The Thirty-three Days of Christmas

'Twas the morning after Thanksgiving

And all through the house,

I began stirring

As soon as I roused.

Well... I may have mentioned that there was a time when I considered a career as a poet. In college, my poetry contained pools of angst populated with 'deep' thoughts pulled from the depth of my psyche. Reading them now I am reminded of an emotional prison-break through a swamp. Give me a break. It was college. And I was one of those English majors.

I suspect roused, as a word, might be a bit antiquated. Wasn't Ebenezer Scrooge roused from sleep when visited by Marley and the subsequent spirits? I am pretty sure it doesn't exactly rhyme with house. But, these days, I think my poetry would lean a bit more towards Calvin Trillin's. Or my favorite contemporary poet, Billy Collins (read The Reverent by him sometime. It gives you a whole new perspective on dog ownership).

Here at Casa de Bronte, Christmas starts immediately after Thanksgiving dinner. But this year, it didn't start until this morning when I got up early, and made tea, pouring it into my favorite Christmas mug. I took the mug, my laptop, and The New York Times back to bed with me. I propped up all of the pillows, hit A Charlie Brown Christmas on my iPod, and began to write this post.

It is a brilliantly sunny day. We finally had rain Tuesday night, and yesterday's sky was filled with gorgeous cottony clouds clustered in every direction you looked. I am always thankful for clouds, even more so than sunsets. And I looked around in awe as we drove up the 405 towards our friends' home. But, back to today. Once I get itchy to get up and get going, I will begin to pull boxes and my small Christmas tree out of closets and begin decorating the house for the coming holiday. There will be clusters of bells on doorknobs, and a big wooden advent calendar with spaces for chocolates behind each door. As people come to visit, they get to open the door for that day. And each one plays a Christmas tune. I can't stand it, it's so adorably silly. I will be using Christmas pot holders, towels, and napkins. And Santa Claus will appear all all over the house. Following my aunt's tradition, I started to collect large Santas and have purchased one each year, mostly from Gump's.

Christmas is hard for many, and was a major struggle for me for several years. And, truth be told, it is still a struggle; the struggle to be mindful and keep your thoughts, like a rudder, straight ahead and in the moment. Frankly, with the recent, local mass shooting, it is more of a battle than a struggle. But, I work at it hard. And, as time passes, I am more and more able to keep the dread down, which, so far, makes the coming holiday feel less insurmountable than it has felt in recent years. And I constantly remind myself that it also can be such a lovely time of year. I love attending Mass during the Advent Season. I love hearing the choir and singing the familiar carols. And I plan to attend an evening event of Christmas music at the church I attend.

Last year, Joel and I went to a staged radio show reading of Miracle on 34th Street at The Pasadena Playhouse. It starred Alfred Molina and Peri Gilpin. This year they are doing It's a Wonderful Life, and we plan to attend that, as well. We've all seen the film a bizillion times. But the story of someone driven to the brink, and then realizing what their life means and what meaningful space they fill in the circle of the people they care about, speaks to me in a different way than in the past. For at least a decade, my favorite Christmas film has been The Ref. This year I feel less irreverent and may get back to the classics. Though, while the radio play was great fun, I really can't handle watching Miracle on Thirty-Fourth Street. I fear cavities. And I just don't get Frosty the Snowman. Nor, The Grinch. We all have our holiday boundaries.

Yesterday, on Thanksgiving, as we were leaving our friends' home where we had celebrated with their extended family, another close friend shot Joel and me a group text that read:

Happy Thanksgiving Deborah and Joel!

We have so many blessings in our lives and you are one of them!

We wish you were here to celebrate with us.

And as the season begins with Thanksgiving and the Christmas season following, I carry those thoughts with me. With each decoration put up, and each ornament I attach to my mini tree, the ornaments I collected through both the years and my travels, I will take a moment to think about the meaning of Christmas, and my own devotion to the circle of people I care about. We shouldn't need Scrooge's three spirits to rouse us from our bed to remind us.

Christmas. Starting today, for thirty-days, let's try to be joyful, appreciative, and grateful for our blessings. Let's try hard to be kind and generous to each other. Maybe we will feel better. Maybe we can even start a trend...

Hope you had a fine Thanksgiving, and let me be the first to wish you a Happy Christmas! And thank you for reading my blog.

Borderline

Los Angeles, California

Joel and I met at Borderline. We each remember this totally differently. He remembers that I asked him to dance (Wrong! I never asked men to dance). I remember him asking me to dance, and that I had never seen him at the club before, though he later told me that he always danced on the opposite side. In the group I hung out with, we mostly danced with the same people each week, and I was not in the habit of dancing with men I didn't know. It wasn't that I had a problem dancing with strangers, I didn't. I had gotten used to that back when I was a beginner. But, I was no longer a novice salsa dancer, and I had a problem dancing with men who didn't know how to effectively lead. Occasionally, I took a chance, as I did in Joel’s case. And to this day, I don’t know on what that decision was based. Fate, perhaps. As we were waiting for the song to start, he said to me, I don't really know how to dance salsa. Oh, great... I thought. What's he doing here? But then he said something about knowing how to dance the way he learned where he had come from. And that turned out to be cumbia and Mexico City, respectively. But he did know enough salsa, and he was a fun lead. I didn't see or dance with him again for awhile, because I went out of town just after that night. When I returned, I didn't connect him with the previous dance and conversation. When I asked him his name, he said, Joe. I'm Deborah. He shot back: I know. We've danced before.

Joel became popular with our group and we all danced with him. And I got to know him better over the years that we went to Borderline. Later, I saw him and danced with him at Mama Juana's. He was not my favorite partner, but we danced well together. And eventually, we started meeting to dance at Bogie's, and Noypitz in Glendale, after texting: Bailando esta noche? We were friends at that time, and talked and laughed a lot together. After we fell in love, we danced a few more times at Borderline. But salsa nights there ended shortly after. Like a lot of salsa nights, they had become disorganized. Out of all the clubs I just mentioned, only Bogie's continues with a salsa night, though with a diminished dance floor since we started dancing there.

I know every part of Borderline, from the parking lot up the stairs to the door and cashier's counter. I know the bar, the stage, and the DJ booth. But, especially, I know the dance floor. It always reminded me of my figure skating days, as it is surrounded by what, in skating, we called the boards, with openings to enter the floor in the corners. When I received the text from my friend in Florida, early Thursday morning, I clicked on the TV to the news that the shooting, about which my friend had texted, had, indeed, happened at Borderline. There have been so many shootings that they no longer carry that sense of once-in-a-lifetime news that they did back when the Columbine massacre occurred. Still, every time I have heard about one, I have felt sickly distressed, my thoughts going to a place where I have trouble throttling back to return to a less unsettled place. But I didn't realize what it would feel like to know that it had happened in a place I knew so well. To see video of that familiar place, a video taken while it was occurring. To hear the eerie silence of that video. I could not stop thinking about it. Thirty-six hours later, Joel was evacuated from his home, not far from Borderline, due to the Woolsley Fire, and he and his dog, Buster, came to stay. Borderline was still a crime scene. There were memorials scheduled at churches, but they were difficult to attend, as the 101 freeway was shut down. Attention and the news service shifted to the fire. Borderline became, literally, yesterday's news.

