Lawyerish

Baby's First Conference

The first thing I would suggest to you, should you find yourself preparing to attend an event involving a couple thousand strangers, is that you borrow or steal a baby to bring with you. 

The baby should be somewhere between two and seven months old; he or she needs to be cute (to attract maximum attention yet divert same away from you, especially if your hair is a disaster like mine), immobile (you don't want to spend the whole time trying to contain a rogue crawler), able to sleep in high-decibel conditions (since once you find your people you'll want to be able to chat your face off without having to entertain the infant as well) and equally able to smile/coo/wriggle as your icebreaker needs arise (awkward pause? baby steps in to do something cute! everybody wins).  The baby should also need occasional attention from you -- pretty much any baby will fulfill this requirement -- so that, when you find yourself left out of a conversation or otherwise without a friendly face nearby, you can change a diaper, give a bottle or, in extreme cases, whip out your boob as a distraction. 

I would also suggest that, if it's over 90 degrees with 90-some percent humidity, you not walk (like a COMPLETE FOOL) over two miles to the venue of such an event, as extreme sweatiness is likely to ensue (especially if you are a sufferer of Severe Post-Partum Perspiration (SPPP)).  Please learn from my mistake. 

On Friday morning, I strolled Felicity down through the park, all the way to freaking Midtown, in the soupiest, most disgusting stickiness of the summer, on the theory that she needed to nap before being subjected to a full day of conference-going.  She did, indeed, sleep on the way there, but a mile into the walk I was absolutely drenched from head to toe (WHEN is the SPPP going to end?  Ever?  Am I going to sweat like an elephant for the rest of my LIFE?) and my hair was in A State from which it may never fully recover.  When I arrived at the Hilton, I looked positively horrid, as if I'd just stumbled in from a trek through the murkiest rainforest on Earth.  There was severe frizzing involved, and I am certain that I emitted a stale and unpleasant odor. 

Despite my grievous error in judgment, I pressed on through the hotel lobby and, after a panicked call to Jonna, a crowded elevator ride, and a trip to the wrong floor, I found my way to check-in, acquired my swag bag, and got a chance to hug Jes when she spotted me and came over to say hi, which was SO kind and helped to quell my brimming horror at having thrust myself into a situation involving enormous expanses filled wall-to-wall with unfamiliar faces. 

I perused the conference guide and, overwhelmed by the choices and all.the.people, retreated to the lactation lounge.  When Jonna and Jennie finally found me, I adhered myself to them in relief and basically did not leave their side for the ensuing two days.  The two of them, by the way, look and act like sisters -- in every way, a good thing -- and are absolute pros at introducing people (i.e., me) around and including everyone in conversations.  And well, you already know how I feel about Jonna, and now I have sort of an embarrassing level of fondness for Jennie, considering we just met, like, 48 hours ago. 

After a Starbucks run and a visit to the park, we braved the conference once again and ended up hanging out with Jonna's friend Liz of Hello Ladies -- a complete delight.  Anna also found us (through Jonna, of course) and several times I had to keep myself from going over and just grabbing her arm because she is so funny and smart and perceptive (and pretty -- you guys, EVERYONE I met this weekend was gorgeous and I am not making that up/blowing sunshine up anyone's butt; I am sure most people imagine a blogging event to be awash in nerds, and to some degree they may be right in terms of bloggers being smart and verbal and all that, but damn these are the finest-looking nerds I've ever seen).  And Julie sat with us for a while and was all cute and funny, and dude, my boobs were out pretty much during this whole span of time because Felicity decided she was not in a Formula Mood.  So that's fun for introductions.

At some point thereafter (and I could well be forgetting a whole chunk of time and more people, but if so I swear it is not a reflection on how memorable anyone was but rather on what a DIM BULB I am), we headed down to the lobby lounge to get a snack, and I got to meet Suebob, who I positively adore and could have hugged all day for all the loveliness and warmth she radiates; and TwoBusy, who is hilarious and deftly handled being one of about five guys at the whole shebang; and then I spotted Leah and Linda across the lobby and had one of those running-through-a-field-with-arms-thrown-wide moments as I rushed over to hug them, and oh, how I love those women and wish I could have stolen them away to force them to talk to me and only me, if just for a short while.  Oh!  And Alexa!  I sat with Alexa and couldn't stop grinning, because...Alexa!  Also The New Girl, who is so fun and cool and has great hair.

Throughout all this, Felicity was A-MAZING.  She was so so so good, and I felt like an ass for having portrayed her as such a Screamy McCrabbypants.  She made a liar out of me, in other words, as little girls are wont to do vis-a-vis their mothers.  But I was grateful, because if a kid is going to pick a time to be a total angel-baby, then a huge social gathering is the one you want. 

Anyway, so we all talked and talked, and eventually it was time for the keynote, where I finally ran into the darling and wondrous Holly (we did not have enough TIME together, woe!) and met the sweet and funny Anne (who was Felicity's FAVORITE person ever; she had the baby giggling and squealing and oh, it was so cute!).  And my friend Metalia absolutely rocked the house when she did her "New Moon" rap, which was worth the price of the conference in itself.  Then on my swing-through of the art auction before I rushed home to put the baby to bed, I met Mar, who has the prettiest red hair and couldn't have been more gracious.

On Day Two, I presented myself at the hotel for Alexa's book signing, but got there just as the last copy sold.  Doh!  But I did get to meet the famous Heather B., who gives great hugs and has an aura of total fabulosity.  And then I grabbed Leah's arm and made her talk to me for a while. 

