mos def, mos def

guess what? i'm going to see mos def and i'm going to a reception afterward to celebrate him performing. now i'm not saying he'll be there at the partay (i'm sure he won't) but i am saying i'm going to see him perform. in person. but so will lots of other swooners. do i stand a chance? not really. will i have a ball anyhoo. most certainly.

change of venue

or, change of name, perhaps, at least, maybe, to a compendium of hot air. why?

because i like you!! (who gits the reference?)

but really because i came across today the blog of an actor who was in a movie i loved in 1989 or something when it came out, 'my life's in turnaround' t'was called, and the dude was all, 'ladies, don't get made at me if i'm 44 and want to reproduce in my 50s which means if you're boobs are sagging you're prolly too old for me. but hey, free love!!'

what struck me is not that homeboy's obnoxious but that a woman who at 44 is still looking for love and goes on one-time dates with nary a follow up in sight might feel bad about herself, question her worth, her desirability, her loveliness. a man would never do that, seems to moi, they seem too often to have too much hmmnnn...let's call it hubris, shall we? or is it arete? my 9th grade world history terms elude me at present. but anyhoo, it's just a rather amazing difference. kind of like how i heard once from a friend's sister who was vetting resumes that men, even at the tender outta college age of 21 were all, 'dig it, i can kick ass in this job' and the women were meeker, a la, 'i feel i could make a valuable contribution.'

it's the same dang thing.

as for the guy who urged a condomless interaction and then wanted to be friends...never heard from him, which somehow seems apt, reminds me of the actor, kind of overly self-assured but so happy or is it smug in that assurance. but also, arguably, full of horseshit. say it with me now!

here's a non sequitur of the evening (it's been a very long 36 hours and i'm having a belt at home as i right, er, write): it makes me sad when people are unable to swipe their metro cards properly through the subway turnstile. they get that 'no go' beep and they try again and then again, you want to help them but don't want them to feel bad that they are swiping perhaps too slow, too deliberately, but they are, you can feel it and see it and as the line grows long behind them a very subtle but definitive tension mounts. it very tinily breaks my heart when i witness it happen. (it's a new york centric observation, so pls forgive me my 'fornia, boston, sconny readers and from whereever else ye may hail).

was supposed to be falling in love tonight. or getting it on. but his father came to town for dinner and he had to cancel, which is a-okay because i slept over last night at my great aunt's house, she's 100 years old, did i mention? and i didn't sleep too soundly for various reasons...and had a kind of nightmare wherein i was assaulted by a younger fellow but then started hitting him back and was about to be arrested when i woke up at 4:46. in part two, there was tap dancing by a dyed-green haired lass whose mother was named, apparently, gwen, and gwen was wearing a wee mini even though she was about 60. she had a blond paigeboy and was doing a version of the shake.

who wants to plays freud in this drama?

and, have i ever ever mentioned how much i love black licorice well, i do. if it were a man and agreed to marry me...well, we'd have a happy ending for shizzah.

ho, ho. ho.

feels like i've been posting so much lately...which is exactly the opposite of what i think i'm getting ready to do, to perhaps stop blogging altogether and save some of my interior life for my interior. or for a select phew. there's much i don't say here but probably too much that i do, quite frankly. and for what? for some kind of exhibitionist sometime gag and sometime s-o-s. there are some folks who read (of the what, four of you consistent readers?) who i wish didn't cause then maybe i'd speak of texture and taste. and there are others i wish didn't read for other nefarious reasons. but right now i'm thirsty to post. so those questions go to the backburner.

(my stomach is so upset from a burrito i ate.)

yesterday got a text msg from someone in the 305 area code. i don't even know where that is. and it said, 'call me, babe' and i thought, is this someone i know? i'm rarely called 'babe.' in fact, i can think of only one person who has ever called me that—my aunt. and i've never felt like calling people babe or baby as anything but kind of a small joke but if i had to explain what the funny is, i'd certainly be unable. there's something vaguely sexy about it, i guess, but it also seems so unnatural to me, so general hospital and what television romance puffy hair types say to one another when they say, 'hey baby, light my fire,'

or 'hey baby, baby, pour some sugar on me,'

or 'do me a favor, babe, and rub this ban de soleil onto my back. if i burn, baby, burn, you'll then have to put on aloe too. i've got some in the fridge, babybabebabe'

or 'please baby please baby, baby, baby please,' except lola darling's pretty far from pt chas.

here's things i've called others: dollface, dear, sweetheart, lemondrop, lemon, my little cashew, peanut, sweets, darling, hb, toots, tootsie, lovely, my little macademia, love, dearest, sugar, stuff, loverboy, cutie, q-t, cutiepie...

