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To Friendship, Old & New – Your Anchors

There’s something about being around friends who have known you since your adolescent days, even if you only see each other every month or so. These lifelong friends understand you like no other because they’ve experienced more with you than most would ever be able to fully understand. They’ve talked you off a ledge more times than you can count, stayed up nights in endless phone conversations and know when you do and don’t want to talk about whatever is bothering you. They might not know your day-to-day activities, but they know your core, and that’s something that will never change.

Then, there are your new friends, those that know your past only from what you’ve told them, but that experience your present with you. Even if it’s something as silly as walking in the opposite direction of where you’re headed to get late-afternoon lattes, or stopping by just to hand you a plate of food because you didn’t end up making it over for dinner the night before. Someone who texts you good morning and goodnight, and every minute in-between, because you can’t bear not speaking.

This weekend, I had the pleasure of hanging out with a good cross section of these such friends, from some of the oldest bonding over music (New Beard, look them up seriously, my friends are awesome), grilled cheese and memories, to the newest, late afternoon shopping/dinner, to others equally as important. I may not see everyone that I care about due to busy schedules or the mere fact that they have slipped away for the time being, but, if I’ve learned anything, it’s that these things are often temporary, and your true friends, the ones who can look into your eyes and see your sole, will always come back to you. They are your anchors.

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Meeting Diane Keaton

Last week, I attended the book launch for Diane Keaton’s new memoir, Let’s Just Say It Wasn’t Pretty, published by Random House, along with my friend Mei. The event was held at Barnes & Noble’s Union Square location and free with the purchase of her book (as most events held at B&N are), and there was a significant turnout.

There are few celebrities that I would get excited to meet (Julia Roberts, the original cast of 90210), and even fewer that I would purchase a memoir from (same answer), then there’s Diane Keaton. Having grown up watching many of her movies (okay, I must admit that I have yet to see The Godfather), and being of the opinion that she is an amazing actress, one of the greats, because, well, she is, I was thrilled to get the opportunity to not only see her in person, but actually meet her. And, it was awesome.

Before she even got to the stage and was announced, I saw her walking towards us. My friend and I had seats that were pretty close to the stage, but were asked to move last minute to make room for others and had chairs brought up to us on the side lines. This kind of obstructed our view a bit, but turned out to be the best move because when they started forming lines based on rows for Diane to sign her book, I ended up being the first one up there.

Diane Keaton was funny, smart and most of all, really sweet. And, while I hadn’t originally planned on doing anything with her book other than getting it signed, I might crack it open after all. Oh, and she had a black and white plaid mani of which I complimented her on.

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S J Watson’s Before I Go to Sleep

“My life…is built on quicksand. It shifts from one day to the next. Things I think I know are wrong, things I am certain of, facts about my life, myself, belong to years ago. All the history I have reads like fiction…they exist, but as shadows in the dark. As strangers, they crisscross my life, connecting, disconnecting. Elusive, ethereal. Like ghosts.”

How would you feel if every time you woke, your mind erased itself? You have no idea where you are or who’s sleeping next to you. You go to the bathroom and see pictures taped up to the wall and mirror, pictures of you with this other person, smiling and aging. It’s only then that you glance into the mirror and gasp because your appearance has changed so much that you almost don’t recognize yourself…until you look into your eyes and realize that it’s you. How would you feel?

For Christine, in S.J. Watson’s debut novel, Before I Go to Sleep, this is precisely the case. Suffering from a rare form of amnesia, she can retain memories in the span of a day, but once she goes to sleep they are lost and the next morning she has to go through the process of learning them all over again. Her memories are not completely gone though; sometimes they come back to her, and she writes them down. With the clock constantly running out, will Christine be able to reclaim her memories and her life for good, or will they forever be lost in the abyss of her mind?

In truly brilliant prose, Watson brings the reader into Christine’s mind as memories flood back to her and she tries to put the missing pieces of her life together in hopes of remembering what caused her amnesia in the first place. It makes you realize just how lonely and frustrating it would be to wake up every morning, day in and day out, and never know who you are, and despite those painful memories that you would wish you could forget, it is those memories that help define us, help make us who we are today, and without them, we would be lost, just like Christine.