While Leah and I were standing there discussing how certain bloggers, such as The Pioneer Woman, would cause a stir if they came to BlogHer, out of the corner of my eye I saw this wall of people coming off the elevators toward us.  As they approached, I realized that none other than Ree herself was among them, and when she was a few feet away from me I basically shouted, "IT'S THE PIONEER WOMAN!" and she paused, no doubt to see what lunatic was accosting her, and as I threw myself at her in what I'm sure was the world's most aggressive hug, I babbled, "Hi, Ree!  I'm Meredith -- er, Lawyerish!  And we used to correspond [what the what?  like we were pen pals?] back in the day [??] and we were both ballerinas and! and! and!"  She smiled and said, "Of course I know you" and she also knew Leah, and I believe that was when I blurted out, "My husband loves your meatloaf!" but fortunately Felicity was being really cute so Ree was distracted by her gurgly smiles. 

And I'm telling this story, by the way, not to be all Fan Girl-y and weird, but rather because Ree and I started blogging at almost the exact same time and we used to comment on each other's sites and had this little kinship over having been small-town, red-headed ballet dancers (and my love of Little House on the Prairie made me instantly riveted by her accounts of ranch life) so I feel like I've known her for all these years and watched her from afar as she's turned her once-little blog into what it is today.  And I think she's handled the hugeness of her media presence incredibly gracefully, which not everyone can pull off.  So anyway, it was just fun and a nice moment to see her in person even though I acted kind of like an idiot.

OH MY GOD THIS IS LONG. 

So anyway!  The other gems I met that day were Pseudostoops (a tall, funny, elegant fellow lawyer) and Sara (a tiny, adorable, hilarious fellow mom) and Maura (another tall, smart, fun fellow lawyer!) and now my brain is on FIRE because I am sure I met other awesome people but my powers of recollection are failing me.  We all had lunch at a deli, where some of us rather loudly overshared about our birth stories and horrified the other patrons (not to mention Pseudostoops).  That evening was the Style Lush happy hour, then I ran home to drop off the munchkin and went back in time to check out the famed Sparklecorn and CheeseburgHer parties.  I have to say, I am officially too old for loud, dark parties because all I wanted was to ditch the din of music (I could not hear a THING in there) and whisk all of my newfound friends to a quiet place where we could all sit and talk for DAYS.  And that's pretty much what Jonna and Jennie and I did -- hit the lobby bar and drank overpriced Champagne and laughed until I had to put myself into a cab so as not to be too surly when the baby woke up at 5:30.

All in all, I had such a warm feeling from the whole event.  No, I didn't attend any sessions and I didn't stay long at the parties (nor was I invited to any fancy private parties), but I got everything I wanted out of the conference -- I met people who I feel like I've known for years, and the affinity I had for them through their sharing of their lives on this here Internet was totally borne out and bolstered by seeing how terrific they are in "real life."  And as an added bonus, I met new folks who will be friends from here on out.  It's a crazy thing, to be a part of this little blogging world, when all I meant to do back in 2005 was start a site where I could tell stories about funny little things from my childhood and life and maybe my mom and Allison would read along.  And now I have all of you, whether or not you were at BlogHer. 

(Since I crapped out on the whole camera thing, here's a couple of photos that prove that I was actually there, as if this TOME weren't enough.)

Don't You Hate When I Post Just To Tell You I'll Post More Later?

Right! 

So I went to BlogHer (well, some of it, anyway), and it was so very much fun, and now I'm about to pass out from The Tired, since I got home last night around 12:30 (early! I know!  but still later than I've been up in about, oh, a YEAR) and had a 5:30 wake-up call from a bald, bleating human. 

In short, it was sort of like Girl Scout camp (with fewer ticks) meets a huge slumber party (with less bra-freezing) meets a social anxiety nightmare (really, there were just SO. MANY. PEOPLE) meets a trade show hopped up on a case of Diet Coke and a two-pound bag of Twizzlers (flashy lights! loud noises! bright colors! and SO. MANY. PRODUCTS). 

Pretty much everyone I met was immensely lovely, and I spent time with so many friends I've been reading for years, plus made some terrific new ones (one is silver and the other gold), and man was it trippy to be standing in the permanent twilight of the hotel conference area with Leah (so willowy and kind and, yes, gorgeous) after following her all these years (it was like Flickr come to life!), and if that weren't enough, the next thing I knew I was ASSAULTING The Pioneer Woman with a hug and a lot of nervous chattering (the words "my husband loves your meatloaf!" actually came out of my mouth, oh YES THEY DID). 

I have lots to recount about the whole thing, but sadly I am kind of a loser and took exactly ONE photo (of Jonna holding Felicity, with the latter in the midst of a minor breakdown) so there's going to be more telling than showing, and I'll have to reread the post 8,000 times before putting it up to make sure I didn't inadvertently leave anyone out (I live in FEAR of unintentionally hurting feelings, tis my absolute nightmare). 

And since the baby doesn't nap anymore unless I'm propelling her forward in her stroller at moderate to high speed (or unless she is in a room of about 2,500 bloggers -- she was AMAZING during the conference, sleeping in the stroller whenever she felt like it and turning on the charm for all her admirers when she was awake (BlogHer is nothing if not filled with an appreciative and receptive Baby Audience, unlike the rest of New York City) (and I didn't take her to the parties, not to worry; she was just my icebreaker/wingwoman at the day sessions, although I belt-and-suspendered my social neediness by clinging to Jonna and Jennie's legs the ENTIRE time and furiously texting them whenever they left my sight)), it may take a while. 

