Chump...

This word has recently become part of my almost daily life. A word that until the present time never really passed my lips. However, after getting up close and personal, I have decided it is a highly underused word. Much like the beloved F bomb, it can be used in so many ways. For example

S: "Guys are such chumps man."

Me: "What do you mean?"

S: "They always wait til after a girl walks past them to say something."

or

Me: "Why won't you tell me?"

S: "Cause I am being a chump"

or

Me: "Maybe she just hasn't reached her breaking point yet."

S: "Whatever she needs to stop being a chump."


I mean the list goes on and on and on. In the last 7 months I've learned that chump can take the place of almost any other insult or name calling you can think of. It wasn't the first word that ever came to my mind, but lately it has become one of my faves.

Tina Feyminism...

One of the joys of moving back to Minneapolis is the lovely company of my favorite ladies. I was lucky enough to entertain them in my humble abode last night for my initiation into their already established book club. There was wine. There were chocolates. There were snacks procured at the last minute. And there was Tina Fey's Bossypants.

Now for those of you who have read it. Congratulations! Nice work. For those of you who haven't you really should. It is an easy, entertaining read, full of half baked themes like motherhood, professional sexism and self deprecation.

To be honest, the book clubs I've participated in up to this point in my life usually included a bottle of Jager. Yeah, we were REALLY interested in talking about the book back then. But now the women that were in my home are no longer just college friends or bar working buddies. These women now run the gamut when it comes to profession from the first ever critical care/neuro NP in the state of Minnesota to multiple entrepreneurs. From corporate desks to teacher's desks. The commentary that was spurred from what was reviewed as a book that included some...

"hugely funny bits, and some inspiring bits, and some nerdishly interesting bits, and some bits that read like essays in the New Yorker (which in fact two of the chapters were). "

Led to the type of conversations I crave with intelligent women whose opinions I trust. Communication enriched by our diversity in specialization, experience and personality.

We talked about men in the work place and how top heavy, pun intended the lower class of business still is. There are so many over the shoulder boulder holders in the lower half of the corporate ladder that I am surprised it hasn't toppled forward due to the extra frontal weight.

We talked about being a working mother. Well we postulated about it except for one. Wondered if the aforementioned situation was intrinsically linked to maternity...which it obviously is. Nobody is talking or writing about the Fatherhood Penalty. But we talked about it less from a fair vs. unfair perspective and more about how our specific jobs treated the subject as well as how we felt motherhood would affect our futures. Of course the one mother in the room made sure to point out that Tina has it pretty good since she can bring her baby on set. Not the case for most. Oh and she has a constant "babysitter" so that helps. But to quote one of the women in attendance:

"Tina doesn't have a f*!%#$% babysitter, she has a nanny. Let's get serious"

Still I think we all felt a certain sense of pride that there is a woman out there who is not conventionally beautiful or funny for that matter, that made it. Like really made it.

One friend mentioned that she loved the part of the book where you could see a shift in late night comedy. There was an instance at SNL when Amy Poehler stood up and said she didn't give a F*&^!!!! what a male writer liked. There was a time when Tina said that a guy told her no one would ever want to watch a sketch with just two women. Then there was the Sarah Palin v. Hillary Clinton cold open during the presidential election and it made the news. Screw you guy who nobody knows!!!

I talked about how I thought it was kind of sad that women's comedy has to be more self deprecating to be funny, or so it would seem. Maybe it is because we don't like watching women be physically humorous, or listen to them talk about the funny things women have to go through like maxi pads. (read the book) I figured it was also about the fact that if women make the joke first someone else can't hurt us by making it for us or about us. That was more of a life comment than a book comment. Some girls heads went up and down. Others side to side. Alas a debate that will go on another time.

We talked about the Tridiots. Palin, Bachmann and O'Donnell.

We talked about the nuggets of wisdom Tina left like breadcrumbs for you throughout the book. They often lead you in a direction but never to a specific destination. I think she believes strongly in women thinking for ourselves. We talked about the anecdotes, peeing in bottles and the difficulty of teaching your daughter that Snow White is pretty even if she doesn't have yellow hair.