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Amy Hatvany’s Safe With Me

In Amy Hatvany’s new novel, Safe With Me, published in March by Washington Square Press, she weaves a tale of abuse, loss and unconditional love through three distinct alternating narrations of two women and one teenager, who are connected long before they meet.

It had been nearly a year since Hannah Scott lost her daughter as she was biking out of their driveway and hit by a car. Since then, she threw herself into her work, opening up a second hair salon and moving into an apartment above it, trying to pick up the pieces when all the while she’s still devastated by it. It’s not until a new friend walks into her life (and her salon) with a connection to her daughter that she is finally able to face the situation and start healing.

Olivia Bell has lived her life in fear for a long time, fearful of her husband’s sometimes abusive tendencies, and fearful of her daughter Maddie’s struggling health, which, after an organ transplant a year earlier is finally improving enough that she can return to school. It is when Olivia picks Maddie up on her first day back in tears that she decides to make her daughter feel better…by taking her to the grand opening of a new hair salon in town. Little do they know that their trip to Hannah’s salon will change their lives forever.

At the heart of this novel lies the concept of the power of emotions and how strongly they can affect us, sometimes without us even knowing it. Hatvany makes us take a look at our own lives and relationships, past the ideals, past the rose-colored glasses, and allows us to see them for what they really are (were).

“We try on personalities like second skins, learning to present only the best versions of ourselves to the world, fearful of what might happen if we reveal just how imperfect and vulnerable we really are. But it’s these imperfections…these struggles, that truly connect us.”

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Below Freezing in the Spring

This morning I awoke to a cold apartment and my weatherman uttering the two words I never want to hear in the middle of April and (gasp) just mere days before my birthday: wind chill. With temperatures in the upper 70s this past weekend (at least in Connecticut they were), how could we go from contemplating a bikini to deciding whether or not to slip our feet back into the Uggs that have just been tucked into the back of our closets? The thought to me was unfathomable, especially since I’ve been browsing the internet (purchasing) in search of new flats and sundresses to add to my collection, daydreaming of the first days where I will once again be able to wear the light, airy frocks…because really, there is nothing in the world like them.

Instead, today, I forewent my Uggs and scarf (I would rather freeze that wear either again this season), donning a sweater and my lightest wool coat before frowning in the mirror and stepping out of the house, having the good sense to grab a hat at the last minute. As I was walking outside, I saw the telltale sign that winter had indeed come back even if just for the next couple of days and frowned at the traces of snow covering bits of grass and cars. I pulled my hat on, stiffened my shoulders and shoved my hands in my pockets, longing for the warm air to return.

But, not to fret. We will reach the 60s by Friday just in time for my birthday weekend!

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F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Beautiful & Damned

First published by Scribner in 1922, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Beautiful and Damned is a story about love, hope and dreams, and what happens when relationships unravel, hope fades, and dreams come true only after you’ve hit your breaking point and therefore can no longer appreciate them. Thought to be based in part on Fitzgerald’s life with Zelda, the novel follows the lives of Anthony Patch and his wife, the beautiful Gloria Gilbert – socialites that inevitably fall from grace because they’re too focused on seeking out the pleasures of life without any of the responsibilities.

In a book review for the New York Times by Louise Maunsell Field in 1922, she writes that, “its slow-moving narrative is the record of lives utterly worthless utterly futile. Not one of the book’s main characters…ever rises to the level of decent humanity.” In many ways, Field was not wrong. When we first meet the novel’s main protagonist, Anthony Patch, he is self-absorbed and living in a small apartment with a servant who comes in in the morning to clean and make Anthony breakfast. He has no profession, choosing to avoid the work-force altogether, but lives under the façade that he is trying to write the next American novel. He spends much of his time socializing with friends and women, accepting an allowance from his grandfather, the wealthy Adam Patch, while waiting for him to die so that he can inherit his fortune.