There is much to say about these shootings, but the solitary question is always: Why? Brian, the owner of Borderline, who I remember often saying hello to, wants to reopen. I admire the sense that these people can't take these things down. But nothing will bring back those lives. And, for us, nothing will bring back the security of earlier days. Where is safety? Not in churches, hospitals, offices, theaters, nor schools. Not at dance clubs, nor concerts. Despite current rhetoric, it's not the terrorists, nor illegal immigrants, who are going to get us. It's our crazy neighbors who have guns. The ones who their neighbors and friends and even family members later reported that they knew were crazy. Crazy enough to go on a suicide mission to take out innocent people enjoying music and dance together. Innocent people praying. Or kindergartners. That crazy, and armed.

Joel and I will dance in other clubs. But there will never be the ease that we had back in the day. With Borderline comes the personal, permanent realization that we just don't live in that world anymore. But we must try to live with the hope that someday we will once again. Once the madness is over. For now, its all you can do. You just cannot give up the hope.


You can find updates as well as the link to the gofundme site supporting victims and families of the Borderline mass shooting, through this link to borderlinebarandgrill: here

A Duck + Two Girls

Los Angeles, California

Every so often, though not often enough, my friend, Lynnette, comes to stay. There was a very short period of time when I was upset with her for abandoning me so shortly after we became, what she calls, official friends. We had begun walking together at the large recreational space near my home. And she dropped by often, bringing baked goods during my bathroom rehab. She was very popular with Kevin, my contractor, and the workers who all coveted her lemon bars. But shortly after, she and her husband, Jim, moved from a few miles away from me, to an Orange County beach community. I forgave her when she started coming to stay with me.

Last month she came for car repairs and then somehow ended up recaulking my kitchen sink. We had each run in different directions that day, and at my local Ace Hardware store, I inquired about tools to remove the old caulking as well as buying the tube of material to recaulk. Lynnette has a Nike personality. Not much for talking endlessly about getting stuff done, but likes to just do it. Or, as she says, you have to have a plan.

This time she had planned to spend the night after attending to an appointment in my area. But I convinced her to come the night before. So she spent two nights with me. The first night, Lynnette picked up take-out from a very good middle-eastern restaurant. Afterward, she helped me clean up (by way of saying, she did the dishes, as she always seems to do...) and then we commenced playing my new favorite game. We played for an hour or two, then took a break to shower and put on pjs, then back at it. We have to set a time to stop, otherwise we might continue to play until one of us cries uncle and drops to sleep like a pre-teenager at a slumber party.

The next day we again ran in different directions, meeting back in the late afternoon. She was returning home the next day for her own birthday celebration at her home, and needed to bring home ducks from the local Asian market, 99 Ranch. Or possibly from the Chinese restaurant next door to the market, Sam Woo's. She wasn't sure, so she suggested that we make a run there. We had planned to get Indian take-out that night (no time to cook -- gotta get to the game). But now our plans changed. Did we want to get take-out Chinese instead? So off we went...

The Asian market was amazing. Joel has introduced me to Latino markets, and I love shopping with him and treasure-hunting all the aisles. Lynnette is someone who moves with purpose and intention, but I told her I had to go up and down every aisle, and she slowed her pace and pointed out different things. Some enticing, some looking strange to my eyes.

At first I was put off by the sight of the ducks hanging by their necks, although I'd seen them before at restaurants in San Francisco's Chinatown. But I like duck. So I got over it. Lynnette's sister had advised her to buy the ducks at the market, but she was thinking the duck at the restaurant next-door was better. So an idea emerged: Should we get a half-duck at each place for tonight's dinner? We ordered at the restaurant and I waited for our number to be called for pick up. Lynnette ran back to the market and purchased the half-duck from there. She also got shrimp: whole shrimp fried and crustily salted, which you eat shell and all. At the restaurant I carried out duck, rice, and Chinese broccoli. And home we went.

The restaurant duck was mahogany-dark and the glazed sauce permeated the meat. We thought we would like this one the best, as it looked the prettiest (so to speak). But the lighter-sauced duck from the market was the most delicious. We never even got to the rice. We sat at my counter, in my kitchen (my kitchen table taken over by the game and my dining room table unapproachable due to all of my living room furniture and art currently stored there since the recent flood). Did we two girls get through a whole duck? Well, no. But I now have duck stored in my freezer which, hopefully, Joel will utilize into tamales at Christmas. I have duck stock and duck fat (french fries), also in freezer for holiday use.

We cleaned up (Lynnette Does Dishes), each took off for our respective quarters, showered and finished off the night playing the game well into the early hours of the morning. Lynnette left the next morning, picking up four ducks at the market and heading south for her birthday celebration. I enjoyed leftovers from the kabobs and the duck for three days, even sending some duck home with Joel before freezing the remainder.

Two girls, a duck and a board game. And a good time was had by all (well... not by the duck, but that's just a figure of speech, after all).

Thank you for reading my blog!

The Gift

Los Angeles, California

I collect words. They're my favorite thing. One of my other favorite things is paper. But the best words I collect are not placed on paper. They are put onto a page entitled Writing in my Notes on my iPhone. When I read something that speaks to me with a degree of gravitas, I add it to the collection. When I think of something that I can put into words which feel profound to me, it goes there as well. I experiment a lot with words: words constructed together as posts here on this blog; words written fast and randomly in my journal; words formulated as prayers. I find sentences magical. There is the alchemy of someone stringing words together to form sentences that can really speak to, really emotionally move, mankind.

If you watch certain news networks, there can be, unfortunately, a barrage of disturbing words thrown at you. I listen to NPR which becomes the background to many of my days. But I also listen to music, and I pay attention to lyrics. I am also attentive to dialog in films. My favorite films are those which were originally plays because the dialog is usually stellarly tight, having been toned and honed throughout the play's creation and production.

I once borrowed a book from a friend and found several pages had their corners dog-eared. Upon returning it, I inquired as to the significance of those pages. She replied that she did that when there was something on that page that was particularly valuable, and that she might want to go back to review what was written. I have my own means of dog-earing in screenshots of quotes, my aforementioned Notes collection, as well as clippings from newspapers and The New Yorker (yes, I still read, joyfully read, in print).

Joel was helping me organize my office this past weekend. Ok, organize is probably too strong of a word. Remember the old saying about getting your sh*t together? Well, I'm not setting the bar that high. In that room, my goal is to just eventually get it all scraped into one pile. I frankly think that Marie Kondo would throw up her hands and switch careers if she saw my office. But I digress... In the process of sorting through some paperwork (meanwhile, Joel was sorting through a collection of hotel laundry bags which I insisted I could not throw out as each was a memory of a trip, many with Sandra. See what I mean?). Anyway, one of the things I found in this pile of paper was a Christmas tag. You know, the ones that we write on and attach to the ribbon of a wrapped gift? I remember purchasing these particular tags (one of, oh, about 10,000 which I have collected, and please don't utter a word about this) at Crate and Barrel, back in the day when Crate and Barrel stores were located in malls, and didn't sell much furniture. On the side where you would write the To: and From:, I had written this in red ink:

Bronte, Treat each day as a new recipe to be tried or a faithful one to be improved upon.

I don't recall writing this, but suspect it was something I did for myself one recent Christmas. I have long given myself a birthday present. Something I would not buy myself on any of the other 364 days of the year. The first was an exorbitantly expensive (at that time) pair of Frye boots when I was in college. I've also bought myself a Mason Pearson hairbrush, which is something every woman should own. Over the past few years, I have also given myself Christmas presents, usually cookbooks, following in the tradition of both my mom and myself collecting them. Although, in Christmas 2015, I bought myself a 75-inch Samsung television so I could watch my favorite Christmas movies. It was a step towards addressing a holiday with intense memories combined with loss and loneliness. Did it work? Mas o menos, as watching some of the films was just too painful.

