BASTA PASTA: Italian, or rather Italian(s), For Dummies

“Travelling is a fool’s paradise…I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea and at last wake up in Naples, and there besides me is the stern fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from.”

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

“I had to read this quote over a few times. I came across it because I was looking for a quote about Naples to put in here, and actually, after reading it again and again, I realized that it didn’t have much to do with Naples at all. But what I think its saying is that you can’t run away from yourself, which with regard to what is about to follow, I considered all the more poignant.”

- Me

I’m sensing you’re getting sick of the lists. One was great, two, three maybe, but there have been a lot lately. Which I completely understand. I get sick of things too. Like Italian men. Well, “sick” is perhaps an exaggeration, but there have been a lot of them too lately. So, this is, in part, an attempt to move away from the lists—which, considering that what follows is a bit of an epic, I think I have succeeded in doing. It is also however, an attempt to move away from Italian men. Which, it turns out, isn’t quite as easy.

***

What is it about me? Do I smell like fish? Lemons? Buffalo milk…? Or is there just a giant sign on my ass saying “Neapolitans welcome!” The saying goes “See Naples and die,” but turns out that for Neapolitans, (who have seen Naples many a time, and not yet died), its more a case of “see me and die.” At least that’s how the one I met this morning put it. Take it easy Rocco, it’s a little early in the morning for suicide. Ok, so his name wasn’t really Rocco, but the rest of the story is true and it goes a little something like this:

(Warning: Some of this is in Italian—relatively simple Italian—but if you don’t understand it, try think of that as a blessing in disguise. For on occasions such as this, I sometimes wish I didn’t either).

***

“Buongiorno signorina!” A man shouted after me this morning. And as my day had gotten off to an incredibly good start, so it was in fact a buon giorno, I turned my head slightly, and with a big smile chirped back “Buongiorno signore!” and carried on walking. I couldn’t help but feel like I was in Roberto Benigni’s film Life is Beautiful. If only he had said principessa! I daydreamed. [Italians for Dummies, Lesson Number One—don’t think Benigni, think Peter Pan. Didn’t Captain Hook teach you anything? Ne-ver smile at a cro-co-dile…]

“Sei Italiana?” he shouted again. No. Still walking. “Spagnola?” No. “Inglese?” Uh-oh, we got ourselves another geography-and-its-discontents scenario here. [See Blog Archive, Nov 2009] “Ma, where are you from? I am curious!” he persisted. [Italians for Dummies, Lesson Number Two: Italians persist). I was tempted to lie, or half-lie, as I often do…New York, Africa…The Seychelles! (Ooh, should try that one sometime). But, for some reason both the exotic and the cosmopolitan variations were washed away by a fervent nationalistic pride as I turned around again and shouted “Serbia!”

Considering it was barely 10am, I thought my list of daily accomplishments thus far pretty laudable, thank you!—Early morning swim: swum, important meeting: attended, duty to country: served. So far, so good. This buon giorno just keeps getting buoner, I thought. (Don’t say buoner out loud. It gives out the wrong idea). But that was about to change. About a minute or so later, a car pulled up beside me, a window rolled down, and I’d like to say BIG was in the car, but nope, it was Rocco.

***

“Scusa, non voglio disturbare, ma….volevo solo dirti che sei BELLISSSIIIIMMMAAA! BE-LLI-SSI-MA!” Got it Rocco, no need to spell it out now. 


“Grazie,” I responded graciously, and of course, kept walking. Which would have been the end of it, had he not too, kept driving…beside me.

“Cosí…veramente…non sei italiana?” At this point, I didn’t yet know for sure he was Neapolitan, but I was beginning to sense it. You see, that’s the thing about Neapolitans, they ask you everything twice. Staunch Catholics though they may be, they do have trouble believing…

“Veramente,” Rocco, “no.”

“Ma, parli italiano?”

“No. Forse solo un po’…” (It was good practice, I figured, using all the Italian words I knew…)

“Ma capisci tutto!” This, totally gave him away. The Neapolitans have a particular way of pronouncing the “sc” (that is, the “sh” sound), and an even more particular way of saying the word “KAPISSSHHHHH!” And so with little else to do, I SHrugged my SHoulders in a New-York-mafia-whaddayagonnado-kind-of-way, and said, “Eh…Capisco.” (Yep, I understand Italian.) Are we done here?

***

We weren’t, it turned out. “So, how do you know Italian?”

Eh…where do I begin, I thought, but another whaddayagonnado shrug was all I could muster.

“You had an Italian boyfriend?” Clearly he could kapish my shrugs, for he somehow knew to use the past tense.

I nodded.

“So you have good taste. I mean I thought you did, from how you dress, but now I know…” [Italians for Dummies, Lesson Number Three: Italians believe that the best taste is, of course Italian. Food…fashion…men]. To be fair, though, I was wearing Guccis.

Another shrug.

“And so…?”

“And so,” Rocco, “BASTA CON GLI ITALIANI!” (But not with Gucci, wink).

Uh-oh, I forgot. Italians for Dummies, Lesson Number Four: (and this one applies especially to Neapolitans) “Basta” doesn’t mean enough. It means “more, please.” As in, when you say, “BASTA PASTA!” what you’re asking for is more spaghetti. Well, its not, technically, what you’re asking for, but it is whatcha gonna get. And so, when I said, “BASTA CON GLI ITALIANI,” meaning “GO AWAY ROCCO!” he took it as an invictus to get out of his car. And there I was doing the whole hand gesture and everything! I am talking to you with my hands! In your language! Clear as a friggin’ airport traffic controller!

***

But this pilot just didn’t get it. No, he just kept on keepin’, and as he came running around the car in his defense said, “But I’m nice!”

(And implicit here is lesson number five…) “That’s what they all say,” Rocco.

