I actually came home from New York thrilled to live in LA. I have a great apartment, a beach (one that I share), and better light...and then I had lunch with a friend today who reminded me of what I'm missing (because depression always begins with the consciousness of what's missing...).

"The sex with _____ is so great...," she told me over the crab cakes.

Sex?! Oh, you mean that thing when two people take off their clothes and rub up against each other...do people still do that?! I thought that went out in 2003 along with sweater coats (though I still have mine).

When I was younger and in a similar sort of dry spell, I could always do something stupid like get drunk at the office Christmas party and go back to the hotel with the cute guy from the New York office while a group of his and my co-workers watched from the bar in the lobby (we ended up becoming friends and having a Margarita everytime he came to town). Now that I'm older and "mature" (a euphemism for jaded and scared), I am relegated to the class of people who wait around at the office Christmas party see who will drink too many mojitos and make-out with the guy/girl from HR/Accounting/Technology/Management/Creative/???... In the end, it's SO MUCH more fun being clueless, but, like my sweater coat, it just doesn't look good on me anymore (not that it ever did...my sweater coat, that is).

At least it gives me something to write about. I can't imagine I would have anything funny to say if I was having the type of sex that my friend is having (swinging from the chandeliers and stuff). It's really fun, it's just not funny.

Just for today, I accept my celibacy.

Coming soon: a chronicle of my past relationships!

I am grateful for the following on Thanksgiving Day!

1) That all my diseases are spiritual maladies and not things like leprosy and plague (let's hear it for the 21st century!).
2) That my only food-related worry on this day is that I might eat too much pumpkin pie (which I did).
3) That not only do I have family to spend the holiday with, but I want to spend time with them.
4) That my sinuses are clear.
5) That the Democrats won the house and senate (it's as if a dark cloud has been lifted...partially).
6) That I still have some fabulous years ahead (and if they have to be single years as well, then so be it).
7) That I don't know what it is to sleep in the freezing cold.
8) That I can spend time with my sister watching videos on YouTube.
9) That my boobs still have some solid firm shape (don't know how much longer that'll last)..
10) For Trader Joe's.

Just for today, I am grateful.

I'm in NYC visiting my younger sister who goes to NYU. I have to say, there's nothing like walking to a dorm room late at night with a substantial buzz going on to remind me of my own bright college years. [For some reason, the East Coast seems to be one of the few places where I actually get intoxicated. Perhaps that's because it's so damn cold and it's what you do to get up the hutzpah to walk outside...].

At dinner my stepfather looked at me and said, "You look so dissappointed."

"I am," I answered, "with my life." I know it's not a good attitude, but at least it's the truth.

I have to say it's hard hanging around young, promising college kids when you're old and bitter. Everything I say in response to their wide-eyed excited conversation is tinged with the some kind of condescending "Sounds great, kiddo!" energy. Just because my life is nothing like I expected, though, doesn't mean I have to lay it on America's youth like some old piece of leftover turkey. I can't blame an NYU student for feeling positive about life. I was tremendously positive in college, what with all the boyfriends, dreams, watered-down beer, and freezing cold wind-chills...what was there not to love about life? I didn't know the whole world was going to go off and pair up in five to ten years...

I really shouldn't write when I'm this tired...

Just for today, I can survive the cold (inside and out).

This is such a great city. Not only are there a plethora of fabulous restaurants, stores, and theaters, but it seems like there are a lot more single thirty-something men. If I stay single any longer, I just might have to move here.

Then I had dinner with my old comedy friend who used to live in LA. We talked about how the men in LA are enabled to act like teenagers for their entire lives (which I can attest to since I live in the Land of the Middle Aged Single White Man). However, she assured me that the men here are just as stunted underneath, they just disguise it better here (all the scarves and warm jackets). Still...it seems more promising.

Just for today, I'm considering my move to NYC.

I arrived in New York this afternoon after a harrowing day. Ok, so the plane didn't crash or anything [although I did spend most of last night imagining an improbable emergency ocean landing in which all passengers survive the impact...However, many don't know how to swim, EXCEPT for me, who spent all summer in the pool (until my sinuses imploded in August) and because of what fabulous shape I was in two months ago, I am able to perform heroic feats that are caught on video...At that point, I became concerned about the untethered nature of my connection to reality). HOWEVER, this day did present me with several stress challenges and I did have a gratuitous freak-out when the metal detector wouldn't let me pass (it's tough being a jangly silver jewelry person in airports) and I had to get felt up by an 18-year-old girl (if it had been the guy, it might have been a different story).

Now that I'm here and immersed in all the busy, cold, holiday energy and had a fabulous Italian dinner with Pinot Noir and a chocolate brownie, I can stop being a victim and life has hope and possibility again [minus the fact that another holiday has rolled around and I'm "STILL" (if there were SUPER-SIZED quotations, you would see them here)...(three giant sighs followed by a prayer) S.I.N.G.L.E.

Which is not to say that I'm not fabulous, grateful for my life and health, and, most importantly, fabulous...

Just for today, I'm grateful to have arrived safely in NYC.

When I was a little kid I remember thinking that the adults in my life were weird (to say the least). Some of the women (like my father's girlfriends) were concerned with things like whether a man (my father) was focusing on them (in my childhood wisdom I could clearly see the futility of this pursuit) or how the table looked with dishes and silverwar. And the men seemed spaced out, like they were living in another time.

Flash forward to today, I seem to be becoming everything I once questioned and deemed sad and bizarre. I obsess about how guacamole is presented (I just got a new dip tray from Targae...horay!) and I worry that my relationship status makes me some kind of social outcast (which it does...I don't seem to know any couples). I want popularity and prestige like every other boring person in America (snore) and I've internalized the worst of American values to the point where I'm becoming a Sex and the City wannabe (which is not to say that I'm not Single and Fabulous...I mean, come on). Still, it's dissappointing to realize that life is dissappointing at times and like some flimsy Gatsby-esque parable without any of the great metaphors...

