questions and answers

All my life I waited for a guy like you
Someone so honest someone so true.
Someone who'll hold my hand when I start to cry
dry my tears and kiss my eyes
A person to stand with me by my side
forever and always till the end of time
Childhood memories that I have held so dear
precious reminders of innocence
Spring time I will  be born anew
but all my seasons lead back to you
You see the beauty within my scars
You see the answers to the questions within my heart
You see the beauty in my smile
I look at you and see the innocence of a child
Every few years we start over
hoping one of these days it'll be our time
No pressure baby, I will wait for you till the end of the line

In Support of Girls and Lena Dunham

Lena Dunham seems like a girl I would hang out with. She is Jewish(on her mom's side, you know the side that counts), she is from New York City, she has tattoos and not the trendy kind that good girls get to be edgy. She is not conventionally attractive, but seems entirely comfortable with that as reflected in her willingness to throw her slightly overweight and pale body into tons of unflattering sexual situations in the name of art. Oh and she was a Creative Writing major---much like myself, and she graduated the same year I did 2008.

Putting all that aside which I'll admit may be difficult, the real reason I am even aware of who she is having never heard of her prior to last week is because of her much maligned and in my opinion unjustly criticized new TV show GIRLS on HBO.

Girls is about four friends in their mid-twenties navigating life post-college living on their own in New York City. The hipster style of Hannah and her friends(which reflects certainly Lena Dunham's personal style if not all of the cast), the choices they make which many critics labeled unsympathetic, and their struggles that seem to be told with cinematography and editing that make you feel like you are there walking down the street next to them as opposed to being a spectator watching a fictional show on your laptop all make this show extremely truthful and relatable to young women in their age range facing similar predicaments such as the characters.

The sad hard truth many college students face(not just the girls) is that after college there isn't this amazing land of opportunity just waiting for you. You may have to work as a waitress, or babysit the same kids you have been watching since you were 16, or you may end up working retail, or at a fucking TGIF is a bitter pill to swallow when you are 23. It may be especially bitter if you come from a middle class upbringing. I know that the last 4 years since I graduated have not been a cake walk. Yes, my parents still support me financially, no I am not rich, yes I appreciate it but hate it as do my parents who threaten to cut me off everyday much like Hannah's parents actually did in the first episode. I too landed an unpaid internship after college at a trendy hipster blog in DUMBO that I thought would lead to a paid position, which it never did and I ended up four years later still reliant on my parents financial support. It sucks, but it is a fact, and it is a fact  all of my middle class friends who attended college have had to grapple with. If you attended a state school or a nice private liberal arts university in the suburbs somewhere and you graduated between the years of 2008 and now, odds are you are either moving home with mom and dad for the next 2-8 years while you scour Craigslist daily for job postings. Or Mommy and Daddy buy you your own apartment while you look for that amazing job. This is the reality. It is not the reality of every New Yorker, or every twenty-something but it is the reality of most. It is indicative of New York City and more to the point, the times.

Now, there has been a lot of criticism for the lack of diversity of this show. I feel like this is a cop-out criticism. Like some guy didn't like that his Sunday nights that were formerly occupied by such testosterone-driven shows like Entourage and Eastbound & Down that they had to find some excuse to tear down a show that was created, written and staring a female, especially a female that doesn't look like Scarlett Johansson.

Where are the black co-stars in most mainstream popular television shows, I ask you. Friends, Sex & the city, Two and a Half Men, Seinfeld, Entourage, Sopranoes, Eastbound & Down, the list goes on and on, none had a single black star. Why were there no complaints targeted at these shows? The reality is with the exception of a select few, most television shows are highly segregated. There are no white characters in Tyler Perry movies and there are no black characters on Girls. Is that television's way of being prejudiced or is that actually a reflection of our society? I personally believe it is the latter. While, yes I interact with people of all races and ethnic backgrounds on a daily basis, if you were to make my life into a TV show, you would find that my core group of girlfriends are all of the same ethnic and religious background and socioeconomic upbringing as me. Does that make me racist for not having more diversity within my immediate social circle? I don't think so. I think it shows that people, myself included, seek out others who are similar to them both racially as well as socially. Girls, much like most televisions shows are meant to show a segment of society, they are not meant to be indicative of an entire generation, or an entire city or an entire group. This is a depiction of what it is like for this group of girls, from a specific demographic at a specific juncture in their lives. It is not meant to speak to everyone.

I think the critics and viewers who are choosing to criticize this show for its lack of diversity need to take a look at the reality of other televisions shows, the industry as a whole and even their own circle of friends before making this show the scapegoat for it's lack of diversity.