Anthony’s life doesn’t change that much after he meets and marries Gloria Gilbert because Gloria is the same way as him, wanting to spend her life as leisurely and full of excitement as possible. Much of the novel’s focus is on the parties that Gloria and Anthony host at their apartment in the city and “little gray house” upstate. These parties comprised of endless streams of people drinking excessively for days at a time. We watch Gloria and Anthony go deeper and deeper into debt, selling off bonds like water and downsizing places of residence numerous times. When Adam Patch dies and they learn that they were left with nothing in the will, a length legal battle ensures, but it is not until Anthony is dragged to the brink of insanity that there is a resolution. Their life of leisure and wealth resumes, but it does so at the cost of everything else.

In a way, The Beautiful and Damned can be looked at as a tale of morality. How, having all the money in the world doesn’t matter if you lose your own soul to get it, and how a life of leisure doesn’t necessarily bring about happiness or excitement. What really matters in life is the quality of it and the people who you choose to surround yourself with…a lesson that Gloria and Anthony never learned. This may not have been Fitzgerald’s most exciting book (it was a bit mundane), but his brilliant writing is there.

“After a few tastes of this latter dish I had had enough. Here! I said, Experience is not worth the getting. It’s not a thing that happens pleasantly to a passive you – it’s a wall that an active you runs up against. So I wrapped myself in what I thought was my invulnerable skepticism and decided that my education was complete. But it was too late. Protect myself as I might by making no new ties with tragic and predestined humanity, I was lost with the rest. I had traded the fight against love for the fight against loneliness, the fight against life for the fight against death.”

-F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Beautiful and Damned

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How I Met Your Mother – Last Forever

This morning, after a jaw-dropping/breath-stopping/tear-inducing series finale of one of my favorite shows, I awoke with the same mixed feelings as I had gone to bed with. Did they really just end HIMYM like that? Is that all we get? Part of me likes the way the series ended, after all, Ted does end up with the love of his life, and isn’t that what the story was all about? But there’s another part of me that feels cheated by the whole thing. With the exception of Marshall’s becoming a judge, everything that I thought I knew about the show, everything that I was made to believe about its characters, turned out to anything other than what I had expected. Okay, maybe that was a slight exaggeration on my part, but only a slight one.

For me, there were three major shocks ( disappointments?) and a bunch of little ones, the first major one being that Barney (Neil Patrick Harris) and Robin (Cobie Smulders) end up divorcing after three years of marriage. We all knew that Robin would eventually become a big-time reporter, and for the past few seasons we all knew that Barney and Robin were going to get married (this last season was devoted completely to it!), but from the way the story had been going it seemed like Robin was the only woman who could make Barney want to be a better man. In his wedding vows, he promised never to lie to her – knowing Barney’s character that could have been the most important thing that he ever said on the show…until he ended up slipping back into his old womanizing ways (post-divorce), having a “perfect month,” and becoming a father. Yes, Barney becomes a father, and it takes the first time that he holds his daughter for him to really commit to someone. Looking back, one would never have thought that his is how Barney would have ended up, but he did always secretly love babies, and he slept with enough women to make you think why hasn’t this happened yet, so I guess it wasn’t that far-fetched. Robin, on the other hand, distances herself from the gang, missing important milestones, and throws herself into her work. I was team Robin and Barney all the way, so for their story to end this way makes me a little sad, but, as I said before, it was one of three shocks for me.

The second major shock – and perhaps the most controversial – is that the mother dies. She dies. In fact, from the very first time that we see future Ted (Josh Radner) sit his children down to tell them the story of how he met their mother, she was already dead. For. Six. Years. That’s right. We see little glimpses of their life together, finding out that, even though Ted does propose to the mother (Christin Milioti), it takes seven years and two kids before they walk down the aisle. They really are perfect together, right down to their meeting under that yellow umbrella at the Far Hampton train station – the one that we had all been waiting nine years to witness, and it was every bit as amazing as I thought it would be…but she dies. As soon as I saw the scene with her in a hospital bed, and future Ted talking about her illness (we never find out what exactly was wrong with her), I knew that she was not the one that Ted ends up with. This is where the part of me that feels cheated comes in, because the whole series is about Ted’s journey to find the perfect woman, the mother of his children, the person he will grow old with. We waited so long to see it happen – knowing that it would happen – and then it does, but in the blink of an eye it’s gone, and that kinda broke my heart a little bit.

