Feels Like Falling in Love

You know that feeling when you are falling in love? When it feels like the world is ripe with possibilities, when you feel like the most interesting, beautiful person on the planet? Well, I have been feeling that way a lot lately.


I wonder if it is actually possible to hold onto this feeling, clutch it close and luxuriate in it. The fact that I am not falling in love with anyone in particular, but rather, many people, places and experiences, means that I am not reliant on a person to maintain the sunshine of new love. As we all know, when the glossy veneer of lust begins to fade, all the cracks begin to show, people becomes real, imperfect and unable to live up to the idolized image we have created of them. Perhaps loving whole heartedly and widely Will create a vacuum in which the beautiful glow can be maintained.


Even as I write this I don't believe it! This feeling is like being high, and everyone has to come down sometime.

As Katy Perry said, "Its not serious, just want to try you on", well what if you could live as though you were in a dressing room? Trying on different possibilities like clothing. Its an interesting prospect.

Hello 2010!

It was great to be with the EWI crew again on Tuesday! We braved the disgusting, frigid weather on the way to Purple Yam, and it was actually worth it. We six ladies ate our way through a good chunk of the menu, and everything was delicious. It was probably the best meal I have had in the past few months. Even more than that, it was good for my soul to be with my people again. The joy this group has brought me is overwhelming. When I start to really think about the fact that this amazing group of 35 people see me as their "leader" (a title that makes me blush), I am awe struck.

I am not shy or all that humble, but I am honored and humbled by the recognition they give me. Bringing people together around a passion so near and dear to me is like a dream. One of my members told me the other day that the key to groups like ours is the leader. She said that "If you don't really like the founder, the group is going to suck, no matter what the theme is". Wow. I am so completely real with these people, and they love me. It is a feeling I have never really had before and it floors me. I need them and they need me. Eating With Impunity is truly my baby.

We have rescheduled the Beer and Cheese Fete for a week from Saturday, but I decided to spring a last minute brunch on the group for this Saturday. Whether one or ten, I am going to have a good time! All about me you know! It is a bit scary, but that has been a theme of mine lately. I care about other people deeply, but for the first time in my life, I am really focusing on just making myself happy. Hopefully this is healthy and not the beginning of my slow decent into narcissism!

This sentiment carries over to my relationship with D. too. I blame it on my new attempts to "act my age", but I am finding myself thinking in terms of "me" and not "we". I have stepped back and I don't think that it is inappropriate. I am 25, unmarried and have my whole life ahead of me. I am no more ready to settle down now than I was when I was playing house at 19, the difference is, now I know it.

Well, 2009 is on it's way out. The parties begin in a few hours. Nine and a half hours from now 2010 will be here, filled with all the possibility, adventure and hope of a new born child. This has been a good year, for the first time in my life I am certain that the next will be even more beautiful. This year I came back to life: I truly met my brother for the first time, I fell in love with a city, I transformed my life, I found my passion and I re-discovered hope. There was sadness, there was pain, but it was all overshadowed by joy. I have so much love in my life, it is overwhelming.

I seem to have lived and died so many times over the last 25 years, thank God I am so alive on the eve of 2010. Thank God for my beautiful friends, old and new. Thank God for the city that took my breath away. Thank God for my strong, resilient heart that still somehow has the capacity to give and receive even after all the heartbreak. I am exactly where I want to be and who I want to be, it can only get better from here.

The Night Before Christmas

People may say that Christmas is a time for merriment and cheer, but I think that better descriptors would be disappointment, obligation and silent prayers for it to just be over already!

Now, don't get me wrong, I love the holiday season. It is the actual holiday itself that lends to misery. Not all my Christmases have been bad, most have just been anticlimactic. My favorite Christmas was the one I spent in Iraq with my best friends. It was simple and joyful and easy.

In an effort to create a new era of merry Christmas's on my terms, I set out to create my own holiday traditions. Christmas dinner with D.'s family was non-negotiable, so I decided to work around it and focus on Christmas Eve.

I wanted to enjoy the splendor of New York during the holidays and finish the evening basking in her glory with a martini. For this I decided to brave the hordes of tourists at Rockefeller Center and make my annual mecca to see the tree. I actually went to see the tree last year, so it could be considered an official tradition at this point! Unfortunately, last year we went during the day and were quite rushed. This year, it was beautiful.

The crowds merely added to the "quest feel" of the excursion. We fought our way through and I modeled in front of the iconic holiday symbol. After the "photo-shoot" we began ambling down Fifth Avenue, basking in the glow of the lights and the sound of carols. We finally arrived at 230 Fifth and headed-up to the heated roof-bar.

A word about 230 Fifth Ave, it is a totally duchie place! It is all velvet couches and waitresses in short skirts and (sorry fellas) investment bankers and European tourists. Despite all that, it happens to have 360 degree views of the city and a year-round heated roof deck. For these commodities I gladly paid $28 for two dirty martini's!

Sitting on the roof, sipping my perfect Kettle One martini, gazing at the red and green lights of the Empire State Building, scanning the skyline for the luminescent peak of the Chrysler Building, listening to the crooning voices of 1950's lounge singer belt out Christmas classics; I could do nothing but smile. This is my city, my Christmas Eve, my life. Looking through my pictures I saw happiness, no fake smiles or poses, just joy. It looked good, it felt good.

Merry Christmas to me.

Life is never exactly what you expect or want it to be. You can never go back in time, but you can make the most of what you do have. You can make your own traditions and indulge in those things that make you merry and fill your heart with cheer.

Forever Young

Reading through my recent blogs I have noticed a pattern. It seems that I have gotten a bit caught up in a melancholy tone. I suppose my humorous outlook needs a rest once and a while, I often let all the melancholy out here. I must remember that depression is not art or visaversa! This blog is about my life, and I refuse to believe that it has been as dark as I have made it sound. There has been a bit of a tempest in my mind lately, but I am a true believer in the idea that it is you and not your circumstances that shape your outlook.

There have not been any EWI events since the wild, wild Holiday Mixer a few weeks ago. There was a beer and cheese event that was snowed-out and a Scotch tasting that I missed due to "work exhaustion", but there is a fabulous Filipino Fusion restaurant tasting scheduled for Tuesday. I need to cook an Afghani dish tomorrow so I can stay on-track with my eat/cook around the world project! Mmmm! Just thinking about my beloved group makes me smile. Well, about the to Holiday Mixer, it seems that in all the excitement I neglected to mention it.

Our darling Bro-friends Mike and Pooneet suggested that we have a party to help foster relationships between the original and new members. They also offered to host. I made a beautiful stuffed fig dish.

Wandering around the Chelsea Market gathering the perfect ingredients: a pungent blue cheese from Lucy's Whey, fresh figs from the fruit market and paper-thin sliced bacon from the meat market. At the market I met a fellow foodie working behind the register. I invited her to join the group and left the market filled with a sense of beautiful certainly in the direction of my life. I love food and people, and the people who love food are a special breed of people; my people.

I headed over to the party and started cooking. I halved the figs, pressed the cheese into the halves and wrapped them in little bacon bundles. The boys popped them in the broiler for me. They had made a chick-pea bruchetta and lamb meatballs. Deepa brought fresh-baked ginger cookies and everyone brought wine!

The party was set to start at 4pm. I had agreed to go to my friend Mark's party later that night, so D. opted-out of the EWI fete and told me we would meet-up at Mark's.

People trickled in at their own pace, but it really didn't matter, I have a great time with them whether there are five of us or fifty. Ironically, there was not all that many new members there to meet original members! As I said before, not that fact (or any other) would stop us from having a grand time. Judging from our long history of partying into the night, I should have known that this would not be a quick party, regardless of what time it started!

We drank, and talked and laughed and then conversation turned to Bourbon. Yes, Bourbon. Pooneet happens to be quite the connoisseur, and I happen to be of the opinion that if you don't like something that just means you haven't tried enough of it. That lead us to a Bourbon tasting. I was feeling no pain before the tasting, after the tasting everything got a bit surreal!

Somehow Rock Band was turned-on and the most incredibly bad singing and playing commenced. After exhausting the original Rock Band line-up, the Beatles's Rock Band was queued-up and the resulting butchery of such classics as "Lucy in the Sky" are thankfully nothing but a blur to me.

It was around this time that we noticed the time. It was nearly 11:00pm. Yes, we had been drinking for close to 7 hours. Naturally, it was time to move the party to Mark's! I texted D. and we were off to find a cab. Our original party had dwindled to a group of four.

We arrived to Solas in the East village and stumbled out of the cab and over to the club. The bouncer hassled the guys (I still don't know why), but submitted to letting us in. Once inside I began looking for Markie. The crowd did not seem very Gay, and considering his sexual preferences, I was confused. We struggled through the crowd and I tried to call him. We decided to leave, but on the way out I ran right into Mr. Mark himself. He was as drunk as I was and we hung onto each other outside the club, slurring compliments to each other. He asked us to stay, but at this point the bouncer was evil-eyeing us again and so we begged-out.

