Blowing Kisses at Scarlett's Boobies

I've had two breast-reductions so I know how bad that shit hurts, but a mastectomy is a whole 'notha ball of wax. Scar's kicking ass and taking names (as usual) and recovering like a champ.

She wrote a beautiful post and I invite you all to read it and send your dirtiest, funniest, most offensive joke(s) her way during this dull and painful recovery week. Not to mention, your virtual boobie-kisses. There's a new rack in town where cancer can not reach. Booyah!

GGC

By the Time We Get There, It Will Be Over

It sounds like an album title or one of those band names that has to be printed really small in order to fit the whole name on the cover of a CD but, no. It's just life-- THE life of a two-year-old and his mother.

The problem with toddler activities is that, they, no matter what they are or where they are happening, are ALWAYS scheduled to late one measly hour. 10:00-11:00 for Music Together. 10:30-11:30 for Storytime at the library. 11:00-12:00 Hollywood Bowl world-music dance-party-theatre thing (which, sadly, is over.)

I'm big on promptness. I may be high maintenance. Okay, very high-maintenance but fashionably late I am usually, not. Er... At least I didn't used to be. Now, I'm always late. I'm the latest person alive. In fact, in the last several months, Archer and I have missed nearly every appointment we have made, arriving at the tail end of any and all activities.

Tickets? Sorry. The performance has already started. You'll have to watch from the sidelines.

At this point I have resigned myself to timeliness. If you invite us to meet you at 10? We'll be there at 11. Because breakfast takes three hours to finish and the dogs will need a walk and Archer won't want to get dressed and then, by the time I pack up the stroller or the car with snacks and wipes and ten bottles of water, Archer will poop. The SECOND I seat him in his car seat he will drop the stinkiest of stink bombs and BOOM, we're back to square one. Ugh.

Today, as always, we arrived at our local library Storytime forty-five minutes late. Which, like I said, was to be expected. We swung open the double doors of the library just in time to hear, "... The End."

Luckily, we were meeting friends who although on time, were happy to spend an hour with us running around an empty library. The "after party" so to speak:



Better late than never is indeed the truth, and anyway, in my experience the fun stuff is what happens after hours. After school. After closing. After the fact. Whatever the "fact" may be.

I know! Let's crawl through the tiny space in the stand of the book spinny thing! Woo!

But just in case, please know, that if you ever invite Archer and me to meet you at the local park, we'll probably see you just as you're getting ready to leave.

At least, for now.

GGC

Things That Make Me Smile

I interrupt this week's me-being-sensitive-fest to bring you something funny via Flight of the Conchords, fantasy boyfriends extraordinaire. Oui? Ah! Voila:



And if you have a minute, my girl, Scarlett is having major surgery tomorrow and is very much in need of virtual hugs and kisses on the forehead.

Thinking of you, Scar.


GGC

On the Road Again

This has been a month of renovations. Of building and tearing down and room ad-ons and new beginnings and of course, conclusions. Of asking myself over and over what I want. Out of life and work and people. Out of friends and strangers. Out of marriage and motherhood and myself.


There is no way to know for sure where the dirt road ends. The bumpier the road, the greater the risk, but also, the greater the view. Then again, there are plenty of trails that lead nowhere. Plenty of times one reaches her destination-- only to find it is exactly the place from whence she started.

Catherine recently wrote of having so much to say but being unable to say it-- at least to the world. This is how the last six-weeks have been. I am filled to the brim with secrets, flailing to stay afloat, regaining my self-control and stumbling wide-eyed down sewer pipes in my own underground. Feeling far more like a child than a woman and yet, at the same time, all grown-up: skipping down the street in pig-tails with a briefcase, and a boy on my shoulders. A boy who new to the world of English language, calls me by my first name.

I am finally back to work on what I love: fiction. Retiring from other projects and moving forward on my own. And even though it is wonderful traveling with others, the most learned journey is the one traveled by herself. Even though no one is ever really alone when they have family, and friends like safety nets under the trapeze.

What is that feeling when you're driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? - it's the too-huge world vaulting us, and it's goodbye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies.

