on to the next one

I feel good about this decade being over.
I ended 1999, the 90s, sitting in a single wide trailer that was on five acres of land in a canyon in southern Idaho. I watched Body Heat with my stepfather, my mother, my brother, and my brother's ex-girlfriend. My stepdad paused the movie to check y2k forums. But nothing happened in Australia. And then nothing happened here. And then we went to bed.
A day later and still nothing had happened. We took my brother and my brother's ex-girlfriend to the airport. My stepdad, Earl, drank cocktail after cocktail in the airport bar. He made a joke about putting cyanide in our drinks. He joked about group suicide. On the drive home, the car kept drifting into the other lane as semi-trucks passed us. When we stopped for gas I asked my mother to drive the rest of the way instead of Earl.
What followed? Earl stopped showering and started baking a lot of bread. There were some bad fights between my mother and Earl, but I don't remember if they were pre or post December 31st 1999. I went back to school. I smoked pot out of an aluminum can. I talked to my brother about moving in with him.
And then Earl left. He went back to Florida to work as a commercial photographer. He said he couldn't work in Idaho. He was supposed to come back and he never did.
My mom started crying when we were in public and stopped wanting to get out of bed. But she got us out of there. We drove to Colorado together, and I can still picture the red dirt and red rocks as we crossed into Colorado from Wyoming. It was raining, and I swear I remember a rainbow when we got there.
My mom got us a house and painted the walls. She had to declare bankruptcy and she filed for divorce. She made me noodles with pesto and salad a lot and I tried to do my homework.
I did okay for awhile, kept it together for a year and got okay grades. And then I started skipping school and failing classes. Experimenting with drugs. Sometimes my mom would tell me I was the only reason she was still alive, and sometimes I would stay up nights wishing the next day would never come.
I made friends and I lost friends and I kissed a boy for the first time. I graduated high school. I got accepted into college, and I went back to Idaho.
In college I joined a sorority and started binge drinking for the first time. I lived with a man (a boy, really) for the first time. We made a nice house together for awhile. Our relationship ended when I was just 19, and I stayed single for a long time. I learned things. My mother moved to Idaho, and later my brother moved to Idaho too. I spent time with them. I graduated college and moved to Portland. And I learned how to ride the bus, how to walk around in crowds by myself.
During this decade I gained 50 pounds and lost 50 pounds. I worked for a national park for a weekend before I quit without telling anyone. I flew to Florida. I drove from Colorado Springs to Boise a lot, and from Boise to Portland a lot. One weekend I spontaneously drove to the address I had for my biological father, which turned out to be a huge apartment complex. I slept in a city park with a friend. I hung out in Seattle. I moved 15 times. I visited Peru and Bolivia. I moved to Argentina by myself and took a boat to Uruguay. I saw New York for the first time. I ran from the cops. I watched a lot of sunrises with friends. I went swimming with my mom and my brother and we walked our dog together. I saw my grandparents. I tried to celebrate things. I struggled.
It took me a long time to realize any of the impact the 90s had on me. I'm ready for it to be in the past. I've spent ten years trying to process and recover. Ten years reacting.
On December 31st 2009 I watched tv on my computer and napped. I fought with my boyfriend, and then we talked to each other. We worked it out and treated each other with respect. We drank champagne. I went to work, which is a shelter for teenage girls. I watched the ball drop with them and we drank sparkling apple cider. I talked to them about their boyfriends and their families and I gave one medicine and one chocolate.
I let them go outside to look at fireworks and they cheered along with the neighbors. We watched the premiere of the Jay-Z video for "On to the Next One."
I planned on writing in detail about each year of the decade. Instead I google chatted with Logan and Dave and I watched TV.
Dave asked me what resolutions I made. I said that I wouldn't look at Logan's exgirlfriend on facebook anymore. It's more than that, though. It's vague. It has to do with how I spend my time. It has to do with knocking some of the bullshit off, and growing up. I work with teenagers for forty hours a week, I can't act like them. It's still about celebrating and struggling. And it's about being ready to let go of the past.
Ten years is a big deal when you're 24. I'm excited to get older. I'm excited to learn how to do more things.
Happy 2010.