My Frankenstein Friendship, or Lessons Learned in Platonic Intimacy with My Ex (Besides It Doesn’t Work)

May 23, 2019 by Cazey Williams in Dating, Life In Your 20's, life lessons, Cazey's Column

As I’ve touched on what feels too many times in other blogposts (me, hung up? Impossible!), I went through what a millennial sociologist may define as a relationship many months ago. At the fling’s conclusion (if you use more casual terms, the memories feel more frivolous!), she spoke of wanting to remain friends. I soundly objected. Of course, I caved because who am I to decline friendship? And I still had feelings for her (me, with a heart? Another fallacy!).

Without surprise, this charade failed. We suffered several trials, extinguished by either she or I for various futile reasons that tiptoed around “you can’t be friends with your ex.” This was always my view and what she denied. I am a Taurus. I insisted she learn what I knew.

For a long spell, we did not speak. I count this as my small victory because she instigated it. During the desert, I met someone else, which I suspected was a temporary ploy to distract myself and proved to be. Nevertheless, I embarked on this doomed fling, though this one seemed destined for failure based on much triter terms like compatibility, ambition, and intelligence.

The Mystery of the Basic Flake

December 19, 2018 by Cazey Williams in Cazey's Column, life lessons, Dating, Life In Your 20's

When I ran into “Vanessa” - a name designation made only for the alliteration of “Vanessa the Vixen” - a few weeks ago, I hadn’t seen her in years. The last time I thought of her was probably two years before and only because her younger sister posted something on Facebook tagging her.

Growing up, Vanessa always existed in the periphery of my universe. She was the older, popular, valley girl-esque blonde who lived in my neighborhood and always seemed to be attached to some faceless jock. We went to the same elementary, middle, and high school and then even college, but I don’t think we ever ran into each other there. We may have 160 mutual friends on social media, but that hardly denotes being part of the same friendship circle.

Friends and Dating

November 01, 2018 by Cazey Williams in Life In Your 20's, life lessons, Cazey's Column

Early in life we learn what it means to like someone. When we’re wee toddlers, we call it friendship. Later we learn we sometimes like people as more than friends. We call this love - or, more often, some watered down derivative.

For the first few months after we stumble into romantic bliss, or perhaps longer - think cafeteria lunches with your crush sitting at the end of the table - we may confuse friendship and love. We love to hang out with both friends and lovers. We want to share secrets with them. Both excite us - but in different ways. Soon, either through trial or heartache, we learn not to mistake these two concepts as synonyms. Friendship may be given without caution or preamble. Love, or similar affection, is far less awarded and comes packed with nuance and people’s ghosts, demons, and spite (my own especially).

How To Handle Rejection

September 18, 2018 by Cazey Williams in Cazey's Column, life lessons, Life In Your 20's, Humor

Since 2005, I have committed a few faux pas on Facebook. I don’t think my sins will ever approach the gracelessness of a middle-aged mother on Facebook (that’s a jab at my own), but I am not some beacon of social media poise. I have accidentally poked, unintentionally shared, and once even tagged myself in a stranger’s profile picture. That last blunder may be most embarrassing moment – until last week.

I have known “Phil” for several years. We share the same friendship circle, see each other monthly, and have the rapport of managing elevator talk if we even communicate at all. However, by proximity, history, and mutual friends, I daresay we are more than acquaintances.

Three Things a Relationship Did Not Change for Me

January 14, 2016 by astoldoverbrunch in Guest Post, Life In Your 20's, life lessons

Upon entering my sophomore year of high school, I had a hopeful vision for how that particular year would play out.

I knew it was the year I would finally, blissfully, manage to snag a boyfriend. I pictured myself walking the halls with him, laughing at something he said and tossing my perfect soft curls, my blue pastel pea coat appropriately fending off the fall chill.

First of all, I did not have soft, curly hair. I had thick, coarse hair that I can only also describe as lumpy. And I certainly did not own a blue pea coat. In fact, even if I had owned such a coat, I probably would have been too shy to wear it for fear of looking like I was trying to hard and instead settle for my usual American Eagle sweatshirt.

