Chapter Twenty-Three: Sliding Doors
January 11, 2021
Dear Diary,
After twelve years in our family home, we are moving and it feels like an insurmountable task. We’ve been packing for weeks, we’ve donated 31 large bags to Goodwill, and we’ve purged more trash than I care to admit. Despite steadfastly moving boxes over to our new residence on a daily basis, our old house looks like we still live here full-time. At the rate we are going, it is unclear whether or not we will be fully moved before I get the vaccine, and I took an online quiz which says that 78% of Californians and 8 million Angelenos are in line ahead of me. Sometimes I get upset about how slowly both the move and the vaccine rollout are going, but then I remind myself that it is very hard to stay on task during attempted coups d’états and other such onslaughts.
Besides being seriously distracted by current events and wary of hiring professional movers with COVID raging so badly, we are also stymied by the fact that we are, how you say in English, hoarders. (Sorry, Hilaria!) We’ve been at it for weeks, and I continue to be amazed by the sheer volume of things which we have managed to pack into all our closets. They’re like Mary Poppins’s handbag, defying all laws of physics and space, except unlike Mary’s bag, they’re full of decidedly useless things like our CD’s and VHS tapes and baby pop-up books. Meanwhile, Hubby watches in despair as everyday’s news from Washington further devalues his beloved Presidential memorabilia collection, which also occupies a lot of space on our walls and in our closets.
I was lamenting my newfound awareness that we are hoarders to a wise friend who tried to reassure me that “moving is the most humbling experience in our own perceptions of tidiness.” Everyone should have such a kind friend who proffers such empathetic pearls of wisdom when you most need them. But no matter what she says, the reality is that Hubby and I are next level collectors of clutter. If others are humbled, we deserve a public flogging.
At the outset of the moving process, Hubby found a receipt in our closet dated 2006 and he challenged me to find one dated earlier. I’m pretty competitive, so, game on. After weeks of combing through each and every one of my belongings, I hit the jackpot by opening a purse which I hadn’t worn for several years. Indeed, it was a carryover from another lifetime. From before I met Hubby, but just barely.
What was inside the purse, you may be questioning? It was a receipt from Ann Taylor dated November 14, 2002, for the purchase of my second-ever pantsuit. You see, I’d interviewed for the position of a paralegal at Hubby’s law-firm just the day before, and it had gone so well that Hubby’s partner called me back for a second interview. Only problem was that I owned only one business suit and I’d already worn it to the first interview. I looked at the receipt’s total and smiled at the memory of the leap of faith that it was to buy that second suit. Where might I be today if I hadn’t purchased it? Hubby and I often refer to this time as my “Sliding Doors” moment, but not in reference to this lucky suit, but to an even more consequential act, which had taken place the day before.
Just 24 hours earlier, armed with a set of wire cutters, I sat parked in the driver’s seat of my car, attempting to compose myself before my most promising post-college job interview. I’d done my research and I felt confident about my qualifications and abilities. There was just one thing holding me back from walking into the building, and that one little thing was staring back at me as I looked into my rearview mirror.
What was this little thing, you may be asking? It was a tiny 1.2 mm 16 gauge gold barbell, which I had pierced around my left eyebrow, right before my high school graduation, much to my mother’s chagrin. It was rather discreet, but I couldn’t help but worry that it might blow my chances at the job. No part of the barbell was removable, hence the reason for the wire cutters in my hand. And I knew that once I cut it out, there would be no going back. It would have to signify the end of one era, and the beginning of a new one.
As I sat there, I weighed it all, and without further hesitation, I carefully cut it out. Years later, I asked Hubby’s partner whether he would have hired me if I had walked into the interview with the piercing, but offered to remove it, if I got the job. Hubby’s partner chuckled and said that there is no way in hell he would have hired me, and I know he’s telling the truth. And, if he hadn’t hired me, I would have never met Hubby, nor Amy Beth, and there certainly would be no Tyler, no Olivia.
Wednesday is Hubby’s and my fourteen year anniversary of marriage and I am unbelievably grateful that a single choice made on P3 of our parking garage led me here. I am also so happy that I found this lucky receipt and beat Hubby at his own game. :-)
Very truly yours,
Maya