Wanderlust

Bird by bird ...

2012-02-11T22:41:00.001-05:00

This is another picture of best friend B and me in Paris in January of 2011. I post it because a) I like it, b) Brian and I are both writers and can spend hours lamenting our habits of procrastination, and c) I couldn't find the picture of birds that was meant to accompany the title of this post. I have an old computer and a new computer and something about a firewire and Bob's your uncle and I don't have all my bird photos.

I'm supposed to write. I like writing - and even more, I like having written - and I get good feedback on my words. I have three projects in the works right now and have spent part of today working on one, which I conceived of in 2006. This year I will finish a draft. It is so damn hard for me to do this - the ease of distraction notwithstanding, due to my editing background I am constantly rewriting as I go, which is exactly what I should not be doing. I should get it all down and then polish. Not supposed to say should but tired enough that I'll let it slide this time. This comes easily to me, jotting down these thoughts about nothing and everything and whatever my brain tells my fingers to type, and if I could I would post and move on, maybe reread in a day or two, because the fact of the matter is that few people read this and the ones who do who know me will forgive me the trespasses of an absentee comma or misplaced, dangling whatever.

Hi Cousin.

I am in the country right now, with my mum and our dogs. It's been a quiet, bonding weekend during which I accomplished bits and pieces of what I'd hoped to. I've started an editing project, gotten further in a (way too long) screenplay I'm reading for a coworker, worked a bit on project the first, read a page or two of my friend's book, exercised, and so on and so forth.

Need to keep writing keep writing don't stop don't worry if it's good or if it's going to be part of the final project or is just the stuff I'm purging to get to the final project. So much easier said, that. Oh! I also read a spec script that I wanted to read and am going to work on on behalf of two of my darling writing clients. Whenever I tell people what I "do" (don't ask me why that's in quotation marks; it just is) they inevitably follow it up by asking what it is that I write and edit - one might think that I'd have my stock answer but I don't, and so I fumble and half-explain and leave things out and mumble and downplay and all that good stuff. What I do for a living: I read and write. That's what.

Bird by bird, I will move forward and write my way through these projects 'cause without a first draft there can be no second. I will not get this done in one shot; it will take many and might very well wind up a pile of pages that allow me to move on to the next. Maybe not. But I have to start with one bird to get to the entire flock. Or murder, if it's crows we're talking about. Nevermore. I've been meaning to memorize Annabel Lee and thus far have but the first and second verses (stanzas?) memorized. Mesmerized.

Okay. This was something. I've now written in my blahhhhhhhhhhggggggggg. Knoblauch.

I might be back later tonight. And I very well might not.

I am a writer, damn it. I really am.

(right?)

Sleep no more...

2012-01-27T03:25:00.001-05:00

...or so it seems sometimes.

Random thoughts:

I wish I could get my blahhhhhhg to look like it used to; in experimenting with the settings I lost my old ones.

I'm somewhere between a luddite and a proficient technology user.

I have a love/cringe relationship with social media. My 20th college reunion is this spring, and while it will be really interesting to see everyone in person, what with The Facebook and all, what will we catch up on? "So, how was that new restaurant you went to two weeks ago?" "Wow -- you are quite the Ron Paul supporter!" "Your turn in Scrabble - I played "nexus" last week."

Many years ago I had an interesting one-night with a fella I almost up and drove across the country with the next morning. We maintained a long distance email romance back in the days of dial-up and chat rooms and he wrote me what remains one of the most romantic things ever written to me: "I just want to take your hand and walk you around the world."With all due respect to the brilliant men who've written me romantic verse, this one strikes a particular chord.

This has been a flucked up week but what's done is done. The present is what we have. I have a very difficult time staying in it - the clutter of my mind takes over and doesn't let me.

There are things I wish I could write and publish (the old-fashioned way) but I'm in touch with too many people to be as open as I want to be.

I recognize that this is a shoddy excuse for procrastinating.

I am a far better writer than I am a story teller.

I am a big believer in apologies and a bigger one in forgiveness.

I forgot what I was going to say.

Whoosh...

2012-01-19T15:54:00.000-05:00

I have something racy that I could post, but perhaps now is not the time.

From a good piece in the Times about Homeland ...

2012-01-19T12:27:00.002-05:00

So let a thousand conversations bloom. Secrets held up to light and air lose their power in the public square. Spies know it as keepers, and writers know it as tellers.

This is the context.

Driving on Nine...

2012-01-16T22:22:00.001-05:00

Now what? I've started writing here again and so I will attempt to keep it up. God willing, the interesting times are not all behind me. But in writing the title to this piece I think of Cousin, who may or may not read this. I wish I may I wish I might. I think of 1994ish, when I brought the guy from Baltimore to Mars Bar, and attempts were made with ecstasy that that night didn't live up to its name. Mars Bar - you were in my dream the other night. I wish I wish I wish I could spend ten minutes in some of my memories.

Grow old along with me ...

2012-01-14T13:55:00.004-05:00

In Paris with my dear friend B, 01/02/12

After a long and winding delay, I have reemerged from the ether. My 2011 was defined by medical issues, the likes of which I hadn't yet experienced. Surgeries, ERs and grafts, oh my. Stitches, iv's, and so, so much Percocet. Apple juice and graham crackers upon coming out of anesthesia. Lost days, weeks, most of a season.

Yesterday was my first day out of a cast since April, when I discovered that, six weeks or so earlier, I had fractured my scaphoid. This is also when I discovered that I had a scaphoid, and I have since said this word enough to compensate for two decades of negligence. I have had three surgeries on this tiny bone, a bone so vexing to the medical community that it has its own book. Surgery one involved putting a screw in to hold it together. Surgery two, three months later, was a bone graft from my radial. As icky as that was, it absolutely pales in comparison to surgery three, a bone graft from my hip in October. Should anyone offer to remove your iliac crest and graft it onto your scaphoid, politely decline. It's not as much fun as it sounds.

In the middle of it all, on June 7, 2011, I took the first (and last) of a six-week class, Intro to Personal Finance, as prescribed by my father for reasons too obvious to fight. It was an unseasonably hot and humid day, and after lunch in the park (Bryant), I decided to walk to my appointment with the wrist surgeon on 88th Street. I was not really supposed to exercise during this stretch, but a 45 block walk seemed reasonable. At the corner of 52nd and 5th, I started to feel lightheaded and nauseated, which is a relatively normal state for me. The subway was across the street, and I decided to abandon my walk. Thank God I never got there. I started seeing dizzying splotches of bright sunlight, the same patterns repeating everywhere I turned. Behind me was a Juicy Couture - yep - and the last thing I remember is deciding to go and sit down in the air conditioning. Some four (according to the witnesses) minutes later I came to surrounded by Juicy employees. Someone handed me a cup of water and someone else told me that I'd fainted and it was very hot out and that they'd called the paramedics. I told them I had to go to my appointment and had to get up, but they kept me there. I remember looking to my right where my bag and papers were and seeing a big pool of Hawaiian Punch. I asked what it was and the fellow behind me, holding a compress to my head, who would turn out to be the one with the CPR and First Aid training, said, "We spilled something there. Don't worry about it."

It took the paramedics about 15 minutes to arrive, and on the way to the hospital I asked repeatedly if I was going to die. I fear things like this happening to people I love on a regular basis, and the results are usually far-reaching in my malevolent fantasies. I think they said no, as I imagine they always do. The female paramedic asked my name address date of birth, which she read on the driver's license she'd extracted from my splattered purse. I was semi-triaged at Bellevue ER and spent a lot of time on a gurney in the hallway being hip checked by passers by. The man having tests in the room I was parked near died an exciting death, fifteen doctors and nurses responding to shouts of "Code Blue!", frantic instructions to repeat whatever was being done, and, finally, the flat line. The denouement. When I finally got to a room, seven staples and many conversations with a cocky resident who so wanted me to have a drug problem he practically begged later, one of my roommates was a Mr. Singh, who shouted insults at the nurse in Hindi (they found a translator) throughout the night. They turned my valium drip up as high as they could so that I could sleep.

Turns out I had a concussion, and a not super-minor one. Short term memory loss and something resembling aphasia took away most of the summer, with that first bone graft thrown in for reinforcement. People came to visit me throughout and I forgot who, and when. My memories came from photos and conversations I found myself in. None of this is good for the mood, which is further squandered by lack of mental and physical exercise. In two weeks I go to an appointment suggested by my neurologist, four hours of neuro-psychological testing, to ensure that I've no longterm damages from the event.

I've since learned what happened between my deciding to enter the store and my coming to. I was leaning in the doorway of what turned out to be the employees' office when a few of them came back from lunch. I grabbed someone's arm and told him that I didn't feel well. He told me to come into the air-conditioning, turned his key in the lock, and I fell straight back and landed on the floor. They got their manager and the guy, Chris, who knows first aid and CPR which we should all know, and at first I was just passed out. Then blood, with the decency to resemble Hawaiian Punch, started to pool around my head. Apparently this made them uncomfortable. I was out for four minutes, and waited another eleven for the ambulance.

I have been profoundly lucky in the health department until now, and these harrowing experiences mark the end of taking it all for granted and the beginning of trying -failing- and trying again to do things well and to stay as from from danger as I can comfortably manage.

And how was your summer?

Something I wrote ...

2011-07-01T02:47:00.002-04:00

...just now without an edit - started out as something else but turned into this -- concussion only partially to blame; I've a wandering mind. Among other things.

It is not quick, or effortless, to come to great wisdom. Knowledge is not wisdom – knowledge is a toolbox with too many drawers and little bits and dusty parts easy to over look. Knowledge lives in the brain and the muscles; wisdom lives in the soul. In the mind, in the self, in whatever those who write books choose to call it – all wisdom is fundamentally the same. Belief is not wisdom. War is not wisdom. Hate is nothing at all – it’s other things shifting focus because they’re too embarrassing to own; anger the same. Fear and grief and love and loss and gratitude are real. Tears are real, those not conjured for cameras through masquerade eyes. Loneliness is fear. With wisdom comes a slow-building cure for all that ails us.With wisdom comes gratitude, trust, acceptance, love; there is no room for guilt and regret.

One I just found from Dorothy Parker:

A Very Short Song

Once, when I was young and true,
Someone left me sad-
Broke my brittle heart in two;
And that is very bad.

Love is for unlucky folk,
Love is but a curse.
Once there was a heart I broke;
And that, I think, is worse.

