dearest daughters & son

Secrets are for suckers.

Dearest Daughters,

At a family party, I was recently giving my eldest niece a VERY hard time about her boyfriend. That's neither here nor there.

But, the conversation compelled Lola to declare, accusingly, "BUT! YOU SLEPT ON A PARK BENCH!"

This fact is something I've shared with the Internet. And, I mean, I knew that the friends and family who read this blog knew about my transgressions. But, there's this whole Internet-Real Life etiquette, where we all silently acknowledge that everyone knows I ate Target popcorn for lunch because of the photo I posted to FacebookTwitterThingamajig, but we don't actually talk about it in real life.

Because the conversation would kind of go like this:

    Them: So, I saw that you slept on a park bench in Brazil?

    Me: Um, yup. So the story goes.

    [awkward pause]

    Them: So, um, cool. I guess?

In general Status Updates are not a great place to start a conversation, unless you're like: "Dude, I totally slept on a park bench too!"

It's become sort of a you-know-that-I-know-that-you-know-that-we-all-know kind of world.

So, when Lola declared her shock a full three months after I posted the Infamous story, it was a "I knew she knew, but I didn't know she knew knew" moment.

And I blushed with embarrassment and shame, getting defensive, like, Mother, that is the Least of your Worries!

Which was true, because now there's this:

( I like to call this "An Unfortunate Series of Events and Wardrobe Choices")

Your Uncle Bruce wrote a mildly interesting post on his Super Famous blog about the whole To Post Drunk Photos or Not To Post Drunk Photos debate.

And both of us are sort of in the business of Honesty, Authenticity and Vulnerability. That's what this blog is about, at least.

So, my Dearest Daughters, yes, the rumors are true.

I went to Wellesley College. It happened to be in a dry town. And the school had a strict alcohol policy. Which amounted to "if you're 21, you may drink behind closed doors." So, we put on hideous outfits. And I attempted to pop my collar, a West Coast girl never quite fitting in to the New England Prep scene. We got drunk in our dorm rooms amongst a circle of close friends. Hoisted our L.L. Bean monogrammed tote bags over our shoulders and, in our buzzed genius-iosity, pretended to steal dorm hallway adornments. Only to replace them two seconds after taking a photo of the event. (We also had a fairly functional honor code, so there was no reason to cross that line.) Then, we probably went back to our rooms to watch Love Actually. And cry about how we would never meet ANYONE who loved us. EVER.

Then, the naked pillow fights. Obviously.

The number of times in my life that I got what you could call "wasted" can be counted on one hand. If it had six fingers. And more than half of those times were in the safety of a dorm room at Wellesley College or in the company of my family.

Bam! Take that Make Good Choices Lola!

Whew. I feel so much better.

Share a secret today! Was it you who ate half a bottle of Tums in Mommy's closet? And did you really lose your Hello Kitty lip balm or did you eat it all? And what's the real reason you poop in your panties? Come on? Because it's warm, right?

I knew it!

Love,

GONE FISHIN': Even in college, my profundity aboundeth

Dearest Daughters,

Posting old content while we're away.

Wrote this shortly after my birthday during my senior year of college. I guess I was just feeling very wise. Being twenty two and all.

The other morning on my way to brunch over at another dorm across the Quad, I stumbled at the prickling sensation of a very sharp object in my slippers (they have a hard sole for going outside-ish; I'm not like those gross girls who wear fuzzy bunny slippers into the dining hall, ewww, far from it). Half awake, still wearing my pajamas and with eye boogers still clinging to the corners of my eyes, I called every so eloquently to Katherine: "Ack! STOP!" Perched on my left leg, I shook out my right L.L. Bean slipper. What fell out was a photo of myself. It was a tiny photo booth picture (1.5 cm x 2 cm) that I took because the monthly Metro passes in Paris required it. Banal as this story may seem, it's really not. Indeed, we often discover something in our shoes that just rubs us the wrong way. We shake it out and then we're on our way. But, how often do you find that the something in your shoe was, in fact, you, yourself. And when you are the one irritating your own big toe, how do you just walk away from that? I mean, really?

For lack of a better word, I am interesting.

Posing in a Metro photo booth, April 2005.

GONE FISHIN' Have I Told You Tuesday: I'm a Compulsive Liar, Maybe

Dearest Daughters,

Posting old content while we're away.

Another thing I wrote while studying abroad in Paris, originally posted this during my senior year of college. Self explanatory.

Sometimes I wonder if I’m a compulsive liar. If a compulsive liar really believes her lies, then maybe all that I believe to be really true just isn’t. Maybe I’m not really from California, in which case I don’t know where I’ve been living all of my life. Maybe I don’t really have a little brother named Kevin who is really really tall and is an underwater welder/EMT, who I’d kill for. I mean he did “spend a lot of time in his room” as a kid. Maybe all of the imaginary friends that I thought I didn’t have as a child, instead preferring “real” friends were actually imaginary after all. Maybe I’m delusional… seriously, though, how does one really know? Okay, I’ll give myself the benefit of the doubt that I was actually raised in California, all of my family members exist and my friends, though few and far between, were not imaginary. Even so, I must consider my college life and the compulsive lies that I may or may not tell my family about my life in Boston or the compulsive lies that I may or may not tell during my college life about life at home. Maybe I have a split personality!