But back to the gift tag. I think this was on the gift I gave myself last year. It was most likely attached to the cookbook which I bought and wrapped for myself, waiting until Christmas day to unwrap. I would have curled up in front of the fire, wrapped in an afghan (blanket, not hound), and then read the book from cover to cover. I don't just choose cookbooks for the recipes, but for the writing as well. I don't often cook from Nigella Lawson's cookbooks, but I buy them all for the delight of her writing. Other favorites: Amanda Hesser's Cooking for Mr. Latte; A Homemade Life by Molly Wizenberg; My Kitchen Year by Ruth Reichl (which may very well have been the one that was attached to that tag). Although not cookbooks, my hands-down, very favorite food writer will always be Calvin Trillin. His collection of articles, Feeding a Yen, is a book I often carry with me when heading out to appointments. I can open it to any article and read with delight.

But, let's loop back to that gift tag. I have often remarked (and I am sure have written here, probably more than once) that if you get one good recipe from a cookbook, it was worth the price of purchase. And that is not a bad way to approach each day. Sometimes when you make a recipe, you find it's almost there. Maybe it needed something more -- more sabor, Joel would say, but he usually just means more salt or chilies. I often find that soups need some spiking, a bit of lemon juice, or a dash of sherry vinegar, or even some Louisiana hot sauce. Something that brings the flavor up. And our days can use that seasoning as well. Many people have written or remarked that each day is a blank page or blank canvas, but I think not. For me, the day spreads before you like a recipe. It offers ingredients which are the friends or family you see, or the strangers you encounter. There is the method, which is how you put your day together with the things that you need to do. It will require industry, which is the work required to get things done, and the workout you do each day to keep your head and body straight. Patience, required while marinating, roasting or baking, can come in time set aside for meditating or resting. That spiking or sabor to bring up the flavor comes in many forms, but for me, dancing salsa provides it in a spicy hit. I also appreciate the marination part, in the idea of time out each day, whether in the form of a nap, meditation, or bath. And the celebration of the day's end by a designated cocktail hour or even tea ceremony. Finally, bread broken at the last meal of the day can provide the reward of completing the day's efforts and savoring the results of the day's endeavors. At bedtime, you might want to copy out your recipe, including the changes or tweaking that occurred. For me, that is by keeping a journal, which I know not everyone does, but is essential for me in sorting out all of the thoughts I have swimming around in my head. 

Some recipes simply don't work out. Some are disasters. But maybe that's the time to come back to the faithful ones. The ones that make up your repertoire as a cook. With these, you can prepare as you always do, or tweak a bit. Each day has the same potential to not work out or to be a disaster. But even in that, we have learned something, if we look for something to learn. And that is perhaps the gift I was trying to give myself with that Christmas tag. A thought in the gift of words that mean something to me.  A gift from me to me. And now, a gift from me to you.

Thank you for reading my blog. And, go DODGERS... please, PLEASE GO DODGERS...

Caryn

Los Angeles, California

My cousin, Caryn, will miss my birthday this year. After over three years fighting a glioblastoma brain tumor, she passed away earlier this month.

Caryn was my little cousin. Her sister, Lauren, was two years older than me; Caryn was six-months younger. While we hadn't seen each other much over the last decades, she and Lauren, and their parents, were a very important part of my growing up. I have so very many memories of Caryn, especially during our teenaged years. We spent seven weeks together in an apartment in Waikiki while our moms were attending summer session at the University of Hawaii. She was my first roommate, after we moved into an apartment together when we were eighteen. Before that, we spent time in Santa Cruz together, then drove with a few of my friends (one had been a roommate, also in Waikiki, for most of the summer after I graduated from high school) back to Reno, where my cousin was in her last semester of high school. Several months later, two of my friends/Waikiki roommates were killed in a car accident when their VW bug went off the road during high winds in Pacheco Pass, including Larry, who was our driver from Santa Cruz to Reno. Caryn came down to LA for the funerals. Larry's funeral was on Monday. Ray's was on Tuesday. Wednesday was my 18th birthday.

Our life as 18-year old roommates didn't pan out as planned. Caryn eventually returned to Reno, and I eventually returned to college. But, while we only saw each other occasionally (at her sister, Lauren's, memorial service just months before my dad passed away suddenly. And why do these things always have to come in clumps?), we were always in contact with long phone conversations over the decades. After her diagnosis and surgery, we began to talk a lot more. This had become difficult for Caryn over this past year, as she struggled with word retrieval. And, I know that we hear this all the time, but she really did fight a valient battle against the disease. Her strength was exemplary: Never complaining; never dwelling on it, and even addressing it with dark humor, which I appreciated.

At the Sukkot celebration that I wrote about in the post Ten Days That Didn't Shake the World, someone at the table said: No one gets out of here alive. I always think that this is attributable to Jim Morrison, but, frankly, I'm not doing any origin research on this. In response to that comment, Steven, who is my friend Lisa's husband, replied that it was true. Something is going to get us.

Just a month before Sandra was diagnosed with lung cancer, we were sitting (as we often did) at the Bora Bora Bar at the Kona Village Resort. We had met there. Not just at the Kona Village, but actually at the Bora Bora Bar. That was about ten or twelve years earlier. This time, in 2010, Sandra remarked that at her age she was starting to wonder what was going to get her. She was telling me that they had been attending a lot of funerals. They were in their 70s, and, that happens. Sandra was joking about wondering what was going to take her out, but, I know that she was also serious. She had a wicked sense of humor and could often be darkly funny. But, I understand that you do start to think about your own demise as you see mortality closing in around you. I've had a lot of death in my life over the past few years. And now I have friends struggling with serious illnesses. I'm pretty healthy, unless you consider my recurring, situational anxiety and depression. My mom, who lived to the age of 94, once remarked that we were healthy as horses. We're just nuts! She also had fought anxiety and depression throughout her life, and my dad had experienced anxiety as well, while in the service during World War II (I was genetically doomed). I also have a sibling who caught the brass ring in the nuts department: OCD; hypochondriasis, in addition to being a certifiable control freak. But enough about family...

...Except for Caryn. She had a distinctive voice, which I can still hear, as did Sandra. It's interesting that we hear their voices so clearly in our heads after they are gone. I still hear my mom and my dad. I hear Tom and Sandra. And I hear Doug.

I recently acquired the BlueRay disc of one of my favorite films: Truly, Madly, Deeply. In it, the main character, who is a translator, hears her late lover's voice speaking to her in Spanish. But he didn't speak Spanish, until... In TMD, there is an afterlife where you can take language courses. Or, you can choose to come back to your lover's apartment, bring some friends with you, and watch some classic videos. It's a funny, touching, and heartfelt expression of what we are capable of when our pain, or our other's pain, becomes unbearable. And pain of loss often feels that way. I do fear that the more loss you experience, the more you become used to it. And that's not good.

Joel came over last night, and we listened to music that I had enjoyed with my cousin. It was a rock and roll extravaganza of Spirit, and Quicksilver Messenger Service with a lot of Buffalo Springfield and Jefferson Airplane. Through the music, and with Joel, I allowed myself to feel the pain and the loss of Caryn, while celebrating what we had shared in our lives. She was a unique and independent woman. She was my closest family. She was another woman in my life who I felt unconditionally loved the people in her life, including me. Which is is a skill. A talent. And a God-given gift.

I will miss her, too, forever.

