"If You Can Only Have One Great Love," 2nd Edition

Executives, regardless of self-sufficiency and perceived coolness, are a crazy breed. The JackieOh whirlwind assistant tour of Nice Hedge Fund has taken me through eight (count ‘em, eight) execs and will conclude in a few short weeks – just when things are getting interesting.

I like working for The Son of Mister Nice Hedge Fund. I should have applied for this position months ago when C left and I could have saved the HR Ladies from half a dozen Temp-induced headaches. It’s possible that I only enjoy this role because I’m so far out the door already, but I figure that if you have to be someone’s assistant you’re better off if that someone is as close to the top as possible.

So I got an email from the home assistant yesterday. The Son is in Europe for the board meeting with his family and like anyone in the history of people traveling somewhere, they forgot a few personal items. The list of oh-so-crucial forgotten items, and I quote:

Two black adult baseball caps
One bottle of pump spray sun screen
One cable for the camera
One pair of SPANX that are nude and waist high as opposed to being longer and going up past the rib cage
One regular black bra
One regular white jog bra (Champion)

Now, any normal person would, you know, head to the hotel gift shop for some sunscreen and tourist trap baseball caps. The undergarments might be a little trickier to wrangle, but SPANX? Oh honey, maybe eat a little less before trying to squeeze into that cocktail dress or work on the art of sucking in. Clearly, these aren’t normal people we’re dealing with here. These are billionaires, and they demand their own baseball caps! So the home assistant sent me their bag of crap via messenger, and I had to ask Easiest to please add it to his personal luggage. The entire exchange required nineteen emails involving five people.

I’d like to amend my Life Plan to marrying rich, but not helplessly, perspective-lessly rich.

Speaking of Life Plan, mine is finally starting to pull together. I drove down to Maryland last week and signed a lease on a nice one-bedroom apartment near campus, so that’s a huge stressy blob off my mind. Coach G decreed this past Sunday Jackie Day, and we started off the morning with yet another victory for Team Drinkin’ for the Kids in a relay biathlon. Later we went kayaking in the Hudson with a view of the Statue of Liberty and all I could think was how am I going to leave all this?

I’m leaving the Midtown Holding Pattern, and that of course raises The Break-Up Question. I don’t want to just cut off this relationship because I’m leaving – I want to say that I’ll visit whenever I can and things are going so well so don’t we owe it to each other to try the distance thing? Maybe we’ll be together again next summer, or maybe in two years after the program ends. But this is New York City I’m talking about here, and she’s a tempestuous lover. We’ve had our ups and downs these past six years, but I wouldn’t undo a single thing. (Okay, maybe I’d eliminate the robbery, or find lower rent while I’m in fantasy land, but otherwise, it's been a great relationship.) Even if it doesn’t work out while I’m four hours away at school, I hope we end up together in the future. When it’s right you know it, and feelings like these don’t just evaporate into the air above Ninth Avenue.

It's Not Me, It's You

So. Bike racing.

I haven’t written too much about it (yet) for several reasons. First, it’s been damningly frustrating so far. I got out of bed at 4:30AM and lined up for a race (the solitary girl in a sea of be-spandexed men) only to get dropped from the pack instantly because I couldn’t keep up. So I worked harder. I got out of bed again at 4:30AM and lined up for a race (this time in a field of beginner women like me) and felt strong, confident even, until some chick took out my back wheel on Cat Hill and ended my race. I rode home very slowly that morning with a non-functioning back brake, several broken spokes, and a bruised sense of determination. But I’m not giving up.

Second, I’ve been hesitant to abandon my runner roots. For over six years now I’ve tried to quit running, but that itch to lace up my sneakers and hit the pavement time and time again just won’t be scratched. I was a Lady Ford, then a Fighting Violet and now, a Screaming Yellow and if those team nicknames aren’t enough to make me quit this painful sport I don’t know what is. But when I injured my hip in April and it seemed like running and I were doomed for yet another breakup, cycling was there for me. It was the first time a NO RUNNING doctor’s order wasn’t accompanied by feelings of depression.

Maybe it was the bum hip that hurt when I did everything but cycle, or maybe it was the burglary that made me realize how important my bike was to me, but something changed in me and I started to feel more like JackieOh, Cyclist. I’d like to have a few words with whatever it was because cycling must be the most expensive sport on the planet and now I’m hooked. When I was home last weekend I bought a new road bike, a sexy red carbon fiber number with better components that feels like it was made just for me. Last month I fell in love with track racing at the Kissena Velodrome in Queens and bought a used Fetish fixie from one of the guys I met racing there. Gearing up for the fall season, I ordered a hideously yellow Cyclocross bike through Nice Hedge Fund’s discount program. Finally, rounding out this obsessive little buying streak, I’m trying to get my hands on a cheap beater bike for riding around the city and on campus in a few weeks. It’s a good thing I’m moving because my lovely little Midtown apartment isn’t big enough for this hobby.

After eight weeks of physical therapy, my hip has healed and I’m starting to regain pelvic strength. I can run again, so I’m told, but I just…don’t want to. I thought I’d be so excited for that post-injury run, to feel the spring in my step that can only come from taking nearly ten weeks off. Usually six or eight weeks off is all I need for my sieve of a memory to forget the pain, but not this time. Sorry, baby, I’ve taken up with someone new. He’s just different, that’s all, but my favorite part of the day is waking up to him. Cycling and I are really happy together, I hope you can understand.

Back in a Big Way

I need a new watch. I need many new things lately, few of which cost less than a thousand dollars, so a watch has a pretty low purchasing pole position. Still, I feel like I can handle this minute task of buying a new watch, especially compared to, say, the death-defying duty of buying a new (used) car. My digital running watch drowned in the Atlantic during the triathlon, my dress watch went the way of my bike and my computer, and I’ve been late for everything since.

I’ll probably buy a watch with an integrated heart rate monitor because I’m a grown-up athlete now and apparently grown-up athletes pay attention to stuff like that. But then today I was reading Fat Cyclist and I came across an ad banner for Freestyle watches. Holy cow, Shark watches are back? Man, I had the coolest purple and turquoise Shark watch when I was younger – with the Velcro fabric strap! – and I wore it with my Hang Ten t-shirts and Adidas winter jacket with the three stripes down the sleeves like every other Middle School student. So if anyone out there would like to fund my nostalgia, this purple/orange/yellow baby has JackieOh written all over it. Now if only I could round up a functioning Hypercolor t-shirt and some reruns of Hey Dude…