Yo Ho, Yo Ho...

A while back, I spent a day with the blue-eyed guy that started with a hot air balloon flight, and proceeded with a back-country Jeep ride, a cattle round-up, two games at Wagon Wheel bowl, and a trip to the outlet mall. (It was what my mom would call "over-defining the situation," which is funny because she first defined that phrase, then coined it.) It was totally surreal and fun.

We kind of had a day like that on Saturday. We went for a hike in Franklin Canyon, which was only slightly laughable because we're the two city kids looking at each other semi-retardedly like, huh, check us out here in nature! even while we were in full view of the valley. But we got in some good Half Dome training (albeit about 90-minutes worth, but it's a start), and, importantly, we tested out our backpacks and shoes to see how sturdy our gear is before the crajor* hike, now just 12 days away. So far so good, but I'm totally buying one of those water-to-mouth-hosey things, because regular old water bottles aren't going to cut it apparently. Also I seem to have developed a late-life heavy-face-sweating issue, but that's neither here nor there.

Afterward, still in our grubby outdoorsy gear, we stopped at an estate sale in Holmby Hills on Mapleton, sandwiched between the Aaron Spelling estate and the Playboy Mansion. It definitely had its share of $50K furniture and paintings, but it also offered walk-in closets full of vintage duds and other semi-affordable finds. Sounds gold mine-ish, I know, but for some reason it wasn't quite. There was no evidence that this woman had done any shopping since the late 1960's, and most of her gowns were labled Bullocks Wilshire and I. Magnin. Kind of rad, but also kind of ugly. Plus, her feet were much smaller than mine (pity--some good nude peep-toe Ferragmos on that rack; just what I've been looking for) and she seemed to have had a tiny waist and outsized bust. How lovely that must have been for her! Moving on.

So then we went home and changed into our best pirate gear (no we didn't, but we should have) and headed out to Anaheim for the Pirates of the Caribbean premiere. Hello, it was awesome. I didn't realize how long it had been since I'd been to Disneyland until I realized how gleefully I was tugging onto the blue-eyed guy's sleeve, begging can we please puh-leeeeease go on Splash Mountain even though it's nighttime and cold, please, we can sit in the middle so we don't get wet, come on, it will be fun, please? And then I ate churros like it was my job (actually, I guess it kind of is my job in this context--sweet) and watched the movie and saw fireworks and wore my Mickey ears with the pirate earring all night long, until I fell asleep in the car on the way home. I figure, if this is what turning 30 feels like, I can totally dig it.



*Crajor = crazy + major. I made that up while writing a comment on my sister's blog and now I'm trying to get it to stick. Anyone with me?

Can I Help it That my Future's so Bright?

This one time I took the Chinatown bus from New York to visit my sister in Philadelphia. It was hella hot outside and we went to catch the end of the Live 8 concert with Stevie. So we're walking and this guy stops us on the street and says to me, "You look like that one singer--what's her name? Mariah Carey!" And after he walks away, I go to big Dubin, "I don't think I really look like Mariah Carey, do you?" And she goes, "No. It's just that nobody in Philadelphia wears sunglasses that big."

Ain't No Mountain High Enough

You know how if, like, your arm hurts, and you start looking on the Internet for all the reasons your arm could hurt, then you end up determining that you're going to die in an instant and you probably have the flesh-eating bacteria or cancer? The Internet is scary like that.

I'm experiencing a similar thing the more I read about the Half Dome hike, now less than three weeks away. I have yet to find a blogger writing about the experience who doesn't mention that training in the gym won't prepare you, and that going down is not easier on your body than going up, and that this will be a 12-hour ordeal so if we don't manage to start right at daybreak, well, then, we're basically screwed. All scary points, but manageable.

