I'm a Carrie

The first time I ever saw an episode of Sex and the City, I was hunkered down in a room at the Newport Beach Marriott. I was there on business and opted out of the first night gathering, a lame meet and greet dinner. Any inclination of socializing was shot after I watched a couple wed in the garden below my balcony. A wedding to a single girl is a time of sadness about what you don’t have, not joy about what two happy people do have. Nothing a medium rare strip steak and some television couldn't cure.

My Manhattanite friend Allison had raved about this new show. I was curious enough to watch but not curious enough to blindly assume the extra expense of HBO on my monthly cable bill. Like raw oysters, some things in life require more convincing than third party rave reviews. Let’s just say that within twenty-four hours of touching down in Philadelphia, I was on the phone with Comcast upgrading my package.

Sunday nights during Sex and the City seasons were spent hosting dinner for my gal pals. We’d huddle around yummy food, sip crisp white wine, catch up on each other’s lives and then settle in for thirty minutes of pure entertainment. Gasps, giggles and ice-cream always dotted the dinner party landscape.

Over the many years of Sex and the City, I saw myself change and grow as a person. At the onset, I associated best with Carrie Bradshaw. She was spunky, a romantic, independent and savvy. Plus, she had some of the best shoes ever. Almost every girl I know thinks she’s a Carrie. For the record, I have never met a girl who willingly aligned herself with Samantha. We all adore her and some women can even relate to her, but no female I know would ever publicly admit to either.

In season two and three, I became more attached to the Charlotte in me. There was something to be said for the fairytale ending that women want but have been trained to disregard as old fashioned and unattainable. Her rules were archaic and rigid, but Charlotte had fantastic intentions of grandiose love.

Then I started to see eye to eye with Miranda, a successful woman in a man’s world who made few apologies. More importantly, Miranda represented the cynic in all of us. Fairytales, like Santa, the Easter Bunny and unconditional love, well, they’re hogwash. Life is life and you either find a way to deal with it or expect to be disappointed. I only realized the downside to connecting with her when I suddenly announced my Miranda fondess to my dinner party group and was met only with concerned glances. I decided to immediately make some personal changes.

I am back to being Carrie. There is an inner creativity and reasonably minded romantic that leaves me striving and hopeful for more. I feel even more Carrie when I sit down with my laptop and a a tea and peck at the keys in the attempt to write something worth reading. In addition to a literary connection with Ms. Bradshaw, I also recently came into an Italian, designer, shoe collection of sexy heels. The kind that require extra coordination and concentration but also guarantee a few complimentary cosmos when I saddle up to the bar. Carrie would just squeal in delight.

Raindrops

I have a love hate relationship with the rain. Snow I absolutely adore. I don’t even mind spending twenty minutes outside cleaning off my car in anticipation of hitting the frosty roadways. Of course, there really is also no way to complain about a perfectly sunny day. But rain can trigger a varied set of emotions.

It was pouring earlier today. Plus a cold front had just pushed its way into Philadelphia, making the rainy presence feel more raw than anything else. I layered up in a fleece, goretex and a scarf and headed to the office. Spend four years in New England and you too will think fleece is the answer to just about any weather condition. Same goes for duct tape as the answer to anything that needs fixing but that is a different topic for another day.

My gas tank was running low but I couldn’t muster the courage to stand out in the downpour to fill the tank. The overhang might provide some shelter but it never does the trick when the winds are whistling out of Canada. I took my chances with the tank and continued about my way.

When I ran out for lunch, I bundled back up and this time added a baseball cap. Umbrellas are great until you get inside. At this point, you either leave it behind to linger with other umbrellas at the entrance or tote it along. I’ve never successfully done the first option. I either permanently leave it behind or come to learn that another shopper “mistakenly” left with mine. Toting a dripping wet stick around a store is plain old tedious. The water the umbrella previously shielded you from is now running down the side of your pant leg and all over your shoes.

But as much as I detest pumping gas or running from car door to front door in a downpour, there are some days where the rain makes life better. The pitter patter of drops against a windowpane can lull just about anyone to sleep. And if you awake to a rain on a Sunday, you are provided with the perfect excuse to remain tucked in bed indefinitely or at least until the front passes through. Like snow, rainy days also pair perfectly with a mug of hot chocolate, a roaring fireplace and a damn good book.