More later! 

(ACK!)

The Thrill of Victory

You know what I love?  Winning.  I'm not one of these crazy-competitive people -- I don't toss the board across the room if I lose at Trivial Pursuit or anything -- but I do take great pleasure in the rush of crossing a finish line, metaphorical or otherwise, first. 

In ballet, I had a perverse love for auditions.  I'd carefully pin my number to my white leotard (white showed my pretty bones and sinews best) and glide into the studio with a mass of pencil-thin girls.  Sometimes they'd have us line up in the middle of the room and cut half of the group based solely on bodies, looks, or posture.  Sometimes there would be several cuts within one audition; after barre they'd eliminate a bunch of girls, then we'd do center and they'd do a cut, and then finally there would be pointe, with just ten or fifteen dancers left, and the strain of desire would tighten our lips as the flush of almost-there lit up our faces.  Once, I was cut just before that last round and I stood frozen to the floor, my un-called number dangling like a scarlet A from my chest.  The walk between that spot and the door seemed to take hours. 

The following year, I made it through -- after pointe, my number was called along with those of the big city girls with the banana feet and the ceiling-high extension and the matching peach unitards, dance bags, and warm-up shirts.  I had been accepted into one of the top summer dance programs in the country.  It was one of the greatest feelings I'll ever have. 

When I got to college and joined the crew team, I experienced group sports for the first time since second grade, when I'd played soccer with the local rec league (you know, kiddie soccer, that unique sport where the entire team crowds around the ball and races up and down the field en masse, all elbows and tube socks). 

Crew was, to quote the Bachelor, amazing (I had a connection with it, even).  I can remember every moment of the races we won -- the back and forth of the bodies and the whoomp-swish! of the oars as we powered up the length of another eight, seat by seat ("I'M ON THE THREE SEAT, LADIES, LET'S GO!" the coxswain hollered), until we shot over the finish line.  When we beat Georgetown in a sprint one year, the rower in front of me vomited energetically over the side of the boat and I laid my head back into the lap of the girl behind me, my legs vibrating and my back afire with pain, but we couldn't stop grinning around our gasps and moans. 

The best part of winning crew races was getting to take the shirts off the rowers you beat, a long-held tradition of sportsmanship that netted us lots of tank tops.  Also enjoyable was the tossing of the coxswain into the river, which we did even if the water was crawling with pollution or barely above freezing.  And, of course, I loved me some screaming and jumping up and down and group hugs and clutching our medals above our heads.  Just thinking about it makes me giddy.

Being a lawyer occasionally provides fist-pumping moments of YES!, although oftentimes it's a relative anticlimax because you find out you won by way the court faxing over its decision, which generally comes months, or sometimes years, after you did all the work.  And someone usually appeals or some part of the case gets remanded, so the momentary woo-hoo is quickly downgraded into an oh-shit of frantically paging through your calendar to figure out how in the world you'll fit a new briefing schedule on top of your current workload.

But!  Sometimes, you get lucky and a judge issues a decision from the bench, and then you get that YEAH BABY sensation, and you have to restrain yourself from hopping onto the counsel table and doing the Roger Rabbit and snapping in Z formation in your opponent's face.  And then you get to bear hug your client, and they're all happy and they're ok with having laid out bajillions of dollars in legal fees.  And, even better, sometimes it's an individual client and the stakes are life-altering and you've just won this person, in effect, their life.  It's those moments that make it all worthwhile, man.

(And just so you know, I don't plan on being one of those parents like Emilio Estevez's dad in "The Breakfast Club", all YOU HAVE TO WIN!  YOU HAVE TO BE THE BEST! -- I'm not one of those people.  However, I also can't abide this pansy-ass New Age B.S. about how it's not good for kids to have competition because someone's feelings might get hurt.  I enjoy the game and the process for their own sake and all, and my world doesn't come crashing down when I lose, but come on -- a taste of victory every now and then (whether my own or, uh, a reality TV contestant's (Go Tessa!)) keeps me keepin' on.) 

Stormy Weather

I love weather.  I'm not one of these people who obsessively watches the Weather Channel to track cold fronts or pores over satellite photos to determine the precise moment the next storm might arrive.  The most I do is watch a snippet of the forecast on Channel 7 while I do sit-ups in the morning, but just as often I  leave the day to chance, my footwear and outerwear choices governed only by the one-line prediction in the corner of the front page of the Times. 

More often than not, I forget to bring an umbrella, even when a monsoon is predicted.  I'm the one you see squinting through the downpour, my hair plastered to my face, my pants soaked up to the thighs, while everyone else scurries about under stadium umbrellas the size of parachutes, fighting against the wind and refusing to admit defeat even when they're left with a twisted bouquet of aluminum and nylon.  And yet, I'm the one with the manic grin on my face.  There's just something brilliant about that whole scene, people hunching against the elements and trying to go about their business while being all blown about and soaked to the bone. 

The same goes for a snowy day -- in fact, snow is even better because it's inherently picturesque.  Before the snowbanks turn to sludge and every corner is a knee-deep puddle, the sidewalks are coated in a swan's down layer that squeaks under your boots as the free-falling flakes brush your face and collect in your hair.  There's nothing like Central Park in a snowstorm, the trees crackling with ice, the footpaths camoflaged but for the lampposts standing at attention in the hush of white.

