Cross-country week

This was probably the most exciting work-related week I’ve ever had at Nearing. On Monday afternoon, I left my office in Princeton and got on a plane to San Diego, a non-stop six-hour flight.

There was an Indian family sitting all around me, a mom and dad, brother and sister. They were sitting in the middle seats of four different rows, and the 6-year-old girl sat next to me. She didn’t understand why she couldn’t sit next to her mom and was complaining loudly when she first sat down. So I started talking to her and established a little bit of a rapport while her mom asked the other passengers around her if they wouldn’t mind switching with her. By the time she found a taker and asked her if she wanted to move, she said no, she was okay sitting between me and another woman.

So for nearly the entire trip I chatted gaily with the girl while she watched Disney Channel shows, occasionally offering me one of her earbuds to listen along with her. We shared snacks with each other (I had brought some pizza-flavored Combos and a tangerine on board). It was a lot of fun and her parents were so appreciative.

It’s not the first time I’ve made such a connection on a plane. I remember back in 2005 on my way back from Los Angeles I sat next to a teenager and her aunt and had a very nice talk on the short flight from Phoenix to Houston. And talking to this young girl reminded me of the times I shared with Pearl when she was that age, so it was very nostalgic for me.

I landed in San Diego and drove up to the Marriott Del Mar, a very nice hotel halfway up to Carlsbad, where our offices and power plant are located. I ordered a yummy late supper of fried duck tacos and fancy macaroni and cheese and went to bed.

In the morning I took a tour of the power plant and then watched the Coast Guard drill of setting up buoys and pretend to clean up an imaginary oil spill in the lagoon that supplies water to cool the plant.



I also toured the aquafarms that grow oysters, mussels and abalone for local restaurants. It takes five years to grow an abalone to market size, so it’s quite an investment. Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t get Kelly, my tour guide, to give me a sample.




After the drill was over and the TV cameras had packed up and left, I drove over to the headquarters and visited some of my colleagues in the West region and the Solar team. It was still early, so I went to a nearby outlet mall and bought a scarf and two pairs of jeans from Lucky (finally, long enough for me and without rips in them so I can wear them to work).

Then I went into the Addidas shop and found one pair of baseball cleats in my size for only $10. Thursday I was going to play in a softball tournament in Maryland, so I took that as a good sign and bought them. I also found some yoga pants at the Gap for $6. Heavily laden, I drove to the West Grill for a dinner of a trio of fish tartare dishes and a New York strip steak with mushrooms and gnocchi on the side.

I went to bed at midnight and woke up at 3 am to catch the first flight out from San Diego to Chicago, then on to Baltimore. I got off the plane and took a shuttle bus to a lovely Hyatt resort for a company dinner of the best crab cakes I’ve ever had (with a Cajun and a caper remoulade), followed by a funny and pretty amazing magician act.

Thursday morning we went out to the ball field for the softball tournament. Each region of Nearing fields a team, so I was on the Princeton team. Although I normally play second base, our coach needed a pitcher because our regular pitcher had a family emergency and couldn’t make it to Maryland for the tournament. I’ve never pitched softball before, so I was very nervous about being put in such an important position.

The first time I took the mound for practice, I couldn’t even get the ball to the plate underhand. I took a lot of time figuring out my grip and a pitching windup (based on my bowling motion) where I could get the ball over the plate with some arc. Our first game was against the Texas team, usually one of the powerhouse teams, since they are the largest single office in the entire Company, they have a large pool of talent to draw from. But somehow I managed to hold them to just a single run, plus I went 2-for-2 at the plate, and we won the game 6-1. That was a nice bit of payback because Texas knocked Princeton out last year (although I wasn’t playing on last year’s team). They did have one scary moment when a Texas batter hit a sharp grounder right back up through the mound that just missed me:



I repeated the pitching performance against the next team, which we also beat 6-1, setting up a showdown with the defending champions, the South Central team for the title. We took an early lead and managed to hang on for a hard-fought 5-3 win, bringing the trophy home to Princeton.

Then it was on to the party tent and tasting all the wonderful food that the various teams from different regions had prepared, from braised ribs over polenta (from the Princeton team again, which won first place for that dish) to crawfish etouffee, fajitas and some outstanding shrimp ceviche. The Texas team won the overall best menu prize for the cooking contest.




There was a live band and a wonderful grapefruit drink made from freshly squeezed grapefruit, ruby red Absolut vodka, triple-sec and a splash of Sprite over ice. Plus there were games for kids and adults too:



I was so tired and worn out from being outside and traveling and playing softball that I went back to the hotel as soon as I could and crashed. This morning I got a ride from some co-workers back to Princeton and we talked about relationships and polyamory, since they are both single and have complicated, non-traditional relationships. Tonight, I’m really looking forward to sleeping in my own bed, with the added bonus of having Puck sleeping next to me.

edit: Unfortunately Puck couldn't make it tonight, so more of the bed for me. Which is kinda good because my back hurts from playing softball :/

New chapter

On my private blog, I’ve flipped a new chapter in my ongoing story. I’m closing Chapter Four: Polyamorous Life in New York and starting Chapter Five: Kink Explorations. This milestone represents a change of focus in my life.

Of course, I am still poly, and I’m still a leader in the poly community. But in short, I feel I’ve learned everything I want to learn about polyamory and have incorporated that into my identity. Now I feel that it’s time for me to put that aspect of my life on the back burner and focus on something different.

I’ve been part of two alternative communities in my life, starting with the transgender community, both online and in the real world, when I was transitioning. I spent two years in that community in Houston and on the old Transgender Boards, where I was a sponsor and an leadership member before they migrated to a different server and I lost contact. But it was through those Boards that I met Tara, and guided me to my new life in the Northeast.

In January 2008, I joined the poly community by attending meetings at Polyamorous NYC, and in October of that year, I met Puck at the Poly Pride rally in Central Park, where we were both volunteers for the event. The idea for Open Love NY was hatched at Poly Living 2009, where I was a volunteer on the tech team. That year I also started going to the monthly Poly Cocktails events and went to 13 of them in a row. I took a lead role as a liaison between PolyNYC and OLNY to create the new organization, and then organized the first public event in November celebrating Puck’s 19th birthday. In March 2010, we started our regular monthly meetings, and I was appointed OLNY’s first president in July.

It has mostly been Puck who has introduced me to the kink community, starting with rope play with Ryan back in August 2009 ("Polys in the wild" - August 11, 2009). But I also attended Manhattan LoveFest IV in July of that year on my own ("Manhattan LoveFest IV" - July 31, 2009), and Alphabet Soup back in April 2009 where I saw fire play for the first time ("Fire play" - April 24, 2009). Bonnie also had a small amount of influence in 2010.

So I can say I’ve dabbled up until now, but I want to start exploring it with intention. I don’t know where it will lead, but I also certainly never thought I’d be the president of NYC’s largest poly group only two and a half years after coming out poly. When I put my energy into getting involved with something (or someone), I usually get some kind of significant result. So we’ll see where this new direction leads and how far I want to go.

MMMM

Friday night I went to my first solo FetLife event, the Mid-Manhattan Midnight Munch (MMMM), one that I went to before back in early February with Puck and Emily, their friend from school. The difference was that this time, I actually knew people who were there before coming, and that's a big difference in comfort-level for me to attend something on my own.

Jet and James were already there when I arrived. I first met Jet at the February munch, and I saw them both last Saturday at an ice cream social Puck and I attended, where I met James for the first time. He and Puck have been close for a few months now - since he lives out on Long Island, he is able to visit SBU. I also met one of his others, Charity, last weekend as well. They had just come from her gang-bang party last Friday night.

So I sat with James and Jet (who are currently involved) until my food arrived and I went searching for hot sauce, as I often have to do when I dine. Upon having the bottle placed in my hand by the waiter, I was grabbed from behind by Piper and we greeted each other - we hadn't seen each other since late February's Oscar nominee roundup, although we've been communicating on FetLife.

I also spent some time that evening getting to know Bellatrix (whom I met back in February, but she didn't really remember me) and Rose, who was also at last Tuesday's Open Love NY membership meeting (she's others with Ben on the leadership team for OLNY). Piper and I had a nice talk about what's going on with me and Puck, and it was good to get her perspective on it.

Since I didn't get to sleep until about 5 am, Saturday I woke up around noon and didn't really get much going on the things I wanted to do. Puck signed on and we finally had our big relationship check-in where I got to say a lot of the things that have been on my mind, and they clarified a little what's going on with them. It was long and difficult, and a couple times bordered on meltdowns, but we managed to end on a fairly neutral note. It was the hardest talk we've ever had and probably the hardest relationship talk since last year's breakup with Bonnie.