At this moment, he bowed, kissed my hand, and introduced himself. I’ve actually forgotten what he said his name was, so much to my delight, I guess we’re going to just have to keep calling him Rocco.

“Piacere,” Rocco.

“Piacere.”

Seeing as we were on to introductions, I felt compelled to test my theories and ask him where he was from. NAPOLI. Certo. [I think I deserve some sort of Italians for Dummies Diploma at this stage. In fact, I should add that to my CV. “My knowledge of Italiano is shaky, but I speak Italiani very well—Napoletani, to be precise”]. Anyhow, I must have had “See Napoli and die” written all over my face, for he then enthused…

“You were with a Neapolitan?!”

Another shrug. Another nod.

“WOW!” “YOU REALLY DO HAVE GOOD TASTE!”

[Sure, I’ll pause here and give you some time to take that in. We’ve stepped things up a notch. We are now in NapoliTURBO].

***

In the meantime, I stood there thinking, yes, I guess I do have good taste, Rocco. But I’ve decided I’m going to exercise it on shoes and bathroom tiles. No more men. And certainly, no more Neapolitans. Which is to say, NO.MORE.AMORE.

And though I didn’t say any of that out loud, I think he got it. So, he took a step back. “Can I ask you just one last thing? Can you take off your glasses?” Why, I thought, they’re Italian! They’re Gucci! No, I’m lying. That’s not what I thought. I figured I’ve been asked a lot worse, I figured I’ve been asked to take off a lot more…and I figured, at the rate he was going, he may well have asked me to be the mother of his children! So when I learned it was just the glasses, with a silent phew, I kindly obliged.

“MAMMMMMAAAAA MIIIAAAA! COME SEI BELLLLIIISSSIIIMMMAAA!”

I was ever so tempted to ask for a favour in return, and plead that he leave MAMA out of it…but Lesson Number Most Important—This is Mission Impossible. With an Italian man, and especially a Neapolitan, MAMA is always, in one way or another, there. So I left him with her.

“Grazie and ARRIVEDERCI!” Rocccccoooo!

***

Considering “arrivederci” has the root vedere hidden in it, meaning to see, I assume this word literally translated means something along the lines of see you soon, or “hasta la vista baby” so perhaps I should have thought twice before using it, because we did see each other again, and baby was it soon. I had barely taken two steps when he appeared in front of me again.

“E allora? Dove vai?”

Daiiiiiiii Rocco! You said the glasses were the last thing! “Per caffé.”

I’m pretty sure my intonation alluded to a fullstop at the end of that, but of course he took it as an invitation. Damnit, I should have said I’m going for a bikini wax or something. Though who’s to say that wouldn’t have invited the same response…

“Perfetto! Andiamo a prendere un caffé.”

No Rocco, there will be no andiamo-ing. You, me, finito, e basta. Oh bugger I used the B word again.

“Perché no? Perché non andiamo insieme? Io voglio caffé, tu vuoi caffé…” Yeah yeah I get it, what is this, a lesson in conjugation?

“Devo lavorare.” I need to work, I told him, holding out my bag to show him its contents. [Lesson Number I’ve Lost Count: Remember, they don’t believe you. You must always provide proof.] I’m not exactly sure how or why I thought the Sunday Times Magazine and Filofax in my bag were to serve as proof that I was going to do any work, but then again, there was a big fat brown envelope in there too, which did seem pretty professional. “I need to read, I need to write…” I added, and I really wasn’t lying because by this point I had already begun tossing this blog around in my head. Basta pasta, basta pasta, basta pasta. The words slurped around in my head like spaghetti bolognese and there it was…I had my title. I had my title, and I was hungry. That’s the other thing about Italians, everything is always somehow related to food. So perhaps, that’s why…you’re always hungry for more…

***

I, in that moment, wasn’t really hungry for any more Rocco, but unfortunately that feeling (like all the others) wasn’t mutual.

“So can I have your number and take you out for coffee some other time?”

Haven’t you had enough of me saying this word already? “No.”

“Percheeeeeeé! I just want us to be friends!”

[Another lesson. They don’t do with “question marks” really well. It’s usually just a long string of exclamations, and quite often—as he demonstrates here—lies, but I’m not even going to open that can of worms. Tomatoes yes, worms no.]

“Do you live around here?”

I nodded in some roundabout way saying yes and no. My MAMA told me never to tell strangers where I live. Or the other trick, answer the question with a question: “Do you?”

“Si.”

“Well, I’ll tell you what,” Rocco, “you live around here, I (maybe) live around here (a lesson in English conjugation, for a change?) so if and when we bump into each other again, maybe we can go for coffee, maybe we can be friends.” What? He lied, so I lied. That ain’t happening. Of course, he guessed it…

“But we’ll never see each other again!” That’s the other thing about Neapolitans, it’s always a case of now or never. You gotta eat the pizza while the pizza’s-a-hot! Incidentally…DIDYOUKNOW?…that Elvis’s “Now or Never” is sung to the tune of O Sole Mio, which need I mention, is a Neapolitan song!? He coulda picked any other melody in the whole world, but no, he chose that one. Why d’ya think that is?

***

So that was more or less the end of that. Of course I did see him again five or ten minutes later, when I arrived at the nearest coffee shop, (an Italian one, no less), and he somehow miraculously “happened” to be standing in the vicinity. But luckily, I was on the phone to MAMA, recounting the whole Neapolitan adventure, and luckily...he was Neapolitan enough to respect that. So he stayed away.

But I’m pretty sure that’s not the last of him, and it sure as hell won’t be the last of them. Neapolitans, or Italians, that is. Perhaps I could avoid coffee shops, or Guccis, or smiling, for a while…but I don’t think this matters. No, it doesn’t matter. There will always be another Rocco.

