friends

The World According To Horrible Bonnie

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*Below is a recent essay by Anne Lamont. I love her writing. A lot.  And I think this piece is one of her best, or at least it pierced the hard candy shell that sometimes surrounds my heart and got into the chewy, caramel center.

I love that she reminds us that words can be dangerous, they can gut someone faster and more efficiently than the sharpest Ginsu knife. Let’s all be careful with that.

And Horrible Bonnie.  God I love that!

Can I be your Horrible Janet you guys?  Reminding us ALL that everybody gets to be free?

Anyway…I though this would be a great piece to start your week.  ‘Cause I love ya!

Carry On,

xoxJ

 

 

“Nearly twenty years ago, I arrived at a fancy writer’s conference, in what were some of America’s most majestic mountains, where I was looking forward to meeting a great (and sexy) American director, who’d given a lecture the day before. But he had already left.

 

There was, however, a letter from him, to me: to not-all-that-well-known me. It began well enough, with praise for Bird by Bird, and gratitude for how many times it had inspired him when he got stuck while writing screenplays. He singled out my insistence on trying to seek and tell the truth, whether in memoir or fiction, and my belief that experiencing grief and fear were the way home. The way to an awakening. That God is the Really Real, as the ancient Greeks believed. And God is Love. That tears were not to be suppressed, but would, if expressed, heal us, cleanse up, baptize us, help us water the seeds of new life that were in the ground at our feet.
Coming from a world-famous director, it felt like the New York Glitterati was stamping its FDA seal of approval on me, and my work.

Unfortunately, the letter continued.

He wrote that while he had looked forward to meeting me, he’d gathered from reading my work that many of my closest friends and family members seemed to have met with traumatic life situations, and sometimes early deaths. So basically, he was getting out of Dodge before I got my tragedy juju all over him, too.

I felt mortified, exposed. He made it seem like I was a sorrow-mongerer, that instead of being present for family and friends who had cancer or sick kids or great losses, I was chasing them down.
And I flushed in that full body Niacin-flush way of toxic shame, at being put down by a man of power, that had been both the earliest, and now most recent, experiences of soul-death throughout my life.
My clingy child was drawing beside me, What did I do? You can’t use your child as a fix, like a junkie. That’s abuse; plus it won’t work.

Well, duh–I fell apart, on the inside, like a two dollar watch.

I had stopped drinking nearly 15 years before, stopped the bulimia 14 years earlier, and so did not have many reliable ways to stuff feelings back down. Also, horribly, my young child, two thousand miles from home, upon noticing my pain, clung even more tightly. I wanted to shout at him, “Don’t you have any other friends?”

What I did was the only thing that has ever worked. After finding a safe and stable person to draw with my son, I called someone and told her all my terrible fears and feelings and projections and secrets.
It was my mentor, Horrible Bonnie.

She listens.

She believes that we are here to become profoundly real, and therefore, free. But horribly–hence her name–she insists that if we want to be free, we have to let every body be free. I hate and resent this so much. It means we have to let the people in our families and galaxies be free to be asshats, if that is how they choose to live.

This however, does not mean we have to have lunch with them. Or go on vacation with them again. But we do have to let them be free.
She also knows, and said that day, that Real can be a nightmare in this world that is so false. The pain and exhaustion of becoming real can land you in the an abyss. And abysses are definitely abysmal; dark nights of the soul; the bottom an addict hits.
And this, she said, was just a new bottom, around people-pleasing, and the craving for powerful fancy people to approve of me. It was a bottom around my psycho doing-ness, my achieving-ness.
She said that because I felt traumatized, and that there had been so much trauma in my childhood, and so many losses in the ensuing years, that the future looked like trauma to me.

But it wasn’t the truth!

There was a long silence. (Again: she listens.)
Finally, I said in this tiny child’s voice, “It isn’t?”
Oh, no, she said. The future, as with every bottom I have landed at, and been walked through, would bring great spiritual increase.
She said I had as much joy and laughter and presence as anyone she knew and some of this had to do with the bottoms I’d experienced, the dark nights of the soul that god and my pit crew had accompanied me through. The alcoholism, scary men, etc.
She said that what I thought the director had revealed was that I am kind of pathetic, but actually what I was getting to see, with her, and later, when I picked up my luscious clingy child, in the most gorgeous mountains on earth, was that I was a real person of huge heart, laughter, feelings and truth. And his was the greatest gift of all.