If you replace the winter chill with summer warmth, a mid afternoon shower is refreshing and sometimes even invigorating. I love the way smells are enhanced after a summer sprinkle. Well, the smells of mother nature out in the open, not the smells of human nature in the subway system. Fresh cut grass, blossoming flowers and heat coming up off the macadam all linger longer in the air after the rain. It reminds you how good it is to be alive.

I heard it is supposed to rain again tomorrow night and the blustery cold is expected to linger well into next week. So be it. Maybe, just maybe it will rain Thanksgiving morning. Nothing pairs better with gluttony than sleeping in before hand.

Connect the Dots

Life is like an enormous Seurat painting. Up close, things blur together and don’t make any sense. Blue bumps up against red and there is no reasoning or understanding as to why. But when you step back, the jumbled mess of yellow and green suddenly morphs into a tree. And the red and blue tones that made no sense seconds before are now the folds of a woman’s skirt. Life always makes more sense from a distance but it is taking the step back that is sometimes the hardest thing to do.

I always adored Seurat’s pointillism for that very fact. I can stand in front of one his paintings for hours on end. Time all but stands still as I alter my position in front of the canvas. The security guard usually gets suspicious and on more than one occasion I will accidentally knock into a fellow art viewer as I waltz across the wooden slatted floor laid out in the gallery.

While Seurat’s vision applies to life in general, it applies more specifically to love. From a distance, it is graceful, elegant and breathtaking. It makes sense. Things are placed right were they rightfully belong and there are no questions.

You kiss. You hold hands. You wake up next to each. You take steps closer and the portrait from afar becomes more intimate but also becomes askew. Things are no longer clear. Dots don’t connect and the beauty and simplicity becomes complicated as you try to decipher why things are the way they are and can they be shifted.

I take two steps back and three to the right. Suddenly the outline of the dog reappears. The muted browns and yellows and oranges that were discombobulating and unsettling independent of reasoning now make sense. They shouldn’t be moved. And who am I to even think about altering it. I don’t have that right and I sure as heck don’t have that power.

I am now stuck where I am standing. If I step back further, even more of the picture in front of me will make more sense. Distance provides ample rationale and reasoning. But love isn’t about thinking straight. The passion and the moment fade as the crisp definition of actual objects clarify. But if I step forward, I am again faced with figuring out how to exist in a world where lines and emotions blur. For the time being, I am going to stay exactly where I am. And when I am ready for a different view, I am sure I’ll relocate. Not sure if it will be to the left or right, forward or backward. It all just depends on what I am curious to see.

In Print

According to the NYPost Page Six, Curtis Jackson (aka, Fitty Cent) has a literary agent. Are you farking kidding me? He doesn't even pronouce his stage name without converting half of it to slang. A man who relies on the English language's subcategory of ebonics for communication purposes has a literary agent?

The same goes for Nicole Richie. I read an excerpt from her Diamonds book the other day. In fact, I read the excerpt three times. Not because her writing knocked my socks off but because it took me three times for it to sink in that some talentless stick figure with oversized Jackie O glasses was able to get published. Forget the published part, she even made it to Larry King Live to discuss her literary debut. Okay, it was actually that retard Ryan Seacrest subbing in for King so it wasn’t quite as prestigious but still, the set was the same.

I totally grasp why Pamela Anderson has made it to the bookshelves of Barnes and Noble. Haven’t read her stuff but she is at least somewhat articulate. When famous people latch onto the PETA bandwagon, they tend to be competent in verbal expression. Heather Mills and Alicia Silverstone are good examples. It's an interesting phenomenon that some anthropologist out there should consider studying.

I tend to shy away from second career, celebrity authors. They might have something fantastic to say but more often than not, the person is just riding the celebrity wave. Britney Spears might be able to belt out a tune and slut her way across a light filled stage but her writing should be avoided at all costs. Take one quick look at her web page and you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.

The career jump goes the same for moving into the singing world. Lindsay Lohan did a nice job with Mean Girls and even with Freaky Friday. Please note that I didn’t intentionally see the second flick. It was more of a home-sick-and-it-was-on viewing. Anyway, Lindsay jumped onto the microphone and introduced herself via Rumors. Talk about lacking. Apparently execs everywhere agreed. A big rumor surfaced this summer that at the Herbie Fully Loaded preview, she stomped out when one of her songs originally slated for the intro credits was buried at the exit credits, the last part of the reel that only eccentrics and intellectuals linger for. Lindsay full well knew that no one cared who the second gaff boy was on Herbie.

