Lovely Things
I am feeling v. inspired right now. Last night the air was warm around my shoulders, and the scene around us had that odd quality of it not being LA, not in September, not at that time of day. The wildfire made the area seem like we were wafting around in one gigantic barbecue. But there were sparkling lights, luscious beats, libations of every color.
There is the return of things, the everyday interactions I love, the idea that things glitter on around you, if you will only stop for a second to notice it.
I have a precious lot to say. About Happy Hour. About Tom Chaplin. About the DMV. About Martha Stewart. About my orchid. About sunshine.
Guarda, m'annoio, eh! M'annoio da morire!
It's A Beautiful Day in the (Downtown) Neighborhood
On a clear day, you can see forever. It stands to reason then that in LA, you never see forever. But today is coming very close -- so much so, that I felt compelled to draw the blinds open in my office. My view faces east and mostly I see the 10, and part of the 60. But even all this is made beautiful by how highly perched and northerly the sun is above my window. So, we are two for two this week with beautiful days.
Yesterday, I had on new shoes that made me feel like I could go for miles. I put in a 10-hour work day, but these shoes made me want to keep on keeping on. So I called R. Calling R is always a crap shoot -- you must call 5 minutes before you plan on doing something, because the only thing he plans in his life is spontaneity. Must never get your hopes up, but that's part of the fun. Last night, my gamble won.
I decided where to go but he told me how to get there. He has been everywhere and it's futile to outdo him in that department. We ended up at Ma'Kai, and were pleasantly surprised to see one of our friends cocktailing. She set us up by the fire pit, which irradiated my face so intensely I felt the effects of dermapeel abrasion. (If I could be so lucky, HA!) She recommended the fresh fruit martini, which was nothing short of excellent.
My response to the turkey burger was 1) that the caramelized onions were perfect and 2) that I was disappointed I could not identify the peppery herb in the ground turkey. Months ago, I thought wistfully, I would have known this instantly. But so much time away from my kitchen and LA's best markets have dulled my hypercritical taste buds. More complex than rosemary. Sharper than thyme. Too mild to be sage. Bite after bite produced no satisfactory answer, and I silently chastised myself for slipping.
R said, "People are more afraid to shine than they are to suffer." Last week, he said, "You have to up your experience so that we can function as a unit." So, he doesn't always make sense, but between the hits and misses, sometimes he will be just brilliant.
Il Maestro Dice
I remember when Roby went to see his beloved Paolo Conte at Royce Hall, he donned a suit and brought with him a handwritten letter. It was the moment of his life then because he wholly idolized and worshipped Conte's work, and had not met him until he finally came to LA. He showed me the letter. "Caro Maestro," it began, and proceeded with all the respect and politesse of one carefully treading among giants.
This is how the Italians treat their artists, as
maestri, masters, specialists, the closest thing to divine on earth. I came closer to grasping this tonight when I had the singular privilege of seeing Pavarotti in his Farewell Tour. It was my third and most complete Bowl experience this season, given that the amphitheatre was absolutely filled to capacity
and we got fireworks at the end. But I digress. Back to the Master.
To be fair, he half-assed it a bit. He remained sitting for both acts, mostly hidden behind a grand piano. The trademark scarf wrapped around his neck looked more like a faded beachtowel that might have had an Italian flag imprint on it. I mean, yeah, the red-white-and-green was there, but did he just whip this off of the Amalfi coast before hopping on the plane? (Maybe Pavo doesn't "hop" anywhere.) He had sheet music, or lyric cheat sheets, spread out on the surface before him, which he seldom took his eyes off of when singing. And there was none of the verve of his glory days, which you can only now see on an old Three Tenors videocassette or the Classic Arts Showcase, if you're up that late. Luciano kind of moaned out the first act, like the main activity was sitting there and he just happened to be singing.
Between songs, the lovely Cynthia Lawrence impressed an audience mostly unfamiliar with her reputation. (I, for one, had to Google her.) At intermission, everybody asked her name, who she was. The lady next to me knew who Mascagni was, but not Ms. Lawrence. (I, for two, had to Google him.) But she was brilliant, and evocative, and at her highest notes I closed my eyes so tightly, when I opened them I had tears.
But Il Pavo was, indisputably, the man of the hour. He seldom spoke, except to repeatedly say sotto voce (how appropriate), "Tank you veddy much." My main complaint with Pavarotti is that, although he probably has the more signature pipes of his contemporaries, being comfortable with only Italian really limits his work. Both Ms. Lawrence and Pavo butchered
Ave Maria ("in prayer for those in the hurricane"), because she didn't know the Latin and he preferred to sing it in Italian. Maybe they thought they could pull the wool over the thousands, but at least one patron in the audience sat stiffly in tight-lipped disapproval, hearing peccatoribuses and gratia plenas wailed in all the wrong places. I could let this slide. But when it was time for the second encore, and
Granada...