But here's the detail that got way under my skin this weekend: the matter of the last quarter mile, the bit where you climb at a 45-degree grade using the Yosemite-provided cables, which will shred your hands as you hold on for dear life, so you better bring gloves. The upper-body-strength requirement doesn't scare me so much here (although I'm sure it should) but it's the fear-inspiring height that I hadn't spent much time thinking about before this weekend. Apparently, according to bloggers who have done the hike, many hikers panic when faced with the cables and don't make the ascent. It could only be a very daunting thing that could make a hiker turn back just shy of the summit, after he has already made it 4,000 vertical feet over eight miles and six hours or so.

Anyway, note to self. If you know you suffer from insomnia, don't read a blog that includes this comment right before you try to go to bed:

The cables are intimidating because: If you slip, you will fall to your death, no doubt about it.

Update: Did it on June 2, 2007! Read my story here.

Holding out for a Hero

(In further sycophantic praise of my gym,) I took an awesome workout class yesterday: Super Hero Training Camp. There was much leaping and bounding and crawling Spidey-style on fingertips across impossibly long stretches of gym floor and partnering up as hero and villain and trying to knock each other off the Bosu. It was so much fun and there was a lot of perverse sweating and hooting and hollering in glee/pain. And if I'd been forced to do something like this in junior high P.E. class--particularly the partnering-up bit--I probably would have been awake with night sweats for a week in anticipation of the living nightmare it would have been.

I hope this sort of thing is preparing me for the great Half Dome hike that is now looming only three weeks down the horizon. There will be camping involved (which is "for homeless people," if you ask the blue-eyed guy, and I generally agree but am trying to be positive and strong and fearless and stuff) and I hope I don't lose a toenail because they don't give discounts on nine-toe pedicures. Oy, I'm excited, but scared. I suppose that's how you know you're alive.

$41.09

That's how much it cost to fill the 12-gallon tank of my modest little Mazda3. And that's even before the orange light came on. And you know I passed up like four gas stations before I found one with regular unleaded for $3.59. To borrow a phrase from my Arafat-hankie-wearing casting director pal in New York, "Dang, y'all, gas prices don't play, mmmm-kay?!"

Student of Life

Who wants to bet this kid goes to U.C. Berkeley?

Thanks For the Memories, Coachella 2007!

Sis: where exactly were you guys staying?
me: we stayed at the quality inn in indio
in a king smoking room with a pullout sofa bed
very glamorous
Sis: whoa, so it smelled like smoking and air conditioner and stuff?
me: yeah
it was kinda ghett
or "bust out" as [my Brooklyn-by-way-of-Youngstown-Ohio friend] would say
but everything was crazy sold out
Sis: "bust out" means ghet?
me: even our room was $224/night with our AAA discount!
and it was kind of a coup to even get it
yeah
bust out is good, right? i'm trying to implement
Sis: wait: 2 things
me: k
shoot
Sis: 1) 224 a night????
even with the three As?
me: yes. for a smoking room at the quality inn with one bed and a AAA discount. and a small bug problem.
Sis: because of coachella, right? i mean, not normally
me: because all the cool kids with bangs flock to town and grab the rooms
right
totally because of coachella
Sis: ok also, you're trying to implement bust out - is bust out an adjective? That's so bust out?
me: yes
like: "our room at the quality inn was bust out, but at least it was close to the concerts."
or for another example:
it was so hot that [the Mexican architect] was fanning herself with her dirty-ass flip-flop. that was hella bust out
Sis: ok
me: or we saw a girl on sunday night walking out of the venue with a plastic bag tied to one foot because she apparently had lost a shoe. that was mad bust out
yeah
Sis: ok whatev you say but it's not totally intuitive

On Posterity

Job posting:
[Our magazine] is assembling a team of energetic photographers to shoot the likes of portraits, venues, and event design/décor in the Southern California region. Per-shoot compensation may be about $100 to $250, and strong images are likely to get prominent placement. Prompt turnaround essential. To apply, please send a cover letter, resume, and a few low-res digital samples to Southern California bureau chief [me] with ''PHOTOGRAPHER'' in the subject line.

