Festival Schmestival

A few years back I had an artist boyfriend who went to the Burning Man festival in Nevada. He was an instant fan. It was the coolest thing he'd ever done. The following year he had been so persuasive, that a bunch of my friends decided to go too. Even though I admired the concept, I knew at a certain level that this was just not my thing. But I didn't want to be a stick in the mud, so I kept my options open as my friends had their planning meeting and I attended. Then one day, my boyfriend said to me with a sneer, "You wouldn't last five minutes at Burning Man."

Maybe some day I'll have a boyfriend who doesn't think that he is sooooo much more hip than I am. Who doesn't think that he needs to save me from my tragic lack of hipness, and constantly give me direction as to how to be more hip. One can only hope.

So, this week, boyfriendless (which means dangerously close to being unhip), I'm in Ireland to attend the Electric Picnic. It's almost a version of Burning Man, but not quite. At Burning Man, there can be no corporate sponsors, no logos, nuthin'. You can't sell anything either. You bring in all your own supplies and if you want something, you'll bring things that you can trade. Or you can provide a service in exchange for something. I liked the story about the guy who set up a little tent and he painted women's breasts. All day long. Isn't he smart? I thought I might set up a booth to paint men's penises. Black. Wouldn't that be smart?

The festival wasn't far away, and there was no traffic jam into the little town of Stradbally. But trying to meet up with our friends after we parked was, well, impossible. They had Lisa's and my tickets, so we had to find them. Evidently, there was so much cell phone usage, that the lines were overloaded, so we never knew when we would be able to get through. In addition, the maps of the festival didn't have any gate numbers on them. And we found out later that the outside gates were named differently than their inside counterpart. So, gate X6 on the inside of the festival led to gate number 7 on the outside. So we kept saying to our friends, GATE 6! And they were totally confused. In addition, all the cops and security personel were bussed in from all over Ireland, and NONE of them had festival maps and NONE of them knew anything about the exits, even though they were standing right at the fucking exit. They couldn't walk from their exit to the inside exit, because they couldn't leave their station, so they had no idea where they were. They were given no instructions. So they had no clue.

Finally, everybody agreed, inside and outside, that we all knew where the main entrance was. So, it took us a freaking hour to walk there, dragging 16 large cans of cider, tents, sleeping bags, food, clothes...in a rolling suitcase whose rollers took a crap halfway there. I guess it wasn't what you'd call "all terrain."

I am not a schlepper. Never have been. Never will be.
I am not big on walking. Never have been. Never will be.

I know. Totally uncool, man.

I was, however, very very grumpy. I'm not sure if that is cool, or uncool. I don't actually care.

Anyway, at Electric Picnic, you can bring in all your own camping gear and food and alcohol (cans and plastic containers only). But there are miles of food and drink booths and bars and restaurants, all charging exhorbitant prices. There are also corporate sponsored booths and tents. Since we are in Ireland, it was supposed to rain the whole time, so there was plenty of mud, even before the rain. I found some cheap Wellies and was grateful for them.

Here's the deal. I lasted more than 5 minutes at Electric Picnic. I actually spent the night there. Even though I had a bad cold and am wobbling between chills and sweats and am coughing like I have pleurosy and my nose is running at a constant flow. Yes. I slept in a tent, on a cheap mat, in a cheap sleeping bag and listened not to electronica music, but to the loud hum of the diesel generator right next to my tent. I smelled the lovely exhaust fumes from that generator all night long. I listened to men stumbling drunk in the dark, along the back wall of the Body and Soul enclosure, trying to find a way to jump the fence so they can get in and join the fun, instead of having to walk around to the front entrance. Or, they were just trying to find a place to pee. I heard many a peeing sound. I even stayed up late, and went to see Digitalism play their digital music. I danced because what the fuck else do you do when everyone next to you has their hands up in the air and are jumping up and down? Stand there? THAT would be soooooo unhip.

I love to dance. I didn't love Digitalism.

So, I got up in the morning before everyone else, as usual. The festival grounds were free of all garbage, except for patches of vomit here and there. But I understand that's a little difficult to pick up. Lisa saw the army of people with plastic gloves and bags and spears, walking in a single line across the grounds, picking up every speck of trash.

I paid too much money for watery coffee and a falafal breakfast. Then I went and meditated at the balsa wood temple. The one they will burn on the last night of the event. Then I asked my friend Lisa if she'd drive me back to the fabulous cottage where we are staying, so I could take a shower and crawl into bed and try and get well.

I know. So unhip.

