Orange Crush

So here we are, the end of August. The end of summer. At this point in August, I pretty much had it with the 90++ weather.  I long for mornings that do not feel instantly old and worn out at 10.  I am thinking about fall of course.  I can almost feel it.  It is getting darker earlier.  It is starting to get nippy at night. And I am starting to consider shoes that cover my feet and wishing that I'd wake up to a scarf kind of day.  So naturally, I start to think of orange - the color of fall - and the browns, and reds - the antidotes to all that relentlessly garishly bright light of overstaying summer.  

When fall nears, I instantly think of renewal as in redecorating.  We have an old artist's table that was painted orange a long time ago and it sits pretty much naked begging for stuff on top of it. The console below is inspirational and those birds are must-have and perfect for fall. I think of stuff like these the moment the whiff of fall is in the air. I saw pumpkins and Halloween decor at the stores the other day and all I could think of was - not soon enough, old friend, not soon enough. 

Some people do Spring cleaning, I do Fall revamping.  For me, fall is time for encore - a do-over, but better.  I am emptying drawers and letting go of stuff. I looked at my closet the other night and saw a battlefield.  Orange revives me. It gives me hope and brightness and inspiration.  It makes me happy.  I cannot wait for it to shed its neon status of the summer and gets restored to its autumnal glory. I am lying in wait with my orange scarves, purse, and throws for our couch where I can be found happily lounging- keeping warm.  Ahhhh, fall - come already! 

Ever the Royalist

'L

This was 1982.  I was crazy about anything written by Barbara Cartland - the Cinderella type heroines in their borrowed crinolines and dark beauty.  And I was obsessed about Princess Di - and quite frankly, who wasn't at the time? I read all the anecdotes about her in Reader' Digest - from her hat size to her jokes.  And when she had Prince William, it was like watching real life fairy tale - wayyyyy before - and much better-  the reality shows now.  Today that Prince has his own baby prince. And me? I am still a royalist. I love all that princely pomp and circumstance - the town crier and announcement on gilded easel - I love them all.

Hello Again. My Soul Stirs.

Oh, hello blog. It's been, what, a couple of months? I ran out of fume before I could even finish posting all our NYC photos - and that was in April! And summer came, and now almost over... Man, when laziness strikes, it really stuck! Well, I have been meaning to blog about this and that. But life- the mundane part of it which we all know is the majority of it, simply takes over. Sometimes, it is work, most times it is the fatigue and subsequent fugue that comes after my long commute. For about a month, it was my brief but passionate affair with Bikram yoga that drenched my body and soul with sweat, that all I could do was shower and sleep. And yes, there's sleep - at times elusive, sometimes sneaky, and lately, a slow coma that takes over the mind and then the body to the exclusion of all. But today, I finally found the energy and passion to write my thoughts down. It must be the 5 days of kicking my ass with Nike Training Club coupled with my half ass attempt to spurn starch.  At any rate, this is might as well, because ever since I took to paper to see my thoughts with my eyes, I have to do this once in a while to feel truly alive. My soul needs it. And my spirit, it honestly smiles when I write.  Ahhh, the stuff that rock our boat, I just wish it comes easy.

Day 2 at the MET

It only took me more than a month, but here it goes - day 2 of the intrepid NYC trip last April.  Day 2 was the day to check things off:  Met - check; Broadway - check; Time Square - check; glimpse of the Empire - check; Forever 21 - check!  It was about going with the crowd and letting go to the noise and chaos all around you - yes, even at the museum!  I was dressed more for a resort than the 60'ish weather that greeted us full blast when we walked uptown to the museum mile so I shivered all the way to the Metropolitan Museum.  The trip to the museum was such a drive-by that I vowed to come back that night - but sadly, we the lure of hedonistic Time Square so transfixed Alaia that we ended up staying there amid the crazies all night long. We could only hit the highlights of the museum and stopped by their cafeteria to get hijacked by the insane cost of the food there.  We so wished we ate at the food trucks outside instead.  Oh well, it was all part of the lore of the day.

Oh No, We Did Not Need Sleep for This.