And I have another story to prove it. Don’t worry, this one’ll be short. The day that infamous Neapolitan affair ended, I went to a party. So bar, not coffee shop. Check. I was wearing Choos not Guccis, so check that. And considering the whole affair had just ended, I’m pretty sure I wasn’t smiling much either. So three out of three. And yet, I ended up, you guessed it, talking to an Italian man the entire evening. Now, he wasn’t Neapolitan, in fact I don’t even think he spoke Italian, and his name wasn’t Rocco either. But guess what, and I say this rhetorically because you never could or would have guessed…that…his…surname…was…Nappolini. Here, in one last nod to Rocco, I’ll spell it out for ya. NA-PPO-LI-NI. So it may or may not be me, but there definitely is, something fishy goin’ on.

this is how we do; 10 things writers do in order to...write.

“A writer never has a vacation. For a writer life consists of either writing or thinking about writing.”

- Eugene Ionesco

So, I’ve been doing a lot of writing lately. Working by day, blogging by night, and scribbling down just about any thought that comes into my head (or obsessively Facebooking and emailing) in between. Besides the weekend in college when I read the entire first volume of Proust and only stopped to pop another caffeine pill, and the week before the dissertation deadline when I stupidly, stupidly, stupidly! decided to rewrite the entire last chapter despite the fact that it had been done for months (and only stopped to pop another…no, never mind), this has perhaps been the most productive week of my life. And I can proudly say there were no pills involved. Turns out, while writing can be “a dog’s life” as Flaubert said, it can also be pretty great. You get to work from home, which in my case is a beautiful one; you get to set your own schedule, which in my case is non-stop save for the 5 minutes I spend on Jeremy Clarskon; you get to wear whatever you want (which as you’ll soon learn, varies); and most importantly, and you probably know what’s coming next, you get to smoke. Correction, you get to chain-smoke. What? I’m a writer. It’s how we do. Dawg. (I hope my landlord doesn’t read my blog—its fiction, all fiction, dawg). But between the words and the cigarettes, I also got to thinking about other things we writers do. For while it may all seem cool and breezy to your average office slave, it still is, nonetheless work. And precisely in order not to be cool and breezy about it, there are certain things you need to do. To force, encourage or inspire yourself to work. So, as I’m totally riding the list train lately, here are ten things writers, or this writer does, in order to make it happen.

1. Dress like you’re going sailing or yachting. You know, lots of navy, lots of white, TODS moccasins, maybe a little scarf if you really want to go all out. This way, every time you get up to go and pee and you see yourself in the mirror…you’ll feel like you’ve just stepped off your yacht and are about to step back on. Works like a charm, this one. There is, after all, some truth to the whole fake-it-til-you-make-it business.

2. Drape your chair with some silk or velvet so that it looks more like a throne than a work chair. Ick, really don’t like the w word. Actually…maybe mine looks more like a gypsy’s or fortune teller’s chair right now, but whatever, as long as it doesn’t look like a writer’s one, it’s all good.

3. Turn off your phone. Boy do I love doing this. Sorry mom, I’m fine, I’m alive, I’m well. Nobody killed me on the way to the supermarket, no lamppost fell on my head, I’m not lying in a ditch. I’m just writing. And yes, I brushed my teeth. Stop worrying.

4. Listen to opera. Preferably in a language that you don’t understand. That way you wont stop working to get up and sing along every once in a while. Damn you MJ. No, no, no “pretty lady with the high heels on”…sit, work, write! “You give me fever like I never ever known!” What? My iPod was on shuffle!

5. Don’t put the iPod on shuffle. “Sex bomb sex bomb you’re my sex bomb! You can give it to me when you…” in fact, remove Tom Jones and co. from your music collection altogether. Awww, but my neighbors will be disappointed! The ones across the way who see the show that is, The Sex Bomb Sailor show! The ones above and below me will probably be grateful. (Oh those “above and below” innuendos are so inviting…but I’ll stay away from them for now. That’s the other thing writers do—we focus.)

6. Empty the ashtray every once in a while. No, not much inspiring or thought provoking in this one, but it still needs to be done.

7. Which reminds me. Open the windows. Call it whatever you want but it’s supposed to resemble an office not a hotbox.

8. Don’t put Jeremy Clarkson’s Sunday Times Column on your desk as incentive to hurry up with your work so you can get to your pleasure. The face he has in that picture just says, “I’m bored, and you should just give up, you’re never, ever, going to be me.” (Gee, talk about a picture saying a thousand words).

9. If you’re going to drink while you write (and I try, for the most part, not to) don’t leave the bottle on your desk. Put it somewhere far away in the fridge, so that in the time it takes to walk over you might think twice before refilling that glass. If you don’t, you’ll just refill and empty your glass to the rhythm of the sentences…and after a while, the shentences, let me tell you, the shentences, are bound to lose their…rithim. Hic!

10. Whatever you do, don’t consult the Urban Dictionary as a reference. You’ll come across hundreds of interesting new words…or old words with new meanings…and you’ll find yourself reading through the 919 synonyms for “pussy” instead of writing 919 words of your own. “Dick mitten.” It was a tough call, but that has to be my new favorite. Incidentally, it’s also called a “pearl hotel.” Fancy that!

girl with a pearl necklace turns ONE!

I just got my 30^th follower! Claire, no idea who you are, and how you came across this, but thank you. I also just realized that it’s the 31^st of July…and July is the month in which I started this blog last year, which means that if I’m going to blow my own horn over “turning one!” it has to be today. Ok. Too many numbers. Not enough words. Let me try that again. I’ve been writing this blog for a year, and let’s be honest, with only 30 followers, I’m no Justin Halpern, and this is hardly the success that Shit My Dad Says turned out to be. He started his twitter account around the time I started my blog, and has since garnered over a million followers, published a book, and become famous. Can’t figure out how or why he’s been so successful, and haven’t yet figured out how to follow in his tread, although I have started inserting the word “shit” a lot more often, and here’s hoping that works to the same effect.