*****

From: [redacted]
To: Me
Subject: $100?
Shove it up your ass.

*****

From: Me
To: [Redacted]
Subject: Re: 100?
I can't actually believe I'm dignifying your email with a response, but clearly I put the fee right in the posting because I am dealing with a very small budget myself and didn't want to waste anyone's time. Needless to say, I got about 100 qualified resumes anyway. I would gladly pay photogs $10K/day if I could magically manufacture that kind of budget. But you sound like an understanding guy, so I'm sure you know what I mean.
Respectfully,
Me

*****

From: [redacted]
To: Me
Subject: Re: Re: $100?
I apologize, for what it's worth. My IQ seems to run up and down on some kind of rollercoaster, and I sometimes forget that an actual person may read corporate emails. There's something really fine about your response, and even in the fact that you reponded.

I keep this pseudonymous address for sending nuisance emails to corporations, corporate media pooh-bahs, and corporate politicians, and 99.99% of them richly deserve whatever miniscule annoyance I can inject into their day: " Aber die Herrschenden Saßen ohne mich sicherer, das hoffte ich."

Of course it's ridiculous to quote Brecht in the context of nuisance emails, but it's even more ridiculous to do nothing because you can't do more, and I do a little more, when I can. This sounds like a collateral-damage defense: "I dropped a bomb on that email because I thought there were enemy combatants in it." Well... That's exactly what it is, but as a defense it always sounds a little better when it's packaged with some sort of compensation. Nothing perfectly appropriate occurs to me, so... the rest of this email is an English version of the great and beautiful poem To Posterity by Brecht. I hope it washes away the unfortunate impression I made on you when I was aiming at some generic corporate persona.

To Posterity
by Bertold Brecht(translated from German by H. R. Hays)

1.
Indeed I live in the dark ages!
A guileless word is an absurdity. A smooth forehead betokens
A hard heart. He who laughs
Has not yet heard
The terrible tidings.

Ah, what an age it is
When to speak of trees is almost a crime
For it is a kind of silence about injustice!
And he who walks calmly across the street,
Is he not out of reach of his friends
In trouble?

It is true: I earn my living
But, believe me, it is only an accident.
Nothing that I do entitles me to eat my fill.
By chance I was spared. (If my luck leaves me
I am lost.)

They tell me: eat and drink.
Be glad you have it! But how can I eat and drink
When my food is snatched from the hungry
And my glass of water belongs to the thirsty?
And yet I eat and drink.

I would gladly be wise.
The old books tell us what wisdom is:
Avoid the strife of the world
Live out your little time
Fearing no one
Using no violence
Returning good for evil --
Not fulfillment of desire but forgetfulness
Passes for wisdom.
I can do none of this:
Indeed I live in the dark ages!

2.
I came to the cities in a time of disorder
When hunger ruled.
I came among men in a time of uprising
And I revolted with them.
So the time passed away
Which on earth was given me.

I ate my food between massacres.
The shadow of murder lay upon my sleep.
And when I loved, I loved with indifference.
I looked upon nature with impatience.
So the time passed away
Which on earth was given me.
In my time streets led to the quicksand.
Speech betrayed me to the slaughterer.
There was little I could do. But without me
The rulers would have been more secure. This was my hope.
So the time passed away
Which on earth was given me.

3.
You, who shall emerge from the flood
In which we are sinking,
Think --When you speak of our weaknesses,
Also of the dark time
That brought them forth.
For we went,changing our country more often than our shoes.
In the class war, despairing
When there was only injustice and no resistance.

For we knew only too well:
Even the hatred of squalor
Makes the brow grow stern.
Even anger against injustice
Makes the voice grow harsh. Alas, we
Who wished to lay the foundations of kindness
Could not ourselves be kind.

But you, when at last it comes to pass
That man can help his fellow man,
Do not judge us
Too harshly.

Zzzzzzz

insomnishopian
A disorder marked by making unnecessary online purchases in the wee hours due to insomnia.

