Everything I ever needed to know, I learned from the blog. There are 16 lessons learned. One for every month that we did this thing.

1. Be honest, even when it is ugly and yucky and gritty and you don’t want to admit those things about yourself out loud, let alone see them on the Internet. Genuine human emotion is the only thing everyone really understands.
2. Everyone out there is doing the best they can. You, who like everyone else in the world are just trying to fumble your way through human relationships, are in no position to judge other people’s choices.
3. Not everyone thinks you are as funny as you do.
4. The only connections between you and the the rest of the world are the mistakes you’ve made, the garden-variety heartbreaks, and all your noble, misguided attempts to navigate your life.
5. Never blog when you are drunk.
6. If you think you’re the only one who feels a certain way, that means a least a bajillion people actually really do feel that way.
7. When you tell men what you do, they will either run away from you as fast as they can or run straight at you as fast as they can. Watch out for the latter. No one can really reach a verdict on the former. They run too fast.
8. People respond to honest, ugly, vulnerable human emotion more than raunchy sex.
9. That being said, people will say anything when it’s anonymous.
10. Everyone in the world knows what it feels like to love someone and everyone in the world knows what it’s like to lose someone.
11. You will never understand why not everyone thinks you are as funny as you do.
12. Be careful who you write about, and what you write. They are reading, and it’s the quickest way to hurt someone.
13. People are dying to tell you that are wrong. Give them a blank space and an anonymous moniker and they will not pass up the opportunity to diagnose you with various psychological disorders or determine your personal worth.
14. Everyone is writing from a place of personal bias. Hence, you have to stay as removed from the praise as you do from the criticism.
15. No matter how many times you tell yourself to remain as far removed from the praise as you do from the criticism, it’s totally impossible.
16. You will fall in love with people you have never met, whose names you don’t know and who live halfway across the country, all because they connect with you everyday in a comment that is less than 20 words, and when it is time for it all to end, you will miss them like mad, and you will feel very, very sad.

Many thanks, a million times, for everything.

All my love,

Mela

…and I do a bitchin’ Lord Palpatine impression.

I’ll see you guys tonight.

I’m going to do my best to get there at 7 p.m., but I work really far away, so it may be 7:15. And I may still be in my suit because I brought the wrong jeans to change into to, and that’s a big deal.

I’m a bit nervous about this. Whatever idea anyone may have had about me is about to be shattered. Hence, I feel the need to do a bit of disclosure. For example:

I’m a Beta.

I got a manicure on Saturday to try and combat the nail-biting. It sort of worked. You’ll see.

I constantly twist my arms into various yoga poses while I’m talking to people. It’s to combat the upper back pain that comes from sitting at a desk all day.

I think it’s hilariously to use adverbs where they don’t belong.

I also think it’s hilariously to call one person “you guys.”

I refer to every man within 500 yards of me as my boyfriend. That includes waiters, bartenders, and random dudes I’ve never seen before.

If you discuss any person who has wronged you during the course of your lifetime, my immediate response is always, “We hate that guy/girl.” Unless you say, “I don’t hate them,” in which case, I’ll say, “Oh, well, I don’t hate them either.” Because it’s my job to hate people that have wronged people I know.

I have a big calcium deposit on one of my top teeth. It grew in that way, and it always looks like I have a big chunk of cottage cheese on it.

If I have a handful of quarters, I’ll load the jukebox with Guns n’ Roses, AC/DC, The Black Crowes, Aerosmith, and Led Zeppelin, and then I won’t understand if other people don’t like it.

My hair is only kind of red right now. Last time I had it colored, we went a bit darker than usual.

I have a enormously lump right below my right shoulder blade. It’s not a tumor. It’s called a lipoma, and it’s really big and really visible and dudes always try and caress it, like it’s a misplaced boob or something.

My face is kind of broken out right now. I’m 30 years old, and my face is kind of broken out. What is that about? Damnit.

If you tell me to stop biting my nails when I have a really important hangnail that I’m working on, I get really pissed and take it personally.