-Jack Kerouac

I don't know where the hell I'm going. But I do know what I want to bring on my journey and more importantly, what I need to leave behind. And that, I am sure, is all I need to know for now.

GGC

*photography by Wynn Bullock

All The Lonely People

photo credit: littlefoodies

Some very interesting points were made in the comments section here and at my SFTB post, The Art of Loneliness. I was afraid I might have been presumptuous assuming what I have been going through was universal, but as it turns out (parent or not) we are all trying to find a way off our islands, innocently flirting with the idea of jumping into the sea to fight pirates and sharks and the current, fantasizing about rebelling against our solitude.

I have been thinking quite a bit these last few days about isolation and whether or not we confine ourselves, not because we're masochists but because it is easier that way. Because when a child is born he naturally becomes first priority, making it harder to make or sustain friendships or relationships of any kind.

There is a scene in Little Children when Kate Winslet is sitting on opposite bench from the other mothers who sit neatly in a row, seemingly secure and content. Winslet is obviously "the outsider" in the scene but only because the movie was her story. I look at those mothers, both fictional and in the flesh at the park I frequent and I think, "they are just as on the outside as I am."

Because popular girls are just as lonely as the so-called "misfits". Maybe even more so. I've been on both sides of the electric fence. I think many of us have.

So what to do? I am afraid the questions are endless but the answers are few. I think perhaps the answers will arrive as we come to understand what we are looking for, the hypothetical lifesaver to our boatman's call allowing us to embrace island life in whatever way that makes it tolerable. Creating for instance. Creating music or art, creating collages or a beautiful garden. Something. So long as we remember to include ourselves in its creation from time to time: all the while remembering we're not alone in our loneliness.

Thank you.

GGC

LonelyMom26

Loneliness is not a disease or an epidemic. It is neither a subject easy to discuss or define. It is definitely not a subject to discuss in social situations, among mother's groups at the playground or the pool, even though I'm pretty sure it is a common denominator among us all. An invisible link holding us all in place, the reason we turn to one another. The reason we reach out, blog, speak, smile.

I have plenty of friends and yet...
I have even managed to maintain somewhat of a social life and yet...
I try to go out once a week and have made friends with the other writers at the cafe where I go to work and yet..
I am not shy. Nor subtle. I am not a wallflower or the quiet girl across the room. On the contrary. And yet...

...Most of the time I feel lonely.

Unable to socialize as much as I would like. Spending my days taking care of Archer and then writing by myself.

I was warned of the loneliness that came with being a mother. The shot social life and fighting the crowds of faceless faces, the voices that sound the same, the park-life rich with cliches and clowns. I was told it would take some getting used to, waking up every morning, going through the motions. I was told to make friends, to get out there, to be around other mothers who might be in the same boat-- paddling the same seas. Like the first day of school with babies on our backs instead of Jansports.

I would never tell anyone in person that I feel lonely much of the time. And if you called me to talk about it I would change the subject. But staying home most of the days, alone with Archer. Most of the nights, in my pajamas at 9pm, face against the window, watching the world and the lights, listening to the music, the laughter, parties, people my age who can stay out all night, sleep in until noon.

I thought eventually I would come to prefer this life of quiet nights, that I sewed my wild oats, and experienced enough irresponsible years before my pregnancy at twenty-three. I thought, "I could use a change" and I could. I did. Except lately? I can't help but miss it. I can't help but miss breakfast with friends on the weekend at 1pm. I can't help but miss the loudness of nights and quietness of days.

And no matter how much I love my life and the people who are in it, I usually feel completely alone. And sometimes it's too much to bear without telling somebody or something other than paper.

Because I'm a grown-up, now. And grown-ups talk about their problems instead of masking them with makeup, elevating themselves with high heels and running off like a wild thing down the boulevard in search of old friends. In search of the missing pieces from yesterday and the companionship of something both new and exciting and old and familiar.

GGC

Sleeping With Dogs

I haven't slept alone in five years. Not in my own bed. Even if husbands or boyfriends or significant others were out of town, I have never slept alone. I didn't even remember what it felt like until last night when I sprawled across the wide open space of the bed-sheets, testing the temperature of the left side of the bed, where Hal sleeps when he isn't out of town.

