manis, and pedis, and crazy ladies . . . oh my!

Dearest darling friends,

Cassandra text messaged me late this morning "you want to get manis/pedis?"  YES!!! I've been thinking about how deplorable the red toe polish looks for days.  We haven't gone to get pampered since before my birthday--before I started this blog.  I'm kind of tired of looking at red toe polish, I thought.  YES!!! LET'S GO!!!


We were both running late =) but got there at the perfect time.  It was packed, but we were seated right away.  Two or three minutes later a 57 year old woman with bleached blonde hair sat down in the only vacant pedicure chair left--the one next to Cassandra.  I was in the seat on Cassandra's other side.  She was visibly on her way to the gym, and was from some borough of the city.  She huffed as she collapsed into the cushy chairs, and turned to us.  "Men, they are all the same," she began... and proceeded not take a breath for the remainder of the time she was in her chair.  She complained bitterly about the lack of sex she was having with her current boyfriend, and went into disturbing, explicit detail of her intimate life with this man--whom I feel as though I know very well after listening to her.  


She just wanted to fix him.  Isn't that the terminal problem of most women.  We find these lost souls, these "bad boys", and want to aid in their discovery of the right way to live.  Why can't we realize that we are better than that, and deserve better than that?  Why do we stay in toxic relationships for too long? Why do we want to fix the world?  These were some of my thoughts in-between the thoughts that were of sheer embarrassment for this woman who was exposing her VERY personal life to two young strangers.  But, she was a character in life I will never forget... 


Another thought I had was how wrong television is in their portrayal of male and female sexuality.  How obviously wrong they are.


Cassandra and I left the nail salon a little more educated...lol... but, with a good laugh, and matching toe and finger nails.  =)  A little pampering goes a long way!!! 


Love Always,

a city's lingo

Dear friends,


I am on the 33rd bead.  And I would like to stress again, that if you have not read this book, you NEED to.


Liz talks about how she loves Rome, but she knows it is a city in which she would never spend the rest of her life. Her friend Giulio explains that she and Rome have different words.  The he goes on to explain that "'every city has a single word that defines it, that identifies most people who live there.  If you could read people's thoughts as they were passing you on the streets of any given place, you would discover that most of them are thinking the same thought.  Whatever that majority thought might be--that is the word of the city.  And if your personal word does not match the word of the city, then you don't really belong there.'
'What's Rome's word?' I ask. 
'Sex,' he announced.
'But surely there are some people in Rome thinking about other things than sex?'
Guilio insisted: 'No.  all of them, all day, all they are thinking about is sex.'

Now if you are to believe Giulio, that little word--sex--cobbles the streets beneath your feet in Rome, runs through the fountains here, fills the air like traffic noise.   Thinking about it, dressing for it, seeking it, considering it, refusing it, making a sport and game out of it--that's all anybody is doing.  Which would make a bit of sense as to why, for all its gorgeousness, Rome doesn't quite feel like my hometown.


This started me thinking about my hometown, which for the sake of my own privacy we'll call Atown.  I absolutely love, with my whole entire being my hometown.  I feel like Atown and I share the same word, thought I'm not 100% sure what that might be--romanticism perhaps.  Walking down the streets of Atown one feels like they have entered a painting, with old fashioned wrought iron streetlights, long well-kept sidewalks, people stopping to say hello and comment on the beauty of the day.  I love this town.


I told my mom once, that when I come home, I'm driving down the long hilly path by the orchard, and I look at the breathtaking mountains--my soul, it almost audibly sighs.  Home.  I'm home it says to my heart.  This is perhaps why my current city has never felt like my hometown--we don't share words.  And, maybe Atown takes up all the space in my heart.


Love Always,

crossing the shadow of the sword

Darling friends,


I am trying to go super slow so I can savor every second of this delicious novel.  I have managed only to allow myself to read ten pages in two days.  It helps that I've had lots to do, so I've had minimal time for reading.  