Regardless of the lack of official followers or fame however…the girl with the pearl necklace has had an eventful year. Some things have changed, some have stayed the same…she has earned me grace and gotten me into trouble…been both my pride and my torment. So here are the pearls of wisdom I have gained, the pearls of gratitude that I owe…and some links to memory lane...

1. I have spent a long year desperately clarifying that I am not referring to that kind of “pearl necklace.” And then, it was brought to my attention that actually, albeit in some hidden, unobtrusive, coy way (if that’s possible), I am. As one reader pointed out to me, “honey, mask it, veil it, lace it all you want, but let’s be honest, you’re always, in one way or another talking about sex.” (I then proceeded to list the titles of my blogs from beginning to end, and he did indeed manage to point out some hidden reference to sex in every.single.one of them). So, much to my dismay, I guess I am referring to that kind of pearl necklace. And I guess I can live with that. I mean, swallow it. (Thanks to A.D).

http://girlwithapearlnecklace.blogspot.com/2009/07/in-vermeer-not-pornographic-sense.html

2. And while we’re on the topic of sex, I received another interesting, helpful and thought provoking comment from a reader. The blog entitled “Of Whores and Horses: Further Contemplations on Writing,” discusses the idea of letting go, and begins with three Zambian words, “osa donsa maningi,” meaning “don’t pull too much.” I explain in the blog that the expression has “raised quite its fair share of eyebrows, especially when told to a group of Zambian men, who can’t help but wonder how, or why I know these words, these three words in particular.” I assumed that they reacted or laughed at it because it sounds like a Zambian man had said it to me, in the form of some sex-ed lesson on how to hold, pull, etc., (even though I had learned it from dealing with horses). But a reader then said to me she thought I was referring to something else…which is the Zambian tradition of labia elongation—in laymen’s terms, pulling on your labia to make them longer. Anyhow, long story short, this sparked a whole inquisition, and I became desperate to learn of this tradition, how, why, where and when it happened…and it became the intrigue du jour for a good four weeks or so. Turns out the notion of sexual education and traditions in Africa is lengthy, dense and complex…not to mention a bundle of rollicking fun. So, stay tuned. Sex and the Bush. Coming Soon. (Thanks to ATK).

http://girlwithapearlnecklace.blogspot.com/2010/03/of-whores-and-horses-further.html

3. One last thing on sex. I don’t know if anyone is enough of a fan to have religiously and regularly read through the comments on the blog as well as the blogs themselves. But I one day decided to do this…and I realized that some random-spam-something had posted comments that were links to websites for Viagra and such. I suppose I felt insulted or devalued or something because I immediately deleted them. But now I kind of wish I had left them there. It has a nice ring to it no? “Writing is like golf…you’ve got to have the balls…” ENLARGE YOUR PENIS! “Writing is like prostitution…you’ve got to bear it all….” BUY VIAGRA!

http://girlwithapearlnecklace.blogspot.com/2010/03/harvard-scrabble-and-golf-some-unlikely.html

4. All the praise, comments, and constructive criticisms were and continue to be great…but I guess the girl with the pearl necklace really shone most when she earned me a job. Earlier this year, I came across a listing for a writer/editor, and all I did was send a little hello and a link to my blog…and a day or two later, I had not only a new job, but a new follower! It was for a book on flirting…and incidentally I had recently written a little piece on flirting/pick-up lines entitled “Geography and it’s Discontents.” So I guess I owe a thank you to (I think his name was) Pietro, the lovely Italian man with the not so lovely pick-up line “where are you from”…but more importantly a big thank you to J.S…

http://girlwithapearlnecklace.blogspot.com/2009/11/geography-and-its-discontents.html

5. On the other hand, sending (or spraying?) the link out like that may not always be such a good idea…as it happened in the curious case of the cookie cut. Those of you who are close or obsessive followers might have noticed that in January this year, there was a blog posted on “cookies” which was taken off soon after it was published. The piece was written on the eve of Serbian Christmas…when my mother and I decided to research some Serbian Christmas traditions and discovered that one of them was to make cookies with “JC” (Jesus Christ’s initials) on them. This got me going on a little ramble about cookies…which incidentally in slang, can also be used to refer to a vagina. Anyhow, a few days later, my mother and I had tea with a Bishop (golly, doesn’t that sound splendid!) and she all too quickly told him about my blog. Before the man was out of the door, I was at my laptop taking the cookie blog down. Look I’m not really one for censorship…but I just don’t think a Bishop should ever have to see the words vagina and Jesus Christ in the same sentence. I may consider reposting that blog at some point…

6. I suppose I should also stop and thank my (real) pearl necklace. It was (I swear) the inspiration for the title of this blog, it is ever the great conversation starter, or…dare I say it, finisher. But then I must thank my dad too, because he has kindly, three times this year, fixed it when it has broken. So thank you dad. And in case you were wondering, yes it was quite a sight seeing me on my knees trying to catch all the pearls as they came thundering down, screaming shitfuckmotherfuckingshitfuckmotherfucker! I know, nothing pearly or graceful in that, but don’t judge, I’m trying the Justin Halpern method. (Thanks to D.S).

7. Beyond my father…perhaps I should thank men in general. The strangers, the friends, the men who give me pearls of inspiration and those who give me real ones. No, wait, I mean…oh whatever, take it as you wish. I wrote a blog in three parts called “In Praise of Men” a while ago. And I still believe it. Every single word…

http://girlwithapearlnecklace.blogspot.com/2009/07/in-praise-of-men-part-i.html

8. Oh alright, I won’t be sexist. Thanks to my girls too. For talking, for listening, for reading, for getting it!…and for never wearing pearls.