I had two magical things happen to me while at the event. I'm out of gas right now, and need to get back in bed. I'll write again soon, when I'm feeling a little better. The festival continues as I write this. My friends are all still there, having a ball, I'm sure. And I am sitting in a gorgeous Irish thatch roofed cottage, with a terraced garden full of flowers, fruit trees and butterflies. And I have my very own bathroom. With a toilet. And a shower.

So who's the fool now?

Milking The Virtual Cows

I'm awake too early again. I've always been an early riser. So has everyone in my family. Lately, I have a lot on my mind. And once the eyes open, I can't seem to stop thinking about all my supposed problems. All at once. So I give in to the dawn, go upstairs into a big open living room, and join the sun as it rises. Everybody else, my fellow travelers, are snoozing downstairs in the dark. Lucky them. It's a windy, gray morning here in Dublin. I just watched a flock of birds through the skylight, fly by me with a destination in mind. The trees outside are bending and scraping against the old red brick walls. I don't think anyone else is awake in the world.

Someone once told me that I woke up early enough to "milk the virtual cows." Well...hand over them udders, girlie. Because I'm awake and there's no stopping this brain from careening wildly down multiple bumpy paths, all ending in long screaming sudden drops into echoing, rock-strewn canyons. I get to listen to the aftermath of the accident, as the bumper of the car of my life falls to the ground with a final clang. Then there's just silence.

Nothing can stop that wild mind, except a deep and strong virtual milking experience.

My head is nuzzled into the hot and heaving, short haired Guernseyesque side of a big girl cow. My nostrils are full of the scent of early morning barn and dung and animal hide. My wellington-shod feet, slicked with muck and hay, are placed solidly on either side of the three-legged milking stool. I put my hand in between my legs and pull the stool a little closer. My eyes are closed, as I reach for that warm, familiar place. Those pink, slightly freckled teats, engorged with foaming milk. I pull on the soft velvety bags, tentatively, with my left hand, then with my right. And I hear the first steamy squirt as it makes a hard tsszzzz! at the bottom of my empty bucket. My cow, she chews cud slowly, deliberately, without a thought in her head. (What were you expecting, Aristophanes?) I hear her tail slap a fly off of her hind quarters. I get a rhythm established. Pull left, pull right, tssszzz! tssszzzz!

I've never milked a cow in my life, but it doesn't matter. I can imagine. When I'm finished, I'll hand the bucket to my virtual grandmother, so she can skim the cream off the top and whip it up later to top our warm strawberry pie. I'll help put more sticks in the wood-burning stove so she can bake her hand-made crust, and I'll sit down in the rocking chair nearby, and lose myself in another Nancy Drew adventure. I'm wearing knee socks and penny loafers and orange stovepipe pants. My Catholic schoolgirl white button down cotton shirt is untucked and wrinkled. My hair is scratched together into a long ponytail, with thin blond strays sticking out here and there, and my bangs are cut way too short. It's 1965.

There's nobody else in the big farm house in Perth, Ontario, Canada that day, with me and my virtual grandmother. No parents to nag me, no brothers and sisters to tease me. Just me, and my grandmother, in her 4-leaf-clover dress, tied at the waste. In her sling-back, open-toe pumps and those legs that stayed gorgeous 'til she died. She's busy making wine or jam. In between stirring, she comes to sit by me and do crossword puzzles, peering down at them through her cat's eye glasses.

That never happened, me being wonderfully alone at the farm with my grandmother, Elsie McIntyre Mitchell. Me being that special. But I can imagine.

Checkin' In Not Checkin' Out

I'm in Dublin now, with friends, and will be going to the Electric Picnic music festival. I'll have spotty access to the Internet, so if you don't hear from me, that's why. I'm SURE I will have many wondrous tales to tell upon my return, so stay tuned!

Forbidden Lips

A few years ago, I fell in love with the movie Cinema Paradiso. It's a story of a curious little boy, a gentle old man, and the magic of the cinema in post-WWII Sicily. It also has a lot to do with lips, forbidden lips, but I won't ruin the end for you, in case you haven't seen it.

There was a scene in the movie that I've never forgotten. It was when the people in the Sicilian village viewed a movie projected onto the wall of an old building. They sat there, delighted to be outside together, on makeshift wooden benches, watching the film. There was something so wonderful about that for me, that the image was burned into my brain. I took this shot from the Cinema Paradiso trailer:

Then I came to Paris, and discovered by delightful accident last year, that Paris hosts an open-air cinema at different locations around town, during the summer. It was magical last year to sit on the cool grass on the hill below Sacre Couer in Montmartre, surrounded by strangers, with their blankets and wine bottles, our laughing faces lit by the communal glow and slapstick comedy of Victor Victoria. I sat there, looking up and watching the clouds float by, obscuring the stars and then letting them go free again. I realized that I was fulfilling a romantic desire of mine, from so long ago.