I love this song. It's one of my favorites because 1) Ricky Ricardo sings it, 2) it helped me learn Spanish, and 3) it was one of the few pieces we had on CD at our house when I was a teenager. Between Domingo and Carreras, I prefer the latter's version because everything about him is vigor and gusto. That said, the rule should be that
Granada is only sung by Spaniards, with all the character and precision that a native speaker can inject. With Pavarotti, it was something like eating a burrito in a Roman pizzeria. He blurred many words that should have been punctuated, sang it languidly as if we were drifting along in a gondola. OK, I think I have exhausted as many Italian stereotypes as I could, in one post...
With all this criticism, I admit that it was still an incredibly emotional experience for me. Sometime during the performance, everything clicked, and I sat there mesmerized as if everything I've loved and learned culminated into this deep appreciation. I thought, to be able to fully appreciate events you go to, people you know, things you own, is much rarer than it seems.
After his third encore, people began calling for
Nessun Dorma. I hardly thought we would be so lucky, and given the few bursts of energy Luciano was able to summon, I didn't think it would happen. Plus, no background choir. So, Sig. Pavarotti, in his Farewell Tour, still left us wanting, which is exactly the mystery we would expect of a true master. To fill the void of
Nessun Dorma, they began shooting off fireworks, and attention spans were successfully diverted to the pwetty sparks.
He sang, "Non c'e' piu', non c'e' piu'," and the words were the music, healing my soul, making me whole. There is no more.
Final note -- I jokingly referred to him as "Il Pavo" because Italians like to shorten long names, and give their celebrities a definite article to accentuate importance. But I do realize in Spanish it means "turkey."
When September Ends
The hardest part about getting older -- for me, at least -- is continuing to be honest with myself. Honest about mistakes I've made, and whether or not I inadvertently or knowingly made them again. It's easy to say, no, this one was an entirely
different mistake, for x, y, and z reasons. But maybe it is just the same mistake, over and over again, packaged differently.
The weather around here is finally starting to fall in step with that which we all already know, that summer is over. I'll remember this past summer more vividly, acutely, than ones before and after it. Imperceptible changes. Obvious transitions. Learning a hell of a lot in a short period of time. It was this month where somebody said, everything is replaceable. This idea has had a lot more mileage than I could have imagined at the time the words were uttered.
But this summer was also when I went to the Hollywood Bowl 3 times. It was Saint-Saens and Mr. Pavarotti and the Killers and Keane and learning to play poker and lesser theatrical revues and beach volleyball and downtown daytime and picnicking and moviegoing and Abbot Kinney and barbecuing and bus riding and long walks and morning jogs and Pilates classes and French speaking and legal writing and brunching and library lunching. Forget what I said before (if I said it to you). This summer was a good many things that will still thrive in me, even if it is with a bit of practiced happiness.
The Long Run
I had bolognese last night. Bolognese is one of those things I'll
always order, if it's there, like linguine alle vongole, chocolate souffle, or pulled pork. I'd say the meat sauce was a little too tart, and could have used less carrot in its mire poix. The pasta was too liberally sauced, but still al dente. I tried to eat as much as I could because I didn't want to take a doggy bag into Montmartre. I'd say I left 65% of it on the plate before the waiter took it away.
I now regret not packing it up. It would be perfectly hearty for lunch, and make all the difference in the work day.
But in other good alimentary news, one of the secretaries left a bag of my favorite japaleno potato chips on my desk. I thought that was incredibly thoughtful, and quickly replaced bolognese as the difference-making item of the day.
Incredible urge right now to play piano. Maybe Mozart's Allegro from Sonata in C Major, K. 545.
"You have pork in your hair."
Outrageous gas prices, but duty called in the form of grilling and chilling in the Gaslamp, in honor of Ms. Talia. There was just so much meat and I tried to salvage what I could, after having accidentally dumped half a bottle of seasoning on top of my pork chops. Erik watched the whole thing go down and poorly stifled his laughter. I laughed right along with him, brushed off the mountain of spices, and just threw the damn things on the fire.
Didn't taste half bad, at least with a few glasses of water. I didn't know that 1) white truffle oil works well in mac and cheese and 2) steak actually does taste better if you've got Wu-Tang Clan and Craig Mack going in the background.