GONE FISHIN': Glad I Didn't Turn Out to Be a Serial Killer

Dearest Daughters,

While away, I'll be posting old content.

I originally wrote the following when I was studying abroad the Spring Semester of 2005. (Actually, the intro I wrote in the Fall of my senior year. Don't think too hard, it'll make sense once you start reading.) I traveled to Brazil, South Africa and France. By the time I got to France, I was homesick, had gained 30 pounds and had no other desire than to hole up in my room when I wasn't in classes. I became a hermit and turned inwards, and spent my time reading as well as writing what I thought to be profound things. Note the precocious vocabulary, run on senteces, and my self-doubting take-it-or-leave-it defense mechanism. God, I'm glad no one stays the same.

I just discovered a bundle of writings I saved from my time in France when life in the French-speaking world sucked and I read more books (in English) in five weeks than I've ever read in five weeks before and I decided to start contemplating my life in the quiet boundary of my English-only room. Enjoy the following or don't-here's the first installment of what I wrote during that time, unrevised:

I am my mother’s third child and my father’s first, but since my older sister is eight years my senior and my older brother is eight years older than that, leaving barely a memory of a shared household, I’m more like an eldest child in terms of my personality. Though, I believe that those first sixteen months of my life before my baby brother was born, during which I lived life as my mother’s youngest child and my father’s only child, had a profound impact on my life. Unfortunately, I don’t remember those cherished sixteen months of selfish crying and un-denied attention.

My parents don’t tell many stories about my childhood days of cuteness, of accidents, comic mispronunciations or unimaginably wise outpourings of philosophical thoughts.

it seems i might like it here afterall...

leaving the commonwealth of massachusetts may prove to be more difficult that I thought.

Yipppeeee kay yea kay yo, (or however you spell that) I see sunspots...

because it's sunny outside! For the first time ever. Okay, not ever, but for the first time in a long time. Check it out, yo:

more procrastination but for a good cause

about this time last semester i wrote a post about our email program FirstClass basically because i was at about the same point in writing a paper that i am now. you know, that plateau of creative energy that is just aching to be fed by a procrastinatory break and which is particularly susceptible to obscure, but nevertheless profound thoughts? yes, that's the one. well, here's the visual to go along with the aforementioned/linked entry:

Speaking of being proud of my niece:

I forgot to add "functional multi-racial/multi-cultural identity" to her list of adjectives. I know we get caught up in "identity" and with exoticising mixed individuals (though we are the best), but here's proof to those who would think otherwise that "racial-mixing" is as natural as can be: a story about a "mixed" polar/grizzly bear. Note to that girl from Kentucky that I met during high school (and others like her around the world) who told me that she'd never marry a non-white person because "she would never do that to [her] children" because it's just "unfair" and "not what [she's] used to": If two different species of bears can do it I think it's a-ok for individuals from the same human species who happen to look different to make babies. It's a cute bear after all!

Where have I been all my life?

I'm in the thick of it right now what with finals and graduation and all descending. But, I didn't want to go too long without posting, because my mother (who is probably the sole reader of this blog) might worry. And I already missed the day where I took my last Wellesley College class ever. And the day where I thought I totally bombed an interview, but then was offered the internship the next day, even before they checked my references. Oh and the day where I took my senior portrait and was told that I had a good "serious face"(?) Then there was the day where I not only made it to my 8:30am class early, but also kicked Spanish ass and finished a final paper a full 26 hours before it was due. I know! I've totally got this college thing down now. But then there was the day where I felt like an imposter for being at a Fellowship reception with really exceptional people at the President's House and I had to leave before they found me out. And then there was the day where I probably sealed my fate of having to take summer classes in order to get my diploma because I 'earned' a 13 out of 25 on my last New Testament exam. Stupid Jesus. Lastly, there was the day where I realized that none of this really matters. But, I thought I'd tell you anyway.

I get it now! Eureka, dumbass!

So, after a chat with Kate today, I realized that the fact that life sucks for me right now isn't a bad thing. I have been thinking that everything bad happens to me. That I must have been doing something wrong in my friendships to experience so much emotional distress this semester. It's me, I've thought to myself. I must be such a horrible person that I've brought this upon myself.

And really, in a sense, it is me. It's not me in the sense that everyone goes through crap, everyone experiences drama, hurts others, gets hurt and looses loved ones; it is me in the sense that I just process all that in a more intense way than most. That is to say (if you will permit me to further my ambiguous, cryptic analogies here) that I ride the roller coaster of life. I feel every moment, every up and down and twist and turn. Indeed, there was a time in my life that I numbed every fiber of my existence against, basically, all of my feelings and after a few years of counseling and non-stop verbal processing, I've turned a 180, for better or for worse. This is not to say that there is no room for me to move back towards a more balanced approach to life. But for now, for me, I don't think it's a bad thing that I not only allow myself to, but also want to feel every emotion that comes my way. I'm not saying everyone ought to be as hyper-sensitive as I am, it just explains why everything hurts so bad. And why most people prefer to not feel anything at all.

Maybe I'm bi-polar. And a compulsive liar.