The blessing was that again and again, over the years, we got to completely change the script. Thank God. We got to re-invent ourselves, again.

But where do we even start with such terrible days and revelations? She said I’d started when I picked up the 300-pound phone, told someone the truth, felt my terrible feelings. Now, time for radical self-care. A shower, some food, the blouse I felt prettiest in. Then I could go get my boy and we could explore the mountain streams.

Wow. We think when we finally get our ducks in a row, we’ve arrived. Now we’ll be happy! That’s what they taught us, and what we’ve sought. But the ducks are bad ducks, and do not agree to stay in a row, and they waddle off quacking, and one keels over, two males get in a fight, and babies are born. Where does that leave your nice row?

I got about five books out of the insights I gleaned from our talk. I still have a sort-of heart-shaped rock my son fished out of a stream later. Sadly, this director’s movies have not done well in the last twenty years. Not a one. And all of his hair has since fallen out. Now, as a Christian, my first response to this is, “Hah hah hah.”

But Horrible Bonnie would say, Now you get to tell it, because then it will become medicine. Tell it, girl– that we evolve; that life is stunning, wild, gorgeous, weird, brutal, hilarious and full of grace. That our parents were a bit insane, and that healing from this is taking a little bit longer than we had hoped. Tell it. Well…okay. Yes.”
-Anne Lamott

Compliments Tourettes

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I had coffee with a friend this week and she mentioned the blog, Hala! and God bless her.

She was particularly triggered by the post I wrote about paying people compliments, and the fact that we can be pretty stingy with our admiration.

“You know why I don’t get compliments?” she asked me, apparently not expecting an answer because she didn’t let me get a word in edgewise.

“Because I deflect them. I’m like a superhero with a shield. They make me so Goddamn uncomfortable that my face and chest get bright red, and I either start laughing or I tell the person to shut up.”

Did I hear that right? I’d seen her blush, maybe even giggle, but the shut up part…
She could tell by the expression on my face that her statement needed further explanation.

“I just did it the other day, the guy at the car wash complimented my choice of vehicle and I ran away. Like a nine-year old. But before I did, I told him to shut up. It was like a reflex, a hit and run, I just blurted it out…Shut Up!” she was clearly mortified, but on a roll.

“Hey, you have nice eyes. Shut up! Fuck you, Perv!”
Now she was acting it out, with hand gestures and everything.

“Nice job on that report. Shut up! Asshole! Raise your bar! You need higher standards!

Oh My God whats wrong with me? It’s like I have Compliments Tourette’s.”

We were both laughing, yet at the same time I realized that what she does is more common than we’d all like to admit.

Why can’t we take a compliment gracefully? The key word here being: grace.

I used to be terrible at it too. I’d look at my feet and mumble a very insincere thank you, when all I wanted was for the perpetrator of the abomination to disappear. Insecurity I suppose. Feeling unworthy? You betcha.

Back in the day, people used to compliment me on my big, white teeth, (now thanks to Crest White Strips they are a dime dozen) and it made me cringe. I had done NOTHING whatsoever to earn those teeth. Okay, maybe worn braces and brushed, but honestly, they were just the luck of the draw. Like winning at Poker. So it never felt like it was right to say thank you.
Now I do. I jump at the chance. Sure, God and my parents gave me great teeth, but I’ve maintained them and appreciated them EVERYDAY. Plus after fifty you’re just so grateful when someone says anything without prefacing it with Ma’am.

These days I also chase that good feeling you get when you give a compliment.
Like an addict with a drug.
I give out compliments like Tic Tacs. Because people deserve them. AND it gets me high.
Just saying’.

“Oh but wait” she warned, holding her palm up to face me, “It gets worse. If you don’t hate me already, you will after this!”

“Well Okay – Don’t leave a sister hanging – spill it!” I was playing along with her game of ‘true confessions’.

“I don’t pay ANYONE a compliment, doesn’t matter what they did, even if I’m thinking it, I don’t say it because I want to save them the humiliation that I feel.
That’s fucked up…right?”