Hello again

2011-03-23T02:10:00.003-04:00

I'm back. From a long, long break in so many good things - productivity, tranquility, active optimism ... but I am absolutely back. Oy. So the first quarter of my fourth decade did not reflect me at my finest ... hence the lack of 'fessing up on this blahhhhhhhgggggg. I told Y that I have this - apparently never mentioned it before - and he said, "Most people I know start these things and gradually taper off - " and if you look at how many posts I've done per year, you will see that he knoweth of what he speaketh. He doeth.

I have a slight lisp, by the way, which I've not thought of in ages - and like clockwork, ath thoon ath I mention it, it manifethth. Okay - enough of thith thubject.

Um, what else. I slept literally not a second last night, and if my track record with ye olde insomnia proves accurate, I shall not sleep at all tonight either - it's a two-day thing with me. And I'm off the crazy-making prescription sleep aids as well as the quantities of booze more suitable for a college freshman than a ... gulp ... woman. I've only started referring to myself as a "woman" in the past six months or so - not a conscious decision, but I've resisted that word forever - "girl" seemed so much more appealing. But girls make mistakes and drink too much and pick fights and don't find their ways and that's okay - they're girls. I'm technically not. And so begins the new era of me - the adult me - the one who knows how to drink like an adult, meaning on occasion and not to excess, and who had put her past behind her and is focused on the present and calmly optimistic about the future. And somehow, miraculously it almost feels, I've crossed the threshold at last and am ready to embrace life and stop fighting it. It was one too many completely avoidable errors in judgment that prompted this but it seemed to happen organically and spiritually (yes, BB, the treehugger is in effect).

Wow - how comforting it is to know that this drivel* is not falling on deaf ears.

*I know it's not drivel - because I like my writing and I like writing and that's really all that should matter in this forum.

I've been thinking a lot about mythologies - not of the Greek or Roman persuasion, but of the human kind. We are all characters of our own mythologies - what we've perceived ourselves to be, often based on messages we've heard our entire lives, what we're "supposed" to be. Is this making any sense? Probably not but hear me out and I will clarify after I've had some sleep - which should be by April at latest. Par exemple - a child's earliest emotional imprint is created by the adults in his or her world. The messages received before we are cognizant that we are receiving them mark us for a very long time. And if we don't realize we are capable of change, they can stay with us forever; they become incorporated into our mythology. i.e. I am perfect, or I am deeply flawed, and/or I am unfixable ... whatever our perception, it becomes part of the fabric of who we think we are - and we act accordingly. For forty years I've felt deeply flawed and unfixable - no one ever told me that I was, but that was my young, young self's idea of how I was perceived by the world. And so I've acted accordingly for forty years - and guess what? Turns out that's ridiculous. But as a highly sensitive and self-analytical being, in my immaturity that's what I took in and that's what I decided I was. And it became a self-fulfilling prophesy. And so despite all the positive I've heard over the last - as far back as I can recall I'll say 24ish years - the first time I recall actively receiving a positive, you're-not-a-weirdo, you're-not-"wrong" message from a peer - I've held on tightly to every negative word I've ever heard directed at me. Rhetorical question: why is it so much harder to embrace the positive messages than it is the negative?

I have finally figured out that that deeply flawed unfixable nonsense was my mythology, not my truth. Forgive me for sounding boastful, but I have some pretty damn good attributes. At my best, I am a loving and caring and supportive and loyal person. And my dear friends recognize this. But I hadn't - and so despite the incredible support system I've had for decades, I have fought against and sabotaged my real and good self and ruptured so many of my relationships that I'm amazed I'm still intact.

I am absolutely one billion percent ready to let go of the past - of the pain I've felt I've had to hold onto. I love my family beyond words. I love my friends in a very different way beyond beyond words. We've all made mistakes, we are all human and thus flawed, we are all "fixable" if we choose to be. I don't need to defend myself anymore against my mythology - because the fact of the matter is a) my defense mechanisms were absolute failures, as may be the nature of defense mechanisms, and b)I AM capable of transformation and thus of greatness. We all are. But I have to say, it must be exponentially more difficult to transform without people who champion us. I think so highly of the people in my life - family, Tara, Ivy, Lisa spring instantly to mind as steady supporters, JB, whom I've never met in three dimensions, as a lovely surprise - like BB - and so many more who absolutely know who they are - that it almost doesn't occur to me that they share my fears and self doubts and insecurities and all the rest on any level - they are all so strong and evolved. You are all, I should say, because I know that at least you guys are reading this. And you have all played significant roles - seriously - in getting me to where I am struggling to explain I have finally gotten - which is READY TO GROW UP.

So here we go, my friends - a new era has begun. For real, this time. I promise to let go of sadness and regret about the past forty years, be grateful for all the good that has gotten me to this point, be present in the present and be productive and strong and determined and manifest a future in kind. And I'm going to make you all so proud. I promise. You deserve it. You guys rock.

I'm exhausto.

Redux

2011-03-20T01:49:00.004-04:00

Oy. So I know I've blahggged often about insomnia, but it bears repeating on a regular basis. I have so much to say and no energy to say it - I've been up since 5AM yesterday and have had a fairly busy day. I will write more and more interestingly. Spellcheck ignored "interestingly" but underlined "spellcheck". And other inconsequential observations.

(puppies are cute)

Dog is my co-pilot

2011-03-19T10:03:00.002-04:00

Ivy's right - I've been a terrible blahgger of late - though I have been doing significantly more writing lately. I shall get back to this forum this weekend. In the meantime, please enjoy this photograph of my dog, with my compliments:

Hurry up and wait

2011-02-21T11:53:00.003-05:00

It feels as if 2011 has yet to really begin for me. It's certainly begun elsewhere in the world - the news is dizzying. But for me, personally, it is off to a sluggish start. Which is strange in light of recent major changes/developments on the home front. I have been writing more and exercising more, and what I have to show for it are more beginnings of stories and, inexplicably, a few extra pounds. "Inexplicable" is a lie ... I can no longer eat the way I used to. This is a really boring post. I'm going to post it now. Sigh.

Good night

2011-01-25T04:01:00.004-05:00

All you who sleep tonight
Far from the ones you love,
No hand to left or right
And emptiness above--
Know that you aren't alone,
The whole world shares your tears,
Some for two nights or one,
And some for all their years.
-Vikram Seth

Leila tov.

and so it is ...

2011-01-18T06:53:00.004-05:00

I am not in the habit of focusing. I am not in the habit of committing to anything, really – thoughts, favorites, friends – I need the bounty; it’s what sustains me. And so I can not do things like re-read/answer emails that are significant and positive because my mind devotes equal parts to them, to the one I miss, to worrying ‘bout Lou – to worrying ‘bout pretty much everyone I know – to wondering why I am this way – to wondering why I wonder – to wondering who would find these thoughts enchanting, to thinking about Anne Hathaway, to wondering about my freelance career, to thinking about my superpowers, to thinking about activating twins, to … and see, without tonic, all of my synapses might fire And it might be impossible to get any one thing done, she rationalizes.

Sleepless

2010-12-30T22:43:00.002-05:00

Today is 2010's swan song ... I am in Paris, where it is currently 4:30 am, give or take quelque minutes. My parents have brought me and some family friends here as part of their very generous nod to my 40th birthday ... which I spent largely on an airplane on Tuesday. Next to an off-duty pilot, which was comforting -- he slept peacefully through fairly turbulent turbulence, and so I took my cues from him.

Forty. It's been quite a journey getting here -- a dizzying array of ups, downs, and sideways'. The highs have been extraordinary, the depths I've sunk to terrifying, and I have emerged strong and smart and capable and ready to manifest my present and future in the best way possible. Certainly there will be steps backwards, but I strive to take many more forward as I put into use the many lessons I've learned along the way. I once thought that was what my thirties were meant to be about; the closer I got to this decade, the more certain I became that in fact forty is the beginning of the best years. I hope I don't sound like a motivational coffee mug.

This past year has been one of beginnings and endings - very bittersweet. I've been using that word a lot lately to describe my current situation - and it really is that. I so look forward to sweet taking center stage, but I realize I have to be patient and to accept the fact that I can not control anyone's destiny or feelings besides my own. That realization has been decades in the making. I wish I could convince those who need convincing that the challenging, sad, or seemingly insurmountable phases do not last forever and that tranquility is attainable, but I can not. Just as no one could "convince" me of the aforementioned realization until I was ready - ready to relinquish decades of misplaced guilt and regret and fears that could not be assuaged no matter how much logic I attempted to embrace. My emotions have always taken over and I think I've feared letting that not be the case because on some plane, overriding my feelings with intellect felt dangerous.

Now that I realize I can update this blahg from here, I hope to do so a few more times before our triumphant return to the states on Tuesday.

For now, bonsoir, buenos noches, buona sera, ar labu nakti,leilatov. Now you know what the address above means. xoL

Ham on rye

2010-12-28T05:21:00.001-05:00

The Laughing Heart

your life is your life
don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.
be on the watch.
there are ways out.
there is a light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you chances.
know them.
take them.
you can’t beat death but
you can beat death in life, sometimes.
and the more often you learn to do it,
the more light there will be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have it.
you are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in you.

-- by Charles Bukowski

Partial list of things I've done for the first time in 2010

2010-12-19T08:42:00.003-05:00

1. Snorkeled in the ocean.
2. Picked up a scorpion.
3. Salsa-danced on the streets of New Orleans.
4. Written a song.
5. Seen a Beatle perform live.
6. Sent pastrami across the country.
7. Sued someone.
8. Seen a shaman.
9. Script-supervised.
10. Made a meatloaf.

Partial list of 2011 resolutions

2010-12-17T00:20:00.002-05:00

1. Take the high road.
2. Keep appointments.
3. Eschew "gossip".
4. Rekindle my relationship with writing by hand.
5. Pay more attention to my health.
6. Respond promptly.
7. Cook more.
8. Waste less time.
9. Finish my book.
10. Record a song.

oy vey

2010-12-12T08:54:00.003-05:00

It am not easy, life, but it is so, so worth it. What a horrid and interesting year this has been. I have learned so much through love, loss, and fear of loss ... and I have come to the conclusion that I am beyond blessed because of the people in my life. And dogs.

I am going to start writing on this dang thing again.

Grace and abundance

2010-12-08T05:41:00.002-05:00

I am on a journey of healing - If you're compelled to stop reading right now, then please do so. If not ... as I hurtle toward my 40s I find myself embracing the fact that things happen for me, that I shed old skins, at a rate much slower than it might be for others my age, but how else could it happen? This is essentially me.

