Bryce Gruber’s Thoughts of the Day (fresh starts edition)

Today’s thoughts are brought to you by my freshly lasered body. I spent the wee hours of the morning lasering my crotch, legs, and underarms. Why? Because my goal is to make morning showers super zippy- shampoo, condition, soap, done. Cutting down on shower time means more time sleeping, eating cereal with my son, or just about anything else. WIN!

1) I’m Turning Over A New Leaf (in a weird way). I think we’ve all been at the point where we’re just ready to say “f*ck it” to the past and totally move on to a fresh, clean slate. Everyone does it differently, and everyone’s reasons for getting there are different. In my case yesterday, I noticed that my past disappointments were creeping right up into my present and future. It started with a text message from Baby Daddy- insulting me for passing on a genetic trait to our son that I have literally no control over. He insinuated that I had ruined our son with this super mild genetric trait (it’s in no way life threatening, and it’s basically as harmless as having freckles or some other normal thing). Obviously I didn’t take this lightly and felt myself slipping into a weird state of isolation and falling back on my typical distrust for men in general. Ugh. Bad move. By the end of the day I had met with my friend Renee, and spoke to her about the fall out of all this stuff  (like my questioning the idea of love in general) without her knowing what the real trigger was. She, however, is a super smart cookie and reminded me that I need to be less reactive, and to break out of what my current nature tells me to do. She reminded me that I needed to go against what feels right and normal to me to find personal growth and not be weighed down by the crap in the past, and perhaps more importantly, find new and better space in the future. So I did. I took the idea and ran with it. Today is my fresh start, and I’m making up go down and down go up while I turn black to white and white to black. Heck, I even changed my nail polish. I’ll get to that in the next thought.

2) My Nails Are Light Pink. Not Red. I met Baby Daddy when I was 23 and perhaps more easily swayed. I was pretty innocent then- only having had one serious, long term boyfriend beforehand. Everything about me at the point was virtuous to the point of only wearing light, elegant nail polish colors with names like “Daisy Dust” and “Elegant Slippers.” Jeez. When I met Baby Daddy he wanted me to be some older, more vixen-like character that I simply was not. He picked everywhere we went, my clothes, and even my nail polish colors (yes, he’d follow me to the nail salon pretty often to ensure that he would get some shade he liked). At that age and experience level, I somehow had no idea that he was a major control freak and that I was allowing it- or that all these behaviors were just signs of a much bleaker future with him. He would demand shades like hot pink, red, burgundy, and “Shimmering Bricks” for my nails. The little bit of fight I had in me at the time would say “no- I think I’ll stick to ‘Elegant Slipppers’ today.” When we finally split just a few weeks after our son was born, I knew I was a mom and that was the only role that counted from moment he was born. But something in me wanted to rebel, fight, and have a silent “fuck you.” So I started painting my nails red. And hot pink. And shimmering brick. And he noticed- because control freaks always do. It’s been almost 2 years since the day he moved out, and my life is in a totally different place. I’m back to the me I knew before I knew him- only better, because I’ve learned, grown, and have a great kid to show for it. In fact, I couldn’t be happier. My friends are better, my job never feels like work, and I have a boyfriend that doesn’t try to control a damn thing I do (score!). So, my nails are back to some light shade of floral, virginal goodness… and now I sort of feel the freedom to choose any color. Maybe next week will be purple.

3) I Invested in Some Wild Silk Pants Today. Really… they’re animal print and look something like the picture below. I feel empowered. My ass will be growling at people as I walk down the street. Just kidding.