Eat the Damn Cake

I am, in many ways, a failure. For example, I am bad at getting a lot done in a day. If I do one big thing, I feel like I’m completely done. I can’t focus on anything else. I can’t seem to figure out when the chicken is cooked through to the inside. Which is why there are those chicken thermometers, I guess, but I don’t have one, and you can’t exactly go around sticking it into every piece of chicken you cook. Isn’t it only for whole chickens? Which leads me to my next item on the list: I don’t know basic stuff. I feel like I have to think twice all the time, because there’s always, always, always a chance I’ll say something completely embarrassing if I don’t.

In many ways, I’m a success. I usually do something I’m proud of every day. I remember to pick up the dry cleaning. I am always friendly, unless someone’s really rude to me. Sometimes I write a beautiful song. My abstract paintings are getting better. They no longer look quite as much like I was saying to myself, “Just put the splotch of red there! It’s daring! That’s what abstract art is! You have to take a risk!”

(image source here) Continue Reading »

So un-roasting. It’s the thing I do at the bottom of every post. But I’ve never taken the time to write about it in detail. I am here, blogging (not, you know, here in the world), because I get in a lot of fights. With myself. And I try to tell myself things that just aren’t true.

“You’re ugly.”

“You’re never going to amount to anything.”

“What are you WEARING? Are you kidding me??”

“Oh, that’s just like you. Forgetting where you put your wallet. AGAIN. Give me a break. Like I have all day to just wait around for you to get your act together?”

Sometimes it really sounds like an abusive relationship. Kinda makes you wonder where the line is. I mean, when does it stop sounding like an abusive relationship and actually become one? I would definitely never talk to anyone else the way I talk to myself. I wouldn’t even come close to that level of meanness and insensitivity. People have feelings, after all!

I don’t think I’m falling apart, or desperately in need of a lot of therapy, or seriously disturbed, or even very unconfident. I go out in the world and do things and succeed at things and feel good in my favorite outfits and do well in the occasional competitive environment (except for the pie-eating contest. That was a total bust. How do those little boys eat so fast??). Continue Reading »

I used to be really, really thin. And I thought thinness wasn’t a big deal, because I was so thin. People were always telling me I was so thin. Like a compliment. And I brushed it off and even pretended to be a little offended, because “thin” shouldn’t mean “pretty.” Now I’m less thin. And I’m betting I’ll keep getting less and less thin. That’s the way these things seem to work. And suddenly I start to wonder what happens when “thin” means “pretty” and you’re no longer thin. What do people say, then? You know what’s scary? They say, “You look so thin in that.”

When I tried on wedding dresses, the saleswoman kept saying, “That is SO slimming!” And “Look how tiny your waist looks in that!” (What is with me and saleswomen, by the way? The last one thought breast implants were an obvious option for me.)

And I said, “OH MY GOD, THANK YOU!!! I FEEL LIKE A PRINCESS NOW!”

No. I probably said, “Uh huh.”

But I thought, “Wait…what did my waist look like before? Apparently not so tiny, eh?”  OK, so I really don’t ever think “eh?” at the ends of my sentences, but whatever. And I thought, “Do I need to be slimmed down?”

My inclination when I gained weight was to feel pretty good about it. I’d been too thin after not remembering to eat through much of grad school, and I had just met my fiancé, and I was happy. We were eating together constantly, out of joy. He clearly thought I was gorgeous, my breasts were not quite as non-existent as before, life was good. Continue Reading »

It’s the weekend! And it is approximately a million degrees here in gorgeous and fascinating Manhattan. I say “approximately” because there’s a chance it’s, like, 999,999 degrees. So much stuff has been happening. I found a veil, and a potential new apartment, and my fiance brought me these unbelievable cookies…From Levain bakery on 74th, near Amsterdam. I discovered that Sarah Haskins is the funniest woman in the world. Emily sent me photos I took of her during her visit. And Elena sent me a VIDEO. It all makes me feel very hip and multi-media.

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It happened again. AGAIN. Emily and I walked into the Bra Smyth on Broadway and 77^th to look for strapless bras for the wedding, and when I explained to the saleswoman that I was looking for a bra to go under a wedding gown she looked at Emily and said, “She’s the bride?”

I’m not even kidding. If I’m with a friend, the salesperson always assumes that my friend is the bride, even though I’m the one talking about BEING A BRIDE, and if I’m by myself, they assume I’m there on behalf of the bride. What is it about me that screams, “Wow, there’s no way anyone would want to marry HER”?! What is it?? I don’t understand. Is it my massive tattoos of naked dancing women that cover my arms and chest? Is it my shirt that says, “Game Over” beneath a stencil of a bride and groom? Am I just horrifyingly ugly?

But that is not what this post is about. It’s about boobs.

The setting: That very same bra shop.

Characters: The lovely Emily, myself, and a businesslike, sixty-something saleswoman with a Polish accent. Continue Reading »

I wanted to post this yesterday, but I had no internet. Time Warner Cable had yet again misunderstood my attempt to pay them, and sternly cut me off, so that I would learn my lesson. I did. Lesson: Time Warner Cable is bad.

So my amazing friend Emily is here from California to help me with wedding planning. Other than telling me about how much better CA is than everywhere else in the world (which all people who live there are obligated to do. They sign a contract that requires them to constantly use phrases like, “Hmm. Rain. This reminds me of how much better the weather is in California!”), she’s been totally supportive of me getting married here in Manhattan. We’re running all over the city.

Yesterday I tried on some bridal lingerie. It had a little fake diamond buried in sprigs of lace. There may have been pink ribbons. It didn’t fit, which was kind of a relief. When we were telling my fiancé about the day and we mentioned the lingerie, he said, “What’s it for? Is there some special purpose?”

We thought about it. I said, “I think maybe to seduce you.”

“Oh.” He seemed uncertain about how he was supposed to react to that. Continue Reading »