I wouldn’t dare judge her. That made perfect sense to me and it actually possessed more altruistic overtones than not wanting to make a fool of yourself, which was the most common reason I used to come up with for not complimenting the people who deserved them.

We had a laugh and a damn good cup of coffee. But it really got me to thinking…

What do you guys think about this?
Are you like my friend? Is it all just too humiliating for words?
Does that humiliation override how good it feels to give or get a compliment? Or have you become so grateful, like me, when someone throws one your way that you can’t say thank you fast enough?
Have you developed grace or are you still searching for it, like my friend? How did it happen for you?

I’m curious. Tell me in the comments.

xox

Be Proud You Crazy Snowflake

Be Proud You Crazy Snowflakes!

*A reader remembered this and requested a re-post and I’m always happy to oblige.

If you can believe it, and I know you can – I had a dream last night about being a snowflake.
I was with all the other snowflakes, waiting in line to fall to earth.

It was very noisy, because us snowflakes are a chatty bunch.
We have to get it all out before we jump. 
All the gossip the complaining and the bad snowflake jokes,(and trust me, they are the worst), because after we leave the cloud – we are required to remain silent.

Everyone was laughing, chewing gum and eating Red Vines, as snowflakes do. Man! there was a lot of excitement in the air.

What I can remember the most, is looking around and admiring, well, really, I was envying everyone else’s designs.
There was such a display of creativity and individuality that it blew my little snowflake mind!

Every flake seemed to be showing their best crystals.
One was really pointed, with great right angles, and deep cuts.
Another had more rounded edges, with huge cut out sections.
(Someone had obviously been running with scissors).

But what I noticed above all else, was that the designs matched their personalities perfectly.

The outside totally matched what was inside.

What strikes me now, as I’m thinking about it, was that I was unable to see MY design. I could not get a glimpse of myself.
There are apparently no full length mirrors at that point in line.

As I looked for a shiny surface, to catch my reflection; I began to notice I was being looked at with the same degree of admiration by the other flakes – but of course, even though I had no idea what they saw, I liked THEIR designs better than my own.

I wanted to go back to the “snowflake drawing board” and make just a couple of revisions. I had been inspired. No one told me we could make a nip there, or a tuck there.

I had no idea we could be as bold as what I was observing around me.

As I got closer to the front of the line, I suddenly had this realization:

I WAS special,
I had done this many times,
I had fallen as rain,
I had pelted the earth as hail and sleet,
But now, HA! I got to be creative – I got to be a snowflake!

One of a kind – sparkling, crystalline, and magnificent!


All of the sudden there was a hush, we all became more present and very serious. Everybody ditched their gum under a table, gave each other big hugs, making sure not to smear our sparkles, and with a minimum of fanfare, but filled with great pride,

…We jumped. Look for me!

Merry Christmas Loves,

Xox

A Not-So-Cool Rampage Of Appreciation

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I’m kinda loving life right now, and I’m proudly, and publicly unapologetic.

Nothin’ special happened.

Maybe it’s the time of year, or a string of good hair days – I’m not sure. All I can tell you is that although it appears as if the entire world has gone to hell in a hand basket…life is good.

And it’s good for you too – really.

Every morning the sun comes up and gives us another chance. Another day to make things right, to make a difference, to love and be loved. I’m sorry. I know it’s not hip to think so; but that’s fucking AWESOME.

Here are just a few of the things that fill me with appreciation.

My health

My hubby (he’s a saint)

I’m at a quandary here, I don’t want to put my beloved dogs before my husband, or after my family…they ARE family, so..
My family (which includes my dogs)

My amazing friends (old and new)

Writing (non-fiction, fiction, essays, the whole caboodle)

My morning walks and hikes with Sally (some of them, the ones that don’t hurt)

Christmas carols (belongs in my Hall of Fame)

Diamonds (they are my best friends)

The fact that I live in Los Angles California, USA.