Just for today, I feel like an adult.

My Voice for the Stage teacher assigned us monologues to work on. We work on the same piece for the entire semester. Here's mine:

"You think of me as the girl you used to know, grown older. But I'm not. I'm different, I'm changed. Some sort of flame seems to have burned out. And now, I'm just cold, and old, and empty hearted."

(This monologue is from the play "Plenty" by David Hare)

Is someone trying to tell me something? Do I really actually seem that washed up and played out? I mean, I know it's been a while since I've "made contact" (can you think of a lamer euphemism for sex?) with anyone (salsa just doesn't cut it)...but does it show? A woman in the class came up to me after the first time I performed it and told me that I was VERY believable. She then went on to say that she was SO GLAD, our teacher didn't assign this monologue to her.

Are things actually worse than they seem?

I know on some level, that I am single and fabulous. The part of me that feels cold and old and empty hearted, felt that way when I was 18...

Still...should I be scared?

Just for today, I can go to acting class.

My Voice for the Stage teacher assigned us monologues to work on. We work on the same piece for the entire semester. Here's mine:

"You think of me as the girl you used to know, grown older. But I'm not. I'm different, I'm changed. Some sort of flame seems to have burned out. And now, I'm just cold, and old, and empty hearted."

(This monologue is from the play "Plenty" by David Hare)

Is someone trying to tell me something? Do I really actually seem that washed up and played out? I mean, I know it's been a while since I've "made contact" (can you think of a lamer euphemism for sex?) with anyone (salsa just doesn't cut it)...but does it show? A woman in the class came up to me after the first time I performed it and told me that I was VERY believable. She then went on to say that she was SO GLAD, our teacher didn't assign this monologue to her.

Are things actually worse than they seem?

I know on some level, that I am single and fabulous. The part of me that feels cold and old and empty hearted, felt that way when I was 18...

Still...should I be scared?

Just for today, I can go to acting class.

I remember back in 2003 when Friendster was all the rage and people had like 100 friends (back then that was considered a lot). MySpace was still renegade country, filled with alternative bands and creepy guys living in their parent's basement. But soon MySpace began to gain strength and energy. The Friendsters tried to hold out thinking, "I spent all this time accumulating Friendsters and now I have to do it again on MySpace?! No, thanks, I'll make my Friendster page cool by sheer will." But, alas, the winds of fashion sucked all the hipness of Friendster out until it was a ghost town of a once vibrant cyber-community. The Friendster administrators decided to refrain from showing the user log-in dates because it was just too depressing...

Eventually, myself and others with a sheep-like mentality (it's less lonely being part of the crowd) came around and resigned ourselves to starting over again on MySpace (I had already been invited a dozen times). With a little less passion, but the same sense of duty, I've started connecting with old friends (from Friendster and other pit-stops in my life). After all, like a summer fling, MySpace won't last forever. What makes the Internet exciting is exactly the lack of control we have over it. Especially when it's not really "my" space, but that of a big ole corporate machine...

Just for today, I can hang out on MySpace.

I cancelled a date tonight with someone who tells me I'm "beautiful" and "stunning." Why? Because I had to go to Target and buy shampoo and Comet and roam the earrings aisle (I ended up buying two pairs of earrings...one that looks exactly like two pairs I already have, only as if they were mixed together). I think I have an aversion to healthy dating. The idea of not having a definitive stance on my relationship to a man I'm sitting across from is more terrifying to me than jumping out of a plane into a jungle filled with spiders. Can't I just go shopping and buy a husband?!

My therapist (she's being a pain) tells me that I don't want to feel vulnerable (whatever!). I'm down with feeling vulnerable and all that crap (uh...in yoga and therapy!), but I'm starting to think that by the time I'm "ready" for a relationship my potential candidates will be playing croquet at Leisure World (do they play croquet...anywhere?)...(giant sigh).

So, instead of trying to get to know a suitor, I went to yoga and listened to the sound my knee makes when I go into plow (like someone stepping on corn chips) and wondered how attractive that might sound to my would-have-been date.

What I'm beginning to see is that I'm a big scarety-cat (sp?) and, like the Lion, I desperately need some courage.

Just for today, I can be honest with myself.

It was almost twelve years ago that I was walking down the street in Westwood when a Persian guy approached me and asked if he could cut my hair. I had a short pixie cut at the time (even though my friend's told me it looked "cute," I think it was my "don't notice me" phase...). It was getting shaggy and he had a slightly smarmy vibe that felt oddly comfortable, so I said yes.

Twelve years later, the smarmy energy hasn't let up a bit. Over the past decade he has asked me countless times about my sex life and it took that long for me to inform him I don't need to hear about his sexual forays. Which is not to say that he isn't compassionate and caring and a great listeners. My eyebrow lady works in his salon and the two of them know my life story as well, if not better, than my therapist. I feel like I've grown up there. They taught me how to grieve over boyfriends, eat Persian food, and deal with facial hair (not that I have any...). My eyebrow lady has been married for 50 years and from her I've gotten some modeling of a real long-term partnership. Like any relationship that has survived the trial of time and growth, they feel like family.

I guess next to therapists, hair dressers are a grounding center of most women's life and leaving one can be seriously traumatic. I know of a friend who tolerated an 80's style hair cut for years to avoid the pain of leaving her guy.

Ultimately, I do like my hair and eyebrows. I come out of there feeling fresh and brand new. But even if I didn't, it would be hard to try someone new. There is something weirdly intimate about hair, that makes the hair dresser/client relationship important in myterious ways...

Just for today, I love getting my hair and eyebrows done!