We debated about why women are such haters? We are HATERS, MAN!!!! We refuse to be happy for each other when we see another woman succeed, especially but not limited to direct competition. Actually that isn't completely accurate. To use the word refuse would mean we have some sort of conscious power over it. Nope it is like a primordial response that our body just involuntarily projects. It is a sad social commentary that women are still the ones that seem to be holding women down. Now don't get me wrong, we aren't the whole problem but until we can lift each other up instead of tearing each other apart there may never be a Tina Fey for every generation. I think everyone at my house would at least agree that young women should have a Tina Fey type.

Over all it was a great evening. It made me proud to be friends with the women I'm friends with.

At the end of the night I sent most home, well one in particular, with Chips Ahoy! Starbursts and Skittles. I'll never get long Swedish legs or the abs of a lesbian gym owner if I have that stuff in my house. The door closed and it was just me and my cat. A little bit fuller and wearier and happier and a lot more aware of what she tells young women who ask her for career advice:

People are going to try to trick you. To make you feel that you are in competition with one another. “You’re up for a promotion. If they go with a woman, it’ll be between you and Barbara.” Don’t be fooled. You’re not in competition with other women. You’re in competition with everyone. Also, I encourage them to always wear a bra. Even if you don’t think you need it, just… you know what? You’re never going to regret it.

Thanks Tina Fey.

And thank you God for the double D's. Wearing a bra has never been an issue.

Coming home...again...

At a certain moment in one's personal history, home as a concept is a paradox. That moment for me is now.

It is odd to be welcomed back "home" to a place that has never been my home. Not in the way most dream, smell, reminisce about whatever place that bore them. The land whose ground supports the foundation of their parents house. A town or city that echoes with the sounds of the childhood they had no choice but to leave behind. A home is usually filled with lifes' firsts or a place to return to for holidays and anniversaries. A one of a kind locale at the center of connective tissue that stretches to sounds, scents and stories.

The more liberal of the twin cities was never that kind of home for me. It was a place to grow up in a completely different way. To discover myself and create a life around that Lauren. That is why I will always have a soft spot in my heart for this place and more than anything the people.

Upon my return to Minneapolis, the place that both cultivated and corrupted me, I was welcomed with open arms. The word "home" embraced me with the outstretched appendages of a long lost love. It trickled off the tongues of friends and my second family. Always prefaced by "welcome" and "it is so good to have you back". Practical strangers seemed genuinely happy to see me. To be welcomed was expected. It was the welcomed "home" that threw me. It slid from people's mouths so easily that it was hard not to believe. In fact, I was almost convinced. Yet, somewhere in the ethereal place where personal memories and instinctive pride come together to create the connection you have to "home", I was awakened. There was a knee jerk reaction and that knee went straight to my gut. This was unexpected. I've never felt all that close to the small town in which I grew up, but something like betrayal filled my insides. Like somehow I had replaced my actual place of birth with something all together different. It was odd. It was like a different side of me was trying to make itself known. Some deep seeded attachment to a place I left easily and have yet to return permanently flashed before my eyes and then was gone.

Once I came back to reality I had to admit I made a home in Minneapolis during college and grad school but it was fabricated. It wasn't authentic and I mean that in the most positive way. I created it out of a need to feel completely myself in a place with people that accepted that person. Here I found people that made that transition seamless for me. The majority of my adult life was spent on the corners of 1st avenue between 4th and 6th street so it's definitely familiar.

But is it home?

Have I've always felt closer or more connected to a place where no family resides, no former playground stands, no historical deep rooted emotional connection exists? And if I do, does that make me messed up? Is that disrespecting my elders or upbringing? Is it turning my back on my roots?

I am glad to be back walking the streets that gave me a chance to get to know me better. The dark corners and bright lights that gave me the confidence to leave the place I call home as well as this place. When I left for Chicago four years ago I didn't know that I'd return. It wasn't clandestine. At least, not in my brain. But alas, I am back. Surrounded by 10,000 lakes and hundreds of thousands of memories. Talking to voices that my ears haven't heard in the flesh for years. Turning corners that almost seem familial but no longer resemble the picture in my mind's eye. Filling my days with doing things in Minneapolis for the first time again.