Crazy Cat Lady

...But not in the way you might think. More like Crazy-Cat Lady. That is, I am a lady who has a cat who is real crazy. I love him, and have historically let him do whatever he's wanted, and generally spoiled him, and made excuses for some suspicious behavior. But it's time to come out from behind the veil of secrecy.

(<---Cali holding down the mini New York fort before the move to his namesake state.)

My cat's pathology is that he eats clothes. This started out as a more manageable, occasional deviance. He would eat things that were stringy, like bathing suits, bras, camisoles, and nightie straps. I thought this seemed OK-ish because it's commonly known that cats like yarn and string and stuff. Although I did think it was a bit odd that he wasn't just severing these strings, he was chewing them up and swallowing them into his belly.

Lately, it's gotten way worse. He's emboldened. He slides the closet doors open with his head, knocks pants and other knit garments on hangers right off the closet rod, and gnaws holes in them and leaves them right there on the floor (R.I.P perfect, classic off-the-shoulders sweater, 09/2001-10/2006). He's insidious. When I went to meet my newborn play niece in the hospital, I came straight from the gym. From my gym bag, I pulled my red-and-gray striped shirt--actually the same soft shirt I had worn on my first date with the blue-eyed-guy--and it was then I discovered all the holes in the arms. And it was all I had packed to wear. Nice, right?

A few days ago, I caught Mister Baby red handed, in the hallway, looking all Urkel-style did I do that? with bits of my brand new bikini around him (it's one of the two new ones I bought after he spent the last year destroying the rest of my vast collection), which he had pulled somehow from a closed bathroom cupboard, and drawn out of a basket where it was hidden, on top of which I'd placed a box as another line of defense. See how well that worked.

That last event was the catalyst for me taking the little guy to the vet today. Needless to say, this dude was not happy about the trip and did some nasty things to demonstrate that. Nearly $200 worth of blood work later, the vet tells me my cat might benefit from Prozac, which they can call into my local CVS pharmacy.

Prozac. My cat is going to have Prozac. Have I already made him that neurotic after only two and a half years in my charge? Jeez. Oy. Apparently it runs in the family.

Update: Some Web research has revealed that this condition is called Pica. Treatments vary. Has anyone experienced anything like this with a pet? Would appreciate any input.

Escrow

Sniff. Times infinity million.

Famous Last Words

Last night over dinner, after a long weekend of birthday partying and related activities, I told the girls, "I'm beat. I'll sleep like a baby tonight." Instead, I woke up to put the cat out of the bedroom in the middle of the night and was seized by a bout of insomnia for hours.

I tried to focus my thoughts and do breathing exercises, like I've learned in yoga and meditation. I tried to do the one where you imagine that every time you exhale you're breathing out billows of black smoke that represent all the toxins and negative energy you're harboring, and on the inhale you're taking in a bounty of bright white light, which is supposed to be purifying and salubrious. But what I ended up doing was picturing this activity diagrammed as an illustration, like they do to demonstrate medicines becoming active in the body on TV commercials. And then I started thinking about those medicines, and TV, which led to other wildly unhinged chains of thought which only perpetuated the insomnia. Then I heard the cat barfing in the foyer, which made me think about how I'm going to have to clean that up in the morning, and about how I have so much else to do today, and about how maybe I overscheduled and overdefined my day, which made me feel burned out before the week even started.

Then I was thinking about seder tonight and how I'm glad I won't be the youngest at the table so I won't have to do the four questions, thank heaven. And what's so bad about the four questions, anyway? I guess I don't like to be on the spot so much anymore these days--even though I thrived on the spot when I was younger--which is probably why I try to get away with wearing cute jeans to most things I would have so enjoyed getting dressed up for years ago.

At some point it was 7:50 and the alarm went off, and I had an 8:30 meeting and the day barreled onward.