This year, I went to another outdoor cinema location in Paris, Parc de la Villette. This time it was on purpose. My Irish friends looked up the schedule online and off we went, blankets and wine in tow. We settled into our spots, to the left of the blow-up screen, and watched the crowd. Parc de la Villette is a huge, modern open space that I've never liked very much. I always felt like they must have torn down streets and streets of homes, and paved over many years of human memories to build that place. It's empty now, and all the love is gone. It certainly was not as intimate as Sacre Couer. Nor was the movie as delightful for me, as it was last year, when I stumbled on a magical surprise on a clear night with my lover, walking back home hand in hand, after a satisfying dinner with friends.

The movie this year was La Comtesse aux pieds nus (The Barefoot Contessa) with Ava Gardner and Humphrey Bogart. I had fun taking pictures with my cell phone camera. But my heart wasn't into it. After a while, I laid down on the grass and went to sleep. My friends said the movie was boring, and they decided to leave before it was over. But I knew it was a tragic story, of love gone bad. That was something I didn't want to watch.

I'm empty now. As empty as Parc de la Villette. I look forward to when the memories fade, and get paved over, so that I can reconstruct myself again. Then I can project a new movie, onto the screen of my life.

How To Fill Your Panties

I came home from an outing with Lisa and The Irish Girls (and one very, very cute Irish boy), in the wee hours of this morning. While dropping my drawers in the slow descent towards the toilet, I heard many little things falling to the ground. Daintily.

My underpants were full of rice.

This is what happens when one goes to the Rocky Horror Picture Show in Paris. I'm lucky it was just a bit (well, it was a pant load, actually) of rice. I could have ended up like our pal Ed: shirtless, and being humped by gender non-specific heavily made-up actors, each of them moaning as if their lives depended on it, finally collapsing in a sweaty lump after shouting "J'arrive! J'ARRIVE!"

Or, if I had been lucky enough to be selected to move to the front row, perhaps I could have been like our friend Maria, with each of her legs in the hands of a diabolical actor, while a hair dryer and a feather duster tempted the nether regions of her thrift-shop skirt. The same skirt that was soaking wet from earlier drenchings of some unknown substance (one hopes it was water), appearing from nowhere in big wet drops, flying through the air, caught momentarily in the film projector's light, before falling upon their victims in the darkness. Some of us were smart enough to take cover.

Some of us were not.

Then there was all the jumping up, singing, and following dance steps, then dropping down into our seats once more. I felt like I was in the Catholic church (well, perhaps not). Luckily, there was very little kneeling required. Otherwise I'd have little rice dents in my knees.

Prayers were out of the question. There was no time for that. I'd relax a little bit and suddenly there would be a demonic transvestite or straggly-haired Lurch-like butler crawling like Gollum along the tops of the theater seats, slithering and slurping and pushing their faces into mine. It was fun to scream really, really loud. As if I were really, really scared.

After all this non-stop frivolity, the movie ended and the cast took their bows and then spoke at length in French. All the French people laughed. From the little I could understand, they wanted us to give them more money on our way out, and if we waited out front long enough, they would get cleaned up and join us for a drink. More money and drinking - the universal language. I wanted to join them so badly.

But I had to go peel off my wet jeans and empty the rice out of my bra and panties. Some other time, guys. Er, girls. Er, folks.

It's Good To Know You

It's been raining steadily here in Paris, since the middle of last night. It's cold. And it's August. But just this very second, close to 8pm, the sun came out, and there's a yellow glow on the buildings that I can see from my sixth floor windows. A warm and happy glow, under a heavy and dark gray sky. The contrast reminds me that life is sometimes just like that.

I've always liked the rain. I've only complained about it a few times, when it seemed like it was raining for weeks and months. I wondered if it would ever end, or if I would ever see spring. But the rain does end, and spring does come. I can count on that.

If it sounds like I'm being cryptic, and talking in riddles, well, that's because I am.

This morning I woke up to the sound of rain and it made me smile. I knew it was tea time. I flipped the switch on my magical electric tea kettle. They don't have them in the U.S. You guys back home have to put the kettle on the stove, and wait a long time for it to boil. We lucky Parisians, Brits and Irish just flip a little switch, et voila! I had some friends from Ireland visiting this past weekend. I attended their wedding a little while ago. They have a thatched roof cottage in the country that they rent out to travelers. Jadzia does a great imitation of an American couple who recently stayed at the cottage: "It's sooo awuh=THEN-tic!" The Americans had never seen an electric tea kettle, so they picked it up off it's little electric heating stand, and put it right down on the top of the stove. It melted. They were embarrassed. The things we learn when we step away from our predictable lives and see the world.