"It will be nice to sleep alone for once," I thought, before remembering that I hate to sleep alone, especially after a long day of working by myself. I want something to touch or talk-to. I need to hear breathing next to me. It is the only thing that lulls me to sleep. I flipped the light and wandered bleary-eyed down the hall toward the living room where the dogs were curled up together in their bed.

"Come on guys," I said. "Come sleep with me."

For years before Hal and I met, Cooper and Zadie slept with me in my bed. Children of a past relationship, they grew up sleeping with my ex-boyfriend, Jason and me. Cooper slept between us and Zadie at our feet and when we broke up and he moved out, they stayed with me and slept in my bed every night so I didn't have to sleep alone.

Men came and went. In and our of our lives but no matter what the dogs knew that when it was just the three of us at home, we would all fall asleep and wake up, together.

When Hal and I met, the dogs weren't allowed in the bedroom and over the years, have never slept with us in bed. They eventually stopped begging at the closed door and obediently slept together in the living room.

But not last night.

"Come on, guys," I said, once again. "Get up here. You can sleep with me, tonight."

But the dogs just stared at me confused until I pulled them up one by one onto the comforter.

Cooper (pictured above) cuddled up to me under the air-conditioner and Zadie went under the sheets, nuzzling up next to my feet.

I slept soundly through the night like I used to years ago, my Insomnia instantly cured by dueting doggy snores, my original family.

And I relished in the simplicity of sleeping beside animals, hairy and smelly and uncomplicated, remembering what it felt like to be a different kind of family of three, overwhelmed by what has changed since last we slept together. Different sounds. And smells. Different dreams and breathing patterns.


GGC

Talkies

Not that life has been a silent film, just an unintelligible one. Which is fine. Life doesn't make a lot of sense most of the time, in fact it is far easier to translate Archer's babbles then it is to understand everyone else's English.

Somehow, this whole time I have managed just fine, understanding Archer's methods of communication like it was second nature. Like we were communicating telepathically, without any words at all.

Speech therapy starts in the next couple of weeks. It will go on twice a week until we all agree he doesn't need it anymore. Except in the last few weeks Archer has started talking. I haven't said anything about this until this week because I was afraid that what happened last time might happen again. (I got really excited when Archer spent an entire day pointing at helicopters and calling them he-ca-cas several months ago, only to become disappointed when I realized it was a one-time thing.) But this isn't a one-time thing. Archer is using words, words that even strangers can understand.


Yesterday he said please and today he said thank you. He doesn't say Da-da but he can say, "Hal." Er.. "Howl," which is what he calls Hal. And "Meow" means cat. And when he hides my makeup brushes under the bed, he says, "wha-di-go?"

Wha-di-go, Howl?

And today he said, "Hi" to a stranger and "bye-bye" to me when I tucked him into bed, waving at me through the bars of his crib. "Byebyebye."

I was so proud I had to take him out of bed and hug him.

"Yay!" he said, clapping.

"Yay, is right, buster," I said.

We have been told that Archer is thirteen-months behind linguistically. It says so on the piece of paper Early Intervention sent to us. The one we had to sign and send back so he can get assistance.

In the past I have been quick to become defensive about words like "behind." Because it's all relative and Archer has always done things at his own pace, with grace and confidence, happily wandering in circles reaching his hands toward the squirrels, squealing as they scamper across telephone lines.


But today I got to thinking about what it means to be behind, about one of the classic tales of slow and steady wins the race. And I watched as Archer clapped away, as proud as a person could possibly be of himself, unaware of the so-called "finish-line".


The whole world's a race, unfortunately, and our children are growing up during a very rushed time. And I will not deny that Archer has some catching up to do, but he's making his way, coming around the bend, his little head poking out of his shell, smiling and babbling in his little language, and every so often, muttering a word or two.


GGC

Twenty Pencils, Zero Paper

Meet my every day bag. It's big enough for everything including Macbook, diapers, snacks and whatever the hell else I stuff within it's pen-stained interior.


