Day 56: I Am Loved

Last year in my post about Conor playing his song for me in the park on my fifth day in Spain, I finished the entry with this line:

"... but it helps knowing that my sanguinity is backed by unconditional love. <3"

 And there is no more accurate of a way to describe all of what happened today.

Man, was it a doozy of a day. I feel like I could write an entire blog dedicated to everything that happened today alone. All of the events. All of the emotions. All of the lessons. All of the growth. All of the love.

But for now I'll stick with one entry:

Maria, Gabi and Kerstin picked me up around 11 am to drive into Madrid to go to the Rastro (huge outdoor market) together. I was excited to see everyone after a wonderful day yesterday and couldn't wait for more pictures, giggles and adventures. It's amazing how one day you're sitting in your room all day watching Gossip Girl in your PJs eating oreos and drinking wine because you have nothing else to do and nobody to do anything with, and then one day you're waking up early and throwing on a cute outfit to rush out the door to hang out with new friends and go on an European adventure!

This. Is. Why. I. Travel. <3

Anyway, we made it to the Rastro just fine but quickly got separated - Maria with Gabi and Kerstin with me. Kerstin and I txted Maria on my phone (hers didn't work) and we agreed to meet up around 1:30 where we'd first gotten into the market. Kerstin and I had a good time strolling through the place, looking at leather purses (awesome), taking pictures of each other, buying something (I bought a CHELSEA soccer team scarf!!! OMG!!! I've wanted one for forever!! It's now hanging on the wall in my room!!!) and having a snack. By the time we were done we realized we were supposed to have been back five minutes ago and began our journey back to the meeting place. What would have normally been a three minute walk back was turned into a 15 minute gridlock of bodies moving at the pace of sedated cattle. There was no way around it, so we just kept going until we got to the meeting place at last.

Gabi was there and told us Maria had gone for a snack and walked us over to where she was. I didn't notice anything wrong, but Kerstin did and asked if Maria was mad at us. Maria immediately begin to say how we were supposed to wait for her to eat and how we'd arrived at our meeting spot a half hour late and didn't say anything and didn't answer any of her calls or txts and she had been waiting there hungry and nervous and was really upset. I wasn't expecting a reaction like this AT ALL. I hadn't heard my phone ring at all so I was confused what was going on. She was so angry and I was so taken aback that I didn't even know what to do.

Kerstin immediately started apologizing but also telling Maria that she felt she was being very harsh about it all and that we hadn't meant to do anything to upset her. Maria kept saying everything we'd done wrong and Kerstin kept apologizing but defending our intentions. Finally a few blocks and many words into this spat, Kerstin broke into tears. I was already completely freaked out by the sudden conflict and raw emotions and anger, but when Kerstin began to cry I didn't know what to do. All I could think was it was really all my fault (it'd turned out that my phone was - for unknown reasons - on silent mode and I hadn't checked it during our walk through the crowd, and merely assumed that Maria and Gabi were hanging out around the area we were to meet at and not at all bothered, or they'd have called or txted ... and, furthermore, I was the one who had been starving and jumped at Kerstin's suggestion to have a quick bite to eat).

And so I did the only thing I could think to do. After having remained silent the entire time, I suddenly blurted out that it was all my fault and I was so sorry and, without any warning, started running.

Yes, I ran away.

Literally.

I ran and I ran and I ran until I couldn't breathe. I just wanted to be far away from all of the emotional conflict that I had seemed to cause. I just wanted to not be in the middle of my two friends yelling and crying. I just wanted to be far far far away from it all. And so I ran.

In retrospect, it obviously makes very little sense. Why couldn't I have merely said, "Hey, girls, this was all a big misunderstanding and I feel really responsible for it. I should have checked my phone. I should have called to see what we were doing about food. I should have kept track of the time better. I'm so sorry and I feel awful. Let's go find a bar and decompress! It's on me!"!?

But Mature Chelsea was not present at that very moment and instead 'Lil Chelsea took over.

Ooops. Fuck. Wow.

I ran until I felt safe from it all and I called my roomie, panting and on the verge of tears myself. She calmed me down and said the whole thing sounded like everybody overreated and that things would be fine. She got me to giggle. She invited me out for drinks with the other roomies when I got home later. She was that friend every girl needs - the one who says, "Oh we all get a little crazy sometimes. Don't worry about it! You're still a BAMF!"

God, I love friends like that. <3

I txted everyone an apology for what had happened and for randomly bailing like a crazy and promptly turned my phone off. Sometimes I just need to tune out of life for an hour or two - and I'm not thinking this is a very Good thing, but it's definitely a key characteristic of Who I Am that will need to begin rennovations sometime fairly soon. :-/

And so I set to taking one step at a time: I tried to calm myself accordingly. I walked around the Rastro some more and bought myself much needed socks (teddy bear argyle socks omg). I then began one of my famous walking explorations of the city (this is when I find a metro station, then continue walking until I find another station, at which point I pull out my metro map and try to figure out which direction will lead me where and begin walking in that direction to see if my method will work or not - it's surprisingly seriously fun and yields a great number of awesome sights I would otherwise never see).

I continued this way for awhile, when J txted me back to my "I just went crazy" txt. She talked to me for awhile and was uncharacteristically judgmental about it all and made me feel awful (which I certainly deserved to feel, considering my behavior). She DID make up a great linguistic analogy for me, though: Love/friendship is like "ser" vs. "estar" - "estar" is the immediate cercumstances of something - maybe you piss someone off or do something stupid, etc. but "ser" is ever-present feeling of love and friendship that's always underneath it all and there, despite whatever is happening with the "estar" at any moment! The root of both words, of course, is "to be," which is completely dependent on yourself and that love/friendship can only be established by yourself and not by others. :) If you know anything about Spanish linguistics, you can't help but to find this to be one of the most adorable and charming analogies you've ever heard of!!