So, this morning, in my warm PJs and socks, I boiled my water in seconds, and had fragrant Thé des Lords in my Olga The traveling Bra mug.

The tea I bought with my good friend Brooke, who I can't wait to see again, when she comes back to Paris for good. I received the mug, shipped all the way over to Paris from California, as a gift for hosting Olga, in all her black lacy braness, in my apartment here last winter. Olga was traveling with her trusty chaperones, Heather and April. We had fun hanging Olga from trees and church signs, but we held her safely to our breasts on the Eiffel tower. I think she screamed a little on that last terrifying elevator ride to the spindly top. I had my eyes closed, so I can't be sure. And no amount of coaxing could get her (me) to leave the safety of the inner wall and go to the edge for the view. As the tower swayed in the icy wind, her sultry voice echoed from inside my flannel coat, "I'm just fine where I am, thank you!" In the end, she was a bad influence, that bra, and forced us to drink way too much Champagne and eat too much roasted duck and savory lamb. But we love her anyway.

Heather and Olga (and Shawn, her harried owner) were some of my first blogging pals, and I'm honored to have met them, and count them as friends, along with Meleah and Bimmy and a long list of lovely people who I never guessed I would meet, when I started blogging more than a year ago. My Great Blogging Experiment was to see if I could crack open myself and write from my heart. I wanted to see if I could speak the truth, as I know it, and be unafraid. I named my blog Omyword! Did I Say That? because, if I'm honest with myself, I say quite a few things that give people pause. But, as a kindly therapist said to me recently, "Well, at 50 years of age, I think it's time you gave yourself permission to be yourself."

Amen, and hallelujah.

That reminds me of Lisa, my new friend with whom I've been spending so much time lately. I've been pretty lost in a fog of grief and fear, but there she's been, right beside me. Just like Olga, I've forced Lisa to drink way too much 98 cent Champagne and eat way too much falafel. She came to Paris a Good Christian Girl, and will leave, well, a little bit tainted. But just a little bit. You know how I am about religion. So I figured she would not be comfortable in my company. But I think she's one of those people who really does get who Jesus was purported to be, and acts accordingly. So, when we talk nowadays, I find myself saying things like, "I'm praying to that God I don't believe in..." and "I thank that God I don't believe in..." and she smiles.

But don't be thinking I'm heading towards religion. No siree. I'm just heading towards the best and brightest part of myself. Same thing, I imagine.

I didn't know what I was going to write when I started this post today. But it's obvious to me now, that I'm feeling so grateful, to all of you who have crossed my path, both in and outside of InterBlogLandia, and have given me the gift of your time, your thoughts and your love.

You Must Be Manly To View The Branly

In the wee hours before dawn, while I slumbered in my bed, Fiachna and one of his friends were sitting in La Sauterelle with Patrick. They said that they were busy being "philosopher kings." Based on my own experience of the magical hallucinogenic post-dinner drink that Patrick serves, I know how this can happen.

Most of Paris was asleep too. But all of a sudden, a young guy looked into the front door of the restaurant and said hello to Patrick. Patrick invited him to join les rois de philosophe. The guy started to pull up a chair, but hesitated and said in English, "You are not homosexuals, are you?"

That was worth a big laugh all the way around. But he was serious. So, the three Muscadet-eers assured him of their masculinity, and relieved, down he sat. Together, they watched the dawn arrive, and spoke of deep and artistic and cultural things. It turned out that the new arrival works at the Musée du quai Branly, an interesting modern museum that houses a huge collection of indigenous art from Africa, Asia, Oceania, and the Americas.

Surprisingly, everyone remembered everything the next morning, and Fiachna called the guy from the Branly to take him up on his offer to give us a private tour of the museum. Fiachna made sure to tell him that he would be coming with his two daughters and three other lady friends of his, which included me. With such an entourage, Fiachna again asserted his masculinity.

Our friend greeted us at the front entrance and buzzed us into the museum offices so that we could see the unique design of the museum. At the very top floor of the building at the far back was an aerie of sorts, a large executive meeting room with glass from floor to ceiling. The view was lovely. At our backs, the Eiffel tower loomed, as if the museum was built just underneath it. Just below the executive room, was the outside back wall, called le mur végétal, or the living wall, designed by Gilles Clément and Patrick Blanc. It's is a three-story wall, covered in plants.

It was a difficult and sad day for me, but I enjoyed wandering through the collections. Photos aren't allowed inside the museum, but I was able to get this shot from the suspended hallway in between the executive building and the museum. I loved the rocks on the roofs of the color blocks, until someone said they were probably put there just to hold the roof paper in place. But still, look how artfully, how Zen gardenish they are. I just want to get a little rake out and smooth the pebbles all around them.