I love me some purses but hold the softest spot for my old standby LV tote that I have been lugging around day after day for the better part of six years. I still remember our first day together-- we eyed another through a window on Rodeo Drive and much like any lovesick lovah, I was unable to resist her charms no matter the price.

Anyway, the bag. It may not look like much but this baby has been full of all kinds of shit in its day, traveled the world, been soaked by the rain and smeared with dog shit (on accident.) It has fallen into pools and been lost and then found. It has been filled with love-notes and manuscripts and cigarettes, stained compact mirrors, condoms, mix CDs and dozens of pairs of plastic sunglasses. Cameras and favorite books, tabloid magazines and airplane peanuts. All in all, this bag and I have a history and every day it's innards are unpredictable

Today, this is what I found:


1. Makeup Bag
2. Three lipgloss taken from the table of my cousin's wedding. (I guess I stole two of them.)
3. Madeleine cookies and almonds for Archer snack sesh.
4. Old photo of Archer from Thanksgiving
5. Shower cap taken from Best Western Pismo Beach
6. Two pairs of sunglasses
7. Eight pens and nothing to write on. (Better stick a Moleskin in that bitch on the double.)
8. Lip gloss pouch (mama loves her makeup)
9. Hand Sanitizer, the only thing in the Blogher swag bag that I kept.
10. Headphones to plug into laptop when working at the coffee shop
11. Makeup brush for, um, makeup.
12. Blackberry for all contact with bitches and hos13. Receipt pouch for tax purposes.14. Band aids just in case one of us skins a knee while out doing errands
15. Facial paper for oily days.
16. Cough drops, cold eeze and a mint that's probably three years old.
17. In case of emergency binky
18. Brand new wallet/ gift from BMC.
19. Other people's business cards (Lindsay's card is on top.)
20. Receipt from recent purchase, button that says "excellent" (wtf?) and a guitar pick in case of rock-out sesh on the road.
21-23 Ticket stub from Knocked Up from recent trip to Memphis, old receipt of said bag and authenticity certificate in case authenticity of bag is in question. (and I need fast cash a la ebay.)
24. True Mom/True business cards
25-27. Small body lotion, Aleve for chronic headaches and personal business cards.

...And now, (because I only MeMe when I can HeHe for BaBy)

Archer's everyday bag is only a year old, a gift from Archer's East Coast Granny (button also care of BMC. The girl is full of goody goodness.) This bag lives most of its life in the car for just-in-case occasions:


And this was what was inside:

1. Three diapers, three different sizes (doh!) one of which is a "little swimmer" for (woops!) little girls (hence the Little Mermaid.)
2. Two pairs of red socks and one lonely white sock. (Aw, shame.)
3. Baby legs used as sleeves when it gets cold out.
4. Ticket stub to this week's Hollywood Bowl presentation of "Greece." (the country, not the musical.) ed: If you are an LA parent, check out summer sounds. Next week Appalachia!
5. One of Archer's all-time favorite books.
6. Wet wipes.
7. Rebe changing pad. Awesome.

Ah, this was fun. Thanks, HBM for the inspiration. And now it's your turn! What's in your bag, baby? Post a lil some'some and give my friend a shout when you've posted.

Happy bag-emptying, peeps!

GGC

Photo of the Week

...Attitude, the one you got, oh baby!
Attitude, the one you got, oh baby!..

GGC

EDITED TO ADD: 100% organic tee c/o Blirt Shirt.

Nightmares on Crib Sheets

My earliest memories involve nightmares. Waking up screaming and sweating, waiting to be rescued by my mother in her nightgown or my father rubbing his eyes.

Most nights they would take me back to bed with them, or my mother would sing to me or my Dad would scratch my back.

The nightmares persisted, almost every night for five years. Eventually the nightmares became less. I started sleep-walking instead. Once I sleepwalked to the staircase and tumbled all the way down. I woke up bleeding from the head and totally confused. But most of the time I just woke up in the bathroom or on the bedroom floor. There was nothing worse, though, then the nightmares. I had a recurring fear of skinny objects. A phobia. In my dreams toothpicks had legs and they were all marching side by side, thousands of them, kind of like that scene with the broomsticks in Fantasia.

