He kisses me, surprisingly hard. I flush with excitement and kiss back. I can feel his hands on my back, my lower back… my backside…watch it buddy…and I am suddenly aware of something odd.
His tongue is long. Weirdly long. Gene Simmons long. I’m going to choke to death right here on the hot Miami asphalt. And this odd realization somehow snaps me back to reality. I have to be up in four hours. Okay, Monica, say goodnight to the hot Cuban gentleman and go to bed. And I do. Numbers exchanged, both knowing this is a total act of futility, since I live several states away, but nevertheless there sit the ten new digits on my phone. It was a delightful evening chatting with Mr. Hot Guy who works in finance.
I card into the now empty lobby, and purchase a two a.m. snack from the medicine cabinet of a mini store, and saunter back to my room, spent and happy. My balcony door is wide open. Warm, balmy air wafts through my room, as I crunch a few pretzels and gaze blankly over the city, deep in the thoughts that happen at two in the morning after a new experience.
The night life in Miami is prolific, and it was stupid easy to find a neighborhood bar to tumble into near the hotel. I quickly discovered there are so many visitors to Florida that outsiders are common, and quite welcome. Right off, I made friends with a few of the gaggle of businessmen invading the bar and spilling out onto the pavement, one of whom I particularly connected with and found myself kissing in the wee hours of the morning.
I love the open air feel everywhere in Miami. Open doors, open windows, open late, all with this magnificently steamy sultry air breezing through. It makes me want to take my clothes off and run around like a crazed maniac, a naked dancer in the moonlight praising the god of Humidity. I sip water out on my balcony before climbing in bed, and when I finally do, I am grateful for my own company. I thank the Universe, God, L. Ron Hubbard, whomever I can think of for this incredible contentment I feel. (I’m kidding about L. Ron. No hate mail, please.)
The great advantage in being alone is your own thoughts, your own guidance, your own everything. You can become your own best friend, which is great, because that way, your very best friend and confidante is always with you. I recall learning about self-comfort, a skill learned early on by psychologically healthy children. I have to point this out so y’all don’t think I’m nuts (I may be, but that’s a different story.). I learn to encourage myself, comfort myself, I even talk to myself in second person: ”You did a great job on that, Monica, go, girl!!” “ Come on, Monica, get up, you have hit that snooze button eight times now!” “Get the black one, the red one makes your ass look weird.” “Monica, do NOT get involved with that pothead at the end of the bar.” I feel I’m learning this at last… at 50.
Even as I am writing today, I am alone in my own apartment, and it’s pretty great. Sunlight streaming in, fuzz throw, leggings, sweatshirt, slippers. With trusty sidekicks Laptop and Sunflower Coffee Mug by my side, I tap tap tap out my life story. It is a lovely day, worthy in every way of Bill Withers’ vocal dedication.
I wake up too-soon later, and jump out of bed in excited anticipation, in spite of my late night shenanigans. As I shower, I consider last night, chatting with lively folks at the bar, talking, laughing, being a part of humanity. As the steam rises around me, I’m thinking of the rather beautiful gentleman who kissed me at the end of the night. Quite a nice kickoff to Monica’s Mad Miami adventure. I towel off and step into Layer #1.
Having been forewarned profusely that it is sub-zero chilly at any Tony Robbins event, I am probably more prepared than most for this event, in possession of all my Wisconsin layers and winter gear. Folks, we know how to do cold.
The hotel lobby is already bustling with people getting ready to go to this event. I invite myself into the conversation, and quickly make friends with a smoking hot redhead. She is a businesswoman looking to expand her AirBNB business, and we are fast friends, chatting instantly about the impact of this event on our relative businesses. I load ten much more useful digits on my phone than last night, and we grab an Uber over to a massive stadium on the coast… who plays there again? Miami something…OH wait. Indoors-it must be basketball. There’s a giant meteor looking thing in the middle… HEAT!! Miami Heat. Apologies to those of you who are offended I had no clue who this was (Yes, I had to look it up). It’s a massive stadium, there are 13,000 people at this event, and we make our way to the nosebleed seats.