The fact that I can write this blog without fear of reprisals or repercussions (except maybe occasional embarrassment)

Chocolate (I know it’s high on the list, don’t judge)

Our motorcycle trips

Being inspired (by people, what I read or see or taste or…)

Singing (Karaoke with Orna)

Coffee

The smell of Christmas trees, pine scented anything

Driftwood

Laughing, humor, being silly

False eyelashes (I’m obsessed)

Airplane travel – all travel really

Red nail polish, well…all nail polish

Movies (at the theatre, I love the surround sound and the big screen)

Rainy days

Fires in the fireplace

Hummingbird nests

The color blue

Peanut butter (chunky of course)

Lazy Sunday afternoons reading (just a memory these days)

My garden (nature in general)

White twinkle lights

Tears of joy

The smell in the house on Thanksgiving or any time Raphael cooks

I’d love you to share some of yours! Come on! Be as un-cool as me!

Xox

“IF I CAN’T GET OUT – NOBODY IS GETTING OUT!”

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Hi Loves,
Have you been feeling held back lately? – dragged back down by the ankles?
Or… are you holding somebody back?
Read this short essay by Liz Gilbert about her insights, and those of Rob Bell. This is by far the best explanation of the crab bucket analogy that I’ve read.
xox

Take it away guys!

THE CRAB BUCKET

Dear Ones –

A few months ago, I was on stage with Rob Bell — minister, teacher, family man, great guy — and a woman in the audience asked him this question:

“I’m making all these important changes in my life, and I’m growing in so many new and exciting ways, but my family is resisting me, and I feel like their resistance is holding me back. They seem threatened by my evolution as a person, and I don’t know what to do about it.”

Rob said, “Well, of course they’re threatened by your evolution as a person. You’re disrupting their entire world view. Remember that a family is basically just a big crab bucket — whenever one of the crabs climbs out and tries to escape, the other crabs will grab hold of him and pull him back down.”

Which I thought was a VERY unexpected comment to come from a minister and a family man!

Rob surprised me even more, though, as he went on to say, “Families are institutions — just like a church, just like the army, just like a government. Their sense of their own stability depends upon keeping people in their correct place. Even if that stability is based on dysfunction or oppression. When you move out of your ‘correct place’ you threaten their sense of order, and they may very likely try to pull you back down.”

And sometimes, in our loyalty to family (or in our misplaced loyalty to the dysfunction that we are accustomed to) we might willingly surrender and sacrifice our own growth, in order to not disrupt the family — and we will stay down in that crab bucket forever.

Friend groups can do this to each other, too. My friend Rayya Elias was a heroin addict for many years, and she saw the same phenomenon at play with her friends in the drug world: One junkie would try to get clean, and the others would instantly pull her back down into addiction again. I’ve seen it happen, too, when friends try to sabotage another friend’s efforts to lose weight, or quit smoking, or stop drinking, or get in shape. (The mentality being: “If I can’t out of this crab bucket, NOBODY is getting out of this crab bucket.”)

When I first got published, I was working as a bartender, and when I shared my happy news with co-workers, one of the managers said, in real anger, “Don’t you DARE go be successful on us. That was not the agreement.” (And, silently, I was like: “The agreement? What agreement?”) That person never forgave me, actually, for aspiring to climb out of that crab bucket.

Not every family (or family-like grouping) is like this, of course. Some families encourage their members not just to climb, but to soar, and sometimes even to fly away. That is true grace — to want somebody to grow, even if it means that they might outgrow you.

But others will try with all their might to hold you back, to pull you down into the crab bucket again and again.

If that is happening in your life, you must identify it and resist it.

Don’t let them stop you from growing.

As Rob Bell said beautifully: “If people love you, they will want you to grow. If somebody doesn’t want you to grow, you can call their feelings about you by many names…but you cannot call it love. You can call it fear, you can call it anger, you can call it control issues, you can call it resentment…but nobody has ever held anyone back because of love.”

Dear Ones, if it’s time for you to grow, you have to grow.

If it’s time for you to change, you have to change.

If it’s time for you to move, you have to move.

If it’s time for you to finally crawl out of that crab bucket, start crawling.

Holding yourself back in order to make other people happy will not serve you, and — ultimately — it will not serve them, either.

Be loving, be compassionate, be gracious, be forgiving. But if it’s time to be gone, be gone.

