the red dress.

did i ever tell you that i blame a red dress for the fact that i am so darn tall?

because i do.

and i blame charlize theron.

more specifically, i blame charlize theron in that red dress.

you know the one i'm talking about. you must.

hmmm. okay, yes, i see your point. now that i look at it i realize it's not exactly red (the footnote says bronze). but you get the point. 

i mean, come on, is she not heaven in that dress?

this spawned a certain love affair with ms. theron, such that, i took to googling. and what i remember is that i was particularly taken with her height. 

five feet, ten inches. 

glorious! huzzah! yes, i would be that height as well then. i was old enough to know that the chances were pretty good that i would be tall, so might as well really be. 

so i took a sharpie, pulled out a tape measure, and charted out the distance on the frame leading into my bathroom. 

growing up i would stand there. against the molding, mark how tall i was, how much progress i had made, and how far i had yet to go. 

and when all was said and done and all the proverbial cookies had crumbled (puberty and growth spurts and the joys of teenage-hood) don't know you, i stood right up against the frame, put my hand atop my head, stepped away to look where it had landed and...BLAM. 5 foot 10. 

some things are willed into existence. of this i'm almost nearly, just pretty sure, nursing a strong inkling that yes, indeed, that is true. 

the funny thing is. i'd give a few of those inches back. because this is what i know now: men are short. particularly those in drama school. particularly on the east coast. and the thing is i'm like anyone else: i wanna wear heals! i want to feel small and demure and lithe next to my beau! 

then again, this too is true: it's great for concerts, and...

oh, gosh, that's all i've got so far, it's great for concerts. 

i've been working on it though. of late. i've been working on pulling my shoulders back, unfurling the full width of my chest, holding my neck high. because for better or worse it's not just ms. theron's story, it's mine. and when i'm surrounded by family, and the tall women we boast, i know it's part history, part heritage, part love-story.

but do send your really tall guy friends my way, won't you?

sunday mornings meet fall.

somedays i wake up and life is just easier.
and i think of course i am beautiful.
and of course i am happy.
and of course i am filled by the love of those around me.
i am not lonely or alone.
and of course i'll figure out the path.
and of course i'll find success.
and of course, of course i'll fall in love.



usually, on days like this, the weather is really damn nice.

photo via one of 

my very favorite blogs.

getting older.

yesterday i confessed to tom that i'm having difficulty with the number 26. i am almost 26. just writing that now nearly takes my breath away.

he told me not to worry, it's not till you turn 27 that you're in your late twenties.

funny, i didn't think it was till 28.

oh boy.

a little note to some of the anonymous commenters out there. (and this will be the one and only time i address this).

there were always in me, two women at least, one woman desperate and bewildered, who felt she was drowning and another who would leap into a scene, as upon a stage, conceal her true emotions because they were weaknesses, helplessness, despair, and present to the world only a smile, an eagerness, curiosity, enthusiasm, interest.

anais nin



i've been thinking about words lately.

words versus experience. words aiming at experience. and how words do not always fail, but they are never the thing.

a photo of an apple, let's say (first thing that came to mind, must remember to have one later) is not the apple. it is an image of the apple. and a compressed image at that. and because compressed, inherently distorted.

words convey an image. compressed and distorted. aiming at truth, but not the truth itself.

when i first went to see tom many moons ago (to deal with that nasty case of bulimia) we talked a lot about weight. a number. weight is a number. but it isn't, not really. weight is a constantly changing thing, contingent upon countless factors--many of them unknowable. tom told me that even with the very best scales the world has to offer, taking my weight at the same time each week, after many weeks all he would be able to give me was an approximation and an idea as to whether my weight was going up, down, or holding steady (well, holding as steady as weight ever can hold).

but we americans we like to know things. we like things in black in white. we want the concrete. and a number, well, that's concrete.

i began this blog as a way to tunnel out of a very dark period in my life. a way to focus on the good and identify all those things that fill me up and fill me out. as a way of cataloging progress and change. but after the last three years with this blogspot lover of mine, the only thing i can say with any certainty is this: i am not what i wrote last week, nor what i wrote two years ago. but somewhere in the space between--if you could subtract the one from the other--somewhere in the weeds of all that muck, you'll find me.

this is all an attempt. an attempt at truth. an attempt at my truth. and i tell lies and omit things and twist the facts to aim at a larger truth. but it is not truth.

