They say that we are not loved for our perfections, but for our imperfections. They (various self-help gurus) say that we can't possibly love people who are perfect, rather we stand in awe of them and really fear them.

The trouble with this line of thinking for me is, I don't want to be loved, I want to be feared. I want people to see me and think, "Look how together she is, she is a powerful weapon of intelligence, beauty, and power." Sure, I can love other people for their imperfections. But do I want to be loved for my imperfections? Do I want a man to say, "Stella, you're so odd and different looking. I love you for that?" No! How condescending is that?!

However, I certainly don't want to be alone for the rest of my life and I don't see myself going in the direction of perfection (unless gray hair suddenly makes it's way into the beauty standard.) Thus, I don't think I have a choice. I'm going to have to be loved for my imperfections. Just for today, I can accept love (minus the condescensions) for my imperfections.

"A Course in Miracles" says that only love is real. Conversely, anything that is not love, is unreal. If it wasn't loving, it never really happened, because only love is real...damnit! (The book doesn't swear, but it does feel like it's yelling at me sometimes).

Forget about what this means for murderers and rapists and racist dictators - I've never been late for work, I've never misappropriated my affections (and other parts of myself) to the wrong people, I never shoplifted from Bill's drugs when I was 13, I've never spent money irresponsibly, and I've never flaked on anybody. If I'm going to forgive myself for these minor digressions, then surely I can extend it to those individuals who have hurt me in my life (and really f---d up). And, yet, there is something about this philosophy that is really hard to swallow. If only love is real, then what is war, disease and poverty? What is the 405 S. after 4:00 on a Friday? What is the Victoria Secret catalogue? What is a dial-up connection? What are divorce attorneys? What is the evening news? Are we all just delusional? I don't know if I can detach from reality as I know it...just yet. Just for today, I can still share the global fantasy of a loveless world.

According to The Course in Miracles, there is actually nothing else. And there aren't really different kinds of love, it's all the same cosmic glorious energy between everyone on the planet (kind of a lot to get your head around when you're stuck in traffic on the 405), but we're so bogged down in our lives we hardly can see it, let alone feel it. When I look at my own life, it's not the pain or the hate that feels like a big knife in my heart, but the love that I never accepted, that was always around, but I couldn't see because I was so worried about my resume, or my bills, or my frustration with the fact that people don't behave the way I want them to. It's not that I hurt people that haunts me, but that I didn't let them love me because I couldn't stand it.

Still, assuming there is such a thing as romantic love, I only have a few song lyrics that seem to capture something of what I think happens between two people trying to recognize (if you will) the love that exists between them.

So go ahead, push your luck, say what it is you gotta say to me,
We will push on into that mystery,
And it'll push right back, and there are worse things than that,
Cause for every price, and every penance that I could think of,
It's better to have fallen in love, Than never to have fallen at all,
Cause when you live in a world, well it gets into who you thought you'd be,
And now I laugh at how the world changed me, I think life chose me after all.

- Dar Williams, After All

Happy Valentine's Day!

I'm falling in love. I'm also having an existential crisis about my survival on the planet. AND I just started Netflix (am watching the fourth season of the "The Sopranos" as I type...experiencing belated sadness at Christopher's heroin addiction). Because it's hard for me to know what my truth is, let alone share it with anyone (especially the whole entire world) I have been encouraged to write my true feelings by my boyfriend. Lucky for him, the truth is that I'm falling in love (with him).

While it's scary, I'm not even going to begin with the "what ifs..." cuz they always ends with "...and then I'll be left all alone to forage for food without enough money to dye my graying hair." Because I'm too tired to start in on that fear spiral, I'm going to bank on the positive feeling I have about being able to call someone my soul mate. I'll leave the question of how we're going to pay for the SAT tutors for our kids for a later date (probably tomorrow).

Just for today, I'm grateful to be falling in love.

A few years ago, I was wondering why two healthy individuals would bother to enmesh themselves into creepy coupledom. I studied all the nauseating couples at Pottery Barn and the Farmer's Market with suspicion and disdain. I scrutinized the men for sidelong glances at other women, and I wondered if the women were ignoring their art, creativity, their real life for the empty supposed glory of a "Relationship." I had no faith in the idea of one. None. Nada. The idea of soul mates was laughable. Don't waste your life waiting for some tacky cheezeball Harlequin romance story invented by The Man to keep you down! Get a freakin' life, already! And then...

CUT TO: INT. - STARBUCKS - DAY
MAN AND WOMAN, BOTH EARLY 30'S, SIT OPPOSITE EACH OTHER DRINKING PEPPERMINT SOY MOCHAS IN FRONT OF LAPTOPS WHOSE BACKS TOUCH EACH OTHER. THE MAN STANDS UP AND KISSES THE WOMAN. IT IS BOTH ANNOYING AND SWEET. IT IS ANNOYINGLY SWEET. THE WOMAN IS HAPPY.

Now I can see that I was working through my own resistance (i.e., shit). But it's still scary, cuz what if it goes away?!

Just for today, I am grateful for my soul mate.

My boyfriend is so nice. Sometimes I'm a little distrusting of his niceness because I've been wired to sniff out motives like a hound. And "nice for the sake of niceness" is a motive far under my radar. My therapist told me today that I think everyone is full of shit and I said, "you're right" (and she would know because I've put her through the ringer...).