I saw a Shaman yesterday at the suggestion of my dear friend Tracey, who shares, in part, my vapors, and who, too, is on a journey of self-discovery of sorts. This experience felt nothing short of miraculous and I've not yet fully realized its effects, as it can take between 3 days and several weeks for the work to be fully integrated into one's being. So much to say on this but only if you want to hear about it; if not, suffice it to say that this experience has changed me and will continue to do so.

I made the heartbreaking decision (I was told it was a decision, not destiny) to separate from N. - from four years of a beautiful, mostly calm, and very sweet relationship the cornerstone of which is love. I came to realize, with great pain, that love in and of itself may not be enough. I love N but I've painfully realized over time that I've been denying myself some necessary me-ness. And I'm not very good at making me-oriented decisions. But there is a catalyst for this change - not a cause, but a catalyst, and I've no choice but to be optimistic and I am. Please wish me strength and clarity and love. And right back at you.

The countdown's begun ...

2010-12-02T03:33:00.003-05:00

Less than a month until I enter the next decade ... and by far the most significant one yet. I'm actually looking forward to 40, which is one of the joyous byproducts of being a late bloomer.

I am on the threshold of a whole new era, a bittersweet threshold for reasons I can't yet publicize. I need to let myself mourn the end of one long chapter but it's not yet time. And perhaps I need to celebrate the dawn of this new, uncharted one, but this will be a gradual process. I've got one foot in my "old" life" and one firmly planted in the new, and it's quite an odd place to be. I have made an enormous change that will take some close to me by surprise and to others will make some kind of sense. And this has been the hardest decision of my life, I am certain. And though my heart is broken, the sense of calm and possibility that's taken the place of denial and insecurity indicates that ultimately I have not made a terrible mistake - my biggest fear when making any kind of decision.

Vague enough for you?

Insomnia

2010-11-15T09:31:00.000-05:00

A sonnet:

While late at night turns into early day,
Languid darkness fading into blue,
I cannot seem to figure out a way
To train my mind toward anything but you.

The sky is lighter now, the world has shape
Dawn emerges from the Eastern sea.
And still you’ve not attempted to escape
My thoughts or any other part of me.

No matter how the decades will unfold,
This was never lost or wasted time.
Look back upon these days when you grow old,
And know our love, though fleeting, was sublime.

A stubborn silver clings onto the night
I’ll always miss this early morning light.

Kismet

2010-11-07T13:59:00.002-05:00

Well isn't this curious ... I could truly not recall the last time I wrote on this blahg but felt inspired to get back into it having just returned from ... New Orleans. I guess it really is in my blood. In fact, we may spend a couple of months there after the new year, details to follow. It's hard to describe the city to those who've not yet been: mystical, magical, haunted, beautiful, sketchy, still falling apart in some places ... or to quote Mark Twain for the 100th time, "New Orleans is a beautiful woman with dirty fingernails."

I will post some photos from our most recent visit soon, and perhaps will take the ill-advised step of posting a video, too.

Neil + piano + me + devil horns - proper lyrics. You decide.

It's nice to be back here.

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Frenchmen Street

2010-05-04T16:02:00.004-04:00

I want to have written but I don't feel like writing. There is a lot to catch up on if this blahg is intended to chronicle my life, but I'm so drained from it all that I can't delve. And anyone reading this probably knows me decently well and probably knows what's going on. I feel like I'm going through an emotional growth spurt and am learning, tiny bit by tiny bit, how to temper my sensitivity and reactions. There will be some regressing of course, but hopefully not much.

I am deeply missing New Orleans these days. I think I will take myself down there when the dust settles a bit if, in fact, it does before the sweltering days of hurricane season arrive. God I hope that's the case.

I visit New Orleans several times a week in my dreams. I've created one place in particular, a divey bar with live music that I frequent but can never find on my own. Sometimes it's also in Paris, sometimes the Lower East Side, but always New Orleans. I've had vivid recurring dreams all my life, some of which have become transparent, some that have not.

I hope I figure out how to get to that bar on my own.

Forgotten birds ...

2010-04-08T19:57:00.000-04:00

Better things will surely come our way ...

2010-04-08T18:56:00.003-04:00

My mind is heavy these days - my mind and my heart, but that sounds so cliché - and I just have to wait this phase out. I don't know if I should be writing about this at all. I don't know why I don't spill my thoughts into some kind of journal first, clear my head before writing for public consumption. I know, I know, the whole validation thing, product of this faux-writer's ego and whatever I decided a while back was my "emotional imprint", as they say in the books and on the talk shows. Freshen up those Psych 101 skills; the people I most want to talk to about what's going on are the ones I can't put this onto right now. I have great folks around me, of course, but no one can address what I'm feeling in quite the same way as they can, for better or for worse. And so I lie awake, which I do anyway, but this time insomnia is a montage of past and current regrets and a panicked glimpse of a stark future I'd never be ready for. And when I sleep I sleep the wrong hours, throw everything off balance and disappoint the people I most want to protect. I generally want to hibernate but at least once or twice a day, usually around this time, my eyes start to leak and I crave company.

Does this make any sense?

I was coming out of the shower before and heard N in the other room; he'd just come in. I practiced my greeting in my head first, "I thought I heard you!", thinking it sounded like what someone who was feeling "normal" might say.

Looking forward to this phase being over? Me too (and them too, and him too, and the dog too). In the meantime, I will talk about other things here. I just needed to get that other bit out.

Does any of this make sense? It does to me.

Skies above two of my favorite places ...

2010-04-08T15:31:00.002-04:00

And I you ...

2010-04-07T20:32:00.001-04:00

Birds

2010-04-02T22:31:00.005-04:00

Ma mere

2010-04-02T19:29:00.006-04:00

Breathe ...

This may be a bit all over the place, but bear with me. Or don't -- there's lots of other stuff out there to read. Like how Anna Paquin has announced her bisexuality, for instance. She's lovely, and she met my dog once and was nice to him.

So, in the midst of all that's been going on around me that I alluded to before, I'd been feeling a little something more than compassion for my friends. Of course they've been weighing heavily on my mind -- one is embarking on an unforeseen divorce where there are children and assets involved and it's been awful for her; one just lost her father; another has just had surgery for prostate cancer; another can't seem to keep herself out of trouble for very long. Add to that the long suffering broken hearts, motherless daughters, people-who-can't-see-the-forest and I've got my hands full -- willingly. I wish I could save everyone from everything but since that's not possible, this is something.

As I've said, it does comfort me to be here for the people I love (another reason to unload the toxic relationships and concentrate on the enriching ones); as someone who can fall apart so often and so easily -- though I'm getting better -- it soothes my soul to know that people can turn to me when they need me, and that I can help in some small way. Obviously this effects my moods -- I hurt when the people I love hurt, and worry when situations are out of control, but that's just the way it is.

But this time there seemed to be something more going on, or as I said to someone last week, "I'm feeling this weird sense of impending dread." As we know, I have what my sister calls "the vapors". And they were, in fact, heralding something more.

My mom invited me for lunch last Thursday; we usually meet out but she asked me to come over. We sat down and she told me we had something to talk about, and of course my tears started to well up. She's having surgery for a suspicious area of her lung that may be cancerous but very well may not be. All I heard was "lung cancer", and I fell apart, told her how much I love her and how sorry I am for any and everything I've ever done wrong, how she's my entire world. She hugged me, made me tea, got me an Ativan, made me eat and explained more -- that it might be a very specific and unusual type of LC -- or it might be completely benign, that the surgery is most often non-invasive and this is not an LC that tends to metastasize (took me three times to spell that right), and that the prognosis is highly encouraging. She scheduled her appointment to meet with the surgeon while I was there, and we hatched somewhat of a plan for how she would tell my sister, who is as hard to get on the phone away from work and kids as every other working mom is, and who lives out west.

My mom has beaten unusual forms of unrelated cancers twice before. Twenty years ago it was an extremely rare form of leukemia and she was given a fairly short window of possible cure. Apparently she looked at the doctor and said, "That's ridiculous." Twenty years later, we know she was right.

Right before 9-11 she was diagnosed with a type of breast cancer that, like this lung situation, tends to remain localized and is easier to treat. In rapid succession my Granny died suddenly, my mom was diagnosed, 9-11 hit and took away a friend and so much more, and my dad had a serious injury that required surgery and subsequent treatments. It was a challenging time, and my mom was the strongest force in it all.

She is now almost 9 years free of that cancer.

And now this. And she's not scared -- she promises me she's not scared -- and my dad and my sister are both taking their cues from her. So that's what I shall do. They did meet with the surgeon, scheduled it for later this month, and she has agreed to answer any questions I have along the way. This is a big deal; I'm the one they most dreaded telling, for reasons obvious to anyone who knows me, and so they tend to avoid frequent conversations that may elicit emotion.

This time around I will try not to fall apart anymore. This time I will be strong, level-headed, and as calm and non-teary as I can manage. This time I'll take my cues from her, and I'll try not to fear fear. I'll pray for the best, and assume all will be well.

All good thoughts welcome.

Je t'aime, Maman, toujours et avec tout mon coeur.

Let it be...

2010-03-23T06:50:00.003-04:00

I really do wish I'd written more in the past couple of weeks but the truth is, I'm exhausted. Exhausted because of my poor sleep (and other) patterns. Exhausted because I have close, close friends who mean the world to me who are going through times far more difficult than they deserve, and who I insist on being available for. Because I love them. Because in my darkest hours, knowing I had people I could talk to and count on was what sustained me most. That and sleep, which we've already addressed. Exhausted because I've just battled my way out of a friendship that reached the toxicity level I addressed in ... 2008? This is a person who, in my opinion, blames the world for his current -- and vast -- problems, and who takes advantage of the kindnesses extended to him. In our recent flurry of emails -- his ranting, my responding and pointing out, but that's probably a biased read on the situation -- he told me that when I lent him money (which I'll never see again) at least I was "helping out someone who truly deserved it" and that I have no idea what the world is really like because I've "had it made". To which I pointed out that he knows nothing about my childhood -- not even where, city-wise, I grew up -- nor does he know anything about the dynamic in my family. Which is good, now, but hasn't always been. At all. And which furthers my point -- his presumptuousness is part of what makes him see the world as owing him something. I should just stop responding to his messages. I know I should. But on principle, I can't let false information that he spews at me go un-addressed. This has always been a problem for me.

Yep, I've got it made.