After that I went to the gym to burn off some of the stress, then got ready for Leon's birthday party at River NYC where the birthday boy was guest-bartending for the night. I sat with Poly Cocktails founder O Man and his date, Jen, and had Leon make me a Long Island iced tea, a blueberry cosmopolitan and a sidecar (Jen was kind enough to look up the recipe on her phone because Leon didn't know how to make it).

In about 90 minutes I was pretty drunk, probably more drunk that I've been since college. I talked to some people at the bar, but I really just wanted to be alone, so I stumbled my way home and went to sleep. Thankfully, I'm feeling okay this morning.

I don't like that I engage in self-destructive behavior when I'm feeling badly about relationships, but I just don't know what else to do. Puck needs me to be patient with them, so I'm going to try and just put this episode behind me and not think too much about a future that is becoming very cloudy all of a sudden.

Easter egg party

I actually had a nice day today, but a crap weekend with Puck. Really don't feel like going into all the negative details, that's more private journal stuff. I don't vent in my blog the way Bonnie does. But there were definitely times this weekend when I was very close to suggesting changes to our relationship. As it is, we're just going to try and do better, and maybe give each other some more space for a while.

Today I went to a Ukrainian Easter egg party hosted by Storm, one of my long-time friends I met years ago when I first started the Poly Women's Group. She commandeered her ex Jonathan's apartment on the Upper West Side for the party - his place is amazing! It's a huge (by NYC standards) apartment with a large living room that holds a piano, a dining room, kitchen, bedrooms, etc. In fact, one of his roommates literally lives in the kitchen pantry! He's gay, so the joke is that he comes out of the closet every morning.

The bookshelves are full of old books (the place belonged to his grandparents) and there are all kinds of decorative items everywhere, and original art on the walls. Everything is so old and antique, so different from my modern furnishings (since nearly everything I own except my stuffed animals is less than five years old).

To make the eggs we used the wax resist method, which is complex and time-consuming. We used tools made from copper on wooden sticks that were much like fountain pen nibs. We scraped beeswax into the reservoir and melted the wax with a candle so it would flow through a tiny hole in the reservoir and we could draw designs on the egg.

Then we dunk the egg in an intense dye, starting with lighter colors like yellow and orange. The areas covered with wax retain the base colors through repeated dyeing with darker and darker colors. Then we had to melt the wax off by holding the egg itself near the candle and carefully wiping the wax away. I worked on my egg for more than three hours, drawing a meticulous Faberge egg-inspired design, but it didn't quite turn out the way I'd planned. Still, it wasn't bad for a first try.



After my egg was done, I sat in the living room and listened to a group of musicians practice, a string quartet and a vocalist. They played some very avant garde music, like early Laurie Anderson but more classically inspired. It was quite interesting and entertaining.

Storm and I didn't get to talk much about personal stuff, but it was pleasant to see her again. And it's interesting hanging out in a room of people who work in theater and other creative fields, speak several languages and discuss philosophy, art and culture instead of current TV shows.

Musical memories

While I was in Texas, my office hired a new person in the pod so they moved me to the opposite corner of the building. There’s good points and bad points about this. I have to walk about 120 steps each way to get back to the pod, and I’m no longer by the café, so if I want a Diet Mountain Dew, I have to trek over there for that.

Being away from Lori and Meredith and sitting next to Erik means I miss some of what’s going on, but it’s also easier for me to focus on doing my own tasks. Since I don’t have to have my antennae up all the time, sometimes I put my iPod on to drown out the chatter so I can work.

Yesterday I was listening to Paramore’s first album, “All We Know Is Falling” and I was transported back to when I first discovered them on Stephenie Meyer’s blog when “Decode” was announced as the first single for the Twilight movie. You know how you get that visceral reaction when you hear music you haven’t heard for a long time, and it belongs of a time that is very different from your current reality?

I still remember that time period (“Twilight music” – Oct. 7, 2008) when I first bought that album. I was working in midtown Manhattan for Agent K. I actually had to leave my office for lunch, which I don’t do anymore. I just started seeing Puck, and it was the time period when I was starting to fall for them. It was also the start of my musical explorations independent from Tara. All in all, a period of great changes in my life.

I’ve been feeling surprisingly outgoing and energetic for the past 48 hours or so. Maybe it’s from all the activity that’s going on in the next few weeks. Softball practice tonight, Poly Women’s Group tomorrow night, then Puck and I hang out Saturday for ice cream in the afternoon, Leon's birthday party in the evening at River NYC and a FetLife rumble late (where we might also bump into Piper). Tuesday is Open Love NY where I’ll be leading a member discussion.

The entire week of May 9, I’ll be traveling for work – to Carlsbad, California for a couple days to help with a spill drill, then back and straight to Maryland for two nights at the companywide softball tournament, the first time I’ve been invited to play. So I hope this newfound energy and enthusiasm lasts.

Oh, so Seder dinner – it was fine. Susan and her son Joey from Puck’s shul came – I’d met them before. Different from last year when it was all family, but it’s always nice to be with Puck on special occasions. I love the way they tuck me into bed at night.

Passover preparations

So it was a fairly eventful and interesting weekend for me. Puck and I finalized plans for Tuesday night's seder with the family after some uncertainty earlier this week. Puck and I talked about it on Saturday night over the phone and Sunday when I went to their home for a visit. This episode rattles me because after the progress I feel we made last Thanksgiving and Christmas, it feels like a setback. It rattled them because rarely do the parents confront them so directly with their disapproval as they did on Thursday. But hopefully these episodes will diminish as Puck gains more independence in the coming years.

I’m still concerned that I will someday not be welcome at future holiday celebrations and put in a position where Puck has to choose between birth family and chosen family, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there. For now, it’s enough that we continue to communicate our feelings, intentions and desires to keep our relationship healthy and open.

As for the rest of the weekend – Friday night Angel invited me out to the Stonewall Inn in the West Village, the historic birthplace of the gay rights movement, for Friday night karaoke with a couple other friends. Angel and I did a duet of “Take Me For What I Am” from Rent, part of a suite of several Rent songs that night. It was a bit of a mismatch since she’s an amateur opera singer, but fun nevertheless.

Saturday, I ventured out to do some shopping with coupons I’d collected – makeup at Sephora, the new Fables book at Borders, and some bed pillows at Macy’s. Sunday I took the train down to my office in Princeton to pick up Yoshi and drove to Staten Island to visit Puck and the family, who were cleaning house for Passover. Puck helped me sign up for FetLife so I can connect with people and events in the kink space, like Piper, Ryan, Beth, Dark, Ardella and other people Puck and I both know. In the evening we did the formal search for chametz (leavened breadstuffs) using a candle and flashlights and Puck and I started the next chapter of The Chronicles of Narnia, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

Retreating

I find it quite telling that today, separately and unbeknownst to each other, Tara and I both got excited about the Enterprise space shuttle coming to the Intrepid Museum in Manhattan. Puck and I are already thinking about going to see it when it gets here. Maybe we'll bump into Tara and Bug there this summer...

I've been feeling the need to hide a bit from the world. I think the Houston trip took more out of me than I care to admit. Possibly there's other complications on my mind. But I'm definitely trying to pull back a bit and focus more on living with intention, rather than just accepting what comes.

For example, Poly Cocktails was Monday, and I really didn't feel like going. Yes, I had the weekend at home, and yes, Puck came to visit on Sunday and we had nice times together to make up a bit for missing each other Friday night. But if I didn't have to bring nametags and flyers for the event, I would have stayed home.

But since I had to follow through on my commitments as OLNY president, I decided it was going to be a hug-free visit. So instead of customary hugs, I just shook hands with everyone, which definitely threw some people off who are used to being greeted with hugs. But besides my own defensive feelings at the moment, it also served as a useful reminder about our verbal consent rules.

I discovered last time that it really irks me when I hug someone and they plant a kiss on me, usually on the cheek or neck. For me, that's overstepping boundaries when I'm hugging you. So no more casual hugging, which means I'm only going to hug people I have a genuine emotional connection to.

I don't have any more social obligations this week, and Passover is next week, so I'm looking forward to some family time, which has been absent since the holidays. We'll see how I feel after that.

Home

Ok, where to begin?

My trip to Houston was fine. None of the jitters from last time, and less of that feeling of time travel, like being in the TARDIS. I didn't really visit places that remind me specifically of my old life. What was nice was to have the freedom of driving around and I did a lot of shopping this time, as chronicled before.

The tough part was in Dallas, the day before the event. I was up until 3 am working on stuff, assembling press kits, getting the news release ready to go at 6:30 am.