The third major shock is that Ted and Robin end up together. In the final moments of the show, Ted shows up at Robin’s place with the blue French horn (its back!), and while I wasn’t too keen on the Ted and Robin storyline (I am team Robin and Barney), I did love the idea of bringing the blue French horn back – it was a fitting way for them to get back together. We all know that throughout the series, Ted has struggled on-and-off with his feelings for Robin, but she didn’t always feel the same way back, so it was never in my head that they would end up together and felt a little like a cop-out, especially since the writers had known that this was going to be the outcome all along.

I think Emil Yahr said it best. In her blog for the Washington Post in regards to the HIMYM finale, she writes that “it’s not really about the destination, it’s the journey to get there.” And perhaps she is right. This was not the long awaited ending that fans were looking for, but maybe it could in fact be the best one after all.

Final thought, I really like the title of the episode, “Last Forever.” I could write an entire blog on it, because really, it could be applied to each of the characters individually, but in the matter of Ted, Robin did turn out to be his “last forever.”

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Makeup & Skin Care Loyalties – Old & New

Those of you that know me, know that I have two go-to brands when it comes to makeup and skincare, the Body Shop (of which I’ve talked extensively) and Dior, but recently, I’ve started to add a third brand to the mix.

My love for the Body Shop stems from a random trip to the mall out in Huntington a few years back. I can’t quite recall what drew me in, but once I was there, I never wanted to leave. My first purchases were eye shadows, lip-glosses, bronzers, etc, and of course body butter (to name a few). I became obsessed with how soft the makeup was, and that’s when I went to their website and started reading about the company and found out how amazing it was. First, they are against animal testing of any kind – they neither test the ingredients nor the finished products – and even received a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009 by RSPCA because of this. Also, instead of going to China for ingredients and production (China has a policy where everything is tested on animals), they have a community fair trade program where they employ people in third-world countries, using ingredients from there and therefore encouraging growth in these locations.

Aside from the makeup (tons of makeup) that I get from the Body Shop, there are three products that I cannot live without. The Seaweed Iconic Clay Mask (which I have written about here) is amazing and always leaves my skin soft, youthful and glowing. The Vitamin C Radiance Capsules – an end of the summer discovery that I use as a boost under my moisturizer – also leaves my face unbelievably soft. And lastly, the Brazil Nut Shower Cream which smells like heaven.

My love for Dior started years ago with my first purchase of Diorshow mascara (it really is the best), and then from a trip to Sephora, where I got a sample of Dior’s Sorbet Eye Crème from their Hydro Life collection, which uses three flower extracts to help defy aging. Right away I noticed the difference under my eyes, the dark circles were less visible and they were less puffy. This of course made me decide to try their Sorbet Crème for the face. These easily became staples of mine for two reasons: one, because I love the texture of the sorbet crème, and two, because the formula is light-weight (not greasy), but still leaves my skin hydrated. I also use their Gentle Foam Cleanser and Toning Lotion.

A few weeks ago I made my newest Dior discovery. I was in need of an eye sorbet replenishment, so I walked over to the Dior section in Sephora and decided to peruse it. The eye makeup remover that I had been using sometimes burned my eyes, so I wanted to see if they had a product that was better, and I found it. I’ve always hated the fact that, makeup removers are usually packaged as for the face or for the eyes, and it is a rare treat to find a product that is meant to do both. So, of course when I saw Dior’s Instant Cleansing Water, I thought that it was too good to be true, but, I am happy to say that that is not the case. It is truly amazing. Not only does it remove all of my makeup, but it leaves my face feeling soft, and, perhaps more importantly, doesn’t burn my eyes. If you try nothing else, make sure to try this, because it really is worth it.

My newest brand obsession began over the summer when I purchased Bobbi Brown’s limited edition Navy & Nude palette. I really loved the subtlety of the nude shades, and also the use of navy as an eye liner instead of my usual midnight grey (almost black) look. Recently though, I had been getting a bit bored of my look. Not necessarily that I wanted more color, just something different. So, last Wednesday, as I found myself at Grand Central with some time to kill before boarding my Metro North train, I stepped into the Bobbi Brown pop-up shop and perused the lipstick options. After trying on three different ones of which I was not completely satisfied, I ended up trying on the color that the makeup artist was wearing. The base was their Sheer Lip Color in cherry pink, and the top was their Lip Gloss in baby pink. I ended up purchasing both. Two days later I was back and looking for new eye shadows, and although I did not make this purchase at the Bobbi Brown pop-up (I actually made this purchase at Sephora while shopping with a friend), I did spot them there. I ended up with a very dark brown (almost black) called Rich Caviar, and Champagne Quartz, the perfect champagne color with just the smallest hint of pink.