(And needless to say, if you are the crab at the bottom of a bucket who is holding another crab back from escape, it might be time to summon up all your love and all your courage and gently, generously, LET GO. It won’t be easy, but it might be the most important thing you ever do.)

ONWARD,
LG

Death of A Friendship – A Cautionary Tale

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And there she stood, hands braced on either side of the bathroom sink, gazing at her reflection in the mirror, feeling…smug satisfaction. She looked goooood.

She’d totally nailed it. The evening, the party, a good hair day—and her introduction to HIM.

She smiled at the thought and that’s when it suddenly became clear to her—crystal clear.

As close as she claimed to be, as much history as they had shared, after all of their years together – she was NO friend of hers—because there, in the mirror, staring back at her, was the biggest piece of spinach – lodged between her two front teeth. It was a piece of greenery so large, it could be seen from space, and she had let her circulate, and smile, and flirt without alerting her to this fact.

That’s right, she was not a friend; because friends don’t let their friends talk to HIM with spinach in their teeth.

Ladies, am I right?

You Have A Good Saturday!
Xox

Pound Cake, Complaints And Coffee

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I heard this story recently, about a woman who went home for the holidays.

Don’t twitch with anxiety, this isn’t about family hijinks – it’s about worthiness.

While she was in Ohio, Illinois or Iowa, you know – the cradle of civilization for transplanted Californians – she met with friends who were also there serving their sentence – I mean visiting family.

Inside one of those knotty pine kitchens with the avocado appliances, we all know the ones, they haven’t been touched since 1970; they all sat around the table catching up. Life it seems, had been good to this cross-section of her friends. They had kids in college, long-standing careers, minimal health issues, at least one living parent, and all their teeth; yet, the entire first hour was a bitch session.

It was as if the Complaining Olympics had come to town. She got so caught up in it, hoping to at least medal, (she could picture herself atop the podium, National Anthem playing) that she embellished her story about a car insurance claim gone south.
In actuality she had a pretty good life, would they judge her for it if she just said so?

Meanwhile, the host made a pot of coffee in a percolator, and cut up a Sara Lee pound cake to give them just the right amount of caffeine and sugar to maintain their energy – in order to keep the complaints coming.

It was the house he’d lived in since he was four, a two-story colonial, which since his mom had passed was occupied solely by his dad, who by all accounts continued to be robust and health -– but apparently clumsy as shit.

“Sorry guys, I can’t find any cups that match” he said sounding embarrassed as he laid out the cake with a selection of several random cups.

There was a mug from the local University, a flowered porcelain teacup with a tiny chip on the rim, a green Pottery Barn ceramic mug that looked as if it had once been part of a set, a plain, clear, glass cup, a tall, white, fancy looking cup that was fluted and flared at the top, and a large styrofoam cup from a stack on top of the fridge.

He, being the gracious host he was, poured his coffee into the styrofoam cup, everyone else jockeyed around, silently sizing up the remaining cups.

The one friend, a mom with five kids, took the plain glass one, handing the nice white one to her friend the attorney. “Oh, that’s too nice” her friend said, putting it back on the table, taking the dainty teacup even after she noticed the chip.

One of the guys took the college mug, after picking up the green cup from the set, and putting it back. After the other two got their cake, deferring the cup choice until everyone else had picked, one grabbed the Pottery Barn mug and the other reached up and got a styrofoam cup off the pile on the fridge.

No one chose the nice, white cup.

She was sure no one else noticed, but she did.

It was so interesting for her to observe what cups people chose.
It was like a small social experiment. Everyone left the fanciest cup for the other guy, until it stood alone, un chosen.

One of the men would rather drink from styrofoam than a fancy white cup. One of the women put it back and chose one with a chip.

What was all that about?

Worthiness. Apparently no one felt they deserved the nice cup.

Now, I’m gonna level a HUGE generalization here – that is SO Midwest.

If this little kitchen scene had taken place in LA – people would have pushed each other down to get the nicest cup; the chipped teacup would have been thrown in the trash, “That’s just dangerous” –– and NO ONE would have dared drink a hot beverage from styrofoam! “Studies have shown styrofoam to be carcinogenic and bad for the environment,” I can hear the attorney saying, citing a current class action suit that’s pending.