Friday was the day of the event, but I had planned to attend Anna's birthday party with Puck and Ryan that night in Brooklyn, so I caught an early flight out of Dallas. Unfortunately, the plane was delayed getting into Dallas, so we took off about 45 minutes late to Milwaukee, and missed our transfer to Newark. So instead of getting to Newark at 4 pm, which would have given me time to go home and change before meeting Puck at Penn Station, I had to get on a later flight to La Guardia that didn't land until 6:30 pm. After a bus trip through Queens and Harlem and a subway ride I was finally home around 7:30 pm and too exhausted and frustrated to contemplate going all the way to Brooklyn via mass transit by myself.

So despite all my plans to do so and not staying to see the event to completion, I didn’t get to attend my reason for leaving early in the first place. It reminds me of Alan Moore’s landmark Batman story, “The Killing Joke,” except I didn’t turn into a homicidal maniac. It was enough of a reward just being home after 10 days in Texas, and having a full weekend to recover. If I’d stayed in Dallas for the event, I might not have made it home until Saturday.

Spending all this time in airports, I watched the entire Firefly series once again over the past week. That always makes me happy. But it also makes me think about wanting to be part of a more interconnected group, like the crew of the Serenity. I also realize that, to a large extent, my life is a lot less adventuresome than it was during transition. In a lot of ways that’s good, but I’m wary of being too comfortable, too settled. I left Houston partly because I didn’t want to live my whole life in one place. Maybe someday another opportunity to move will appear – I just hope it doesn’t involve a fire.

Photos

Here's some photos from recent events that I'm getting around to posting now. First there's me courtside at the Rockets game, taken by Mark, the Microsoft guy sitting behind me.



Before the game, I talked with former Rockets player Matt Bullard, now a TV color commentator. I told him I've been a fan since they went to the Finals in 1985, and he said I wasn't old enough to be a fan that long - isn't that sweet? Such a charmer, but he can still shoot the 3 ball (he is 6-foot-10, by the way).



Finally, here's a picture of me and Linda at the 59 Diner, taken by our charming waitress.

Vamp it up

Three of my favorite vampire franchises have new content this year, which I’m greatly looking forward to reading and watching. First up is the new Sookie Stackhouse novel, Dead Reckoning, by Charlaine Harris, which comes out May 3. I’m going to have to re-read the last couple books to remember what’s been happening in that world.

Surprisingly, I’m not a huge fan of the hit show True Blood. It seems to be headed downhill after only the second season, and Bonnie already told me the third season is crap (with Sookie getting some weird superpowers that she doesn’t have in the book). If I wanted to watch people get random superpowers, I’d have stuck with NBC’s Heroes – another great series that fell off quickly and died.

Then a major new Anita Blake novel by Laurell K. Hamilton, Hit List, publishes June 6. This follows the short novella Flirt released last year, but this one really looks like something you can sink your teeth into. I still don’t understand why no one has made a TV or movie adaptation of the Anita Blake world. I love the characters so much, flawed as they are. And reading the books helps me get into that BDSM headspace that I’d like to know better.

Finally, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 opens on November 18. I’m not sure if I want to re-read BD before that, or come into it relatively cold and take the movie on its own terms. Besides, the second installment in 2012 is the one I’m really looking forward to, when Bella’s a vampire and the showdown with the Volturi happens with all of the Cullen’s allies. Seeing that world open up beyond the borders of Forks (like when they went to Volterra) will be fun to watch. I don’t know if Puck is going to let me drag them to see it, but we’ll see.

Dinner with Ben

I sent Bonnie an email Saturday night, extending an olive branch and suggesting we might end our five-month silence. I don’t think she’s going to respond. But at least I can say to myself that I tried to be friends.

Last night I had dinner with Ben, my old boss and mentor. We ate barbecue at Goode Company and talked for three hours about all sorts of things – clients, work, money, travel, relationships, colleagues and current events. He and his partner of 20 years, Bob, are going through counseling together, and apparently are doing well after a rough patch earlier in the year. He’s coming up to New York over Labor Day and staying a few blocks from my apartment, so we’ll probably see each other in a few months.

Things here are not quite as busy as last November when we did this shindig in Houston, maybe because we’ve all been through it before and a lot of the groundwork is already done. So I’ve actually been able to do a lot of other work along with helping the electric vehicle team.

The last three nights I’ve been waking up between 3 and 4 am and having trouble getting back to sleep. I think it’s a combination of too much caffeine and sleeping in an unfamiliar bed with a loud air conditioner. At least it’s much better than the inflatable bed in the hotel I stayed in last November. I also had all kinds of weird dreams last night, but they’ve faded by now. They weren’t terribly interesting, just weird. I miss being home and I miss my bed.

I’m on the final section of Winter’s Tale, and it’s getting to that sweet spot in a good book where everything is starting to fall into place, all the storylines are converging, and you can’t wait to see what happens next, but you want the end to last as long as possible. So I’m digesting it carefully one page at a time, savoring every word. I’m excited to finally finish this book after having it for so many years.

Houston trip, week one

So it’s been quite the eventful trip so far, and it’s only half over. I spent Thursday night at Loehmann’s and bought a couple things, but the big event was Friday night and going to see the Rockets game from Nearing’s floor seats, which were on the third row back from courtside.

I got there an hour before tip-off and chatted with the guy behind me, who works for Microsoft. He pointed out a 6-foot-10 woman across the court from us, and remarked that he didn’t think she was born a woman because of her height. So of course I immediately let him know I wasn’t born female either, and he hardly batted an eyelash. I’m happy about being comfortable enough with myself that these conversations are routine for me now.

So, back to the game. I’ve been a Rockets fan since 1985 when they lost to the Boston Celtics in the NBA Finals (the first year of the fabled Twin Towers tandem led by Olajuwon and Sampson). In all that time, I’ve never had floor seats, and it was every bit as exciting as I could have hoped for. I caught a cap from a cheerleader and touched the ball when an errant pass went into the crowd. Kyle Lowry hit a step-back jumper to tie the game with less than 4 seconds to go, sending the game to overtime where the Rockets prevailed.

Saturday I went to Half-Price Books and bought some CDs before heading to the 59 Diner to meet my pal Linda, and we had an epic catch-up talk that lasted nearly five hours. It’s been at least 10 years since we’ve seen each other, and almost 20 years since our last one-on-one face time. She’s an avid reader of my blog, and we’ve been keeping a lively correspondence for about the past year.

Today I started the day with lunch at La Madeline, one of my favorite French bistros, followed by a visit to the original Half-Price Books in the Rice Village, where I bought six more CDs. Then I went to the Rothko Chapel for some quiet time in one of my sacred places of the world.

From there I went to a very noisy Memorial City Mall and did some shopping – I got some clothes at Macy’s (finally using the gift card Polina gave me for New Year’s) and a YSL brow pencil at Sephora. I also got a tasty Cinnabon roll for an afternoon snack.

During this trip I’ve had some good Cajun food at Boudreaux’s, Mexican food at Pappasito’s, Chinese food from Feng Ling, homemade ice cream from Marble Slab and donuts from Shipley’s. Surprisingly, Krispy Kreme seems to have left town, so I guess Shipley’s put them out of business. Monday night I’m planning to have dinner with Ben, my old mentor.

Next week is going to be busy as the event approaches, and I’ll be flying to Dallas early Thursday morning, staying one night and flying home Friday morning. It’s been a good trip so far, and it’s been fun driving my Kia Soul around and visiting various places. My suitcase is gonna be a lot heavier coming back, that’s for sure.

Happy Birthday Tara

Today is Tara’s birthday. I wish I could celebrate it with her, but the best I can do is honor and remember the times we had together.



The girl who sits across from me at work asked me today what part of Texas I hail from.

Houston, I said, and I’m going back there for a 10-day work assignment starting tomorrow.

No trace of an accent, she said.

That’s because I had to re-learn how to talk a few years ago, I said.

Then fortunately the group conversation steered elsewhere before I was asked to elaborate. Anyone who’s been to my office knows how open it is, and I don’t really like coming out to people en masse.

Days like today, I think about the process of how I reinvent myself every day, and how I have been doing it continuously for the past five years so that I don’t even realize I’m doing it anymore. I pick up new things from everything I come in contact with, analyze, filter and decide if it’s something I want to use. Almost every thought that runs through my head, I can trace back to an experience or person from the past five years. Most of it comes from Tara and her family, a lot comes from Puck, some from Bonnie and Hiba, and a little from other friends and co-workers. Very, very little remains from my old life and the people who were in it, except for what I choose to keep from my professional life.