Traffic going south was nothing short of punishing. But back up north, it was all streaming sunlight and smooth breezing, allowing me to remember all the things that had inspired me across the weekend. Cirrus showed me the little house they were waiting on, a bit troubled about the newly painted yellow with maroon trim. "No, it's Cate Blanchett's Givenchy," I told her. She, in turn, appeased me by telling me how to look at things in life in terms of different Buddhas. And Coach bags.
I showed up unforgivably late at Hash House, just to see that they had already ordered me a Lavazza espresso. We talked about World Market white ribbed spa towels. If only for the fact that we all happened to know a bit too much about it.
Usually, if I'm in the area, I'll stop by my old apartment and peek inside. A lot of things had changed around the area, but I could still imagine myself within the white Spanish-style walls. There was a lot of development in the neighborhood, but the charm was all the same. Gratitude, comfort, and a lot of relief.
Outrageous Gas Prices!
(End of blog.)
The Rolling Thunder
There are those weeks where nothing happens, and there are those weeks where everything happens. It breaks my heart, the things that have been told to me this week. Of things that happened to friends I speak to every day. To friends a long plane flight away. To myself, even.
My friend in Italy wrote me about the passing of his aunt. Well, I knew her not one bit, but I couldn't help but feel incredibly sad. I remember the day he brought me to lunch with his family. It was a beautiful spread, with multiple courses involving roasts and overly buttered pasta. This aunt arrived late, but with total flourish. She squeezed into a chair beside me, with large sunglasses and heavy jewelry. I remember her showing me her various fashion accessories and detailing exactly how much she paid for any of it. She had the delicious merriment of one who could never contain stories of good deals. And I understood only a little of what she said, because it was an accented Italian I was unfamiliar with. I still laughed a lot and nodded emphatically.
As brief and remote, it was totally memorable. I was glad Roby told me, because after all these years he knew I would care. He remembered I had met her. I wish that I could preserve the memory of that warm spring afternoon, with his aunt still as lively as she was, and that today she is still fromping around the Italian bazaars. But things change, people grow, time will push you.
Love’s on your list of things to do
To bring your good luck back to you.
And if you think that everything’s unfair,
Would you care if you’re the last one standing there?
And everytime you hear the rolling thunder,
You turn around before the lightning strikes.
And does it ever make you stop and wonder
If all your good times pass you by?
- S. Crow
Cosmos and CNN
We both grabbed sandwiches and then met on a park bench just outside the Central Library. Kids back to school were milling around in their first field trip of the year, standing listlessly around old trees that have long decorated the metropolitan expanse. He had tuna and I had turkey, and I was glad to have my best friend in just the next building.
We went five minutes too long, which was fortunate. When I came back I saw many co-workers standing outside the Aon Center. More than a coincidence, I thought, and found out quickly about the power outage. Had I gone back to work on time, I would have probably been stuck in an elevator, or had to trek down 45 flights of stairs. And then most of the office was returning from their lunches. So we just stood around in a circle and made smart cracks.
There was pandemonium for awhile. Sirens, many questions, cars stalled because of tripped-up traffic signals. Still, we stood around. Starbucks? Probably closed as well. Eventually we made our way to the bar for martinis. One of the partners treated the lot of us. A pink drink, some ribbing, and watching the state of our sequestration on the news right before us. I could not think of a better way to pass the non-billable hours than with company, cosmos, and CNN.
This is the last time
That I will show my face.
One last tender lie
And then I'm out of this place.
So tread it into the carpet,
Or hide it under the stairs.
Say that some things never die,
Well I tried, and I tried.
Something I wasn't sure of,
But I was in the middle of.
Something I forget now,
But I've seen too little of.
- Keane
Days After
I sing because I'm happy,
I sing because I'm free.
His eye is on the sparrow
And I know He watches over me.
Kismet Revisited
The truth is this: usually, I dread going home. It's oppressively hot that far east, the pushy drivers in the Asian plazas stress me out, and my father invariably sends me off with boxes of bric-a-brac I just don't need, but feel guilty turning down. The lure that keeps me going back is plain daughterly duty, and the promise of delicious Chinese food.
Today did much more than
not disappoint. At first, I sat there in a questionably clean Chinese restaurant with hunger of cavernous proportions. I was irritated that our waiter had a large black mole from which many hairs sprouted. I asked my dad with impatience what the deal was with that mole. I suspected that it was rooted in some ludicrous Chinese superstition that plucking or cutting any of those repugnant hairs would be "bad luck." My dad confirmed this, adding that perhaps such a practice was distasteful in modern times. I mean, yeah, it was gross. I thought to myself, this waiter's mole alone is grounds for never returning to this Chinese restaurant. However tasty.
