bugger this for a lark, i’m off to england.

does everyone else agree that GE can change its slogan? we’re a world-weary, media-savvy bunch of people, right? we don’t fall for that “imagination at work” crap.
wouldn’t everyone feel like something was accomplished in the name of honesty if GE changed its slogan to “WE OWN EVERYTHING”? i know i would.

when i was a little girl, we traveled a lot. and i don’t mean, a weekend at six flags kind of traveling. i mean the kind where you put two months’ worth of clothes in a suitcase and drive around greece, or shove all your worldy posessions into enormous room-sized crates and move clear across the ocean.
starting at about ten, i was entrusted to pack myself for vacations. i would often get so excited about it that i’d pack a full week ahead of time, carefully arranging my clothes in piles whose attributes were decipherable only to me. i’d arrange, stand back, observe, close in for a small adjustment, scrap the whole thing and start again. i was the picasso of packing. it was always as much fun as the trip itself.
last night i organized a list of everything i am taking to england – on the computer. clothing was separated into lists based on category: shoes, pants, shirts. then the list was further subdivided into plausible outfits. with the advent of technology, i can stand back, observe the patterns, and swoop in for minor readjustments. those slides? no. they won’t coordinate with enough. let’s try the slingbacks instead. can that tee shirt fit into the pants schemes? alright, it’s a go.
tonight, the tasks became more concrete. skirts with tricky pleats were ironed. shoes were polished. a purse was carefully shopped for and selected at a bang-up bargain price. vaccuum-pak suitcase bags were tested and approved for space-conservation. preliminary toilettries were set aside. tomorrow and wednesday’s outfits were selected, tailored to not use any clothes being taken on the trip. books were promised from friends. tylenol PM was set aside for tomorrow’s assuredly restless night.
then the more personal preparations were made. feet were exfoliated and toenails were trimmed, buffed and painted. cuticles fell victim to a superb cream after being soaked in warm milk-bath water. there may or may not have been a face mask and some detailed attention to pores. a last-minute list is stuck to my door – new razors, a sunglass repair kit, H20 spray for the plane.
surveying my handiwork spread out neatly on my bed before moving it carefully to the trunk until its final packing tomorrow night, i had to stop and ask myself if i had gone completely insane. who cares what i’m wearing or if my pores are visible from outer space? wasn’t this all very self-absorbed and frivolous? isn’t it the journey, not what you’re wearing and whether your shoes have the appropriate high shine, that matters?
sure, what matters is the getting there and the being there, not how well-turned-out or prepared you are. but when i step out of the apartment, i’ll still get a thrill from a job well done, just like i did when i was little. packing always meant Something Exciting was about to happen. it still does.
i may have exchanged jellies for kitten-heel slingbacks, roald dahl for zadie smith, greece with my parents for england with my darling. i don’t even fit snugly asleep in two seats anymore. and jetlag actually catches up with me at twenty-three. but the thrill of packing is still the preview for the thrill of the new. and insofar as the well-traveled life is an art form, it’s nice to know i’m still the picasso of travel.

my bags are packed, i’m ready to go…
i remember a rough patch, a month back, when i flipped through a calendar and counted something with a sickening four in the end result. i couldn’t imagine how i’d get through forty something days and forty something nights.
and here i am, after a refreshing weekend at home with my family, looking at only three more lonely nights in my bed and one long night on a plane. on wednesday night, i will kiss my parents goodbye at the airport and set across the ocean, holding nothing but a well-packed carry-on, a purse, and my heart. i will speed through the night over the vast ocean towards england, a pilgrim in reverse, to finally be folded safely in stuart’s arms again.
week after week, we have toasted each other on separate sides of this damned ocean, proud of each other, proud of what we have, proud of making it through another week smiling. i won’t say i haven’t cried. the other night, i barely held it together when a friend sang the song that titles this entry, simply because i knew that after five precious days, i will have to be dragged back over this ocean by customs officials and a plan i know is right.
but right now, i’m not thinking about another terribly painful moment in another unfeeling airport. i’m thinking about mornings finally spent waking up next to the most beautiful person i know. i’m thinking about sunny afternoons in a garden on an island. i’m thinking about a train speeding through bucolic countryside, curled up together and making plans. i’m thinking about being in a crowded bar with dear friends old and new, and seeing stuart across the room and smiling.
i’m thinking, too, about the frightening dichotomy of these airports – how that arrivals hall at heathrow will seem like the sunniest, most glorious place in the world, four mornings from now.
dreams about days to come,
when i won’t have to be alone,
about the times that i won’t have to say,
oh, kiss me and smile for me
tell me that you’ll wait for me
hold me like you’ll never let me go…

what’s a _________ like you doing in a ___________ like this?
whoever makes me laugh the hardest will get a postcard from england.
in a related note, i am very sorry for the shit quality of the blogging around here. i am very tired, very anxious to get to england next week, and very caught up in the real world. i will try and blog this weekend – but just like a romance, i can’t simply force my hand… *
*stolen from shiv.
have a good weekend, folks. go out there, love someone, make something, walk somewhere, and sleep late.