I guess in the end, I am just confused. I am not saying my writing is up there with people like A. M. Homes (brilliant), Alain de Botton(brillianter) or David Sedaris(pure genius). But I’d like to think I could out perform Nicole Richie in a write off any day of the week, including Sunday. She might be a skinny Minnie with designer digs and a Jewish fiancé (talk about adding insult to injury) but the only place that girl's name belongs in a bookstore is on the credit card she hands over to the salesgirl to finalze her Us Magazine purchase.

Setting the Bar

“And who's our next caller?”

“My name is Dana!”

“Dana from where?”

“Near Vineland.”

“Were you at our Q102 Singler Mingler this weekend?”

“I was and I met such a great guy!”

“Get out!”

“No, I’m dead serious. He has a job, a car and no kids!"

I almost rear ended the person in front of me when I heard that last sentence. My peripheral vision blurred and my head felt fuzzy. Is this what the world has come to? A guy qualifies as a good mate if he has a steady paycheck, a set of wheels (four apparently) and the ability to hold off from impregnating a woman?

When I was in my early twenties, I joked with my dad that the only characteristic I looked for in a man was a pulse. My standards had lowered so far that a consistent heartbeat was enough to convince me to go on a first date. After four years at a women’s college, it isn’t all that surprising that I was willing to be flexible on things. Sometimes you just need a little human touch, even if it is coming from the clammy hands of a man with "heartbeat" being his one and only strength.

With age and ample time dedicated to the pulse-only standard, I tweaked my limits and raised the bar. Perhaps saying this makes me picky or elitest but the job, car and no kids thing is a given. If you can’t put a check in the yes box for those three things, well, there really is no reason to meet up for drinks and test out the chemistry.

A really nice guy on JDate emailed me last night to say hello and strike up a chat. His profile as a whole was pretty darn good. He was honest, funny, cute and from the picture void of any large gold jewelry (rule # 17: he can’t wear more precious metal than I do). But there was one line in his profile I just couldn’t agree with. It was something about not being consumed with titles, degrees and what you have in the bank. On the money comment, I concur. What you have in the bank is really no one else’s business except for your accountant and stockbroker. However, I just don't agree with the titles and degrees comment. In most instances, titles and degrees are the direct result of dedication and perseverance, two traits I find really attractive. I politely declined the advance and moved on.

I’m sure he has a lot of fantastic personality traits that many other Jewish girls on this planet are seeking. But he just didn’t have the things that were important to me. That isn’t to say I want to spend the rest of my life waking up next to a mirror image of myself. I’m sexy, smart and fun but come on now, even I tire of myself sometimes. The bottom line is that I consider life one big school. In my past lessons, I’ve learned what I want, what I don’t want, what I can tolerate, what I can’t tolerate, how much I should give and how much I should take. More importantly, I’ve learned that no matter how hard you push, you can’t squeeze a square peg into a round hole. If life is one big classroom, I’m taking everything I’ve learned from the past and applying it to the future. One gold star for me!

Slow Down

I recently noticed that when it comes to familiar paths I drive, I spend most of the time in a cruise control kind of haze. It’s an odd sensation where I simply flow with traffic and turn not because I recognize a street sign but because my body knows that after proceeding fifty feet ahead, I am suppposed to turn right. Every so often I suddenly realize that I can't recall looking at a light. Was it green or worse yet, was it red? I look in the review mirror to make sure there are other cars behind me. If I ran a red light and they did too, they are more at fault. He who is closest to the light run is the worst criminal.

My cruise control driving became very clear to me the day I started looking to buy a home. I’m very familiar with my neighborhood and most of the surrounding areas that fall within a twenty mile radius. If you spent your youth in Philadelphia, there’s little reason to get lost navigating it as an adult. It’s a pretty big city but if you’re middle class or above and white, there are only so many neighborhoods of interest. Of course, that changes if you have a drug habit or like to pick up prostitutes.

I'd search the MLS listings for homes in my price range and desired areas and would look in awe at an ideal listing that was apparently right near my office. I knew the address but had no idea where the heck the house was. And from the house number, I even had narrowed it down to one of two blocks. How on earth did this little gem get missed these last eight or so years?

The next morning, I got behind the wheel of my car with the intention of finding this perfect house. I turned down the street and started scanning the front lawns for “For Sale” signs. My posture was leaning forward and I clutched the wheel like a senior citizen who should have lost driving privileges a long time ago. In the distance, I saw the edge of a sign and knew this was it.