I dance like a stripper, only I don’t take my clothes off. It’s because when I was in college, I had a friend who was a stripper, and she taught us all her moves. Whenever a Prince song comes on, I can’t contain myself, no matter who’s in the room, even my mother. I have to bust out the stripper moves. I usually require a chair or a pole or a human being as a prop.

I think that’s everything you should know.

That being said, see you tonight!

Scene: Show at the Black Cat. Member of band is pregnant.

Me: “Pregant women are really beautiful.

November’s roommate: “Pregnant women are incredibley beautiful. If I could, I would impregnate every women on the planet because they are so beautiful.”

Me: “Wow. That would be really exhausting. For everyone involved.”

I was just having visions of a conveyor belt type of a process. I mean, that’s a lot of impregnating.

What I tried to do was, I tried to go through the last 16 months of the blog and find some of the very greatest comments. I ended up staying up way past my bedtime, which has given me a grand headache this morning, for which I cannot complain, because I brought this on myself.

It was impossible. Completely and totally impossible. I found some good examples, but the best weren’t single comments, they were discussions, where you guys wrote 500-to-1,000-word essays and talked back and forth about the politics of gender, gun control, female genital mutilation. And convinced another commenter that he was bi, not straight, told one of my dates to go to hell,
debated the definition of fidelity, posted the entire lyrics to “You’ve Lost that Lovin’ Feelin’”, and wrote down some very personal, vulnerable, honest stuff.

We talked about the birth of my niece and the death of my dad. My dad is even on this blog, in the comment section, and he signed it “Love, Dad.”

There was the now-infamous “Usually I find a simple ‘want to fuck me in the ass?’ works well in getting the message across…”, which we just shortened to F_in_the_A. There was the kind of thing people don’t usually say in a somewhat public sphere: “I was sexually assaulted as a 7 y.o. 2d grader while on my way home from school. I often wonder what affect, if any, that has had on me. I believe my confidence was shaken as a young child but that it bounced back as I matured physically during my teenage years.”

There was shit that made me pee-pee laugh: “Screw that!!! What is sex, without a nice cheese tray???” and “When sex toys are outlawed, only outlaws will have sex toys. You can pry my dildo from my cold, dead hand. Unless you’re into necrophilia in which case get the hell away from me!”

There was shit that made me really, really angry: “um, ’spooge’? I honestly didn’t know males over 15 used that word. I wouldn’t have put my head in my hands. I would have made a quiet exit. In my experience, guys who talk like that in front of women have a lack of respect for women. Coincidence maybe, but I think not. But I’m glad you like it - and apparently others, too - or those poor guys would have no one to have sex with. And frustrated military guys aren’t good for the country.” I thought only pimps insuated that women are nothing but relief holes. Apparently, other women do it too.

There were those times when I thought I was hilarious and you guys did not think I was hilarious: “Self is too insecure and desperate for attention to realize that random men can and will “compliment” anyone who is apparently female between the ages of first menses and menopause. Self is a disgrace to the millions of other women everywhere who must deal with unwelcome street harassment on a daily basis.”

Mostly, I just couldn’t believe how much we will talk to each other if we’re just given a safe space.

Meet me at the 18th St. Lounge. Not Adams Mill Grill. I had fantasies of sitting outside at Adams Mill, but due to the unanticipated return of winter, I will be at 18th St. Lounge.

Time: 7 p.m. (that’s the soonest I can get there)
Date: April 13
Place: 18th St. Lounge.

I’ll see you then.

…at Adams Mill Bar & Grill.

For my very own victory-lap/going-away party at 7 p.m. this Friday.

Come eat, drink, and make merry to celebrate all the fun we’ve had.

These are, in no particular order, some of my favorites. In my walk down memory lane, these are a few that stuck out in my mind, for one reason or another. Some that I loved, and some that you loved, for one reason or another. Here is the love list.

