Warning: Contains Nudity and Whining.

There’s this bit on the news right now about internet “codes” and how to “protect” your kids from them. By codes, they mean shorthand, like “LOL,” and “BRB” and “A/S/L.” And by protect, they mean “prevent your children from ever having any fun or friends, ever.” Seriously. There’s this “expert” lady saying that if you see your kids using shorthand like “POS” (“Parents over shoulder,”) then it’s a warning sign that your children are CONSORTING WITH THE DEVIL AND TRAFFICKING IN EVIL. My god. What ever happened to trusting your children and letting them have their privacy? What happened to looking for changes in their general behavior for signs of trouble without becoming a tyrant incapable of letting them live their own lives? I’m not a very maternal person, but I swear, sometimes I want kids just so that I can show everybody the right way to raise them.

Actually, they did mention one SOOPER SEKRIT CODE that I’d never heard before, and that also might become my new favourite thing in the world: NIFTC — nude in front (of) the computer. Which I am, you know, right now. Whee!

Yesterday afternoon, I arrived at my play rehearsal a few minutes before it was about to begin, and took a seat next to a guy I’d seen at previous rehearsals but had never spoken to before. He’s your basic stereotype of a stoner — tall and lanky with a mess of long curly hair, a tan messenger bag and a lingering odor of patchouli. He turned to me, and without even saying hello, told me how he had gone to buy shoes that morning only to come home and discover that one was a size eleven, and the other was a size eight.

I still don’t know his name.

My part in this play is relatively small and without much characterization in the script, but the director’s fleshed it out and given me a lot of background information to work with. There’s another girl in the show who is playing my sister; she’s sixteen and I’m my own age, twenty-two, but I’m married and don’t live with her or our father, who is the town’s police officer. The girl who is my sister actually is sixteen, and she’s sweet and adorable and almost looks as if she could really be related to me. Whenever we’re on stage together, she comes to me and grasps my hand, or rests her head on my shoulder, or giggles into my ear, and I’m always left with an intense longing for a real sister.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve felt like I was missing out on something by not having a sister. I have a younger brother, and I love him dearly and would do anything for him, but it’s a different kind of relationship — It’s more distant, it’s uncomplicated, and I know that it’ll always be there because really, there’s nothing for us to fight about in the first place. What I crave is the kind of relationship that can only exist between women — not just the affection and the gossip, but also the bickering and the grudges and then the unconditional forgiveness that invariably follows. (Just for how long have I wanted this? Well, when I was seven, I decided that if I couldn’t actually have a sister, at the very least I could make my brother — my three year old brother — believe that we had one. I told him that her name was Amy, she was two years older than me, and she had been bad so our parents locked her in the attic. Two years later, we moved out of that house, and my brother stood on the front lawn and cried because he thought we were leaving Amy behind. That’s how long I’ve wanted this.)

Really, I’m just being silly and jealous, because I know plenty of people who have terrible relationships with their sisters and I know that it’s not guaranteed to be peaches-and-cream, and besides, it’s not like it’s something that’s ever going to happen, but still, I want it. Is that so wrong?

Tomorrow just happens to be the birthday of The Dreaded Ex. We were together for the better part of six years, but we broke up a lot and we always, always used each other’s birthdays as an excuse to start talking again. Since the last time we broke up (which I’m confident was finally for good,) I’ve had two birthdays, and as of tomorrow, so will have he. The first year, I got an e-mail from him on mine, but this past year went by without any acknowledgment. And last year, I mailed him a card, got myself blindingly and embarrassingly drunk, and wept to anybody who would listen about how painfully, painfully lonely I was. This year I’m not mailing him a card, and I’m the farthest thing from lonely that I’ve been in years, but still, it’s hard, you know? Even though I have little-to-no sentimental attachment to him anymore, I’m still holding on to the tradition. I’ve always found it difficult to let go of tradition.

So anyway, I was planning on spending tomorrow night doing what I did exactly a year ago, which meant curling up on the couch with a bottle of wine until I couldn’t remember my own name, much less the details of a relationship that I had been trying so hard to forget. So I walked by the state store this evening after work, but I forgot that it would be closed due to Veteran’s Day. I was pissed. And then I stopped for a minute and realized, what the fuck? I’m happy. I don’t miss him. I don’t miss the relationship. I don’t even miss the idea of the relationship. I moved on for good at least six months ago, and there’s no need for me to go regressing just because of the date on the calendar. Besides, my attentions are focused elsewhere right now, and I’m actually receiving the same attention back for a change. I’d rather spend tomorrow focused on the things that are so good in my life than on the things I gave up ages and ages ago.

I’m sure of that now.