And while I plan on keeping my current loyalties to the Body Shop and Dior intact, I see another trip to the Bobbi Brown pop-up in the very near future. What new products will I purchase? Stay tuned!

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The Life & Death of It All

It’s been a while since I’ve heard anyone utter that expression, but due to recent events in my life, this popped into my head this morning. I am reminded of a scene from the finale of Dawson’s Creek (yes, I was a fan back in the day), where, to paraphrase, Dawson says that the opposite of life isn’t death, that life has no opposite.

It has been a long time since that show aired, but that line has stuck with me through the years, mainly because of how true it is. Birth is the opposite of death because birth is the beginning of something and death the end, but life…life is existing. Can there be a true opposite to that? I don’t think that there is, and I think that that is a thought that is overlooked more often than not. Many people go through life without a care in the world, ignorant of the very real fact that they are on a once-in-a-lifetime journey, because when life ends, that’s it. There are no second chances or do-overs. It’s just over. Then there are others who strive to make a name for themselves, to leave a legacy, but they have it all wrong too. These people are so wrapped up in leaving something behind that they, too, are ignorant in the rarity that is life, and therefore miss out on the little things, which, as we know, really are what make up one’s life. Not that there is anything wrong with living either of those ways, it’s just that often times a person’s life isn’t really appreciated until circumstances threaten its very existence. And it shouldn’t be that way.

We tend to obsess over the little things that really have no significance, something of which I am definitely guilty of. But, I often find that while I am obsessing, something big or traumatic happens to someone that I care about which always forces me to take a step back and reexamine my life, and brings me to the realization that all of my obsessing is just wasting time that should be spent doing/thinking about other things. That, if I put as much effort into my life and my relationships as I do obsessing, I would be leading a much fuller life and, hopefully, not missing out on the things that truly matter.

Right now, in the midst of a life or death situation of someone that I truly care about, I sit back and think about everything that I thought was important, people who I once thought would be with me forever but have faded away, and I realize that, while some of these people I do miss, the only thing that matters is right now: this minute. And that everything else just isn’t as important as I once thought. That the only thing to do is to live in the present, because everything else just isn’t living….

Life has no opposite; life is existing.

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Winter Inadequacies & Traveling

After a late, wine-infused evening of great conversation with a new friend (a weekly tradition in the making), I woke up this morning to a world of more white than when I had gone to bed – if that is even possible. I quickly got dressed, threw on my rain-boots, and headed outside to shovel out the car. Seeing as how I am not normally in possession of a car, I also am not in possession of a shovel. I know, how can you live in NYC without a shovel, well I have been in my apartment for close to eight years and I have never needed one because my landlord always shovels me out…eventually. Ah, the perks of living in a private house. So, having a deficit in the winter-gear department, I grabbed the closest thing I had that resembled a shovel: a dust pan. Yes. I am that girl. I shoveled the car out this morning with a dustpan…and no gloves: a winning combination that left my hands red and raw. I am not proud of this moment; however, it is definitely something that I am going to laugh about in the not too distant future…like perhaps tomorrow or Friday after I have gotten rid of the last of the snow.

When I finished, I went back insides to warm up for a few minutes before my trek to the bus stop, but unfortunately it doesn’t end there. Not only did my bus end up being twenty minutes late, but it also broke down and I had to wait another large chunk of time to get onto the next one. Thankfully, my ride on the subway was fine, but right after I got off at Grand Central they stopped the 7-line from coming into the city because of a fire.

On the bright side, I was able to get my latte with no problems as there was surprisingly no line at Starbucks…hopefully my commute home won’t be so bad. I am sooo looking forward to my day of yoga, beauty and shopping on Friday 😁.

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