Persnickety Tutu

What do I say on my very first post on my very first blog?

Oh, just wait until I get to you and suck you into my little bitty world. Just you wait!

My brother Jim just got back from touring around South America. This was his second year livin' la vida loca in that part of the world. When he's not there he's in North Carolina enjoying the mountains. He's got that same wanderlust I have, but he's a serious nomad compared to me. I haven't seen him for three years now, since our dad died. It's been too long.

Ah, I remember the day I came home from college coming down off a trip (hey, like you haven't?) and feeling all wonky and out of it. I was sitting on the dryer in my dad's kitchen and he came over and popped up on the washing machine. There was this silence between us and then he said those knowing words, "bad trip, eh?” I mean how great is that? Ah, big brothers, you know?

I love you bro! Nice to have you back in the same country. Stomp...wheeze...

Paris Hilton, my very favorite person ever
(I actually gagged a little just then), will be released from jail this Tuesday. I heard the news this morning and I must say, I'm not a happy camper. Beside the fact that I think the girl is a blight on America, she happens to live right up the street from me and I'm going to have to deal with all of those damn helicopters hovering above my area again when she gets home. I had to deal with that crap when they made the mistake of letting her go home for, like, 5 minutes a while back. I woke up to the sound of helicopters two mornings in a row at 6.00 am. Can’t her parents just buy her an Island to live on already?

Polluting my neighborhood with your noise and bad behavior?
SO NOT HOT.

I now officially hate this petrol chain. I will never use them again and I hope no one I know will either. Why, you ask?
Last week they took my money and gave me nothing in return. NADA.
I got screwed!

I've been home for the past two days dealing with a sinus attack. Nothing like heat and bad allergies to make life grand! I took Benadryl this morning and proceeded to pass out for three hours. Benadryl and Advil are my new best friends. I'm fairly useless when this happens. You might as well put a fork in me: I'm DONE.

I'll write more this weekend when I'm home snuggled in with a nice glass of B&B. I never have talked about my trip to Montreal last Fall to see the Italian. I think it's time...

Later!

White collar client to lawyer: Dude, what happens if the jury finds me guilty and I actually have to do some time?

Lawyer to white collar client: Hey man, no worries. I'll talk to my peeps in the admin. and I'll get them to Libby it!

'nuf said.

In honor of my dear friends and fellow Slow Travelers, Marcia and David, who are about to head off to Italy this week, I bring you Cortona...

I am alone. I am alone in Italy and it is summer and I am fresh from a lover's arms. I have my fabulous rental Nissan Micra, the road is before me and I am alive. I am so blissed out I actually find myself chanting
“this is f***ing crazy!!" as I drive down country roads lined with sunflowers praying to the sun gods.

I'm in the car driving down winding Tuscan roads and I am still digesting, ever so sweetly, my visit to Cortona. It is a bright clear day and the sun is beaming through the window, warming my skin. I have music blasting, the windows are open, and I can smell heaven.

I am the luckiest woman alive...

I decide I want to explore Umbria so I take the day to wander in and out of towns so small that even in my little Nissan Micra I can reach out and touch the walls of buildings as I drive through tiny passages that I’m sure will eat me whole. They never do, of course, and I just keep going.

After stops for coffee and the occasional treat, I see a sign for Orvieto. By this time it is getting on toward dusk and this is generally my cue to find a place to set up shop for the night. I decide Orvieto is a place I'm meant to visit so I begin to make my way up into this hill town and once I've passed the rather ugly lower part of the town, I wind around the long hill, wrapping around it until I know I've arrived in the town center.

I will admit that I am in a bit of a funk at present. I am officially funking.

It's not one thing, really. It's ten things all at once. It's work and family and friends and life and the deep and tender parts of me that I hide away from the world being re-tweaked and poked at.

When I get to funking I think of the places I've felt safest and happiest and most at peace. Funny how I almost always find myself back in a tub somewhere...

My favorite tub at my dad's house

Yes, I have succumbed to the cold going around. After a week of back to back events I got sick last night. Methinks my body is telling me to chill out already. I'm home chillin'...