For Kristie...

Dear Kristie,

It's been 13 years since you moved away. It feels almost like another lifetime. It's surreal how at 26 my childhood is starting to feel like a distant memory, almost like it was another lifetime entirely. You left in the fall of 1998. Our friendship didn't end well. I will never forget that day you broke my heart when our friendship came to an abrupt end like it did. You moved away, we never got to say goodbye to each other and now we never will. Please know that I didn't want to end our friendship but at the time you had left me no choice. The details of why our friendship ended are not important. Not now. Not anymore.
I remember meeting you on the first day of Kindergarten. You had blonde hair in a high pony tail and bright blue eyes hidden behind big glasses. The other kids stared and judged, even at 5 kids knew how to judge others who looked different. But I didn't. I saw beyond what those kids saw. I ran home and told my mother she must schedule a play date with my best friend Kristie immediately. For weeks all I could talk about was my new best friend Kristie who I never wanted to be away from. My mom sent me to school with a letter in my book bag to give to you to give to your mom requesting a play date for us. That same year 6th graders were making fun of you in the school yard because you were different. I remember standing up to them telling them not to make fun of my friend. I was not much bigger than you. We were always the smallest kids in the class, but I stood up to them because it was right. Nobody was going to mess with my friend. From that moment on we were inseparable. We had endless amounts of play-dates, sleep overs and we were in all of the same after-school activities. We watched the same TV shows(90210---You were Kelly and I was Brenda and we both loved Dylan) and listened to the same music( Mariah Carey, TLC, The Spice Girls) and we were in the Girl Scouts and Chorus together. You and I both were outcasts and easy targets for school yard bullies but we stuck together. We both had this pain inside of us even as children, both for very different reasons and I think that is what drew us together and bonded us.

Kristie, you touched my life and impacted it in so many ways. Ways you probably never knew and I wish I got the chance to tell you.
My love and knowledge of music was truly influenced and shaped by you. Your parents inspired and encouraged an appreciation and love of music in you from an early age. They took you to concerts all of the time and each concert you saw you told me about. Music was always playing in your house-- on the radio, in the car, on the t.v., in your parents bedroom where we would watch MTV back when they played videos. I remember sitting in front of the tv, listening to the 80's and early 90's music of the time. I discovered my favorite singer Alanis Morissette thanks to your parents taking you to see her Jagged Little Pill tour. After you saw her in concert I ran right out and bought her Jagged Little Pill album which was at the top of the charts at the time. It was 1995 and I wore that cassette out listening to her songs over and over, even though I had no idea what she was singing about.I just related to her anger and her passion. Even at 10 I had so much anger I didn't understand, but Alanis knew that same anger. We both loved her and to this day she is my all time favorite singer and that is because of you. I remember watching MTV in the early 1990's, back when MTV was good. When Beavis and Butthead and The Real World were the only shows they played that wasn't music. I remember listening to Bryan Adams, John Mellencamp, Michael Jackson and Janet Jackson and all of the amazing bands of the 80's and 90's on the radio driving in your mom's Taurus. You truly loved music and you introduced that love to me.
As children you and I were attached at the hip. We would giggle and laugh non-stop. We just looked at each other and laughed. I remember staying up all night during our many childhood sleepovers just laughing and thinking of ways to cause trouble. Prank phone calls, running around your neighborhood, watching Scary Rated R movies, eating candy and junk food and playing with our dolls. We always had so much fun! You had more life, more spunk than anyone I knew. You loved to play and party and have fun. Loved to laugh. I can still hear your laugh after all of these years. I will never forget it.