Ten Days That Didn't Shake the World

Los Angeles, California

It started in late September when my friend, Lisa, invited me to be her guest at a wine tasting fundraiser for our mutual friend's dance company, Donna Sternberg and Dancers. Donna taught at Jane Fonda's workout, and after its closing, I had followed her to another studio, which is where I met Lisa. We were both taking a step aerobics class. Lisa is a petite thing, but she always stacked two steps. I aspired to the two-step workout, but spent most of my time moving steps on and off as I, Goldilocks-style, was wanting a step-and-a-half system (which was not going to happen). It was great to see Donna again, after almost two decades since I had moved on to pilates with the lovely Cathy, my friend and Chinese-medicine practitioner/pilates trainer, and to salsa dance for cardio.

The wine-tasting, auction, and two-course dinner was fun, held in a home in my absolute hands-down favorite place in Los Angeles -- Rustic Canyon. It was a lovely first of Fall afternoon and evening. Again, good to see Donna again, as well as spend an evening as Lisa's date.

I didn't get to be Lisa's date at dinner at her home the following week, when she and her husband, Steven, hosted a Sukkot celebration outside on their patio. Steven explained the significance of the holiday and celebration which was interesting. October is my favorite month, so any celebration of harvest is going to be a good one. The dinner was amazing, the wine was The Prisoner, and I went home in a happy harvest haze.

On Sunday the Dodgers closed their season in San Francisco by sweeping the Giants. As this was happening, I made a momentous decision. After not having attended any games at Dodger Stadium in the 2018 season (though there were a couple of away games), I bit the bullet and got tickets for the MLB National League Western Division Tiebreaker game against the Colorado Rockies. I had, early in the season, told Lynnette that I was bailing on the Dodgers and becoming a Rockies fan. Of course she never bought that. And now, here were Joel and I, on a Monday at Dodger Stadium, clearly cheering the Dodgers to a Division win.

What was it like being back at Dodger Stadium a year later? Not bad. Still WAY too loud. Remarkably shabby. It's a shame, and hopefully the tide will turn (as in so many other areas of present life), and some attention will be given to giving the Dodgers a decent place to play, as well as the fans a more comfortable place to watch them. For now, it really is an ugly mess. I'm not much for tearing down old structures, but when something is so clearly shabby and junky (the Queen Mary also comes to mind), maybe it's time to rethink the preservationist movement. But, at any rate, Joel and I had great fun together at the game, as we always do. Joel came late to baseball, but he increasingly enjoys the game and even more so when the Dodgers are winning. What he is not big on is fighting the traffic back out of the stadium. Another good reason to use Lyft.

So, that was my ten days that didn't shake the world. And that's a good thing. As time goes by, I appreciate my undershaken days ever more. So, my time with old friends, Joel, and the Dodgers was well-spent and relished.

As for the next ten days, it's yin and yang: the first of Joel's wrist surgeries; Lynnette's visit including Ticket to Ride, my current favorite board game, then my first MLB Post-season Dinner Party + Watch, with the rest of the month speeding up as I commence construction here at Casa Healy. While I don't enjoy construction and repairs, having done it before, like most things in life I am getting better at it. The key is in trying to have a good relationship with your workers. Coffee and donuts definitely help!

Thank you for reading my blog and GO DODGERS..!

Emotional Intelligence

Los Angeles, California

This term emotional intelligence has been hanging around for awhile. So, why do I feel like it is reverberating a lot lately? Reverberating in both the macro and the micro.

Emotional Intelligence is defined as the capacity to be aware of, control, and express one's emotions, and to handle interpersonal relationships judiciously and empathetically." This definition appears online on the google dictionary site. Online, where there is a lot about this. Wikipedia's definition is: the capability of individuals to recognize their own emotions and those of others, discern between different feelings and label them appropriately, use emotional information to guide thinking and behavior, and manage and/or adjust emotions to adapt to environments or achieve one's goal(s). It says that "...the term first appeared in a 1964 paper by Michael Beldoch and gained popularity in the 1995 book. That book is Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman." Ok, but after having offered that, I must now ask: Do we really rely on Wikiopedia's take on, like, anything? Let's move on...

What I find interesting is that most of the references to EI online is about EI in the workplace. There are articles in periodicals such as INC and the Harvard Business Review. But clearly, anyone who has these abilities to bring to their organization, will display these capabilities in other areas of their lives as well, right?

An article in The Atlantic, ponders whether EI can be used for evil, as well as for good. It questions whether both Martin Luther King, and Adolph Hitler, used their ability to read the emotions of others to tap into movements. Clearly, good and evil. EI is touted to combat bullying in schools, but, as the article points out, "when people hone their emotional skills, they become better at manipulating others. When you are good at controlling your own emotions, you can disguise your true feelings. When you know what others are feeling, you can tug at their heartstrings and motivate them to act against their own best interests."

If you have been a victim of this, as I suspect we all have, you recognize the dark side of it. As the articles states: "When people have self-serving motives, emotional intelligence becomes a weapon for manipulating others." Certainly today, in the world, we see leaders who appear to be capable of robbing their supporters of their capacity to reason. But in the micro, even if you are intelligent as well as emotionally intelligent, you may still be at risk of being influenced by individuals who have their own agenda or past score to settle, which creates the basis for their action.

A research team led by University College London professor Martin Kilduff, reported that "emotional intelligence helps people disguise one set of emotions while expressing another for personal gain..." While perhaps not for personal gain, I have observed people disguising emotions which cause them discomfort or which they have no tools for handling. And yet, those disguises do require some personal, emotional machination. In my experience, this is never so evident as in the emotion of envy. One of the things I have learned is to spot envy at 50 yards (so to speak). You might notice it first in individuals who never express their envy about anything. All humans experience envy, what differs is their ability to tolerate it in a healthy manner. Examples of those who cannot, might be seen when an intelligent person pretends to not notice obvious things that they envy. Sort of a protective blind spot. But the more obvious indication is in the person who goes the other way. My therapist once pointed out to me that people who exhibit a very strong trait are usually covering the exact opposite. Sad people who present as humorous. Penurious people who pretend to be charitable. Envious people who scorn or ignore the quality of what they are actually envying. I like the clothing much better at TJ Maxx than at Georgio Armani. Right?

I have been told by family, educators, and friends, that I am intelligent. And I am in touch, possibly too in touch, with my own emotions. And I have a particular antennae for people who present in a certain way before showing their true colors. I learned that I have a pretty good bullshit detector (sorry for my language, but that's what my therapist called it). But even that system might not protect you from people who operate in life out of their own agendas, while hiding behind other presenting traits. Or, as Joel says, throwing flowers around garbage doesn't make it pretty. So, while emotional intelligence clearly has value, you have to be careful about discerning how people utilize it. We live in a dangerous and precarious world. Choose your community carefully, because even if you are intelligent and emotionally savvy, you might still be conned. And, you must trust me about this.

Thank you for reading my blog. TJ Maxx was deliberately left out of the labels below. If you are searching TJ Maxx you won't be led to this site, because you'll surely not be happy here. And YOU must trust me about this. 😏

The Stack and the Net

Los Angeles, California

I was watching a program recently where, before sitting down to a meal at their home, the host collected everyone's cell phones. I was reminded that I once heard someone interviewed on Fresh Air who was promoting an unplugged weekend. At the time, several years back, that appealed to me. But now, it just seems impossible! I now even need my phone to unlock and start my car! While I ponder about overusing my phone, I am gratified that I stave off impatience by playing pool on my phone, when I am, for example, waiting in line at the bank. But my phone usage has begun to usurp time that I would normally spend reading books at night, or catching up on the last month of The New Yorker magazines that I seem to be perpetually chasing.