So, two questions: do you find yourself competing in a bitchfest when you reconnect with old friends, not being able to admit that you’re actually…happy? AND which cup would you have picked and why?

Don’t say you don’t drink coffee, this story works for you tea drinkers as well.

Xox

Fraidy’s Death – An Unlikely Gift – Part II

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Dedicated to anyone who’s ever lost their pet.

While we were away I actually received a few calls, “Hey, I just saw your cat in my front yard” the lady five blocks over reported. I thanked her, explaining that he had returned home.

Damn, when I get back I’ve got to remember to take down any signs that are still up, I told myself; but I thought it was sweet that people were calling and I was thrilled that he was back to visiting his old haunts. So no red flags went up when we got a message mid-week, that someone had our cat.

“Please call me, it is very urgent that I talk to you. I think I have your Siamese cat.”

“Another Fraidy siting” I said out loud while Raphael dialed her back. Thirty seconds into the call I could tell by his face this one was different.

I remember we were sitting in the car, in a parking lot, but then I left my body as he gave me the news: this woman had found the upper half of a Siamese cat; an obvious coyote kill.

It had taken her days to reach us; for some reason his collar was missing, and as was his nature, that little shit was far from home. She had put “found cat” signs up in her neck of the woods, but it wasn’t until someone saw one of my signs and put two and two together that she had a number to call.

We went back, met her and her family, bringing pictures of Fraidy, just to make sure it was him. Of course, it was – but she really loved seeing photos of him alive and well.

This woman is an angel on earth, an animal LOVER and a mom.

Here is a beautiful letter she wrote to us after our initial meeting about my darling Fraidy and the gift he gave her family. This letter was Her gift to me.

July 15, 2006

“Dear Janet and Raphael,

It was very moving to meet you both. It’s strange to have shared something so personal with people I don’t know, and I’ve found myself wanting to tell you a little more about the day I found Fraidy. I need you to know – more than I was able to express when you were here – the gift your beautiful cat gave me.

Three days before we went on a family trip, my daughter’s dog Lulu, had been diagnosed with bone cancer. Our housekeeper, Angelica, stayed at our house taking care of her and all of our other animals. Lulu took a dramatic turn for the worse after we left town and died two days before we came home.

My daughter, Ivy, is 14, the same age as Lulu. She and Lulu were inseparable.
Everyone who knew the profound relationship between them believes that Lulu timed her death so Ivy wouldn’t be here to experience it. The trip home was one of the hardest of my life knowing that Ivy would walk in the front door and need to be told that her beloved soul mate had passed away while we were gone.

We got home Saturday night, June 24th. I was up most of the night consoling Ivy and woke up Sunday morning feeling completely helpless. I took our little dog for a walk in the neighborhood to try to find some peace with it all before the rest of the family woke up.

It was probably 7-7:30 in the morning. There are often lots of people walking at that hour, but on this morning the sidewalks were completely quiet. It was in this quiet, surreal state of exhaustion that I saw a beautiful Siamese cat in the yard of the home on the southeast corner of my street and Kraft.

The image that will always be with me was the peacefulness of his face. It was in such startling contrast to the attack that had been made on him. It was as though his life had been taken from him in the middle of a happy nap. When I petted his head, he was still warm, so I found him very close to when he died. Because he was laid so neatly in the yard, I can only assume he’d been carried there by a coyote who had been frightened off by something – maybe even by my dog and me walking down the street.

I ran home and came back with the car so I could wrap him in a towel, bring him home and keep him safe. (she put him in a large freezer in her garage) I came back later with Ivy to ask neighbors if they knew whose cat he might be, which is when we met Geralyn, the woman who later saw your sign which put me in touch with you.

I didn’t let Ivy see Fraidy, but she knew his death had been the opposite of how Lulu had died – inside, surrounded by our friend and other dogs. The experience of trying to help with someone else’s loss really helped her get through the first day.

When I hadn’t had any response to the signs we put up by Thursday of that week, I decided to bury him. I chose the back corner of our yard because it’s the most peaceful spot. It’s far from all the dogs, kids and gardeners, and is where I love to walk to get away from everyone. A couple of times a day there is a great shaft of sunlight that shines right where I buried him. I had a little service for him by myself when every one else was off at work and camp. (she is a famous illustrator, and she decorated a rock as a headstone with her art and his name).