DeShon finally texted me back to let me know he was going out with one of his boys instead, I texted him that the club sucked and would be home soon.

Rather than rolling on home, the crew suggested that we check-out a bar on the corner. Why not? We sauntered into Hi Fi and promptly ordered drinks. Let's see, after an evening of red wine, white wine and Bourbon a Dirty Martini only makes sense, right? Ah, the drunken mind! I enjoyed Erin's comment about the evening; poetically she told us that our evening was merely an "adventure for our livers"!

Adventure it was. After we secured our cocktails we moseyed on over to the pool tables. Now, I am a firm believer in the fact that alcohol impairs your abilities, with one striking exception: Pool. I suck at pool, I mean really, really suck! When I drink though, I get good. We played in teams and I was actually on the winning team the first round! Even in the subsequent losing rounds, I held my own. In fact, I kicked some ass! It shocked me every time the ball miraculously found its way into the pocket. As you can imagine, I was very vocal in my satisfaction with myself. Ah, booze!

Amidst the revelry, I neglected to check either my phone (in the coat room) or the time. As the evening came to an end and I was shuffled by my dear members into a cab, I glanced at the clock to see a luminescent 4:00am flashing back at me. I came into the apartment gleefully intoxicated and jolly from my evening of excitement. DeShon was not amused. He bitched at me and then sent me to bed. Thankfully I was smart enough (read: drunk enough) to just do what he told me and go to sleep.

It took D. a few days to get over it, but he came around. See, I don't generally stay out all night. Hell, I rarely stay up past 1:00am! It felt good though. Not something I would make a habit of doing, but hell, it made me feel young. It reminded me of a time in my life when life was too exciting for sleep, when I was afraid of missing out on one second of it. I let myself get carried away in the moment; in the sheer pleasure of friends and drinks and laughter. I am a young woman, but I have to remind myself of that fact. I grew up too fast and now that the brakes seem to have failed, I am desperately trying to slow down time. I want to act my age, even if just for one crazy night of marathon drinking and blurred East Village bars.

Survivor

One of the World War II veterans came to the travel office the other day. He proceeded to tell us about being captured at the Battle of the Bulge while trying to save a wounded soldier. He was a medic. The Germans threw him into a POW camp where he lived in a small room with six other prisoners. They were fed one loaf of bread each day to split between them. He told us that they used a playing card to measure and cut the bread into six equal slices.

Then he asked me a strange question, "Which piece would you take if given the choice?"

I thought for a few minutes and then told him I would take the middle piece to avoid the slender end pieces. He looked me in the eye and said, "Good choice, you are a survivor".

The startling thing about this conversation was the timing. I have been thinking quite a bit about being a survivor lately. There are certainly advantages to being this way, but it is also dangerous. There is an ugly side of survivor instinct, a side that is single-mindedly focused on self-preservation and willing to destroy anything standing in the way. A survivor does what needs to be done. A survivor makes hard choices. A survivor will not be stopped by anything or anyone.I would like to think that my protective inclinations balance me out, maintain my humanity.

We became such different people in the war. The sweet country girl became my best friend after she morphed before my eyes into one of the strongest, most ferocious women I have ever met. In light of our precarious position, being two of the only females in the pressure cooker of an army aviation platoon, she became a vicious man-eater. If a man approached her, or dared to speak to her, she would verbally assault him and send him away in a state of shock. There was a young man from Texas on my truck with me. A generally soft spoken soldier, he became a territorial animal. He staked his claim in the front corner of the vehicle and would go ballistic if anyone attempted to take his coveted spot. He would scream "Stay off my property! Stay off my property!" like some deranged version of Yosemite Sam. Me, I became a bi-polar volcano.

I had an anger in me, constantly boiling and burning just under the surface of my smile. That is when I learned to paint my smile. I played the game, smiled and did my job. And I would explode. I learned to survive with that smile. I also learned to lie. I lied to protect my life, I learned to lie to protect my friends, but I did not lie to my friends. Ironically, I valued my integrity and my word above all else. It would throw me into a fit of rage to be accused of lying. I suppose I found a way to make the survival lies a form of my own truth. Yes, it is interesting to see who we become when forced to fight for our lives.

The anger has burned-out. I still feel a flair here and there, but it no longer rages inside of me, constantly threatening to consume me. As the rage died, the tears began. I cried so much and so hard as the fire died over the last four years. The tears have dried-up now too. I feel the familiar desert in my eyes I had for all those years as a soldier. I long for tears sometimes, but they just aren't there. Perhaps that is what has turned my mind back to the survivalist residing within me. There is no time for tears when you are fighting for your life, so what am I fighting right now?

I am poised to attack. I am strong and protected on the inside, I am circling those I love like a mother bear, I laugh a lot because nothing is so serious in the scheme of life, yet there is a serious undertone to everything I do. So what has triggered this response? What has brought this soldier back?

When I begin to concern myself, I excuse my thoughts with the sentiment that I am not good or bad, simply human. That is something she would think. I am not that girl in the desert, I am even more dangerous; I am a controlled, mature version of her. As my mind gears up for an unknown battle, I beg her to maintain her humanity, to stay kind, to stay good,to stay soft; to keep the best parts of herself regardless of the fights ahead.

The Gray Waiting Room

Waiting rooms can be places of anticipation, of fear, of boredom, of detachment.
The gray waiting room, with mere sadows pacing back and forth offers little joy. Looking out the window for a glimmer of beauty I see only gray clouds, no sunlight or signs of life to distract me. Distraction, that is the order of the day.

I move to another waiting room some days, this one is beige. There are a few distractions here; a joke, a smile, meaningless banter. Between these rooms, I search for signs of life beyond the walls,but those here with me seem to have found their home here. Even their dress reflects the monotone palate of the space. They are here and they aren't going anywhere.

I come to this place in the shadow of darkness and leave after the sparse rays of light have gone. My hours are good, much more limited than I have ever had before, but the weariness I feel seems to lengthen my days and steal my time away from this place.

I have been working here for a month now. I paint on a smile like a warrior puts on camouflage; just part of the uniform. I am good at my job, but I always am. My heart is not here though, it is too busy doing somersaults inside my chest. Watching the parade of sick old men come through my office affects me in ways I never expected.

I have never been squeamish before. I spent time in the hospital in Mosul, Iraq. Never was I taken aback or nauseated. The young wounded and ill, my brothers and sisters, they did not frighten me. The deteriorating lives I see on the wards and the infectous disease warnings that flash across my computer screen make my stomach jump. My compassion is stronger than my reservations, I touch the patients- a reassuring hug or pat on the shoulder, but this is always followed by a large dose of hand sanitizer when I am back in the confines of my little office.

I help them as best I can, but in a large bureaucratic organization, I am just one tiny piece of the machine. Reading the files I am filled with sorrow and rage as I read about men who destroyed themselves and who were destroyed by others. My job is not hard but it is heavy. I am just so tired.

I built my new life this year on the knowledge that your job does not define you, that life can be lived around your 9-5. I am struggling though. I need the life, the beauty, the hope that springs from my pretty past-times, but the gray exhaustion has consumed some of that. I find it hard to come home sometimes. I work a second job, make plans and go out, the gray exhaustion waits for me when I enter my apartment, throwing me into bed and pinning me down for anxious sleep.

My glimmer, my shining star on the horizon is starting school at NYU in January. Yesterday, as the impatient admissions aid told me that I had been wait listed, I felt my heart drop into my stomach and I felt my hands begin to shake slightly. For some reason, through all the little sorrows of the last few months, tears have not come for me, and yesterday was no different. How I long for tears, but my eyes are like deserts, instead re-routing all the anxieties in my life to the pit of my stomach.

Wait listed is not a no, I know that. I need this so badly though, I want to cling to it like a life raft when the gray walls begin to close in on me! I need a place in my life where intellect, creativity and passion can take me out of this waiting room, help me soar above it and see it as merely a tiny piece of my world, not the hulking megalith that stands before me now. But it is not a no. I will move forward as though it WILL happen. There is always a sweetness to painful longing, it is the knowledge that you have found something to desperately desire, kind of like being in love.

Perhaps it is not the room but the season. Winter is a gray bitch indeed. For now I will cling to my sweet distractions, continue to paint-on a smile and pray for the warm sun of springs yet to come.

You are What I Want You to Be- An Affair of the Mind

I desire you because my life with you is perfect.
I lust for you because you fit so perfectly into the idyllic future in my mind.
I long for you because you represent the life I dream of.I hunger for you because I hunger for what my life could be.
I love you because you are not you at all but a piece of me.

The Hideousness of Men

I am reading a book right now that describes the intense, animalistic cruelty of men. Of course there are exceptions in the book, a few flickers of humanity in the cold landscape. It’s not just the book that got me thinking about the hideousness of man, and the power even that gives them. My boyfriend gave me another one of his “men are heartless animals” speeches.