I don't think I could handle living in a place with temperate, sunny weather year-round.  Aside from the lack of crisp fall days, which would be enough to keep me away, I would miss the moods evoked by seasons and storms.  Is there anything better than a rainy Sunday, when you have no obligations and you can curl up on the couch with a book and the dog, listening to the spatter of the drops against the windows?  How do you find excuses for naps or hot chocolate or fuzzy slippers when it's always 75 degrees and sunny out?  And, on the flip side, how do you truly appreciate the warm days -- do you still remember to tilt your face into the light and flop down on the grass to let the balmy air pass over you?

In college, the first warm day of the year -- meaning the first day over 45 degrees -- always turned into a campus-wide beach party, without the sand or the volleyball net; the Diag would be awash in co-eds (suddenly, it appears that I went to college in the 50s -- the hell?), everyone sunning themselves and socializing and shedding their layers of coats and scarves in favor of tank tops and cut-offs.  The entire school was infused with newfound joy and a certain languorousness, in contrast to the hurried purposiveness of the long winter.  It always made me wonder whether students in Florida or California ever went to class -- how did they summon the motivation to spend ten hours at a stretch in a dusty library or an echoing lecture hall when there was all that great weather to be experienced?  But of course, when it's great weather all the time, it has less of an effect on your mental state; you can operate entirely independently of the barometer and thermometer.  Which ties into my point above -- I don't know how I'd indulge my inner brooding writer or reflective diarist or, let's face it, crappy TV addict without regular atmospheric downpours to assuage whatever guilt I would otherwise have if I were missing a gorgeous day to be inside.

I will say that, of all meteorological phenomena, I could do without the blazing hot summers.  I'm ok up to about 85 degrees, and then it's just downright unpleasant.  I don't like sweating all that much, unless I'm exercising, and I really don't like being around other sweaty people.  The subway on a hot, humid day is a new level of hell that should be reserved for, I don't know, Sanjaya.  Put him down on the C train platform on a 98-degree day with a nice complement of urine-soaked bums, and see how long it takes him to promise that he'll never sing again. 

If this whole global warming thing continues, I may have to move out west, out to the Pacific Northwest, where summers are mild but there are still four distinct seasons.  And I would have more than my requisite allotment of slouchy weekends, pretty snowfalls and puddle-stomping commutes.    

Tingle All the Way

Despite my deeply held values of pragmatism and frugality, and my general lack of enthusiasm for girly-ness, there is little I appreciate more in the world than a good spa.  I'd never had a spa experience of any kind until my post-bar trip, when I experienced the joy of the massage and facial whilst tramping about Southeast Asia. 

In Vietnam, my friends and I took full advantage of the startlingly cheap spa services, which were often offered in hair salons or out-of-the-way hotels.  These were not "massages" and did not include anything untoward, mind you, although on at least one occasion, the procedure involved my masseuse steadying herself with a pole running along the ceiling while she walked up and down my back (it feels much better than it sounds).  I started to feel deprived if I went a day without a massage, or at least a manicure and pedicure. 

And then we went to Thailand, where the massages are even more plentiful, and involve donning cotton pajamas and having your body contorted by a therapist, who flings your limbs around and swings your upper body up and down and pulls you over her back to stretch you and pull you into something resembling relaxation.  It was a much more athletic experience than massages elsewhere, but still dirt cheap and ultimately worthwhile, if only for the humor of effectively being bodily forced to perform yoga and calisthenics. 

Back Stateside, when I started working and found out what a high stress job and a heavy briefcase could do to my bodily infrastructure, I found a SoHo spa where I could receive deep tissue massages and intensive facials for roughly 80,000% of what I'd been paying halfway across the world.  Even with the high price tag, it was more than worth it to emerge with a fresh face and gooey muscles after a few hours in an urban oasis.  Since then, I've tried to go at least twice a year -- sometimes here, sometimes while traveling -- although for a while I had to drift about, spa-less, after my go-to place in the city closed and I had trouble finding somewhere that approximated it quality.   

I need not look any further. 

On Saturday, I spent a few mind-altering hours at the Spa at the Mandarin Oriental, where I would still be right now if they hadn't called security to remove me when I started to move all of my worldly possessions into the Women's Relaxation Room.  (Well, I would have, anyway, if I'd had the presence of mind to do anything after I finished my treatment; instead, I staggered around the neighborhood with a vacant, yet wholly satisfied, stare.) 

I had booked what the Spa has deemed a Time Ritual(TM), which is basically two hours of the most intensive awesomeness you can imagine.  And, by the way, those two hours follow your complimentary use of the Spa's Heat Experience, which is a steamy room with a sweeping view of Manhattan that contains the largest, bubbliest and cleanest hot tub I've ever seen.  You can hang out in there and drink orange-scented water, then have a little schvitz in the steam room, followed by one of those jet-propulsed showers meant to approximate a multi-directional torrential downpour in the rainforest.  I had the place to myself, so I floated around the Vitality Pool (er, the hot tub) for a good half hour before my treatment time, being pleasantly buffeted by bubbles.

After emerging flushed and warmed to the core from the Heat Experience, I met my spa therapist, who brought me to my treatment room, with its subtle lighting and scattered orchids.  She had me sit in a little alcove, where she washed and massaged my feet while she explained what would happen in the Time Ritual.  She had me choose which essential oils appealed to me, and asked about how my body was feeling, where I was carrying tension, and how I wanted to feel after my experience there. 