Youth, Tinder, and All of the Above

December 16, 2015 by Cazey Williams in Cazey's Column, Humor, Life In Your 20's, life lessons, Dating

I preface this post by alerting the reader to two things:

1.) I look younger than my age.

2.) I often have a sense of a humor that no one else gets. Or at least they laugh a lot less loud than I do.

On the former, I have a brother who is five and a half years younger. When I return home, the lady at our local Chinese restaurant inevitably asks, “Are you the young one or the old one?”

Friendships Over Relationships . . . Right?

October 15, 2015 by Cazey Williams in Life In Your 20's, Cazey's Column, Humor, life lessons

My best friends tend not to overlap with each other. They all tend to belong to their own friendship circles. In each circle I am generally a recurring character, but rarely a season's regular. That is not to say my friends don't get along; we just don't hang out all together at the same time - unless I'm hosting a New Year's Eve party.

My college best friend happens to have membership in a friendship group based in the D.C. beltway. They maintain a sporadic GroupMe where they can group text about meeting up for drinks or road tripping to visit old college friends. Somehow I got inducted into this group. I really can't remember why; the majority of the friends live within 30 miles of each other, and I live 94 miles away in Richmond.

A Snapchat War

April 09, 2015 by Cazey Williams in Cazey's Column, Humor, Life In Your 20's, Social Media

Yesterday I discussed Snapchat's latest update and how Snapchat has ignited friendship wars in the past. Everyone wants to be their best friend's top Snapchat user - or maybe that's just me. But relationships have ended over this sort of thing.

Thankfully, I'm single, so that's never happened to me. And Snapchat is just an inane app for sending selfies, so why do I care who my friends' top Snappers are - as long as I'm in the top spot? That's right, folks: Ever since discovering Snapchat in January 2013, I have managed to maintain a monopoly over many of my friend's top spot. It wasn't hard; all I had to do was Snapchat pictures whenever I bought iced coffee, battled through grad school projects late at night, or heard a great song on the radio. I don't worry about my friends' top spot because I know I have dominion.

Snapchat Best Friends, or the New MySpace Top 8

April 08, 2015 by Cazey Williams in Cazey's Column, Humor, Life In Your 20's, Social Media

Assuming your phone automatically updates your apps, millennial friendship dynamics shifted on Monday while you were Facebooking. That is, Snapchat released a new version - one which allows users to identify their mutual besties, six degrees of separation, and who is the Judas of your best friends (who you snap all the time and they don't reciprocate).

In case you don't use Snapchat, it's an app that allows friends to send self-deleting photos and messages to one another. Snapchat used to be just in good fun (and maybe sexting) before they allowed friends to see who their friends' top Snappers were. You could click on a person's name and see the top three people who they snapped with.

No big deal, right?

When Wednesday Bleeds Into Thursday (literally)

October 16, 2014 by Sara Woznicki in Life In Your 20's, life lessons, Sara's Column, Tweets and Mascara

Editor's note: This is going to chronicle probably the goriest event that has ever happened to me. Get ready! A perfectly normal Wednesday was wrapping up. I had done some Zumba (poorly, I may add), cooked a chicken-based dinner (extremely typical), watched some television with the roommates, took a shower and lounged in my bed for a bit.

I was ready to go to bed at this point. It had been a long day and my hair had basically finished drying. So, like I do every night of my life, I went over to my closet door, pulled it open and reached up to hang up my towel. Then there was a bang, I look down.

The mirror from the front of the closet door is laying on the ground next to a bloody piece of meat. No wait -- that bloody piece of meat is my leg. I shit you not I saw bone. Huge drops of blood are hitting the floor every second. And huge drops are hitting the rug my mom explicitly told me not to ruin. I knew I had to move off of the rug, but my leg is limpy. I focus in. I absolutely need to go to the emergency room. My roommate next door is asleep already, so I'll crawl to the stairs and call for the one downstairs.