anyway, the person texted in reply this: "stop it!"as if i had written him and stalked him many times. so i did as he ordered. and erased these msgs.

then, i got a voice mail from the same number today. and i couldn't well understand what he was yammering on about but it clearly wasn't to me, and i didn't recognize his voice and at the end he said, 'call your boy.'

so, like, i did, right.

and told him wrong number, wrong text. wrong. wrong. but it'd be fine and fun if it were right. right. i'm in the mood for canoodling, ya dig? and if the 3-0-5 was near and i knew this guy i'd text him to come on down, babycakes, and treat your baby right.

thar, on the bluff!

mister 'make me tea, woman!' wrote me an email. lemme paraphrase:

ola slush,

pls forgive me as i broke my rule and failed to call the day after we got it on. but hey! better late than never! wowzers! what a ball (tee hee) i had meeting you. you are so superterrificmarvy and, girly, great rack too! bravo! messin' around was too! much! fun!...there outta be a law!

but on the romance tip, well, you and me kid, we're not headed to inspiration point. but here's what i'd luv. let's be friends, how bout? but let's also get down, get down, from time to time.

gotta run, my soul patch needs a trim! cheers!

but here's what i note: he did not actually call all those days later, he typed an email. i replied—'sure, fun.' and 'i too am not romantically inclined this time,' but with some existential musing thrown in, a la, 'doesn't it take more than one meeting?' and 'i'm not trying to convince you or me for a second go but just thinking out loud.' and, reader, outside the box. i could make an incredibly lewd (even for me) comment here but i won't. or did i just?

anyways, as for friends, i said, 'right on. grab a beer, chew a beer nut, whatever you like. but thanks no to the nookie, pal joey. been down that road. it's got potholes.'

and as my uptown girl l pointed out on the telefono, friends with nookie...how exactly does that differ from most relationships?

ain't heard from him since. is it possible he lied and didn't wanna be friends after all? goodness! did he only want a booty call opp. i'm not against those, but you had damn well better be a good kisser if you think i'm going to pick up the receiver.

where's the wonder-full?

well, i had a date on saturday night and did what i do best (what is that, even, make salad dressing?), but it ended a bit oddly and i couldn't tell if the fella, who seemed quite shy all along, was still shy there at the end and awkward too, or simply wanted it to be over so he could go home to tivo or some such. i think it was the latter which i am sometimes on the opposite side of so understand it, but wrote to say anyways that 'i had a lovely time and let's go out again' even though my friend a-l advised perhaps not to say 'lets go out again' because wouldn't that be making myself too vulnerable but on the other hand and on the advice of a writer whose writing inspired me and a relative whose email inspired me (j, i'm talking to you, dude-ls!) i thought, 'without making myself vulnerable i may not get whatever prize i seek' so why not be vulnerable? take off whatever armor? lose that down vest and such? and then got a note back saying, 'yes nice to meet you too, but bad news ladybuggles you're not the one for me,' and 'i am looking for something else in a relationship' and that intellectual theorizing part of me wanted to write back and say 'fine, fine, but is that true?' and what i mean is, 'what else are you looking for, i'm curious' and also, 'is this your way of avoiding telling me the truth, say, that you find me icky and that when i accidentally spilled wine (i was not drunk i was clapping enthusiastically) i seemed sloppy and clumsy and you want someone tidy with a more refined sense of applause?'

how can you tell what kind of relationship you're going to have after one glass of wine and some polite conversation, huh? i wanted to ask all this, i'm a little tired of etiquette. but i also wonder, why bother asking, it's just an energy sucker in this case, and adieu to yuh, don't wanna dwell, but do want to be out there, decidedly attracting not repelling.

whew, such a lot of thoughts.

last night i woke up at 2 am thinking it was 6 am and then was wide awake for two hours and am now tired. but not utterly discouraged. it goes on, i hope. i think sometimes i want to convince myself into liking someone who i may not really like either but i'll give it the college try. even the junior college try, for cryin' out loud. i'm willing to go on more than a single date with someone to find out the score. others are not, maybe they can read the score right away. i will do my best not take it personal even though that's precisely how it feels.

ps -- someone wrote a note a couple of posts back but it's romance language gibberish. that seems just about right.

daybreak

slept poorly last night, fidgeted, restless, and woke long before sun-up and checked email and found one directing me to my dating site where there was a note from a fella in faraway californi-yay! and he was sure cute. no, not cute. he was handsome. my type (or one of them, anyhoo) and he said i was beautiful. isn't that the cat's meow? that's the way every damn day should start with someone telling you something altogether wonderful.

