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JJG.  Even after all of this time, that name makes me dizzy.

It was brief, complicated, and nearly a decade ago.  But it happened during the crescendo of my 20’s and was, afterwards, a parachute as I barreled downward. He was the only good thing during the worst part of my life.

We never really knew each other. But carnally, we were…it was…we…it was magnetic.  Fervid.  Because of him that I understood the power of that kind of union.

It started with wine on a late-summer evening in the secret garden dubbed ‘the most romantic place’ in the city which clearly was, but had not been identified as, a date and led to both the freedom and terror of not being in control.  It ended a few months later with a kiss on the forehead.

It started again with enigmatic jealousy and ended with inadvertent spite.

And yet again with a grand gesture and ended with an email.

What began with virile attraction, perhaps in a way, never really ended.

While he is married now and I am quite fulfilled, it is with great intention that I avoid him even in this vast metropolis as I don’t dare play with Kryptonite.

With a grimace, I stepped on the (unofficial) scale for the first time since weighing in at 146 lbs on September 5. While there were grander hopes than 141 lbs, I’m happy to see progress in the right direction.  An annual physical on Friday will determine the official progress.

Working out might help – right now my YMCA membership might as well be considered a charitable donation. I have been interested in the much costlier CrossFit, but will wait on that until the New Year’s Resolution crowd has fallen back into their bad habits.

Clean in ’13 has been a beneficial experience. I’ve found that the foods I crave all week are not very fulfilling when consumed on the weekend.  I’ve even found myself having trouble eating poorly on Friday…but by Saturday, that hesitation is long gone.  I also eat a lot less.  And those are all wins.

…one is silver and the others gold. As the Girl Scouts song goes.

For a shoddy memory, mine never ceases to amaze when it comes to the most random of details.  A snippet of a song from more than twenty years ago I recall, yet what I had for breakfast yesterday eludes me…or if breakfast was even consumed. Ugh.

While I’ve fallen prey to a few dastards in the first 2.5 decades of life, I have successfully avoided and rid my circle of toxic people.  Yet, one remains. ‘We’ is that friend for which an explanation is always necessary prior to introduction. As in, “She’s abrasive and snooty and pretentious when first meet her, but she’s a dear once you get to know her.”

(‘We’ is actually the nickname we use for her because she sheds her personal identity when in a relationship.)

Of course her snoot and pretension surface from deeply rooted insecurities, but I have always been able to see past her ‘less flattering’ side for her better qualities.

That was until my wedding.  One month before the wedding, we were having lunch and I told her that TB would no longer be drawing a salary from his start-up company beginning about the time we were married.  I told her how the idea of being financially tethered to someone who would now be financially dependent on me was scary.  I was looking for a friend in that moment to tell me that everything was going to be fine.

Instead, she said to me: “Matt and I don’t lend people money.”

I was befuddled and humiliated.  I wasn’t asking for money, I was asking for support. Our friendship had started to unravel long before that comment, but it fast-forwarded it for me.

The idea of shedding a friendship that’s longevity is approaching two decades is kind of unimaginable.  While I retained zero friends from high school, I also had no idea who I was at 18-years-old. Today, while continual evolution is guaranteed, I have a pretty good idea who I am. I know who to keep and who to drop.

Huh. Come to think of it…I met We when I was 18.  Perhaps that song should actually be, ‘Make new friends, but keep only the gold.’

Laddy will forever be my best dog.  A Shetland Sheepdog, he was my bestie growing up. I vividly remember being 13-years-old, curled up in his fur into the wee hours of the morning of the day my parents knew it was time to take him into to be euthanized. I cried for three days straight.

After Laddy, there were a series of dogs that flowed in and out of my unaffected adolescence. Butch, the beautiful Samoyed who left to live at the farm after hell nor high water could keep him tethered in the yard. Lady, the skittish rescued Gold Retriever who only liked my mom. And finally Rickie, the Pomeranian who was priced as such but as he aged it became quite apparent one of his parents had a thing for a pug.

After college, I moved in with T-Doll and she bought a puppy: Bailey. The Bernese Mountain Dog better known, very sarcastically, as my BFF. Bailey is a shedding, shitting mess of neuroses.  He has something called ‘Fly Biting Syndrome’ where he sees things that aren’t really there. In my family, we call that Schizophrenia.

And Bailey looooooooves me. He goes ape-shit when I walk in. He’s seven now and during the handful of times a year I visit T-Mick (new name: she got married), I’ve grown to tolerate him.

Then I lived with Bobo and KM…and Piper. Piper is a Vizsla. Piper is my best buddy. I love Piper.  She now has a brother who was rescued from the streets: Murphy. Don’t tell Piper, but I might like Murph more.

All of that back story to talk about Boog.  Boog is a Great Pyrenees. He is to date, my favorite puppy (alive, of course. RIP, Laddy.)

We dogsit for Boog probably once or twice a year. He’s a great pup and sleeps most of the day away (he’s a giant. If I were proportionately 7’5″, I’d probably sleep a lot too.) Despite the shedding and drooling, he’s just a good boy. That is until he spend last summer at the cabin and turned feral.

He quite literally ate the curtains. He also hates straps. As in the ‘I-still-can’t-believe-I-spent-that-much-money-on-a-bag’ shoulder strap he severed. Boog’s owners are kindly replacing the curtains and even having their leather guy (apparently you need a ‘ leather guy’ if you have Boog) create a new strap if Kenneth Cole cannot send a replacement.

Needless to say, the puppy-fever TB and I had has been cured. Even though we miss Boog now that he’s gone home, we’re pretty happy with our clean, dogless home.