Baby, hold on to me ...

It's the last day of 2009 and as I sit in my warm apartment next to my odd little dog watching the rain-snow hybrid that may or may not impede today's travel plans, it seems the right time to make resolutions. I have one this year: to do everything a little bit better. Everything. I want to work better, write better, make better coffee, cancel fewer appointments, take my vitamins more often than not, drink less, exercise more, take Louie on longer walks, sleep better, be more patient, cook a little bit, watch better movies, read more, keep better tabs on my money, speak better French, learn more Russian, and so on. I have the dubious advantage of turning a new year at the same time as most of the western world, and a few nights ago I rang in the end of my 30s with a great group of friends old and new. And a very diverse group. And it's times like these -- as well as the lovely, intimate Christmas I had with my family -- that I realize what a tremendous amount I actually have if I could just trust it, nurture it, and stop being paralyzed by imperfection.

I will always have my dark side but it needn't have me -- I can weather the lows as gracefully as I can the highs; at this point it's a choice. I know so well what it feels like to hibernate, to shut down productivity because, well, I have this thing that's wrong with me sometimes where my moods don't fit the situation at hand and much easier to hide under my pillows than it is to face the world. I do dysfunctional beautifully -- I'm a pro -- and I don't think I need to prove this anymore so that the world cuts me some slack. I've been given plenty of slack. It's time to move onto the next phase.

Part of this is being kinder and more patient with myself. Somewhere along the way I adopted this all or nothing attitude without really thinking it through. I don't consciously decide after, say, not working out for two weeks that I will see how slothlike I can become before something (event? reunion? vacation?) forces me to "get in shape" in a hurry and I become obsessive about it. Nor do I decide after month or two of avoiding my novel-in-progress that I will wait another four months until, in a fit of confidence I read over the last bit I've written and realize it isn't actually terrible.

In the interest of being realistic, I am not going to resolve to work out five days a week/write 500 words a day/ update this thing every day/ never spend another day wallowing in chemical imbalance and hiding from the world ... instead, I resolve to do the good things more often and the "bad" things less. And maybe in treating myself better, I'll be a better friend/daughter/sister/mom/girlfriend/tenant/neighbor than ever before.

I wish for all of you a 2010 that shines with inspiration and possibility and the strength and patience to make it work for you.

Words

Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be doing at that moment. -Robert Benchley

I think I've made updating this blahg more stressful than need be, by setting a precedent with the photos. That's the part that can be the most time-consuming (choosing and uploading) ... in fact, I am a writer, so I should be comfortable with simply writing, right? Right.

Okay then. However, at the moment I have three book proposals to work on, a review to write, and a website to editorialize. And so, with the knowledge that I can once again use this as a forum for procrastination, I will have to do so later...

Then again ...

My dear friend Ivy, who reminds me in the pic above of Catherine Deneuve in Repulsion, called me this afternoon to see how I'm feeling. She asked what I'm taking and when I told her, she said, "Fuck that -- I'm bringing you some good old fashioned western medicine. If you grow a third arm you'll be a better piano player."

She appeared a short time later with a care package of Claritin D, Advil, Robitussen, Afrin, Vicks Vaporub, Puff's Plus, Cosmo and People.

I'm starting to feel better. Must be the neti pot.

Hot and sour soup for the soul

I don't get sick often -- as in colds, flu, that sort of thing. This week I came down with a full-on cold, the week before the largest event for which I have ever been single-handedly responsible. That would be Neil's surprise 50th -- I can say this, because my darling luddite has no idea how to find this blahhhggg.

As such, I have made a full-time job out of trying to get well, using every remedy that's ever been suggested to me. These include but are not limited to:

-Going to the doctor to learn that they have not yet found a cure for the common cold
-Chicken soup
-Hot and sour soup
-Ginger tea with cayenne and lemon juice
-Regular tea with honey and lemon
-Gypsy Cold Cure(tm) tea, by the potful
-Dandelion tea, also by the potful*
-Vitamin C
-Airborne
-This homepathic sugary substance one ingests sublinguallly
-So much garlic it's absurd
-A neti pot (I know, but you get used to it)
-Something called Wellness Formula, in which I have high hopes
-Tons of water (with lemon, of course)
-Sleep
-Exercise
-Skipping exercise
-Prayer

The end result? There is still no cure for the common cold.

That said, God willing, Saturday will be wonderful and Neil will be happy.

*full disclosure -- this is more for slimming purposes, to eliminate the water that all these remedies make one retain. It works!

All we need is love

I'm truly sorry to have written so many mournful posts this year. I am actually having a pretty good one, work, family, man, dog, and self-wise. But death is a part of life; in fact it's the concept that keeps me from being truly calm and centered, the idea of losing those I love and of wasting my own life. I'm working on this.