I felt pretty resolute in that until the food actually arrived. Glorious clay pot stews of tender beef braised in hot oil, a pork roast cooked so tender that you needed great dexterity with your chopsticks to pinch the meat. A chicken soup so flavorful and invigorating, I felt I could fight 100 kung fu fights right out on Colima Road after lunch. Chicken fried so crisply and so spicy that I had to take large gulps of lukewarm tea for comfort. I reasoned, this waiter is out on the floor and rarely in the kitchen. There's no definite relationship between his hairy mole and this delectable feast.
After lunch, any plans I had for the Sunday pretty much evaporated into the warm Diamond Bar air. Work? Laundry? It all can wait. I needed that epic food coma nap. So I stopped my parents' house, with few expectations except a soft and flat surface.
What I found on my bed at home sent my pulse racing and my eyes bulging. It was a pink Marc Jacobs purse, the exact same one as the white one recently swiped from me in the Great Theft of 2005. (Of which no details were relayed to my parents, fully aware of their paranoia.) What it was doing on my bed, I had no answers for. I clutched it tightly to my chest and ran downstairs to interrogate my mom. She was standing there with her friend, and they were about to head off to choral practice.
"Is this purse for me? Why is it on my bed? Where did you get it? Where did you find it?"
"It's not for you, it's mine. I just wanted to show you."
(Not a problem, I thought. I can haggle, it's in my blood.) I tightened my grip.
"I like it. Can I have it?"
"No, but if you like it I can call Auntie Sherry because she ordered one from Nordstrom. And they have one in TO-MAY-TO RED. What does that mean?"
"It means it's red. I like pink. How about you give me this one, and get Auntie Sherry's? I'll pay you back for this."
My mom's friend hooked me up. "Wow, you'd have her pay for this?"
"I guess not," my mom said with a bit of disgust, "even though she gives me plenty of attitude. But she did buy me a bag from Barney's for my birthday."
I continued to hug the bag to my chest, boring my eyes into my mom's.
"Alright, fine," she relented. "Just take it."
"Thanks," I practically whispered, before running upstairs to my bedroom to hyperventilate.
It all seemed too good to be true. I thought I would never see this Marc Jacobs shape again, except slung on other arms. And on Friday, we had lit a candle in memoriam of the white MJ so precipitously taken from me. It seemed like a beautiful coincidence, almost divine, poetic.
I asked Justin if it was OK that material things made me happy. He told me, no. I promised that I'd read some of the Dalai Lama's works this week to rehabilitate myself. I asked j., all giddy, "How many times can this kind of thing happen?"
"Well, we'll see," he quipped.
No witnesses. No leads. No problem.
- Forensic FilesYou're easy breezy, and I'm Japanesey.
- Utada
Dreams and Schemes and Circus Crowds
Today was filled with some happy events.
First off, it's Eve's birthday, so hope you are having a lovely one, bella. I sent tulips to her office, and she promptly called me.
"Do you like flowers on your piano?" she asked, sort of stifling a giggle.
"Huh?"
Maybe the punchline is inappropriate to post here, given that I am now acutely aware of a potentially different audience. But I'll say this, the line did involve the words "tulips" and then "organ." Discuss.
j. and I were finally able to meet for lunch. The walk over was scenic, even idyllic. I passed by roses. I passed by Cafe Pinot. I went around the Central Library, with greenery and park benches that seemed out of place in the sprawl. At the top of the stairs, I met him at McCormick and Schmick's. Service was speedy, food was filling. Looking back, however, the mustard cream sauce with the salmon and penne was just too rich.
He made me laugh, quite a lot. I told him about my frustrations and, as usual, he made light of them. I fretted, and he drolly said, "Well, that's cute." I never would have thought so, but it certainly did make fretting a much more charming affair. Walking back to work, I was still laughing.
In the more frantic moments of the day, I plug Liszt or Bach into my ears and stare outside the window. I think of cupcakes or Pilates classes or fried chicken or driving through Tuscan roads listening to Natalie Imbruglia. Then I can turn back around and crank out some discovery or some motion. I could not get through a day without music.
It's weird to think that every day, I am figuring something out that will only be realized months and years from now. Every moment, I am living something to be looked back on with either a warm or rueful nostalgia. Everybody says that it is best to be patient, because when you really have to do something -- you will.
Joni said it best,
I really don't know life at all.
Change of Seasons
Fall means baking streusel, taking out a car coat, maybe darkening your hair. I've done all three already. I'm ready for changes.