Since the inception of our relationship, he has taken it upon himself to paint me a picture of what men are really like. He claims that it is because he resents the fact that their bad behavior has made his love life more complicated in the past. I finally asked him the question that has nagged me, as he spoke about the way men only want to use me. I asked him if he really thought that he was the only man who could care for me. If every other man just wanted a piece of ass, and saw me as nothing more. He snorted and told me he was sure some men would actually want to be with me, but they would want to fuck me first.

After three and a half years with this man, I will give him the benefit of the doubt. I will believe that he tells me these things, not to try to intimidate me, but to educate me. Why? I still really don’t know. It has been informative though. And I suppose it was the combination of reading vicious stories about the plight of my sisters in the middle east and my boyfriend’s speech that made me begin to think about the grotesque nature of man.

....

One of the most breathtakingly beautiful places I have ever been was not the Caribbean, it was not Mexico, it was not Europe or the Rocky Mountains. The place that truly took my breath away, brought tears to my eyes at the sheer wonder of it all was Iraq.

The beauty of other places is so easy, so effortlessly giving. The beauty amidst desolation; the splendor of the sunsets that painted the rocky horizon deep shades of Orange and Red and Purple; the shock and delight to see lush green surrounding the rivers after coming over yet another dusty hill; these things were gifts and perhaps just due to the contrast and the unbending will of this hard place, I fell in love with it.

I began to think last night that perhaps the species of man is like that harsh unforgiving place. When a man does something out of character:tender, soft, kind, it takes our breath away. The idea that we are desired enough for this selfish creature to change his ways, to be our own, to be gentle, it is enough to make us fall in love. If they are good men, then it will remain beautiful. We will stay captivated by the wonder of the beauty in this naturally ugly thing, we will remain in love with this mysterious being, captivated by him. But when he changes, begins to morph into that which our love is not strong enough to keep him from becoming, when he begins to hurt us; it is the memory and the potential for beauty we once saw that will make us stay. We will stay and stay until he has beaten the love right out of us and we no longer see the sunsets in his eyes, when all we see is the ugliness.

The hideouness of man and the female eye to see beyond it, the intense beauty of a man unlike his barbaric peers, the false hope and the happy endings; these are the stories that live in the war-torn heart of a Woman.

Me and my Words

My mind has been filled with a tempest of thoughts lately; words begging, demanding to escape. Despite their clawing at me from within, I have merely been able to jot down notes, compose queries in my mind and I lay awake in bed. The knot in my stomach should begin to loosen and I release these tortuous thoughts, lay them to rest on paper. At least I hope so. There are so many, the question is where to begin. Is it with the growtesc nature of man? The drab gray of my professional life which I desperately try to add color to? The sweet melancholy of longing?

Well, New York in all her wisdom, has chosen to strand me here alone in my apartment. The impending blizzard dashing any hopes of the sweet distraction of my EWI event. I am here, just me and my words, and all the time to put them down.

Sentimental

Walking to work today I caught a whiff of diesel fuel. That smell brings me back to the war and all the memories from that time. The pangs of longing have become much more quiet these days and I suddenly remembered a time last spring, when the fierce longing was so intense that I ended up in Dr. Katz’s chair. I remembered how tortured and sad I was. I remembered that the moment I finally broke into tears was when I finally admitted that the thing I missed the most about those times was me. The hopeful young woman who had the entire world in front of her. I had lost my hope. I felt so trapped by my life and so disheartened by the future. No wonder I was filled with dread every evening in bed and every morning when I awoke.

Thinking back on that day, I realized something profound: It is not times in our lives that we long for, not really, if you break it down to its most basic form, it is a feeling we miss. Life is never perfect, there is always bad along with the good. Clearly this was true for my military service! It was not the army life in early 2000 that I longed to recapture, it is impossible to recreate a period of time with all its intricacies, it was the youthful hope, fearless love and deep friendships.

I find this epiphany to be profound because it offers a solution. Though you cannot go back in time, you can find ways to re-capture the things you truly long for. That singular therapy session did not cure me, it did not calm the screaming in the pit of my stomach, but perhaps it was the seed that lead me to my experiment a few months later, the experiment that lead me back to friendship, hope and confidence.

Next time I am feeling that sentimental stab, I will ask myself what it is I am truly in need of: closer relationships with my family, excitement, adventure. I can never go back, but the past may help me to craft a better present and future. Passion is my compass and perhaps now I see that the past can be the needle, for at the core of sentiment is desire a close companion to passion.

I am on my way, I may take a wrong turn here or there, but I am no longer the woman who wakes in a panic of the life she has come to loath, I am no longer the lonely woman trapped in her memories, I may not know exactly where I am going, but I am no longer lost.

New York Cries for Me Tonight

New York cried for me today. She cried tears I could not muster. It was wet and sad, but I barely felt it as I walked home with no umbrella in hand. Perhaps it was the warmth of the wine, but I feel that it was more than that. It was like the numb, sad feelings I have been carrying with me all week. The anonymous, sad little face that haunts me from time to time has been replaced with the sad, broken faces of my new clientele. The young veteran living in a homeless shelter, the older Vietnam vet desperately asking for help, my brother's sad voice; these have replaced the anonymous sad face in my heart.

My new job is hard. Not technically, technically it is idiotically simple, making me feel like a faceless cog in a machine. No, it is hard to see sick, dying and desperate people all day. Especially hard with an alcoholic brother and demented grandfather always in the back of my mind. A means to an end, plenty of leave, promotion potential; these are my mantras.

I don't mean to complain. It is getting better, getting easier. It is nice to at least give an ear to those so desperately in need of one. I am just a bit sad today. Sad for my baby brother, sad for my grieving mother and a little bit sad for me. I still have not found the tears though. This brings me back to my city. She did not pelt me with freezing rain, simply showered me with unexpected sympathy. She did what I am not able to do. She cried softly.

Still no word from NYU. I'm glad. Today is not the day for good news. Perhaps tomorrow I will smile, perhaps tomorrow I will be ready to celebrate. For today I will gratefully accept the compassion of my city, today I will morn. 12 hours of work down, another two days to go. One day at a time. Tomorrow will be brighter, tonight I will let the tears of New York lull me to sleep.

My Mecca to Brooklyn Ikea

To say that I have been obsessing over my apartment make-over would be putting it mildly. Since deciding to stay in my apartment, I have been consumed with measuring, scheming, and list-making. I am determined to turn my 300-some odd sqft apartment into a picture of efficiency. I want a living room that doubles as a dining room for 6-8 and a guest room. I want my bedroom to double as an office. I want my kitchen to be a workspace perfectly capable of housing dinnerware and cookery devices, as well as a convenient workspace. And, above all, I want it to look clean, uncluttered and perfectly styled in mid-century modern decor. Yes, all this in around 300 sqft. Oh, and I have a very limited budget due to my mid-level employment and location in central Manhattan.

What can I say? I love a challenge. Well, actually, I would love to have a huge budget and a massive downtown loft to work with, but I have found the key to happiness is working with what you got!

I spent hours starring at my space from all angles and doing price comparison shopping online. I began with the easy stuff, purchasing decorative touches and a few towel racks from The Container Store and Bed, Bath and Beyond on 6th Avenue, but I knew to complete my mission I would have to venture out farther. I had to make the dreaded journey to Ikea.

Ikea is a magical place, full of cheap contemporary solutions, I truly love it. Unfortunately, it is off in a corner of Brooklyn and driving is not an option for me. I google-mapped it, and tried to find a way to minimize my walking, knowing full well that I would have to carry my booty home. Finally, I decided to make the trip yesterday.

Getting there was obnoxious, with the F line running on the A line and creating something of a transportation scavenger hunt for me. I didn't mind, I wasn't carrying anything heavy. I finally arrived at the massive retail store.

Going to Ikea is a bit of an out-of-body experience for me. It starts off well enough, leisurely taking in the sights and writing down item numbers. By the time I reached the Kitchen area, close to the end of the loop, I was getting a bit crazed. I had to run back downstairs for a cart because the shelving unit I found was so heavy I felt like I was dragging a dead body (it turns out, that in my haste I grabbed a bundle of 6 shelves). This was when the anxiety started. A voice in the back of my head was taunting me, asking me how the hell I thought I was going to get this shit home if I couldn't even get it through the store. Down in home-goods, as my cart began to overflow with dishes and wine glasses, the anxiety worsened as I strained to push the cart.

I finally made it down to the warehouse to find my coat-rack. I was quite crazed at this point, frantically looking for the aisle and bin that was to house my rack. It wasn't there! This item suddenly became the most important purchase of my trip, I dashed up and down the aisle looking for it. I saw a Hispanic man who was clearly doing the same. Then, under a pile of other boxes, I found it! The Tjung Rack! As I triumphantly pulled down the box, all the polls fell out. The box was open on not one side, but both! As I put the pieces back in the box, I knew it was probably a bad idea to purchase this piece, considering the fact that there were probably pieces missing. I was not to be detoured though, I had to have this rack!