In her thirtieth bead (chapter) Liz talks about how her sister comes to visit her in Italy.  She writes about some of the things she was thinking in terms of the way her life and the life of her sister flowed in different ways.  She says "I am so surprised sometimes to notice that my sister is a wife and mother, and I am not.  Somehow I always thought it would be the opposite... we grew up into different adults than anyone might have foretold when we were children."

I loved this part because this past week in my Columbia writing institute class I wrote, in my writer's notebook, and then drafted onto yellow paper the astonishing thoughts of the way my sister's and my life have flowed and ebbed differently too.  I realized at some level, I have always been competing with my sister.  I was also first at all things because I was the oldest, so I was used to having the upper hand.  I was the first to be born.  I was the first to go to school, so I showed my siblings the ropes.  I was the first to learn, so I taught.  I was the first to be allowed to shave my legs, so my cousins and sister used to enviously watch.  I was the first to get my driver's license, so I was the cool older sis with the ability to drive places.   The only thing I was not first in was marriage.  At first, I didn't think this bothered me.  I love my sister, naturally, and I love her husband, he is everything I could ever want for my sister.  And I am so happy for them.  But, people started asking me insensitively and curiously "does it bother you that your baby sister beat you to it?"  And other variants of the same question.  "No, no of course not," I would respond on auto-pilot.  Deep down though, it did.  In the past week, I realized that the "deep down" feeling I was grappling with was jealousy.  Writing, as it always is, was therapeutic in the sense that it gave me closure to this feeling.  As I no longer care that I wasn't first.  I no longer care if it never happens for me at all.  


Liz wrote once that she used to look like her men like some people look like their dogs.  This would happen because she would change herself in her relationships to fit the projected needs of her partner.  She came to terms with this.  I think I'm battling some kind of a similar illness... hence this project of self-discovery.  

Liz also talks about Virginia Woolf, a modernist woman for her times.  Liz quotes Woolf in her book: "'Across the broad continent of a woman's life falls the shadow of a sword.'  On the one side, she said, there lies convention and tradition and order, where 'all is correct.' But on the other side of that sword, if you are crazy enough to cross it and choose a life that does not follow convention, 'all is confusion.  Nothing follows a regular course.'  Her argument was that the crossing of the shadow of that sword may bring a far more interesting existence to a woman, but you can bet it will be more perilous."


That's the feeling in my soul pushing me into spontaneity and adventure.  There is a piece of this sword in each of our spirits, the one that Peter Pan chose, I can imagine.  The one that screws any thoughts about life but your own.  


I choose to cross the sword!! I have come to understand that I would rather be alone than married to the wrong person.  That a relationship will never define me.  That bringing children into an unhappy marriage, that marrying for the sake of getting married would be just as irresponsible as quitting my secure job and traveling the world ten times over with no money.  Some irresponsibility's are just accepted by society more than others. 

I choose a different life.  A unique life... one like no other!  So, be prepared sword, be prepared to be wowed, then crossed!!

Love Always,

take risks

Dearest friends,


I talked to my sister on the phone yesterday for a couple hours.  She was putting together these ultra creative "thank you" cards.  She simply called to get an address of a friend who attended the wedding, what she didn't expect was two hours of me recounting the hot mess I've created in the recent months of my life--and choking up at parts of my life story that are particularly tragic.  Not in the someone died sense, or financial struggle sense of the word tragic, but something much more superficial.  Which shamed me.  There are so many people in this world that are unfortunate in their life circumstances, and so many reasons why I am fortunate, why was I upset over stupid, mundane things???!!! 


If you asked me ten years ago, where I thought I'd be at 27...without a doubt I would've said married, in a house, with at least one kid.  HA!  Life had other plans.  While this has saddened me, I have grown to really love life's surprises and I'm happy.  Truly.  I wouldn't have it any other way right at this moment...sitting here, relaxed in solitude, at my computer writing while my little dogs sleep at my feet.  This is what it feels like to be content. 

Rachael said to me yesterday, "you have to get out of your routine... take a risk... do something new."  So, last night I decided spontaneously (for me means the day of lol) to go to Cassandra's brother's graduation party, where I had a blast!!! I also enrolled for Intermediate Spanish at the local middle school building.  This starts in September!! I can't wait =)


Supreme adventure awaits!!!


