I signed up for an acting class taught by a woman who looks like she might have stepped out of Valley of the Dolls' Real Estate Licensing School c/o 1984, before discovering "The THEA-TA!" later in life (fyi: anyone who says they like theater more than movies has, quite frankly, not seen enough one person shows, performance art pieces, improv, or "THEA-TA", for that matter). Despite the fact that her skin looks tighter than mine ever did, I think she might have something to teach me, if not about acting than either about the demolishment or edification of my own prejudices towards blonde Los Angeles matrons with diamond boulders on their fingers.

However, because I know nothing about this woman except for that she called Stanislavski "that little Russian," I probably need to uncover my own resentment towards all the pampered blonds who have skipped through my life (not to be confused with the humble blonds who dragged themselves beside me).

Just for today, I can examine my prejudices.

It all started on the day I was born and met my parents. They were the first cult leaders.

On that day, without speaking a word, (but through the vibrations emanating from their bodies) they said to me, "you are now our child and, therefore, a member of our cult. You must do as we say and believe as we believe or we will withold the love you so desperately need (not to mention food, shelter, etc.)."

However, the foil was that my parnets got divorced, and the sect divided (sort of like what happend in England with the Protestants and Catholics). Since I couldn't decide which cult I belonged to, I struggled to belong to both, whatever it took in order to bask in their love of my compliance.

There are many cults that exist in this world. The Hare Krishnas are just one. And here are a few that I've noted:

1) The Gap
2) "Friends" (the television show)
3) Vintage People
4) Trust Fund Cool Cynical People (too poor to join)
5) Insecure People
6) Target
7) The cult of college girls who drank too much in and puked (one semester only)
8) "Recovering" people (member since 1997...considering separation).
9) People Who Pay Taxes

Just for today, I can live my life free from cults.

I've been feeling lonely of late.

I called my friend Olga, but she was rushing out to her Kundalini yoga class and said that she couldn't make plans until she returned from her ten day silent retreat on Mauii. I tried my friend Tracy, but she was in the middle of a meditation. So I went to a meeting and shared that all I feel like doing with my life is shucking coconuts on a Carribean island and selling jewelry made out of tortoise shell, but I almost started a 12-step riot of uncomfortable laughter. Afterwards, people came up to me and said things like, "you go with the whole hippy thing if that works for you, I'M pursuing my dream of winning a Tony for my one woman show about bulimia."

I hate to feel misunderstood because it's so First World. You don't see women in Ghana slouching in front of a monitor because they've got "stuff coming up" and their therapist is on vacation.

Speaking of "stuff coming up," (which is a popular euphemism for emotion and grief...BTW, I really like how the word "stuff" can describe everything from sadness, to luggage, to sinus blockage), I hear that the release of this "stuff" into the real world is a good thing and means that I'm becoming (big therapy word coming up)....EMOTIONALLY AVAILABLE!

However, right now I feel lonely and like I've fallen off the treadmill (one of the hamster wheel ones at 24 Hour Fitness) of life and can't get up.

Just for today, it's OK to feel lonely and to have "stuff coming up."

I once read that women have instincts to think circularly due to thousands of years of runnning around like headless chickens (except with heads) taking care of everyone (weaving baskets, shucking corn, scaling cliffs like Ninjas with babies on their hips, etc.). Thanks to the women's movement, and the fact that I was born into the top 1% of women free of social obligation to any family (friggin' rocks), I don't have to take care of anyone but myself (until my biological clock starts to sound an air raid siren). So, when I really have time on my hands, I like to let my day unfold via momentary gushes of inspiration.

It sounds very non-Western and non-linear (i.e., lazy), but I trust my own natural instincts (i.e., accept my "laziness"). Here's an inner monologue of how my day went:

8:00 AM - I'm awake and reading in bed.
9:00 AM - I'm asleep.
10:00 AM - I'm hungry. Inspired to get up, walk to kitchen, make toast, back in bed, asleep by 10:30.
11:00 AM - I'm reading again
12:00 PM - I'm asleep
1:00 PM - Honest to God, I'm getting up now.
2:00 PM - I'm actually not in bed, but now I'm lying on the floor and staring at the hypnotic motion of the ceiling fan.
2:10 PM - I'm writing in my journal after having several epiphanies (for instance, love is not hatred) of how I was perpetually scapegoated by parents as source of all their misery...new resolve to uphold boundaries with certain family members...
2:20 PM - I'm staring at the rug. It's been a while since I vaccumed.
2:25 PM - I'm experiencing intense, unstoppable urge to vacuum like a mofo. I worry it's too early on a Sunday, and then realize that it's mid-afternoon (but feels like morning for me cuz I've only been out of bed for little over an hour).
2:35 PM - Back on floor celebrating first accomplishment of the day.
2:50 PM - I'm spraying Resolve on stains and scrubbing like there's no tomorrow.
3:10 PM - Amazing jolt of inspiration to tackle writing project that I have been talking about for four years!
3:30 PM - Back on floor celebrating 20 minutes of hard work.
3:50 PM - Powerful surge of inspiration to put on green crazy face mask from Sav-On.
4:00 PM - First actual conversation of the day. Plans to meet friend for de-caf.
4:30 PM - Writing in journal about feelings of isolation and loneliness due to my disconnection from certain family (as well as from spending day alone).
5:00 PM - Giant well of inspiration to sweep and mop kitchen!
6:00 PM - Writing in journal about feelings of freedom and peace due to disconnection from certain family members.
6:15 PM - Cleaning kitchen!
6:30 PM - Writing!
6:45 PM - Cleaning kitchen!
7:00 PM - Coffee (at last!)! Conversation with real human being!
8:30 PM - Serious phone call with boyfriend about "issues."
9:00 PM - Issues resolved. Watching Olympics with boyfriend. Feeling inspired by 100 meter Men's race.
9:30 PM - Cleaning kitchen!
10:00 PM - Snuggling!
10:30 PM - Cleaning dusty TV (mess up picture)!
11:30 PM - Sleeping while boyfriend watches movie about giant ants.

Just for today, I can trust my circular thinking.

I don't like reading past entries of my blog because then I start to notice the typo orgy and the crimes of grammar I commit while in my frenzed I'm-So-Creative-I-Don't-Need-To-Actually-Make-Sense state. It's sort of the geek equivalent of taking shrooms and throwing paint on a canvas (except I consume large quantities of M&Ms and spew my frustrations...is it really that different?). Unlike those admirable Olympiads (is that even a word?...see, now is what I'm talkin' about...) I seem to go for the bronze (if that) when it comes to writing clear, grammatical sense-making blogs.

The truth is this: I'm not sure that's a bad thing.

The other truth: I'm a recovering English major. I went to college and had a lot of snooty TA's who wore black scarves (they weren't all snooty) and put a lot of red marks on my papers, and talked about their pretentious poetry books that made no sense at all to me, and told me that I am judgemental of the characters in the giant brick of an English novel about some prissy housemaid who wants to get it on with her master (get it on already!)!!!!

You see, out here in web-land, no one can mark up my blog (at least not in front of me). But I've heard something about how adulthood has something to do with not acting out....so maybe it's time to let up on the creative grammar.

Just for today, I can check for typos.

I'm thinking of beginning my own business as a Professional Declutterer. My job will be to support people in getting rid of their crap. So, when when my clients say to me, "...but that pile of New Yorkers taking up half my garage space will be worth money some day," I can tell them that, "that's a pile of crap blocking you from your true self." And when they say, "but I bought that Bonnie Tyler album in 1984 with my babysitting money..." I can say, "this is a relic of your past and unless it's in a museum about the history of 80's music, it's crapola." Come to think of it, museums are nothing more than pre-historic crap (I think I just like using the word "crap.")

Speaking of which, I offered my office-mates the opportunity to bid on some of the gems I found during office-clean-up day (including a snow globe/pen holder Chicago memorabilia with pyschedelic snow) at an impromptu office auction, but they told me it's mean to auction away gifts (I also don't think they understood my powerful decluttering abilities).

Just for today, I am a kick-ass declutterer!

When I said good-bye to my family my teen-aged sister and my mother were in a gridlock argument. They sort of remind me of the 405 S. at 5:45 on a Friday afternoon or the Hoover damn for all the energy flows between them.

The argument had something to do with my sister's claim that she never was taught how to ride a bike. My mother suggested that perhaps the child she rode around on bikes with outside the house was some other little girl. I offered that maybe it was my sister's "evil" twin. My step-father took it one step further (and it's obvious really...I was just feeling in a kind mood) by offering that maybe it was the "good" twin. When I hugged my sister good-bye she whispered in my ear loud enough for everyone to hear...

"Help me..."

When I hugged my mother good-bye she didn't bother to whisper.

"Help me..."

I helped everyone by getting in my car and driving away, all while contemplating yet another beautiful illustration of the forces that created my intense co-dependency.

Still, when I got to LA I felt sad to be so far away from my family, craziness and all.

Just for today, I can love my family.