Texting sometimes stands in for telephone conversations, which is both good and bad. Good in its expediency; but bad in its lack of face-to-face, or at least voice-to-voice, connection. Thankfully, it hasn't replaced the phone conversations that I have with my cousin and my closest friends, and, of course, Joel. But for some of the friends with whom I am in intermittant contact, texting often suffices, and that's okay.

Christopher once mentioned the stack, where, during business lunches, everyone stacks their cellphones in the middle of the table. The first one who reaches for their phone has to pay for the meal. I once proposed a similar plan with friends who seem to be vilely steeped in celebrity culture: The first one who mentions 'the k-word' pays for the meal. The k-word being Kardashian (Kardashian clearly up there with Lord Voldemort as a name which should not be spoken aloud ever). I suspect they were not amused. Can you imagine?

The cell phone thing has apparently replaced the personal computer thing which replaced the television thing. Think of the changes that have occurred in interpersonal relationships since people have become distracted by screens. I grew up in the sixties, and have no memory of living in a home without televisions. There was always a television set in each of our bedrooms, though not in my parents' bedroom nor anywhere else in the house. Watching television together was not a family activity, as both my parents looked on TV-watching as something that was done by people who did not read books. However, my grandfather worked for Barker Brothers department store in downtown Los Angeles, and they retailed television sets. So, our family always had an abundance of new TVs, even though my parents never watched except when there was a major news event or NASA launch (Dad was an aerospace engineer whose firm worked on instruments in those rockets). We had our skating lessons and other activities, including Girl Scouts, after school. At night, we did our homework and practiced piano during the week. If we were at home on the weekends, we played games while listening to albums on the stereo system that my father had built. Engineer that he was, he had put together a receiver, a metal tray of tubes and wires, connected to a turntable. When my parents joined us, we played Tripoly and other card games. I was the youngest in my family, and always trying to get the rest of them to play board games with me. I think I got them to play Clue and Monopoly a couple of times, but we got back to Tripoly pretty quickly.

I'm not the first person to observe that technology is wreaking havoc on our relationship to others. On this planet, normal humans need to have a connection with the people in their lives. At the worst of times, three years ago, my therapist and I discussed the idea of bringing my female friends together in a sort of loose support group. When I floated this idea out to two of them, one immediately demurred, saying she wasn't interested in talking about, nor listening to others' problems. Fair enough. So, the Frister Fridays became social, which was fine. Friendships became stronger through these monthly get togethers, which clearly separated the women from the girls.

Recently, my friend Cathy, who is also my pilates trainer and acupuncture practitioner, was telling me about a workshop she attended in Washington state. We were having lunch at a little restaurant in Westwood called Fundamental. After she described one of the exercises in visualization which was called The Net, I had an epiphany. That was a realization of what my friends and I are providing for each other. The net Cathy described is a metaphor where strength comes from being interwoven, which allows it to support, even to gently rock, as in a hammock. How important is that? In my own net, I am, literally, trusting these women with my life as I have given them this power through my Living Trust. But they are also available, and emotionally available, in so many other ways. As I have written before, Joel is my rock. But these women are my safety net.

Whether they know it or not, everyone needs The Net in their lives. If you don't get this, step away from this blog and go watch a few Sex and the City episodes. Or, The Golden Girls, or I Love Lucy. Remember how many times Ethel was side-by-side with Lucy in all of her zany experiences and schemes? If you utilize your friends for socializing alone, you are missing out on what it feels like to have people in your life who have your back, whom you can call at any time, and with whom you balance all of that by also having a lot of shared fun: travel, and shopping, and concerts, and special dinners together. The best of two worlds. And the best part of all of it? They are always only a text away...

And again, thanks for reading my blog!

The Affair

Los Angeles, California

SPOILER ALERT!

Awhile back, I wrote about the sudden death of Matthew Crawley on Downton Abbey. As an update, I did recover from that. But now, another one bites the dust, and that would be Alison Bailey on The Affair. An aside: my friend, Lynnette, tells a story about teasing her young niece that her pet rabbit would make a delicious meal (you'd have to know Lynnette to appreciate that this is funny). After taunting the six-year old niece about how the rabbit could be cooked (with white wine and herbs, I am assuming), this little six-year old responded: "Well! I didn't see that coming!" This has since become a well-used phrase in my vernacular, but never so appropriately applied as in response to the unexpected demise of Alison on The Affair.

I have had a love/hate relationship with The Affair, since its first season in 2014. I am not a series-watcher. I could count on one hand all of the non-PBS series I have watched in the last decade. I did not watch the Sopranos or Six Feet Under. I didn't watch Lost or 24, and I'm not about to watch Westworld, The Leftovers, or Sharp Objects. I did watch Big Little Lies because it was filmed around Carmel and Monterey and had an interesting cast. I hated it.

What I initially liked about The Affair was its presentation of point of view. In the beginning, the storyline, per episode, was told from the point of view of two of the main four characters. Hour-long episodes split in half, with the second half duplicating the same story as the first, but told from a different character's point of view. Changing the filter changes the story in both small, nuanced ways as well as more obviously. Clothing and furnishings, facial expressions, inflections in speech, all bind together to tell a different story. And the viewer is left in the middle with the various versions of the story in jigsaw-like pieces.

The series hasn't always been good. I threw up my hands in season two, it was so maddening. I criticized the writing that I had lauded in season one. The plot was now meandering all over the place, and I could barely make sense of it... until the season finale, where the solution to the murder mystery, strung out for two full seasons, was shockingly revealed. And that tied up the threads, and made sense out of what had seemed like a splintered season. But, by the end of season three, I was out. I felt the series had lost its way. However, by the time it rolled around again with season four, I found myself sneaking a peak, and subsequently, I was sucked back in. Season four ended last month following a tumultuous final three episodes.

Throughout those last few episodes, I found myself running a gamut of emotions. The third to last episode, where it was revealed that Alison had died, was a stunner. Alison was the centerpiece of the series which is hung on the shoulders of four characters who have been married and/or friends to each other in an  enmeshment of relationships. But, Alison, right from the get-go was understandably sad and suffering. And Ruth Wilson was so good at it. You didn't always like Alison. In fact, you don't always like any of them and that is the beauty and conceit of the writing. Just when you have had enough of these people, an episode shows you a character's vulnerability or tenderness. I flop around disliking them, then feeling varying degrees of empathy for them. By contrast, none of this happened for me with Big, Little Lies. The characters started as nasty and/or shallow people I didn't care about, and that impression stayed. Not so with The Affair. It is inspired writing to create characters with that much dimension to them.

A woman I knew once said that Diane Lane's character in Unfaithful made her hate her as well as the entire film. Why would we care about her, she lamented. She cheats on her husband with disastrous effects, then she feels bad. Huh? Madame Bovary..? ... Anna Karenina...? How about Graham Greene's The End of the Affair or Edith Wharton's The Age of Innocence, to name just a few. Perhaps we English majors developed a less narrow view of womankind through studying literature?

Alison was an adulterous wife... twice. She cheated on her husband before leaving him to marry her lover. Then she cheated on that husband with... wait for it... her ex-husband. You could write that off as a bad soap opera plot, except that the characters are so multidimensional. They are flawed, yet somehow balanced with sensitivity, pathos, and, yes, humanity. That is highlighting the human condition, and that is writing I envy. Alison alternately pissed me off and broke my heart. She was the victim who was always trying to shake her fist at those who had wronged or used her, and always trying to set herself right. But, alas, in the end, she was taken down. Although... although, we are not really sure about anything other than her death. For that we must wait until season five.

