any ideas?

i know new york can seem terribly glamorous. but sometimes it's just terrible.

last night i took a subway train strait out of dante's seventh circle of hell. i'm not kidding. i've never met nastier new yorker's in all my life. selfish, profane, and unforgiving. 

and then a taxi-cab driver yelled at me tonight. for no reason. i know it was his own stuff, but whoa...he was cruel. 

this is all my way of saying...

i'm now fielding offers for alternative locals...

any ideas?

paris, san fran, chicago?

and if anyone could offer me a job on top of that--well, that would be great!

yum yum

i've eaten two apples this week.

this is a really big deal for me.

i don't really like apples. but i'm learning to love them.

take that ned.

confused as to who ned is? i know, me too, but this might help.

here's to taza

naomi at rockstar diaries has been doing some captivating features, asking people to list ten things that make them happy--and in turn getting us to think about the little things.

she emailed me. and you know how when the president calls, you answer?

that's what it felt like.

find my list here.

but. i'd like to add...

pasta strainers

lint rollers

pantaloons

pumpkin rigatoni 

and

naomi

ps: remember this list? well, im checking one off tonight. but i'm not telling--you'll have to guess!

love after love

I've just begun The Time Traveler's Wife (apologies, apologies to Krysta who advised against this book) and as of now I'm totally confused. 

But...

Just before the dedication page there is a poem by Derek Walcott. And I had to share it...

LOVE AFTER LOVE

The time will come

when, with elation,

you will greet yourself arriving

at your own door, in your own mirror,

and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.

You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored

for another, who knows you by heart.

Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,

peel your own image from the mirror.

Sit. Feast on your life.

Isn't that perfect? Isn't that exactly what everything is all about?

image at fffound quoted by Oh Joy 

in a corner of nyc in 1949...

after a lovely dinner thai dinner, with my friend angela, that ended in a search for mr. softie ice cream--i sauntered over to the bookstore to troll the aisles in search of some of your suggestions

i ended up getting The Time traveler's Wife because i was told that it's wildly sexy (and because it was a today show book club selection--and since i stood in line behind matt lauer at the ice cream shop yesterday--i took it as a sign)

after passing up countless books that i could have snatched up in a second if it weren't for my tight purse strings, i ended up in the postcard section

years ago, when i first became a wee bit sad my general practitioner sent me to a fantastic life coach in houston. life coaches focus not on the root of the problem but rather what can be done to improve your life immediately--little things: making lists and collages, identifying what makes you happy, and so on and so forth

one of the things this life coach asked me to do was cut out pictures from magazines that in some way lit a fire under me...well i'm doing this again. now.

above my work desk (in the corner of my bedroom) i'm gluing images right onto the wall. blogs are veritable treasure troves of delicious images so that's where most have come from.

but tonight, in the postcard section, this one struck me:

i flipped it over.

"Tanaquil Le Clercq, Donald Windham, Buffie Johnson, Tennessee Williams and Gore Vidal at Cafe Nicholson, NYC, 1949. Photograph by Karl Bissinger"

holy smokes. 

the quintessential Balanchine dancer, the pioneer of female painters, and three of the greatest, most prolific American writers. ever.

you think gatherings like this still happen anywhere? i sure hope so.

it's going up on the wall. now.