In the post below I wrote that human resilience never ceases to amaze me (yes, I realize I've just quoted myself, but hear me out on this one). Of equally morbid fascination, though, are the depths to which human ignorance can plummet, and the things that prevail in people's minds.

A 49-year-old man, Jack Price, was attacked last night in Queens because he was gay. He's now in a medically induced coma. I did not know him; I read about him in the news. This is also the anniversary of Matthew Shepard's death.

For lack of anything more erudite to say at this hour, what the fuck?

I just don't get it, on any level.

Whether or not you like Keith Olbermann, please watch this.

Kindness and compassion. That's what it's all about.

Sing of the past as you behold the dawn of hope in my eyes, for
It's magic meaning is a soft bed upon which my heart rests.
-Khalil Gibran

Beautiful girl

A friend of a friend took her life on Thursday. She'd battled very real demons for quite some time, and they finally took over. Not "finally" because it was an inevitability; human resilience never ceases to amaze me. "Finally" because demons can be tenacious, will try with all their might to get the best of us. I mourn the loss of this woman, Annie. I feel like I "get" her.

I've told this to very few people, but last year, winter of 2008, I went through a fairly intensive training program for Samaritans, one of the oldest suicide prevention hotlines in the world. This was, oddly, a credential of sorts - the process for inclusion in this group reads like a reality show; despite how human he was, the director had to be tough. Obviously. Candidates were elminated after each training session. I made it toward the end, and Neil finally asked me if this was a good idea. I have first-hand knowledge of depression which, while not fun, has made me comfortable with some of the darkest human experiences. I am not and have never been suicidal, but I get it. And I wish I could prevent it. But one of the many things I learned while I was in training is that ultimately, insurance and religion aside, it is our right as human beings to choose to end our lives.

This is nothing if not complicated.

I have so much more to say on this topic, but right now I feel like reprinting a poem I've already presented here. I wish I could convey this to Annie, but I can't.

Rest in peace, beautiful girl. May you now find the tranquility that so eluded you in life.

***
Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

-Mary Oliver

Don't let it be forgot ...

that once there was a spot,
for one brief shining moment that was known as
Camelot.

Fare thee well, Senator Kennedy.

I would love to believe that I live in a country that will make you proud by realizing your dream of health care for all.

Honestly, how could one possibly object to this notion? It is nothing short of bewildering.

From the people who brought you ...

...Headless Body Found in Topless Bar

comes my first published book review. Glaring typo on web editor's part notwithstanding, here it is for your amusement.

Summertime dirge

It's a cold, quiet rainy afternoon and the Mr. Softee truck is driving around my neighborhood, playing that creepy, creepy song. It sounds like an antique music box being wound by a ghost. I'm baffled by its apparent success as a marketing tool.

How's that for a comeback?

I just dropped by to say hello ...

Is that the name of it? I loved that album (she says, dating herself) when I lived in San Francisco.

Mark Twain once said, "The coldest winter I've ever spent was summer in San Francisco." He also described New Orleans as, "a beautiful woman with dirty fingernails." Both apt descriptions for two of my homes-away-from.

I realize I haven't written in a while. In an effort to stop apologizing, um ... you know.

I have insomnia (see: timestamp). We are going away tomorrow. Far, far away, to Paris and Florence. Lovely lovely lovely can't wait beautiful cities all that -- I did, actually, break my foot which is a slight hindrance to absolute perfection on this trip. So that's a relief -- I already know it'll be imperfect.

Broken foot as analogy for allowing life to be imperfect. Give it a whirl.

Yes, I've had a glass of wine tonight.

I was telling a new and lovely friend (that's you, Mr. K) today about how I managed to spend yesterday, a beautiful, springlike day following a fabulous week of love and festivity and preceding a potentially amazing vacation, immersed in tears and hiding behind my pal depression. Moods, we've decided, are strange, strange beasts. And it's beyond comforting to know that there are others out there who know and live this too. My sweet friend with whom I dined last night and I shared this realization earlier in the day when we had the following conversation:

LB: It's beautiful out.
VB: I know - it really is.
(pause)
LB: And for some reason, I feel like hiding inside.
VB: OH my god me too. Can we have wine?

It takes a lot of effort to maintain a chaotic mind. But the payoff is fairly huge. If you're reading this and you know me, you're part of the payoff, and I love you.

I'm off to the continent. As my nephew would say, "Von boyage".

Je vous adore.

Ouch

Okay, to the snarky commenter below (smiley face) - I do have something else to write about now, which is that I think I might have broken my foot! Have to wait twenty minutes or so to call the orthopedist, whom I would much rather see than the St. Vincent's Emergency Room staff. I hate emergency rooms. If they're not horrifying they're boring and almost always entail a l-o-n-g and disturbing wait. Blech.

