Tuesday, August 4, 2009

04. Try and Try Again.

Third times a charm; that's what people told Juliana at her going away party. She smiled and thanked friends and coworkers as they wished her well in the Big Apple, but she knew it wasn't sincere. After all this wasn't the first time Juliana had this party. Twice before she boasted about how this was her chance to really make it, yet she always came home with a sheepish concession that things just weren't meant to be.

The truth was, being on her own was a lot harder than she excepted. She watched shows like Friends and Sex and the City that made being single in New York City so glamorous and easy, not to mention completely doable on a barista's wages and tips. Juliana was naive enough to believe that these shows portrayed real life and was in for a wake up call when she found herself broke and alone in a 300 square foot studio in a part of town where she was afraid to leave her building even during daylight. But Juliana was determined to try it again and after two failed attempts, she knew how to do it right. This time she had a nice cushion of money saved up and found an affordable, decent sized apartment on the fringes of the good part of the city, and already had one telephone interview with an independent boutique where she could eventually sell some of her own designs.

Juliana's good feeling about moving to New York was looking grim after being in the city for three months when she started noticing the same pattern that resulted in failure on her previous attempts. Her cushion was dwindling fast and living expenses were constantly on her mind when the boutique cut her hours and her designs were still stuck in her daydreams and hadn't' quite made it to the drawing board. Juliana wanted to prove everyone wrong, but she secretly knew it was only be a matter of time before she was buying yet another train ticket back home. She desperately wanted something to happen, but she was stuck in the rut of her daily routine to do anything to make a change. And then she met Trevor; meeting him was like a dream come true and slowly, the pieces of being in a real life in New York was falling into place.

Trevor was all she could think about as she got ready for work, she waltzed around her apartment in a dream like trance picturing his perfect face and piercing blue eyes, then she let her mind wander to his other perfect features and she blushed at the thought of seeing him again. She hoped she didn't come across as desperate by jumping into bed with a man she just met, but she had to admit to herself that part of her really needed to feel the arms of a man holding her and she felt validated as he made love to her. But it was Trevor who suggested they meet again, so Juliana figured it was a good sign.

Juliana was so happy and couldn't wait to get to work to tell Abbi about Trevor. She glanced at herself one last time before leaving the house and nodded to herself with approval but she was so distracted with thoughts of Trevor that she didn't notice one earring was missing.

1 comments:

Mara said...

Ha! I have always laughed at how extravagantly characters on those shows live despite having little to no income....you definitely can't believe everything you see on TV!

Thanks for stopping by my blog yesterday and leaving a nice comment--I am glad we have become online blogger buddies too! I found your comment particularly interesting in that you said you felt like you could relate to the first part of my post but not the second. It's interesting to me that people can have the same emotions and develop the same insecurities, yet live totally different experiences. I guess that just proves that we are all much more alike than we are different when it comes down to it.

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