The thing with red-eye flights over to the East coast is that you gotta be below 30 for the loss of at least 3 hours not to affect you.  Otherwise, you got to do what you got to do when the hotel you are staying in had no room for you at 7:30 in the morning.  For us, that meant checking our to-do list and figuring out what we can possibly do at our current state - jet lagged, no-sleep, hungry, and really, just plain tired.  Quite naturally, we opted to cross the Brooklyn Bridge to Manhattan  - a 1.1 miles of a journey that included a chaotic Subway ride that involved the "natives" yelling well-meaning (but yelled) instructions how to do this and that in that damn, antiquated, subway turn-stiles (really - in this century?).  Unfazed by the ride, we headed to the bridge and crossed it with other tourists, murderous commuters on bike, joggers, wedding parties, artists peddling their bridge pictures, and a motley crew of others that looked like they should not be on a bridge or anything that one can jump off from.  When we reached Manhattan, I rewarded myself with Belgian waffles and incredibly scorching hot coffee from a food truck by the City Hall.  Alaia waited until we got to Chinatown for some pork buns - two kinds no less - crispy and not crispy.  Along the way, we had close encounters with folks in uniform black jackets (knock-off North Face) whispering "Gucci, Chloe, LV bags" to every passer-by.  By the time 1 pm came around - both of us clearly reached the end of our line.  The subway ride back to Brooklyn was long and un-touristy.  Thankfully, our room was finally ready and we slept until 5 pm at which time Alaia woke up with a raging "toothache" so we had to insert "pharmacy" in our go-to list.  It was the only way our NYC trip could have started - it could only go bumpier after that.  Day 2 next.

Twenty One Years Ago, You Came To Our Lives

One and Two and Counting

Twenty One Years Later...

This blog has been quiet lately but something loud and proud happened lately in our lives - our daughter turned 21!   How did that happen so fast?  Surely, all things considered, parenting a child into a bonafide adult should rank high up there like earning a PhD or something- one that took 21 years to finish?  So, to celebrate her first adult birthday and my parenting feat - we chose to take a trip to a place that supposedly never sleeps - perfect for a girl who once racked up over 5000 minutes of talk time on her phone - in a single billing period!  The trip was short and sweet and being only four days - was decidedly frenetic.  And as it had always been since day one of this girl's life - it was a wild, crazy and exhausting ride but seriously fun and memorable.  This turning to Twenty One was surely a milestone not only for her, but for me as well - one that she gleefully marked acting like a boss in New York City and with me trying mightily to boss her around while I still could.

It's Written in the Stars, Maybe.

Nothing else makes you stop and take stock at things than a sudden death of someone you know quite well.  Two Sundays ago, a work-friend of mine suffered a heart attack as he was getting ready to get out of the waters of Monterey Bay after what his friend called a spectacular dive.  He scuba-dives on weekends -which was a pleasant surprise to me when I first learned it of him because he did not seem to fit the scuba-diving type.  I jokingly told him that I see him more line a  mowing the lawn on weekends -type.  Well, he did that too but only when he wasn't covering serious mileage on his bike or plunging into the freezing waters of the Pacific Ocean or handing out water at some local marathons for the disabled.  He was my confidante, my mentor, and my train buddy - he too commuted a couple of hundred of miles to work.  He was no spring chicken at close to 60 but still he used to tell me - ironically - enjoy life, it is too short to fret about un-important stuff.  The last time I saw him I told him that he looked like he lost some weight to which he answered - nah, just a new haircut.  He was his usual jovial self looking forward to the days ahead I am sure.  The following Monday, he was not at our regular morning meeting.  I heard that his friend found him flipped over in the waters as he tried to free himself from the sea-kelp but not before he talked about how great the dive was.  I guess, he kissed the ocean goodbye as he went out of the world doing what he loved to do best.  That Monday before I knew that he passed away, I passed by the train heading out of town and I thought of him being in it getting ahead of me as I sat stuck in traffic in my car.  Little did I know how true that was.  For two weeks now, I think of him, and what he used to say and how he lived and viewed life.  It's over-said and overwrought I know, but one can never really know what the next day brings.  But even though we know that, we still push through as if we do - unfortunately, we tend to obsess on what might be or we wished will be rather than living the present and actually "experiencing" what is now and happening.  I told another friend - why can't I just say:  today I am doing laundry or pulling weeds and that is how my life will be that day - own the laundry, the weeding - feel it all, enjoy it even, or hate it, anything, just feel it.  My friend was feeling life as he left it - my wish for me is that I do the same while still living it.

My Un-Freaky Friday

The night had no chance after a feast of Boiling Crab crustaceans, a hefty serving of rocky road ice cream, and a generous dose of Chinese mentholated ointment - my antidote to everything.  Prior to all these, I spent the entire twilight driving and freaking over my son's stalled car at a tennis club.  At the moment, I am catching up on historical trends by watching JT's suit and tie at SNL and thinking - is it the show or getting too old for this? Yup, tonight - it's all going down.  To bed.