I sat with him for a long time. The suddenness of his death put the suddenness of Lulu’s death in great perspective for me. The tranquility in his face reassured me of a greater plan, and gave me peace about our loss. It was as though he was saying to me that even this vicious attack couldn’t scratch his great spirit.

It is this message from Fraidy that has helped me help Ivy cope with losing Lulu in the weeks that followed. It has given me – and her – great strength. It’s made me believe more deeply that our next life is just on the other side of this one, and that animals travel between the worlds more easily and are certainly always around us to be our guides. The book I’m sending, http://www.amazon.com/Cat-Heaven-Cynthia-Rylant/dp/0590100548
was written for children, but is exactly how I imagine the next life to be.

I didn’t do anything heroic helping Fraidy find a resting place.
He gave me a gift I will never forget, and I am very thankful for him.
When I contrast his free life with the way our cats live – perfectly safe, but the closest they’ve ever gotten to a tree is to see one out the window – I think he was a very lucky guy.”

That he was.

Blind Date Disaster – Vet in a ‘Vette 

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You can always tell what your friends think of you, by the people they set you up with.
~J Bertolus

“Oh, and he’s sooooo good with ALL of my dogs, even my crazy new rescue…”
She leaned across the jewelry counter, handing me his card, her giant diamond ring blinding me.

At that point she’d been waxing poetic about this guy for a good fifteen minutes.

Tina was the young, hot wife of a regular watch client of ours. He was a significantly older businessman, she was an attorney, (which never ceased to amaze me, because she looked like Malibu Barbie…seriously) he was richer than Trump – she was Georgia Peach sweet – and they seemed genuinely crazy about each other.

I was turning over every rock in my search for a husband at that stage of my life, and I’d decided, in a flash of desperate spontaneity, to ask her if she knew anyone.

Looking at her, I was sure men threw themselves her way on an hourly basis, and I was right.
She had a stack of cards that could choke a horse in the secret pocket of her bright blue Birkin bag, and when she pulled this guy’s out of the pile, it had his personal cell phone number handwritten on the back.

“He’s an excellent vet, he really is, and a beautiful human being. Honey, call that number” she said, tapping the back of the card with a long crimson fingernail, “that’s where he can be most easily reached.”

“Oh…I’m sure of THAT.” I snarkily replied, turning the card over in my hand. “For a dog emergency, right?”

“Of course. He said anytime, day or night. Isn’t that darling? He’s so devoted…”

I searched her face for any trace of…well, I don’t know; was she for real?
Could she really be THAT naive?
Yes – yes she could.

A handsome, single, forty year old veterinarian; in my neighborhood; that didn’t suck, right?

I gave her MY card, I wanted him to call ME.
I was getting good at blind dating – blind calling? Not so much.

After another five minutes of extolling his virtues, I stopped her by fibbing; telling her I had an appointment coming in, and immediately called the Vatican to petition for his sainthood.

Then I promptly forgot about this Saint Francis of Assisi – and Studio City.

As I remember it, he called, and we set up a time to meet the following Friday night, at the bar of a local Mexican restaurant.

I was usually dressed nice enough for work to be able to go straight out for drinks or a blind date. Nothing too fancy, but waaaay nicer than what I wear now.
If I was dating now – forget about it. I’d have to spackle, and put on pants.
Have I said too much?

The bar was LOUD and filled with every assorted type on a Friday night in the middle of summer.
There were tourists, with their Universal Studios t-shirts, young businessmen in suits, and sports guys, glued to the game on the TV above the bar.
She’d said he was dark haired and handsome, so I just looked past the ferret faced blonde guys.

Janet?” a man’s voice asked from behind me, so I spun around.
There was my vet – in board shorts, flip flops and a faded surf shop t-shirt.
I had seen him in my preliminary scan of the bar and mistaken him for…something – not a guy meeting a blind date.
Had I made a mistake? Were we meeting to go grunion hunting?

Oh hi.” I tried not to look as disappointed as I felt. I don’t think I succeeded.