I haven’t felt much like writing this past week because it’s been so crazy at work with all the nuclear kerfuffle, but there’s really not much to tell. Friday night I went to my friend Lyndell’s birthday party and listened to erotic poetry readings. I’ve been spending a lot of time with Puck on weekends, and they gave me a huge surprise when I returned home last Thursday night to find them at the apartment with dinner on the stove. My arcade joystick came in, plus my second PS3 controller, but I haven’t had much time to use them.

Yesterday Puck and I drove down to Hazlet, NJ in a red Mini Clubman Zipcar for Ryan and Beth’s engagement party. We came back and went to Gamestop to buy some PS3 games, then to the movies to see Suckerpunch, which was just okay.



I feel like there’s some tension in our relationship, but I can’t really say why. Things are fine on the surface, but we are a bit overdue for a serious check-in. Maybe when I get back from Houston in a couple weeks.

I’m rather looking forward to my Houston trip tomorrow. It will be nice to have a change of scenery at work, and after my trip in November, I’ll feel less anxious about stepping back into that environment. I’m looking forward to all the great food I’m going to eat, going to the Rothko Chapel again, and best of all, a co-worker in Houston got me a floor ticket to see a Houston Rockets basketball game in the Toyota Center - I hope Tim Duncan doesn’t dive on top of me going for a loose ball!

I’m not planning to see anybody from my past except for Linda, my former TxDOT co-worker and current pen pal, who is more involved with me in the present than she ever was in my past, so I don’t really count her as someone from my past. Best to keep the past where it belongs. Not to say I don’t still miss Tara and Bonnie, especially on anniversaries like today, but I wish them both only the best for whatever life has to offer.

Perfect days

I was thinking today about perfect days in my life. You know, those days where plans go right, when amazing things happen, that you remember for a long time. Focusing on living in the moment to me means that when those wonderful moments occur, you can be fully present in them.

Sunday was close to perfect. I made fried egg sandwiches on jalapeno cheese bread with a side of tabouli for breakfast. I sat in the playpen and read a couple chapters of “Winter’s Tale.” I watched Sherlock Holmes and the making of the movie. I played some Street Fighter 4 on my new PS3. In the evening I took a short walk around Times Square, then went over to Magnolia Bakery at Rockefeller Center to get some banana pudding. Then I stopped at a food cart to get some lamb over rice and went home to eat dinner. It was one of the most peaceful days I’ve had in a while.

Truly perfect days are rare. The last one I recall was the last day of the staycation in August with Bonnie, when we went to the Met and won front-row tickets to see “Wicked”. The one before that was Poly Pride in October 2009, when Kerry joined Puck and me to celebrate our first anniversary ("Poly Pride 2009" - October 13, 2009)

The night I met Tara and her family for the first time, after IMing with her for over a year – despite all the logistics of missing my flight and being delayed by awful weather – it turned out to be absolutely perfect, like the ending of Sleepless in Seattle ("Third anniversary" - October 14, 2008). And Samhain 2008 with Tara was pretty awesome too ("Samhain at the Met" - October 31, 2008)

Back when I kept my old journal after college, I used to rate special days on a 10-point scale. I remember having a few close to perfect days with my friend Pearl, 8.9 or 9.0 on the scale. I always marvel at the perfect timing that she became such a big part of my life when I needed her most (after Agnieszka Prime left town), giving me the uncomplicated and pure friendship that only a child can give. Just hanging out with her, running errands, buying Shipley’s donuts – being together made everything fun, and without the heaviness that sometimes comes with adult relationships.

There have been a lot of days that are more significant, filled with adventure; or fun days when cool stuff happens. I don’t mean to discount the importance of days like getting a new job or doing good work, but what I have to do for a living doesn’t factor into my idea of a perfect day. For me, perfect days are a combination of excitement and peace, and strike a balance between what I think I want and what I really need. And they usually have to involve someone I love, platonically or otherwise.

Another quiet weekend

It's been another wonderfully quiet and peaceful weekend. I did a lot of reading, mostly Winter's Tale, and I'm about halfway through now. I'm also liking Avril Lavigne's new album, "Goodbye Lullaby." Even though her voice can be a little grating sometimes, she has some good songwriting chops.

Friday I went out to Best Buy and bought a Sony Playstation 3, something I've been meaning to do for a while so I can play my Blu-Ray movies, and they were offering a $50 gift card with purchase. I got Gran Turismo 5, a car racing simulator, and Street Fighter 4, the modern version of my favorite game, Street Fighter II Turbo on the Super Nintendo system, several generations ago in the days of 16-bit console games. So this weekend I've been trying out the PS3, getting to know how it works, playing the games and watching special features of my Blu-Ray discs (Eclipse, Coraline and Beauty and the Beast) that I haven't been able to access until now.

There's something going on in Times Square this weekend because I keep hearing 80s music like Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" out the window. Nivea has these huge stages set up, but when I went out to look this evening they were empty. Maybe people are getting worked up for St. Patrick's Day this coming week.

It's been a couple quiet weekends in a row, but that's good because the next two weeks are busy. Poly Cocktails tomorrow night, Poly Women's Group on Tuesday, and this coming weekend is Purim, so Puck and I will be getting into costume once more and going to an event with their family. Then the following Tuesday is Open Love NY, and that weekend is Ryan and Beth's engagement party, so they will be coming back for that too. Thankfully, after a weekend of home cooking, they are feeling better now, and it turned out not to be strep throat after all.

Lashes and cash

Just a few random thoughts today, ranging from the very significant to the completely trivial.

Starting with the significant – I got a nice review at work this week, which led to a pay raise and an annual bonus. The pay raise is just enough (after taxes) to cover my rent increase, so that’s a wash. The bonus, however, is sizable enough to buy a brand-new compact car (although taxes will take a big chunk of that), so that’s a welcome addition to my bank account. If Nearing continues to be successful and I continue to perform well, I should have enough to put a down payment on a permanent dwelling in a few years. Or maybe I can finally take that trip to Italy I’ve been thinking about. But for now, it gives me an extra cushion in case I find myself unemployed again.

In the past, when I got a raise, I’d take my family out to celebrate at Harold’s – that was our tradition. But somehow I just don’t feel much like celebrating, even though it’s a huge paycheck and I’m certainly happy and grateful. Maybe I’m just not living in the moment on this one, or maybe I just don’t want to get too excited and buy something stupid.

But the thing about me and money is that having a lot of it doesn't really make me want to buy things I didn't already want. I'd much rather spend it taking someone out to dinner or an event, be it a movie, concert or show. It almost always makes me happier to spend money with someone than on myself. But unfortunately, Puck is sick and they are probably not up for celebrating this weekend.

I went out to see “The Adjustment Bureau” with my friend Angel tonight. She came directly to the theater from dinner where she just broke up with her girlfriend of two months (they met on New Year's Eve). The movie was pretty good, but you have to be a hopeless romantic to really enjoy it. Unfortunately, not everyone in the theater was in that kind of space, so the spell that was being cast often got interrupted by sarcastic and cynical comments, snickering or outright groaning. But for someone who believes in love, there are powerful moments in this film, and it really does make you think about the nature of love and destiny.

The weight loss has been slowing lately, but that's to be expected. I've dropped 20 pounds and haven't gained any back yet. I'm eating a lot more fruit lately, taking apples and oranges from work home to have with dinner. I generally eat some blueberries or grapes with my lunch too, which is usually salad.

I'm also wearing mascara everyday now too. I used to hate wearing it, but now that I've kinda made it a habit and gotten used to it, it's doing wonders for my lashes. I always envied Tara's long, full lashes, and it's because she's been wearing mascara since she was a child, whereas I didn't touch any kind of makeup until only five years ago. I'm using Clinique's lash building primer and mascara, and I apply it on the train every morning on my way to work.

As you can see on my GoodReads window, I got some new graphic novels - the new Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter by Laurell K. Hamilton, Echo: Black Hole by Terry Moore, and the third volume of Madame Xanadu, a Vertigo title. I'm also still trying to finish Mark Helprin's Winter's Tale before the weather gets too warm.

Anyway, enough rambling. I'm so ready for a quiet, relaxing weekend.

Sex dream

Had an interesting sex dream last night, unusual since I only got about four hours of sleep. I was invited to a party by a female friend. We entered a large open space that was filled with people who were all laying on mats having sex with each other. It looked like a yoga studio of sex.

She was showing me an app on a smart phone related to this party where we could make a suggested donation for attending, so I contributed $20. We laid down on an empty mat and she got on top of me. And while the physical sensations were nice, I remember feeling ill at ease, like I couldn’t really let myself go. I don’t think it was because of anything to do with her (in real life I’m not really attracted to her); I think it was more that, after Bonnie, I’m feeling a little gun-shy when it comes to sex.