there is a buddhist expression: the finger pointing to the moon is not the moon.

 everything i've shared here, it is not the moon, it only points to it.

but i'm trying. and that's something.

on getting bangs.

i needed a wee of a change. you know?

and i thought, bangs, so very parisian, no?

yesterday a man stopped me at work and asked if people don't tell me all the time i look like carla bruni?

i do not. i do not look like carla bruni. and i've never gotten it before. (she's far better looking than i).

but i understand why he said it--it's the haircut. with the bangs and when i wear my hair down, well, i understand where this man was coming from. 

and listen, a compliment like that, i'm gonna take it and run.

after all i was going for french. and she's married to the president of france, so...

i might have over shot it. 

(ps: i'll get an email from my mother saying this photo doesn't really look like me. 

and she'll be right. 

but that's the miracle of instagram--it's a really cheap way of airbrushing 

{and making you look better than you do in real life}).

saturday morning movie date

i believe in crying the way most people believe in exercise.

that it should be engaged in often and that it's essential for the health of the body.

i'm in need of a cry. a good cry, a solid cry. i'm not terribly sure why, all i know is  i can feel my body calling out for it.

usually when this happens there's a backlog of tears and i never find the release until that fated moment when i hit the top of my head on the underside of the bathroom's standing sink.  it doesn't hurt much--it never does--but it results in pretty substantial heaves and me crumpled despairingly against the cool tiles of the bathroom floor. (i've lived a life on that bathroom floor).

to prevent this i'm taking myself to the movies this morning. a date! for (with) myself!  i've indulged in a medium soy chai latte (fear of soy and sugar be damned today!). a six dollar movie ticket, a cool, dark theatre, and a space in which to silently water my soul? huzzah! (does that sound dramatic and cliche? that watering of the soul? oh but it is! this is all serious and important work i'm going about.)

alright, must be off, i'll let you know how it goes.

image credit: unknown

(if anyone does know who

this is by please comment below).

deep laughs and old friends.

this is my friend rob.

we met on our very first day at juilliard. the very same day we had to wear body-skimming clothes for our alexander technique photos (acting school is strange) and when the time for his photo came rob stripped to nothing but tighty whities. 

we've been friends ever since.

(get your head out of the gutter, it wasn't like that).

rob and i haven't seen each other for a while. so last night we made a date for dinner followed by swing-dancing classes at lincoln center (there is so much to do and take advantage of during a new york city summer!).

and when, at that moment during dinner, i pulled out my camera for the cursory pictures he made some peter parker comment (classic) and then proceeded to fire off fifty at a time (usually i have to beg people to take three in a row). he had me laughing so hard that my sometimes-snort crept back in. it's not terribly attractive that snort, nor are the veins now protruding from my forehead. but at least i know i'm laughing, deeply. i'd take real laughs, deep snorts, and pulsing veins any day of the week if it means a life lived fully.

this is for anyone who thinks my apartment is always pristine.

turns out after a week and a half of not feeling well this is what i get.

nyc living is hard enough that i do try to keep my room extremely organized, but that's because if you could open up my mind you'd find it looks suspiciously similar to this. external order helps to balance the mish-mosh that is my mind. 

i just wanted to share because i find this image a bit hilarious. and because my momma's now in town--i gotta get my but out of bed and clean up. 

happy sunday friends. 

dear anonymous,

you raise a very good point.

why would i, who enjoys being single, wear a ring on my left hand-ring finger?


to which i say: i understand your confusion. it does look like my left-hand doesn't it? such is the trick of the mirror. ah, the mirror, you say! you missed that critical point. yup, it's my right hand. don't worry, many before you have been bested by the mirror's flip.

don't worry about it. it happens.

with mutual admiration,

meg

red capes.

i have this idea for a world in which we all wear our stories stitched into superman capes unfurled behind us--emblems of humanity.

i just think it might make understanding and loving and listening to everyone else a little easier.

and, let's be honest, it'd be super fun.

just a thought.

you know what i was thinking yesterday?

there is no scent--none in all the world--that i love more than a just-blown-out-birthday-candle.

yeah.
that's all.

sometimes, late at night, i don't want to go to bed.

because life is too short and life is too sweet and i could cry for all the moments missed.

a list.

i start shaking now--when something upsets me.
visibly.
it would be embarrassing but that it only happens in private.

my favorite pair of shoes cost a mere twenty-two dollars.
twenty-two dollars, i say!

the stress of (not) moving is giving way to thoughts of potted plants, easter brunches, and open windows.

i like to sleep with my feet hanging off the bed.
or diagonally.
depending on my mood.

there's nothing i like quite so much as climbing under the covers immediately following a bath.

speaking of lists, a friend recently listed all of my failed romantic ventures.
all together, on paper, they seem a bit laughable.
but they are mine and i claim them as such.