Posts That Make You LOL (IMHO):

The War of the Worlds Guide to Dating
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 12:08 PM ON MAR. 3, 2006
…At this point, a girl can’t shit around with amateurs. The threat of global warming and global conflict is all up in our grill. A girl’s got to think about that shit. War of the Worlds could happen, and then where the hell would I be? No one’s going to be banging down the door for a writer when bloody veins and electrical squid are fucking shit up all over the place. What am I going to do, write a haiku?…I’m going to have to be a stripper or the village whore or something.

The Cuban Urination Incident
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 2:12 PM ON AUG. 29, 2006
They love me at Habana Village. They really do.

Posts That I Think Are Hot:

Lasting Less Than 30 Seconds
My, my, how his voice cuts me off at the knees. He’s left me a voicemail that lasts less than 30 seconds and I’m already thinking of how that voice will sound when he’s on top, and his mouth is pressed against my ear, whispering something divinely dirty. Less than 30 seconds and my skin is warming beneath my dress.

Fuck It Out of You

Quotables—Posts That Wrote Themselves:

It’ll Be Syphilis

Jesus Doesn’t Care About You

A Three-Year-Old on Love

Posts About My Love For Men:

Shower
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 4:01 PM ON JUL. 17, 2006
Men, when they are just out of the shower, are disarming. It’s that scent of clean skin and the softness that is usually reserved for intimate, privileged parts of the body, like bellies and the backs of knees.

Men: An Expression of Gratitude
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 5:43 PM ON JAN. 5, 2006
A single strip of muscle, starting at the pubic bone and stretching over the hip.
Dress shirts pulled across broad shoulders.
Broad shoulders that narrow to the waistline of faded Levis.

Posts That Make Me LOL At My Own Self:

Epidemic
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 11:11 AM ON JUL. 10, 2006
The variety of good ideas I had on Friday night are lined up like a row of suspects on my credit-card receipt. Oh, look there’s that round of shots.

Isn’t It Obvious?
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 3:07 PM ON MAR. 19, 2007
I’m at the airport checking in for my flight home from Austin. The nice lady at the counter is telling me my reservation doesn’t exist.

Posts That Chronicle My Most Significant Heartbreak:

The Give and Take
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 12:06 PM ON MAY. 31, 2006
What will you take when your father dies?
You will take a handful of his pipe tobacco, sealed in a jar, and you will carry it to your apartment on the other side of the country. When you need to, you will crack open the jar, and breathe. And then you will hold your breath and hope your mother doesn’t move any of his things until you are done with them, until you have decided what you want to take. Because, of course, you will never be done with them.

Intheeventofavalidheartbreak
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 6:10 PM ON JUN. 14, 2006
It is so odd, when your dad dies, when something of such gravity comes to pass, to continue on with everything the way it was before. It is so odd to moan about the state of your apartment and bitch about men, when, in the very front of your mind, you are thinking, I’m changed. None of these things seem to fit anymore. Something is very, very different.
You start writing about sex again and it seems oh-so-trivial. The sex and the games and all the lies we tell. None of it means a goddamn.

Posts That Make Me LOL, But Not Necessarily Everyone Else:

Roots
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 8:20 PM ON DEC. 11, 2006
Riding crops are not roots.

Absolutely Not Famous
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 11:23 AM ON MAR. 14, 2007
“Girl, stay here, I’m gonna see what the deal is,” my panty friend said.

Posts That Are A Real And/Or Raw:

Worn Thin
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 9:19 AM ON MAR. 30, 2006
Just for a minute, the phone calls had me tricked. Because the only reason you would call was if you wanted to talk to me. Right?
I’m a bit embarrassed at how long it took me to figure it out. Silly girl.
You call me when you’re on your way to the metro. You call me when you’re on the bus, or on your way home. You call me when you’re on your way to somewhere else.

Burial Spot
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 7:56 PM ON APR. 4, 2006
At the time, writing you down seemed like too much of a compliment. Giving you that physical space on paper and on the World Wide Web seemed like it would boost your ego a bit too much. But this is the way I pray, so this was written down.
Posts That I Liked For Whatever Reason:

In My Hair
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 5:24 PM ON DEC. 14, 2005
It’s all so deliciously simple some times. Expose a little cleavage and you’re suddenly the table centerpiece. Laugh with a bright smile and men respond like retrievers. Let down the mass of auburn curls and they crawl through it, get tangled up, and, if allowed, build a nest.

