The Smokers

I learned to smoke my sisters freshman year of college. I remember this because a friend of hers was going to visit and asked if I'd like to come along. On the drive down she asked me to reach in her bag and grab her a cigarette and light it.

I pushed the car lighter in (do cars still come with those?) and grabbed a cigarette and said I didn't know how.

She talked me though putting it in my mouth and explaining that you had to inhale to light a cigarette. It never occurred to me before that every one lit cigarettes in their mouth because you had to, not because it took two hands to strike a match or shield the flame as you went to light it.

Eating While Hot

Once, Ben had an intern at work who was from Korea. It was his first summer in NYC and he was miserable. So one day Ben said to Intern "I always thought Korea was really hot in the summer, too." To which intern replied, in a line that has lived in infamy ever since, "Yeah, but in Korea even poor people have air conditioning." Ha!

An undiscussed secret of New York is that summers are miserable. It's hot, it's muggy, the subway is like a garbage dump sauna, and when the wind blows from the west the whole place smells like the Hudson River. Plus the normal joys of living on top of 8 million other people. And of course, no apartments have central air.

Last year Ben and I broke down and bought a little portable air conditioner. I hate air conditioning, but finally conceded that it was too hot to sleep so something needed to be done. It half cools one room of our apartment, but it is better than nothing. My goal is to never break it out before July, and so far we've been successful.

But today we pretty much had popsicles in our underwear for dinner.

Here's hoping we can make it 12 more days.

Memoirs of a Time Well Wasted

When I was in junior high and high school I had a friend who always had the most ridiculous things happen to her. In retrospect, they were pretty normal things, but she was just such a great story teller that they seemed ridiculous and hilarious and story-worthy. We always joked that we would pen a memoir one day to be titled

I Was a Teenaged Teenager

Memoirs of a Time Well-Wasted

Now she is a mom and a teacher and we don't see each other (circumstance, not any "thing") and I am certain our memoir will never be. But I hope large groups of people are still benefitting from her ridiculous knack with a story. 

An imaginary excerpt: 

SO there was this time when my best friend and I had a crush on almost the same boy. I say almost because they were brothers and not the same boy at all, but looked remarkably alike and existed as one unit in our heads, but we liked separate ones so there was no friend conflict. Not that there really would have been, because we were NEVER going to do anything about it (not ever. ever. never.).

So we nursed our collective crush. We knew their phone number. Screen names. Sports schedules. Knew how to play the cards games they liked to play (and how to cheat most effectively). Knew the best route to walk to totally accidentally run into them. I'm sure we were completely subtle. 

One day, in spite of our careful planning, there was an accidental, non-scheduled encounter in the library. He came in to the library, where Friend was working as a library assistant. She saw him coming and froze completely in anticipation of this unplanned rendez-vous. 

Will he talk to me? Should I talk to him? Where is he coming from? Where's K when I need her? What am I even wearing today? Does my hair look ok? Why is he here, he's not supposed to be here now. I wonder where he's going. Is he on an errand for the teacher? Is he leaving school early? I can't wait to tell K about this. His hair is amazing. Ohmigod he's coming up to me. Do I acknowledge him? Do I pretend to not see him? Was I staring?

All this in about 3 seconds (it was a small library). 

He strolls up and says with perfect nonchalance and a desire to waste time, "Whatcha' doing?"

And in that moment, form the vast array of options of responses to such an easy opener, she replied "Filing books," blushed, and turned back to the shelf. And that was that. 

When I found her 10 minutes later, melted into a puddle of shame and self-loathing, I asked her what happened. All she could say was "I carried a watermelon."

Espearto

Sports are not my thing - but every four years I get way fired up for the World Cup. Maybe it's because I only need a concentrated burst of energy to be really into it. There's no long season and endless stats. You've got a couple weeks. You win or you lose. And that's it, see you in four.

So, in honor of my recent vogue for jazz and the just-started World Cup, I give you my playlist. A little jazzy, a little international, all cool.

Enjoy the weekend.

PS. I'm rooting for the Netherlands. I love how many yellow cards they get.

PPS. Espearto is portuguese for "Clever with a hint of mischief." Perfect.

My New Thing

Any time I develop an interest in something new I tend to be pretty shy about it. Especially in areas where there are a lot of self proclaimed experts, who are not always welcoming to newbies. I feel like a lot of people try to defend their turf instead of welcoming people into the fandom.

"How dare you be in to this on a whim. This is my thing, and I'll shame you with the depth of my knowledge, you who only have this as a 'cute hobby'."

I feel like you encounter this a lot in things like collecting records, or high end alcohol, or really realms that tend to be affluent white-guy interests. And so when I develop a new hobby I keep it to myself for fear of exposing my ignorance and feeling embarrassed.

Which is a long introduction to say, recently I've been listening to jazz and I'm really liking it. I'm not sure why I suddenly felt inspired, but I googled a song (a piece? I don't really know what you call it in jazz music) that was referenced in a manga I loved, Sakamichi no Appollon (another hobby I don't discuss out of embarrassment. I should make a list!) and have been listening non-stop for days.

I don't have anything informed or intelligent to say about jazz yet, but so far, nothing beats a lazy Sunday with John Coltrane playing.

People I would like to be when I grow up

1. Anne of Green Gables

2. Steve McQueen

3. Haruki Murakami

4. Katharine Hepburn

5. Pippi Longstocking

6. Beryl Markham

7. Diane Keaton

8. Ralph Lauren

9. Wes Anderson

10. Sophia Coppola

The Flame Throwers

The feeling of being 22.
The feeling of wishing someone, anyone would come find you, save you, tell you who you are and what you should be doing.
The feeling of being alone in a new city.
The blank canvas of your life when you are first cast in to the world.
The terror and desire to prove yourself.
The desire for a connection to something more than yourself (love? art? justice? friendship?)
The credulousness of inexperience.
The willful ignorance of not wanting to know, be responsible.
The hunger for experience, to eat the world in huge starving bites.

The Flame Throwers was a great book. I find myself wondering what happened to everyone after the last page. The magnetic assholes, the ambitious youths, the fragile psyches masquerading as personalities.

It reminded me of some of my favorite "coming-of-age" novels, and like This Side of Paradise and Norwegian Wood, I can picture myself rereading this book and getting more out of it each time. Maybe even more so, since it was a woman's experience navigating the unknown world.

Things I do when I'm putting off doing what I need to do

1. Check for updates on Tumblr
2. Hang up the not-quite-dirty clothes that congregate on my dresser
3. Call my mom
4. Lie on the couch and tell myself just five minutes
5. Makes lists
6. Facial scrub (St. Ives Apricot scrub since 1995)
7. Snuggle a cat whether they like it or not
8. Contemplate my next meal
9. Flip through the nearest abandoned magazine or book I've been meaning to get back to
10. Make repeated visits to the dried fruit and nut jar that is NOT FOR SNACKING, breakfasts only!!!