I hadn't thought about my nightmares in forever. Not until Archer started waking up screaming. Standing in his crib, holding open his curtains, staring out the window like he was watching something horrific. Sweating and shaking-- totally inconsolable.

This has been going on, now, for the last few nights and I don't know what to do. I wish I knew what the dreams were about but he cannot tell me. He just screams and shakes and I do what my parents did for me, rub his back, sing to him...

The ants go marching one by one, hoorah.

...Until he falls back asleep, up against me on the couch or in bed.

Like right now. His little head on my lap as I type this from the safety of our couch, where nightmares cannot reach him for whatever reason.

I remember feeling so safe between my parents, like nothing could touch or harm me. Like everything was going to be okay. I knew that Boogie-men couldn't reach me and there was no such thing as monsters under my parent's bed. Not even marching skinny toothpicks could find their way back into my subconscious.

In many ways I still believe that-- that when something scary happens, or upsetting, that I can just run away to my parent's house. That they will take care of me. Protect me from boogie-men or the scary things in life. The complexities. The fears of having so much responsibility, of feeling unprepared for domestic life-- for marriage and motherhood and being an adult. Waking life can be just as scary, just as out-of-control as nightmares. Sometimes even worse. The inner-demons we wrestle with in our waking life cannot be killed with a lullaby or a parent's warm embrace.

I look at Archer, asleep in my lap and I think, "I am his safety. Nightmares do not reach him here." But one day they will. One day he will wake up a man. And his nightmares will all but be forgotten, the tremors of real life taking their place, and he will come to me for safety and suddenly realize that the only person who can protect him from his fears and chase away the boogie-men is himself. That growing up means having to sleep alone sometimes, with bad dreams and the ominous shadows that filter in through open windows.

And he will want so badly to lie beside me, to believe me when I say, "everything is going to be okay" and so will I. Because a parent wants nothing more than for their child to be happy. To sleep soundly. But a parent can only do so much.

No matter how much we want to chase away our children's nightmares, protect them from heartache, from their inner-demons, we are powerless. There will come a point when we cannot bring our babies to bed with us to stop the crying.

It has been difficult for me to come to recognize this about myself-- that knocking on my parent's door in the middle of the night will not make my boogie-men go away. Because I'm not the child anymore. I am the parent. I cannot seek protection, I must protect. I am the safety. I'm the one who opens the door.

I have the answers. Somewhere in here.


GGC

cross-posted @ Straight From the Bottle

Of Weddings and Cousins and Adventures with Nanas Who Dress Up Like Bananas

"Ready?" My Nana said. "Let's peel outta here!"

She was wearing her banana suit when we picked Hal up from work in The Valley on our way due North, taking the 101 to Bodega Bay for my cousin Erica's wedding.

Soon after, she stripped down to her normal clothes, but even without her banana suit, Nana the Banana rocked the banana-suit vibe all the while north.


It was Nana the Banana's idea to shack-up at the Madonna Inn (a family favorite) for the night, as we made our way up the coastal route, singing along to our special road-trip mix-tape which included this song (covered below by a foreign kid with a ukulele):



Nana took the Yahoo room, the rustic western Banana that she was/is as Archer, Hal and me shacked up in the Rock Bottom room:

Archer sneezing in the Rock Bottom room of the Madonna Inn

The Yahoo Room = Giddee-up, Banana!

And boy, did she ever:

My cousin, Erica's wedding was beautiful. Her friend, Christopher, a fashion designer, made her dress from scratch and I got to write something for the occasion, excerpted below:

...Once there was a time when the power went out and there were no candles in the house so they bit lifesavers and made sparks until the light returned. And then there was the afternoon where the two of them overlooked the sea and discussed the future and the past and today. And she said, "Remember the day we were married? Remember how it felt as if Daddy was smiling down and your mother was watching us dance from the sky?" And he nodded and said, "yes."

The years twisted and moaned around their growing garden, with a little sun and water and the kind of love that only happens when two four-leaf clovers grow side by side.