But I'm starting to think that maybe my boyfriend isn't full of shit. Maybe...perhaps...driving six hours on Thanksgiving day to experience car loads of relatives [some of whom were highly intoxicated (mom?)] is a long way to go just to get laid [which we couldn't even do because someone (mom?) asked us to sleep in separate beds].

So, what is the motive? I think my boyfriend is just nice because he...loves me?

Just for today, I can accept my boyfriend's love.

4 avocados (amazingly enough)
3 limes
1/2 onion (finely chopped)
2 cloves garlic (finely chopped)
two tomatoes (finely chopped)
salt
pepper
lotta love (that's the kicker)

So much as I claim to be a victim, I know that I am comfortable in the part. The point is, I don't want to break up with my boyfriend, I don't want to play the victim anymore, and I don't want to fail at love anymore. I'm ready to graduate to what used to seem boring, but now seems very freeing. I'm ready to give of myself as selflessly as I can, instead of seeing how much I can get. I'm ready to appreciate, without worrying about whether I am appreciated. I think Carrie said it best in the final episode of Sex and the City (love that show!)

"...I am someone who is looking for love, real love, ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can't live without each other...love."

Just for today, I am willing to give ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can't live without each other love.

I saw this acting guru speak last week who coaches Leonardo DiCaprio and Hilary Swank. I furiously took notes on everything he said as if her were the second coming (close enough). I especially liked how he said actors should all be in therapy. That made me feel hopeful because God knows, I've been doing that! He also spoke about "doing your art" irregardless (not a word) of your life circumstances or whatever pain you're in. He said that Lena Horne got up and sang the year that she lost her father, son, and husband. If she could do it, then so could anyone. Thanks, for the comparison.

I've been so heartbroken the last few days that the idea of pursuing my "art" seems ludicrous. I'm too busy running like mad from the pain of the food processor my heart just went through (if you don't like metaphor, perhaps a meat grinder? boat propeller?...it's not going to sound attractive, cuz it's not). Compared to Lena I'm feeling self-indulgent But was she really a "great" performing artist, or was she just running from the pain by doing the thing that always brought her joy and love. Or maybe I like to sit and wallow and think of every excuse I can to not be a grown-up.

Just for today, I aspire to be like Lena.

There are many cults in Los Angeles. Churches, groups, meetings, expensive self-improvement classes, acting classes, 12-step meetings, and places to shop. You may think you're buying a cup of coffee or engaging in the latest styles, but you're really on the outer fringes of the Michael Star cult, or the Peete's coffee cult, or the Vegetarian cult. Sure, Govindas likes to sing and spew out new age maxims about acceptance and what not, and sure the plethora of cute yoga outfits is a little overwhelming for someone whose been using a jog bra for far too long...but yoga is my cult!

At some point while sweating out the chosen pain of a torturous "fiery" one legged split (over the far more painful agony of breaking up with my boyfriend), I realized that nothing I could say or do would bring my boyfriend and I back together. It's not that I didn't cook him dinner enough, or that I typed while we talked on the phone. Neither was it the fact that he feels he must share every passing thought (good or really bad) with me.

And with that acceptance....we got back together! It's like someone picked up my heart from the trashcan and put it back inside my body. I'm not saying that all is smooth sailing, but in his words, it felt like an act of will to be apart. And, it's far easier to put up with him than without him. Amen.

Just for today, I adore, love, and appreciate my boyfriend.

Spending another fabulous night babysitting boys who give me more love than any man I've ever "known." Sigh. If only I could be seven or ten again. Those were really the golden years of pure, unadulterated love between me and the opposite sex. Little did I know that those moments of sexless intimacy would remain the shining examples of genuine affection that my bitter heart could conjure up at the old age of 33. Like when I was in the first grade and was playing tag with a bunch of kids and Andrew pulled me aside and asked me to make a pact swearing that WE (my first true introduction to the word that would get me in so much trouble later on) wouldn't play if Alicia joined the game (maybe it wasn't Alicia, maybe it was Carlos...I can't remember, but it was someone who annoyed US). It wasn't that I gave a rat's ass if Alicia or Carlos played tag with us, but I was the ONLY ONE to whom Andrew had made such a request. What romance! What passion! Truer words of love were never heard by mine ear (did I mention I was taking a Shakespeare acting class?...) Now, I have Relationships...Relationships that end in bitterness and dismay and dredge up every rank childhood pain. I know it's all a part of growing up and blah, blah, blah, but pleeze, let's be honest. it's rare that it's not all a bad imitation of the blissful sweet moments of youth.

Just for today, I can recall the sweet puppy love of my youth.

My sister gave me "The Muppet Show" Season 1 DVD for Christmas (thank you!) and after watching it for a few dozen hours I have come to the awareness that I have a crush on Fozzie Bear. I didn't realize the extent of it until I saw Frank Oz interviewed and I thought, "He sounds just like Fozzie Bear...what a hottie!"

Just for today, I can experience Muppet love.

"Someday, Chica, you're going to be 52 and single...," said Jewish American Salsera to me last night. She's been regaling me for the last few years for not trying harder to find a husband. Actually, come to think of it, I don't try at all.

"I wasted my thirties on guys like X Salsero...and look where it got me. You get de-sensitized and then you don't know how to find a real man."

I've also got Grandpa Salsero on my case. Every time he runs into me he gives me a lecture on finding a man "who has love."

I appreciate the concern. But, am I reaching some threshold point of no return? Is it now or never? I don't really see how 37 is easier than the fifties. At least in their fifties, there are more divorced people walking around.

Just for today, I can heed warnings from Middle Aged Singles.