In any event, I'm going to try to sleep another hour -- today is an office day -- and, failing that, will shower and drink too much coffee and go to work feeling sluggish and slightly depressed from lack of sleep.

Non-sequitor:

When I was little, I thought the song, "Torn Between Two Lovers" was "Torn Between Two Leopards". I realize the cat above is a panther or puma, but I didn't see any leopards on that particular trip.

I need to talk about the positive things -- post more photos from Tulum, describe the amazing celebration we had for my mom, but ... I'm exhausted and not feeling particularly "up" these days. This too shall pass.

Thanks for listening.

2010-03-18T22:14:00.002-04:00

I don't know where to begin. So much is happening.

And your mama's good looking...

2010-03-07T22:07:00.003-05:00

True dat. And that doesn't skim the moons of the surface of what an amazing creature my mother is.

Her birthday's on Tuesday. If you remember to, think of her at some point that day. As she taught me to say when I was little and needed to make sure she really knew, "I love her more than words can say."

Driving on nine, you could be a shadow...

2010-03-04T01:47:00.003-05:00

Holy smokes do I have a lot to say most of which I can't say now. And of course I'm awake -- why wouldn't I be when I'm due in the office tomorrow morning? Ma nishtana ha-laila ha-zeh mikol ha-leilot?

I've been feeling more 39 than I'd expected to lately. I've been mildly altering the rules. Now what? Now I settle back into 39 and calm the fuck down.

Someone once said to me, about 14 years ago, "I want to take your hand and walk you around the world." I still kind of love that.

Bears

2010-03-02T00:37:00.004-05:00

I've been feeling melancholy since I've been back - and have been hibernating like a really tired bear. Okay, I'm back. But first I must sleep. Hasta manana, mi amores.

You saw me standing alone, without a dream in my heart, without a love of my own...

2010-02-27T23:16:00.018-05:00

Tulum is beautiful, rustic, enchanting and imperfect. More pictures to come; here are a fewski:

The front yard:

The cabana:

The neighborhood -- ours is in the middle.

My reading room:

Drank cocktails here on non-rainy days.

Caribbean Sea:

Gratuitous awkward bathing suit shot 'cause I've been working at it:

El gato con el ojo con un problemo:

Testing the macro lens:

The loveliest of bartenders and outdoor showers. Mutually exclusive.

Papaya Playa with the best outdoor showers in my world.
Cool angles:

Artistic collaboration:
Pre-snorkeling:

Such a lot of world to see

2010-02-27T22:34:00.007-05:00

I'm not sure I'm ready to write about Tulum to the extent that this last week deserves. There was so much vastness and newness and strange familiarity - to the specifics of this place and to the sea, which always overwhelms me.

Enough with the thickly veiled procrastination.

The basics: we stayed in a cabana on the beach at a small resort without electricity -- I think I've mentioned this -- on a strip outside of Tulum. Meals, drinks, outdoor showers all along the beach at the various spots -- all rustic and lovely. The weather varied from wet and blustery (relatively speaking) to sunny and beautiful, which it was the majority of the time.

Things I did for the first time this week:

Snorkeled above the reefs.
Seen, in the sea or otherwise, an animal that resembled a vertical hammerhead eel that hovers sideways.
Seen one of these in the wild.
Sunbathed topless.
Woken from a nap to see a scorpion (this, not this, unfortunately) walking by my bed.
Picked up a scorpion with a napkin and thrown it outside a bungalow.
Woken to hear Neil say, "Mother fucker - I just got stung by a scorpion."
Watched iguanas mate - or at least watched them mate other iguanas.
Seen things that look like really fat iguana-Gila monster hybrids either mate or fight, rolling down a hill in the process.

And many more, of course. Unfortunately I only have photos of two of the items above. I'll post one of them, and many more beautiful shots.

In the meantime, how have you been? Tell me stuff.

Birds singing in the sycamore tree

2010-02-02T18:38:00.004-05:00

I don't feel like writing at all right now, which is exactly why I probably should.

I did an ill-advised thing this morning, though compared to many of the other ill-advised things I've done, it's fairly banal. I went to sleep at midnight, which is about as early as I ever do, and woke up promptly at 4AM. After lying awake, restless, for almost an hour, I got up to look for something to help me sleep, and found the Benadryl I'd bought for Louie to combat his allergies (apparently dogs can take it too) -- it was that or a shot of Triple Sec with a Listerine chaser. I was desperate for a couple of hours of sleep, planned to go into the office today and knew I would never make it through on four hours. I took it, got very sleepy, and woke up two hours later feeling like someone had slipped me a roofie. Not that I've ever been slipped a roofie, but from what I've heard it feels something like this.

And so I called in sleepless and spent the day trying to get work done, trying to send out packages, trying to get to the gym, trying to rearrange things in the apartment, and so on. Somewhat of a lost day, but at least I was awake for it; the old me might have stayed under the covers until Wednesday.

I did get a fair amount of reading done; I'm finally slogging my way through the fascinating-but-dense-and-in-small-print Peoples' History of the United States, whose author, Howard Zinn, died last week. As did J.D. Salinger, but you already know that. This is required reading for the liberal-minded, I've been told, and so I'm immersing myself in it. Right now we're on the verge of the Revolutionary War; I'm really looking forward to moving into the 19th Century.

Turns out Columbus didn't discover America, he discovered the Bahamas. Actually, Rodrigo did, but CC took the credit. Too bad; I'd love to have a long weekend because of Rodrigo Day.

Macy's Rodrigo Day Sale!

I had planned to write about the blackout of '03 and the magical night that ensued, but I shall have to do so later.

Hasta luego.

Wilde Thing

2010-01-21T18:56:00.004-05:00

This morning*, seemingly out of nowhere, "In the Air Tonight" popped into my head. My big head. I haven't heard or thought about that song in ages -- though, admittedly, it's a guilty pleasure -- but when I started singing it aloud to Louie I realized why it was there.

I've been waiting for this moment for all my life ...

Last night I experienced said moment.

My beautiful (and only) mother was an actress in the '60s -- and a really good one, at that, according to every review I've come across. She worked in theater and one of her favorite roles was Gwendolyn Fairfax in The Importance of Being Earnest. I'm probably getting the chronology all wrong but I think the following year, the theater produced Earnest in Love, which is a dare-I-say delightful musical version of the play. One song in particular stuck with my mum, and she sang it to me (and Jules) when we were tiny girls. We learned it, and we'd all sing it together -- and continue to.

Last night, my mom and I went to see a production of Earnest in Love at the Irish Repertory Theatre. There was much anticipation -- would the song be the same as she'd remembered it for almost 50 years? Would we be able to resist the urge to sing along? Would I cry? Okay -- we knew the answers to the second two would be yes and yes, respectively. Turns out it's the closing song and it was almost exactly as we'd been singing it. It was so sweet and such a full-circle moment -- but my being the most sentimental person in my immediate family (sister notwithstanding but she's at Sundance so we haven't spoken about it), I doubt much further discussion will ensue. So here is the moment, recorded for posterity. And here are the lyrics -- Leonard Cohen it isn't, but in context, to me, it's as meaningful:

The skies are blue
The grass is ever so much greener
Not a cloud in the heavens above
As for you, my dear,
There's sparkle in your whole demeanor**
Just because you are earnest in love.

No matter where you go
You'll find a rainbow right before you
In the air is the song of a dove
Because your love is there
To worship, honor and adore you
Just because you are earnest in love.

*I wrote this on Thursday morning

**somewhere along the line my warped mind had transformed this to, "There's sparkle in your misdemeanor."

Jane, his wife ...

2010-01-21T00:14:00.002-05:00

A quick digression ... I just went to make a doctor's appointment online and wound up looking at my GP's wedding registry. They got a lot of Mikasa items and some wine glasses. Her younger sister was Matron of Honor.

Back in the olden days, kids, we had these things called boundaries...

Ramble on ...

2010-01-18T20:51:00.006-05:00

I've just returned from a late afternoon/early evening at the home of friends who have a new baby boy. These are friends I haven't seen in a while ... there's an intense, tragic and ultimately comforting story behind all of this, and I may get to it in a little while.

I slept almost not at all last night; Neil left for Florida at 6 this morning and I was still awake. This trip to visit friends is a long time coming and my relationship with them is very important to me. Di and I got comically lost en route to their house, more than doubling what should have been an hour or so of driving. I was worried -- imagine that? -- that my state of mind would be misconstrued, that tired would read as apathetic, observing as judging. I don't think this was the case; I think it was a successful visit and an appropriate one for the situation at hand, weird as it may have been.

I've never had a sense of how I come across to others -- probably because I'm so all-over-the-place inside. My love for the people (and dogs) I love is unwavering -- and it's difficult for me to connect without loving to some degree. In turn, I've developed this notion that I come across as completely inconsistent to others. Yes, I've heard mixed messages all my life -- who hasn't? As such, the way I've thought I've seemed to others at various times and the response I've actually gotten from them has often taken me by surprise. I hope that's grammatically correct. I'm tired and off the clock right now.

When I was just out of college I went through the first of my two deepest black holes -- of depression, that is; I've been through countless black holes of troubled, insecure, self-medicating, misguided, raging dysfunction. And while I was in this first phase of bleakness it was my sister -- Jules, I'm not trying to make you sad, this is the truth and I appreciate it -- who told me that I was strong. Exact words, "Laurs, you're such a strong person and I know you'll get through this, and someday you'll be able to say, 'Yeah, I went through a really tough time in my early 20s, and I learned so much.'" I had no recollection of being perceived this way prior to this conversation, and it has, in many ways, sustained me to a degree of which Julia has no idea.

She was right that I'm able to say this, though it's now almost two decades later and I've had cause to remind myself of this time and again. In my early-to-mid 30s I went through the second of my that-kind-of-black holes, and I was working in a job that required a certain insensitivity toward the plight of others. I thought I was failing miserably, in part because I was miserable. When you're depressed, that kind of depressed, you think "crazy" "unbalanced" "creepy" and "glum" are written all over you. You picture yourself as you must look to others, your face scrawled in Sharpie, a fruitcake hat perched askew, a broken-gray shroud covering your face and entirely inappropriate clothing for the weather at hand. You feel like everything you think, say and do is unappealing: if I ask for tomatoes in my salad will the waiter think I'm gross? Do the people on this train think I'm nuts for carrying an umbrella when it's not actually raining? If I try to smile at my neighbor will he think I think I'm pretty?

So I worked at this job while feeling this way and I felt lost and fat and pale and gross and like I was slowing the whole thing down.