9. One last thing. Some of you read this blog religiously. Some of you a little less. Some of you can cite lines and dates of postings better than I can. Whoever you are, however often you read, and for whatever reason you read…whether for entertainment or marketing, that is, penis enlarging purposes…please, please, please: Click on the FOLLOW button! Look, its right here….to your right…yep, that’s the one! à

10. Sorry that wasn’t the last thing. This is. Like the “pillow and champagne bucket,” you’ve got to save the best for last after all. Dear Mom. My very first follower, my biggest fan, and my favourite person in the whole world to quote. My mom reads every blog before the rest of the world is even aware that a new day has begun let alone that a new blog has been posted. And in true motherly fashion, only has one response every time: Super! (That and “try cut down on the smoking dear.”) I can’t thank you enough. And don’t worry, it’s not all true. Sometimes I like to exaggerate…

That’s all folks. Happy Birthday to me and a big thanks to all of you. Oh, and one very last thing…shit!

go get em' frankie! - on the perks of living alone.

"I grew up with six brothers. That's how I learned to dance -

waiting for the bathroom."

- Bob Hope

You know, Frankie was on to something with the whole “My Way” thing. I mean sharing is caring and all…but “my friend, I’ll say it clear, I’ll state my case, of which I’m certain…” and my case, is that I’m done with that. Done. With. That. I have, as I’m sure most people have, lived with parents, grandparents, other family members, total strangers, boyfriends, friends, flatmates, flatmates who weren’t friends, flatmates who became friends, flatmates who became more than friends, flatmates who became more than friends and then became less than friends, way way less than…you get the drift. And for the first time in a long time, I finally live alone. And I absolutely love it. Sure, there’ll probably come a day when I slip and fall in the shower and will need someone to help me up, a lightbulb that will need changing, or a day when I’ll just get plain lonely…but we’ll cross, (or jump off) that bridge when we get to it. And by “we” I of course mean “me.” Right now however, all “we” can see are the perks. And boy are there many…

1. You can live on chicken caesar salad everyday…and you, in true Caesarian fashion, get to decide when you’re bored of that. And, truth be told, I just don’t think that’s ever going to happen.

2. You never have to worry about having the last one of anything. “No you have it.” “No you have it.” None o’ that.

3. You can open things with things you’re not supposed to open things with. Like butter knives and teeth. And nobody’s going to tell you not to.

4. And after you’ve opened the jar with a butter knife, you can stand over the kitchen counter and eat all the stuffed green olives in it. And be completely satisfied with that as dinner.

5. Or be completely satisfied with just cigarettes. Yum! (No, mom, I don’t really just have cigarettes for dinner, stop worrying).

6. You can smoke in bed. (I don’t do that either, but I like knowing that I can). And I’m sure that if and when that “right” moment comes along…I most certainly will thank you very much.

7. And speaking of “right” moments, and wrong moments…you can bend over to put dishes in the dishwasher, or to do your hand-washing in the bathtub without worryi—no, never mind, scratch that. TMI.

8. Nobody is going to “accidentally” wash your cashmere, or silk, or wool, or lingerie with the linens on 90, in the name of “doing you a favor.” You what, you didn’t know? No sweetheart, you didn’t think.

9. You can laugh out loud over something you read on your computer and you don’t have to explain to anyone what it is you’re laughing over. (Like your own jokes for instance. It totally works to laugh at your own jokes when you're on your own. What's more, you kind of have to. Otherwise nobody will).

10. In fact you can spend long hours in front of your computer facebooking, skypeing, googling, wikipediaing, or you-tubing, without being questioned on whether that is a legitimate use of your time or intelligence. Yesterday I spent a good hour reading up on St. Pancras and the pancreas. This is because last week, when I went to King’s Cross, the tube conductor said over the loudspeaker, “this is King’s Cross St. Pancreas.” Not PANCRAS, PANCREAS. I swear that’s what he said. And this got me thinking, are the two related? So I googled it. One’s a saint (or train station named after a saint, if you will), the other, a gland. Ipso facto, not related. That’s what I thought. Also, I randomly came across a video of a one-legged salsa dancer. Again, totally unrelated. But totally awesome. Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnsz8Uc3enE&feature=related

(PS. I love how the last word in that link is…RELATED! Maybe it all is, somehow…Google?)

11. The toothpaste always has the cap on. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not exactly the saint-of-all-things-closed—I leave drawers and stuff open all the time—but the toothpaste? Toothpaste is just one of those things you have to close.

12. Everything is Always. Exactly. Where. You. Left. It.

13. You can file, buff, and paint your nails whenever and wherever without worrying about the sound or the smell bothering anyone. And without getting a lecture on the coffee table varnish. Sorry dad. I promise. I won’t do it again. (But my nails are gorgeous, thanks for asking!)

14. Nobody’s going to judge you for buying the expensive toilet paper. (There should probably be another sorry dad somewhere in here). The thick fluffy one with snowflakes on it and adorable puppies on the label. Love that stuff. Correction, my tush loves that stuff. Doesn’t yours?

15. When you forget to get the (fancy) toilet paper out of the shopping bag you’ve just brought home…you can hop out of the bathroom with your knickers round your ankles and get it. Oh come on, we’ve all done it. (And if you haven’t, then you should probably try the fancy toilet paper. That stuff is worth the hop).

16. You can pee with the bathroom door open. I don’t know why I like this so much, but I do. It feels very Louis XIV…l’âge d’or, or something. Incidentally, in his time, he was one of the few (or only) people who actually had their own bathroom. But knowing him, he probably just ordered everyone to piss off (pun intended!) and left the door open anyhow. (And just to give credit where its due, I’m sure it was so much more than a door—the entrance to Louis’s bathroom quite possibly closely resembled the gates of heaven).

