On plastic bags and things that sparkle...

I've been kind of MIA, sorry folks.

I've had a lot on my mind lately and have been feeling very restless and somewhat cranky. I think I'm being all weird and introspective partly because my birthday is next week and I'm getting older and this is freaking me out again. It's making me question my goals and my dreams and all that generic stuff. That and I'm kind of having boy issues. But not really. See it's weird like that. It has me feeling slightly confused. And slightly helpless, slightly enamored, slightly disappointed, slightly contented, among a host of other feelings I wasn't quite prepared for... It’s making me feel a little overwhelmed because it all kind of came from nowhere, and I feel like I don’t know what to do with myself. On top of this work kind of sucks right now. (Although I did get to serve Pascal Lamy coffee, which made me feel a little star struck.) Aside from that I have spent the majority of the week taking undeserved shit from a coworker and searching for a new job, which combined with everything else has left me feeling somewhat uninspired to do much, write much...

Although I did see a really funny old lady yesterday that made me laugh, and also made me ponder a number of things. She is basically me in 50 years, I swear. There are a fair amount of old people in the building I live in, and I've seen this lady once before but was so amazed by what I saw that I think I half thought that I hallucinated her, but yesterday I had the pleasure of riding in the elevator with her. She's the kind of old lady that has reached that age where she just doesn't give a fuck about what anyone thinks because she won't be around much longer, like that whole wear-red-hats-and-purple-dresses thing, I don't remember what that's called. But yeah this lady couldn't have been more than 5 feet tall and was wearing what had to be the largest and tackiest neon pink sunglasses I have ever seen. They were of course framed with nice sparkly plastic rhinestones, for extra glam effect, and with these glasses she had on a bright pink knitted poncho and pink ugg boots. She was also carrying a pink leather clutch, and the flowers in the pattern on her skirt were, wait for it... Pink. It was quite a sight to behold. I decided she was fabulous immediately. I told her I liked her purse and asked her if pink was her favorite color, and she got very solemn and said, "Oh yes, of course, I do love pink." I smiled and stroked the pink yoga mat I was holding and told her it was my favorite color too.

It made me very happy to see this lady wearing all these fashion don'ts all at once for the sheer fact that it pleased her to do so. In my opinion, this elevated all of her perceived fashion no-no's into one big fabulous yes.

It also made me think about youth, and the similarities I see in extremely young and extremely old people. Maybe this is a silly observation, but it seems to me that really young children and really old people care less about what other people think about them then everyone else. Children, until they reach a certain age, often do/say/wear things just because it makes them happy. They don't realize that some things are frowned upon in society or that some things might get them laughed at and they continue to do as they please until they reach that age where they suddenly notice that people can be mean, they develop the desire to "fit in" and subsequently cease most behavior that made them previously stand out. Not to say this is always the case. But I know that when I was around 3-5 years old I went through various phases involving animal noses, 7 dwarfs costumes, star-shaped sunglasses and pink elbow length gloves most commonly worn with a blue pill box hat (complete with purple veil) and a white faux-fur stole. I wore these things all the time, everywhere, and when I say everywhere I mean EVERYWHERE - to the point where I was somewhat infamous on the tiny island we lived on, or so I'm told. Apparently my mother's attempts to dress me like a normal little girl were futile. (Seems I've always been more stubborn than a mule.) But I digress; eventually I got older, went to elementary school, and at some point realized that I would get made fun of if I wore a tiara to school every day. So eventually I guess I just stopped, despite the fact that wearing glamorous fake jewels and pink gloves obviously made me incredibly happy. One could say I just grew up, or grew out of the phases, but seeing as I still love wearing tiaras and jewelry and sparkly things in general I don't know how accurate such statements would really be...

Then I see old people like this fabulous pink lady, or my grandmother, who do and wear what they please b/c they don't know how much longer they'll be on this planet and have stopped caring what anyone has to say about their actions. My grandmother is going to be 90 in September. I have never met someone so intent on living life to its fullest and for that reason she is my hero. She taught Latin for years and didn't retire until she was in her 80's, and the only reason she retired was because she felt that she was traveling too much and not devoting enough time to her job. Some of her recent trips include a cruise to Antarctica where she went for a swim (a bit chilly she said), a trip to Mongolia simply b/c she'd never been, a D-Day tour of France and England, a trip to Austria to celebrate Mozart's 250th birthday, a trip to Nepal where she rode an elephant around the base of Mt. Everest (a little bumpy), a trip to Dubai (whose luxury she found rather gauche) and the list goes on. She is currently planning some conference for this club called the Ninety-Nines, which is an organization started by the first women pilots ever (of which she was one) and she's doing this while planning her 90th birthday bash in between frequent trips to Manhattan to see every opera and play known to man. She does all this because it makes her happy. Her answering machine message is hilarious, her little voice crows through the phone, "CARPE DIEM!!!" every time you call and she's not there, which is frequent. If you happen to be stuck next to her on an airplane/train for an extended period of time I guarantee you she will find out your life story by the end of the flight. She doesn't care what anyone thinks. She took me to lunch yesterday and got lost on the way to my office and soon had 2 different random strangers using their cell phones to try to find me. She carries a plastic bag in her purse for leftovers; in case she eats something "divine" and wants to take the rest home with her for later (this is the woman who paid for my Cotillion and my debut, if you can believe that). She also doesn't care that her 22 year old granddaughter does find this last particular trait a tad bit embarrassing when she tries to pull it out in The Oceanaire. She's beyond the point of caring in the slightest what people think and if her actions could be interpreted as tacky, the point is that she does it simply because it makes her happy and content with life and I think that's just grand. (Although you won't see me carrying around a plastic bag anytime soon, but you have to admit it does take balls though.) It’s as if you reach a certain age and just realize that you don’t have to care what anyone thinks, that it’s ok to live your life for you, as long as you don’t intentionally hurt anyone in the process and are smiling at the end of the day. Maybe you lose the fears that we all have that keep us from doing the things we most want in life because you realize that death really can interrupt your life at any given moment, and I imagine that’s a bigger fear to deal with than, say, fear of traveling to such-and-such place b/c of how it might interfere with your career or something.

I don't know, I guess my point is that it seems to me that really young kids and really old dudes know where it's at. Everyone has bizarre quirks, why not embrace them and celebrate them? Why wait until we are old enough to die at any given moment to do the things that make you happy? I may sound like a generic commencement speech or a Hallmark card right now, but I know I have a good point.

So if you see a blonde in leopard print shoes and a tiara next weekend, it’s probably me so introduce yourself and take a birthday shot with me....