The day I announced my impending departure (and weeks later this all lifted, for which I'd like to thank certain pharmaceutical companies and a very insightful doctor), my boss said, "I'm disappointed; I thought you were doing such a great job." Words, I said to myself, lifting a corner of the shroud to adjust the fruitcake. About a week ago, six years after I left that place, my name came up between Friend and Former Boss. And Former Boss said, "Oh -- she's fabulous -- tell her I say hi." Fabulous? The one who wore the ill-fitting top, who actually ate the roll that came with the soup, who went to Jamaica and came home more pale?

On the flip side is the former good friend who announced one day that I'm far too self-centered (this doesn't count; it's my blahg) and didn't care about anyone. Self-centered ... yes, the person whose thoughts I most examine, whose emotions I most assess, and whose well-being I feel I can most control is, in fact, me. Neil running a close second, but still. Not caring? If I could relieve myself the burden of caring I wouldn't be me. I wouldn't cry nearly every day, I wouldn't be disappointed in others, I wouldn't worry so much. I can keep myself alive; I can't keep everyone else with me. I came, I cared, I collapsed ... to relieve myself my love and caring would be freeing, wonderful, and completely subtract me from the equation I am.

I've listened, as we all do, to all the things people have said about me. I know I'm a good person -- we all owe ourselves that honor -- and I know I've been horrible in the past and have deeply hurt others in ways that devastate me to think about now. But I think we should listen to the things said in calmness and internalize them more than we tend to those said in anger.

Up next ... top ten reasons to limit the Sauvignon Blanc before my next post.

You know I had my share

2010-01-15T01:13:00.003-05:00

So ... 2010. Not going to lie to you, I haven't been perfect this year. But I take comfort in the fact that I have 351 more chances to start anew ... in the modern day Western way of looking at things.

Good things I've done in 2010:

Made a new friend (hi, you)
Repaired an old friendship
Kept all but one appointment
Exercised (fitness-wise, though in truth I've exercised many things)
Done one of the bad things I sometimes do less
Deeply and sincerely acknowledged friends' triumphs and difficulties
Gone to film and theater
Read
Practiced French
"Cooked"
Blahgggggged

I'm exhausted. I have insomnia.

I'm going to try to sleep.

I love.

Donc, je suis

2010-01-05T00:02:00.005-05:00

I'm trying something out. I'm going to post something I wrote without editing it. Bear in mind that this was written somewhere between 5 and 7 yesterday morning -- I have not slept, at all, since Saturday night. It's not as alarming as it sounds ... I've had insomnia for as long as I can recall and I know the way mine works. It's usually a two-night deal. I will sleep, eventually, and I will be fine. Right now I feel as though I'm suspended in aspic. That said, here are some rambling musings from sometime between everyone's-asleep and sunrise:

Why

Why do I do things like pour boiling water into a teacup in near-darkness when I’ve been up all night with insomnia and then why do I carry my too-full cup of tea over to the table above my parents’ light-colored rug still without having turned up the lights?

I will never bungee jump.

This is our year. I’m cautiously optimistic. My muse has returned; let the blessed thing stay.

My dog is beautiful.

Dear God – or muse – let me get through this year without putting in writing a single cliché. Actually, there are many things I wish for more. Please strike that from record. And please don’t get me started on adverbs.

2004 (read that twice – 2004, not ‘9) was an incredibly difficult year. I’ve had far more of those than I care to acknowledge but that was a particularly that-kind-of year. Yikes. But I sure was prolific. Now, to write from a place of calm and promise, not hopeless inertia.

I wish I could keep everyone safe and warm (unless it’s hot out, which right now it isn’t) forever and ever. I love with a love that is more than a love.

I’m writing a novel, a play, one or two children’s books and a whole lot of emails. Please hold me to that.

Should I be embarrassed that I like Facebook?

Fuck it – I’ve spent far too many hours being embarrassed and second-guessing my taste in things.

I should curse less. I never got into saying “swear”. It sounds a bit provincial to me. Notthatthere’sanythingwrongwiththat. Argh – a cliché and a Seinfeld reference all in one shot. Oy vey says the wannabe Buddhist. Or wannabe real Jew. Or something.

“I believe in all paths to God.”

Beautiful sunrise. Thank you, insomnia. And thank you, winter, for this beautiful snow. And thank you, parents, for this beautiful life. Thank you, sleeping man, for proving that love can be calm and complete. So many more thank yous … this could go on forever.

May there be a forever. And may it be paradise.

Baby, hold on to me ...

2009-12-31T10:17:00.003-05:00

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

2009-11-05T08:39:00.003-05:00

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 ...

2009-10-15T18:57:00.002-04:00

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

2009-10-15T15:13:00.005-04:00

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

2009-10-13T00:49:00.007-04:00

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

2009-09-27T21:02:00.011-04:00

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 ...

2009-08-26T22:08:00.003-04:00

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 ...

2009-08-05T17:44:00.002-04:00

...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

2009-07-23T16:19:00.005-04:00

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 ...

2009-04-20T03:08:00.003-04:00

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

2009-03-19T08:40:00.003-04:00

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

2009-03-18T23:36:00.002-04:00

Farewell, beautiful lady.

Midwinter night

2009-03-04T02:40:00.002-05:00

March comes in like a lion ...

Sleeping dog

2009-03-02T00:26:00.003-05:00

Into the great wide open

2009-02-28T18:38:00.006-05:00

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

2009-02-28T07:21:00.005-05:00

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 ...

2009-02-23T13:58:00.002-05:00

So, this happened.

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

2009

2009-02-02T17:32:00.004-05:00

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.

Woof

2008-12-15T11:51:00.001-05:00

You can dress your dog up in all the holiday finery he'll allow, but you can't force him to feel the holiday spirit until he's good and ready.

Turn and face the strain...

2008-12-15T11:10:00.004-05:00

Hello,

I'm so sorry (I know I wasn't going to say that, but I really am) for the sporadic nature of my musings this fall ... there's been so much going on that I haven't really known where to begin chronicling it. I've been inspired at inconvenient times and thought through what I wanted to write, and by the time I was in front of my laptop, more things had happened and my original thoughts were rendered obsolete - incongruous - uninspiring and blah blah blah insert one from my arsenal of excuses here ...

'Tis the season to be scatterbrained.

So, 2008 ... oy vey. So much change, so many endings and beginnings, it's been mind-boggling, but I must say, I think I've come out stronger and smarter for it all.

I have accomplished a lot this year, much of it intangible. I have made some mistakes, large and small, and I have learned from them. It's said that the definition of insanity is repeating the same behavior and expecting different results. I'm not sure that's insanity ... I have a whole lot of everything to say on that topic ... but I get the message. And that is what separates the people with whom I connect ... truly, deeply, connect in a wavelength - kindred spirit - fleeting-or-permanent soulmate kind of way ... from those with whom I don't.

I've severed ties (sans premeditation) with two people who had been vital parts of my life for several years. And as painful and disappointing as the processes have been -- you all know how infrequently I sever ties -- they've also been necessary acts of self-preservation. When the scales tip in favor of the toxicity of a relationship, and stay there, it is time to move on. And for someone like me (whatever the hell that means) there likely needs to be an explosion to precipitate an ending ... lest there be an implosion further down the line.

I have learned so much this year about myself and the world and the people in my life. And I forgive myself my errors in judgment and messy actions and reactions. If I had to choose one all-encompassing goal for the duration of my days, it would be to move into the great unknown (another topic about which I could spew for hours) with no regrets and a hugely expanded mind.

I'm feeling really good these days, but the Christmas thing hasn't hit me yet. That said, I rarely say no to a festive cocktail or passed hors d'oeuvre.

More to come. Welcome back.

Blue

2008-12-01T17:57:00.005-05:00

A friend told me to go out and look at the moon tonight, because for about 45 minutes it shared an unusual alignment with Jupiter and Venus, I believe it was. This was good advice and took me out of the melancholy I've wallowed in all day.

This weekend I spent time with someone I've known for quite a while, someone who will always be a link to my younger days. To some of the most significant moments of my life thus far. This is a person I care about deeply, and who represents, in a way, other courses my life might have taken.

I don't mean to imply that I wish I were elsewhere -- my life is rich and wonderful -- but at times I'm reminded of how vast and infinite our possibilities are. As I described it to a friend, I feel as though I stopped by a world I once lived in, and it's jumbled my mind and my heart.

I'll always hold a torch for days gone by, but I truly do love my life right now, and the choices that have led me to this point are among the best I've made.

I just went into the kitchen, where Neil is preparing a tagine of lamb and root vegetables and something with mint, and told him how I'm feeling. And he said, "This is a melancholy time of year." And this is part of what is so right in my life -- my sweet little family.

Whenever I hear the song "Kooks" by David Bowie, I feel as though it's Neil and me singing to Louie:

We bought a lot of things to keep you warm and dry
And a funny old crib on which the paint wont dry
I bought you a pair of shoes
A trumpet you can blow
And a book of rules
On what to say to people when they pick on you
cause if you stay with us youre gonna be pretty kookie too

Soon you'll grow, so take a chance
With a couple of kooks
Hung up on romancing

Writing this has been cathartic.

In good hands . . .

2008-11-06T07:26:00.003-05:00

Speaking with a dear friend yesterday (as opposed to one of my many deer friends), I inquired whether her son, who is 7, is aware of the elections. She said that he is; in fact, when Obama was declared the winner, she woke him to tell him the news and they high-fived -- that's how he rolls. She then said to him, "You know, it's because you wore your pin to school that he won!" at which point this generally savvy fellow hesitated, then asked, "It is?!"

For the first time in a long, long time, I think many of us echo this sentiment ... wait -- we actually can help shape the world around us? The older and more confident I become in my ideology, the more I realize that this is true. And even better? We're raising subsequent generations to intrinsically hold this belief -- to assume that they can make a difference.

This is not about bipartisanship. I don't think President-elect Obama will only ultimately better the lives of Democrats. I truly, deeply believe that he will better the lives of most Americans and many non-Americans, and I expect that in time he'll have made substantial strides in blurring the categories that define us by dividing us.

Brightness follows every squall . . .

2008-11-05T00:11:00.010-05:00

*exhale*

A new era begins.

I am deeply encouraged and dare-I-say happy about this! I truly believe that Barack Obama has the desire, determination and ability to steer our country toward well-deserved better times. He has a long, difficult path ahead of him, but I've no doubt that he's the right person to embark upon it.