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

It seems my parents are getting awfully close to selling the house I grew up in. We moved in there when I was three-ish, and now I'm almost 30, and I'm trying to be pragmatic about it. At least I hope they get a fair price, and that some family with two cute little curly-haired pudgy girls moves in. So I'm sentimental and change resistant, but I can deal with this.

The idea of that address not belonging to the Dubins anymore has always been heartbreaking, when I've thought about it. That's the address that's been on my driver's license consistently, through probably 25 rental addresses of my own in four other cities. But now it's got to be time for the next chapter. As my mom told me on the cell when I was browsing the racks of Forever21 in the mall last night with my fountain Diet Coke, "That part of our lives is over. You girls are all grown up. It's a new era." Sniff.

Hi A,

As an undergraduate my favorite campus building was Sterling Memorial Library. There are simply no words adequate to describe the place, inside or out, or how I felt in it. If I must have a religion then it consists of books and my cathedrals are the great libraries. Most of my education occurred alone in the stacks of Sterling. The building was constructed in the depths of the depression, a time when Yale had money from hugely successful benefactors and New Haven was filled with skilled Italian immigrants—hungry for work. It is hard to imagine how it could ever be recreated absenting those circumstances.

There is a story, probably apocryphal, concerning Sterling’s opening in 1933. Yale in general employs very low-key signs to define its buildings. It is said that the University Librarian wanted to place a typically small sign outside the building which read, “This is NOT the Library. The Library is inside.” Even if untrue it is a great story with an important message.

Our house was wonderful chiefly for what was inside. The most important product of that experience is the emergence of two smart, talented and generally wonderful young women who are well poised to make their own homes in the coming years. Your Mom and I look forward (keina hora) to events in these. Furthermore our new home, even among the Topangan hippies, artists and nouveau riche lawyers, will always welcome you.

XO,

Dad and Mom

Word Up

These are the three most recent sets of (brilliant) keywords through which miscellaneous Internet-using people came across my blog:

jewish joke my god i hope nothing happened to him
working for cvs pharmacy
travel size mousse pumps

That about sums me up, I'd say. (Not that I work for CVS, but the other two.)

Wallflower

Last night I went to a swing dance club with my guy--the first time I've really ever seen him do this thing, even though he's been going dancing two nights a week when possible for the nearly six months (!) we've been going out. He was light as a feather on the dance floor, and I kind of had a retro kiss-in-Times-Square swoon moment watching him out there. Adorable.

Anyway, y'all know swing dancing is not my area (not yet anyway), so I sat at the bar and chit chatted with his friends and bought people drinks to ingratiate myself. And as I was sitting there, this guy walked by wearing a fragrance that smelled just like junior high to me. I guess it might have been Drakkar Noir or something? I wanted to ask him what it was, but if it was actually Drakkar, I thought the question might embarrass us both, so I let it go. But it's amazing how one quick whiff of a particular aroma can bring you right back to Mrs. Novack's homeroom. Or to not dancing to the MC Rob Base and DJ E-Z Rock tape at the summer camp dance, but instead making comments with fellow gawky bunk mates off to the side.

Not much changes, apparently. Thank god for continuity at least.

Seriously, Do It

Maybe eight or 10 years ago, I was walking with my sister in Berkeley. We were walking from her Ford Escort wagon with the architecture nerd bumper stickers on it and the Taco Bell toys in it to the YMCA downtown, where we took a totally empowering kick-ass (ahem) boxing class together.

She is more than two years older than me, which at some point in our lives was a significant difference. It must have been around the time she'd just graduated from college and she said, "You know, when you're small you think you can or will do everything in the course of your life. Maybe you'll live in Africa, or Panama, and you'll go up on a blimp, and maybe you'll go up in space. You won't necssarily do anything in particular, but you can and might do everything. And then at some point, you realize that you won't or can't do everything. You pick some things you want to do, and you may not do the rest. And you realize that and accept it, and that's just the way it is."