Dear Diary, Nothing Happened Today.

Love, Lisa.

I kept all my diaries from my childhood. I just couldn't throw them out. They're in a box somewhere in Arizona in my brother's garage. I especially wanted to keep the one that my brother infiltrated. He left little scraggly comments at the bottom of those lined pages. Somehow he must have found my little brass key and unlocked the flap on my purple Barbie journal. Then, with the delirium tremens of an old man, he shook a sentence out here and there onto the page. If I had written, "I love my bird." He would write, "But the bird hates you."

I can just see his face and hear his evil chuckle. It makes me smile to think of it. He was a bugger. But for some reason, he messed with my older sister more than he messed with me. She was more sensitive, I think. She reacted more to him than I did. Except when we were playing a game. With each Monopoly step backwards that I took, or every time I went to jail, he laughed villainously and sang over and over and over again, "Lisa is LOSING! Losing, losing, LOSING! Heh heh heh heh heh heh!" Just conjure up Cartman, and you'll have the correct tone. I didn't like that AT ALL.

My brother's hands are still shaking. Forty years later. I don't know why. He doesn't even drink. He just shakes. And he's a house painter who doesn't tape things off. He just pushes his shakiness into the brush handle and lets the shakes move the brush. He paints perfectly straight lines on not-so-straight walls. He painted my condo in Arizona with all those bright Mexican colors: purple, yellow, orange. He was really proud of that paint job and I loved living like that, surrounded by color. I'll always remember when we went to Home Depot to pick out my paint and I picked out a bright, New York Taxi Cab Yellow for most of my walls. When we stepped up to the counter, I told the paint mixer guy what, and how much of it, I wanted. He looked at me and said, "NO! That's too much! You can't paint that much with that color. It's too much."

My brother looked at me and we both went, "Heh heh." And he said to the guy, in his best Philly accent, "Yes we kyan!"

Then, when my fricken condo didn't sell, and I'd been through a gaggle of mid-western divorcee real estate agents who insisted that all my walls had to be egg shell white, my brother flew back out to Arizona from Philly and painted away all that color so that all the people who say, "NO! That's too much!" got to win the War On Maintaining Mediocrity. Fuckers.

That's OK, my house still hasn't fucking sold, even with the boring ass walls. We showed them now, din't we.

I guess the reason I wrote this post is because:

• I haven't written anything in a while, and I don't want to let myself get away with losing myself and
• I found this hilarious and charming website called Get Mortified, where adults get up on stage and read their childhood diaries out loud.

I laughed and laughed, and I want you to laugh too. (If you're reading this post in an email, click through to my blog to watch the video. You won't regret it. I swar.)
// The Mortified Shoebox Show //


Dear Diary, Nothing happened today. But, one thing I know for sure, is that my bird loves me. So does my cat. So does my stinky brother. Love, Lisa.

Back In The Day

About six or so years ago, I had a jeweler boyfriend who also had a blues band as a little hobby. He memorized every single guitar lick of every single Stevie Ray Vaughan song, and then got a drummer and a bass player and commenced to have band drama.

I swear, I've only been, uh, intimate with two musicians (OK, well that was a big fat lie), but I got intimate enough to see the inner workings of band management, i.e. the stupidest behavior on the planet. (Well, maybe there is behavior that is more stupid, like George W And The Amazing Fundie Gay Hatin' band, currently hogging the White House stage, drowning out continuous booing with their own brand of Neocon Klezmer Electronica. They do seem to have trouble with all the rotten fruit and raw eggs being thrown in their direction, but they continue to play, undaunted, and Karl Rove continues to dance, badly, to their one hit wonder, We're SO Going To Jail If These Guys Have Anything To Do With It.)

But, I digress. I was discussing band drama. I'm talking about the shit that you hear if you're the band leader's bitch, at 2 AM, after the Guy Who Wants to be Famous comes home smelling like somebody dumped a fifth of Jack Daniels on his head followed by an entire trash can full of cigarette butts.