Tony Robbins… is doing well.
After two hours of cheerleading preamble by his minions, he is finally onstage. Say what you want about him, there was a ton I learned that day… business, confidence, presenting yourself to the world, making your life amazing. The session was an ample thirteen hours long with a few short breaks, and by the end we were kind of whipped into a frenzy (my pal the hypnotist would have had a field day studying the psychological aspects) and at one AM, thousands of people poured out into the hot Miami evening to do his trademark walk across hot coals.
Catwalk runs of glowing embers are everywhere outside. He had spent the last hour explaining how it works, and how to do this without the risk of becoming Darth Vader. I am excited, and a bit apprehensive, as I approach the burning coals. The run is about twenty feet long, but it’s twenty feet of orange coals. It’s not fake, I can feel the heat radiating from them as I watch person after person in an ever shortening line in front of me do the Walk of Fire. My stomach flips in a jumbled combination of excitement and panic.
It is finally my turn, and, as instructed, I look straight at the volunteer standing in front of me, beyond twenty feet of what looks like is going to fry my feet. Monica, it’s what’s for dinner. I count with her “One…two… THREE!!” and not running, but not exactly standing still either, and in this bizarre pumped-up weirdly adrenaline-powered state of Zen, I steadily walk the twenty feet of hot coals.
I feel nothing.
And this gets chalked up in Bizarre Experiences I’ve Had That Make No Sense Whatsoever. It’s the strangest thing, I could feel the heat before I stepped onto the coals, but felt absolutely nothing as I walked directly on them. Some people have burned feet. There’s some crazy mind-over-matter shit going on here, and it’s rather fascinating, though I don’t have a lot of time to consider it. I am in a sea of thousands, a waterfall of humanity pouring out of this event at last.
Released into the wild, bearing a jam-packed brain oversaturated from fourteen hours of mental drinking from a firehose, I climb into my Uber, complaining to my driver that everything will be closed soon. I’m wayy too pumped up to go to bed. He laughs, and brings me good tidings of great joy, the bars in Miami are open till five.
God Bless Miami!!
Miami is everything I was hoping Los Angeles would be and absolutely wasn’t. When we took our ill-fated journey to L.A. so many years ago, there was little I liked about it, and thought Florida might be similar. Nope, not at all.
I disliked L.A. just as much as I’m adoring Miami at the moment. I feel like I’ve come home. I tell the Uber driver to take me someplace fun, and he takes me on a tour around the places he says have the best night life. We drive past club after club, flashing lights, thumping subwoofers, and barely dressed women with breasts wayy bigger than mine and faces far more expensive lining the pavement everywhere. I just wanna dance away my sky-high energy after spending all day listening to the Big Guru speak. I see people spilling out of a bustling nightclub: “Drop me off HERE!!” and I walk in totally faking that I belong here, and wave, and smile, and order a drink. I chat up the people at the bar. They are friendly and awesome. For a while the music is typical club music, but after a bit, the music changes to delicious syncopated Cuban rhythms, and I sit in awe as salsa dancers take the floor. I watch for like two minutes before I am begging them to teach me to salsa.
For years I taught what I thought was salsa in group exercise classes, and one thing is clear.
I most absolutely and definitely have no idea how to salsa.
I always did this hippy-swingy thing, but the motion is a lot more subtle, and higher up, just under the ribcage. I spend over an hour in my futile attempt to make my ribcage move correctly. I never do get it right. These people have double-jointed backs, I’m sure of it.
It is four am and day two of the conference is fast approaching.
I Uber to the hotel and collapse in bed, my head swimming with the day’s events.
I am exponentially stronger.
I will already never be the same.
…and this was just the first day.
Worship Leader Gone Wild 