At this point I was getting close to hyperventilating, probably in part due to the massive cart I was pushing. I found an empty cart to dump my unwanted purchases into. I knew that I could not likely carry all this shit and I did not want to break the bank either. I tend to black-out in Ikea, I just can't say no to the super deals and delightful finds, and being alone, there was no-one to rope me in. After much agonizing, I pushed my new, lighter cart to the checkout line.

I was in-budget, but it took me a good 20 minutes to strategically stuff to humongous Ikea bags with my finds. I decided to do the unthinkable and take the free water taxi to the Financial District and get a cab from there. I knew if I could just make it the 50 feet onto the boat, and then from the dock to the street, I might just be able to get this stuff home.

As you may remember from a previous post, I get quite sea sick, and after the uber-stressful three hour marathon in Ikea, I did not relish the idea of getting on a boat. There were a few dicey moments on that 20 minute sail, but I made it to land no worse for wear. Trying to carry the two mondo bags, one containing the open-ended rack box with the poles flying out at every step, made that 100 foot trek to the street a long one! I made it, and a cab was right there waiting for me.

Considering that I had wine glasses, dishes and heavy shelving units, all in the same bags, it is nothing short of a miracle that everything made it home in one piece. Hell, it is a miracle I made it home in one piece! I felt like Rocky as I climbed my stairs. I think I even started quietly singing Eye of the Tiger as I approached my door. I fell into the apartment, my entire body shaking from the strain, and victoriously unpacked my bags.

The rack had all it's pieces, the glassware was in one piece and my plan to turn my little apartment into a luxurious entertaining space was one step closer to fruition. One small step for those with cars, one large step for this Manhattanite!

The City of Giants

Riding through New York last night, gazing up at the passing brownstones, churches and skyscrapers, I realized that New York is a city of giants. Some people would feel intimidated by the dwarfing structures surrounding them, but I think that the people here, those of us who love this city, are inspired by them. My friendly giants tower over me, rising up to the sky, some containing massive mosaics of saints gazing back down. I politely nod to them, taking in their grandness, feeding off of their enormity. All I feel is a rush, a drive to get to the top of these giants and gaze across this beautiful city from their shoulders.

I mean this literally and figuratively! I do want to climb, I want to become successful enough to own a piece of this brick and mortar, a piece with a view of the entire kingdom. I want to climb and claw my way to a corner office overlooking the sea of monuments that make-up Manhattan. I suppose this must be one of the many things that make New Yorkers so special, in the face of giants we charge ahead, fueled by the challenge and monuments to past glories, we do not cower in our own small stature.

These friendly giants are alive with the ghosts of the past, throbbing with history and both accomplished dreams and shattered ones. This entire city is alive, a creature with it's own pulse and energy. It is as if I will never be alone in New York, because the city itself absorbs me into it's flow and life. This embrace further drives me forward, unafraid.

How could a place capture my heart so completely? Is there any other location on earth like it? Perhaps, but I certainly have not found one, so like a love sick teenager I will continue to let myself be surprised and enthralled and hopelessly in love with my city.

Holidays and Family Portraits

This is a beautiful time of the year; the approaching holidays filled with sentiment and tradition, the New Year on their heels bringing hope and new life. The actual holidays are much less important to me than the season they reside in. Appropriately, in this time of looking back, I received a note from my mother. It contained two articles about my Grandfather, written when he retired as CEO of Security Life.

Unfortunaty, I know my Grandparents more in theory than reality, through the stories my mother tells and childhood memories. Over the past couple years, my once brilliant and mysterious Grandpa began to fade away. His body remained healthy and strong, but his mind was crumbling under the crule (and undiagnosed) onset of alzheimers. During the past year it became too severe to ignore; he was offically diagnosed and sent to live in an inpatient facility.

Something else was crumbling with his mind, the family portrait my mother had painted and I had come to know. My grandparents, the madly in-love couple who adored one another and said "to hell with the rest of the world". The brilliance of my quiet grandfather and the fiesty vigor of my wild grandmother. The picture perfect love that spanned six decades. My mother idolized and adored them.

As my Grandfather's mind began to go, so did the affection of my Grandmother. She became so angry at her abandonment, at losing her best friend and provider. The cruelty my mother saw from her seemed to open an emotional pandora's box. The new picture painted was not that of an evil woman, but a cold one. The fun-loving Grandma was becoming more clearly the narcassistic one. It seems that this was always the case, but we have a way of painting the past in colors that suite us. Grandpa became the loveable old fool, unable to really relate, but at least happy and taken care of.

The emotional toll this took on my mother was significant, I only experienced it through her stories and tears. But, amazing woman that she is, she took everything in stride and made the most of it. We have all fallen into a state of acceptance, acknowledging the new family portrait as a basic reality.

She told me that she had ripped apart her home looking for an article, then miraculously found the original when visiting her mother. Until I read it, I did not understant the importance of these clippings.

The articles described a briliant man defined by unwaivering integrity. They described a man who came from nothing to become the CEO of a company, yet maintained the humility of the young army band leader he once was. They contained photographs of the quiet smiling face of the man I never fully knew, but always loved. And they showed a happy, fun-loving couple facing the great whells of their lives with a sparking humor in their eyes. This couple, in a room of executives, looked as though they had an inside joke, as though everthing around them was inconsiquential, just senery in the set of their lives that contained only the two of them and their adventures.

After reading the articles and looking at the pictures, I heard a familiar humming. A bum bum bum, the quiet drumline my Grandfather was always singing to himself as he walked through his home. This sound embodies the mysterious band leader and genious my Gradpa was to me. I could see him walking past me humming, with my happy Grandmother making me and my brother noodles in the kitchen behind him. I saw the old family portrait in a new light. The picture my mother painted me was real, if not complete. They were all the wonderful things she described, but they were in their own world built for two, we were just fortunant enough to be close enough to bear witness to it.

As the seasons change we remeber the past and bravely look toward the future. The memories we carry into the new season act both armor and compass, comforting us and pointing us toward (or away from) future possibilities. Perhaps this is why we have the holidays before the New Year, we must look back to look forward. Family is at the core of this reality, giving us a history and ideal to live-up to or surpass. In my tiny family I am so unbeleivably grateful for my mother's stories. She is the keeper of her parents' history and she passionatly gave that gift to me. No matter how much things change, and they always do change, the family portrait she gave me will live in my heart and mind, as my comfort and compass, forever.

Closing Doors and Open Horizons

Well, it was my last week at RRA. I had a mild case of the flu, I only worked-out once and I barely touched my stove! It was a good week though. As one chapter closes, the next is taking form. I am going to miss seeing M. and G at work everyday, but I am determined to keep them in my life. I am going to keep working for RRA a few hours a week to make some extra money, and because I am a sucker who can't let go! My crazy boss was gracious and her outpouring of support and appreciation really touched me. I feel my greatest success during my crazy time there was the fact that I was able to maintain positive relationships with everyone there. I did not let the crazy change me. Or maybe it did. I am able to see my oppressive and offensive boss for the woman behind the tyranny, and I have no ill will toward her at all. That's pretty cool. My last day was celebrated with a big salad lunch, wine at the end of the day and my special gift to them: a detailed (very sarcastic) "how-to" Manuel on my insane job!

The festivities continued at Momofuku Fried Chicken Dinner with DeShon, Gus and Hen, Kaitlin and her brother and Kyung. The food was ok, but the dinner was a blast! It was so wonderful to share a meal and celebrate with a few of my favorite people in New York. To me, that is what the good life is. Simple, yet sometimes so hard to attain.

Beard on Books on Wednesday gave me a renewed sense of excitement at the thought of joining the ranks at NYU's Food Studies Program. The book, Gastropolis, was written by a collection of professors there, and there were several current students in the audience. The girls told me that the program was phenomenal and that spring semester admissions decisions were being made this week! Hopefully I will hear something next week. These people speak my language; seeing food as more than caloric necessities for life, but as the most intimate picture of who we are as a culture. I still have my hesitations, but they are slowly fading away in the bright light of my excitement. We will see what the future holds for me.

I had a dream last night, likely spurred-on by my new job starting on Monday (and the fact I still don't know what I am going to be doing!) and my ponderings about the future. I had arrived at a large, crowded building for my first day of work and was searching for my supervisor. The head of marketing at Food Network stepped out of the crowd and excitedly said, "You must be Felicia! I am so glad to finally meet you in person." then she exclaimed, "You are so thin! Much thinner than most of the new arrivals!" She began to lead me through the offices, chatting with me about new cookbooks and recipes I had tried, and I could not stop smiling. I could not wait to see what came next. Then I woke-up. It was the sort of dream that makes you squeeze your eyes back shut, desperately trying to get back to it. How amazing if I could find a life that made me feel that way, that made me never want to shut my eyes again.