She started with an exfoliating treatment involving a dry brush and a cream made with crushed apricot seeds, peppermint oil and I don't even know what else, because I was mostly paying attention to how UNBELIEVABLY AWESOME it felt.  You'd think being scrubbed with something along the abrasiveness of a Brillo pad would hurt, but no.  It did the opposite of hurt. 

After I rinsed the scrubby cream off -- at which time I found that my skin was somewhere around 2500 on a softness scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the butt of a baby fresh out of the womb and 1 being the feathery wing of a butterfly -- I snuggled back into the towely goodness of the massage bed for my facial cleanse.  This consisted of her caressing my face with various oils and cleansers, then gently applying a red clay treatment to my scalp and hair.  The level of tingling at this point was through the roof -- is there anything better than someone playing with your hair and running their fingers along your scalp?  My God, man!  Armies and prosecutors have their interrogation tactics all wrong; instead of threatening to rip someone's fingernails out if they don't talk, they should knead the guy's scalp and slowly brush through his hair with their hands.  I would have done just about anything to keep that sensation going forever.

Sadly, it did end, but the full body massage was next, so I didn't have to fall to the ground weeping or anything.  She did a whole deep tissue thing with just the right pressure, and the only thing that kept me from flying apart in a zillion pieces of totally relaxed molecular matter was my constant panic that the whole thing was about to end.  I kept trying to calculate how much time might have passed, how many parts of my body were left to be worked on, and how I could possibly get her to be with me at all times, forever. 

Eventually, there was nothing left to massage and I was basically a useless heap of flesh covered in aromatic oils -- but there was a bit more.  She finished me off with a craniofacial massage, the final note of which was her pushing down on the top of my head while gently pulling on my hair.  Which, again, sounds uncomfortable and possibly painful, but NO.  YOU ARE WRONG.  It is a sensation that could cure cancer, stop global warming and end hunger. 

I thought I would have to stumble back to my locker and face the reality of showering and getting dressed, but no!  There was more.  After I regained my faculties, I was led to the Women's Relaxation Room, where I was invited to lounge on a bed facing a panoramic view of Central Park while drinking tea, enjoying a fresh berry smoothie and wearing a heated pillow around my shoulders.  I stayed there until the soothing running water in the Zen fountain made me have to pee so bad I had no choice.  And then I reluctantly got myself together and reentered the cruel, cruel world in which we wear shoes and clothing instead of slippers and robes, and no one offers to bring us tea or massage our heads.  I think, as a society, we should work on that.

I've been to some amazing spas on vacation, but this was possibly even better -- a vacation without the plane ticket.  It was the most expensive spa I've been to, but well worth every cent.  I'll be back as soon as I can afford to go.  Or maybe sooner.  Maybe tomorrow.  Maybe EVERY DAY FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE.  If only.  If only.  Oh, world.  You bastard.  

And Many More

Sunday was my one-year blogging anniversary.  (Or was it my blog's first birthday?)  There was no party, and no one made any cupcakes or took photos of my blog smushing its one-candle cake.  I did nothing even remotely blog-worthy that day, in fact (ran; read the paper; got hair cut; napped; finished Summer Crossing; made grilled cheese sandwiches and brownies for dinner (oh, yeah, we are on such the health kick...heh)). 

Sometimes I wonder if I've already written all I have to say on this here blog-thang -- not that I'm threatening to abandon the site (no!), since having nothing to say has never before stopped me from pontificating to anyone who will listen.  I've told most of my funny stories and chronicled my childhood dorkiness in excruciating detail and made note of the daily frustrations of living in a city of millions of people, many of whom at times appear to exist merely to annoy me and/or get in my way on the sidewalk.  (Here I suppose I should link to some of my old entries, but that feels a little too self-congratulatory, and anyway you can find them pretty easily via the category archives -- also, the best stories of the angst and trauma of growing up a giant nerd can be found in the May to August period, should you be so inclined to have a look.)

I started this site mostly to make myself write.  To organize the many thoughts I've got burbling around in my head, some of which I'd like to use in other writing projects, others mostly to keep for myself as part of my lifelong journal-keeping habit.  It's turned out to be a side perk that I can keep in touch with friends and family this way, to let them peek into my past and present lives and view some of our shared history through my own peculiar lens.  And, thankfully, Allison has her own blog, too, so I can see what she and David and Maggie are up to all the time, almost as though we've continued our practice of writing letters to each other every day.  Just like when we email, after I read her site I feel like we've just gotten off the phone with each other, and in its way that makes up some small part of the distance we've put between ourselves geographically. 

Since I started out with a reading audience of zero last year, I'm astonished -- and deeply pleased, of course -- to have ended up with such a respectable number of regular readers, many of whose sites I also adore and read borderline obsessively.  I love hearing your thoughts here and also getting to say what I think about your sites.  In that way, this whole weird blog phenomenon feels like a write-in coffee klatch or, I don't know, a brown-bag lunch series by teleconference (especially since I usually surf my sites while I'm eating either breakfast or lunch at my desk).  I've also had the immense pleasure of meeting certain of you in person, and thereby found that it is indescribably satisfying -- and not at all creepy -- to forge full-on, real life, possibly even epic, friendships with women who started out as odd sort of pen pals. 

Without getting too "I LOVE YOU, MAN!", I want to thank everybody (all of you! even the ones who never speak up!) for reading and joining into the conversation. 