Not Your Boyfriend’s Jacket
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 5:11 PM ON NOV. 16, 2006
The best part about dog-sitting at his house is the jacket.

My Editor Really Liked This Post:

The Men In My Life
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 3:46 PM ON OCT. 31, 2006
It’s an old-fashioned barber shop, a man’s man barber shop, with a blue-and-red-and-white-striped spiral outside and a man armed with an electric razor and trimming scissors inside. There are men lined up in the barber chairs, and postcards of women in G-string bikinis “wishing you were here” stuck into the edges of the mirrors.
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 10:44 AM ON NOV. 27, 2006

The First Post Ever:

The Manifesto
POSTED BY MELANIE BOYER AT 8:00 AM ON DEC. 1, 2005
Pony up the proverbial belt with the notches, boys: We’d like to use it tie you up. The playing field is finally even, and from our side of the bed the view is wickedly divine.

It has been suggested to me that my dating life will improve once the curtain falls on the blog.

One would hope. Frankly, It can’t really do anthing but improve.

The reasoning is that when men discover the blog, they either:

1. Run away from me
2. Run towards me, and they do this for
3. exactly the same reason in both cases.

We shall see.

It had to be done.

I resisted; I did everything I could. I listened to the advice of my friends. I visualized the wrath that would be heaped upon me should I go through with it.

I did it anyway.

I had to cut the rogue piece of bangs that appeared after my last haircut. It was too long, it curled oddly, it simply wasn’t working. It had to go.

You know what this means.

“What are we going to tell The Man?” I asked Chocolate-Chip Eater. The Man is our hairstylist. “He’s going to know. We’re going to have to tell him I was attacked by a rival stylist.”

“What have you done?” she asked.

My God, I don’t know.

We both have bangs now. There the new hip thing, you know. Everybody’s doing it.

After acquiring my own personal set of bangs, she informed me there were also a form of voodoo gris gris that attracts men who want to commit to you.

“I swear,” she told me. “Everyone I know who got bangs suddenly had a boyfriend two weeks later.”

Bangs = boyfriend. Who knew?

That was not the case for me. I got bangs and two weeks later had nothing but hair in my eyes to show for it. So it goes.

The Man can simply never find out what I’ve done to his masterpiece. Because that’s what it is. He was an architect before he chucked it all to be a hair stylist, so he’s very precise about his work.

And we all remember the way he reacted to my fingernails. The way he berated me and told me I simply would never find a man who find me attractive with fingernails like mine. It was fairly crushing.

Chocolate Chip Eater regulalry texts me now and says things like “When are we going to get manicures? No man will ever love me with hands like this.”

We’ve had manicures two weeks in a row now. One could argue that it’s helping in my case. One finger at a time, friends, one finger at a time.

And now, to top off my fingernail recovery program, I have to hide whenever I am in the neighborhood of my hair salon. Because he’ll know. He’ll sense it, even from a distance. He’ll come out and tell me no man will ever love me with bangs like that.

And yet to top it off even more, the pink-and-black polka-dotted thigh-highs I bought at the burlesque sex-toy party have proven to be not exactly what I expected. I wore them to work yesterday, because that’s the kind of saucy, irreverent girl I am. I wear polka-dotted thigh-highs to the office.

But alas, the pink is so pale, and the nylon is so sheer, that it is dangerously close to the color of my white Irish skin. Hence the black polka dots look like a nasty-ass case of Black Plague Chicken Pox.

Not. Hot.

What have I done? In ending my tenure as the resident dating blogger, I have rendered myself persona non grata in the eyes of my hair stylist, I have painted my stubby fingernails red, so they look like little red hots, and have purchased Black Plague Chicken Pox thigh-highs.

No man will ever love me with bangs, hands, and thigh highs like this.