I'm not working on Christmas day as planned. I was on the fence about it as I don't like the woman I was going to work for and she is beyond demanding. I got a call last night as I was leaving for a client's house that the Christmas day Hollywood housewife had "requested" that I do a walk through at her house on bloody Christmas Eve. I said I was already giving up my Christmas day so the biddy wasn't about to get my Christmas Eve. as well. Then I asked WHY this woman needed a walk through for a family dinner party for all of 26 guests. Well, you see she's having the thing in a tent on her property and there is a serious heating system involved. When I booked this I was told there would be a heating guy there to take care of all of that jazz as Kathy don't do rental/heating stuff. It seems little rich and spoiled Hollywood studio head wifey decided she didn't want to pay the heating guy the $900 he was to get to be on site to handle said heating so she decided I, that's ME, was to do it instead. Excusez-moi??

Needless to say Kathy will not be working for said rich spoiled Hollywood wifey on Christmas day. I said they could find someone else. Yep. I don't do two jobs for the price of one. Fug dat.

I'm also leaving a work relationship with a woman I've been working with who, when you look in the dictionary and find the term passive-aggressive, her name is there next to it all in CAPS. She has a knack for asking you to do things above and beyond what you're hired to do and then always tries to find a way to manipulate you into doing them. Tricky chick. She's a master at the game. Now I know why she can't hang on to her assistants, oh yes. My path no longer finds its way to that door, but I am grateful for the experience. Be peace, I say. Oh, and may you find yourself a good therapist. *big hug*

So, now that I'm free for a while I'm going to get over this cold, spend time with friends, and make some travel plans. I've people to see and places to go. My New Year is going to be a bloody fabulous NEW YEAR. I see bright and shiny things in my future. This chick has plans...

Oh, and my clients from last night asked if they could fly me up to their new house in Berkeley to do an event for them. They'll put me up in their guest house and I can pop around San Fran for a day. I likey!

Did I mention I'm damn good at what I do? I am.

So my thought for the day is this: I have found that in life we must learn to listen to our instincts, trust that wee voice inside and have the courage to say no when no is what needs to be said, or perhaps say yes when an opportunity comes along that lights us up from within and makes our wheels spin. I say be the you that you have always wanted to be. It's really easier than you think...

I say shake things up!

I had to pack it up and leave my event in the desert today (and let me just say that I am TAN). I have business back east and couldn't stay the weekend. I set things up as best I could and made sure the young woman stepping in for me has an easy time of it. I worked my ass off to insure everyone was in line, on the ball and that the client was happy. Hell, I even got invited to the client's wrap party (Super nice Germans. Working with them was a pleasure!) and there is talk of work with them in the future. I'm damn good at what I do and PR is half of it. Good social skills are key, let me tell you.

I had breakfast with the kitchen staff this morning and there were lots of hugs and talk of plans to all get together when I return from the east coast. I even stayed an extra hour to finish up room assignments and wrap things up with hotel management. Even the hotel dude (my man Dion) said he was going to miss me! And let me say, if you are ever passing through Hesperia and need a place to stay on the way to Vegas or San Diego, you just have to stay at the Holiday Inn Express there. Those people seriously rock it out! And man, were they accommodating and good to us. Anything I wanted they were there to hook me up. And that jacuzzi and pool were divine at the end of a long day. AMEN.

I'm back home and have just enough time to unpack, clean, do laundry and re-pack for my crack of dawn flight on Monday. I also have to teach my class tomorrow night as I promised I would. When did I become so goddamned responsible? When did I become a.... GROWNUP? Crazy poop.

Must go love on my little feline beasties for a while. Thank god a new and delightful friend stepped up and volunteered to take care of them after another girlfriend flaked on me and put me in a really bad spot. It's always so bloody nice to know you have good people you can count on. The ones who flake on you? Well, as my dear and lovely friend Heather always says: Bless and release.

I have no room for unreliable people in my life. I have too many good people who would be there for me no matter what. Man, do I adore them. And I am solid to the bone. My word is everything to me and friendship sometimes means being there for someone even when it's not convenient. I think we all need to learn to be a wee bit more selfless. It's in the giving that our hearts bust wide open...