This whole thing has, in a way, fulfilled this strange idea I had when I was ten:  I got a Hello Kitty diary for my birthday, and before I started my first entry, I wrote in the inside cover this weirdly legalese notice, stating to anyone who found my diary in later years that they could publish it even if I were dead, so long as they identified me as the author.  Now, why I thought anyone in the world would ever want to publish 200 pages of "I love Matthew S.  I hope he loves me.  I want to go with him and hold hands with him during Friday films" is beyond me, but there it is:  even at ten, (1) I was acting rather Lawyerish, both in the literal sense and in the sense of being exactly who I am now, only shorter and goofier, and (2) I wanted someone to hear what I had to say, no matter how banal it was. 

Here I am, 21 years later.  And here you are, too.  For that, I thank you. 

Come, Ye Thankful People, Come

Since it's the season to be thankful -- although the retail community has decided that, no, really, it's Christmas!  Christmas, people!  Shop!  SHOP! and anyway, even without the premature Yuletide propaganda, it's only about 24 hours of thankfulness and then the full-on anxiety hits that it's 32 days until Christmas and I have nothing, and have done nothing, in the direction of even thinking about gifts and I have to go spend some time breathing into a paper bag -- I figure I should take a moment to share some things for which I am grateful. 

And so, here are the things that I can't live without. 

Diet Mountain Dew.  I know.  It's as caustic as battery acid and is probably wearing away the lining of my esophagus, but God it's good.  Every morning, I stop at the coffee shop downstairs in my office building and buy a 20-ounce Diet Mountain Dew and a Fiji water.  When I get to my office, I start up my computer and set out my day planner and neatly place a pen on my notepad and do all of my other excruciatingly anal retentive things that I have to do to remain a functioning human being, and that, if you witnessed, would make you want to set up a direct line of Paxil into my arm.  Then I sit down at my desk and twist open that chartreuse bottle and take my first sip of that delicious, bubbly elixir, and all is right with the world.

And, as I sip my tasty beverage, I take a bite of my daily breakfast. 

Some people like variety in their diet.  Me, I could eat the same thing every day for the rest of my life and be fine with it.  Well, maybe not every day, but most days.  And every weekday, sure enough, my breakfast is the same:  a Diet Mountain Dew and two Cookie Dough Balance Bars. 

Every once in a while, I make the grievous error of grabbing two Yogurt Honey Peanut Balance Bars from my husband's stash in our cabinet.  This is a clear sign that the day is not going to go well.  In fact, I did it yesterday and nearly cried when I peeled open the wrapper and saw a pale cream coating staring at me, like a lewd expanse of exposed flesh, rather than the rich, lovely chocolate that I so deeply adore. 

I don't know what will become of me if they ever stop making either of these products -- that is a barren, scorched world I prefer not to contemplate -- but I feel confident that, when I'm 97 and someone interviews me about the secret of my longevity, I will name these two staples of my diet.  And, indeed, they may keep me going until then, as they'll have embalmed me from the inside out. 

Actually, let me back up.  Before I leave the house, I obviously have to shower and get dressed -- which, by the way, I loathe.  I despise the process of brushing teeth, putting in contacts, showering, choosing an outfit, blowdrying hair, etc.  HATE it.  It seems like such a waste of time and energy.  Sure, I like how I feel when I'm clean, and at times a shower seems like the greatest thing ever, but the whole daily thing of it just makes me want to scream. 

Even so, there are a few hygiene items that I have found indispensable.

The first deodorant I ever used was Sure.  I have no idea why, but I'm assuming it was because that's what my mom bought for me.  It seemed fine.  Very gender-neutral, which I like.  At some point, though, maybe when I was on the crew team in college, I realized it wasn't quite getting the job done.  I started using men's deodorant -- serious, athletic deodorant -- like Right Guard.  And then Secret busted out with the Platinum a few years ago.  This deodorant does not play around.  After I ran the marathon, I stank to high heaven from certain regions of my body, but my armpits?  The Platinum was still going strong.  Odor-free, baby.  Smellin' like an ocean breeze. 

I'm not particularly married to any more of my daily routine products -- which aren't many, I'll tell you; I wash my face and hair and body in the shower using the shampoo/face wash/bath gel of the moment, and then I lotion up, put a little stuff in my hair before drying it, throw on mascara and lip gloss, and I'm out the door -- and nothing I use is fancy in the slightest (we're talking Herbal Essences, Pantene, Noxema, that sort of thing), with the exception of this face cream I bought when I was visiting Allison.

I don't know what the hell tourmaline is, but this stuff rules.  I have a growing crevice in my forehead from scrunching it all the time -- seriously, my brow is furrowed at all times -- and nothing in the known world can help it (kiss my grits, Botox, with your "I'm doing it for me!" ads).  I also have parched skin most of the time, especially in winter.  This cream doesn't make promises it can't keep, but I could swear that the crevice looks a little less crevice-y, and my cheeks definitely look dewy these days. And this smooth coating of light cream generally prevents me from looking like an overworked, overtired craggy mess.  It's worth the extra couple of blocks I have to walk past the drugstore and to the little salon that carries Aveda stuff.  And the additional $25.  And for me, that's saying a lot.

In terms of little stupid things that I really couldn't do very well without, we've about covered it.  I don't ask for much.  The other things are the big things -- my family, my friends, my iPod, Central Park -- that I've probably rhapsodized enough about so that you're all, we get it already.  And there's the obvious stuff like TiVo and the Internet that deserves honorable mention. 