The penultimate (I've been overusing that word, I know, but I kinda like it) episode showed two perspectives as usual, but breaking with tradition, these were both Alison's. In the first, she was was not able to change her story as another character, Helen, had advised her. She was still succumbing to her attraction to damaged and dishonest men who offered her anything in the form of intimacy. In the second, dark episode she was changing her story, fighting back and ultimately railing against the man who was sinking her back into the ocean. In most of the episodes, you have this person's story, and that person's story, and the truth, which might be closer to one or the other but likely in the middle, or, more accurately, in the perspective of the viewer. In this episode, both perspectives are Alison's, and the truth... murky as the dark ocean water into which she was dropped. It was not an easy episode to watch.

And then we have the final episode, which didn't progress any further down the road than to show how all of the remaining characters, including secondary ones, are, in the words of Helen, so fu*%ing crazy. And yes, those characters are, and have always been so. But, as I take a quick mental inventory, I must write that so are many of us. It would take a multitude of blogposts to delineate the fu*%ing craziness I have seen amongst some of the people I have known. And I'm talking complex neuroses, eating disorders, hypervigilance bordering on obsessive behavior, even what seems like sociopathology (defined by the DSM as an Antisocial Personality Disorder (people who describe themselves as not being social?). Again, human condition. But, not going there, not here. Not now.

So, back to The Affair. For the evocative food for reflection that The Affair has given me, I am appreciative. Then again, I am always euphorically grateful for, as well as envious of, good writing. Especially when the product of that good writing sticks with me, and makes me think.

Thanks for tuning in here...

Orthorexia

Los Angeles, California

Is it me, or has anyone else noticed the way people are eating, or not eating, these days? First off, everyone seems to be eating very differently from each other, a sort of gastronomic iconoclasia. Not that we didn't always eat differently, with ethnic and other traditions in our families. But what appears rampant is what everyone is not eating, which can be easily designated as a lot.

I'm not criticizing (à la Nick Carraway, right?), as I have always said that I more easily define myself by all the things, and people, in the world I don't like, rather than the things/folks I do. So I am down with people shunning. Just not so much with food, because it does seem like this food thing in the US has gotten a little, well, ridiculous.

It's been more than a decade since I stopped throwing the kind of dinner parties I once enjoyed. There were credible food allergies, and religious or conviction abstinences. And I get that. I get, as well, that there are foods that people simply dislike and cannot abide: a friend who cannot eat cilantro; my own self regarding goat cheese; Joel who is religiously opposed to consuming any vegetables that don't start with the letter A (inexplicably, he will eat artichokes and asparagus, but a great deal of aioli is involved in this). But, seriously, it has just gotten downright nuts with so very many people homesteading their own particular territory of diet. The only person I could invite to a traditional paella party would be my friend, Lynnette. But she simply doesn't like paella...

Diet is a word that has always bothered me, unless the word Coke comes after it. Products labeled Diet, were generally marketed for people who could not control their calorie intake, wanted to lose some weight, but still wanted brownies and lasagne. Diets are also designed regimens, where participants change their habits for a period of time, lose weight, then resume their previous habits and gain weight. Sort of a push-me-pull-you system. I often scratched my head at the trendiness of dieting. My female ex-outlaws (what I call in-laws) seemed to always be jumping on these regimens, and announcing them as if their endeavor was something quite enviable. Sort of like those My child was the student of the month stickers. As in, I have joined the diet du jour! Again, fingernails to scalp; scratch in bewilderment.

And yet, diets are still out there. My favorite diet ever: What my mom called Reach for your mate, instead of your plate. This is where you replace food with sex. What is not to like about that? A diet regimen with cardio built right in.

And so, after six paragraphs of sarcasm, I have to just simply write: I really don't get it. Is this some kind of weird Kardashian/reality TV thing, or is it really something more serious? 

Orthorexia is an eating disorder related to anorexia and OCD. It occurs when someone's desire to only eat "healthy" (please note finger quotes, as clearly I'm not done with the sarcasm) foods, is linked with a real, emotional discomfort when faced with consuming any foods they deem to be unhealthy. And, lest I remind you, healthy foods today were not necessarily healthy foods yesterday, nor might they be healthy foods tomorrow. If you try to keep up with this (and frankly, I don't try), you will know that eating raw kale has been identified as causing metabolic problems; oat bran lost its healthy lustre, probably because it just got so plain damn boring, and coffee jumps back and forth between good for you and not so. And don't even get me started on the sugar/honey/agave thing, as I will be compelled to run away while loudly shrieking.

Someone (and it might have been Bill Maher on his HBO weekly, Real Time with Bill Maher), pointed out that many of the American health gurus of the past died at relatively young ages: Adele Davis, who recommended eating our food raw; Jim Fixx, who demonstrated what running your legs off will do for you; Euell Gibbons, who declared that many parts of the tree are edible. In addition, I recently heard an interview with a medical researcher who postulated that the spike in colorectal cancer among people in their 20s and 30s might possibly be related to the abrupt and intense change in diet as these people jump on and off severe diet bandwagons. That, even with a positive change, shocked cells can react with abnormal production.

In the micro, it is clear to me that those who seem overly healthy-diet conscious and even healthy-diet obsessed, are, without exception, not too healthy. This, of course, throws into the chicken-and-the-egg quandary, and obviously I'm not doing scientific research here. But science has identified orthorexia as a compulsive desire to eat only "healthy" foods (finger quotes, as above). And I see friends who truly stress out about this, and even express fear about eating anything that they consider to be "unhealthy." These mostly women friends are now taking medication for some of the following issues: high cholesterol, high blood pressure, decreased bone density. In addition, I see a few of these as being painfully thin, which is not good at any age, but wreaks havoc on your face as you age (the french say that after 50 a woman must choose between her face and her derriere. Makes you think about the french and their brie and steak frites and bordeaux...).

I wonder if this might be an American thing. I heard some Brit actors on a television show cajoling American actors for being so squeamish about everything. Well, actually, they were discussing french kissing in films, and how American actors don't do that (which is clearly untrue and I can think of filmed examples). But maybe as a country, we just aren't as able to enjoy eating foods outside of the "healthy" box. My friend, Lisa, put this well when she said: I'm not afraid of food. Because truly, there is fear involved in all of this. Recently, a friend exclaimed with some apprehension that consuming oysters was really bad. Hey, they are not bad. But even if they were, doesn't anyone remember that discretionary bad can be really good?

And, discretionary is an important point here, as this issue, like many today, seems to have very little middle ground. Clearly it is unhealthy to subsist on fast food and junk food. There is also an obesity epidemic and it is alarming that children are being diagnosed with type II diabetes. The whole super-size thing was and is a product of evil marketing. But, can we stop shaming people who eat a couple of Big Macs annually..? And yes, I just might be one of those consumers.

I eat foods which are considered by some to be "unhealthy" but I balance those with good food. I don't have high cholesterol. I don't have high blood sugar. I don't have bone density issues, and, surprisingly, I don't have high blood pressure. Surprisingly, because high blood pressure is often caused by stress, which I do got! I'm human, and, not to put a fine point on it, I've had some rough years lately. But one of the things I don't stress about is food. Julia Child once commented (and I paraphrase) that worrying about butter was probably more harmful to your health than eating butter. And Julia, butter-consumer extraordinaire, lived to 91, which I consider to be a pretty good run. If I worried about butter and oysters and all of the other "unhealthy" (finger quotes) food... jeez! What would my life be like!? Does it make any sense to spend so much of your lifetime singularly consumed with the relentless pursuit of extending your life? Or, as someone pointed out, if you add years to your life, it's going to be the last years. Those aren't so much fun anyway, so why work so hard at adding onto those?