And among the raindrops and power-outages and fallen leaves they drew a life together. first with pencil, then with pen and finally with precious metals and then after... A wild and wonderful collage made from the leaves they first sat upon, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.

...................................

All of my immediate and extended cousins were there, chasing Archer around the grounds in his Seersucker Suit, like they had known each other for ages, even though for many of them, it was the first time they had met:


Oh yes, the suit. How could I forget the Seersucker Suit I had searched high and low for the past several months, finding much to my sadness that no one working in children's retail has ever heard of Seersucker. Pulease. Are you joking? A Seersucker Suit is a must-have for a Pirate of the Snails, if not every toddler boy from coast to coast. I'll show you why:

Seersucker Suit from (who else?) Hampton's Child

perfect for a wedding by the sea...

...and one size too big = room to grow.

And in the famous words of Maurice Chevalier a la Colette's Gigi: Thank Heaven for Little Girls...

My Grandfather, Nana the Banana's late husband used to sing the song to my cousins and I when we were little girls, now all of us grown up, married, with babies, watching our yesterdays flash before us in the form of our younger cousins:


Sometimes I forget I'm all grown up when I watch them dance around in their floral dresses. I think of my cousins and I when we were their age and I wonder where the time went and if they think of me as old and unable to relate to their giggles.




Nana the Banana stepped back into her banana suit for one last Hoorah! before we set sail back down the coast, the four of us happily trapped among animal crackers and trail mix and bottled water and songs about Jessica Simpson.

We spent a night in Pismo Beach, overlooking the end of the world, and watched the fish swim below our feet at the Olde Port Inn, on the end of a pier, surrounded by old fisherman and buckets of entrails, and seated ourselves at a glass bottom table with plates full of shellfish.

"Louis and I used to frequent this spot," Nana the Banana said. "I haven't been here for years. It was one of our favorites."

I haven't been home for two weeks and much like any vacation or collection of vacations I have been a little bit sad unpacking my various night-on-town costumes and uploading my photos.

But also refreshed and ready for a new chapter. New projects and people to keep in contact with. New life and stories to tell. New moments to cherish.

Nana the Banana and the children who love her

And even though it's over for now, the adventure continues. A neatly folded Banana suit tucked away in the trunk of my Nana's Highlander. Waiting to come alive again and dance among the generations of smiling flower girls and beautiful brides and of course, pirates of the snails.

Peel, out.

GGC

Another Adventure Begins

Am packing up the car for a road trip up the coast starring Archer Sagebrush, Pirate of the Snails (Felix, for short) and my Nana (since childhood, I have called her "Nana the Banana") who appropriately came to the door dressed like this:


"I'm all ready to go!" she said.

And I cried because I have never seen anything more adorable.

Gawd, I'm grateful. Good people everywhere I turn...

GGC

As Permanent as a Moment You Want to Keep Like an Heirloom

I got my first tattoo when I was sixteen. My boyfriend was skateboarding professionally and traded a local tattoo artist some Zero decks and Independent trucks in return for my first tattoo-- it was, much like every sixteen-year-old beach-blonde's first tattoo: my astrology sign, a roman numeral II for Gemini with a little butterfly on the side.

My second tattoo was much the same, in some dude's apartment in high school-- this time, Japanese symbols for Inspiration on my ankle. Cliche yet meaningful to me at the time and therefore meaningful still, although I'm not sure it actually says "Inspiration"... but that is beside the point.

I have a crown on my lower stomach that I got after stumbling into Sunset Tattoo in the mood for something, um, regal? I have a grape vine up my foot (San Francisco) three different stars around my wrist, each accumulated in a different city (London, San Francisco, Los Angeles) divided by the word: evolve (as in the stars are evolving) an Anais Nin quote around my waist (East Village, NYC) and a daisy whose petals fall down the outside of my thigh. And now this on my left forearm:


This was the only tattoo that wasn't spontaneous: the words I have made my modus operandi: Tell the Story Until it Comes true. I told myself if and when I ever sold a book I would tattoo these words to my arm, like a permanent cheat-sheet to life, to remind me that there is nothing more powerful than a story, than believing in the themes and the characters and the possibilities of happy endings or at the very least, learned ones. That if I wrote enough manuscripts (four, total) eventually one would be published.