Totally random note – I saw this show called “The Best Thing I Ever Ate” and it had a recipe I wanted to try for beer nuts that are served at a bar near Union Square. You take a can of plain mixed nuts and put them on a cookie sheet in a 400 degree oven for about 5-10 minutes until they are really hot. Mix in a large bowl a stick of butter, brown sugar, sea salt, ground cayenne pepper and fresh sprigs of rosemary. Pour the hot nuts in and stir to melt the butter and mix the ingredients. Very simple recipe and it sounds delicious.

Life is pretty routine at the moment, but there are still simple pleasures to be had. Yesterday I left work early to attend the OLNY leadership meeting, so it was the first time in months that I’ve left work in full sunlight. I was standing out on the train platform, and it was a moderately windy day, and very dry. The smell of the air reminded me of fall outings with my family, hiking in the forests, visiting pumpkin patches. The sun warmed my skin while the air was cold and the wind was bracing.

It felt good to be alive.

Semantics

As readers know, lately Puck has changed their preferred pronoun to reflect their genderqueer status, and I’ve been slowly learning to use gender-neutral pronouns when referring to them.

So I asked them last night if they still wanted me to refer to them as my girlfriend. Interestingly, they didn’t really mind that because for some reason, they can hear me saying they are my girlfriend without thinking of themself as a girl. However, in order for me to reinforce the usage of gender-neutral pronouns, it’s helpful for me to use something other than “girlfriend” to describe them, because when I think of girlfriend I can’t help but assign gender to that role. It’s not unheard of to de-gender a previously gendered word (e.g. “guys” is now pretty gender-neutral when used in direct address) but “girl” is still pretty strongly gendered toward the feminine, at least in my mind.

So I’ve been thinking of what else we might call one another to describe our relationship to other people, especially those in the mundy (mundane, or non-queer) world, where girlfriend has a clear meaning depending on how you emphasize it, and can also provide ambiguity if needed (although we are both pretty out to everyone).

While “significant other” is also appropriate and accurate, it’s kind of unwieldy and technical. “Partner” seems to imply a more serious and interdependent relationship than we currently have, since most mundys think queer people use that to describe their marriage partner, whether legal or not.

Two years ago we were "affectionate friends" (which seems inadequate to describe us now), or in an amitié amoureuse (“in-love friendship”) which is probably still applicable, but too difficult for everyday use. "Lovers" implies a more serious and sexual pairing than we currently have. "Sweethearts" is probably the most useful and accurate word to describe us, although they probably prefer the short form, "sweeties." I like the more formal version, maybe because it sounds so charmingly old-fashioned.

Most of this is just mental masturbation because it's not like it matters to anyone really, other than helping me adjust to them being genderqueer. We both know what our relationship is and what it means to us - the rest is just semantics.

Oscar roundup

I had a really fun time this weekend at the movies with Piper, watching seven Best Picture nominees in a row – Toy Story 3, 127 Hours, The Kids Are Alright, True Grit, The Fighter, Winter’s Bone and Black Swan.

I met Piper at the theater at 10 am for Toy Story 3, which I thought was the best movie of the day in terms of emotional impact. Maybe it’s because I’m invested in the characters after two excellent prequels; maybe it’s because I’m such a fan of The Velveteen Rabbit, or How Toys Become Real as a subject matter. But I’m sure I’m not the only one who believes that movie would be a strong Best Picture Oscar contender in a weaker field, and if the Academy didn’t handicap animated and foreign-language films by putting them in their own subcategorical ghettos for awards. There really should be a “Best Drama” and “Best Comedy” to balance the playing field if they are going to keep those categories.

Anyway, we both thought 127 Hours was a really hard film to watch. I think Danny Boyle is a great director in the sense he has such a unique style and flair, but the subject was a killer. Not to mention that decapitation and other bodily mutilations appeared in four of the nominated movies (five, if you count Mr. and Mrs. Potatohead having their body parts pulled off by screaming daycare toddlers).

The Kids Are Alright had its funny moments, which was a welcome change after sitting through 127 Hours. It’s hard for me to watch movies like that because of all the issues I have with birth families, compulsory monogamy and what might have been if I’d been allowed to make different choices during my transition. But it was definitely the lightweight movie of the group – only the superb acting by the leads makes it BP worthy, and Julianne Moore was robbed of a nomination in a strong field this year.

True Grit was surprisingly good, although I’m a fan of westerns to begin with. I am not, however, a big fan of the Cohen Brothers, but they made this remake into a very accessible film, and Hailee Steinfeld was amazing! Fittingly this year, she’s the most inspired debut performance of a young actress I can remember since Natalie Portman’s debut in The Professional.

The Fighter also took me a little by surprise. Christian Bale was fantastic – I really didn’t recognize him; he lost himself so completely in the role. It was better than I expected, but didn’t quite reach my standards of BP winner. Million Dollar Baby reduced me to a blubbery puddle of goo, and this was no Million Dollar Baby.

After The Fighter, Piper left because she’d seen everything else except for The King’s Speech, which wasn’t until 7 am Sunday morning, so I watched the last two with Rebecca, who was sitting next to us throughout. Winter’s Bone was an interesting movie, but unfortunately it suffered from two things – my highest expectations and that I was distracted by the noisy couple next to me, talking and eating food from noisy plastic wrapping. It’s the kind of movie that I’d have to watch again to fully appreciate, and it’s too bad that this little indie film didn’t pull off any upsets Sunday.

Finally, Black Swan started at 11:45 pm, also a very hard movie to watch, as Darren Aronofsky’s work sometimes is. I don’t like scary movies much, so near the end I spent a lot of time with my eyes covered – I’m such a marshmallow. The ending was good though, and that’s important. As a mind-f**k, it doesn’t hold a candle to my all-time favorite, David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive.

The final three movies in the marathon were Inception, The Social Network and The King’s Speech, but since I’d seen the first and third, I didn’t feel like sitting through Inception just to see The Social Network. Perhaps in hindsight, knowing how many awards it would pick up, I should have. I’m glad that Inception got its due in the technical categories, although Chris Nolan should have gotten a directing nod over Tom Hooper (the eventual winner). Just my opinion, of course – I didn’t think The King’s Speech was that great.

In between True Grit and The Fighter, Piper and I went to Shake Shack to grab a bit to eat – it was my first time there. They only sell burgers and hot dogs as entrees, but the frozen custard was really good. The burger was like a fresh In ‘n’ Out Burger, but smaller, so a good choice if you’re not too hungry. And since they provided us with $20 gift cards for the concession stand, I also ate a fair amount of movie food, which was pretty gross but convenient.

One more busy week at work and then I should be winding down a bit. There’s also an OLNY leadership meeting on Wednesday to talk about how to clean up Poly Cocktails, so I’ll be going back to Diana’s place in Brooklyn for that. Plus, I'm looking forward to seeing Puck Tuesday night as they pass through New York back to school from visiting Ryan in New Jersey.

The rent is too damn high!

In the last few days, I’ve been watching a lot of movies because I’ve been watching them on my laptop on the train, and there’s a lot of good stuff on TCM and AMC leading up to the Oscars this Sunday. I saw a bit of Amadeus the other night, and also watched Copying Beethoven on DVD – arguably two of the greatest movies ever made about classical composers and the nature of the divine spark in humanity.

These kinds of movies always remind me of my time with Tara, because she is the only true artist I’ve ever known personally, in the sense that she did it professionally and never aspired to be anything but an artist. She would be the first to say she’s lucky she has people around who love her and take care of her needs, because otherwise she would starve. As I’ve said before, her family lived very much like the bohemians of Rent, living paycheck to paycheck, sometimes not knowing if they could pay the bills each month. While I admired and tried to emulate them and their way of life, I could never quite bring myself to fully commit to that.

Speaking of rent, can you believe it’s been almost a year since I moved into the city? My lease is coming up due at the end of March, and of course, they are jacking it up $100 per month. I tried to call and negotiate, but they shut me down. Guess I’ll have to curtail those spa visits to make up for it. But it does make me think that maybe in a few years, if the rent keeps going up, and once Polina is out of school and traveling the world, maybe I will buy some kind of property nearer to wherever I’m working at that time. It’s kind of outrageous to be throwing away money on rent and then have that uncertainty of it going up every year. I should start saving up for my down payment.

I’m so glad it’s Friday! It’s been a tough week at work after my busy weekend at Wicked Faire, and we had Open Love NY this week too. I’m looking forward to sitting in the theater all day tomorrow with Piper and whomever she's bringing. Then Sunday night, the Oscars, which I haven’t seen in a few years, but I used to be a huge fan and I’ll have seen almost all the Best Picture nominees this year. It’s nice to get back to things I used to enjoy doing but kind of got lost in the shuffle of transition.