17. The toilet seat is always down. Down and clean. I just don’t get how they manage to spray it everywhere in the first place. You have a pointer for crying out loud! What do I got? (Not you, Louis, I’m sure you had control down, even in that department).

18. It seems a lot of the perks of living alone revolve around peeing. What can I say? I drink a lot of water. And a lot of coffee. A lot a lot.

19. Which reminds me—no one is going to count the number of cups of coffee you drink. Ahhh…encore garçon encore! Wait, there’s no garçon. But that would be nice, no? A little butler boy? Do a little dance, make a little love…roast a little chicken?

20. Ok. Focus. I’m focusing. Back to quantities—nobody is going to question whether you really need all those pairs of shoes. Need? When did that become the categorical imperative? You don’t really need that attitude, but you have it don’t you? And boy do you wear it well. (See now my butler boy, he wouldn’t have an attitude…)

21. As for “wearing:” you can take as long as you want to get ready…and actually, when there’s no one else around…turns out it doesn’t take that long at all.

22. I’d like to say you can walk around naked all the time…but I have big windows and a lot of them, so, that doesn’t really work. Yep. I learned that the hard way. Tweet Twee-eet. I suppose I could crawl around naked though. I should give that a go…

23. But speaking of crawling, this is a big one: You never ever have to tip-toe. I did ballet for almost ten years so I think its fair to say that I’m done with the whole tip-toe business.

24. Which sets us up for the coup de grace. You can be sure that when your Sunday Times is delivered early on Sunday morning you won’t wake anyone up when you pop down to get it…

25.…And most, most, most importantly: nobody will touch it before you. Jeremy Clarkson and I…All alone………

Now, tell me, what could be better than that.

MEGA-EDITING-COMPLEX; "editorial" observations on pharmaceuticals.

You know something’s wrong in your life when you walk out of the pharmacy, look in the bag the lady packed for you, and there’s a bottle in it labeled “MEGA-STRESS COMPLEX.” Seriously? MEGA? Couldn’t ya just have given me the regular version? I told you I had an ulcer for chrissakes, not a stroke! Or the lite? Isn’t there a stress-complex-lite? That would make it sound like a tasty snack bar or something. I got it! Stress-complex-ZERO! Only one calorie! Nope. I was given MEGA. I’ll say it again, MEGA. STRESS. COMPLEX. It's all in really big, fat, bold letters too. What about me exactly suggests that I need that? Is there a sign on my forehead? Is it my hair? My shoes? My shoes! I knew it. This is why I never wear trainers. And then, as if the MEGA isn’t injury or insult enough, did they really have to call it a COMPLEX? I mean I understand, it’s a compound of vitamins B-complex, C, and other supposedly stress relieving nonsense, but surely there’s another way to say that, no? Don’t these people know that the word complex bears a lot of Freudian, dare I call them stressful connotations? How ‘bout amalgamation, mixture…cocktail! Cocktail! The MEGA-STRESS COCKTAIL! See how much better that sounds already. Gimme two, and we can call it happy hour. Happy hour—there’s another name they could have given it. Do pharmaceutical companies have writers? They should hire me. I’d make those pills sell big time. Sorry, not big time, MEGA time.

feng shui-ing the shit out of my shit; lessons learnt in packing.

Salvador Dali

“keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss.”

- joan didion

“I think I’ve just figured out why you’re always packing, unpacking and repacking,” somebody once said to me, “it’s because there is so much chaos inside your head that you cannot conceivably order, so you psychotically arrange and rearrange all the tangible things within your reach…and you delude yourself into believing that what you are actually doing is somehow miraculously folding up all of your thoughts and packing them away into neat little drawers and labeled boxes. Well let me tell you something darlin’, pack away all you want, feng shui the shit out of your shit, but you, will still, always, have chaos in your head.”

He was a very intelligent man—perhaps one of the most intelligent I have ever met—so I valued his analysis, I wholly agreed with it, understood it, believed it, took it to heart…but that didn’t change much. I still obsessively pack, unpack, repack and rearrange whatever and whenever I can. (When I can’t, like when I’m sitting in somebody else’s house, I do it anyway in my head. All my time spent indoors is essentially one long exercise in virtual reupholstering). And I still believe I am somehow putting my thoughts into order. Or at least axiomatically approaching order. And regardless of whether I succeed in inching towards order, I do learn something each time. So after a weekend of packing, moving and unpacking here are some things I learned. In, of course, something like order.

1. I have a lot of shit. (Somehow this is always the first realization and it always seems to come at the wrong time—as in, after you’ve acquired it, when you need to carry it, not while you’re contemplating buying it and cooing over just how pretty it is!)

2. Bin liners are my new best friends.

3. Some half-a-dozen bin liners later, I still have a lot of shit.

4. So far, so good, lessons being learned, but truth be told, the moment I’m settled and unpacked, the first thing I’m probably going to do, is go out and get more shit.

5. (Prophecy fulfilled. I did in fact, go out and get more shit. Like a big clothing rack. But I carried and assembled it all on my own which was a revelation in itself).

6. And hangers. On a side note, nobody in London seems to know what clothes hangers are. CLOOOO-THESSSS HAAANNNGGGG-ERRS. Pantomiming taking off your clothes and hanging them really doesn’t help. In one shop, a guy nodded and brought me clothes pegs. Not bad I thought…close enough, they technically do “hang clothes.” But in another, get this, he brought me a box of firelighter cubes. Sure, I’ll say it again, firelighter cubes. Erm, sorry, but what about my whole song and dance of taking off my clothes and hanging them up suggested to you that I wanted to set anything on fire?