Thank you, God, and thank you, people.

I've clearly been steeling myself for disappointment more than have my more confident friends ... we had a few people over for a viewing party last night, and have three as-yet-untouched bottles of Champagne in the fridge.

Really, what choice have we but optimism?

p.s. I have now heard from some of my friends who did not vote for Obama, and they have all expressed that they, too, are proud of this major milestone in American history -- how could you not be? -- and plan to throw their support behind the President-elect and celebrate when he takes office in January. That warms my heart and gives me even more hope. No more divisiveness.

Election Eve

2008-11-03T17:42:00.009-05:00

Like most of you, I'm too anxious about tomorrow's outcome to think straight (which doesn't explain the crooked thinking the rest of the time). I've made calls for MoveOn, I've donated small amounts of money, I've discussed issues with those who wished to discuss them and listened to alternate points of view. I have to resign myself to the fact that, if tomorrow does not go the way I and so many people I know want it to, it's NOT because I didn't do enough.

Ugh. This is a stressful one.

In lieu of belaboring points that have been belabored and then belabored some more since this campaign began, I am going to switch gears and promote a friend's beautiful work, proceeds from which go to another cause I strongly support.

Gary is a longtime friend, from those hazy, just-out-of-college days. He is also an excellent jeweler (and musician) and a former resident of New Orleans; in fact, he pretty much introduced me to the city, which I'd known little about, and when I first visited almost a decade ago, he armed me with a list of places to go and things to do. He and his lovely wife, Elyse, are animal-lovers and have over the years given homes to a menagerie of pets they've rescued from New Orleans (pre- and post-Katrina) and elsewhere. I can't drive down Tchoupitoulas Street without thinking of dear, departed Funky Tchoupitoulas, who, along with Zigaboo, were the first of their dogs whom I'd met.

And so, as we're gearing up for the holiday season, I want to turn your attention to a project Gary's recently embarked (woof) upon: with the Louisiana Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, he has created these gorgeous Fleur de Lis pendants, half the proceeds of which will benefit the LA/SPCA.

This year I've decided that my holiday gift-giving will contain an element of altruism ... money's tight for so many of us this year, and while I've long lamented how materialistic the holidays have become, I've also developed a steady habit of procrastinating my gift-buying, getting frazzled and caught up in the melee, and spending far too much money on gifts that don't mean as much as something like this would.

Okay -- now back to MSNBC and stress ...

Isn't this your year?

2008-10-24T01:32:00.002-04:00

Let's try this again.

My mother, who has a lovely speaking voice, had a fairly successful voiceover career in the 70s. This is one of the commercials I remember best and, thanks to the magic of YouTube, I can now enjoy it some three decades later. It's a commercial for Cougar cars; the voice at the end is hers!

Arc-en-ciel

2008-10-22T15:54:00.004-04:00

I saw a rainbow yesterday, down 24th Street. Not the one pictured above; that was from a few years ago and was further uptown, if memory serves. Yesterday's was the first one I'd seen in a while.

When we were in Ireland last year, I kept expecting to see one -- the weather was conducive. So I guess this was my consolation prize for not being on tour with Neil this time around.

Say what you will, I LIKE rainbows, puppies, and long walks on the beach.

But I DON'T like that cloying "Pina Colada" song.

When I was in fifth grade, all the gals had those metallic puffy clouds and things of that nature hanging from the ceilings of their bedrooms. There were a couple of places in White Plains that sold these items -- "It's New" and "What's What" -- on Mamaroneck Avenue, I think. They sold all those mid-80s novelty gifts, like upside-down soda-can sculptures and enormous pairs of dice. Useful things. Learning toys. My sister had the coveted beanbag chair in her bedroom. Though life has taken many important twists and turns since and those were not the best years of our lives, I have some very warm memories from that house.

Whenever Jules wasn't feeling well, I'd "entertain" her by acting out "Gilligan's Island" -- a spastic, one-kid show in which I played all the parts:

Maryann: "More coconut-papaya pie, professor?"
Thurston: "Lovey, darling!"
Mrs. Howell: "Oh Thurrrrston...."

and so on.

Jules returned the favor by teaching me how to dance which, at the time, involved a lot of finger-snapping. My bedroom had the best mirror in the house, one that took up the entire wall behind my bed (get your minds out of the gutter -- we were children). This meant that many a night, I'd be lying in bed when the door would fly open, the overhead light would go on, and there she'd be, assessing her going-out outfit.

I learned a lot from my sis -- besides how to dance-and-snap. I still learn a lot from her. And she's still a much better dancer.

Erin go bragh

2008-10-21T11:32:00.003-04:00

Neil is off to Ireland for the week, to play the Guinness Jazz Festival. Actually, at the moment he's en route to JFK from which he will fly to Boston and then, after a three hour layover, he heads to Shannon. Anything to save a buck, according to the person-who-plans-his-travel.

The festival takes place in County Cork, which is actually Murphy's Stout territory. Apparently the rivalry between Guinness and Murphy's is akin to Yankees/Red Sox -- to the degree that people (mostly older gentlemen who spend a lot of time in pubs wearing caps) actually leave the county during this festival.

I had my very first pint of Guinness a little over a year ago, moments after we arrived in Dublin. And I grew accustomed to the perfect pours and the blackness of the Guinness in Ireland; have yet to find a pub in NY that elevates it to the art form that the Irish do. I'm sure it's out there, but Irish pubs in this city are a far, far cry (charm- and clientele-wise) from the ones there.

The day we arrived in Dublin was another fine example of saving a buck on travel. We had breakfast in Norway, lunch in England, and dinner in Ireland ... 'twas an adventure.

More soon.

Punch and Judy

2008-10-17T13:58:00.002-04:00

The puppeteer who operates Cindy McCain really isn't very good.

Ugh...

2008-10-13T03:27:00.002-04:00

Send some good health karma our way ... there seems to be a bug in the Buchwald/Thomas household, and not the adorable six-legged variety that skitters away when you turn on the lights.

When Neil was a little boy, according to his mother, he would occasionally announce that he couldn't go to school because he had a case of "the blahs". Unfortunately this is more a case of "the blechs". At least Louie seems to have been spared, but we have extra seltzer water and bitters should he prove otherwise. It seems to be Neil's turn to sleep, poor guy, and mine to sit on the couch feeling sorry for myself.

Happy Monday!

L-O-L-A

2008-10-11T16:57:00.003-04:00

The aptly named, gender-confused Lola makes her/his singing debut.

Lola would be the bird, by the way. Erika is playing the role of the perch. I'm the one filming with the laugh of a heavyset man:

"Why I love my dog reason #4,629"

2008-10-11T12:50:00.002-04:00

He makes an excellent pillow:

(not to mention his French toast ...)

... or highwater

2008-10-11T04:57:00.006-04:00

First to id this locale gets a copy of my book ... which is to say, the book that I edited. 'Twas a labor of love.

I hope you'll love it too.

emailez-moi.

Nevermore

2008-10-11T04:50:00.002-04:00

Semantics

2008-10-11T02:55:00.002-04:00

Maybe I told you this already. One day while we were in Utah in June, we were hanging out in the hotel pool. We met a couple from (I think) southern California, who were very friendly. We told them it was one of our birthdays, and what our plans were for the evening. Invited them to come by the suite. They asked:

"Do you party?"

Um ... how do you answer that? "Party" means different things to different people. Do we drink? Do drugs? Swing? Enjoy a good laugh?

They stopped by after birthday dinner. As it turns out, "party" means "drink Grand Marnier".

And there you have it. After one month, this is what I have to offer.

I'm back. Won't leave you hanging like this again.

Happy autumn.

In the blinking of an eye

2008-09-11T16:19:00.001-04:00

In the blinking of an eye
Soon everything will change
From a blue September sky
The brimstone falls like rain.
If true Love
Soars the heavens
Pretend and we can fly
Soon everything will change
My love
In the blinking of an eye.

-Neil Thomas, September 2001

Anniversary

2008-09-11T07:58:00.002-04:00

My sweet, sweet friend, you are loved and you are missed, today and always.

Speaking of the vapors ...

2008-09-10T11:34:00.003-04:00

Neil in Haugesund, Norway, summer 2007

Neil in Cooperstown, NY, summer 2008

Brian and me, faking it.

Neil's mom sent him a couple of articles from his hometown newspaper yesterday (did you know that there's a $1.00 bus to Philadelphia?), and told him of a story she'd read recently about a 5-year-old accordion prodigy. Apparently this little boy's dead grandfather, himself an accomplished player, appeared in a dream one night and taught his grandson everything he knew. The little guy woke up the next morning "fluent" in accordion.

Weird.

I have had two dreams in which Mel Gibson, whom I'd never found particularly attractive even before his anti-Semitic drunken rants and weird relationship with Britney Spears (I have to skim US Magazine. It's part of my job. I swear.), proposed to me. In the second one he proposed on stage at my highschool (what was the name of that room, TJ?) with a pair of sapphire earrings.

I woke up fluent in Aussie and best friends with Danny Glover.

Autumn

2008-09-04T11:54:00.005-04:00

Alright, despite the rental and lack of photos, I feel like writing a bit. We're coming up on what may be my favorite time of year -- or at least my most energetic and productive time. The languid summer days are drawing to a close ... and the stress of the holidays is miles away. Or seems to be, anyway. They do start decorating earlier and earlier these days, which drives my mom and me nutso -- she takes the same stance on people who leave their decorations up well into January, and I can understand why. There's something forlorn about it, unloved. Like a hanging clock that stopped working ages ago - or a calendar set on the wrong month.

When I was looking for apartments before finding this one, I was particularly interested in a much larger but affordable place in the West Village, on Barrow Street. Actually on the corner of Barrow and whatever Christopher turns into across 7th Avenue. I visited it twice -- brought my mom by -- but there was always something that felt a little off -- like it had been suddenly abandoned. According to my sister I've "got the vapors"; I tend to pick up on weird energy (I know how flaky that sounds to some). There've been many times that I've sensed something forboding -- have not wanted to enter certain rooms, all that. This has been happening since I was a child. Some years ago I went to a party at the home of someone I was just getting to know. After a glass of wine or two I asked if someone had died there recently -- and, as it turned out, his roommate had a couple of months prior. Once in a bar in New Orleans I headed toward the ladies' room and couldn't bring myself to open the door ... I said something to the bartender and she said, "Everyone says that room is haunted!" If the vapors do in fact exist, I believe I've got 'em. With regard to the enormous apartment on Barrow Street, I asked my realtor to look into why the apartment was for sale ... I think you can guess how this story ends, but yes, the previous tenant had died there.