Finally, though he doesn't receive enough mention on this site because he is pathologically averse to being discussed or identified in a public forum such as this, my husband must be given the title of That For Which I Am Most Grateful And, Oh My God, What If I Hadn't Found You? for 2006.  And, well, every year.  I couldn't have fashioned myself a more perfect teammate, partner and best friend (even though I might have made one that was a better dancer).  I'm grateful to him for making me laugh every day, for sharing every thing and every task with me equally, for always giving me the last bite of dessert and for cleaning out the cat litter (and vacuuming) all the time even though he can't stand the cat. 

I love you, Old Dude.*  For you, I will always be thankful.

* When I told Allison that we'd gotten engaged, I mentioned, for some reason, how old he was.  My husband happens to be the same age as her husband -- they're about six years older than Allison and me -- and Allison's response was, "Hey!  You're marrying an old dude, too!"  So now, our husbands are the Old Dudes.  And it's a little eerie at times, because we have become increasingly aware that they are the same person, just with different amounts of hair. 

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

I'm It!

I’ve been tagged by Martha to do a “meme”, which I love doing in the same way I used to get a little giddy when I would get to the quiz in every issue of Sassy and YM (Seventeen only had them sporadically, and Teen’s quizzes were just moronic – and yes, I did subscribe to ALL of those magazines; why do you ask?).  In sum:  self-discovery and introspection = YES!  This one is particularly fitting for me, as it instructs me to do the following:

List/discuss the various obsessions that you have had over your lifetime.

Oh, boy.  Get comfy, get a snack (beef jerky for Jonniker and Martha!), make sure you’ve emptied your bladder.  We could be here a while.

I have already mentioned my all-consuming love of Annie (the SATCHEL!  Remember the satchel), unicorns and Laura Ingalls Wilder, so I needn’t get into that again.  Also, my love of ballet (which truly was an obsession).  And space.  And cleaning products.  But oh, there is so much more.

Proceeding (approximately) chronologically:

Breyer horses.  Growing up, I must have had at least twenty of these.  One time, Allison and I were “racing” Black Beauty and the Black Stallion, and Black Beauty’s leg got caught in the carpeting and broke.  His foot snapped right off.  Fortunately, we didn’t have to put him down – my dad, ever the household Macgyver, fixed his leg right up with some gauze and Epoxy glue.  We had to retire Black Beauty from racing; but he lived happily on my bedroom shelf for years to come.

Cabbage Patch Kids.  When Adoption Dolls first came out, my mom MADE me one.  With her hands!  And a sewing machine!  Can you imagine?  She must have spent 400 hours on that thing.  When I opened the box on Christmas morning, I yelled, “HERE’S MY KIMBERLY PEARL!”  (I haven’t the slightest idea where that name came from.  If there is such a thing as a fat girl’s name, that’s it.)  And I dragged Kimberly around with me everywhere I went.  Then CPKs came onto the scene, and then they came out with all those different iterations every year, and I got them ALL.  A bald one (Adam), a regular one (Sandy), a Preemie (shit – I’m not sure…Tessa?), a Show Pony (Christine and her trusty steed Lucky), a Koosa (Bubble Gum) – dang, I had a lot of stuff. 

Spying.  Is there possibly a better children’s book than Harriet the Spy?  No.  There isn’t.  And don’t even MENTION the movie to me, because it was so wrong on every single level.  Not even close.  I read this book at least 5 million times when I was a kid.  Allison and I used to try to be spies, but there never really was anything to spy on.  I remember sneaking downstairs at her house when her parents were watching Yentl but that was about as covert as our operations got. 

From there, we move to my teen idol era. 

My first famous person crush was Ricky Schroeder.  That’s right:  THE RICKER.  I actually joined his fan club and got an autographed photo in the mail, along with stickers that said, “I Heart The Ricker.” 

Then came Michael J. Fox.  I was MADLY IN LOVE with Alex P. Keaton.  A geeky Republican who wore monogrammed sweaters and wanted more than anything to go to Princeton – that was the man for me.  I shoved aside all the rainbow and unicorn paraphernalia on my walls to accommodate pages from Tiger Beat featuring his clean-cut Marty McFly headshots.  The first day I put them up, I was supposed to go to ballet class.  But I was so giddy from staring at MJF’s feathered hair and cocked eyebrows that I could hardly conceive of putting on my leotard and tights and leaving him for two hours.  My mom came into my room and sat on the edge of my bed, where I was dreamily staring into space, and said, “You don’t want to go to class, do you?  You just want to stay here, dreaming your preteen dreams.”  (EXACT WORDS – I swear!  [I love you Mom, but…”preteen dreams”??]).  So yeah.  I snapped out of it and went to class. 

After I grew tired of Michael’s cold, distant ways, I moved on to someone more hard core:  Jon Bon Jovi.  Ohhhh, mama.  I had the life-sized poster, the regular-sized poster, and countless magazine photos.  I kept a blank tape in my boom box while I had the radio on, just in case a Bon Jovi (or Europe, or Cinderella, or – ack! – Poison) song came on (at which point invariably someone would come in to tell me dinner was ready and RUIN MY RECORDING – “DAAAAD.  I was taping something.  GOD.”).  I bought the videotapes of Bon Jovi on tour and even (I can’t believe I am going to tell the Internet this) dressed up as Jon Bon Jovi for Halloween.  Someone really should have said something.  (Thing is, he is still SMOKIN’.  In fact, he may even be better looking now, without All That Hair.  And also, without the lace-up pleather chaps – I’m sure we’re all glad those days are over.)