I pressed my hazards button and started to pull over to the curb. There isn’t really any traffic in this area but it was the courteous thing to do. I put the car in park and looked up to the right to see the home. Set before me, on yellowed lawn dried out from lack of watering, sat a home in need of paint, new stairs and a fair amount of love. The townhouse next door was in even worse shape. Plopped down on that dilapidated front stoop was a fat man with dirty hair and an even dirtier wife beater. There was a can of something in his left hand, an odd concept seeing most canned beverages aren’t really appropriate before eleven in the morning. Trust me; it wasn’t V-8 he was nursing.

Not sure what to do now that my dreams where dashed by the peeling paint and retired trailer park trash lingering on the neighboring stoop, I sped off from the curb so distracted that I drove the rest of the way to the office with my hazards blinking.

The other day I had to share a car with my dad and the end result was me sitting shotgun. He isn’t a bad driver but I prefer to be the one with a hand on the wheel. It’s a control issue that I can and will totally admit to. Anyway, the neatest thing happened to me. I started noticing everything around me that otherwise went unnoticed. First I saw a lovely stone home set up on a hill. I didn’t even know there were hills in my area. Then, at a stop sign I usually roll through, I saw one of the prettiest gardens. There were tall roses surrounded by pinks and purples and yellows. It was a magical plot that paired perfectly with a long exhale and smile.

Maybe there is something to be said for taking one’s time and, more importantly, taking time to smell the roses. Or in my case, at least take time to admire them from behind the car window while sitting at a stop sign.

Shaking the Snowglobe

Over Labor Day weekend, someone took my idyllic snowglobe life and shook it all about. I landed on my feet but a swirl of chaos remained. There were conversations, lots of them in fact. I never thought I could speak so much and so often about the same darn topic without getting bored by the repetitiveness.

In the end, flakes settled and the waters of the globe cleared. But the problem was that the snow that almost perfectly covered my contained world before was now in different places. The familiar became foreign and the learned responses and emotions no longer applied. It was like closing my eyes and waking up in Canada. It's pretty similar to home but all those “eh” sentence endings are just different enough to make you pull back and ponder what’s going on.

I tried to acclimate myself to my old but new surroundings. I even turned to my inner circle for interpretation, guidance and translation. Maybe being discombobulated was clearer to those looking in as opposed to me peering out. The funny thing is that no matter who I spoke with or how I relayed my situation, I was met with the same response. And it wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I understood, agreed and knew the inevitable but didn’t know if I’d be able to survive more disruption. Staying put in the wrong place was temporarily more appealing than departing in search of a new right place.

I’ve always joked that my comfort zone expands a whopping 7 inches beyond my actual body mass. This is impressive considering it had been 4 inches a few years back. I appreciate and like change, as long as it is contained and limited. My friend Samantha recently boxed up her crap and moved to Santa Monica from Seattle just for the heck of it. She is a free spirit who has never been tied down by hesitation or fear. I envy her.

Last Thursday, I officially left the snowglobe in search of someplace else. No matter how hard I tried to justify staying, I couldn’t do it. Things were too different to remain and there wasn’t enough to convince me that with all the right tweaking, I’d ever get all of those itty bitty flakes back to where they had been before the Labor Day shake up. At least I couldn't do it alone and alone is exactly where I stood.

As much as I’ve resolved to move on, I’ve been peeking back over my shoulder every now and then. It is hard to just up and move on when you didn’t expect or want to . And even though the flakes are still in all the wrong places, I’ll still miss them. They still make me smile, even if the smile is slightly interrupted with the gentle passing of a tear.

Accessorize Me

Like any and every female on this planet, I have a thing for accessories. Some women focus on handbags. Others focus on jewelry and even others put all efforts into shoes. My sister is a shoe person. Has been since day one. My mom knew she was in for a long and bumpy shoe ride when my sister refused to get into bed without her patent leather Mary Janes. To this day, Leslie is addicted to shoes. I, on the other hand, go through phases when it comes to the “it” accessory of the moment.

In high school, I was obsessed with jewelry. There was a local store that sold fantastic silver pieces from Mexico. All of the area prep school girls used El Quetzal in Chestnut Hill as the jewelry resource. I’m sure everything was priced 500% above what the owner spent south of the border but it was still cheaper than a roundtrip flight on Aero Mexico. Almost 25 years later and I still have some El Quetzal items in my jewelry drawer.