This was not at all what I intended to write about.

Are we all going to have arthritic thumbs in the future from all the texting that's suddenly required of us? I hate texting -- but sometimes it makes the most sense.

That said, I have an errand to run -- perhaps I'll be back later.

Insomnia

2008-09-03T05:07:00.005-04:00

This time it's seasonal ... hi TJ, my dearest friend, who lives much too far away. So far away that the time zone is convenient both for an insomniac and for one who has trouble remembering time zones.

My grandfather, Wei Liang Chow, was a mathematician and fellow insomniac. I've long assumed that it was on one of these nights, while pacing the house in his slippers, efficient pajamas and dark blue robe, that he discovered what became the Chow Theorem of Algebra.

I've read this theorem, have had it explained to me (by an exceptionally quiet man), have spoken it aloud, and I have absolutely no idea what it means. I completed my formal mathematical education early in college, in a course widely referred to as "Math for Morons". It involved arranging match sticks in patterns. So I love and appreciate Tara for finding such an efficient time zone, one that eliminates the need for any calculation whatsoever, and for a slew of other reasons. We're coming up on 25 years of knowing one another, having met as infants. Give or take 12 years. I can't do the math.

Which brings me in a roundabout way to my next point: for a few days I'll be communicating the old-fashioned way, via Skype and Blackberry, as I will be taking a slight hiatus. Due to the unfortunate union of my laptop and the floor, I will be on a rented machine for a couple of days. And I don't have all my extras, so I can't post the photo of my Papa (Chow) that I otherwise would and so on and so forth, and I'm taking a few days off.

Until we meet again -- the nice fellows at Tekserve promise by Monday -- enjoy the waning days of summer.

Responsibilty

2008-09-02T08:25:00.002-04:00

My friends,

If you are a McCain supporter -- and I don't think that McCain is an evil man -- please, I urge you as responsible and educated citizens and free-thinkers to read everything you can about Sarah Palin's politics. The Vice Presidency is a crucial role -- Dick Cheney has been a formidable and influential presence during his years in office. This is the year that the fate of many, many people in our and other countries rests upon this election -- people you know, and people you read about.

I will now be stepping down from the unusual political soapbox I've been on lately and write, mostly, about other things. I'll save the politics for lulls in cocktail party conversation and dialogues with some of the mostly foreign-born cabdrivers in this fine city.

With love, truth, and good intentions,
LLB

Balance

2008-09-01T10:07:00.006-04:00

I'm a great believer in luck and I find that the harder I work, the more I have of it.

-Attributed to Thomas Jefferson

Happy Labor Day, folks. A new chapter begins ...

A chance for redemption

2008-08-31T21:45:00.006-04:00

In 2002, the late writer and historian Stephen E. Ambrose described New Orleans as "the city that care forgot". Little would he know the prophecy of his words.

As I've mentioned several times, New Orleans is very dear to me for countless reasons and experiences. This time around they are doing things better, according to my friend who is down there on assignment. He is a brilliant photojournalist who has spent extensive time there and in farther flung places I have never traveled. This time around he saw people rounding up the homeless and driving them to safe shelters.

But the city is still miles away from being as prepared as it could be and is still, physically and emotionally, suffering the aftermath of Katrina, and I place the blame entirely on the unbelievable corruption and idiocy of this current administration.

My heart broke during Katrina, and these feelings are surging inside me now. I will try to keep the vitriol at bay.

This time around I plan to do more.

...upon my doorstep

2008-08-22T08:56:00.006-04:00

I really do wish I wrote in this every day, but here's one of the problems: when I write here, I'm aware that I should be working on my book. When it comes time to work on my book, I realize that the apartment's a mess/the dog needs to be walked/there's laundry to do/I need a nap.

Procrastination is one of my strong suits. As are erratic driving and the ability to trace the origin of any conversation, no matter how tangential it's become.

I'm out in LA right now, where I briefly lived 130 years ago. Nice to be here, spending quality time with sister and niece and friends. Yesterday we went to the beach in Santa Monica and then came home and took a swim + jacuzzi in their saltwater pool. Their pool, by the way, is about the size of every apartment I've lived in in NY put together. When I visit the rest of the world, I question my decision to reside in NY. But when I see a free outdoor concert, amazing Broadway play (August: Osage County ... see it!), walk to just about anywhere I need to go, order in just about anything I feel like eating, and spend time with my parents and amazing friends, I remember why. Still, it would be nice to have an apartment that takes more than 11 seconds to tour.

There is either a very industrious gardener or an automatic sprinkler system outside. It's not yet dawn here so I can't tell, but the aforementioned woke me up a little while ago.

Tomorrow we are having a couple of friends over to swim and snack. Among them is my best friend from third grade whom I haven't seen in nearly as long. Through the magic of the Internets (please vote for Obama, people), we reconnected earlier this year. We're so oldschool that we did so via Myspace, not Facebook. Anyway she was a beautiful gal back then and is a beautiful woman today, and I'm really looking forward to seeing her!

What else, what else ... reading a good book recommended to me by the woman working in the bookstore in Woodstock, Vermont, where we were last weekend for a wedding. It's called Loving Frank and is a fictionalized, though thoroughly researched story about the love affair between Frank Lloyd Wright and Mamah Borthwick Cheney. Poor thing probably longed for a simpler last name. Speaking of Cheney ... VOTE OBAMA.

Today we are hiking Runyon Canyon, my sis and me. Last time we did that we ran into Will Ferrell at the top. Of all the canyons in all the towns in all the world, he hikes up mine.

Speaking of hikes, remind me to tell you of our harrowing, treacherous, and vastly understated "hike" in Norway last year. Now I'm going to attempt to sleep a little bit more.

Love you! Miss you! So does this guy:
Triangles make excellent pets.

Gadget's looking happy, isn't he, shyguy?

Will write more.

UPDATE: I just rescued and put outside a bug that had more legs than the Radio City Christmas Spectacular. Blech.

Levee's gonna break ...

2008-08-11T10:43:00.005-04:00

There is the most incredible rain storm happening outside right now. I have never seen anything like it.That's one of my favorite things about this apartment, it's a great place to watch storms as they drift off the Hudson. I would photograph this one if I could but as I CAN'T FIND MY CHARGER, I can't take photos. This has been driving me nutso since August 1, when I took a bunch of great photos during our sailing trip for Erika's birthday. Alas, I have nearly given up hope and may go get a new one today, after which I will inevitably find the first one. Louie is staring at me as I type. He's taken to jumping on the couch and l-e-a-n-i-n-g against me while I'm working on my laptop. Strange little gadget, that one.

In lieu of today's weather, I offer you other rain photos:

Don't stop believin' ...

2008-08-07T02:38:00.006-04:00

Me, my pants, the front hall, the piano I miss. 1974-5ish

Jules in our kitchen, Easter. As opposed to Passover, which we celebrated too. Confusing, but festive.

Jules on horseback, me riding shotgun in a bouncy thing. Jackson Heights, 1971.

I've mastered my scanner. I love it when things work.

Tonight we heard the above-named song, which has become an iconic one, due in part to its brilliant placement in the Sopranos' finale. One of the first MTV videos I saw was by Journey -- the one with the quick angle changes, that appears to be set in a warehouse. The Buchwalds were latecomers to the cable TV trend -- among the last on our street to install the faux-wood contraption with the three-tiered switch and the stubborn push buttons. My very first cable experience was an HBO presentation of Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet -- of which I have vivid childhood memories. I had a crush on Tybalt.

As long as it took us to get cable, it took us double that to embrace the answering machine. We held out for years, the yellow wall phone in our kitchen echoing aimlessly through the empty house. When the four of us would come back from dinner, my sister and I would play a rousing game of Pretend Answering Machine. One would beep and deliver the outgoing message, the other would re-enact messages from family members, our parents' friends, and all those cute boys whose calls we were certain we'd missed.

We finally got a machine and left the requisite outgoing instructions, that the caller leave his name, his number, the time of his call, and that he wait for the tone before doing so.

I got a care package last week from my new friends in Moab -- a book, some sagebrush, a piece of local artwork, and the water bottle I'd left in somebody's car after spending the day on the river. It's a beautiful gift and memento of that strange, mystical, life-changing day.

I wish that I had time to see the whole world.

Lie, Cheat and Steel (Pulse)

2008-07-30T12:07:00.005-04:00

This morning I was perusing one of the freelance writing job sites I frequent, and I came across this gem:

Wanted: Someone to Write my Ethics Papers

Oh, the money I could make were I less scrupulous...

Last night, Neil and I went up to Central Park with a bottle of wine and a blanket and eavesdropped on the Crosby Stills and Nash concert at Summer Stage. They were really good. As always, there were many people doing as we did, picnic baskets, wine, dogs, babies, marijuana (the others, not us) ... and we moved a couple of times till we were finally not sitting among large groups of people talking loudly and paying absolutely no attention to the music. I understand that it's a social event and fun to come with your friends and all that ... but the "free" seating area is, literally, on a bed of wood chips. Not comfortable, reminiscent of the environment in which my childhood pet gerbils lived ... wouldn't these people rather be in the comfort of one of their homes -- or at least on a grassy knoll somewhere?!

A few weeks ago we went to a free-for-everyone show on one of the piers downtown -- Steel Pulse, a great reggae band from England. This was a banner evening as, not only was the band amazing, but I got a step ahead with my new camera! I learned that, when photographing live musical performances, Sports mode works best. Finally, I'm making progress with this thing:

Been a long, long time ...

2008-07-29T04:57:00.003-04:00

Hello my friends! I've been a terrible blah-ger of late, and for this I apologize. I got in a non-blah-ging rut and grossly overstayed my welcome. But now I'm back and I will de-rut immediately.

Much has happened. Still working on my "novel", I'm happy to say -- it seems that I just might reach my goal of 20,000 words by Labor Day, thanks to the guidance of my excellent writing coach, Jill Dearman. Any NYC-based writers who might be interested in her services, check her out on line. Her approach, which has become my approach, has really been working. I made a big deal out of hitting 10,000 words. As Brian said, "Now you just have to put them in some kind of order," which lead to a short-lived banter of nonsensical words "Platypus toast might World War One ever in being for spoke bartender taking the" and that sort of thing. Two people -- my mum and my friend Steve -- asked what word # 10,000 was: overtanned.

Who knows how much of this will remain after the first round of edits? Not I.