I feel like I am getting there, on my way to that place. Until then, I have bread baking in Brooklyn on Sunday, a Tapas party on Monday and a Post-Thanksgiving fete next Friday! All that and a new job next week! I may still want to curl-up and close my eyes from time to time, but I have a pretty great life, punctuated by a store of hopes and dreams.

EWI New Member's Event Recap

Well, after looking over my blog I realized that I made the egrigious error of not commenting on the New Member's Gala.

Every month I try to put together a new member mixer to give other people the opportunity to come meet the group and see if it is something they would like to be a part of. Thus far the events have had modest turn-outs, usually around 5 new members. Well, this month the response was tremendous. My thread got so many hits on seriouseats.com that it was featured on the home page of Eater. The responses kept rolling in, in fact they are still trickling in! My list of yes's, no's and maybe's kept growing. In total I had almost 100 responses, 58 of which ended-up rsvping for the event. It got to the point where I dreaded opening my email. I was somewhat terrified!

Where could we possible have an event of this size? I thought about contacting the James Beard Foundation about borrowing a space, but then I realized that I worked in a potential location already. I asked The Boss if I could use our office for "a little meeting of my culinary club", she agreed.

By the end of the week I had submitted all fifty-some-odd names to security and sent out the final instructions to the group. The magnitude of the response made me realize how special this group of mine is and how many people are out there in New York, seaking connections with people who share their special passion. The core members were a bit concerned about growing at such a rapid pace, not wanting the group to become impersonal. We scheduled a core members meeting for the following Tuesday to discuss.

As the event appoached, my nerves were on fire. I was so nervous! I have never conducted an event of this magnitude by myself.

I prepared a dish of stuffed mushrooms-bacon, cheese, marsala wine,which were fabulous, gathered two bottles of wine and ran out the door with my heart beating a mile a minute. I was flustered and finally stumbled into a cab. I arrived, checked in with security and headed up to the office. Upon walking into the office I saw a light had been left on, then someone came around the corner. I nearly had a heart attack! My coworker was there working overtime, after I composed myself, I invited her to join the party. One of my dear group members arrived shortly and helped me set-up.

I arranged food in the conference room, overlooking the east side of Manhattan, and set-up the bar in the reception area. Then they began to arrive. Thirty people came in all. I greeted and mingled and drank and drank and drank! I met an amazing group of people and five hours later stumbled home with a few of them in tow. They were so enthusiastic, and they liked me, they really liked me!

I added 20 names to our permanent roster, sadly one of them requested to be removed as she already had a club of her own which conflicted with our events (I am such a pussy, this really bummed me out!).

We are off and running again! We will mix and come together and some will become core members as well. The group has decided to stop the monthly new member events until we see how it goes at our current size. I agree. Tonight is our first event since the mixer, an Afghani tasting in Kips Bay. I am already scheming on a Tamale Demo event for next weekend with E. demonstraiting and one of our new members SY hosting, I'll discuss it with them tonight. Ah, the Great Equalizer does it again! Who knew that bringing people together could be as easy as offering a place to meet.

Oh, and I still am going to talk to the James Beard House, I happen to be going to another event there on Wednesday. Who knows, maybe they have a soft spot for young broke culinarians!

Rhythm of Life

I have fallen into a nice rhythm of life. My weekly goals have become more of a checklist, a way to schedule my time, almost effortless. EWI has blossomed into an organization that needs to be nurtured, but is relatively self sustaining. It is my imagination and desires that determine the direction, as megalomaniac as that sound, it seems that people want or need someone to lead the charge. I push myself in the kitchen and in the gym, but not obsessively. I have learned to cut myself some slack. The longer I ponder my future, the brighter it becomes. Passion is my north star, and as unpredictable as it may seem, it has been my constant. My applications are all in, my third step in the FSO process is complete, and all I have to do is wait. Wait and enjoy.

For the first time in my life waiting is not rot with nauseating impatience and anxiety. I feel only curiosity, excitement and, dare I say, hope. The vague picture of the future I have is like a Monet: beautiful, recognizable, but with soft details. I feel that this is where God works best. Let him workout the details!

Life is not perfect, but it is good. My apartment, for example, I looked for something better and found that it was by far the best I could afford right now. This made me appreciate it more, and I am happily obsessing over re-designs, my mind aflutter with midcentury modern accents and nods to the style and feeling I want to evoke. I can't afford it all, but I am doing a fine job working with what I have. Perhaps this is what contentment is.

I have an exciting week ahead of me. Tonight I am hosting an Afghani tasting, I am attending another Beard on Books on Wednesday where I hope to speak with someone about using the space, I have Momofuku chicken dinner on Friday, I am trying to plan a Tamale demo for EWI at a new member's loft for Saturday and it is my last full time week at RRA. My job itself is sure to be completely insane this week due to my impending departure, but what a joy that my life outside of those 40-someodd hours is enough to color my experience. Who knows, perhaps my brother will get his rehab date and I will get an acceptance letter this week as well!

I am about to start my Korean cooking for tomorrow's dinner, something I have been putting off for a few weeks! At this rate my "Eating/Cooking around the World" project will take me the next 25 years! Se La Vi. I know this Serene calm, this quiet contentment will not last, life is a stormy journey, but the place I have arrived makes even this thought unaffecting. Through it all, the love, the loss, the adventure and the pain, I have survived. Better than survived, I have lived. At the end of the day, what more can anyone really ask for?

The Culinary Adventures of Katie and Keith

It was a busy week last week; I decided to keep my apartment after working out a killer deal with my landlord (and seeing the bullshit that is on the market right now), I threw a successful EWI event at the Empire State Building for 30 guest and I have begun planning a complete overhaul of my apartment. I have an EWI meeting tonight to discuss the future of the group, but through all that the one thing that remains in the forefront of my mind is my brother, Keith.

This boy (really a 6'2" ex-marine) has always been the baby of the family. Despite his anger and behavioral problems, all I have ever been able to see is this mysterious, sensitive, amazing creature. We have a very close bond, but I don't really know him all that well. Looking through his Facebook pictures, I see an adventurer. Pictures from Japan, Mexico, Iraq, Florida, California.... I want to get to know this man.

He is going through a fucked-up time right now. A diagnosed alcoholic, dropped out of college this semester and on his way to rehab in the (hopefully not too distant) future. When he talks to me about his drinking, I am grateful for his honesty. He is really letting it all out. But today was different. I was angry. I hid it from him, I don't want to push him away, but I really just wanted to kick his ass.

When we are not talking about his drinking we talk about food. Like me, it is a passion for him. He sees places as culinary destinations and he indulges duelly. As I hear his stories and tell him mine, I feel that I am getting to know this mysterious man. I look forward to his Christmas visit to New York, where we can create an adventure of our very own.

I want to hear his stories, tell his stories and create new ones with him. Reverting back to my childhood name, I want to begin a journey into my brother's history, into his experience, the culinary adventures of Katie and Keith. Perhaps through "The Great Equalizer" we can become adult versions of the two children who once played in forts made of cardboard boxes. I don't want to lose him and I want to get to know him now, before the memories fade into the sunset of the past.

Deja Vu and Impossible Memories

Deja Vu is a fleeting phenomenon for most, a mere moment of familiarity. The haunting I feel is more than a fleeting sense of remembrance, it is almost as though I have memories and a homesickness for a time before I ever existed.

I have always felt a longing for the past, watching films from bygone eras and feeling an uncanny sentimental ache. As I have grown older and begun to seek out vintage clothing and mid century modern decor, the feeling of comfort these items evoke is almost unnerving.

Walking through the booths of fading objects in the flea market I feel as though I am looking at my own belongings from another life. The romance and intensity of the
40's, the class and pride of 50's and the moments quivering between the traditions of the past and the tumultuous future of the early 60's, these are the times I "remember".

I am not lost in the 21st century, I am capable and unafraid, but these "memories", this sense of deja vu, what do they mean?

I don't believe in reincarnation, but the soul is a mysterious thing, unencumbered by the laws of time and space, it gives me reason to pause and wonder.

I have always been so much older, always felt a bit out of place. I wonder if my soul is a bit older than my body, if God in all his infinite wisdom created me before my time. All I know is that this seemingly insane line of reasoning feels like the most authentic explanation I have found for my old soul and my impossible memories. I suppose the only question is, why? As I have stumbled upon my "past" I suppose the answer to that question will present itself in it's own time as well.

Believing that the comfort and belonging I feel as I look at objects of the past is real and not just romantic notions gives me a sense of peace. Perhaps deja vu is merely glimpses of the present, past and future as our souls see them, as God sees them, as simultaneous, as layers rather than one long line. This makes me feel small, and makes me grateful that I have a God bigger than the bounds of this world.

Floating Hogs, Perfect Meals and Happy Scars

Last weekend I ventured out into the overcast city in search of supplies for my long awaited red wine steak. I was absolutely thrilled that it wasn't pouring rain! The sky was threatening to open-up at any moment, but only a light mist came down.