7. Is this some cosmic sign telling me to really purge myself of my belongings?

8. And on that note…It’s all well and good that I have a lot of notebooks, and boxes, and postcards, but lighters? I have a lot of lighters. Like a lot a lot. What can I say? The only thing worse than not having a cigarette is having one and not having a lighter.

9. That, and obviously, I’m rather forgetful. Or my memory can’t keep up with my nicotine addiction.

10. I did consider stopping smoking. I even purposefully walked down the whole Nicorette aisle at the pharmacy. Nicorette gum is £18!?!??! It’s chewing gum for chrissakes! Screw that. That’s three packets of cigarettes. (Besides, buying Nicorette gum would technically fall under the category of “acquiring new shit.” And I’m totally trying not to do that.)

11. Packing lends itself generously to positive ideas like, stopping smoking, or feasible positive ideas like giving things away. I did. A lot of things. For example, some Oxfam shop now has a sizeable collection of designer shopping bags. Just think…you can go to Oxfam and buy a £5 lamp, and they’ll put it in an Agent Provocateur shopping bag! That’s nice, no?

12. And speaking of agents, I think that in a previous life I was a member of the French Resistance. I have not one, not two, but four berets. And I don’t recall buying any of them. Its as if they mysteriously appeared in my wardrobe as some persistent totem of my previous allegiances. (This thought stopped me from donating them to charity).

13. Before joining the resistance, I must have been a zookeeper. A good one at that…for I was obviously awarded with the occasional bonus of some animals to take home and skin. What remains from that life: a crocodile bag, a crocodile belt, snakeskin heels, snakeskin flats, a snakeskin clutch, a rabbit fur hat, a fox collar (head, eyes and tail included!), a coat with a fox collar, a sheepskin waistcoat, sheepskin boots, an ostrich wallet, an ivory bracelet, and one made of green sting ray leather. Sting ray! Obviously, I didn’t give any of this away either. What, I don’t want to offend anybody. Or inflict on someone the trauma of getting shouted at on the tube! “I can assure you that that fox would be much better off alive than sitting there as a trophy around your neck!” somebody once chastised me. Fox you lady, and besides, it was my grandmother’s so I’m sure the poor thing would long be dead by now anyhow.

14. Some things are easier to let go of than others. Turns out disposing of boyfriends is a lot easier than disposing of the stuff you collect from or with them…

15. I think there’s something in this whole feng shui business. Something about our things and how they reflect who we are. And also something in the saying “save the best for last.” It didn’t occur to me until I had already completely packed and moved out and gathered the very last of my belongings…it didn’t occur to me until after I had crossed several streets…and inspired several intriguing glances…it didn’t occur to me that I was walking through the city of London with a pillow and a champagne bucket. What that says about me I’m not sure, but I think I like it.

"it's not about the blue dress!" and other things PMS is and isn't about.

"From the moment I was six I felt sexy. And let me tell you it was hell, sheer hell, waiting to do something about it."

- Bette Davis

“It’s not about the blue dress!” I belted for about the seventh time. (Belting is the best tone for fury I find, for unlike screaming, belting is just contained enough for it to be dangerously explosive). I was beginning to sound like one of those voice-coaching exercises in emphasis they make you do in acting school. “It’s not about the blue dress!” “It’s not about the blue dress.” “It’s not about the blue dress.” “It’s not about the blue dress.” “It’s not about the blue dress!” “It’s not about the blue dress!” And when all those failed, I even tried throwing in some extra syllables. “It’s not about the BA-LOO-OUE DA-RESS!” I’m certain that every person who lives on the street where I gave this performance yesterday, and had their windows open (which they surely did, as it was swelteringly hot—even for a short blue dress!) has these words ringing in their mind today…like an annoyingly overplayed radio jingle that simply refuses to go away. But as I stood in the middle of the street yesterday, performing my operatic rendition of the Blue Dress, flapping my hands about in hysteria, stomping my delicate ballerina flats in a manner far from delicate or balletic, and all this to the dramatic percussion rhythm provided by my swishing and clanging gold chain belt (which, yes, hung from my blue dress!)—the fact that I was perhaps disturbing the neighbors, or even that I was causing a scene, did not seem in the slightest bit unusual, inappropriate, or dramatic to me. I was PMSing. And PMS is the abbreviated version of the lengthy medical term which in laymen’s terms, or for our purposes here, can be simply reduced to DRAMA.

***

The reason “It’s not about the blue dress,” or “it’s not about the groceries,” or it’s not about any of the other little things people may fight about…is because during PMS, nothing can only ever be about something. For that something becomes inextricably woven to countless other somethings, moments, places, people, feelings, thoughts, perceptions. Like a snowball rolling down a hill that turns into an avalanche…the little insignificant thing we are fighting over, be it a dress, a word or a bottle of water…becomes a symbol, cause and effect of something so much greater. Of me, of you, of us in general, of my childhood, my sex life, my career, of our relationship, of all relationships, of the history of the world, the meaning of life, of all joy or destruction, all wars, and if you carry through with this train of thought, you will invariably come to the conclusion that this ba-loo-oue da-ress is, in fact, the symbol of the universe. So, in actual fact, me picking a little fight with you over it is a thoughtful consideration on my part, not an overreaction. Things. Could. Be. Worse.

