. We weren’t exactly the “cool kids” in the class (we were weird, dirty, and generally left alone), but here we were, about to host the NYE MILLENNIUM party! We got right to work. First of all, I got my hair straightened, so I looked roughly 1000 times more attractive than usual. Also, I bought a sparkly sweater. Molly put her hair in pigtails. Our other nerdy friend agreed to “DJ.” Molly’s mom showed up early with the largest platter of deli meats that has probably ever existed. IT WAS ON.

Oh, and one other thing. Another friends’ mom happened to own a local toy store. As a surprise, she brought us party favors: little black journals that you had to write in with special day-glo pens. Everyone got one. EVERYONE GOT ONE. Has anything ever been better?

We ALSO had one of those mini polaroid cameras, which were HUGE and not yet defunct. We pasted the mini pictures in the journals. GENIUS.

We partied away; drinking soda, listening to Smashmouth, hugging each other. Everyone used the journals as little “yearbooks” for the night, having everyone else sign theirs. The class HOT GUY, who I will call Jim, wrote in mine: “Thanks for having this party Jana, we really needed something like this.” I read it over and over. He knew my name; I was somebody at last.

There were slight hiccups, like the DJ friend breaking the stereo (see my list of party high points and low points, below). But mostly, I was in heaven.

At midnight, we all gathered on the back porch to watch Boston turn black from the Y2K power outage (my parents’ house has a view of the boston skyline. It’s a “grand view,” which is also the name of the street, which you are not the first one to point out). I will admit that when the lights stayed on I was pretty disappointed – what now, if not the apocalypse?, I thought. Well, life went on. Molly and I spent ALL of new year’s day in our pajamas, listening to Smashmouth’s hit CD on repeat and eating just SO MUCH deli meat. We rode our NYE2000 high straight into January: we were the 8th graders, and it was a new millenium, and anything (read: just high school, more sadness) could happen.

I will leave you with these excerpts from my “Millennium Journal.” Read them, and go forth into your NYE with full hearts and low expectations.

Catherine: Unusual though it may be, yes, this post has been about a happy memory. One of the very few Jana has, so YOU’RE ALL WELCOME. As someone in Jana’s house, right now, I can gladly report that yes, the journal is as wonderful as it looks and oh-so-exquisite.

As Jana and I prepare to spend NYE together tomorrow, I think we can both assuredly say that it will not be any more fun than that party she threw that time in 8th grade. The party we are going to SOUNDS REALLY COOL (it’s in a WOOD SHOP – RIGHT?), but I know that we won’t have anyone to make out with, something unforeseen and tragic will happen, and maybe we’ll kill ourselves. And then it’ll be 2013 and we’ll begin making a new year of shitty memories.

Vehicle-Related Misfortune: Part 1 of One Million

Jana: Alright, guys. The time has come to talk about my cars.

I’ve been avoiding this post because there is just SO MUCH to say. I would think about writing it and suddenly become overwhelmed with memories of all the terrible things that have happened to cars I have owned, and think, how could that ever work? Think of the subheadings! There’s just no way.

So, today I have decided to start by telling you two little stories. Gradually, as time goes on and I heal from the more recent incidents, I will share those with you as well. Just to pique your interest (PIQUE! That word is spelled cooler than it has a right to be, or perhaps I am spelling it wrong?), here is the list I am working from:

PT Cruiser:

– Tires slashed

– Towed (while on a first date)

– Eventually destroyed by electrical damage (father’s fault)

Honda Fit:

– Rear-ended and pushed into car in front of me (damage to front and back)

– Plow backed into me destroying front of car (plow driver screamed at me)

– Towed

– Towed (one week after first towing)

– Window smashed

– $300 in tickets accumulated from expired parking permit

– $600 ticket acquired after driving into a construction zone, in a tunnel, at midnight

As you can see, my car life has been fraught with tears, near-death experiences, and the expenditure of vast amounts of money. But, let that all go! For now, let’s just focus on the first and third items on the PT Cruiser list.

So, yes! I owned a PT Cruiser. It was black, like all good mini-hearses should be, and it came to be mine when I inherited it from my Aunt, a wonderful woman who was so wackily awesome that when she decided to buy a new car in her 70s, she bought a PT Cruiser because she thought it was weird and cool. And then I got it, and I also thought it was weird and cool, despite what all of my friends said.

Here is a picture of the car that I had! Keep in mind that mine was, just in general, more disgusting-looking. I didn’t clean it much/ever, etc, and I’m certain that the sunset was never able to be reflected in its hatchback.