For me, when their is a weather forecast for rain and instead it is dry, that is like a snow day for a school kid! I feel as though I have somehow gotten one over on mother nature, I have a day full of possibilities and freedom from the misery of a drenched city to sludge around in.

Anyways, it was with this sense of elation that I set-off. I wandered down 5th Avenue to the Madison Market, which turned-out to be a total bust. Lots of crafty boothes and about four restaurants with tent offerings. I bought a cider doughnut for a dollar, just to try this much lauded Autumn treat. It was terrible! It tasted to me like an overdose of baking powder. Ugk... On to Union Square and my beloved Trader Joe's. The rain was playing games with me as I trudged along, picking-up and then going back to a mist. It became humorous to me as I relaxed into the belief that it was simply toying with me and no severe storm was coming.

I bought a bottle of my favorite white, a Spanish sparkling wine at the wine shop and a bottle of tempranillo with a fantastic picture of a floating hog. Now, I was not going to purchase a young, light Spanish red. I was making steak! I was thinking something a bit more full-bodied. I put the pig down, but I just could not walk away! That apathetic floating hog captivated me! Fuck-it, the hog pleased me and I was sure the steak would be fine!Next door I did battle with the crowds at the TJ's and my anxiety grew about the sheer volume of groceries I would have to carry home!

I left the Joe's with what felt like a bag of boulders and grunted my way over to the East Village Meat Market. What a place! The little butcher shop was immaculately clean and a Young polish man was standing there feeding us all perogi's. They were fabulous and I made sure to tell him so.

I asked the butcher if they had tri-tip steak or triangle roast, he told me in his thick polish accent that they did not. I asked him what the closest cut was that he did have and he proceeded to pull out a rump roast. He cut exactly the portion I wanted and trimmed it beautifully. I was worried about the cost, but my hunk o' meat came to just $7.54. Elated, I drug my bag of goodies over to the bus stop on 1st Avenue for my final ride home.

The sky's did open-up on Saturday night, just after I had my groceries put away and my mis en plas together for our steak dinner. Ahhhh, what a great day!

I cut the steak into three smaller steaks, patted them dry and rubbed each one with salt and fresh cracked pepper. I seared them on the range until they were crisp and caramelized, then put the entire skillet into the oven above the crisping sweet potato fries. Pulling out the sizzling skillet, even with a towel and hot pad, burned the shit out of my hand, the battle scare of which has lasted me all week in various states of healing. Never-the-less, I soldiered-on, deglazing the pan with red wine and finishing the sauce with two generous pads of butter. The resulting dish was spectacular. The sauce was so rich and flavorful, D. would have licked the pan had it not been searing hot! The steak was flavorful and moist. This dish made me realize how much can be done with a simple hunk of meat!

I attended Beard on Books at the James Beard House yesterday with Kaitlin and promptly fell in love with the organization. Perhaps I can find a way to join, despite the high membership fees!

The joy of creating that dish, with the searching and cooking and surprising results has stayed with me this week. Every time I look down at my nasty scarred finger I smile. It is a battle wound in the truest sense, a badge of honor in my pursuit of culinary adventure. Sometimes I step outside of myself and say "How could you possibly want to dedicate your life to food? That is going to get so boring!" I suppose that seems like it could be true, but in everyday moments it is what I think about, in the pursuit of adventure it is my vehicle, the joy of creating one simple, perfect meal carries me along. So maybe it will be enough. Perhaps this passion is about more than the calories we put in our mouths.

As I reflect on this, I continue to see food as The Great Equalizer, as the one thing that is needed and enjoyed world wide. It is a window into a culture, into the homes of those around the globe. I began my Eating and Cooking Around the World blog on Sunday. My first country is Korea, as my friend Kyung invited me to Baden Baded for dinner on Monday. My experience has been chronicled in said blog and I plan on going to K-town for ingredients this weekend. My recipe of the week, courtesy of Korean inspiration is short ribs and spicy rice cakes. We will see how I fare!

This weekend I am going to take Gus out for a birthday drink, go shopping in Ktown, explore Brooklyn (again) at the Brooklyn Flea and perhaps a Halloween party. We'll see. I missed my EWI Chinese dinner in Flushing last weekend, it was just too far, too expensive and I just plain didn't feel like it! I still have gotten out and enjoyed my friends and my city, so perhaps my plans need not be set in stone! My life plans certainly arnt!

I have been advanced to the next round of selections for the Foreign Service Officers selection process, meanwhile I have applications out at 9 different graduate schools, 3 different disciplines, I am starting a new job in 3 weeks and I could not be happier! I feel like the pieces of my life and passion and skills are going to come together in ways I can't even imagine yet. As I mentioned before, God is the Chef d'Cuisine of my life, I am merely trying to learn how to enjoy it. In that vein, thank God tomorrow is Friday!

Sick Days and Dog Dream Guilt

Here I am, in bed at 1pm on a Wednesday. No, I am not dying, yes, I am feeling ill.

Monday I was feeling under the weather, but because my boss was not around to make me miserable, I made it through the day. Tuesday I debated coming to work, and decided to test myself to see if I was sick or just trying to get out of work (I know I have problems). I got up at 6am for pilates, they made me feel a bit better, so I went in for a half day. I felt guilty leaving early, but I still was feeling a bit run-down. I lounged all day, ate some food, and went to bed at 9:00.

This brings me to this morning, up at 6am for spinning and it seems my head and tummy are already there. I am not well. I weigh myself to find that I have gained 3lbs, true motivation to get to that class! I really can't though, so I crawl back into bed with a whimper and tell myself that there is an evening class if I am up to it.

So far today I have gotten out of bed only to shower and call the office to let them know I will not be joining them, and again about an hour ago when I decided to straighten-up and grab my laptop. Sitting was not the right move, so here I am back in bed.

I really don't know what is wrong with me, nausea and light headaches and overall fatigue. Basically, I don't feel good. I have be raked with guilt over missing some work the last two days. I constantly wonder if I am just being lazy and avoiding a job I hate. Gus tells me I have issues. I tell her we have the same guilt issues, just over different things.

Uggh, it is gorgeous outside too! Going to be 70 today. I really hope I can get out and enjoy it a bit, but right now moving feels pretty bad. Maybe I will eat a plain bagel with a side of Aleive, perhaps that will fix me right up. For some reason I feel like I am not meant to be fixed right up, that this is a time of quiet for me that I have been missing.

I had a dream on Sunday night, a dream I have had before in various forms. I was going somewhere and suddenly realized, in horror, that I had forgotten about my dog. My poor dog had been living in my old house, alone, for a long time. This dog looked like my childhood pet Angel, but was named BabyD like my rottweiler from Ft. Campbell. In fact, the place in the dream looked a bit like the area off of 41A in Hopkinsville, KY. I found the dog and as I stroked it goodbye (apparently I was still leaving) someone said, "It's not good for a dog to be alone so much". The guilt and the sorrow of forgetting and neglecting this creature was overwhelming.

The sorrow lingered as I made my way toward the office on Monday morning. I have had dreams like this before, usually I find a cage under my bed with my old hamsters or guinea pigs in it, and I am shocked to find them alive, wondering if I have forgotten any others. This one was different though. My BabyD was like my child, the sorrow was so deep. What does it mean? What are these dreams really about?

There is something I am forgetting or leaving behind, something I am responsible for, something I love. But I am still leaving. I thought I had finally said goodbye to the South, to my past, to that simple life. I thought I had moved-on and embraced a new life, all my own. What did I forget? Why do I feel so guilty?

I know many people say dreams are just dreams, or that dreams are the subconscious way of working things out and are not to be interpreted. I suppose that this dreams seems different to me because nothing was resolved, the dream keeps coming back, but with greater intensity. It feels more like my subconscious is screaming at me with increasing volume, but I still can't make-out what is being said. Perhaps during my quiet day, in my soft prison of bed, it will come to me. Somehow I doubt it will be that easy.

Getting my Life Back and the Sad Little Face

Surprisingly D has only been home for 3 weeks. Knowing that makes me feel less terrible about the fact that I am only just starting to feel my life coming back together. I carved-out a rather nice life for myself while he was away, and for the first time I am feeling like he can fit into it.

The great weekend we had, the time together and the time apart, felt normal. I am excited about my weeks again and filling my weeks with adventures. This week I am taking him to a Bar game show night, possibly to the Free MoMa Friday and then possibly curling-up and relaxing on Saturday. Sunday I have an EWI dinner in Flushing, next Monday I am having dinner with a girlfriend and an editor from Savour, I have Beard on Books next week, the Brooklyn Kitchen book club and a bread baking class next month, whew! I'm baaaack.

I feel like I am me again, with him. Don't get me wrong, I curse him every time I put away laundry and his pile is bigger than mine, but it is nice to have someone to run around the city with.