(and yes, my legs are so white they actually glow.
and i am not--i repeat--not ashamed).

a guide to a successful self-portrait session. (in the bathroom).

1. stop worrying about whether it's narcissistic. it is. move on.

2. pull out your bumpit. if your gonna engage the ego, might as well add a bit of whimsy.

3. choose a bathroom with strong lighting to wash out any flaws.

4. make sure the camera is in focus, even if you are not.

5. know that for every 10 photos you take there might be 1 good one. and that's a pretty successful ratio.

no, but in all seriousness, i joke about this and i take excessive amounts of bathroom shots because i actually have a tremendous fear of having my photo taken. darn that last vestige of ned. but i'm working on it. here's to the day when i won't need to ever employ the bathroom photo shoot again!

and since i'm feeling "in the answering questions mood": the lipstick worn in my other bathroom shoot was benefit lip stain in posietint.

this is just to say.

i drink pellegrino. with lemon if i can.

and i don't eat meat. if i can help it. for environmental reasons.

i'm never gonna choose a sushi place for a night out.

and i prefer the expensive cheese.

i understand there are choices i have made that others consider odd. elitist even.

choices that make me seem like a snob.

but they are my choices.

because at the end of the day i say bless you when someone sneezes.

i say please, and thank you.

and i always introduce my plate to the dishwasher.

i believe in honesty. even if i'm not always good at it. even if it's not always easy.

i believe there are ten million ways to pray. ten million ways to honor God.

i believe that i was raised by two of the best, most honorable people in the world.

and i believe they have instilled within me the skills to be a good person--the need to be a good person.

so, perhaps our beliefs are different. and perhaps the manner in which we live our lives occasionally refuses to align. but i will not apologize for who i am or the choices i have made.

call me elitist, call me snobbish. i refuse to shrink myself to some smaller, more palatable version that sits quietly at the dinner table and poses politely for the family portrait.

image via.

i hope i never think i know.

i want to live in a world where "i don't know" is the currency of choice.

where those three words are recognized as both a gift of humility and generosity.

where that admission is the open doorway, the body of water in which to dive and spin and swirl.

because there is the edge of the cliff. there is the fault-line of humanity.

those three words are prostration before God and the Spirit and the mountains and the rising of the sun each morning.

from there--from the i-don't-know--is life suddenly possible. plausible, even.

it is the heartbeat, the marrow in which to sink one's teeth.

this is just to swoon...

oh for a man with some deep-set eyes.

ice cream. not all good?

i tend to go through food phases.

and of late i've wanted nothing so much as ice cream.

but on friday night when my friend megan suggested too much ice cream was one of the causes of kidney stones, i took that little nugget of information for the gift that it was:

reason enough to lay off the mint chocolate chip. (for tonight at least).

cookie

it should be noted that i spent all night (yes, all night) attempting to make cookie monster cupcakes.

why, you ask?

as an i'll-see-you-in-three-months gift for little zoobie (my nineteen-month-old friend that i look after a few afternoons each week). she loves cuppycakes which shall here-to-for be called "happy-ahs" (derived from happy birthday, of course) and on top of that she is nuts for all the sesame street characters. most especially: elmo, abby, big bird (bia), and cookie (which she pronounces by simply grunting).

so yes, this one little happy-ah took me all night. hopefully, i'll get a few more turned out. but the others are downright terrifying. can you blame me? remember, i'm not particularly adept with frosting.

note: if you're confused as to why i won't see zoobie for three months it's because i'm off for some fresh-air in utah!

this is how it begins...

there are mornings that as i wake i feel a calling so strong to stretch out my toes before me. and i usually consent before my wits are fully formed to stop me.

the result is a short-lived charlie horse. and short-lived or not, it is painful.

i awoke to that. and the song eleanor rigby stuck in my head.

who knows what kind of day this will be?