I went camping with my (yes, it's official) boyfriend and had exactly two "fights" in a matter of five days. I spoke to my friend from the sixth grade about it and realized what an embarrassment I am to myself. Here I thought I was so advanced at life (which is I guess what happens when you've had ten years of therapy and 12-step programs and you start believing that there might be some place to arrive in relationships, like A.P. English or the Olympics or Harvard.) So here I thought I was in an Advanced Placement Relationship cuz I've "worked on myself," (i.e., stumbled into adulthood after a fifteen year adolescence) only to discover that I still have more in commone with a 17-year-old sorrority pledge than my "normal" married friends (i.e., those friends who look at me like I'm crazy when I discuss my latest therapy session).

Here's what we fought about:

1) an old girlfriend

2) whether he appreciates the recent fullness of my figure (i.e. "does he think I'm fat?!")

The image I had of myself as a feminist warrior has been completely shattered.

Just for today, I accept my remedial side in relationships.

I did my duties of seeing many family members and now I'm going on a vacation from my vacation. Most likely I will find Internet access in the wilds. But if not, will blog on Friday.

Just for today, I can be on vacation.

While home visiting my mom, I told her that I would help her de-clutter the room with all of my books, papers, and clothes from my childhood (i.e., my "crap"). Because my mom believes that she can avoid death by saving every object that the winds of time place in her home, I had the opportunity to dig through dense vestiges of my past.

And I found...

1) a giant lock of the hair I saved from when I was 22 and had my hair chopped off as a solution to post-college-end-of-adolescence-crisis (which never actually ended, but I just learned to embrace as my special gift...). Let me just say that locks of hair are creepy and should never be saved by anyone except wig makers.

2) a 45 of Duran Duran's "New Moon on Monday" and other records (I thought Brian Setzer was so hot ) that I'm going to price on e-bay.

3) a dot matrix picture of me and my two friends from the 8th grade that we PAID MONEY to have made.

4) a notebook filled with the attendance record of the high school yearbook staff written during the time in which I helmed the yearbook as EDITOR-IN-CHIEF (in case there was any doubt as to when my control issues began). Please note: the only word that can adequately describe the frequency of pictures of me in my 12th grade yearbook is "shameless."

...and much, much more "crap" that can't possibly be interesting to anyone but my madre. Let's just say, I threw out as she would allow and am now leaving her responsible for the rest (including the creepy hair).

Just for today, I can help my mom de-clutter.

When I'm really depressed at work I like to read news clips about people I went to college with who are now "famous" and after a moment of dramatic faux self-pity I can usually see why I would be such a terrible famous person. Unlike my college friends who say incredibly appropriate inspiring things that prove their worth as model professionals in their field, I am wont to demistify the whole cheezy elevation of people onto quicksand pedestals by yapping away about my IBS or my thirty-somethin' menstrual flood (it's like a bad SNL sketch, really....see, I'm doing it already!) or the $3 shoes I bought at Thrifty while eating Rocky Road cone...or whatever it takes to gratify my perverse need to douse the world with my hyper-humanity.

The truth: I want to be an earthy inappropriate human being.

The facts: In this world, you have to have things like pinacles and "credits" so people can go ooh and aah enough times so they can shake their heads in condescension when you fall from grace like some Tennessee Williams character, or Winona Ryder (who was really just trying to make a point about the ridiculously over-priced crap they sell at Barney's) and then everyone can say to each other "See! she/he is really a screwed up human being - just like you and me!"

I already admit I'm screwed up like everyone in the world.

Just for today, I think I'm too human to be famous.

I don’t care what anyone says. I feel the way I feel and I'm just going to let it (the Sadness) be (because, like flowers and grass, it wants to exist...).

Experience has taught me that talking myself out of feelings with smarmy affirmations about the goodness of the universe is about as helpful as telling a four-year-old that it's OK that his parents are getting a bitter divorce because his father drinks too much and his mother has deep unconscious rage because "God has a plan (...to make your life really #$* hard)!" or whatever platitude you have on your fridge underneath the apple pie magnet...

The point is this: affirmations are dangerous (maybe more dangerous than cigarettes...but there aren't any studies to prove it...yet!).

I have an intense bias against affirmations. The one time in my life that I gave someone the bird while driving came after a meditation in which I said "I'm willing to give and receive love..." while outstretching my arms 27 times (it proved more useful as an aerobic exercise than anything else)! It was just way too much positivity for me and I became a danger to society. Which is why I find most spiritual people (priests, yoga instructors, airy fairy hippies who sleep on mats) kind of frightening because while their anger (and they have to have some othewise why would they see the need for peace?) has to go someplace...we just don't know where...

The second point is this: I am sad.

No affirmations. No therapy session (um...actually, that's not true...not at this moment, though). I need to cry and then I need to meet my hug quota for the day (8-10...preferably 10) and then I need some coffee (it's been 8 days of abstinence!...freakin' bladder infection...)

Just for today, I accept my sadness.