This place was a terrible idea (mine) it’s too loud and crowded, let’s go someplace else.” He said walking several steps in front of me toward the door.

Maybe he was disappointed as well.
I wasn’t Tina, not even on a good day.
Maybe he thought all her friends looked like they hung out in her Barbie Dreamhouse.
Yet, he certainly hadn’t dressed to impress.
I was hungry, disappointed and stumped. And I wanted to run.

Were do you think we should go?” he was asking me as we stood outside on the sidewalk.
I wasn’t exactly batting a thousand, since I’d picked the loud, crowded place, and he wasn’t really dressed for anything nicer than Denny’s.

We walked for a few awkward blocks on Ventura Boulevard and settled on CPK – for a blind date – in LA. This was NOT going well.

Just as I’d suspected, it was filled with families and screaming kids at that hour, but I was done giving this date one more minute of thought, since it appeared HE was already phoning it in.

Wine!! I need wine!, was all that was going through my head as we sat down at a booth that was so dirty it sticky/slimed my silk blouse.

After the booze came, we started to make small talk, mostly him, (and if you know me at all, you know it’s rare when I’m quiet) as I chug-a-lugged my merlot.

He loved the animals and being a vet, and he lived up the hill – Nice.
Then suddenly, like a brick to the forehead, “I went to veterinary school in the Philippines, I really LOVE Philippine woman, they’re my type” he said to the curly-haired blonde, stuck to the table across from him.
He had a lascivious look on his face.

How rude was he going to get? His lack of blind date decorum was shocking. Didn’t he know the rules? Didn’t he know he was blowing it? Did he even care?

Well, of course you do” – I’d had it.
Isn’t that where the people who can’t get into veterinary school in the states go?”
I sniped.

Okay I know, low blow.

I grabbed a passing waiter’s sleeve as he walked by, “Check” I hissed, almost yanking his arm off.
Board short guy barely noticed; he was still staring off into space, grinning, dreaming of the women in the Philippines.

He grabbed the check and insisted on paying, even though I had my $20 out and ready.
What a gentleman.
He pulled a crisp hundred-dollar bill out of his wallet and snapped-snapped it in my face, to pay the $18 tab, like the flip-flop wearing, high rolling, big shot that he was.

I couldn’t have been more UNDERWHELMED.
I’m sorry to sound like an ass, but I was a jeweler, I counted hundred-dollar bills all day long, so much so, that they’d begun to resemble Monopoly money to me. (But that’s a whole other story.)

He then took several minutes to arrange the change in his wallet according to the bill denomination. I bolted.

Uh, thanks so much, I’ve really got a run, I have an early….thing” I was literally speed walking to my car, with the vet trying to keep up, flying out of his flip-flops.

Let’s do this again” he was behind me, out of breath.

That stopped me in my tracks.
Your kidding right? This did not go well, we have nothing in common and we have absolutely NO chemistry.
I let him down easy. Hey! That was easy, believe me.

Oh, okay.” I heard in the distance. I was running now, with the safe haven of my car in sight.

I felt like I was going to need a Silkwood shower to wash off the yuck of that night and what the hell was Tina thinking?

Lost in thought, I didn’t hear the person beside me honking and trying to get my attention.
It was the vet. In a brand spanking new, red Corvette, giving me that same hundred-dollar smile and a thumbs up.

So, the moral of this story is: be really careful when putting out the blind dating feelers. You should ONLY ask the people who know you and love you. And you’ll be able to tell who they are by the people they fix you up with.

PS: Tina was shocked when I told her the vet and I were not a match. He told her I was “out of his league.” What?!

Ladies? Weigh in pretty please.
Xox

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Shame – On You

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Apropos to what’s been written about this week.

The reasons we feel shame can be buried deep, or hiding right there – in plain sight.
Me? I’ve experienced both.

Speak its name.
It thrives in shadows, under the bed, in your junk drawer.
Once you call it out, trust me, it cannot survive.

Shame’s a wussy. You can totally kick its ass.

Big love,
Xox

Hi, I’m Janet

Mentor. Pirate. Dropper of F-bombs.

This is where I write about my version of life. My stories. Told in my own words.

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