It was a hard week last week. Not only with work, but with my family. My brother's struggles absolutely break my heart, and my mother's agony over it and her father makes me cringe. It is more of a heavy frown on my face and heart than an active pain. It feels heavy and sad, but I can't feel anymore than that, there are no tears, no fits of anger, just the heavy face. Just the reality of the sadness of the situation looking at me from inside. I wish I could cry or something, but I can't, it is content to just sit there and be. Nothing I can do to help, nothing I can do to fix, nothing I can do to protect. Just a sad face staring out at a sad, hurting family that it cannot touch.

That is my little family. The one being tossed side to side in a storm. I suppose I feel guilty for not being in the dangerous boat with them. It makes me sad, but I cannot feel anything. My mother's tears for her Daddy and her son, My brother's retreat and deep, deep sorrow. These are the two people I love most dearly in the world. These are the two my life would be destroyed without, so why do I feel nothing? Why is there just a heavy sad face looking out at their struggles? I suppose I will figure it out eventually.

I don't know, but at least I feel like I am wrapping my arms back around my own life, embracing my sad little face, and my joyful adventure seeking, and my bi-polar work weeks. All I can do for now is hold-on tight and try to enjoy the ride.

Soul Stealing Weeks and Triumphant Weekends

Last week was a BEAR! but it ended with a phenomenal weekend.

I did nothing last week outside of work, we ordered-in 2 or 3 times! I spent every last drop of my energy keeping my mouth shut, rather than letting the hot lava of uncensored truth come spewing out all over my boss's face! Whew! It was ugly. But somehow, somehow, I made it to Friday in one piece and still employed. (My week ended with a frantic search for dry ice, because my boss had decided to take her dead cat out of her freezer and finally bury her properly in Connecticut, yeah that kind of week.)

Friday night I left the office early with Gus for a quick drink at her place before we embarked on our weekends. Hers involving endless pre-wedding appointments and mine a food and real estate quest.

I decided to be more open minded about potential areas to live in, so I booked an appointment for D and I to head out to East Williamsberg to see a new 1 bedroom apartment. To be fair, I also scheduled an appointment to see a studio in the East Village later that afternoon. Along the way I planned for us to stop into the Brooklyn Kitchen for a mini-muffin pan for my cheese puff recipe for Sunday, to Trader Joe's for wine and to the East Village Meat Market for our dinner. On top of all that, I booked a consultation with a new broker for us. Ambitious? Crazy? Maybe. But miracle of miracles, we did it!

There were some definite snags along the way. We started our journey with a jaunt on the L train to Brooklyn, unfortunately, the train was running limited service and would not go out to the stop we needed. Hello shuttle bus. Ugh, I hate buses under the best circumstances, let alone when I am being packed-in. We finally made it to our stop (in Bushwick, not Williamsburg) and proceeded to walk to the 1 bed apartment. As we walked, the voice in my head was screaming NOOOOOOOOOO! I was trying to keep an open mind with the jaws of death at this point! No stores, no people, empty lots...... We did keep going and the apartment itself was quite nice. Large bedroom, decent living room, great kitchen, balcony, roof deck and even, gasp, a washer and dryer hookup.

Now, under normal circumstances, this description alone would be enough to give me an orgasm, but somehow all the things that matter to me loose their luster when they are located outside of my city. If it had been closer, if the neighborhood had been more vibrant, perhaps then I would consider it, but as it was, there was just no freakin way.

We climbed aboard the crowded bus, made a quick stop at the Brooklyn Kitchen (a great little shop) and dropped back down the rabbit hole, emerging once again in the soft light of Manhattan.
Next stop, East Village!

We wandered down to our next appointment, finding ourselves 30 minutes early, we decided to grab some lunch at a diner next to the apartment entrance. It was nice to catch my breath for a minute! We popped-out to view a small studio in the back of a building on Avenue A and 12th Street. It was small, but had a cute separate kitchen with new appliances and a great skylight that opened it up. We were both quite taken with it, despite the vast size difference, the EV studio still out-shown the Brooklyn giant. God I love this city!

We wandered back out onto the Avenue and headed up to the Flatiron district to meet our potential new brokers. At this point, I must say that I am incredibly impressed that my man has not only hung-in-there, but has not tried to cut anything short! No complains! What a catch!

We met the brokers, they gave us a few reality checks with a dollop of hope and scheduled viewings for November. Time to head down to T.J.'s and our final stop at the Meat Market.
We walked in the light drizzle that had started, still warm from our hours of wandering, and I for one, quite happy. We bought our wine and wandered down to the Meat Market. Foiled! It was closed.... the one thing we did not get to. Oh well! We boarded our bus and headed home. We ate take-out, watched some bad TV, and passed clean-out.

What a perfect Saturday! Just like last week. There is no way the entire weekend could go as planned, right? (last Sunday, we had a post-bliss blow-up in NJ, oh well)

Sunday dawned, and we prepared to go up to Harlem to Abyssinian Baptist Church. We made it, despite the bitter cold and wet weather, had an ok time (D enjoyed it, I fell asleep), bought some groceries and headed home. D helped me get the house ready for my EWI guests and then went to the movies as I began to cook. How nice to have the house to yourself sometimes.

My mini-macs were unspectacular, but it didn't matter, the wine and laughter flowed and I think the small group of us had a great time. D came back hours later to catch the tail-end of our festivities. I cleaned-up and we collapsed on the couch. Another well executed day!

The dull, misery of the week was conquered by the frenetic, joyful frenzy of the weekend, and though I don't feel well today, I still am filled with some excitement and I think the energy of the weekend is going to spill into this week.

Fantasy Dream Dates and Pasties

Saturday was my 3 year anniversary with D. Three Years! That is a long time. It began with my requisite sending-off of the aunt, but progressed beautifully from there. We had planned on having lunch, golfing at Chelsea Piers, shopping in Brooklyn, seeing a Broadway show, going to dinner and dancing at an 80's party. Quite ambitious, I know!

We started by walking up to Harold's Square to grab some sandwiches from Tom Coliccio's WichCraft. The weather was beautiful and we stopped to window shop on the way. We had grilled Gruyere and onion panini and chicken salad, both fantastic. We talked and laughed. From there we decided to detour up to Times Square to the TKTS booth to try and get tickets to a show. We waited for an hour in line only to find out that our first choices were not available. Burn the floor was available for $86 a piece, but as DeShon slid them his credit card, I asked him if we could just skip it and go to burlesque instead. I was so touched by his generosity, but really did not want him to spend the money on a show I didn't really want to see. I was certain he would be annoyed with me for keeping him in line for an hour for nothing, but he simply kissed my cheek and told me it was fine. The fantasy dream date continues!

We wandered back home, shopping and talking along the way, and decided to go see a movie before dinner. We got dressed, I made a reservation at DBGB, and we headed off to see Couple's Retreat. (He actually wanted to see it too! See why I love this guy?) The movie was good (not great, but really good) and we set-off to try and get an earlier table at DBGB.

The restaurant was packed and it took a sort of guerrilla warfare to get a table at the bar, but after some devious undercutting, I got the table. He picked the first course and I picked the second. We started with Autumn Squash soup and an iceberg, blue cheese salad. They were phenomenal. The soup was a life-changer with the complex flavors, beautiful foam and perfect texture. The salad, which I have never been a fan of, was executed to perfection. The blue cheese was subtly intense and the thin sliced iceberg made a perfect base. Honestly, the dishes together were a symphony. The tangy and sweet, overpowering and subtle, a very nice nod to the occasion.

For second courses I ordered the Frenchie Burger, a burger featuring pork belly, tomato confit and an onion bun, and the DBGB homemade hot dog. They both came with fries and were both good. Not the best hot dog and hamburger I had ever had (which for the price you would hope it would be) but very good none-the-less. The martini's and wine were also pitch perfect.

After dinner we flew uptown to see our burlesque show. We sat in the front row, close enough to see EVERYTHING, and it was delightful. The show was funny and entertaining and my face actually began to hurt from smiling so much! D was called-up on stage to help the magician with his act and practically stole the show! We drank and laughed the entire performance. After the show I stopped the performers to compliment them on the performance. The burlesque dancer hugged me and told me how nice it was to have women in the audience who enjoyed it and didn't judge her body or cellulite. I must say, she had a beautiful body, and hardly a glimpse of cellulite!

Happy and drunk, we stumbled into the night and began walking toward the dance club. My feet were throbbing and we were fading fast, so we mutually agreed to nix the dancing and continue the burlesque show at home. I drunkenly danced for my man and proceeded to put him right to sleep! We made plans to continue the fun with brunch and shopping on Sunday.

Now it is Sunday and I am contently writing about my weekend of adventure, every so often glancing over at my sleeping man. It was a great weekend, one that reminded me of how much fun D and I can have when I make plans and he makes sure we are not enslaved to them, and one that continued to re-confirm my love of the city that has become my home.

