Normal.

I sat in the boardroom. I heard the words that many before me had heard; worst case scenarios, a final date of December 6^th; the culmination of months of speculation. I saw the faces of friends who had been coworkers since I was in middle school become painted with the realization of the looming separation.
But I sat there; engulfed in this haze that has recently become my new normal; perhaps the same haze that overtook my body when I slung myself on top of a pipe that sprayed our kitchen a few weekends ago. My fear that I lack motherly instincts slightly faded as I took the water’s beating until Justin could get the water turned off. Now that’s a woman who loves her kitchen floor.
It has been one thing after another. And amidst all the ugly that is becoming an adult, there has been some beauty too: the beauty that occurs when you feel like you have taken the reins of your own life; your own marriage; the satisfaction you feel when you have been initiated into the club of other adults who are on a runaway train filled with crappy appliances and ants in their cabinets.
You accidentally buy an oversized fridge on a whim after your old one bites the dust; you chainsaw away at your top cabinet until it fits. And such is life. You make it fit. You make it work.
And you look at this man; this man who you tried to write off because he was a youngster with weird musical taste-- and you realize your naivety. You realize just how little you knew about what you needed to sort out adulthood. And here’s a hint: You don’t need a guy that runs through an airport and makes you miss your plane. You need a guy who understands the importance of having an entire fridge drawer dedicated to cheese.
You want to know what else you don't want anymore, sister friends?

1. A Man Standing at Your Doorstep. He’s also usually holding some stuffed animal or other item you don’t need. Throw in some rain and you have enough precipitation to complete the female fantasy. Scratch that wet dog business. A real man comes barreling through the backdoor carrying a half-gallon of milk, your monthly crazy pills and a box of Tampax. Love.

2. A Man Running Through the Airport. For the self-conscious female, the last thing I need in my adult life is a man making a scene near my gate. Plus, I paid a lot of money for this ticket and I don’t want to try to book another flight because you watched one too many Garry Marshall films. When I’m in the butt-to-butt traffic that is the Wal-Mart checkout line and realize I forgot cornstarch, I need a useful sprinter that can hit the baking aisle before Beatrice scans the last item in slow motion. Now that’s an Olympian worth aspiring to.

3. A Man Who Dances with You in the Street. You can thank Noah from “The Notebook” for this gem. Now that one of my favorite hobbies doesn’t include playing a game of Frogger on Stadium, I appreciate a different kind of jig. He’s going to kill me for including this—but he’s out of town so I’m feeling brave. If I am in one of my “zones” or appear to be getting too serious, Justin will begin doing this dance in my line of vision to see how long it takes me to notice. It has been a year and a half and I burst into laughter every time. Imagine arthritic Granny meets belly dancer.

4. A Man Who Uses Clichés. I’ll never forget when he said it. I was sitting there holding the dog in the car and he looked at me and said, “You know, you’re kind of like a dachshund. You’ve got a really long back and short little legs.” Um thanks? These are the kinds of compliments you will receive when you reach the comfort stage of a relationship. And though you’ll roll your eyes at your random Romeo, you will stare at your back in the mirror that night and wonder what that even means.

Marriage and adulthood look a whole lot different than what I had in my head in college. Contrary to Pinterest belief, not everything is Pumpkin Spice all the time. Sometimes life’s a plain pound cake; sometimes it’s a nasty fruitcake; sometimes it’s a pan of Funfetti (Life’s a box of chocolates was already taken).

But one of the positives I have found is that all the things that don’t matter fade away; they disappear into the fog of naivety from which they came. And somehow, somehow you are able to gain just enough strength to deal with a situation at a time. And when you feel like you don’t have what it takes, your true self kicks in and takes the grenade…or the volcanic kitchen pipe.