Home is a paradox when you return to a place that was never really your home.

Especially when you realize through its archetypes and architecture the world moved on without you but is still happy to have you back.

The gates are golden...

Dark.

Dimly lit but still, somehow vibrant.

A fire breathing head, that smolders and cracks while it winds from sea level to such great heights. The air is always on aflame.

A cloud appears on the sidewalk like an apparition. A smell you cannot misconstrue. Yeast pumps into the street where transients and tourists salivate for completely different reasons.

The pungent scent of a salt that can only accommodate an alien food chain that is both on the higher and lower end of our own.
The unreality of its reality transformed a movie set into a landscape to live and love right before my eyes.

"Take my picture", floated on the night mingled and muddled with the scent of medicinal THC.

"Where'd you get that booty?", broke the night abruptly like the disappearance of the beam from a lighthouse stretching across a nothingness that fades into a deeper nothing.

Blues spread over the deep blue.

Cash exchanged for contraband that sustains sister cities across the ever-rotating globe.

High heels walk the crowded streets of history.

You can smell the ashes of Ashbury. You can feel melting in the pot. You can see the hum of a place that runs on the real ideal that anything goes.

If it happens here it most definitely doesn't have to stay.

Costumes moonlight as casual and couture. It is difficult to miss the fanfare.

Gold lame jackets of lizard lounges beckoning for the good old days. Vampire teeth suckling on a cigarette. Beehives and bow ties on boys. On girls.

Boys. Girls. Some both. Some neither.

There is no rhythm here because it is too melodic to just be a bass line but there is sound and a strong beat. Noise with intention, vibrating with purpose.

A multiple personality disorder displays itself like the proud tail of a male peacock. Each one layered in a beautiful arrangement. Still schizophrenic but well meaning and full of heart.

It's not hard to see its appeal. Both sex and judicial.

There is something addicting to the feeling of already fitting in. Just another patch on an infinite patchwork quilt. Between the hours of late night and early morning my sister and I became citizens of a city that showed us it's wonders, it's unsavory and it's unkept secrets.

I felt like I fell in love in the dark.

Perhaps that is the best way to fall.

The Flatlands...

As someone who comes from the Midwest, land of rolling hills, tall corn and flat lands, a place with that name doesn't exactly belong among the sparkling antennas and dark, black iron of the Hancock and Sears towers.

A name like 'The Flatlands' doesn't seem to fit a city like Chicago, at least not instinctually . Yet here it sits on the South side of the city surrounded by everything that isn't flat. Not even close. Well, that's not entirely true. Once the doors open and one is inside these walls everything is flat but only for a while and only to serve at the pleasure of the artist that stands before it with bottle, blade or brush in hand.

It is run on an energy of people. A humming that comes from inside the brain, the soul and the heart. This place has a lifeblood and it's made of ink mixed with sweat that pumps out colors Crayola doesn't tell us about as kids. These colors emanate from a variety of cones. Pressurized and pointed because you never know what will come next. They spread from bristles and fingertips. It is a living, breathing creature that allows visitors but never truly lets them in. One doesn't need a passport to come here, but one may feel jet-lagged upon the return to Earth.

This place is poetry in words expressed visually. It is camaraderie in solitude. It is home to some. A rest stop for others. A place that one may not love at first but will always want to leave last.

Ruled by creativity. Run on 808's. Rotated on an axis of late nights and the lyrics that the people of this world spit. An individual sound. A communal silence. A place ruled by a common passion. The result a common good. Uneven, rough, and jagged as the streets of the city on which it stands.

A land unto itself. Full of cramped, cluttered nooks and crannies packed with everything and nothing all at the same time. Masterpieces and just pieces. One man's trash. Another mans treasure. In this place something could be both to the same person depending on the time, place and mood.