• Musician: (Takes off clothes and drops them on the floor at his feet. Grabs junk and rearranges. Smells fingers.) That fucking Ralph. I'm gonna stop inviting him to sit in. He's always steppin' on me!
• Musician's Bitch: (Thinking: oh, wah wah!) I'm sorry to hear that, honey. Why don't you have a talk with ol' Ralph? Tell him to stop steppin' on you...or whatever.
• Musician: And Joyce! Man! Did I tell you that she closes her eyes while she's drumming and doesn't realize that she slows down? (Lets go of penis only long enough to raise hands in apparent frustration.)
• Musician's Bitch: No! You're kidding! That must make you and Rick nuts! (singing to self: who the fuck cares, who the fuck cares, who the fuck ca-a-a-a-ares!)
• Musician: (dropping into bed smelling like a dead, wet, dog) Oh, well fuck. I mean, I don't even bother talking to Rick about it. He's still pissed off that Joyce isn't fucking him anymore and now that I told him he could do the sound setup, his bass is all you can hear! He's such an attention hound.
• Musician's Bitch: Well, maybe he's trying to keep Joyce in the pocket?
• Musician: Oh, you don't know anything. In the pocket. Piffh! There's no such thing as "in the fucking pocket." You're either on your way into the pocket, or on your way out of it.
• Musician's Bitch: I'll write that down in case Regis Philbin asks me the next time I'm on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire.
• Musician: (Goes off to the kitchen in a huff. Makes himself a mayonnaise sandwich. Sleeps on couch. Never lets go of penis the entire night.)

So, even though your mother never knew the colorful details of life with a musician, she somehow knew, intuitively. That's why she told you not to go out with one. You can call her now, and tell her she was right.

Meanwhile, one of the benefits of being the musician's bitch, is that you can go with them to gigs and everything! And unload equipment and then stand around while the band members bitch about the guy who isn't there, until he shows up, late as fucking usual, man. Then you get to sit at different places in the bar and say, "Sounds good from here!" as you start chugging boxed Chablis to stave off the boredom. Then, you get to listen to the band complain about "the room" and watch the single members hustle the cocktail waitresses for free drinks. You kid yourself that your boyfriend never does that when you're not around. Finally, the music starts. And while your man is playing Cold Shot, the drunk who's been sitting at the end of the bar for the last three days decides to come over and ask you to dance. You demur. He says, "What? Are you fucking gay or something?" Well, yes, actually. Now I am.

Meanwhile, even though you know alllll the background bullshit of the band, and even though you've heard all these songs played badly dozens of times, that Chablis kicks in and your ass starts moving and you just wiggle your way to the dance floor and start bumping and grinding and humping an imaginary man, right smack dab in front of your boyfriend. Because, he seems to like that. As does his bass player. And the drummer.

On one such exalted occasion, when the band played for a cowboy wedding at a Mexican restaurant, I was doin' my thang in front of the stage. A very cute drunk girl does a lock n' load from her eyes to mine, and uses that imaginary string to propel herself forward, until we're tits to tits and she's trying to get into my humping rhythm as best as she can. She is worlds and planets and herds of buffalo better than the guys that usually try and dance with me, so I let her do her thing. She finally gets the groove, and we have a nice little time dancing through to the end of the song.

As I stop to catch my breath and position myself in front of the portable swamp cooler (this was Arizona in August), she steps back and stares at me with that head to toe and then back up to the head kind of assessment. She sways a little, and cracks a little smile. Her eyes go off focus and then wander back at me.

"Well then, " she says, "I'll bet you were hot.......back in the day."

I wonder if she'd be interested in a mayonnaise sandwich later.

And Then There Was The Word

In my current situation, I've actually taken the time to read a regular book, instead of only reading political news in my feed reader. My friend Lisa recommended a book by Elizabeth Gilbert called Eat, Pray, Love. It's about Elizabeth's one year odyssey to Italy, then on to an Ashram in India and finally Bali. I just finished the Italy section and am starting with India. I'll let you know if I have any astounding revelations as I read the rest of the book, but I wanted to say, if you love Italy, then you will love the first section of this book. For many reasons.

Take for instance, on page 108, when Elizabeth's friend Giulio offers an interesting theory. He says that all cities have their own word. And if your own word doesn't work well with that city's word, then that is not the city for you. As an example, he says that Rome's word is SEX. Every hour of every day every person in Rome is thinking about sex. When challenged by Elizabeth about the Vatican, Giulio said that the Vatican is not a part of Rome, it is its own city and state, and it has it's own word: POWER. Man, ain't that the freakin' truth.

I thought about what Paris's word might be, and off the top of my head I thought: FOOD. Paris is famous for many things, but walk down the street and count all of the different specialty food shops, from butchers, to horse meat peddlers, to pastry shops and bread shops, chocolate shops and pasta shops. You get the picture. Plus, Parisians are focused on food. In the mornings, they stop in at the local cafe for a quick standing swig of espresso, then continue to the bakery for their croissant. In the evenings, they walk home from work with the bread for their dinner under their arm.

There's even a secret timing for the bread shops in Paris. It's too early to get the first batch of bread in the morning for most Parisians, and all Parisians know that after the morning rush, the morning bread is reheated to appear fresh throughout the day. But the baker makes a fresh batch in the evenings and you will see Parisians lined up between 6 and 7 pm to get that truly fresh bread.