I'm sending love out to my friend Tracey for loving on my girls when I was gone and to Andy, Tarik, Jose, Lindsey, Jason and the one and only Gregg (my partner in crime and the boss on the other end) for making this event so incredible for me. Your girl has more big ideas to come!

I got nothin' but love for you people.

Some of you know that I've been dealing with estate hell and an unstable party (and that's being crazy kind, trust me) for four years now. And some of you know the toll it has taken on me over the years. It hasn't been easy, let me tell you...

Well, it's over.

On Wednesday things were finally settled and one chapter of my life came to a quiet close. And after the fact my brother and I, along with the executor and all of our lawyers, went out and partied it up at Aidan's, my favorite Irish pub here in Rhode Island.

DAMN BLOODY STRAIGHT!

I can't begin to tell you how much I've learned about myself over the course of these four years since my father passed away. What I can tell you right now is that I have come to appreciate the small things in life and have learned to have more patience than I ever thought was possible. I know my father would be proud. Everything I've done was in honor of what he wanted and what he stood for. I am my father's daughter...

Good things ahead! And there is a screenplay percolating in my brain about all of this. Oh yes...

Yoga and travel have been my therapy. One can find salvation in the stillness of a pose or the beauty of a sunset over the rooftops of Antigua. I know I have.

And thanks to those people in my life who have been there for me and stood by me whilst this madness unfolded. I bow to you for being my rocks, my lifelines and my ears to bend on the days the darkness seeped in. I value you far more valuable than the most precious of metals. You have been as important to me as air itself.

I feel big changes a comin', my fine and illustrious people. I can be anything now. Oh, you just wait and see...

Closure is a beautiful thing.

My thoughts lie with Nicole Paultre-Bell today as the startling verdict in the Sean Bell case settles in. I am still puzzled and often outraged by fuzzy justice and I know that there is a serious inequality that still exists. Alas, I can only hope that with a new voice running this country of mine there will perhaps be some rays of light that appear over time. I am with Michael Bloomberg, the Mayor of New York, in his statement that there are no winners in this case.

May those involved search their souls and find a way to positively contribute to a more united community. And for those who now get to go back to their families and live out the rest of their lives as free men I can only hope that every single day they will feel somewhere deep in their bones how utterly and profoundly tragic it is that Sean Bell cannot be one of them.

As I raced to get a towel after a bath the other day, the towel I had to have because I didn't want the color rinse I'd put in my hair to get on my nice new sparkly ivory towel (the one that was actually hanging in my bathroom), I slipped in my hallway, fell forward into a table with the corner jamming into my left hand, bounced backward into a bookcase whacking my shoulder and finally landed on my butt. Yes, there I was naked as a newborn baby on the floor trying to assess how bad the damage was. Naked, wet and battered - classic...

No ambulance for me, but man did I haul booty into the kitchen to down three Advil as I knew the pain was going to be bad (it was). I'm sure I looked like a desperate junkie shaking like mad and flinging Advil all over the place as I did, scarfing them up off of the floor to down them. You do what you have to and the pain in my hand was kicking in...big time.

I called a nurse friend who told me to R.I.C.E.: Rest, Ice, Compress and Elevate. She said the Advil was a truly smart move. My hand was swelling and the pain was mind numbing. Advil is the best thing EVER.

Not sure if it's a fracture yet. I've been to my acupuncturist friend who isn't sure either but the treatment she gave me helped quite a bit (I'll be going back regularly until it heals). A fellow yogi friend just happened to have a brace for the left hand and I'm now using it. All three women I called to help me are fellow yogis. The nurse, the acupuncturist and the friend with the brace are all my people. My Kula, which is Sanskrit for community, was there for me. Beautiful thing, that.

It's no fun trying to get around without the use of one hand. I can't hook a bra, zipper pants or tear open a tea bag cover. Sleeping is challenging. Yoga is just plain OUT.

This is all a lesson letting me know I need to slow my butt down and breathe for a while. I'm teaching yoga tomorrow night and will not back out. I'll simply be careful and I'm sure my students will appreciate my commitment to them. I love what I do!

I am reminded of the statement my dad always made when wonky stuff like this happened: "Caca occurs."

Indeed it does...

Yes, I am the chick who broke herself trying to save a friggin' towel. Hindsight's a bitch!