Nope, my leg won't make it. I yell downstairs, "I need to go to the emergency room." Both roommates materialize like they are wizards straight from Hogwarts. Everyone is calm, like we have a prepared emergency response plan. One roommate collects my and her belongings so that we can leave. The other wraps a towel around my leg and goes for gauze and pre-wrap. I sit applying pressure. Not crying. Just planning. I need shoes, id and my insurance card. And a bra. Can't leave the house without a bra.

She comes back with the supplies, and I squeeze the two halves of my leg together, while she applies gauze and then tightly wraps the pre-wrap around my wound. (The next day, I find out that she has experience splinting horse legs, so she was ready to put that skill to use). The other roommate comes back with our to-go supplies. We work out that one goes and one stays to clean the blood. What more can you ask for in a friend than someone who will mop up your pools of blood for you? #BloodSisters

I slide on my butt down the stairs, slip my boat shoes (they ended up being a casualty of the night. The entire left shoe is caked in blood beyond cleaning) on, and we are off. It was a quick drive (thank god) down just a few blocks to the ER. I get dropped off and hop on one leg inside. The greeting nurse takes down all sorts of information, as I internally contemplate whether I should call or text my parents. I decide text, because it's late, and they'll think I'm near death if I call now. Plus, what can they do when they're eight hours away, anyways right?

So then I'm led back to my bed. And then I sit alone, with just the sounds of the EMT's gossiping, the click of the heart rate monitor for the patient to my right and every now and then a squeak of a shoe. And I totally lose my shit. What if it actually broke my bone? Or ripped a muscle? Or it gets infected and they need to amputate? What if they just leave me sitting here to bleed out?

I sob. And sob a bit more. Nurses come and go, but I sit alone sobbing.

Eventually, one comes over and compliments the nice dressing on my wound (thanks, years of horse splinting). I still can't compose myself. They go to get my roommate. No one comes back.

I freak out a bit more. They just wheeled someone away for higher-grade attention.

Then, a lovely, nonchalant nurse comes over. She tells me I'm doing well, ask me how it happened. Then she asked me if I think I could have Ebola, if I was trying to hurt myself or if I was assaulted. All no.

She cracks a few jokes, and my tears subside. Shortly thereafter, I text my other friend and he comes running (more like brisk walking) from his house to the hospital. Once there, I feel much more calm. He's not nervous about all the blood. He handles it. He talks to me and takes my mind off of it.

"You really went big on this one," the nurse muses. "Go big or go home, right?" I quip back. When you're in pain, freaking out, there's nothing like a good wound joke to break the ice. We get some x-rays and praise hallelujah no broken bones, chard's of glass or ripped muscles. While getting hit by a falling mirror is a total unlucky fluke, at least hearing good news like that is calming.

So then begins the time to stitch. My friend snaps a picture (which I swear if he shows that to me before a years time, I will vomit. Not that I actually need the picture to remember how my leg looked. I'll probably carry that image with me to the grave. It looked straight out of a horror film.), and the doctor begins. Oh pain. So much of it.

But damn, do I have a good friend. He talks about nothing for the entire time. He explains his graduate school classes, which meant nothing to me. Except for the real fact that it meant everything to me. He had a midterm the next day, but he chose to help me out when I needed him most, and was able to talk to me enough to distract me from the mangled mess that was my leg.

After a long evening of waiting and stitching, my roommate and I head home. She's GOT to be drained, as she drove our other roommate to the airport at 5:30 that morning. She hates blood, yet still sucked it up and brought me to the hospital. What more can I say other than she's a leg-saver.

I'm spent too, except for the fact that I can't sleep. Maybe it was the drugs they gave me, maybe it was the pain or maybe it was replaying the way my leg looked when it was about to become stuffed chicken. But I was very much awake.

I then decide that I should blog about it (the nurse did say this would make an awesome story), and I should do it immediately before I forget. Right -- because I can forget this trauma so quickly.

So instead of trying to blog about the night at 4am, I roll over, thank god for the three most helpful, amazing people a girl could ask for, and do my best to go to sleep (and waited til daylight to share the gore with you all. Happy Halloween!)