At the time, I found this very shocking and upsetting--I don't even know that I really believed it was true yet. I've since realized that you do make some choices, and some choices you make render other things unlikely or impossible. Kind of. But the trick is to continually think of your life as a changeable entity, because you can always do something else. Maybe you can't do everything in the in the realm of possibility for human beings, but you always control your option to do something else that might make you very happy. (If the person who inspired this post is reading, then for god's sake, go find a place for yourself at a public art organization that moves you! I want to you to be happy. I want everyone to be happy!)

My sister also said to me one time, after she called her boss in San Francisco and announced that she wasn't coming in, not ever again (and then moved briefly to Alabama): "We always imagine the consequences of our actions are so dire. But it's really not always that serious."

It's not really that serious. It's not.

Try To Solve the Puzzles in Your own Sweet Time

Do you know this gal Des'ree? This R&B singer doing her thing in the early 90's? I love her.

I love her because, in 1995, when I was on spring break from Beverly Hills high, and I was toting around Northern California looking at colleges I might go to (even though the only place I really cared about was Berkeley), I made a stop in Santa Cruz where I stayed with a friend from summer camp. While she was off in rehearsals for some kind of upcoming feminist dance performance (natch), I listened to Des'ree's album to death. I listened to it in that hippie dorm with the pretty trees and the clean air all around--listened as my day unfolds, challenged what the future holds, tried to keep my head up to the skyyyyy--and I always still associate the positive lyrics and melodies on the "I Ain't Movin'" album with the everything-is-about-to-happen feeling I felt that week, this week, 12 years ago.

Girl Scouts' Motto: Be Prepared

Last night, when I was out with the girls on Pico for some wine, I realized, shoot, I forgot to eat dinner. And all they have at that wine bar to eat are cheese plates and chocolate plates, and you know I can't mess with those because it's not in the Brand New Booty plan. So I go, "It's OK, I have a granola bar in my purse." And the girl with the bangs goes, "Dang, Dubin always has a bar in her purse."

True! I always have a bar in my purse, along with an array of other things I use and don't use. Turns out, last night this included not one, but three pairs of sunglasses (Versace, Marc Jacobs, and Paul Smith, from Filene's Basement, Nordstrom Rack, and Loehmann's, respectively--bien sur. Never mind that it was dark outside.); boat tickets from last weekend's mini-break; one granola bar, one protein bar, and one fiber bar; a Betsey Johnson wallet the size of Manhattan island that contains photos from my 11th grade semi-formal dance and the likes of a half-stamped Tasti-D-Lite buy-10-get-one-free card only good at the Park Avenue location; antibacterial spray in a pen-shaped container; a metal tin of hand lotion; two cell phones (my personal Treo, and my work phone); the Modern Jewish Girls' Guide to Guilt book that I've only had time to read like 50 pages of, but I've nonetheless toted miles around the state of California in case I find myself waiting in some kind of waiting room; a pill box containing mostly pills I would never take because I cannot identify them; etcetera.

Having a purse like this is my gift to you, because I am very likely to have something you need before you even know you need it. It's kind of heavy, but, you know, you're welcome.

Anyway, TGIF, whew.


[Unrelated: Katherine McPhee's "Open Toes" just came on my "Aaliyah Radio" on Pandora. Why is this song so genius?

I could wear them all day
And listen to the click-clack
Shoes like this make me hate flats
Swipe that card--I'm good
Another pair in leather and wood
I'm a sucker for a name-brand
Skip the rack and stick to the game plan
Hey let's go!
If they're not too high, too low
I'll take them home in purple, red, or gold
'Cause I know them boys
They like those open toes...]

What, Me Worry?

I am a worrier. Not to be confused with a warrior, which I'm realizing lately is the complete opposite. I've always sort of embraced my worry as part of the culture in which I was raised. In my family, you showed how much you cared with the frequency and volume of your oys, and with the number of check-in phone calls you made, and with the number of times you felt somebody's keppellah who said he felt a little chilly. Worrying always made me feel very Jewish (which I like) and very close to my mom (which is also nice).