Love Always,

near sigthtedness

Dearest friends,


I just got my glasses prescription renewed on Tuesday, and got the call from BJs that my new glasses came in.  I went to pick them up excitedly...because they are so pretty.  I love the intricate design around the lenses--almost like wrought iron.

I started thinking about sight...
While my prescription is for my far sighted inability (ironically similar to my life), my "near sightedness" --that is, near to my heart-- I am working on too.  seeing without the eyes is just as important.  Having the ability to look into yourself and focus--allowing what is blurry and obscure to come into view and clarity is crucial to our own inner survival.  


Elizabeth Gilbert is my own inner-optometrist.  Her life-story is opening clarity into my own.


Love Always,

transformation

My darling friends,

It didn't take me long, not surprisingly, to find something in Elizabeth Gilbert's book for me to talk about today.  Not two pages in and I was breathing in to my heart, thinking about my own life, and wondering at how I can live each day with this new idea.


Gilbert compares, in a way, the changes the Augusteum has been through to her own life.  "The world is chaotic, bringing changes to us all that nobody could have anticipated.  The Augusteum warns me not to get attached to any obsolete ideas about who I am, what I represent, whom I belong to, or what function I may once have intended to serve....one must be   prepared for riotous and endless waves of transformation."                   photo by CNES

I started thinking about how I define myself

*daughter

*sister

*teacher

*writer

*reader

*lover of many things

*outgoing 

*beautiful

*friendly

*selfless

*family oriented

*happy

*smart

*learner

 *scholar 

*pet owner

*swimmer

*summer baby

*preppy

*artistic

*creative

*christian

*adventurer

*traveler

*green bay fan

*whatever the opposite of high-maintenance is

This was just a "quick" list... as long as it may be.   These were the first things that came to mind when I think of myself--it was very therapeutic for me to see what was in the stream of consciousness of self for me.  I'm happy to say that they are all positive!!! I am open to transforming my life, and open to whatever changes life throws my way.  While I am attached to some of these "definitions" of myself, I see that my life is fluid--any of these can change at any moment of any day.


Elizabeth Gilbert says that's it is time to ask yourself those crucial, vital questions.


who am I?  


So, in turn, my friends, I ask... who are you?


Love Always,

TOUCHDOWN!!!!!

My dear friends,

Have I mentioned how much I love the book Eat Pray Love?  Well, I LOVE this book!!!  Today, I read a part where Liz goes to a soccer game with her new friend Luca Spaghetti (which is surprisingly this guys actual name).  She said that she thoroughly enjoyed learning all of the Italian curse words like cafone which means asshole.  Cursing is something she would undoubtedly hear at a sporting event--at least in America this would hold true.  She learns most of these words, which she explains she wasn't learning in school, from the old man sitting near her.

She writes:  "Oh, it was such an exquisite and lucky moment in my life to be sitting right in front of this man.  I loved every word out of his mouth.  I wanted to lean my head back into his old lap and let him pour his eloquent curses into my ears forever.  And it wasn't just him!  The whole stadium was full of such soliloquies.  At such high fervor!  Whenever there was some grave miscarriage of justice on the field, the entire stadium would rise to its feet, every man waving his arms in outrage and cursing, as if all 20,000 of them had just been in a traffic altercation."  

This made me excited for the beginning of football season--a season I have come to love with great and intense passion.  Especially seeing as though I'm a Green Bay Packers fan!!!  This sport converted me to Verizon FIOS so that I could have the "red zone,"  and be privy to seeing EVERY touchdown during EVERY game!  Last year, I even started my own fantasy league!! Living in New York, I don't get all of of the Green Bay games, but I sit down in front of a Giants or Jets game with my laptop on the table watching the digital Packers field on nfl.com update me in real time!!! Such a great invention!!! God, I love this sport!  And what sport could be better? Certainly there are none so great!

Love Always,