A Letter to the Girl in My Driver's License Photo

Dear Girl In My Driver's License Photo,

Dear, dear girl. What a life you lead! The winds of change have blown you through four cities in the last year, and spat you out here, spinning, with your hand on your hat. In each new place you have shaken your head, dusted yourself off and walked forward into another new situation – scarcely even taking the time to absorb your surroundings.

And as a gentlemanly gesture, your surroundings, in turn, did not absorb you either. You and your respective cities of residence have lead lives as kindly neighbors – acquainted, sure, but otherwise hardly cognizant of one another’s presence. Arizona’s sprawling desert and beautiful, panoramic views made friendly eye contact in passing but did not call to you, did not whisper sweet nothings into your ear. Similarly, the noisy, pulsating streets of San Francisco were quaint and appealing in photographs, but in the end warmed someone else’s bed. No, the dapper charm of these cities was lost on you, dear one.

It seems needless, then, to say you have not felt "at home” at all this year – flighty and transient as your existence has been, that four-letter word has not even snaked its way into your vocabulary. What is home, but a place to hang your hat? A place where you never got around to stocking the pantry, where you’re not quite compelled to unpack all the boxes… just in case. No, a mere stepping-stone to the next adventure, surely not a home.

Were you afraid? Of course you were. Before this tumultuous year you were secure in your place in the world. Your entire life – friends, family, every school you ever attended – were all a stone’s throw away. You had hunkered down in your hometown like a bird protecting her eggs: You spread your wings out wide and strong, but stayed firmly perched on your nest. Because to do anything else would mean certain danger – even an inch’s movement in any direction would be much too risky.

Little did you know, little bird, that you would move from that nest of comfort and familiarity – not just an inch but 400 miles, and then another 800, and then 600 more. As if your ties to it were not made of rope but of rubber, and you wanted to see just how far they could stretch.

And did they stretch? Do you still feel like that little bird, pulling and tugging against the bonds that held you there for so long? Or is the resistance all just imagined, and the cord was severed completely when you first left home a year ago?

And if no binding ties exist to that old nest, to what now, dear girl, do you consider yourself bound? Not the sunny plains of Arizona or the bustling streets of San Francisco, surely.

Are the evergreens and snowcapped mountains of your current surroundings enough to provide anchor? Your new home carries not a single unpacked box, and your cabinets are full of canned goods. Could this mean that you are, after all, itching for some measure of permanence? A place to call your own?

I think the answer might lie in the one, solitary declarative act of relocation you have made. The only time, in three moves over 13 months, that you have taken the time to stand in line and notify this new location of your intent. Like crying from a rooftop that you are here. You do exist, and you want this city to open itself up to you, and vice versa.

Dear girl, waiting patiently for your turn in metal folding chairs, standing behind the yellow line and looking up at the camera, wide-eyed and grinning…

Welcome home.

A 5th Grade Tale of Love & Loss

Valentine’s Day is on Friday.

Recently the Daily Post issued this DPchallenge, which got me thinking a little more about my history with this Hallmark holiday.

When I was in elementary school, Valentine’s Day meant dragging my mom to Party City to buy a pack of 30 themed valentines to distribute to the rest of the class. I would stay up late the night before addressing each one individually – spending hours trying to decide which generic greeting best illustrated the intricate subtleties of my relationship to each classmate. After all, who was most deserving of Strawberry Shortcake’s “You’re a BERRY special friend!”? Not just any friend, surely.

In 5^th grade, this quandary was kicked into high gear, by a boy named Zach Whitaker*. Zach was cute and charming in a way that suggested his ancestry might have been linked with the likes of Casanova or Hugh Grant. He was easily the coolest boy in our class, and his bleached, spiky hair and freckles made me (and the rest of the 5^th grade girls) utterly weak at the knees. We could often be seen drooling at the crosswalk as he cruised by on his black Razor scooter. With all this competition, it was imperative that my valentine to Zach accurately portrayed my undying love for him.

That year my valentines were themed after the movie “A Bug’s Life.” The most romantically-worded option available said “BEE Mine, Valentine!” …A play on words, which, under different circumstances, might have been the perfect choice to adequately sum up my infatuation for Zach. HOW-EV-ER, the premise of the card annoyed me, since the movie “A Bug’s Life” DID NOT HAVE A BEE IN IT. Anyone who has ever seen the movie would know this, and would automatically think this valentine is stupid.

So now I was faced with a pressing dilemma: Do I give Zach the more appropriately romantic card – even if it makes no logical sense? Then I would risk him thinking the card was stupid, just like I did! Or do I give him a different one – albeit less affectionate, but at least cinematically accurate?

In the end, I decided to err on the side of caution. I gave Zach a different card, one that would not raise an eyebrow if he was a fan of “A Bug’s Life,” but which also did nothing to sufficiently communicate my passion for him.

Inevitably, it got lost in the sea of other neutral, platonic-sounding valentines on his desk.

Holly Winters, on the other hand, DID give Zach a romantic valentine. She sauntered up to him with her French-braided pigtails (making me curse my simple, unbraided pony) and placed it tenderly in his open palm. It was “Lion King”-themed, and said something along the lines of “I could say I don’t like you, but then I’d be LION.”

…And Zach asked her to be his girlfriend, right there in front of everybody.

They were our celebrity couple for the rest of the year, together for FOUR WHOLE MONTHS – the elementary school equivalent of forever – and at our 5^th grade graduation party at Soak City, they rode the same inner tube down the big waterslide and kissed.

I have spent years replaying this story in my head. That should have been my story, Zach should have been my valentine, and sliding down a giant waterslide with the boy of my dreams should have been my first kiss experience. I could blame the greeting card company, for producing a line of movie-themed valentines without bothering to actually WATCH the movie in question… or I could blame my mother, for never teaching me how to French-braid my hair, which was OBVIOUSLY a factor here…

But in the end, I blame myself. I was afraid that Zach would think I didn’t know my stuff when it came to Pixar movies – and that fear prevented me from taking the leap and asking him to “Bee mine.” So instead of throwing caution to the wind for love, I made the logical, sensible choice. And as a result, Holly got the good first-kiss story – and I’m forever stuck with the story that came four years later, ‘the back of a movie theater watching Shanghai Knights.’

I am a walking parable, children. Learn from me.

*Actual names have been altered… partially to protect the identity of those involved, but also because I think we're still Facebook friends and if they knew this post was about them that would be way-hay-hay embarrassing.