okay, i’m not one to post about current pop culture (NO ONE MENTION THE APPLE BABY, PLEASE) but among all the current woes of television goodbyes, perhaps the saddest one is probably the least noticed… agent briscoe is being retired. the craggy, tired wit of jerry orbach has long kept me company through the good, the bad, the law, and the order. agent lennie “Morbid Comeback” briscoe, why are you being taken from us? i guess we’ll always have the laughs. the laughs and the bodies. the laughs, the bodies, and the morbid comebacks.
lennie, you were totally like that dad i would have had if i grew up in some row-house, family-oriented part of queens and i would totally forgive you for the drinking and the womanizing because damnit, you’re a great detective and so what if my childhood as your daughter made me some fast-talking queens girl that drops the second D from “didn’t”? i’d love you anyway, lennie. i still do. don’t go, lenny. you and sam waterston look so good together!
anyway, lenny, you’ll be missed. much more than frasier “SIGN OFF ALREADY WHILE YOU STILL HAVE A HAIR” crane or the entire cast of fri – “YOU ARE ALL TOO FAT AND/OR SKINNY, YOUR BEST WRITERS HAVE LONG BEEN FIRED, AND NO ONE CARES IF YOUR LOVE LIFE IS D.O.A.” -ends. certainly more than an- “WE ONLY WATCHED YOU BECAUSE WE ALL MISS BUFFY” -gel.
and i swear. i’m not kidding. if one more person asks if gwyneth’s baby name is funny because it’s almost a drink, i will do more than wear a sign. i will so totally cut you.
that is all. i promise not to blog about stupid pop culture again until next year’s premiere of the O.C. and shut up, i can still totally cut you.

spring always brings out the wanderlust in everyone. so wander over to stuart’s Gap Year Diaries and have a good look around. there’s travel, spontaneity, adventure, the art of Sitting, awkward mornings, foreign languages, strange arabs, stunning vistas, dizzying feats of trans-euro knavery, sickness, excitement, greek dancing, high seas … and oh, a panama hat. really, everything but pirates. and we can’t even rule out some pirates. because you never know, with pirates. savvy?
really, what more could you want for an afternoon’s read?

well, i never thought i’d say it, but camera phones are cool.

do you want me to tell you something subversive? love is all it’s cracked up to be. that’s why people are so cynical about it. it really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. and the trouble is, if you don’t risk anything, you risk even more.
-erica jong

jez left that quote on stuart’s site a few weeks ago and i haven’t been able to get it out of my head. it’s a rainy night here in queens, after a long day appeasing the Moving Karma Fairy by helping my darling friends on their apartment journeys. it’s raining in that beautiful way that puts you right to sleep, and the sort of lazy thunder that rumbles across the sky like zeus taking a walk. or, for that matter, having indigestion.
and yeah. i wish stuart was here. most moments – beautiful, frustrating, serendipitous or stressful – i wish he was here. and i swore, for years, that i’d never want to feel that way. unable to fully appreciate a moment because of longing for something, or someone, you don’t have. while my beloved city is a more beautiful place to me now, because its the spot i will stay firmly routed until my love arrives at the end of the string i am so faithfully holding – it’s also hard to see the city’s beauty because stuart isn’t here with me.
and then i think about that quote. i think about the word subversive. because, really, love is a tough concept for this Here Now Me world to wrap its mind around. love makes you do crazy things that don’t follow plans. it makes you worry less about your selfish materialistic independence and more about whether another person is happy. love – all love, not just the romantic kind – takes you out of yourself. it puts on the backburner so many of our self-absorbed greedy pursuits.
subversive. and yet we all do it. because the toughest things you do are usually the most rewarding. we love because it’s hard, because it’s unstable, because it’s fascinating. it’s like traveling to another country to find out who you are. and the worst thing you can do is walk away from a challenge. because you never know what you’ll find.
love really is all it’s cracked up to be. far out, man.

well, technically john donne said “death be not proud” but hey, we do what we can.
down at the bottom of this page you’ll find an unaligned, roughly hewn a pretty shiny little paypal donation button. i am usually loathe to ask anyone for anything, and lord knows i have food in my fridge and a roof over my head, so if it’s between that and this, choose the food, people.
but stuart and i are currently looking at another 4-8 months of separation. at least through the summer, we might not be able to afford to see each other. we’re scraping money from every possible avenue to put towards a life together, but babies, if you’ve got ten dollars lying around, or ten thousand, and you want to further the cause of love… we’ll send you so much loving karma you’ll need to rent out storage space to keep it all in.
really, i want you to know that donate or not, every single one of you – high rollers and barrel scrapers alike – are shiny superstars for coming along and cheering on this crazy wonderful ride. i love you guys.