Ironic irony.

I will preface this by saying I haven't written in eons. Literally. But perhaps it's a product of a silver lining. 

I used to always think that my life didn't fit my age. Like, I should've done what everyone else my age has done by now. Half-mastered a career, had children, gotten married, bought a house, grown a vegetable garden, became VP of the Junior League, etc etc etc. Growing up, it seemed a lot of my peers planned these things in their heads. Put ages to tasks: "by 24 I'll be married", "by 28 I'll have a child" , by "30 I'll be a director in my company..." The list seems endless. 

I'm different. I'm one of the wild ones. Not that I don't want these things---(I think I do...some of them anyway) but when I thought about my life and future, and how it was going to look...honestly, as strange as it sounds, I saw a Blue Sky. Literally. In my head, my plans consisted of a blue sky. It's this gorgeous shade of blue: cobalt mixed with periwinkle. Dotted with a few fluffy white clouds. That's it. It's still what I see. I can't decide if never setting goals in accordance to my age is why I haven't accomplished anything seemingly normal, or if I HAD set them it would just be another tool to punish myself because I haven't achieved them yet. (Chicken or the egg anyone??)

I think I got jaded by irony at a young age. A voracious reader, I took after my sister in my love for literature. One of the earliest stories read to us by my mother and grandmother was The Gift of the Magi. Ohhh, The IRONY. A couple giving up both their most prized treasures to make each other happy with a single gift; only to find out their gifts were useless without their original treasures. What. The. Fuck???

Moving on to the Giver. Don't even get me started on a reality based on no color or emotion except for a chosen one to see it...and what's the irony in that we ask? 

Then came high school: we had our famous, irony-filled, obvious story of star-crossed lovers that basically end up destroying an entire empire because they can't stand up for what they believe in. They'd rather hide it until it's too late...and then it's really too late. (And no one should ever see Leo DiCaprio in that much pain.) 

Then the Veldt. Ray and I have a lot in common--we love irony (or perhaps we just understand its inevitability). So this story:"Let's give our kids everything they want so they can hate us enough to actually kill us with the gifts WE gave them!" is the perfect vessel for irony.

Talk about fucked up. And I forgot to throw in Alanis somewhere between Romeo and Juliet and the Great Gatsby. I stole my sister's CD and literally had "Ironic" on repeat for the whole of 1995. I mean, "a free ride when you've already paid?" "A fly in your champagne?" Talk about poetic.

So I guess, when my genetic brain was supposed to be mapping out my Cinderella fairytale life, wedding and kids' names like all my friends, I was too busy figuring out a way to outsmart irony. 

Not that it got me that far.

13 cities (one twice) and about 27 heartbreaks later, I'm no stranger to our dear friend irony. In fact, just a few weeks ago irony visited me in the form of actually taking my knee away from me--during my dance class no less--also known as my bloodline. Dance: A major source of my joy, stress relief and sheer freedom. It just snapped away from me. The thing I love most betrayed me in a matter of seconds.  You would've thought I had learned about loving something so much. New York did it to me in 2011 and I swore I would never let it happen again. Irony, however, as always, had a different plan. "You love something too much, You run the risk of losing it."

So Here it is. I'm finally figuring out that God uses irony to teach the hard lessons. The ones that sting no matter how much we bandage them. The ones that make us think twice about our so-called "plans". The ones that if we don't learn after awhile, we won't stop getting taught. (And who wants to be trapped on the same rollercoaster 2,458 times?! Barf bag please!) While it's true, I have no kids, no husband, no fancy title, and certainly no garden. My dog doesn't even live with me! I also currently don't have a working knee. (Which means I have about 35 pairs of unwearable designer shoes.)

However...I do have an incredible life full of wild, amazing single girl adventures that have woven the beautiful tapestry that is my life. (Even if the main thread in that tapestry is irony.) I also have my faith. Faith in God that my ironic situations aren't lost on me. 

I have the knowledge that this, and everything else, is happening for a reason. And the sooner I give into that fact, the sooner I realize that life, in all it's essence, is one big irony. Because ultimately, we have no control. And if we start living with that knowledge, embracing our "blue sky" goals and taking everything that happens to us as a lesson, (instead of a goal derailment or plan gone wrong) perhaps irony won't get the last laugh. We will. 

Here's a toast (fly and all) to letting go of the shit we can't control and holding onto the fact that even though something seems inexplicable, unimaginable or even amazing---there's a reason for all of it. 

Cheers.