My physician believes that everyone comes into this world with an expiration date. He feels you might be able extend it by a year or two in a few ways, or cut it short by a year or two by making choices that put you in risk of that. He thinks the three most important rules for longevity are: Don't smoke; wear your seat belt; wash your hands, fruits, and vegetables (protection against human viruses, e coli, and the virulence of a variety of bird influenzas). He believes in moderation in diet. I believe in moderation in all things, including moderation.

So, are we on our way to a full-blown epidemic of orthorexia? And, while we are on the subject of eating disorders: Is there anyone who hasn't figured out that IBS can be a code for anorexia/bulimia? When you encounter someone who is claiming that food attacks them, check their weight. I hate to break this to you, but if they look like a broom handle, they may be making excuses for low weight which is being caused by starving or purging.

Penultimately, what is with the protein thing? I understand that we need protein. But excessively meat-rich diets have been known to lead to gout. So, let's not get so crazy about protein, like the one who extolled the virtue of protein-enhanced milk. This is milk which is treated to increase the protein within. Forget the process for doing this. Just know that the product tastes like dirty socks soaked in evaporated milk. And soy-based cheese product? Vile. A case-in-point on trading "healthy" (*f.q.) for taste.

Lastly, on the subject of washing fruits and vegetables. I know I have already written about this here by commenting about people who say they eat clean, but don't wash their produce. But, here we go again. Not washing fruits and vegetables is kinda akin to making soup from dirty undergarments. You are literally ingesting from someone's bowels to your mouth, and that someone includes birds, animals, and farm workers. Are you so sure that everyone who uses port-a-toilets washes their hands before handling the food we purchase to eat? Then, ok, Little Mary Sunshine... don't wash. But don't invite me to eat at your home either. I've already had one friend who was treated via induced-coma after what was dianosed as a virus contracted by accidentally ingesting bird droppings. Months of occupational therapy followed. Though not probable that this will happen to you, it is possible. And that's a risk easily not taken.

Someone once said that food is a feminist issue (this might have been in Henry Jaglom's film Eating). And I also recall an article linking women's food issues to their financial issues, which might just be true in the area of overeating and overspending (as well as hypervigilance in both areas). But you could clearly bring so many other issues into this. So, I'm just going to simplify. Put the way you eat into your food box. Use crayons to color your daily food choices. Now, use the same crayons and draw some things outside of your box. Personally, I can't draw, but I could abstractly designate the following: oysters + sashimi; cheeses, especially cheddar and runny french ones; crusty french bread; frites; cacio e pepe, the late, lamented Huntsman Burger at restaurant Public School; Kaya Toast from the late, lamented Susan Feniger's restaurant, Street (memorialized on a previous post called The Acid Test); fresh-fried chips and good salsa; Cupid's hot dogs; a variety of booze but especially single-malt scotch and reposado tequila. And lastly, though I don't have much of a sweet tooth, I would also attempt to draw my friend Susan's Boston Cream Pie, my mom's butterscotch pudding, and beignets, loukoumades, malasadas and sopapillas (all yeasty dough fried in oil then dusted with varieties of sugar or drizzled with honey then dusted with cinnamon. I cannot stand it, they are so amazingly tasty! And, by the way, Loukoumades is a franchise opportunity in Australia!). Anyway (big digression there), here is the thing: Eat inside the box all you want. But ask yourself the following: Do I feel anxiety when I eat those things that are outside of my food box, even if only occasionally? Orthorexia? Clearly, it's not just for millennials anymore...

Thanks for reading my rant, but seriously, eat, drink, and be merry! (*finger quotes)

Real Time with Connie

Los Angeles, California

Connie and I went to a taping of Real Time with Bill Maher last Friday evening. It was the second taping I've been to this summer, and the best of the two. While the show is always funny, and usually interesting, this particular one was downright scary. One of the guests, Nancy MacLean, who is a history professor at Duke University, has written a book entitled Democracy in Chains, which I don't think I could read because the premise scares the bejesus out of me. And that's all I'm going to say about that. Google, if you will...

After the taping, Connie and I went to Connie and Ted's for dinner. I didn't have oysters and a lobster roll, as I usually do. Instead, I had a Bombay Sapphire martini and a soft-shell crab sandwich, with french fries. They have such good french fries there!

And, speaking of french fries (which is much less scary than political commentary), the last Frister Friday, when Lynnette came to stay, we made Cold-fry Frites from Patricia Wells' recipe. I bought a ton of canola oil at Costco, and we used 1.5 quarts to fry 1 1/2 pounds of russet potato sticks. It was fun and fab. You have to eat them in the space between burning your fingers and their getting cold and waxen. But, in that space between, they are stupendously delicious.

In spite of waxing rhapsodic about french fries, I have been eating more salads at home. I think Christopher kickstarted me with his farro salad. I have lamented more than many times, that a woman only has so many salads to be made in her lifetime. I hit the wall about fifteen years ago. There is nothing I hate making more than salad. All the washing of greens and vegies, and then chopping, making salad dressing... It just got so tedious. So I ended up eating salads when I was out for a meal, which is generally a lot, and ate mostly roasted vegies at home. But again, that farro salad... So, here's my salad du jour. I've been roasting radicchio, then slicing and mixing with romaine. Also roasting fennel and tossing that in, with garbanzos or borlotti beans, and the rest of the usual suspects: heirloom cherry tomatoes; radishes; kalamatas; some feta cubes or halved mozzarella balls; a handful or two of farro, all tossed with a sherry-vinegar vinaigrette and voila! Back in the salad business. Of course it takes about 45 minutes to prepare and about ten minutes to consume, but that's salads for you.

Connie and I spent our dinner talking about friendships. She is not my longest-known friend, but we have known each other since college, which was quite a while back. And she is someone with whom I very much enjoy spending time, whether here at my home on Frister Fridays, in Arizona for MLB Spring Training or out and about. It was a great, albeit scary show and great dinner, but mostly great conversation with a great friend. A great evening, which makes me greatful (ha! ha! Take that, spellcheck!). Oh, and yeah, she ordered a salad, but did sneak in a fry or two. Life is short, so (and I think this goes without saying) one should always eat french fries first!

And thank you for reading my blog during these summer salad days...

NO MPG

Los Angeles, California

The eaglet has landed. Late last week, Joel and I lyfted to Tesla in Marina del Rey to pick up my Model 3. It is white with black upholstery and it is a pistol. The process was crazy-easy. I handed over my check; they handed me my keycard, and I downloaded the app which allows me to tap in multiple functions, including unlocking and driving! A brief orientation, and my 3 was brought around. I looped it once around the parking lot, before hitting the street. My first electric, after three and-a-half years with a hybrid.

The day before, we stopped at Costco on our way home from Joel's treatment for carpal tunnel syndrome. He was in a lot of pain, so I got out and pumped gas. Suddenly it dawned on me that this would be the last time I purchased gas for my own vehicle -- like my world was changing big time! The next day, I pulled into the public parking lot in Santa Monica. We hooked up my spiffy 3, already named Trace, to a charging station, and went to eat oysters and drink beer at Enterprise Fish Company. Joel drove it home from there, across Mulholland so he could let it out a bit. Again, it's a pistol.

