Mess by Molly

When Marisa and I were in our mid-twenties, we took what was then a relatively inexpensive trip to Fiji and Australia. You know the kind, the package deal, 9 days airfare and hotel for something like $900. The affordability was due to it being our summer and their winter but we didn’t know any better. We were simply eager to travel, sign us up.  And, the more people who shared a room, the less expensive it was, so we recruited one of my work colleagues, a high-strung marathon runner, to join us. Given his energetic nature, we believed he’d be a perfect fit. 

Our first stop was Fiji. It stormed the entire time; so, we couldn’t explore the white-sand beaches or swim in the turquoise waters.  Marisa and I made a LOT of piña coladas out of pineapples.  We hung out in the bar with the other guests, we danced, we made new friends, and even got invited to a wedding.  

However, by the third rainy day, my work colleague, who in addition to sharing a room with us was also sober, had a meltdown. He couldn’t take Marisa and me because all we did, is “get drunk and retell the same childhood stories.”  Who cared that we met when we were 12, tennis prodigies squaring off in the finals of San Diego tournaments?  Grunting loudly was not something to be proud of.  He’d never heard of these famous tennis playing twins Marisa dated with two first names- Mike Bryan?   No wonder our Notre Dame tennis coach nicknamed us Double Trouble; because that is what we were and not in a good way.  He was surprised we even made it to practice the way we partied.

I suspect my ex-work colleague wouldn’t be bored of our stories now 20 plus years later, because if there is one certainty about Marisa it’s that she packed several lifetimes of fun into her 46 years on this planet.     

Marisa and I met through tennis when we were 12 soon after I moved to California.  Her reputation was fierce, a mini-Beyonce, with her thick braided hair and sprayed up bangs peaking out from behind a white visor.  In our first major final, I learned several lessons that would come to define our lifelong friendship. First was her undefeatable warrior spirit.  She LOVED to win and HATED to lose.  Her tenaciousness and determination carried her from the top rankings of the national junior tennis circuit to become the best sales rep in the country, to the most excellent advocate for herself in her hard-fought battle with cancer.  In the end, she reminded us all that she won an 11 additional years of life. 

When the doctor first gave her ONE more year to live, she created an elaborate bucket list:  front row Justin Timberlake, J.Lo in Vegas and exotic travel.  After the one-year mark passed, I’ll be honest, her bucket list started getting expensive.   I want to go out fighting like that, living every moment to the fullest.   

Going back to that pivotal first final, our rallies were so intense that neither one of us called the ball out when it was close to the line.  Now this is unheard of, an anomaly for sure. Most opponents call close balls OUT and take the point as theirs.  Marisa was intimidating, so I was extra nice, but the more generous I was to her, the more she was to me, and it evolved into one lifelong virtuous cycle. 

That same match we split sets and had a mandatory 10-minute break. Marisa went to the restroom and returned with a footlong Subway sandwich. She offered me half.   The point isn’t that she ate a footlong Subway sandwich in the middle of a three-hour tennis match, which is totally unheard of, but that her generosity was fundamental to her character.  She often volunteered to dog sit when I traveled for work sometimes feeding my dog burritos to the detriment of her carpet and she befriended my 80 yr old uncle after a tragic motorcycle accident left him paralyzed, taking him to lunch when I never once did.

That friendship we established on the tennis court as children grew deeper through our time together in college. My favorite story from those years was when Marisa confided in me that she had a crush on a fencing player named Luke.  We were in her dorm room when she asked me an existential question.  

Molly, do you believe in fate?  Do you think Luke and I are meant to be?    

I do, she confided,  I believe if it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be.     

And then, she picked up her phone, dialed Luke and successfully asked him out. 

I’ve never laughed so hard.  Sometimes the universe was too slow for Marisa. Sometimes, she helped fate along.   

One final story; in the mid-2000s I lived in Hong Kong when Marisa came to visit with her then boyfriend.  They were staying at a hotel and in the middle of the night she called:

 “Molly, Brady and I broke up, can I come stay with you?”  

“Of course.”   When she arrived, I was concerned, “what happened?”  

She was livid. He had the gall to question her about spending over $2000 of her own money on a designer purse. He felt it was unnecessarily extravagant.  Who did he think he was?  She stranded him in Hong Kong, never to look back. 

That night the lesson I learned had nothing to do with the necessity of expensive purses because I already knew that.  It was about being true to yourself no matter the consequences.  Marisa was an independent soul, hilariously marching to the beat of her own drum.  

I was in Dubai the day she passed.  Her last words to me via text were,  “I love you Molly Gavin. Until we meet again.”

I love you too Marisa, so much.  Rest in peace, my blue butterfly.