***

Yesterday, I told my mother I was writing a blog about PMS and asked her if she had any thoughts or sentiments on the topic. And she said, “all I can remember is that I always used to get a pimple right in the middle of my nose!” Think about that for a moment. Over thirty years of periods, and pads, and PMSing, and lord only knows what quantity of blood, bloating and blue dresses, and all she can remember is that tiny little spot. That pimple clearly wasn’t only right in the middle of her nose. It was in the middle of everything. It was the axis upon which the world would turn, or cease to turn, once a month for over thirty years. It erected itself as a proud, beaming statue between herself and her mirror, (countless mirrors which she surely looked in all day long), herself and anyone she came into contact with, herself and life, itself. That pimple, poor thing, was probably blamed for just about anything, from a lost earring to a lost fiancée, a dropped bag of groceries to a broken crystal vase. Oh, that’s the other thing about PMS—it can make you very clumsy. Apparently, Italians, Italian men to be precise, believe that if a woman is clumsy, or drops something in front of a man, she is hiding something from him. (Arguably, an Italian man, vase dropped or not, will always think his woman is hiding something from him, and probably only because he is hiding something from her, but let’s not get into that right now). But when it comes to PMS, she is hiding something. Besides the pimple she tries desperately to conceal, there are dozens of other physiological and psychological things she is hiding, because if she didn’t, the universe, remember, the entire universe, would spontaneously combust.

***

Any number of physiological changes can occur in a woman during PMS. Her breasts might get firmer, larger and more painful. (But more sensitive too, which can sometimes be a good thing). Her skin can break out. (Bad thing). Her stomach, back, head, earlobe or just about any other part of her body can ache, and more often than not, it is some combination of these. Her hair can curl, or straighten, or behave in any other unusual way that makes it completely unmanageable and definitely makes for not one but several, bad hair days. She can become more sensitive to smells and certain foods, repulsed by some and addicted to others. (Yoghurt and gherkins are big ones, and no, not together). Her stomach can bloat—in fact her entire body can bloat from water retention, making her a whole dress size larger. Yep, goodbye skinny jeans. Because of this, or not because of this, she can become lethargic and fatigued, desperate for any excuse to not get out of bed, and even one single drop of rain will sometimes do. And, as if that’s not enough, she can become incredibly, insanely, and unstoppably, aroused. (Good though it may seem, this can also be a bad thing). In fact, on closer look at these symptoms, one might say that PMS is a mini, or 7-day pregnancy. Except without the promise of a little gift to come, without all the showers and shopping, without the belly that might get someone to give up their seat on the bus. There’s an idea. Those signs that read “Seating reserved for the elderly, disabled, or less able to stand,” should include “women suffering from the tragedies of PMS.”

***

But these physiological changes, or symptoms, if you will, are still nothing in comparison to the psychological and emotional ones, those indescribable and undiagnosable terrors. There are several pills or accessories that can remedy the break-outs, the pain, or the water retention, and indeed we make good use of them and manage, for the most part to keep on keeping. But unfortunately, there is no hat to cover the unmanageable, knotty mop of thoughts that accumulate, no elastic “dress” for the heart that might give room to the bloating of emotion and sentiment, no pill to pop to alleviate the feeling that the apocalypse has indeed, finally, arrived. Instead, it all stays contained and restrained in a mind, heart and body that suddenly seem way to small to carry it all. And at the faintest indication of a possible EXIT, release, or outlet, it explodes. “It’s not about the blue dress!” Often times, it is more like a series of minor explosions.

***

A man I was dating once said to me, “but I don’t understand, you are so intelligent! Can’t you think or rationalize your way out of this one?” Think my body out of PMS and into submission? Believe me, I have tried. Perhaps I am not that intelligent after all. The best I can do is partly acknowledge that I’m PMSing…and that all the little things that are making my blood boil (no pun intended) probably wouldn’t in normal circumstances, and probably won’t next week, but unfortunately that’s as far as it goes. This acknowledgement doesn’t change much. I might have the “intelligence” to add “I’m sorry, I’m PMSing,” as an encore to my tantrums, but the tantrums still happen. The show, must always, go on.

***

As I was stormed off finally, if for no other reason than because I ran out of emphatic ways to say that phrase, and sat down in the park to ponder these cycles of joy and disaster…these overtures and encores…and the cathartic embers slowly turned to ashes…I looked down at my blue dress and said, “I’m disappointed in you, you know, I expected more.” All the excitement I had felt when I bought it, when I put it on that day, all the promise it held for showers of compliments and a fabulous night out, were gone. If I could, I probably would have gone to return it right away. “Hello, I’d like to return this dress please, it didn’t quite live up to my expectations.” And then, I began thinking about disappointment and expectations. Isn’t that what periods are? Simply the tears of disappointed ovaries and eggs unfertilized? I know they don’t wear any, but try to put yourself in an ovary’s shoes for a moment. Ovaries are the icons, the totems, the presidents of expectation. Their entire raison d’être and definitive verb, is to expect. From the very moment they come into being this is their calling. For the first eleven years or so, they wait patiently to be able to exercise it. And then they begin to pursue it with vigour, working and performing tirelessly every month in the hope of being put to use, with the greatest expectations to create. Of course, in most cases, they are forced to wait another 5, 6, 10 years, (no judgment!) before this opportunity for procreation (read: sex) even presents itself. And then, in many cases, even when all the stars and sperms are aligned, we often fail to fulfill their expectations. (In fact we habitually choose to deliberately sabotage them). So think that every single month we don’t get pregnant, whether it be ten, fifteen or twenty years since we became ready to, think, just think how our ovaries feel. Months and years go by and layers of expectation and disappointment heap up. We are often times ready to quit a job, or get a divorce, or even end our own lives when things don’t live up to our expectations, when our toils and efforts pass unnoticed, when our homes or investments collapse. And yet, our ovaries continue to live, to work, to expect and invest, once a month, like the most loyal of soldiers, while we, pardon my French, continue to fuck them over. So you know what? Allow them their little tantrum once in a while. They more than deserve it. And you know what else? Give them a fucking round of applause. (Sorry, I'm PMSing).