I watched Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps last night, and there's a scene when Jake and Winnie break up. It made me think about Bonnie, and how there's a point for most people where they know unequivocably that a relationship is over, when love is over. I knew it the day I had that awful phone call with my ex-wife while she was in California, but that's the only time I've felt it. My other two breakups have gone not with bangs, but with whispers.

I really should be more protective of my heart, but what is it good for if not to be consumed, to be used as a vessel of joy, passion and happiness? My heart is an organ of fire, not of stone. I refuse to let fear rule my life. I think I've forgotten that and I need to remind myself from time to time.

Wicked Faire!

This weekend I had a great time at Wicked Faire in Somerset, NJ with Puck and a bunch of our mutual friends and acquaintances. We stayed in a hotel room with four other people including Puck's friend Eric, so it was a bit crowded, but we didn't spend much time there anyway.

The theme of the event was "Fairy Tales Gone Wrong," and I loved the massive balloon structure of Rapunzel's Tower, which stood about 20 feet high in the lobby:



I arrived on Friday night after work and ran into Ryan and Beth shortly after I arrived. Puck came in later with Eric, who picked them up from Penn Station. The first presentation I attended was one on BDSM toys (floggers, paddles, whips, etc.) given by Dark, another of Puck's acquaintances. I knew him because they told me about him, but he didn't know me yet. He was accompanied by several women who served as test subjects for the various implements of pain. I've heard Morpheus' BDSM 101 presentation, so it wasn't all new to me, but Dark really knows his stuff.

Puck and Eric arrived in the middle of the presentation so I went out to meet them and organize our room situation. We went around looking at the vendors for a while because Puck wanted to buy some steampunk goggles, a vest and a few other things. We ran into Leon and Ardella from Open Love NY, and Roy and Michelle, who run the NJ poly group. It was everybody's first time at Wicked Faire, which I found rather comforting.

Beth, Ryan, Puck and I joined a small group in the gaming room to play a tabletop RPG called Deadlands, something I haven't done since the 1980s, when Dungeons & Dragons was new. Ryan played a crazy Russian hunter, Puck played a South American gaucho (cowhand) and I was a spy pretending to be a teacher. I can't remember what Beth's character was, other than he was named Mr. Smith. In the game we encountered a giant bear-gorilla in the woods of Washington State during the Civil War era, and we managed to defeat it. Ryan's character was almost killed, but I saved him by drawing the creature's attention with a daring attack on horseback.

Beth and Ryan went home after that, and Puck and I went to Dark's suite for my first kink play party. Puck put a box tie harness on me with rope, their first ever solo bondage scene tying someone up. I flogged one of Dark's subs, an Egyptian woman named Yasmine, which was a first for me. It was a nice crowd of people, and having gotten to know them at bit during the day made it more comfortable for me in the evenings. And of course some of them Puck knew from going to other parties in the past.

Saturday we went out to a nearby diner for breakfast with Eric and his friend Magdalene, and then came back to dress in our full costumed regalia. Puck dressed as a forest spirit and I dressed into my Renaissance Faire outfit. I teased and sculpted Puck's hair with hairspray, and they used my makeup to dramatic effect.



Later Puck bought a green leather mask that completed the costume nicely.



I stayed in the lobby to watch Leon in a grappling match where he dominated two other martial artists in a 10 minute match. This included a vicious body slam on the first guy, who then had to be replaced by someone bigger, but who didn't fare much better. I'm thankful Leon would be on my side in a street fight!



We also saw in the lobby a whip demonstration that included a four-crack move by this whipmaster:



Later, we met up to listen to Dark's performance of bluegrass renditions of popular music by Lady Gaga, Sir Mix-A-Lot and songs from the Joss Whedon-verse (Firefly, Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-Long Blog).

One of Dark's entourage, Piper, served as the house girl for both late-night parties and was in sub-space all weekend. She was working at a toy booth Saturday afternoon and I was looking at a flogger while Puck and Ryan were having some alone time, so I got to test it out on her. It's a lovely toy, made from a carved wooden bedpost as the handle and long straps of red leather, so I bought it (my first one ever). Puck bought some sharp metal claws from the same booth, and got to try them on several different people.

Saturday night I went out to dinner at a sushi restaurant with Leon, Ardella and a couple new people, Alissa and David, while Puck went back to the diner with Ryan, Beth and other friends. Later, at Dark's party, Ryan and Beth brought out their extensive collection of toys and played with almost everyone in the room. Puck and I left for a while to try and see musician Voltaire perform on the main stage, but the prior band ran long so we just listened to them. They were really good though, very original stuff.



When we got back there was all sorts of kinky stuff going on, but I was feeling pretty tired, so I went to bed early. Ryan and Puck did a kinky scene together with rope later that night and he brought Piper into the scene since she was serving as the house girl. Puck told me about it the next day and it sounded pretty hot.

Sunday was a much more subdued day, as it usually is at the end of cons when everybody's leaving. We went to the diner again for breakfast, then came back to watch Ryan and his friend Murphy demonstrate rope bondage on Puck and a female wrestler named Ginger:



Murphy is quite the wizard with rope. He made this intricate rope swing, suspended from a custom frame he named "The Blue Raptor."



He was also playing some really cool mashup music by Robin Skouteris, who takes popular hits by Madonna, Britney Spears, Linkin Park, Nirvana, Michael Jackson and others and mashes them together to a dance beat. I really liked the one of "Circus" by Britney and "Numb Encore" by Linkin Park and Jay-Z. So he was nice enough to copy all those tracks to my flash drive for me.

As we were saying goodbye to Dark and his crew, it turned out that Piper needed a ride back to New York, so she rode with us as we went through Staten Island, stopping for tea with Puck's parents, then out to Stony Brook to drop Puck off at their dorm room, then back to Manhattan, where I dropped her off before coming home.

It was interesting getting to know her on a more personal level and it turns out we have some things in common - we are both journalism majors (she graduates from NYU this spring), and film buffs. So all in all, this weekend was certainly a big step in being fully acclimated to the kinky space and finding something fun and fulfilling in it for myself.

Valentine's Day

Puck surprised me on Sunday by stopping by in the afternoon and finding an excuse to stay the night and go back to Long Island in the morning, so my Valentine’s Day treat was getting an unexpected morning waking up with my love in bed (even if we had to wake up at 6:30 am). They was coming back from NJ and missed their connecting train to Stony Brook.

So instead of just a quick stopover before the next train, we decided to color their hair again – we had just been to Edison’s salon last weekend, but the color was a little bit light so they wanted to darken it to a richer red color. It was the first time I’d ever colored anyone’s hair – it’s actually kind of fun. It doesn’t smell as strongly as the chemicals I remember when I was a child, watching my mom color her hair. It turned out pretty well, although maybe not as red as we’d have liked.

One of the bestest things about living where I live is opportunities like this, the unplanned days of spending time together. I absolutely made the right decision to live in the city. I love the energy of walking through Times Square, especially when the air is clear and it’s not too crowded. If I lived in NJ, I might be closer to work and save money on commuting and taxes, but then I would spend most of my weekends feeling very isolated. And frankly, the majority of my time at home I do spend alone, but it doesn’t feel so alone knowing I could walk out my front door and into one of the great crossroads of the world. If I lived in NJ, I probably wouldn’t go to Poly Cocktails as often, I wouldn’t be able to host meetings for OLNY, and I certainly wouldn’t see Puck as much as I do, which is a joy.

I’m thinking about living locations today because my best friend Lori called me yesterday to catch up, and I found out she’s buying a co-op in Elmhurst, Queens, where Hiba and Bonnie live. Apparently she and Erik can’t stand living together, so they are going to live separately but still be a couple. Hopefully everything goes well for her and she will move in April. I’m excited for her, and it will be nice to have an excuse to go to Queens and try more of the wonderful and authentic Asian foods to be found there.

I don’t know that I’d ever buy a home again. I guess a lot depends on my working situation and other people who may come into my life. I’m happy where I live, even though it’s a long commute. Ultimately, I want to be where my friends and the people I love are, and days like Sunday make it all worthwhile.

A Brooklyn wedding

Just a quick update from work about the wedding this past Sunday. Polina invited me to her cousin Gene’s wedding at a synagogue in Brooklyn, possibly the first time I’ve ever been to a synagogue. There was a short ceremony in the afternoon, accompanied by a singer who also played guitar.



Afterward we went to a nearby restaurant where we hung out in a smaller room with hors d’oeuvres and drinks until it was time to go into the main room. The appetizers were so good (sushi, caviar crepes, brie on crackers, etc.) and we were so hungry by the time we arrived that I ate enough so that I wasn’t very hungry when we sat down at the table in the main room. Which is a shame because they had some delicious food waiting for us.