These words have appeared in some context in everything I have ever written, both fiction and non and I stand by the idea that through narrating our lives and adventures we will discover our own truths. That by believing in our stories we can write and then re-write our lives accordingly.

I don't believe in destiny but I believe in fables. The Anais Nin quote around my waist was taken from one of my favorite books, House of Incest, which says:

"What is allotted me to say? Only the truth disguised in a fairytale..."

That is what writers do. We disguise the truth in stories and fairy tales. We tell stories in hope they come true, for our characters and for ourselves. (Is there even a difference?)

We tattoo our stories on the world or the walls or pages of books and/or websites, brushing up against the truths of others with our skin or the very least, the glow of white beneath our type face.



I have always loved tattoos, for a very simple reason: they become a skin you cannot shed. I remember where I was in my life for every tattoo on my body. I remember what I was wearing, feeling, and why I walked through the door buzzing from the sound of the needle. The souvenirs of moments both significant and not become stories in themselves.


And to me that is what matters most.

GGC

Calamity and Jane... Never the Same

All I have done for the past week is laugh. I'm home now and feel a little like I did when I went to London and fell in love with a man on a dance floor and had to leave the next day. I've been crying in my soup. Missing BMC, her husband Boyband who I adore beyond belief...



...and her kids. Adorable and Adorablest.

I'm obsessed with the idea of moving the family to Portland just as all of my favorite L.A. boutiques have already done and it's no wonder. Indeed PDX is the perfect urban setting for young, creative parents with a passion for cafe-culture and rain-rock.

Chicago was beautiful as well but I would have liked to have explored the nooks and crannies beyond the well-to-do neighborhood where we stayed the better part of a week. Next time me thinks. Not that we didn't explore... I would have just liked to have spent more time doing so, maybe during normal office hours.

Erik's porch on our only outside-downtown adventure

Dana and I have made about 16793 videos over the last week of our honeymoon together, some of which have been already posted: me freaking a wax fireman, a drunken breakfast where I look like a (constipated) G.I. Jane with a bowl-cut, our carriage video (below) and plenty more where those came from. I don't want to run duplicate videos so I'll keep directing all interested parties to her, the north star of all things entertaining.

It's hard to make friends. The real kind of friend who you want to stay up with just to hear what kind of interesting and hilarious things they are going to say next. I realize eyes may roll upon reading this post and many have made comments about Blogher being cliquey, but I think the whole idea of meeting the people/person you have been eyeing from the interwebs is making whole friendships. Cliques form when people feel comfortable around one another. Groups form when like-minded people realize they have the same love for vodka tonics and sex toys. The same style of parenting, clothes, conversation. It's all about connection at the end of the day and very rarely does one get to truly connect to another person. For better or for worse, for whatever reasons shallow and/or profound.

There is nothing better than falling in love with like-minded women. There is nothing so fun as staying up for 48 hours running around town like a couple of Banshees, crashing biker gangs and raiding the mini bar, going on late-night missions to "wherever the road will take us and hopefully we won't get shot in the face." There is nothing better than spending time with friends who feel like family. Being assholes and loving each other more for it. It's been a long time since I have felt so comfortable around people outside my family. Maybe even forever.


I knew Dana before Blogher but I never knew how much I could love someone until we spooned for a week. Until we exchanged everything but bodily fluids (maybe next time.)

Honestly, I don't know what else to say besides, I'm heartbroken to be so far from her right now. I feel like someone just punched me in the heart.

What BMC's homemade-shirts say is true: Vaginas really ARE for lovers. Her vagina, especially.

look for Vagina is for Lovers shirts coming soon...

In fact, I would dare to say that from this point on we might just live happily ever after, reliving our adventures over and over on youtube for all eternity.

Or at least until I can move my family to Portland and we can start our very own karaoke commune. (Seriously. How can one not fall in love with a woman who makes videos with poorly lit karaoke shots. Best. love letter. ever.)



GGC