Anyway, I had it for three years. During its third year, in January of 2010, it was seriously injured for the first time. Here’s what happened: I lived in Allston. I had taken a week off from work for the holidays, and on Monday the 2nd of January I got up to go back to the office and face the world. I was already feeling anxious, like I always do after a vacation from anything – for some reason, it always feels like probably I’ve been fired while I was away and when I get there it will become really clear that I’m not supposed to be there and everything will be terrible. So, I was feeling anxious on this particular morning as I agonized over an outfit, picked something stupid, and got in my car.

I remember that the car definitely felt a little weird, but I was tired and have no common sense, so I kept driving. BUT THEN, suddenly, I was on the highway, and my car was no longer a functioning entity. Strangely, it felt like it had no wheels – like I was now driving a cardboard BOX, with CARDBOARD wheels. It was, essentially, a living nightmare.

So what I did was, I started to cry, because that is my instinct in any situation of nearly any kind. Somehow, I made it to the next exit and managed to pull into the parking lot of a Bertucci’s. There, through my panicked tears, I made the crucial discovery that both of my back tires … had been slashed. Not just cut a little, you guys: SLASHED AS FUCK. It truly looked like someone had gone to town on them with a machete.

So that was that. I cried and waited for Triple A and they came and replaced my tires and I went to work three hours late. And then I continued to live in that Allston apartment for another year, never knowing why someone had chosen to slash my tires. I didn’t really question it, honestly, as it just seemed sort of par for the course, my life-wise. But, to answer your questions, yes there were other cars in the driveway I had been parked in; no, none of them appeared to have slashed tires, and yes it did seem like a very personal attack but like, does someone hate me? I chose to think it was just god reminding me again that I’m not a “winner.”

Time for the second story, in which the PT Cruiser meets its demise.

First, the only picture I could find in which I’m driving the Cruiser. It’s fitting that I look hideous here – obviously, on this day I chose not to wear any makeup, and to wrap a weird thin scarf around my gross dirty-looking head. But there we are! Me and the car.

One Sunday afternoon in the fall of 2010, I was at my parent’s house, and my car was parked in the driveway. The whole family was just hangin out, but then my sister, who has hawk-like car-vision, looked out the window and noticed that my car’s right front headlight was cracked. “Jana, did you get in an accident?” she asked me. I was like, um NO, what the fuck! So we ran outside, all of us: me, my sister, my mom, and my dad. Sure enough, the damn thing was cracked! How could this have happened! I was racking my brain for some kind of collision that I’d potentially blacked out, my mom was saying things, my sister was saying things. It was so weird! This went on for about five minutes before my dad, who had been silent all this time, said simply:

“I did it.”

DADDDD. So yeah, it turned out that my dad had borrowed my car and rammed it into a pole in a parking garage, and then deliberately told no one because he thought he could get away with it. WHICH HE ALMOST DID. Because he KNEW that I would never, ever notice that my headlight was cracked, and he didn’t feel like dealing with it. Honestly, it was a brilliant move.

When I brought the car in to have the headlight replaced, I learned that the crack had let in a whole bunch of water, thus causing very expensive electrical damage throughout the car (or whatever, I have no idea about anything except that it cost a lot). This led me to purchase a brand new car (with the help of my sweet father), which I would later come to systematically destroy.

Catherine: Jana, you forgot about that time we were driving up to Burlington for New Year’s Eve and we hit some ice and did a 180 on the highway. You silly girl… and luckily there were no cars coming otherwise we would have died? And we slowwwwwly got the car going again and turned it around? This all was before we had a terrible time and made resolutions that we of course did not keep.

The Low Point of My Life, or, Advice For The Perfect New Year’s Eve!

Jana: Ah, New Year’s Eve. What a great time of year! Forever 21 is selling exclusively sparkly, skanky clothing, people are compiling lists of resolutions, parties are being planned. It’s always hard, though, to know what will REALLY be the right choice for a NYE activity. Because even though probably what you WILL do, in the end, is go to a party with people you vaguely like and drink way too much and then someone will take a picture of you making out with someone else who you only sort of know, and will post the picture on facebook, there’s always part of you that thinks that this year, you might just rent a movie and have a glass of wine and reflect on things quietly, and wake up and go for a run on New Year’s Day. On this day, New Year’s Eve Eve, I imagine a lot of you are struggling with a decision between two such options. To help you, I have compiled a list of ways to avoid later saying about New Year’s Eve 2012, “That was, without a doubt, the low point of my life.” It is possible!