An Aunt in New York

The aunt descended on Friday and, true to form, she tested my self confidence. You see, if I were younger or less secure, she could really embarrass the shit out of me. Thank God I have gotten to the point in my life where I can just grin and bear it.

She waltzed into my office to pick me up from work as planned, and of course to meet my co-workers. My infamous boss was in, so naturally an introduction had to be made. Watching them together was as humorous as it was uncomfortable. It was "battle of the talking heads"! They both love nothing more than talking about themselves, so each would begin a story only to be interrupted by the other with a tidbit about how this story related back to her, and on and on it when. That is, until aunt made an announcement. She wanted to present something to me in front of my boss. UUUUUUGH! I knew what was coming as soon as the words came out of her mouth.

She began her speech by expressing the importance of a general's coin in military culture, calling it a soldier's most prized possession (believe me, it is not) and proceeded to tell the story about how I gave the coin I received by General Petraus in Iraq to my brother when he graduated from the Marines. Triumphantly she declared that she had a new coin, from the now 4 star General Petraus, to present to me. I reached out to take the coin from her and she recoiled, she said, "come-on you know how to do it right!" requiring me to take it during a handshake.

After this ridiculousness, my boss actually teared up a bit, something very unnatural for her. She exclaimed: "My ex-boyfriend from high school died on a plane next to me and they found a coin in his pocket!" Ever the narcissist, it still came back to her! Thank God.

I think it is clear that I do not care about Army shit anymore. It was a part of my life, but now I have other things. Give me a spatula from Chef Eric Rippert and I will be excited, a coin from a general I never liked to begin with, what am I supposed to do? Jump for Joy? Cry? I don't think so. D. summed it up best, he asked me, "Is she a military groupie?" Ah, that is the best explanation I have ever heard!

Well, after that I had made reservations at the Season 1 Top Chef winner Harold's restaurant. I was pretty excited to check it out. I cleared it with her before making the reservation. She had mentioned she wanted to go to a bistro. Well, I found a few French bistros and then Harold's American bistro. As soon as we left my office she began talking about pasta. WTF. I mentioned that I would have found us a great Italian place if that was what she had mentioned, she replied that she had. No, you asked for bistro, not Italian, bistro. She conceded. D was running a bit late, and I knew she was not feeling my restaurant pick anymore, so I began looking for other options.

In the mean time she called an old friend of her's who lives in New York. He only lives a half mile north of me, so we decided to meet him for drinks. He also made us a reservation at a French bistro below his apartment. We gladly would have walked, but aunt was tired and preferred to wait 15 minutes for a cab. No matter, when we arrived, it was a fabulous little sidewalk bistro.
I asked for wine immediately.

There was an older man and a young woman at the table next to us, and he kept trying to talk to us, while she embarrassed, tried to stop him. It was clear he had had a stroke or some other mind altering ailment, and sweet D patiently spoke to him. It was touching to see that kind of compassion. The next set of guests next to us were a beautiful, hip couple with a baby. We spoke to them briefly and found out the man was French and the woman African. That is why I love New York, it is a city of casual friends and conversations. This is a sentiment I cannot share with the aunt, who hates New York and is an LA fanatic. Se la vi.

The food was good, not amazing, but good. We had beet salad, french onion soup and calamari to start; beef bourginon, seared bass with spinach and potato and cassoulet for dinner; and a truly terrible caremel flan and proifitols for dessert. Despite this, this weather was perfect, the wine flowed and the experience was good overall.

Her friend Vega joined us for dessert and then brought us up to his apartment for another glass of wine. Ah wine, I generally only drink it in celebration, but it also serves as my secret weapon for surviving family gatherings! Vega was absolutely charming and I see us becoming friends on our own, an absolutely wonderful, unexpected surprise.

The next morning I joined her for a small breakfast and lots of coffee before taking her to Grand Central to put her on a bus to La Guardia. Our conversation was typical and shallow and in a way that is a bit sad. As I have grown up we could have developed a friendship. She was, at one time, an interesting, fun, charming woman. We crossed paths though. As I came into my own, she retreated into a judgemental, semi-religious nag with her grating personality traits becoming her primary ones. I have grown a thick enough skin to tolerate this in small doses, but not to enjoy her company. Oh well, I survived another aunt experience and even made a new friend! Alls well that ends well.

Wandering Meditation and Unexpected Solutions

Walking for hours through the darkening streets of New York, searching for Masarepa (cooked corn flour) I felt like a ghost. It was so quiet, so peaceful, so alone. I walked and walked and walked for hours. It was like meditation.

I arrived home, with a slightly improved mood, and got started silently on my Arepas and soup. D blessedly let me be quiet. By the time we finished our Arepas and a sitcom, I felt like the darkness was beginning to lift.

I woke-up on Wednesday with a renewed sense of joy.

Cocktails and trivia questions and celebration over D's new freelance job highlighted Wednesday evening which ended with a fat-fest courtesy of our downstairs deli!

I awoke this morning with agonizing cramps, I am still uncertain whether they are PMS or a result of my turkey club with extra mayo!

It looks like EWI may have to reschedule again, this has been a strange week. I accomplished many of my goals, but not in the way I first intended. My social events are all with D's family or my own, my workouts have been more out of the gym than in, potential connections are spontaneous rather than planned, my new recipe was ok but hindered by a mysterious missing ingredient, and all the strangeness has left me feeling a bit upended. But that is behind me now, and the great expanse of possibility lyes ahead! The FSO exam was a breeze and I have only to wait and see what happens!

I feel more a leaf in the breeze then master of my destiny! I suppose that is where faith comes in. I will try to float happily through the rest of the weekend, through dinner with the Aunt, through a fun-filled 3 year anniversary, through an evening with in laws rather than foodies, and over a scale I am dreading stepping on!

Arepas! And Other Joyful Distractions

Looking back over the last few months I see that it was not all dinner parties and laughter, I got a bit down from time to time, there was just no one there to mirror it. (I think the tree falling in the woods fable applies to bad moods as well!) I suppose the only thing to do is talk something happy.

My recipe inspiration this week is the sweet corn arepa. You can't even say arepa without rolling your tongue and shaking your shoulders! ARRRREPA! Now that is a happy dish. The recipes are as easy as they are foreign, using methods I am not familiar with. I am eager to try this happy meal from South America and pair it with one of my best ever fusion dishes, the Thai chili green pea soup. Talk about an upgrade of the grilled cheese and tomato broth!

The sweet corn cakes with melted mozzarella playing of the delicate spiciness of the chili infused soup should be a symphony! Hopefully my nausea will not detract from the experience too much. Stress plays some evil games with me.

Masarepa or cooked corn flour is not as easy to come by as you might think. Even in New York it takes some investigation. I scanned the blogs and found out that a Gristedes in Chelsea sells the masarepa, so that is where I am headed after work. I think I will go from there down to Trader Joe's, finally looping back up to my little home in Murray Hill. A good walk through my city usually does wonders for my state of mind.

So tonight I will cook with global inspiration and then study global information. I need to get on my FSO preparation, the test is Thursday! Attitude is everything, and maybe half of attitude is happy distractions. Fuck it! What ever works right? My drill sergeants always said that if you fake a good attitude long enough it actually might start to stick. Maybe with the helpful distractions of ArrrepA!, and Thai chili and bun and perhaps one too many vino's, it will.

Help! I've Fallen and I Can't Get Up!

I am sitting at the bottom of the proverbial well. Tired, bored, dejected, gazing up at the spot of light that I remember as my happy life. The one thought booming in my mind is "Why?"

I have been getting lower and lower the last couple days and now I am decidedly down. I pray I can just blame this on PMS, but that begs the question- why haven't I felt this way the last few periods? The worst part may be the not knowing or understanding. As I have gotten older, have I also crawled onto the denial train? Am I too afraid to see what's the matter?

I missed my workouts yesterday and today, I feel 500 pounds, but more troubling still is the sense of apathy and bleak tomorrows. I hate it when I feel this way. It came so quickly. I was feeling on top of the world, excited about tomorrow and today, happy with my daily debacles. From my dark hole I wonder how anything seemed interesting or exciting before. I just want to cry. I want to cry because I can't find any good broker's to make my apartment hunt easier. I want to cry because my boss is being a bitch and I can't just walk out. I want to cry because my tummy is puffy. I want to cry and run away because my Aunt is coming in two days and my 3 year anniversary is in three days. I want to cry and cry and cry and then kick something.

Oddly, my tirade here reminds me of a tirade I may have had last month... hmm.. I will have to go back and see. I hope it is just PMS. I am just so tired and I have so many things on my mind. I am worried about me and D. I think that is what I don't want to look at, don't even want to speak. I hope it is just PMS. I just don't want to think anymore, but I do want to know what changed. What made me so happy and alive before and what is missing that I feel so dead inside now?

Help Me! Help Me! I have fallen into an ugly pit of anger and sorrow and BITCHINESS! And I really don't know if I can get up.