I remember the first time I saw you after you had your bone marrow transplant in the 5th grade. You had been out of school for months recovering, when I ran into you and your family at McDonalds on Metropolitan Avenue. Your back was turned to me but I knew it was you. I ran right over to you, so excited you were okay. So excited to see you after having been separated from you for months. When I walked up to you and your parents you wouldn't look at me. You turned away and hid your face. You had lost all of you hair, and your face was puffy and swollen from all of the medication you were on. You didn't want me to see you like that. You were embarrassed and afraid I would start to judge you, the way many of the other kids in school cruelly had. You were scared and ashamed of the way you looked. But to me you were the same person, just with a cute flower hat. You were my beautiful, funny, strong, incredibly brave best-friend. I admired you so so much my beautiful best friend. I had so much love and admiration for you, for what you had been through.
I remember days when you were absent from school and I was miserable, because I had nobody to talk to, nobody to eat lunch with when you weren't there.
I remember one time at lunch, you had a pear in your lunchbox, and you offered to share it with me. However, being kids we had no way to cut it seeing as they didn't provide kids with knives. So you came up with the idea to cut it using your nails. You always had long, red-polished nails. We spent the entire lunch period mutilating that pear, trying to cut it with your long nails and my stubby nails. You were so determined to cut it down the middle so you could share it with me. By the time lunch ended that poor pear was disgusting we just threw it in the garbage. But that is exactly the kind of friend you were. So determined to share your snack with me.
I remember all the time we spent sitting on your stoop playing and talking, drinking our quarter waters we had gotten from the corner store by your house. I always loved going to your house. My house, while only my parents and I, was rather boring and full of fear, your house was filled with so many people and fearlessness. So many friends and family who were always there, always surrounding you and loving you. You had a home full of love and excitement. Always something to do, somewhere to go, people to see. Your aunts, uncles and grandparents always embraced me and I spent a lot of time with them. Ordering chinese food with your beautiful ma ma(grandma) and having a sleepover at your Aunt Gina's apartment when we were 12. Time spent together was always an adventure. Your birthday parties, where we played spin the bottle in the basement taking turns kissing the same boy on the cheek over and over(usually Anthony Montalvo or Matthew Burke.lol)


You were my best-friend. The frick to my frack as my mother would say. We were two peas in a pod. But when I only narrowly missed getting my head smashed into the concrete right outside my own building by that gang-girl Theresa, I knew our friendship had reached an impasse. I was scared what danger I might face if I kept seeing you. I was scared of what you were capable of. I wanted nothing more than to protect you, to be your best-friend. I never ever would have hurt you. And now 13 years later you are gone. It isn't fair. I forgave you long ago for what happened to our friendship. I understood you more than you maybe understood yourself back then, and I knew how much you struggled with on a daily basis.

Kristie--you taught me so many lessons that have stayed with me today. My friendship with you shaped my view of the world and the values that I stand for. You helped make me the person that I am proud to be today. You taught me that we must not treat those that may look different than us like outsiders or less than. You taught me that everyone is special regardless of the way that they were born and they are deserving of respect and kindness. That what you look like on the outside does not matter, because it is who you are on the inside that counts. You taught me to stand up for those who can't stand up for themselves. You taught me that good things come in small packages(you and I are both a testament to that), and that you must fight for what you believe in. You showed me friendship and laughter, and you were my very first friend. You taught me that size doesn't matter and to not let others push you around. You taught me and inspired me in ways I never get the chance to tell you, but I know someday I will.

Another year, another story.goodbye 2011

It is customary for me to write a blog entry the night before the new year, or the night of the new year, or the day after the new year.
This year I just wasn't feeling it.
This year it hasn't felt like a new year.
But it is starting to now.
Since I still don't feel the inward pull to write a long-winded drawn out entry about this past year. I will just write a list of things that come to mind when I think of 2011, in no particular order.

Finishing my first year of graduate school with straight A's.
Starting my first social work internship and feeling uncertain.
Realizing that the smartest person in the room isn't the one talking the most(or the loudest).
Understanding that I may not know it all.
Making mistakes I vowed years ago never to make again.
Making a promise to myself just like I did back then to never make those mistakes again.
Experiencing Michael moving down to Georgia.
Realizing a long distance relationship is equally more difficult and easier than I had imagined.
Flying to Georgia to visit Michael.
Losing my precious cat Steffi and saying goodbye to her after she had already passed away.
Feeling helpless and useless at my internship.
Becoming a vegetarian.
Realizing that changing ones eating habits is an ongoing process and making poor food choices on occasion isn't a reason to beat myself up
A spiritual awakening of sorts regarding health, wellness, and the nutrients we put into our bodies.
Beginning my discovery of the raw foods and vegan movement.
Drinking wayyy too much.
Going on my very first vacation, one that I paid for and helped book on my own.
Going on my first cruise
traveling and being with Michael for 7 days
Jet skiing, parasailing, and snorkeling for the first time.
Netflix as a way of paying for my own entertainment.
Seeing lots of movies thanks to Michael.
Getting a new cat: Sheldon Socks.
Realizing I could love another pet not because I loved Steffi less, but because my heart is big enough.
Gambling in AC
flea markets. flea markets.
first punk show to see Dave's band play since I was 19.
first hangover after a punk show.
Celebrating a 1 year anniversary with someone.
contemplating my first tattoo
Jewish holidays spent with friends and their wonderfully generous and kind families.
visiting the statue of liberty
matzah ball problems at the jersey shore
good food, good friends
good books
Discovering a love of cooking.
Saying I love you.