this girl has cried for me

and i have cried for her. that's not a reflection of what i feel currently. it's a lyric on a song by dean wareham and britta whatever-her-last-name-is and it's very ripe for use in some new wave french film about a love that cannot be. it makes me feel like i wish i was in an impossible romance so i could make that the soundtrack but even then it would be overwrought and therefore trivial. sometimes i like that record a lot, i think it's called l'aventura, but it's a little much today, a trifle trop, in keeping with the french motif.

very exhausting period in life right now as i go off this afternoon to help out an elderly relative who is feeling quite unwell. makes some things feel very unimportant, trifling, and others become vital.

a bientot.

coffee, tea...aw, to hell with the dang drinks

once i met a fine fella who invited me over after dinner to meet his dog, pete. i went. pete was a golden shepherd if i recall. or golden anyway. we didn't ooh and ahh over him too long and in short order got to mackin. later, he told me his ex girlfriend was back in the picture and i was sad for a long while cause i liked that guy a whole lot.

another time a guy asked me if i wanted to come over to watch television. if i recall, the pianist was on (holocaust flicks being an aphrodisiac, i s'pose)

now, the come-on's all about hot drinks. that is, had a date the other night on an evening i was not feeling so grand but i put on my game face, laughed just so, smiled, charmed, shared my french fries, and at the end of two drinks was semi-asked, semi-ordered, 'i think you want to invite me over for tea now.'

harumph! i did. off we went to my house and boiled no water.

in the course of events he asserted that he'd been tested recently and is clean as a whistle. that was his reason for dispensing with a condom and implicit pressure to get it on.

i wanted to ask, 'dude, have you heard of hpv? your aids test tests nothing for that shit.'

and, also i wanted to ask, 'how do you know i'm safe and am not lying if i tell you i am?'

man, the baloney some fellas pull. but they're not alone. was there a condom in my house and i said there warn't one on purpose? perhaps. perhaps. perhaps.

am trying to keep this PG. so the end of the episode remains for you to imagine.

but after the end here's what: i haven't called this guy, nor he me. and i don't expect to hear from him. despite his profession of interest in seeing me again, i got a very singleminded vibe. not hearing would be a-okay cause though the mild bossiness was amusing one time, i can imagine it fast getting long in the tooth.

props where props are due

though i usually live according to a bondian axiom made famous by wings...today i'm gonna tell you exactly what to do. watch this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UaX0vosEbY

but really it's not the video i likes, it's the music. composed and played by someone i adore—dior!

er, no, not dior. whatduhyuhthinkiyam?

now back to works.

sands through hourglass

an update prompted by my friend who wrote me a note of concern after reading my post of yesterday, which is that i've shed no tears today (oh, actually not true—reading about the electricion (?) who jumped on top of a college student who had fallen on the subway trax after a seizure made me tear up but in astonishment and praise, i guess, at that bold decision and life-saving gesture), but none shed over myself. that's the great difference. and viva! by the end of yesterday, in fact, i felt better. and maybe it's just time, getting away from the new year hoo-ha, getting back into routine, writing a few exploratory emails related to professional pursuits, having a one-hour conversation with a internet date dude who seemed a tad controlling but i was bizarrely and uncharacteristically going-with-flow and totally unaddled, even amused by the 'tude. it's the reefer.

or is it?

dudes, there is no reefer. it's just me.

but the short of it is that i feel better. and i thank jc for writing me. it's kind and touching. and the thing is that even when i am so blue i'm black, there is that, to know that one is loved and cared about even if not romantically. my friend n made the same point to me the other day when we were walking around and i started to cry in front of him. and i was moved by his gesture. by both of these gestures.

but in those dark recesses into which occasionally i stumble (and hopefully everyone does cause i'd hate to think it's an anomoly) one forgets that there are folks around who care about my welfare and happiness. the prob is that even if i remember to remember it, every now and again even that is insufficient salve.

but i want to end on a happy note: high c and hold for four beats.

big apple circus

a combo of new years and watching best of youth until way too late last night, watching the youth i know...mature, and an unidentifiable angst has taken grip. i sat on the subway quietly weeping this morning. or, tears simply rolled out and i had no tissue and nobody even noticed me which was both horrifying, that even in crisis i may be invisible, and also oddly liberating. i feel better now somehow but also wary of the sudden onset of despair and even when i write that word some tears brim up. so i'm going to be buy new jeans cause my friend advised me that it might help.

happy happy blah blah blah

had some crazy, cockamamie dreams this week. for instance, locked suitcase, lost key, can't get at my 'stuff' or woody allen sucking on my earlobe (don't ask, pls) but among other things i realize to say to people who matter that i love them. new years rockin horse eve. glad it's done. today (jan 1) feels mundane. but i'm hopeful yet.