In order to stay away from a night that will drive you to years of therapy, DO NOT DO the following things:

1) If you are young and in college and recently bought a new pair of jeans that were more expensive than your other jeans, and also went crazy and purchased a green tube top from that new store American Apparel that you suspect just MIGHT make you look super hot, DO NOT spend $50 on tickets to a weird band playing at a bar. If you must do that, though, definitely DO NOT put on the aforementioned ill-fitting outfit, skip dinner, and start pregaming at 8 PM. Tequila is a good thing to avoid in this situation, too. Because let me tell you this: If you decide to wear that outfit and slam tequila shots and then pile into your friend’s mom’s car to go to the bar, when you arrive at the bar you will know that you’re too wasted to go in. Your friends will go in, but you will have to gesture to the driver (remember: friend’s very sweet mom) that you need a ride home, and as you pass the charles river you will need to tell that driver to pull over so you can puke onto the sidewalk. You will wake up in your childhood bedroom at 2 AM with makeup all over your face and see that it is, in fact, 2005, but that you have missed it. To make matters worse, your parents will make fun of you the next day when they find out why you were home so surprisingly early.

Here I am having a bad hair day, wearing a weird tube top, and slamming tequila. What could go wrong?

2) If you previously had an experience like the one just described, don’t swing WAY in the other direction the next year. Ie, don’t take a babysitting job instead of partying. Sure, you and your friend will think, this way, you’ll make tons of money and avoid puking! You’ll find a large group of parents who are all attending the same party and tell them you’ll watch all of their kids – group rate, you’ll say, though you won’t specify what that rate is, because you’re probably an idiot. As you put on your jeans and converse and sweatshirt before you leave that night, you’ll feel really proud of yourself for being so smart and awesome.

Unfortunately, probably, when you arrive you’ll learn that a) the kids are assholes, b) they’re all different ages and have different bedtimes and c) a lot of them can’t eat gluten. But you’ll persevere, make all kinds of pizzas and non-pizzas for the kids’ dinners, and even spend midnight watching Scooby Doo with the oldest ones who refuse to go to sleep and don’t think your jokes about the movie are funny, even if they are super funny. Finally, when the parents return home at 2 AM, you’ll know it’s time to receive your reward. But instead, you and your friend will get a few pieces of chocolate and $40 EACH. As you trudge through the snow to your door, you will resist the urge to SWEAR AT THEM RIGHT NOW. But you’ll know – you and your friend now have a better understanding of how shitty things were during the slave trade.

(In the end, if you are not a COMPLETE pushover, you will write a strongly worded letter to those completely immoral parents and, after a really awkward exchange, get more money. But at the time, it will be like, HEY FUCK YOU, 2007!).

3) And here’s my final piece of advice. If you are in seventh grade and you’re a little weird (obviously, I mean more than a little), don’t go see “You’ve Got Mail” with your parents, even if you’ve already seen it the week before and you know you love it (obviously, who doesn’t, it’s brilliant). Because what happened is (and here I break the convention I have set for this post, because it’s just too sad to talk about except with brutal honesty), we went to see the movie and everything was going to be great. But before it started, I saw two girls from my class at the theater, clearly there seeing a movie alone together, whereas I was with only my parents. This threw me into a depression so deep that, after the movie, I refused to do anything but lie, face down, on the living room floor. My parents tried in vain to interest me in card games or conversation, but I was OUT. My face pressed into the carpet, I was certain I would never be popular, pretty, or happy; never, it was never going to happen for me, this was it, I would lie in this carpet forever, THAT’S IT.

I saw my father for coffee this morning, and he told me that story and said: “Honestly, I really believe that night was the low point of your life.” So, friends, don’t do any of these things tomorrow night! Do something that you will look back on with completely neutral feelings, something about which you’ll say: “Oh yeah, that was an ok night. 2012 might be decent, or not. Whatever.”

Catherine: All of Jana’s advice is sound. It was just last night I was telling Jana that she should form a new tradition by wearing sweatpants, drinking heavily, and hanging out with our good friend Kayla on the couch. I cannot say what the Jana will end up doing, but I sure hope I talked her out of going to that party where she won’t know anybody and I will field the “who are these people,” “i think everyone here hates me,” “do you think i can get a falafel delivered here and nobody will know?,” “this falafel is amazing,” “biubas falafel sjbi8 n in ugly” texts.

Extra advice? Don’t drink too much. Or you will end up looking like this.

That wasn’t even my hat.