You might be tempted to say that Paris's word is LOVE or ROMANCE. But I think Parisians would agree that there is food first, then love to follow. Or food and love combined. But food is more important that love.

But Paris is also broken down into arrondissements, with neighborhoods within those arrondissements, and each one has it's own word too. Pigalle is obvious - the home of the Moulin Rouge and all the peep shows and sex shops. Its word is SEX. Chateau Rouge's word is AFRICA. The Marais? GAY.

I think about Carefree, the town in Arizona where I have my unsold condo, and its word is RETIRE. It's not a surprise then, that I left, since I'm not yet ready to retire. I think I moved there and bought a condo because I wanted to HIDE, and what better place for a mid-forties woman to hide than in a tiny little retirement town. The town next door called Cave Creek has the word COWBOY, as its a long strip of honky tonks and western themed restaurants with corrals and posts outside where you can tie up your horse. I went there as an amused observer, but no matter how vintage my boots or how expensive my hat, I was never a true part of the town's word.

I could not come up with a word for Scottsdale, where I lived with my parents since I was 15 years old. It used to have the moniker, The West's Most Western Town. But that just isn't true anymore. Nor could I come up with a word for Phoenix. They are both nondescript to me. Scottsdale is FAKE, maybe. A Beverly Hills Wannabe, but that's too many words. Phoenix is...DRY? Who knows. I just know I can't live there.

Of course, the inevitable question is, what is my word? The first word that popped into my head was WRITE. I thought about it for a while, but nothing else came up. I think it's because all I want to do is write. I get huge pleasure from writing. Now, I would like to make money from my writing, and I know that will happen. So, I imagine that this is the right word for me. I think that we have different words throughout our lifetime, but for now, this is my word.

What is your word?

You can order Eat, Pray, Love here and I can make .0000038 cents, OK? Thank you. Thank you very much.

Metro Adventures

I just wanted to check in with a quick post to lighten up after my last one. I have just a tiny window of Internet. I'm sitting in a little park in Le Marais, called Square Leopold Achille. It's across from one of my happy haunts, Le Sevigne. I came here to take advantage of the free WiFi offered by the city of Paris in all the parks, but it is a pain in the ass. I finally found another network to cruise on and hope it stays strong long enough for me to post this. It's just a funny little picture I took recently while standing waiting for a train in the Metro. Here's what happened....


As I stood on my side of the tracks waiting for my train, there was a train on the other side of the tracks stuffed full of people. It was rush hour. But the train didn't leave. Instead, there was an announcement, "Mesdames et messieurs, bleh bleh bleh bleh bleh parce-que bleh bleh..." and all of a sudden, all of the people in the train got out and crammed themselves onto the platform. Then the doors of the train closed, and it took off, empty.

I looked at that mass of people and had to take a photo. My train still hadn't come. Then, I saw a light coming down the tunnel towards me and assumed it was my train, but instead, it was the empty train speeding by without stopping. It must have turned around in the tunnel somehow to come back in the opposite direction. The only thing I can figure out is that for some reason, they took that train out of service, but to do so in the middle of the rush hour was very strange.

My train came and I took off for parts unknown, while all these people stood, without protest I might add. The bad news? There were too many people on that platform for one train, so some of them had quite a long wait ahead of them.

She's Got That Look

I miss my friend Brooke.

She likes shoes, and so do I.

She has several facial expressions. They range from the Princess Diana looking down with shy upturned fluttering eyes, to the Evil Princess plotting where the next free drink or cigarette will come from. From pure innocence to snickering sluttiness in 0-6 seconds.

She has this aversion to using the mascara, lipstick and eye liner testers in Sephora. Instead, she mutters, "Cover me." as she rips the protective plastic wrapping and magnetic alarm tripper off of the real stuff (quite a feat in itself), and stands in front of the mirror and completely makes up her face.

I cover her. I guess. I haven't been schooled in covering people. I figured it meant standing with my legs spread apart and both hands gripping my Luger, my right eye trained on the bullseye while my left eye scanned all peripheral targets. I don't have a Luger. But I know how to spread my legs. So at least I got some of it right.

Besides, she's nine feet tall and I'm 5'4". The best thing I can cover is maybe her ass. Meanwhile, anything she's doing with her hands is waaay over my head.

Big black security guards in navy blue blazers with English schoolboy crescents on their left breast hover in front of us, to the side of us, behind us, while Brooke layers an extra, extra coat of purple mascara on her lashes. While she carefully blends the pink/purple eye shadow along the outer rims of her big green eyes. While she rips off the wrappings of a blush brush, made from the hair of rare albino goats, and cracks open a bareMinerals loose powder container so she can show me how amazing that powder is. She steps back in between each coat, each smudge, and inspects the results. I fidget as big black men shift their positions, then come nearer. "How's it look?" she asks loudly, without even a hint of shame. I squeak, "Gorgeous! Lovely! I think that's the one YOU SHOULD BUY." The black men relax a tiny bit, fade farther into the background, but don't completely go away. Ever.