In other someday-they'll-catch-on-to-me news, a memoir that I edited is being published this fall, and is in pre-sales on Amazon and B&N at a sizable discount. The book is called Living in the Woods in a Tree, and is about the late country singer/outlaw Blaze Foley and his relationship with the author, who was his girlfriend in the mid-70's. The title refers to their temporary makeshift home in a treehouse in rural Georgia, amidst an enclave of artists and bohemians. Blaze met an untimely death -- by murder committed by a man who got away on a technicality and is now a minister of some sort in Las Vegas -- and there has recently been a resurgence of interest in him. A documentary is in the works, as well as a release of some of his music, which is amazing. Lucinda Williams wrote a song for him following his death: Drunken Angel. If you are at all interested -- it's really a beautifully written book and a great story -- I hope you'll consider pre-ordering a copy! I stand to make at least $37.00 off this project. Celebratory PBR's are on me.

What else ... I'm in insomnia mode right now so will have to save the real catching up for a post later today. The sky is turning Crayola's Thistle ... do they still make that one? I always liked it in the way I liked Cornflower. My alma mater, Lafayette College, is in Easton Pennsylvania ... home of Crayola. And Larry Holmes.

Must go try for another hour or so of sleep. I shall return.

Bad dog...

2008-07-14T11:36:00.002-04:00

Independence

2008-07-12T04:19:00.002-04:00

Man in the moon

2008-07-11T00:09:00.009-04:00

I wrote this post about 24 hours ago:

I've had several ideas in the last two days of what to write -- and I feel that the answer's made itself clear. This is a significant day, the one I've just lived through. I had a scary-but-dealable medical issue -- a procedure -- to contend with; it's all good now, but things of this nature always bring with them bouts of melancholy and contemplation. Today was also my sweet friend Laura's birthday. Laura left us six years ago and has been on my mind nearly every day since.

Happy birthday, my dear!

Earlier, I spoke with a friend who's been having a hard time with things lately. One recent morning -- he'd been out all night with nowhere to stay -- all the sadness and pissed-off-ness he's been swallowing for far too long began to surface. He feels like he's about to lose it, he's out in public (midtown) and he meets a man -- a Cherokee man, he explained, though I'm not sure this was a necessary descriptor -- who takes him under his (Cherokee) wing and calms him down. My friend, who's a fairly spiritual guy, tells me he ends up having "an amazing day with this stranger," to which we both said at the same time, "That's magical."

I'd told him the story of my second-to-last day in Utah, a kindred experience. I was feeling blue and planning to spend the day by myself. Despite my best intentions, given my state of mind, the day would have likely degenerated into nothingness. Or nothing productive, anyway. I went across the street to the store and was considering the beverage display when the girl next to me asked if I was okay, because I "looked sad". We introduced ourselves, I told her the bare bones of what was going on -- it can be very freeing, opening up to a total stranger --and she invited me to go rafting with her and her friends. So I did -- there were about fifteen of us and three or four rafts -- and it was amazing and beautiful, and magical. I couldn't have imagined a more perfect remedy than being taken in by this group of lovely and comforting strangers -- all of whom had gravitated toward Moab to embrace the lifestyle -- and spending the day on the Colorado. It helped me to realize how much larger than our lives the universe is. As broadminded, experienced, and adventuresome as we might be, there is limitless room for expansion. Who's to say whether this is the life I'm supposed to lead in the place I'm supposed to lead it? Every decision made along the way, from where to go to college to which corner to turn one afternoon, has collectively led me to this very moment.

In early 2000 I went to New Orleans* for the second time to visit my friend Bliss, a writer who was down there researching for her next book. On my first night there we attended a party at a well-known New Orleans writer's house -- he and his wife had a beautiful home in the Marigny, the neighborhood I stay in when I visit. I spent the end of the evening talking to a man named Charlie Smith, a seasoned fellow who was, he explained, an out-of-print poet. He recited to me various lines and verses from his work, most of which seemed to be about drinking, and falling futilely in love. I asked Charlie where I could find a copy of his book of poems, Still Waiting for Last Call. He told me that I probably couldn't, that it was gone forever.

A year or so later I found a copy -- signed, no less -- through an out-of-print bookshop. The poetry is simple, imperfect, lyrical -- and, for the most apart, about drinking and falling futilely in love.

Earlier this evening I was sitting alone in the living room (the boys were sleeping) and thinking about Laura, and a line from one of Charlie Smith's poems popped into my mind. I couldn't recall the name of the woman to whom the piece was written, but I rememembered the line, "You left us too soon." The poem is about the loss of a friend who grappled with drugs and demons. This was not the case with Laura, but the sense of loss and of a life snuffed out long before its time is the same.

I found my copy of Still Waiting for Last Call in the other room and -- despite the fact that most of the pages are loose and the cover functions basically as a folder -- I opened right to the poem. This could just be coincidence, but I think it's more than that. Magic, the universe, a sign from beyond ... to me it's all one.

Anyway, here 'tis:

You Left Us Too Soon

Butterflies reach out
when they break their cocoon
Stretching their wings
and seeking more room.

Reaching out for the man in the moon
with a go-to-hell smile
and a gold plated spoon.

But,
Nikkie
Sweet Nikkie
you left us too soon.

Bright eyes can disguise
the person within
Pain can be hidden by
a quicksilver grin.

So Nikkie went looking for the man in the moon
with a go-to-hell smile
and a gold plated spoon.

And
Nikkie,
Sweet Nikkie
you left us too soon.

It's a short one ... I wish there was more. I guess that's the point.

*The photo above is from the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans, February 2006

Pride

2008-07-09T15:47:00.009-04:00

Argh -- sorry I haven't updated in almost a week! It's been a busy one since the long weekend, but that's no excuse not to write. I will do so later this evening.

In the meantime, and in the spirit of Gay Pride, which was two weekends ago, I post some photos from last year's festivities. Despite living in what was once considered a predominantly gay neighborhood (gayborhood?), this year's Pride weekend almost went by without my realizing that it was happening. Most of my gay friends skip the festivities, which I can completely understand. With the exception of those taking place in New Orleans, I do not fall into the "Everyone loves a parade" demographic. Last year, however, we were aware of the weekend and stopped by the parade to lend our support:

The moral of this post: be proud of who you are.

'Tis of thee

2008-07-04T10:28:00.004-04:00

Happy 4th of July, my friends! I will withold serious commentary on this great nation of ours until November ... though politics ranks right down there with finances and religion as things-I-am-reticent-to-discuss. There are some wonderful things about this country that should not be taken for granted. And some things -- practices and ideologies -- that will always baffle me.

However, my ride will be here soon. I shall return.

Sunrise

2008-07-03T06:32:00.002-04:00

Why must I wake up so bright and early on the mornings I don't have to go into the office? I beat the Times delivery guy and I hear garbarge trucks. My dog looked annoyed that I disrupted his sleep.

Time to read: I'm engrossed in an excellent book, God's Middle Finger, which is written by a friend of a friend -- an affable fellow I've met several times. This is by no means a shameless plug -- he's a brilliant, witty writer with a fascinating story. Several, actually.

Tra la ... I bet you're all still sleeping.

Mother Nature

2008-07-03T01:07:00.003-04:00

Among many others, I inadvertantly left this shot out of the Utah line-up:

We didn't set out to go on this rather harrowing excursion in an ecologically brutal vehicle, but once there, we were hardly in a position to ask the driver to turn around. We thought we were taking a jeep to the arches; instead we scaled rocks in a Hummer. This day was henceforth dubbed The Accidental Hummer. Hilarity ensued. As did my fear of heights, which I got over relatively quickly.

It was actually kind of fun.

Chivalry is under the weather ...

2008-07-02T15:25:00.003-04:00

I keep thinking today is Thursday.

Yesterday I was crossing the street against a flashing "Don't Walk" sign. As we know, this quickly becomes a time-sensitive issue. There were two fellows (in suits) standing right at the crosswalk entrance, blocking access for everyone else, including me. I had to side-step them whilst avoiding the oncoming traffic. One of the gentlemen was advising the other, "I'm telling you bro, chivalry will get you everywhere ..."

Wisdom

2008-07-02T11:39:00.004-04:00

I just asked Erika if I should share something in this forum and her response was, "Yuck. You may want to keep that one to yourself."

Consider yourselves spared.

Gotham

2008-07-01T23:40:00.003-04:00

The color of photos doesn't transfer well to this forum. The actual photos from Utah are much more vibrant, I noticed when I re-read that last post twice to make sure it didn't sound too anything...

This is the view outside my window taken the day after I returned from our trip.

Bang a Gong

2008-07-01T11:49:00.013-04:00

At long last ... I've posted some of my photos and can put this trip behind me, where it belongs. There were some beautiful moments (scenery-wise, there were no non-beautiful moments), and some regrettable ones. I seem to be in the midst of one of these phases during which too many things are not quite right. I'd like to believe that we're only presented with what we can handle, but it can certainly be overwhelming.

One of my favorite expressions is the allegedly Chinese proverb:
It's better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.

I agree, to the point that I've been called Pollyanna (I realize some of you will find that absurd).This has been an extraordinarily challenging 2008 thus far -- somewhat for me and very much for too many of the people in my life. I have several friends going through what might be their most difficult times yet, and I have been doing my best to be supportive. But I am human, and sometimes I don't have the emotional energy to expend on everything and everyone who deserves it -- and still have enough left over for me and my relationship. I got a few pieces of upsetting-but-fixable news early one morning during our trip, and Moab was an odd place to be for this. The indescribable beauty and the vastness of it all made me feel at once connected to the world and completely isolated. I tried all day to be cheerful and positive ... and by nightfall it wasn't working. Until I figure out the secret to boundless energy, I can only take on so much.

Today is July 1, exactly six months from New Year's Day in both directions. My half-birthday was Saturday, and I'm told that this is a period of subconscious reflection -- similar to the collective reflection that marks the end of the calendar year. We define our lives with each passing year, each birthday. It's a lot, facing both of those markers at once (not to mention Christmas -- oy vey). So I acknowledge every possible new beginning -- always ready to start over and get it right this time. Today is the mid-point of 2008, a new phase. I plan to use it wisely.

That said, welcome to Moab:

This is a dinosaur footprint, a type they believe is related to (but much smaller then) T Rex.

This is a spot called "Matrimonial Springs" ... it's perfect, clean water that comes with the caveat that once you sip it, you'll have to come back to Moab.

Maybe.