During college, I went on a shoe binge. If it cost under $50 and had a chance of being worn ten times, I bought it. The floor of my closet was hidden beneath multiple layers of sandals, sneakers, loafers and boots. I owned a navy blue suede pair of penny loafers that sound atrocious now that I say the words aloud but were really fun. Then there were my Jolly Green Giant green Doctor Marten boots. I loved how they clashed with my prim and proper private school appearance. The only remnants of my shoe binge are my cowboy boots. During an art trip to NYC, I found a red pair and a black pair of lizard skin cowboy boots. Trends come and go but cowboy boots are forever.

After college, I stole the scarf habit from my friend Allison. She grew up on the Upper East Side and had a different scarf for every day of the week. Hermes, Pucci and Gucci, oh my! That is not to say that Allison discriminated against lesser scarves. There was a great one she had bought off the street in Paris. Okay, that it came from Paris knocks it up a notch but it still came from a street merchant. I took my cue from Allison and suddenly owned a nice collection of silk scarves. I haven’t crossed the Hermes threshold but I’m just as happy with my Yves St. Laurent, Burberry and Moschino options. A twill silk scarf with rolled edges can take any outfit to the next level.

From scarves, I jumped on the handbag wagon. Left and right I was snatching up variations of the perfect bag. I had clutches, messenger bags, totes, and any other style displayed in the pages of Town and Country, Lucky or Marie Claire. I usually favored some more than others but just about every bag was given ample time dangling on my arm.

I’ve been on an accessory hiatus the last few months but recently pondered a scarf return. I just got a new jacket and the lining has a pretty red tone. I have a scarf that works but think there just might be something better out there. The funny thing is that I am desperate for sweaters, shirts and pants. I’m getting by just fine but you can rework the same, black, ¾ length sleeved sweater only so many times in a one week period. Then again, the idea of alternating near nakedness with poorly fitting clothing while viewing the wrinkles and pulls under the heat and glare of neon lighting with a poorly dressed sales associate banging down the door to falsely compliment me…well, I’ll pass. With a knot and a twist of a scarf, I can easily milk one more wear out of that same old sweater.

Exit Interview

My friend Allison just got a pink slip from a guy she’d been seeing for around a month. He started acting weird and she picked up on the poorly disguised vibe. They parted ways but not before having a final chat.

Allison: Can you tell me what exactly it is that you had an issue with?

Boy: I don’t want to hurt your feelings. It just isn’t necessary.

Allison: But I want to know because if it is something I should consider changing, I would rather learn from it.

In simple terms, Allison was requesting an exit interview from her soon to be beau. Maybe they weren’t the perfect match but she respected him enough to take his perspective and use it to her advantage.

Only in recent years have I welcomed criticism of sorts from a significant other. The defensive response is still there but it usually gets shadowed by my willingness and desire to become a better person. The bottom line is that if one person has an issue with certain behavior, others do as well. It is just that “others” haven’t had the reason or comfort to speak up.

Todd has reminded me many times that I need to work on being less reactive in situations that bother me and less critical about those around me. After he’s shared his thoughts, he assumes the crash position and waits for an explosion. More often than not, none come. Instead, I calmly express appreciation for his thoughts, apologize for my behavior and note it is probably a good idea to work on it. The short temper thing has actually been somewhat tackled but the criticism is something that's rather ingrained in me. Changing this might actually require a visit to the self help section of Barnes and Noble.

My response to the problems throws Todd for a loop. He doesn't understand why I don’t get mad at him or depressed about the comment as it isn’t sugarcoated or complimentary. I explain my reasoning and in a foggy haze he accepts the answer.

After Allison relayed the downward spiral of her recent relationship ending with the exchange of a dander infested chair he’d lent her, she told me about the final conversation. I was eager to hear what this guy had to say. Would I agree? Would I disagree?

“He accused me of being adversarial. I asked him to elaborate and while he stumbled over polite synonyms, I flipped through the dictionary to make sure my understanding of this rather simplistic word didn’t have a fourth definition I’d never come across. By the way, it doesn't.”

“You’re kidding, right?” I replied.

Allison is a friend from Smith. I loved my years spent at that women’s college and strongly believe that I wouldn’t have become the confident, outspoken woman I am today without that experience. Allison wasn’t being adversarial. The problem was she wasn’t being demure. I’m all for the exit interview. It just has to be conducted with someone who isn’t a twit. And that the guy in this instance is a twit is a matter of fact, not a version criticism.