Here colors have their own scent, a scent one is powerless not to take on. Lining its bowels are materials waiting to be molded. Or resting in a flash of new found inspiration, molded but forgotten. Layers upon layers of project upon project try desperately to blend into the floor or the walls. Failing miserably to do so, of course.

Scraps lie in piles on tables and against pipes wishing for the proverbial dog to gobble them up or bury them. In every corner one can find mismatched liquid rainbows. The harshness of metal penetrating, banging or protruding. Panels dripping wet with what is here today and possibly gone tomorrow.

There is plastic and piping. Trees get blown. Bottles get emptied. Conversation flows both with words and without. Art becomes greater than artwork.

It is an amalgamation of paint. Wood. Paper. It is a concoction of film. Cotton. Fumes. A never-ending bass line that makes dreads, braids and baseball caps bob up and down. It don't matter if you’re black or white here. For real. This place, this world opens itself up to you as long as you have access to someone who has the key.

Welcome to The Flatlands.

A landscape that makes the name so much more than ironic.

She's got legs...

and doesn't know how to use them?

Legs are so strange. They are the foundation of your body there to serve a functional purpose for most. You know, a way to get from here to there. They can be strong. They can be stubby. They can be gorgeous. They can be long. They can be overlooked. They can be the center attention and names like Betty Grable, Marilyn Monroe and Rita Hayworth have made legs so much more than the most archaic way to travel.

While I must say I love those women for reasons other than their legs, like their voluptuousness, moxie, gumption and pin up... it's their legs that have me writing today. I for one can appreciate someone who has really great legs. The kind of legs that turn heads. The kind of legs that have covetous knees. Yes, I said covetous and knees in the same sentence. The kind of legs that have a definition in the calves. A contour from top to bottom. A shape at the ankle. Different lines running parallel and perpendicular towards the ground. Graceful. Curvaceous. Silhouetted. The kind of legs that made the aforementioned women famous.

Well guess what? Those are not the kind of legs I have. So, while I appreciate the women who were known for their stems I also secretly hate them. Not only have knee surgeries and bike accidents scarred my, what I lovingly refer to as ‘trunks’, genetics haven’t helped me out one bit. My mother would attest to this, so I will publicly thank her and the women that have come before her for my walking sticks. The gene pool has left me with thick thighs, knock knees, high arches, and undefined calves… I mean the list goes on and on. I have all the trappings of killer legs, but in my case it’s killer of a serial kind.

I will always watch classic Hollywood films and stare in wonder at the way Marilyn and Jane Russell sauntered across the screen. Or the way Vera Ellen and Ginger Rogers floated seemingly inches off the floor. Their legs were a tribute to these women. I would argue their legs were a tribute to legs themselves. Little girls and grown women have stared longingly at the pinup of Betty Grable and sighed accordingly. Men have as well. Double takes and catcalls. Green eyes and pouting faces. Great legs have the kind of power to cause involuntary reactions. And when it comes to reactions, and legs for that matter, I will always be a bridesmaid, never a bride.

Puzzles...

You know that feeling when you're doing a puzzle and you search and search because some of the pieces are almost perfect but then bend and warp slightly. Just enough to realize that it isn't the right piece.

Then you know the feeling you get when you actually find the piece that fits perfectly. That sense of excitement, accomplishment and also calm that follows. Calm because it fits. There is no fighting. There is no pushing. There is no trying to squeeze something in where it doesn't belong. It is easy. It puts you at ease.

That is how relationships should be. As a person who has always said "the people who walk around thinking relationships are easy should be shot", I guess I sort of agree with them. I mean don't get me wrong they are work. Work to make them successful, to be always present in them and sustain them. However, as far as a partner goes or the piece you find it doesn't have to be. In fact, it shouldn't be that hard.

The things that have warped you in the past are actually things that endear them to you. The things that have bent and buckled before are appreciated, wanted even. The pushing and squeezing is replaced by pulling in and letting go.

The cynic in me says "nothing is perfect", but the hopeless romantic in me says "a perfect fit does exist".

Relationships are just like a puzzle, there are plenty of pieces that almost fit...but there is only one that fits perfectly.

edited by kristin haley