There was dancing pretty much from the get-go, led by a quartet of musicians and singers, one of whom doubled as the emcee. He was a wild looking guy with white spiky hair, and dressed in a white-tie tux and tails. One of the other singers was vaguely Asian and reminded Polina of actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt (from Inception).



Polina and her family sang a song in Russian for the bride, Yana, and the groom. They did this at her sister Ella’s wedding too. This is a family that loves to sing! For those of you who understand Russian, here’s the performance.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v488/Waterlily88/?action=view&current=MOV03308.mp4

Finally, it was time to cut the cake and then they opened up a whole another room filled with desserts, including a croquembouche of profiteroles (choux pastry filled with cream).



Then there was the traditional bouquet and garter toss, except they did it in reverse – Yana threw her bouquet to the guys, and Gene threw her garter to the girls. Which reminds me: there was another queer couple there, Anna and Nat (Natalie) – Anna is the tall person below in the splendid black velvet tuxedo, which I complimented them on. Unfortunately, they were sitting on the opposite side of the room, so we didn’t get to talk to them very much.



Our ears were definitely ringing and our feet were sore by the time we left, but we had a wonderful time, and I’m happy that we were able to go together. It was definitely a wedding to remember.

Tosca and Dogma

We had a fun time at the Metropolitan Opera last night watching Tosca, one of my favorite operas. The performances were marvelous and the sets were distinctive, if a little austere, a pretty radical departure from the heyday of Franco Zefferelli's extravagant productions (e.g., La Boheme). And Polina looked rather dashing in their new clothes - I commented that they looked like a younger and smaller version of the person I used to be, which is no surprise since I picked out the clothes.

We had box seats at the Dress Circle level, which is one level lower than when we saw Carmen, but the view was not quite as good because last time we were more in the corner of the hall with a more direct line of sight to the stage. Plus it was a little tighter in the box for tall people like me, although it's always nice to have space around you to put your purse and coat. Next time I'll know better which seats to get.

**SPOILER ALERT!** For those of you who have seen Tosca, there was a story my dad used to tell me about a diva who played Floria Tosca in a performance where at the end she was to jump down onto an offstage platform from the tower where she meets her death. The diva was a heavy woman, and when it came time to perform the dramatic leap, she simply turned around and refused to jump. Now that is playing a diva like a boss.


Anyway, after the opera when we were waiting for the subway there was a saxaphone player playing "E lucevan le stelle" ("And the stars shone") so we dropped a dollar in his case. When we got home it was about 11:30 pm, and Polina was showing me an article about athiests, which sparked a desire to watch Kevin Smith's riotous parody on religion Dogma. So that kept us up until about 2 am, but fortunately because of snow and ice, the office opened an hour later this morning so I could take a later train.

Ski, sauna, spa and shibari

Thursday night, and I'm finally winding down for all the activity from my week off work. Let's recap the highlights.

Sunday night Polina came over and we went across the street to Famous Dave's Barbecue for dinner. We had a good talk about the three topics that were bothering me, namely the proliferation of metamours, the encroachment of our week together from other things, and our second talk about money. It was a good discussion, and also a good affirmation of our relationship and where we stand in each other's lives.

Monday we headed down to Brooklyn so she could visit her dentist to fix a filling that had come loose. From there we went to her home in Staten Island so we could water the plants, do some cleaning, eat dinner and pick up more clothes for later in the week. We dressed up nicely for Poly Cocktails - her in a smart striped vest, necktie and pants, and me in a sparkly black top, leggings and a short grey wool skirt that didn't fit me three months ago until I'd lost weight.

At Poly Cocktails Polina went and had fun while I had meeting after meeting with my Open Love NY committee members, planning February's meeting, getting several fires put out and smoothing ruffled feathers that made one member on the verge of resigning. I did get to spend a little time talking one-on-one with Phrannie, Jill and especially Kerry, who rarely comes out to poly events these days, so it was wonderful to see her. We got home about 12:3o am, so we only got about four hours of sleep until the next morning, when we woke at 6:30 am to go skiing.

We picked up the Volvo ZipCar from the garage one block away, the silver chariot of justice as we call it (a Twilight reference) and drove out to Camelback Mountain in Pennsylvania. It's a relatively small mountain, so the trails are pretty easy. The highlight of the day was when Polina broke one of her skis, probably when she tackled some scoops alongside one of the trails and had a wipeout. Luckily, they didn't make us pay for it, and we just got a replacement. We left early because Polina had taken quite a beating on the slopes, so we stopped at an outlet mall to do a little improptu shopping and had dinner at LongHorn Steakhouse, one of our favorite restaurants, where we had a couple of exceptional steaks before driving back home.

We dropped our things and took the subway downtown to Wall Street Bath and Spa, a Russian bathhouse for my first such experience. We sat in the Russian Sauna, which was kept at 245 degrees, and watched guys get platza, a theraputic flogging with branches of oak leaves soaked in hot water. Unfortunately, the platza guy was all booked up, or else Polina would have gotten one.

We also sat in the Dutch-style sauna, which was a little cooler and had water available in buckets to splash or dunk on you to cool off. There was also a cold plunge pool, just large enough for one person about five feet deep and filled with ice-cold water. This is where you dunked yourself after you got really hot in one of the saunas, and it is a pretty shocking experience! I preferred the Turkish steam room, which is a wet steam heat. We also swam in the very ornate pool and took a dip in the jacuzzi to massage our ski-weary muscles. Afterward we ordered some chicken dumplings with sour cream and a pitcher of tea before showering and trudging home in the falling snow.

Wednesday we visited the American version of the spa by going to Spa Merge 10 blocks north of the apartment. We each got a three-and-a-half hour package that included a facial, a full body aromatherapy massage, and a manicure/pedicure. Other than a few minor service gaffes, the experience was lovely, and I especially enjoyed the facial by my esthetician Hiroko.

After the spa, we came home and were preparing to go to Dance Manhattan for Polina's Argentine tango class that she attends with one of her ex's, Louis, and afterwards to a TES event on basic Japanese rope bondage (shibari). We didn't have any rope, so it turned out that Dave was going to go to the same event and he was going to lend us some rope to play with. This set off another very difficult conversation about relationship boundaries and metamours, but we managed to resolve it and headed to the dance class. I just sat and watched, and it was the first time I'd ever been in a dance studio watching someone teach dance. It was fascinating to see the movement and instruction going on.

At the TES class, it turned out that the instructor brought plenty of jute, or Japanese hemp rope made from natural grass fiber, so it wasn't necessary to borrow Dave's rope, but he did sit behind us in the class. We learned the basics of rope bondage, like safety tips, types of rope, and basic ties like the Somerville Bowline, which Polina and I practiced on each other. We also did a Takate kote, or box tie on each other, which is where the arms are tied behind the back and double strands of rope run across the chest above and below the breasts. It was actually quite a lot of fun - somewhat like the art of origami that I enjoy.

Afterward we went to Dafni Greek Taverna, Polina's first visit to a Greek restaurant, for a late supper before going home and finishing up Season 2 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Today we really slept in until almost 1 pm, then got up for some breakfast I picked up from Financier Patisserie across the street. We started in on Season 3 of Buffy before she had to leave to meet Dave and take him home to Staten Island.

A few hours later I met up with Agnieszka, who came into the city to catch up with me. We entered the lottery for the Broadway rock opera American Idiot, and of course, I was the second name drawn. Agnieszka's name was drawn fifth, but we didn't need to use her entry since I'd already won. My record on drawings is now 6-for-8, and with tonight's win, there's no show I've entered that I haven't eventually won.

We had a quick dinner at a nearby Turkish restaurant and then took our front row center seats ($27 each) for the show. Billie Joe Armstrong, the lead singer of Green Day, was supposed to play St. Jimmy in this performance, but it was an understudy instead, so that was disappointing. The show was a fiery, kinetic extravaganza of punk rock indulgence, but ultimately there wasn't a very coherent storyline. I also caught a little bit of spit from one of the singers from being too close to the stage - it would have been nice to be in the second row for this one. Agnieszka, on the other hand, caught a guitar pick that was tossed down to her by one of the three leads in the finale.

So that's been my week so far. A lot of fun stuff, and a lot of firsts. Lots of time-spending with Polina and good relationship talks. Thankfully I have the next three days by myself to get caught up on Open Love NY stuff, laundry and cleaning up the apartment before work starts again on Monday.

Angel ornament for 2010

So, now that I'm feeling better, it's time to tie up one last loose end from 2010 before anything major happens in 2011; namely, the issue of the Christmas ornament.