That’s about the extent of my celebrity obsessions.  And I did have a period of quasi-weight obsession, which kind of comes with the territory of being a dancer – for a few years, all I ate was cereal, rice cakes, yogurt, and bread with jelly, and that was pretty much it.  Teenage body image issues, blah blah. 

Now for the quick-and-dirty list of today’s obsessions:

Bad celebrity fashion (see Snarkywood and Go Fug Yourself).

Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, Napoleon Dynamite¸ Office Space and Felicity.

Burgers and fries; Thai fried rice from Lemongrass Grill; Champagne; Hershey’s Special Dark chocolate.

We all know this, but:  So You Think You Can Dance.

Catcher in the Rye (shut up), Lolita and Prep.

Travel (next up:  Costa Rica in August – woot!)

(Suddenly, this has devolved into a chirpy sort of “Things I Like!” list, in the vein of “10,000 Things to Be Happy About.”  But whatever!  I don’t have much time for obsessions anymore, or maybe I’ve just mellowed in my old age, so I’m just grasping to think of things that bring me some mild to moderate satisfaction during my non-working hours.)

Running (next up:  the New York City Marathon – uuuuuunngh.  Tired.)

Writing.

And, YES, checking for comments on my blog.  You know y’all do it, too (refresh…refresh…oooh, I haven’t refreshed in ten minutes…).  Except the two or three bloggers who don’t have to because people, like, compete to see who can comment first.  Yyyyyyyeahhh.  Not really a problem here (although apparently a bunch of you are reading out there in the ether!).

1-2-3…You’re it!:  Allison, Jonniker, and Jes.

Things I Love: OCD Clean Freak Edition

On a somewhat lighter note...

For the past few years, we’ve had a cleaning service take care of our housekeeping matters; but after we moved a few months ago, we decided to do the cleaning ourselves.  Through our weekly cleaning binge, I have found a few things that have made life a little easier and/or better-smelling.  (Note:  This is not a paid advertisement.  I’m just a girl who loves some clean.)

The Dyson DC07 Cyclone Animal Upright Vacuum. 

Ohhhh, boy.  This is IT, people.  You will not believe how this thing will make you feel like a bad-ass even while vacuuming.  You might think your floor is clean, or at least clean-ish, but then you’ll take a few passes over it with the Dyson DC07, and you will realize just how wrong you were.  My God, the dirt!  The dust!  The detritus!  It staggers the mind.  And then, with one swift and easy motion, you deposit all of it right into the trash.  Spit spot!  (P.S.  I have not actually used this vacuum with my own hands.  My husband won’t let anyone else touch it.  He will direct me NOT TO VACUUM until he gets home.  That is how much he loves this thing.  But, yea, I have witnessed its power.  And I bow before the Dyson.)

Method Cleaning Products.

I first learned about Method hand soap a couple of years ago in the Consumed column of the New York Times Magazine.  The article was about how this little company had built a big customer base on its neat-o design concepts and its enviro-friendly philosophy.  I bought the hand soap and liked it well enough.  And then.  Oh, then!  Method started coming out with household cleaning products.  And they were good.  So good.  Don’t you want your bathroom to smell of eucalyptus and mint rather than ammonia?  Don’t you?  I know you do.  And to display a nifty space-age dish soap dispenser next to your sink?  You bet.  I keep the Ylang Ylang Daily Shower Care spray in our shower, and it makes our glass tile and shower (stop saying “shower”!) door much easier to maintain.  The one thing I haven’t totally loved is the Floor Care stuff in Lavender.  It still smells a little chemical-ish.  But it still gets the job done, and it beats Mop-N-Glo.

Caldrea Counter Spray.

Yummy.  Green Tea and Patchouli.  In a happy little squirt bottle.  Go ahead, pretend you’re wiping down a rough-hewn farmhouse table somewhere in Provence after a languid afternoon meal of baguettes, brie and Chateauneuf-du-Pape.   Yes, I am buying into the whole product-as-lifestyle thing that I usually love to deride.  But…but…it’s EUROPEAN!  (Ok, no, so Caldrea is based in Minnesota – but the products are biodegradable!  And plant-derived!)

Murphy’s Wet Disposable Soft Wipes

The name of these is kind of pervy.  Maybe that’s why I like them.  These seem like they would be all chemical-y, but they’re “Pure Vegetable Oil Soap.”  So that can’t be bad.  Anyway, the beauty of these is that you dust with them and then the dust stays away for like two weeks!  Since I despise dusting, this is a very good thing.  And they have a nice orange-y kind of aroma.  Yay. 

Swiffer.

Oh, Swiffer!  Why did it take so long for us to make this leap in sweeping technology?  Why did we have to suffer with brooms and dustpans for so long?  Remember how you could never quite chase that last strip of dirt up into the dustpan?  There was always some left behind that the bristles just couldn’t get?  No more!  We are freed from the tyranny of floor grit by this magical device.  As with the Dyson, I love seeing the results on the Swiffer cloth – you can gawk at all the crap it picks up off the floor in that sick-but-fascinated way that you gawk at the towers of blackheads on a Biore pore strip.

So here’s what you do:  you vacuum with the Dyson.  Then you Swiffer.  Then you Swiffer Wet Mop.  And then, only then, can you sleep at night.  Because your floors are clean.  Damn clean.