Photo above from Neil's injury last summer, for which he still does daily physical therapy. This is one of the rare times I'd like to be accused of exaggerating and have this accusation prove correct. For many reasons of course, not the least of which is that we've just booked a trip to Paris and Florence for a month from now. Having visited Paris a few years ago with a freshly sprained ankle, I know that this is still doable, but come on ... really?! Hopefully this is another sprain -- these spindly little colt ankles of mine twist very easily -- but either way it hurts like a mofo. And please don't ask me how I might have done this -- it's completely unglamorous and I have a rep to protect.

Bollocks. This sucks.

Natasha Richardson

Farewell, beautiful lady.

Midwinter night

March comes in like a lion ...

Sleeping dog

Into the great wide open

I just left the house for the first time in three days and wow did I need to do that. I was going stir-crazy in here, but really, this has been the most debillitating cold I've had in recent years -- thank goodness it didn't last too long. Today I felt better, finally, and the "fresh" air was amazing. I felt like John Travolta at the end of "The Boy in the Plastic Bubble", though as I recall he emerged from said bubble into a pastoral world of flowering fields and pristine beaches, not a congested block of construction and cab exhaust. Still -- that was about as exhilerated as I've felt in days.

Someone on my floor is cooking bacon. I've heard from several ex-vegetarians that that was the craving that finally pushed them over the edge. Several years ago -- actually, several lifetimes ago -- on my drive across country with my then-love, we stopped off to visit friends in Fort Collins, Colorado. The Mrs. was a recently reformed vegetarian who had heeded the salty, crispy siren's song ... and had since gone the other extreme. I have a vivid memory of her pulling a tray from the oven piled high with burnt strips and offering it to her kid, "More bacon, Jacob?"

Since my bout of illness began I've had some really bizarre, vivid dreams, including the funeral at which Tom Waits (and Madonna) performed. Others: I witnessed a horrible car accident in which one car literally crumbled into another and disappeared; the driver and passenger of the second car were fine, but we all knew not to look back at what what probably lying in the road. I dreamt that my hairstylist (God I hope he never happens upon this) had a side business of giving erotic massages in what looked to be the art studio from my high school; I dreamt that several people I know commuted to work via Coney Island roller coaster ... not the Cyclone which, as I recall, offered almost no shock absorption. This seemed to be a much smoother ride.

I feel like writing tonight and would love to write more here but should probably get to work on a few of the many assignments looming over me. Has my muse returned? I don't want to jinx it by assuming it has, so I'll just go with the flow until the flow is no more.

Morning

Why have I been up since 6AM on a Saturday, when I can barely open my eyes by 9AM during the week, you ask? An excellent question, friend, to which I have no answer. I've had a cold for the past several days and have been in a steady pattern of sleeping and waking and sleeping and waking and have been allowing myself to follow the natural rhythm of things, figuring my body knows what it needs to get better. But really, body, this? You're not going to let me sleep in on a Saturday? What did I ever do to you?

Don't answer that. I'm taking my health a lot more seriously than I ever have before -- not that I've taken it for granted, per se, but I've overlooked certain healthy habits that, as I approach my fourth decade, can no longer be overlooked. Like regular exercise, that sort of thing. And not indulging my every whim. I suppose I have taken it for granted. I don't anymore.

I'm reading The Age of Innocence right now, which Edith Wharton wrote in 1920. And really liking it. I want to be back on a reading kick. My mother, by the way, is one of the preeminent collectors of Edith Wharton (first editions), and so hers is a name I've known since nearly as long as I can remember. Yet somehow this is the first of her books that I'm reading. Good stuff.

Okay, I'm going to attempt to capture a few more hours. Two nights ago I had a dream that I was at the funeral of a gal around my age who had killed herself by jumping into the Thames, and Tom Waits performed at the service. He sounded great.

This just popped into my head, one of my favorites:

Stars shining bright above you,
Night breezes seem to whisper I love you,
Birds singing in the sycamore trees,
Dream a little dream of me...

At this point, I'd be happy to dream a little dream about anybody. Really. Even this guy -- remember this guy? I learned a few things about him recently, which I will share soon:


Holy smokes I'm exhausted. Going to give it another shot...

One down ...

So, this happened.

I'll write more later today. This time I mean it. Right now I must edit.

2009

Oh my goodness it's been a long time. So long I feel like I'm starting anew. The muse was on an extended vacation following a busy holiday season of parties and stress. That was my running excuse for a while; when I learned that Mercury was in retrograde, a new alibi was born.

That said, 'twill be a wee bit longer, this time for a much more valid reason: I am busy with work! Woo-hoo! Yay, me!

I will be back, I promise.