The Golden Age

Los Angeles, California


I'm mad at Matthew. Until a couple of weeks ago, Billy and I were going merrily along, enjoying the second series of Downton Abbey. Did we notice the anachronisms? No, not really. Were we stuck on intense admiration for the hats? Well, one of us was. But then, a character showed up last week, looking like The English Patient, and claiming to be the heir to Downton (the one who had gone down with the Titanic). That was, well, weird. This week (spoiler alert): Matthew learned that he could walk again just as Spanish Flu descended upon the estate. Livinia, the fiance (the one who had gone back to him after he had summarily dismissed her as a result of his paralysis which would prevent them from having a "proper marriage"), suddenly looked unwell at the dinner table. She's a goner, I said to Billy, trying to even the score because he had readily picked up on Lord Grantham's attraction to the new maid. Sure enough, Livinia is now DYK (dead, you know). "Died of a broken heart, because of that
kiss . . . " said Matthew, at her graveside, further telling Lady Mary that they could never be together having caused the death of Livinia by sharing a brief dance, profession of undead love, AND a kiss (are you following this?). No, I cried to Billy even before this last speech. Matthew had that self-righteous look on his face that made me fear that he would go all upstanding on her, and refuse the fact that they are meant to be together. I've seen this happen before, like, with Bo and Hope on Days of our Lives (yes, it's true. A college addiction, everyone was watching it, who was I to be different?).


Despite the above rant about Matthew, we really are enjoying Downton Abbey. It's been a long, cold couple of decades since what we now consider to be the golden age of PBS. In fact, if you just hate it when people start waxing nostalgic about the good old days, this would be a good time to exit, stage left.


We came to the PBS party pretty late in the game, but were able to catch up on a lot of the classics through pledge breaks and PBS reboots (ok, reruns). We had already missed the original Upstairs, Downstairs (didn't like the recent remake much). Also missed the original Forsyte Saga (liked the Damian Lewis remake a lot). We missed most of the Shakespeare (I think they did the complete works, if memory serves), including the legendary Much Ado About Nothing with Sam Waterston. But we did see a good deal of really, really good stuff: The Jewel in the Crown, and Brideshead Revisited (which people remember as being on Masterpiece Theatre but was actually on Great Performances). This was truly a gilded age: there was Masterpiece Theatre, Great Performances, American Playhouse, and Wonderworks. American Playhouse offered productions of American short stories incuding Kurt Vonnegut's Who Am I This Time?, with Christopher Walken and Susan Sarandon, which was so good. They also produced a couple of Jean Shepherd's stories, including The Star-Crossed Romance of Josephine Cosnowski -- these masterfully narrated by Shepherd himself.  Wonderworks was a wonder. It produced excellent full-length, and even series-length, versions of children's lit, including Anne of Green Gables and The Little Princess. Adding Mystery, with it's fab Edward Gorey titles, into this mix and you had something good going almost every night of the week. Now Masterpiece Theatre is cut up into three portions: Masterpiece Classic (which in recent years has caused me to cry out: enough with the Jane Austen already. And don't even get me started on Dickens); Masterpiece Contemporary, and Masterpiece Mystery (still with the Gorey titles). With Downton Abbey, there ostensibly is a nod to that golden age when it was simply Masterpiece Theatre, and introduced by the incomparable Alastair Cooke. While it's only one night a week, that's ok. At this point in time, I don't really want to watch TV on more than one night a week. And with Netflix (which we don't utilize effectively), and the DVR, there are always more choices than we can handle, should we choose to sit and sog on another night.


So, while I don't anticipate a real return to that golden age, I do now find myself looking forward to the Sunday night saga of Lady Mary and the others at Downton, in spite of the plot having more twists and turns than the Space Mountain ride at Disneyland. Also, in spite of Matthew's recent peevishness. And the truth is, I would probably keep tuning in regardless of all of that, and even if I wasn't enjoying it quite so much. Because, after all is said and done, one should never underestimate the power of fabulous hats. Thank you so much for reading my blog. Cheerio!

Cottage-by-the-Sea

Los Angeles, California


While it is stating the obvious, I feel compelled to write that life is made up of too many endings. I know, I know. Endings are the other bookend to beginnings. And without that other bookend . . . the books topple over. I get it. I just don't like it.


And so, with that in mind, Billy and I left Carmel a week ago, and returned, at a slow pace, to Los Angeles. The slow pace as a result of the speeding ticket Billy got while driving back to LA just after New Year's. He was going 84 in a 65 mph zone (I've been telling him, and telling him, and then Officer Vasquez told him). This event has significantly cooled his jets.


So, home. Los Angeles. The first day wasn't so bad. Lydia accompanied me on a visit with my mom, on the way to Century City to pick up some earrings that I had left for repair several months ago. These days, life is like that. It was a beautiful, warm end-of-January day. We walked around in the hub-bub of the busy mall -- much different than the slow, quiet one, Del Monte Center, in Monterey. We shared a sandwich at Breadbar, and being the friend she is, she let me eat all the french fries. I mean ALL.


Billy and I stayed in that night and made a pasta with olivada sauce. I haven't yet really returned to cooking (is anyone out there thinking, where are the recipes?), and have yet to set foot on a dance floor. Returning to Los Angeles is a process. It requires some adjustment, a touch of grieving, and finally, resignation. Meanwhile, I think about these people who have made the jump. They fell in a love with a place and just went there. And usually it worked out. Billy and I made the decision to do that in 1998. We were going to sell the business and the house and just go. We announced this to friends and family. But then, my dad passed away suddenly. My mom was on her own, and she needed us. So we put our plans on the back burner. Fourteen years on the back burner.


For the last seven years, our annual travel plan has been anchored by a week at Kona Village Resort, and a month in Carmel. We've also been to Napa. And to Glenbrook, on Lake Tahoe, almost every summer. And we snuck in trips to Tahiti and Panama. But the economy's free fall has kept us closer to home and the business. And, that tsunami put the kibosh, so to speak, on the Kona Village trips. So now, we keep increasing the time we spend in Carmel; this recent stay from a month to six weeks. And we are contemplating spending the month of September there as well. Maybe we're just not the kind of people, or at the time in our lives, when we can just jump. Maybe we have to ease or ooze into it. Trickle. I don't care how we get there, just that someday we do. Because while being back in Los Angeles is where we find many of our friends; while it offers up a lot of activities and events that are not available to us in Carmel; the truth is that my heart will always be in a cottage by the sea. Any cottage, as long as it's in Carmel. And that's just the kind of hairpin I am. Thanks for reading my blog (aka the rants of a crazy, homesick woman).