Like Serene, I am smitten…

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When the new cast actually got a minute to sit down, get settled, and have a conversation about how we planned on portraying our lives on Jet Set Zero, we came to the conclusion that we wanted to be completely and utterly honest.

One of the hardest things to be honest about are our relationships while on the road.  For the most part, we don’t have any problem divulging all the gritty details of our lives, but when it comes to relationships, it can get tricky because that begins to involve other people in what we’re doing.  We’re four pretty liberal girls, and yes, when we’re out on the road, there’s a pretty likely chance that we may get involved with some men.  So here’s my honest story of how things went for me in Turkey:
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The price for getting to travel the world is steeper than you may wish to pay.  And it’s not just measured in dollars.

This episode was excruciatingly hard for us to put together.  It took everything I had emotionally to keep watching Rob’s confessions over and over again, and I’ve been dreading the impact it will have on him when he has to relive those experiences while watching the episode.  Never before have I been faced with real moral and emotional consequence in my line of work, and the process has been a bittersweet.

When I took on the job of primary editor/producer for JS0 it was a mostly carefree decision.  I was basically unattached to the world and had some money saved away so I could take whatever job I wanted at the time.  I chose to tell the story of 4 people having an adventure because it sounded like fun, but in the course of working with them over the past 6 months the experience has turned into something far more complex.  Not only are we all friends now (though I’ve never even met some of the team in person), but the story is getting more and more serious, and the act of retelling it is having a greater impact on my life.

This episode especially: I’m still recovering from a relationship that ended almost a year ago.  More accurately I’m not recovering from it, and hearing the numerous parallel’s with Rob’s situation has been stirring my demons.  The unique challenges of editing very painful material concerning a friend’s life, the events of which remind you horrifically of your own, has made the past two weeks completely surreal.

Wherever he is, I hope Rob is finding some closure right now: for both our sakes.

My marriage ended in October. Tomorrow it’ll be one month and twenty six days. I’ve written fifty-seven different eulogies, and I start over every time. I haven’t found the kind of language that does it justice, or even a way to communicate how I feel.

Tomorrow will be Thanksgiving, and it feels oddly symbolic. Tonight, there’ll be no shopping, no oven, no pies. We won’t fall asleep together. I won’t spend tomorrow with family, walking the dog, watching football, setting the table. I won’t pour her a second glass of wine or eat two helpings of dessert. There’s no house to clean when we’re done.

Tomorrow I should be thankful. After all, she’ll be happier this way– but I feel lost, angry, regretful. I feel that this has been the biggest failure of my life. And most of the time I feel nothing.

After three Thanksgivings together, it’s hard to remember the day otherwise. We started traditions, saved recipes, took pictures. We had a box for the champagne corks we got on our anniversaries with two inside. We rented movies on Friday night.

It’s good to be in Saigon on Thanksgiving, lost with friends who are all lost too. I can’t be reminded of it here. I’m a thousand miles from the snow, ten thousand from the blanket, and further from the beating heart beneath it. It’s cold in Minnesota, colder in Saigon.