Once, when my legs weren't spread into the cover-me position, when I was shirking my Brooke-covering duties, one of the big black men came up to her and pointed to the mascara in her hand, its plastic wrapping bent and flared out around it like a disconsolate flower. "Bleh de bleh, porquoi bleh bleh?" he demanded. Brooke said, in perfectly not understood English, "Oh, this one was like this before I got here." I was hiding (searching for my Luger no doubt), but I can guarantee that her chosen expression was the innocent, big-green-eyed (with new purple shadow and mascara) Princess Diana look.

She doesn't buy anything either. Ever. But she looks damn good for the rest of the day.

These same black men are in all the grocery stores. All of the discount stores. OK, all of the stores in Paris. And they all wear the same blazers. There must be one security guard blazer supplier for all of France. I'm not being racist here. I'm just saying that I've never seen a white guy in one of those schoolboy blazers, guarding the vegetables. But it wouldn't matter if they were all blond, broad-shouldered Albanian women. I'm guilty, no matter who they are. Guilty when I walk in. Guiltier as I walk the aisles. Guiltiest as I stand in the check-out line. That's why the following story is funny. Hard-de-fucking-har funny.

Brooke wanted a Paris street map in book form. The best one that I found is sold in Monoprix, a higher-end grocery store with a small clothing, cosmetics and housewares section in the store, usually downstairs. Brooke and I went to the one near her apartment, in the Marais district. We both bought a map book. I needed a new one because mine disappeared. In addition, the new maps display all the Velib bike rental kiosks. That would be the bikes I never rent, and probably won't ever rent. Unless I get a non-American credit card that works in the rental kiosk, and I rent the bike at 3AM when there are no cars on the road. Those are my rental terms. Take it or leave it.

Anyfuckingway, the gal at the Monoprix cash register must not have taken the magnetic alarm strip off the back of my map after I purchased it, because as we exited, the door alarm went off. I stood there, waiting for one of those big black men to come running, and nobody came. So, I shrugged, like the not guilty person that I am (I know I paid! I have the receipt!), and we went our merry way.

A week later, I went to the Monoprix in my own neighborhood, to get some bird seed and a few other things, and as I'm standing at the cash register busily loading my groceries into plastic sacks (there are no pimply high schoolers or retired people bagging groceries in France like there are in the US), I kept hearing the door alarm going off, over and over again. How annoying! At one point I even looked up at the doors with a scowl on my face trying to see who the dipshit was that kept trying to leave the premises with stolen items.

Well, that dipshit was me.

The big black man in his schoolboy blazer came up and scared the shit out of me by tapping on my shoulder. "Madame, bleh que vous avez bleh bleh et c'est possible que bleh?" I look at him in my best "Je ne comprende pas a fucking thing you just said, bleh" face. He pointed at my purse, and gestured that he wanted me to open it, which I did. He rifled through it and probably touched that map book three times. He gave me a shrug. I gave him one back, and I finished packing my groceries. The gal at the checkout (by the way, the checkout people all sit down in France. They don't stand at the check out. That's what unions do for you.) told me the price and as I dug in my purse I noticed a red light flickering on a panel right in front of me. Each time my purse went near it (with the incriminating map inside), the light went red. And the door alarm went off.

It didn't occur to me until I was halfway home that I might just possibly maybe need to take the alarm strip off of the back of my map book. Distracted much lately? Nah.

Anyway, Brooke fell in love with Paris all by herself, without any cattle prodding from me. She did her own thing, made friends, fell asleep on the Metro until somebody woke her up at the end of the line. "Bleh de d'un bleh ce que bleh bleh!" they said. "Huh?" she said, until she saw the name of the station and looked up at the map in the train and realized she'd missed her stop, by a few miles. She always got herself out of her own jams. She was righteous.

All by herself, she made a decision to come back, because there's a certain something involved with Paris. It's hard to name. You either get it, or you don't. Paris either gets under your skin, or it's just a couple of days in the middle of your multi-city tour. As the old post-WWII song says: And how ya gonna keep ’em down on the farm, after they’ve seen Paris? Et voila.

I'm hoping Brooke meant it when she said she'd be back in a month. But it doesn't matter when she actually comes back. I know she'll be back. We have hot chocolate to drink at Angelinas, pichets of vin blanc to drink at Cafe Renaissance, and many more maps to steal.