I am selling the hybrid, finishing up my mom's trust, and addressing another minor trust issue with Tom's family, but all-in-all, winding down from all of the responsibility I have had over the past three years. I have sold two properties, and a business and a car. I've completed a bathroom remodel, paved a driveway, and administered my mom's trust including the transfer of stocks. I've fired and hired a gardener, and successfully sued Anthem Blue Cross. And now, I've bought a new car, a Tesla, and just a mere forty years after my first new car ever, a convertable VW bug, white with a black top and black upholstery, purchased from Volkswagon Santa Monica. 

My friend, Diana, has told me that she is in awe of all that I have accomplished and at the strength displayed in doing so. But, truth be told, it's just what you do when you are faced with a mountain of things that must be done. And climbing any mountain cannot be done if you look up to the height of it. You just have to keep your head down and take the first necessary steps. Just because you haven't done any of it before, and you are now alone, doesn't mean you can't do it.

I have joked that my life has been like a Sally Field movie over the past few years. I am thinking of the roles where she is the plucky heroine or survivor. But I also often think of her in the comedic film Soapdish, where she goes to bed with a bottle of Cuervo Gold and a straw. You can do that (I haven't, but I've come close). But as I said to Diana, eventually you're going to have to get up. You're going to have to pee. And you're going to get hungry. And, once upright, you will face what needs to be done, and take your first tentative steps.

A lot of steps follow those first ones. But, workwise, I now have a lot more in my rearview mirror than I do ahead of me. And as I step on the gas (ok, that's not right) or, rather, on the accelerator of my new Tesla, I relish what is, and will be, on the roads ahead of me. Thanks for joining me here. Now, fasten your seatbelt, for it will hopefully be a most amazing ride!

Stop the World, I Want To Get Off

Los Angeles, California

Karen and I stayed up until after midnight, talking. Greg had gone to bed hours before, and I knew Karen was exhausted. But still, I talked. And I cried. Do you need a hug? she asked me. I did, and she provided. And that's one of many reasons why I love Karen.

I keep doing this. With Karen and Connie and Diana. With Cathy, a lot. With Lisa, and Keith. Even, for I guess the last time, with LOL last year in Arizona. And, with Lynnette, more often than I wish to own up to. It is a release for me. I am a human pressure cooker, with emotions barely below the surface. When cracked open, a lot of pent-up anger and mournful despair escapes. I feel better, calmer, afterwards. But then the guilt, that I am burdening these people, steps in. When are we going to stop doing this? I once asked Keith. And he responded: We're always going to do this.

The night after Karen and Greg left, before the week fell apart in a downward spiral of plumbing and other repair issues, I watched the HBO documentary about Robin Williams. Drawn like a moth to a flame, my dark interest in why people take their own lives leads me to articles, stories. Documentaries.

In a reduction of it all, it seems that whatever demons drove Robin Williams, he found relief in his own kinetic (indeed, manic) comic performances. As his career descended and his neurological illness progressed, that outlet was fast diminishing. I am reminded of Kevin and the loss of his ability to do his work. But mostly I think of Tom.

Tom was Billy. Billy, of the happy partnership and marriage I wrote about for many years here. Or maybe Tom wasn't really Billy. Maybe Billy was the idealization, or compartmentalization of a part of Tom that I hitched onto in the hopes that it would take up all of his space in our marriage. I used to feel that there were two of him. And the Billy part was amenable and companionable. We shared dialog from films, and played gin rummy together for five hours on flights to and from Kona. We shared a love of Carmel, and of Sandra. Just four of a thousand and more memories of him. And when I am flooded with these, I miss him in a way that defies expression. But there was another part of him that I have long struggled to understand. It begins with a family of members who are remarkably disassociated from each other. He was additionally burdened by a learning disability that was not addressed by his parents, in spite of their knowledge of it. And was further weighted by the parents most of us had: The ones who did not allow us to express, nor learn to process, our emotions. Not anger. Not frustration. Not any.

In the same way that Robin Williams needed his frenzied work to keep the demons at bay, Tom turned to behavior that took down our marriage. But it didn't take it down right away. We had been married twenty years when I learned that he had been arrested. It was impossibly hard. Driving into a block wall, hard. And I didn't know if I could stay. But I did. And so, instead of a dramatic parting at the time, the marriage died by a thousand cuts over subsequent years. I have struggled, for two decades, to understand why he did what he did. Even more since his death three years ago. I often asked him why he had done this, and the best answer I ever got was: Because I could. But maybe, maybe he ended up in that place, doing what he did, because it was the only thing that brought him respite from his demons. It was the only thing that worked. That even though it was wrong, and destructive to our marriage, and even more so, destructive to him, he couldn't not do it. After he was found out, that door was closed. So he drank too much. He withdrew, and dropped out of the relationship. He sat in front of the TV, with vodka his constant companion. Seven years later, after he refused to attend couples' counseling, I began to dance salsa.

Guilt is a terrible thing. If I feel guilty for burdening my friends with my grief, what guilt did Tom suffer for all of the pain that he caused? He once said that not a day went by that he did not think of it. I know that if he could have changed one thing in his life, it would have been to rewind and not do what he had done for so many years. But we don't have that ability in this life. Maybe he lacked the emotional wherewithal to face life squarely; get the help he needed, and be the man I believe he really wanted to be. To be Billy, 24/7, instead of Tom... or Kevin or Robin or Kate or Anthony. There are many ways to escape from the darkness of the soul. But, evidently, they all saw only one way out of their big empty. They were unable to keep living until maybe one day they would want to, once more.

I too live with guilt. Guilt in my constant rumination that, had I left him after that block wall crash, maybe he would have been able to survive it all. Instead, I clung to the part of him that I saw as Billy. I suffered the curse of being a romantic, with the romantic's faith that if you made a commitment, you simply stayed with it, worked at it. Honored it. My faith that the commitment was the most important thing, and would triumph over what had been dropped into the center of it, was misguided at best. But, in an attempt to make this work, I divorced the darkness from the person who had brought it, refusing to accept that this evil was within him, even if it were only a part of who he was.

So, after it happened we each stumbled along, one blindsided by grief and the unaccountable knowledge that the person they had married could not be the person who had done this; the other simply blinded by insurmountable guilt. Guilt in a titanic mountain, never to be scaled nor eroded. We moved separately and circuitously through days, weeks, months, and a decade until we could no longer see each other within the relationship. Separately blinded; the marriage was no longer in sight.

Watching the Robin Williams documentary brought me a greater sense of understanding of Tom. An unconditional compassion for him, and for all that was dark within him that he could not control. The phrase own worst enemy certainly applied, for I believe the marriage was important to him. I think that he loved me enough to take a bullet for me. Yet, sadly, he loved himself more, enough to take the bullet that took him out of his misery and out of this life, in spite of what it did to those of us left behind. I don't question anyone's right to take their own life. It is their life, and they have an absolute right to do what they want. But I wonder if, in all the pain that they are feeling, they have any capability of compassion for their survivors and for the endless, lifetime pain that their act will cause. That, in choosing to end their pain, they leave a legacy of pain behind.

I am no longer the woman who married Tom. Nor the one who partnered with Billy for all of the events and episodes I wrote about here. I am embattled by bitterness and anger, and an ineffible sadness most of the days of my life. But I look for the spaces between the more intense bouts. I look to Joel, to my friends, my writing, my dancing, my home, and yes, to my scotch, for the joy and respite that brings relief.

So watching a documentary about a man I did not know, who took his life out of despair, brought me some clarity about the man who was in my life for more than half of my lifetime. His mother used to say Life goes on. And it does. But you carry their sad end forward with you always, and while you are sometimes provided with insight, and answers to the never-ending questions, you will never understand it all. And, the greatest truth you will discover is that you just have to go on living with that.