Recently (around the time he told the Hitler joke that I so thoroughly enjoyed), my boyfriend told me his mom is a worrier, and she will figure he's dead if he doesn't call back for a couple days. I'm like, homie, you don't know from worry! You get a couple of days before she calls the morgue; I get a couple 15 minutes. He also said his mom was very relieved to find out I was a worrier too, because she felt happy to share the burden of her worry over her son who lives in another state. She asked, would I come over if he was sick to take care of him? And I'm thinking, do you know how much Emergen-C I can fit in my Mazda3 hatchback?!

Anyway, I can learn from the blue-eyed guy, who can be rather zen when he wants to be, and who does a lot of yoga, and who doesn't really worry or brood like I do. (Did I mention he got hit by a truck a few years ago?! A TRUCK! Hit! On Pico Boulevard! And he was unconscious in the ambulance! And then kind of got over it and moved on after he got released from the hospital, and now doesn't worry about getting hit by another truck, which I now worry about because he told me that story, like, exactly one time.) (Hit by a truck, oy oy oy!!)

I watch myself set these worry traps for myself and get caught in them. (This is particularly tricky for me since I work at home; it's a lot of time alone with my snowballingly funky head space when I get in a rut.) I watch myself pick at a molehill (albeit, maybe, a kind of substantial molehill) until it becomes an unclimbable mountain. Until I'm like, I've read Into Thin Air, I know how this ends.

But the fact of the matter is (and I know this from dutifully reading my DailyOm): it ends however you want it to end. The only thing to fear is fear itself, and what not. So you know, it's a matter of self discipline (which I know I have, since I get through all those "Brand New Booty" classes at the gym--ouch!), and pulling back a bit from the worry, and maybe changing my mindset about worry being kind of a cool, productive, Jewish community-building thing.

Nu? Discuss.

Back to the Future

Mercifully, about 16 years ago, I got my braces off. At that time, the orthodontist glued in a permanent retainer behind my four bottom teeth, and there it stayed through high school, college, post-college chaos, graduate school, and since. The retainer traveled with me to many of the continental United States, the territory of Puerto Rico, and a few countries. The retainer was not obvious to most people looking at me (although I am rather animated and I talk a lot, opening my mouth really big, so maybe people did see it sometimes), and it became a part of me--just like, maybe, my navel ring, which I never even see anymore, although it's been there for half my life. I regularly ran my tongue along the ridge of the retainer, and I knew it was there, although I never formally registered that knowledge or cared. The retainer also kind of made it hard to floss, except using this loop-like contraption, which is kind of lame and labor intensive.

Today, I went to an orthodontist at UCLA and there, in his third-floor mural-covered office, that retainer got plucked right out of my mouth without ceremony. I'm so sentimental and resistant to change; I almost cried. I ran my tongue over the spot where it was and there was nothing there and it felt really weird, kind of naked. (When I was the blubbering maid of honor in my sister's wedding, I took out all 19 of my earrings at once for the first time since I'd gotten pierced. It was the same kind of nakedness, a feeling of loss, but it felt clean and uncluttered too.)

So I was there in this orthodonist's office--not five blocks from the orthodonist's office in Westwood where I'd reported for all those torturous braces check-ups and tightenings and general nightmarishness--getting my mouth filled with green goo for making impressions (for a version of my retainer to be worn at night). That very specific faintly minty, generally gross taste--that brought me back. Braces. Woah. I don't relish the idea of getting older (eew! 30's only four months away now! Make time slow down!), but I don't miss the days when those inadequately filed-down wires used to tear up the insides of my cheeks while the Sally Jessie Raphael-red glasses decked my little face, framed by a pre-mousse mane of stringy hair, topped by an uneven row of imitation-chola double-decker bangs. My metabolism may have slowed down, but my hair looks way better now and I have a car.