Anyway, despite the adorable analogy and her telling me that fights happen in friendships and rough parts make any friendship even stronger in the end, I couldn't get over the feeling that what I had done was extremely awful and spoke volumes about what a awful person I was and how immature and pathetic I was and would ruin my friendship with those girls for forever, and so I found a place to sit facing the sun and sat down and cried. My fingers were numb from txting in the cold and I was shaking. My nose was running and I wiped it on my jeans. I felt like the biggest failure; all I had wanted to do this weekend was hang out with these friends and have a wonderful time and make my friendships blossom... and now look what I'd done. I was beginning to feel like I'd come into the whole "having friends" thing too late and that I was doomed to never understand how to have friends and be a good friend myself.

As I was crying an old, old lady came up to where I was sitting and sat down right next to me in the sun. She could tell I was crying but didn't bring it up. I could tell she wanted to make me feel better. I tried to hide my sniffles. The first thing she did was ask if I knew anything about cell phones. I responded I did. She then asked if I might be able to set the correct time on her phone, with day light savings time having changed the hour, and all. I smiled and took her phone from her. It was the phone I'd had last summer in Spain. I changed the hour for her in no time and gave it back. She thanked me and asked me where I was from. When I told her the US, she started telling me about neighbors she had that traveled to the US and always brought her back postcards for Christmas and would visit her. It was a really cute story. :) "They're a couple. They live together next door to me. They're not married, you know. But they've been together 17 years! He says he won't get married until he's finished his Doctorate! Ha!" :)

I'm not sure if her generosity of spirit took me aback more, or if the fact I could understand every single word she was saying to me in slightly slurred Castillian Spanish took me aback more. Either way, she definitely cheered my little spirit. She handed me a picture of Jesus (or a Saint?) with a 2013 map on the back of it and said she was in charge of handing them out for her church - which is where she was going now, but it didn't open for another twenty minutes, and so she thought she'd just sit and enjoy the sunshine until then. :) We sat there in silence for awhile, and I wondered what she'd say if I tried to tell her I was afraid about life, about where I was going, about who I was becoming. But instead I remained silent and was grateful for her company. And then all at once she got up and said she should be going to church now.

"It made me very happy to meet you!" she said, with a kind smile, before walking off.

I continued to sit there for a moment and take in what had just happened. It was like a scene from "The Phantom Tollbooth" or from "The Little Prince." A random encounter with somebody seemingly wise and open and accepting. An encounter which I really needed in that moment and which came out of nowhere. And I was grateful. Very grateful. Moments of serendipity. :)

I shed a few more tears and continued on my way down to Starbucks on the Paseo de Prado. I waited in line for a small eternity and ordered an Apple Crumble Latte to warm up, J had told me to contact everyone and simple apologize, since I hadn't responded to anything since I'd turned off my phone two hours before, and so I did. When I heard nothing back for an hour I took it as a sign that I had permenently messed everything up in my moment of complete immaturity and began to truly feel awful.

I was walking to the train station to head back home when Gabi called. He asked where I was and asked if I would meet up with them all at Callao in an hour. I knew my answer had to be yes, and so I turned around and headed in the opposite direction, happy that there was a shot I hadn't blown my frirendships after all and nervous as hell of what I'd say when I met back up with them.

And so I txted a boy, because sometimes a girl just needs a Boy Who Knows Her Very Well to give her perspective. I txted, "You there?" Immediate response: "Yes." I txted one word: "Help." A minute later, his response: "K."

<3 I smiled, took a deep breath and closed my eyes, imagining that single letter wrapping itself around me, hugging me so tightly and closely that I had no choice but to realize everything would be okay.

I told him everything that had happened and he responded, "Yep, you do that sometimes. It's time to stop emotionally over reacting and to be Rational Chelsea. Tell them the truth of how you felt with a smile on your face. It'll be fine."

<3 Boy advice.

And so that's exactly what I did. Both the girls ran up and hugged me and we all apologized. <3 Maria said she'd just been worried about me. Kerstin said she didn't want me to feel like she was blaming me, because she truly wasn't. I said I was sorry for what had happened and for freaking out and running away when I became overwhelmed. We all agreed we needed a warm drink to rehydrate from all of the tears of the day and a slice of cake to feel better after a rough afternoon. :)

After our stop, we were all feeling a little better and embarked on the journey back home together. When we got to Maria's house, Kerstin hugged me and said she had had a wonderful time with me the past few days and would truly love it if I came to Berlin to visit her and to stay really closely in touch. :) We planned on trying to meet up tomorrow night (I said I'd make chocolate melting cakes for everyone!) before she left.

When I unlocked my apartment door, I could hear Katie saying, "That better he HER." When I opened the door, Abby exclaimed, "You have a lot of 'splaining to do, Missy!" I giggled. :) I told them all about the day and they all listened and giggled and commented. "What a dramatic day!" "All that and it started over relatively nothing!" "Well now we know in a 'Fight or Flight' situation Chelsea certainly chooses 'Flight!!'" It was wonderful to be able to come home and tell the three girls about it and for them to listen to me and make me giggle about it all. I love my roommates so much. <3

And so that was my day. My crazy, dramatic, awful and amazing day.

It's certainly not how I intended for it to go. I certainly did some crazy, emotionally hell-bent things I'm not proud of. But it totally showed me just how many people care about me, are patient with me and truly back me with unconditional love - even when I'm being a Nutty McNut Nut. <3

With buckets and buckets full of love and gratitude,
XOXO