I shed a lot of things today, and right now, I feel lighter. I will shed more.
A year ago today, I was in a similar state of mind. But with much different circumstances.
Today, I was waiting on the corner of Santa Monica and Ocean about to make a right turn. Windows down, moon roof open. Right at that moment, Tevin Campbell triggered in on my iPod and blared out of my car. Then, an African-American man wearing a purplish Steve Harvey type zoot suit began to cross the street. He heard the music, our eyes met for a second, and he sort of smirked at me. Old skool early 90's jamz. Embarrassed*, I quickly averted his gaze, and hastened the right turn. Be careful what music you're playing when you're stopped, it could expose you a little too much.
*
After all these years in Ame-li-ca, I still had immense trouble spelling this word and had to access www.dictionary.com.
Wear It Out (You're Gonna Have to Eventually Anyway)
I did a precious lot this weekend. I would have preferred otherwise. I had to do a precious lot, because a precious lot was also taken from me right from the get-go on Saturday morning. It is becoming clearer and clearer everyday that it is simply too much to expect that any situation is necessarily safe. Reyna said that bad things happen in threes. Last year may have been the year of auto body damage for me -- I experienced that thrice. This year, I hope I have just had my third and final run-in with identity theft.
It made me realize the importance of being accountable to yourself and others. Being accountable to yourself means that you will never engage in those types of petty crimes that upset a person's peace of mind much more than his or her pocketbook. Being accountable to others means that, when you truly are in a state of crisis, the value of having them there to help you is the relief and reward more invaluable than anything stolen. I was never as grateful to have the things swiped from my purse than the support of my friends, in the form of a ride here or there, a drop-off or spot of cash, an extra key held for that very event.
I have run such a dialogue in my head of what I would say if I confronted that thief. Take all these pretty items, these things so small and sleek I hoped especially I could keep them all together in my purse, never expecting that one day their compact mobility would spell a certain facility for your theft. If you would like cash, I'll give that to you too, in an amount just a few bucks shy of what it is costing me now to replace everything you've taken -- so that it is profitable for us both -- because it would be just as hefty and more useful to you than walking off right now with all those items, as they are. But please, leave me those items that it is just a pain to replace for me, that you can make absolutely no use of. You won't use those keys because you don't have the wherewithal to try a thousand or more locks in this city in hopes of striking gold. And did you think I was so stupid that I wouldn't have had them all changed already, anyway. You won't use the little trinkets of jewelry that were cheap and small affectations of others' friendship to me. And there's just no way you can appreciate what lengths I went to, to find the white Marc Jacobs summer hobo with the teal suede interior, of which the acquisition was a magic moment of kismet for me at Neiman's First Call this year. Maybe I can eBay it back after you've posted it. Even if you made that opportunity available to me, I'd be a bit more hopeful than I am right now.
Yeah, all this is meaningless in the grand scheme of things happening on the Gulf Coast. And the tsunami and Iraq and 9/11 and slavery and the Cultural Revolution and the Holocaust. But I'm not here to talk about my particular brand of deprivation that really isn't deprivation at all. It's all replaceable. I'm just saying, please be accountable to yourself and others. You may not go to heaven for it. But you'll be able to look at yourself in the mirror every morning with some small modicum of integrity. This will go a much longer way than you think.
Office Kitchen, You Will Be The End of Me
The easy access to fresh and hot coffee is nice. But, taken together with the other office treats, that kitchen is just a den of gastronomical sin. In the morning, I gave in to a long-buried urge and indulged in a few (large) bites of overly sized, overly fried donuts splayed out on the table for all to enjoy. They made me happy, and I channeled Homer Simpson in my satisfaction of them. But then, they hit me like a wall. Maybe 10 minutes after the last bite, everything within me curdled as I experienced the nausea of too much sugar and oil. Maybe it was psychosomatic, but there's a reason why only children have the physical constitution to gorge truckloads of sweets. My body loves caffeine, and on occasion, even alcohol. But sugar and oil, stay back.
An afternoon task put me on the fabled LA Metro, and then I found myself in the catacombs on Hill Street that they call the court archives. When I came back, I was fiending for coffee. Wandered into the kitchen for my fix, and there they were. So great was my surprise, I cried aloud even though no one within earshot. "OREOS!"
They seemed like a good idea, especially with coffee. So I had one. But the consequences recalled the morning experience. And now, with the work day miserably winding down, all I have to show for it is having eaten too much play food.
I said to Obie, "One day, you can tell the story of how I came in here thin, and months later, became a blubbering slob."
He said, "It's going to take months?"
