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001_ThreeMilestones
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001. Three Milestones
Saturday, January 25th – I made a lot of money the night before. Double the usual tips for a Friday night bartending at Mood Ring. It wore me out, though. I only woke up on time for my boyfriend and I’s anniversary date because he sent me a playlist minutes before my alarm would have gone off. “one year bf”, he named it, using a photo of us from a year ago at a club. It’s a tight shot of me grinning in purple light, wearing my Willy Chavarria cap that I’d knock him in the chin with in the moments after. The live iPhone footage captured it all. We had a big day planned: massages, omakase, Junior’s cheesecake, and a 9:30 showing of One of Them Days. It was the perfect date. The cherry on top: that morning I completed my 500th day of daily yoga. Happy Anniversary, baby.
Sunday, January 26th – He slept over, and in the morning we went to our favorite bakery, Bakeri, for cinnamon rolls, they’re our favorite treat there. We watched the latest episode of Rupaul’s Drag Race over our other breakfast pastries, and he bragged about his 100-point lead in our Drag Race Fantasy bracket. I used the new coffee mug he gave me for my twenty-eighth birthday. “I’m Dead Without My Coffee” it read, written on a tombstone. I had organized a birthday dinner for later that night at a friend’s place in Ridgewood. She’s an excellent chef, and a group of seven of us split the cost for her to create a Kamayan-style Filipino feast. I had the idea to make Manila 75s - French 75s but with calamansi juice instead of lemon juice. After marathoning half of Castlevania Nocturne season one and a game of Scrabble (which I won), we headed for the liquor store, then for dinner. On the menu was milkfish, cod, coconut chicken adobo, lumpia, longanisa, pinakbet, pork belly, and pork sisig – over rice, of course. We gorged ourselves, then indulged ourselves again on birthday flan. I played “one year bf” again before bed that night. The 26th is our actual anniversary.
Monday, January 27th – My actual twenty-eighth birthday. It was the first Monday of term, and I had a discussion section to plan and a lecture to attend as a Teaching Assistant. I treated myself to a Murray’s Bagel and a spiced chai. Murray’s has my favorite chai, you’d never expect it. I had a copyediting assignment due that night so I made my way to Honey Moon Coffee in Ridgewood (where my new mug is from, actually). I reached my tenth stamp last week and traded it in for a cappucino as I made my track changes. At home, I practiced a yoga flow I’d created some two weeks before. It’s what I use when I can’t make it to the studio. I was on time to be early and grab a lamb kebab dinner at Oasis Williamsburg before meeting my boyfriend after his improv class. I wanted to try the new coffee toffee cookie at Levain. He and I sat in a booth, chatting and kissing and eating our cookies until closing.