As I've said before, I wanted this ornament to represent Bonnie, and my previous ideas have really not panned out the way she deserves. So I had in my refrigerator the bottle of champagne that she brought the first time she came to visit me at my apartment in New Jersey. I thought it very appropriate that a year and a day later, that champagne was finally consumed at Polina's New Year's Day party.

When I opened the bottle, I did so with extra care, thinking back on all the wonderful memories of early 2010 when I was falling for Bonnie, and somehow the bottle itself seemed to take on a great deal of meaning. After all, other than her extraordinary birthday gift, a hand-illustrated scrapbook of our time together, it's one of the very few tangible things I have that she's given me.

So it occurred to me that I should make the Christmas ornament out of the parts of the bottle itself, namely the cork, foil wrapper and wire basket. And since my tree is predominantly decorated with angels, why not make an angel? Most of my angels come from the Metropolitan Museum's collection, which I buy every year, but there's also the handmade paper angel made in Buenos Aires that Polina picked out in 2008 while we were shopping at the Holiday Market in Union Square. That was the year before she went to Argentina, of course.

To make my 2010 angel, first I fashioned the halo by cutting and twisting the wire that holds the cork on the bottle. Then I cut out the wings from the foil wrap around the bottleneck using the pinking shears I got for scrapbooking to simulate feathers. I used leftover strips of the foil to gild the halo to match the gold color of the wings. I also glued the wine label to the back of the wings, so I'll remember the vintage.

I borrowed the tiny Santa hat and a golden hanging thread from the penguin ornament I bought to complete the ornament, and assembled the whole thing with a single pushpin. Here's what it looks like:



What I like about this ornament is that it reflects the creativity and effort that she put into the scrapbook she gave me, still the most overwhelming birthday gift I've ever received, or am likely to receive.

And that's the great thing about the way I love someone - even if they are not around, I can still be inspired by my feelings for them. The holidays, gift-giving, the people I love - they inspire some of my best creative work.

I think about the handmade book of marriage vows I gave to my ex as a wedding present - bound with a leather spine, gold leaf lettering and hand-marbled endpapers, and die cut pages that revealed a golden wax seal of a cherub inside. That book took almost a year of planning (which is how long we were engaged), buying materials, finding the right bookbindery and die cutter, designing the pages with artwork, finding the right handmade paper, etc. etc.

I think of the puppet videos I used to make for Christmas with my stuffed animals hosting their own movie awards shows, interspersed with clips of some of my favorite movie lines. A Christmas video I made on my old iMac of one of M's first Christmases. More recently, I think of music mixes I've made for Tara, Bee, Polina, Linda and Lori, and the associated designs that went into their packaging. I'm no artist, but I am a creative person that just needs an excuse to flex those muscles.

I do miss Bonnie. I think about her a lot, obviously. I miss the days when we texted back and forth every day, when she would distract me at work, when we couldn't imagine our lives without each other. I miss showering her with affection, and being so close that molecules of air would bounce off her, getting caught in my hair to be carried away when we part ... and invisible moisture that escapes with her exhaling breaths would splash on my skin like a million microscopic kisses.

I know that we'll never share those feelings again, but goddess, it was fun while it lasted. And that - more than anything - is what I want to honor and remember with this 2010 Christmas ornament.

Skiing Christmas

On a slow train this morning, as it’s been ever since the Blizzard of 2010. So I’ll spend a little time recapping my Christmas holiday weekend.

Wednesday night Polina and I met at the apartment after I got back from work and she got back from Dark’s and we went to a Cuban restaurant on 46th. They had live music playing, and people were dancing as we walked in. It was a nice atmosphere, but the food was only so-so. Can’t compete with that braised beef at our Carrabba’s near Stony Brook. On our way out we joined the dancers for a few beats until it got so crowded that I was bumping into people.

Thursday we had to get me some ski pants because I stupidly left mine in Yoshi in Princeton. I remembered to get my gloves and goggles, but I didn’t realize that there’s a tub in there with all my heavy winter clothes, including the North Face snowboard pants I bought last year and haven’t ever used. So we went to Sports Authority on 20th to get those on our way back to the Staten Island Ferry Terminal, where we met up with Katie and hung out with her all afternoon at Polina’s house.

Friday morning we got up at 6:30 to head out to Mountain Top, PA, home of Natasha and Pavel, whom we visited over Labor Day weekend. Along the way we stopped at a grocery store and then the car wouldn’t start, so we had to get a jump from someone. So we got there a bit later than we planned, but we still skied the afternoon session at Elk Mountain. It’s a small mountain, so we spent a lot of time on the lifts, but the trails were nicely groomed, there was lots of powder and very few skiers over Christmas.

Saturday morning we intended to ski just the morning, but we woke up to find that one of our tires went flat overnight, so that took time to inflate. So we got there late and just skied the full day. I went on my first black diamond trail, but it wasn’t that hard because I went really slowly (unlike Polina and her dad, who whizzed ahead of me). It’s just not that enjoyable for me to have to stop after a couple of turns and basically ride my edges down a slope. The blues at Elk were perfect for me – good speed and a few gentle turns. The last thing I need right now is to get hurt and have to miss work or jeopardize plans with Polina in January.

Sunday Polina stayed home while her parents and I skied the morning session and returned the equipment. We had some good bonding time on the lifts, where her dad and I talked about their family history and all sorts of things. It’s nice just calling them “mom” and “dad” in everyday life – more personal, less formal. I just think of them as family now.

After we were done skiing, we went to Pep Boys to get the tire fixed, which took hours because it was the first day open after the holiday. So we ended up leaving quite late, about 5:30, as the snow was really starting to come down. The ride home was harrowing, but we made it back to Times Square about 10 pm. Polina and I suggested that everyone stay there with us, but the parents wanted to get home. They didn’t get back to Staten Island until about 1:30 am, and then had to dig out their front door to get into the house.

I had lots of fun this Christmas, a very different kind of Christmas than I’m used to. I used to go skiing over Christmas back in my old life, but not for the last decade or so. Christmas with my NJ family was a very traditional, home-bound affair with lots of presents and a decorated tree. The only thing I didn’t do this year that I’ve done in years past is visit the Angel Tree at the Metropolitan Museum. I think I’ll do that on Friday before going to Staten Island for the New Year’s party, since I’m off the whole day.

2010 in review

So here we are again at the end of the year, or near enough anyway, and it’s time to look back and reflect on how my life has changed. Normally I do this closer to Jan. 1, but since I've been blessed with a snow day to work at home today and I'll be at Polina's house most of this three-day weekend, I thought I'd get it done early this year.

So after a relatively quiet 2009 when I was out of work for most of the year and building my relationship with Polina, this year has been full of the highest highs and the lowest lows since my transition period. Obviously the person most responsible for both of these was Bonnie.

Funny how when I was with my family in NJ, New Year’s Eve was never a big deal for us because we didn’t celebrate the secular/solar new year. But now, because of Polina’s annual fete(which I’ve come to look forward to every year) and the fact that I consider New Year’s Eve the start of my adventures with Bonnie, it’s no longer a day of disinterest for me, since everybody knows how I am with anniversaries.

I say that New Year’s Eve is the beginning because it’s the first time Bonnie and I spent time together alone, after meeting at the Poly Women’s Group, getting to know more about each other via email and then attending her family Christmas party with Polina. We were still quite platonic on New Year's Eve, but it was the start of being intimate in a poly way, cuddling for warmth, watching Firefly episodes and calling our significant others (who were both out-of-state that night) to wish them a Happy New Year as we watched the ball drop on TV.

Bonnie added passion and intensity to my life the way that Tara used to, and from that standpoint, she embodied everything that I was craving in a new relationship. She also provided a necessary balance that fundamentally changed my relationship with Polina and allowed it to flourish in ways I could have scarcely hoped it would at this time last year. For that reason alone, I can only be profoundly grateful for Bonnie’s all-too-brief presence in my life.

As for my year with Polina, it has been nothing but positive as we continue to build a relationship that meets both our needs. We celebrated our second anniversary in October with an exchange of presents and cards out in Stony Brook over some delicious pumpkin ale and a wonderful meal. My move into Manhattan in March made it more convenient at the time to see both my loves, and by now in Polina’s case, we’ve started thinking of this apartment more and more as ours instead of just mine.

The biggest change in our relationship is how we’ve managed to get more of her extended family to be comfortable with us being together and making the holidays better for everyone. Polina’s extended tribe may not understand the poly or even know about the kink stuff, but anyone can see that we love each other and it would be wrong to deny it. And that’s how she gives me a big part of what I need – a sense of family, of belonging, and getting to know the people who are important to the people I love.

We also continue to get more comfortable just sharing space for extended periods of time. Over Christmas holidays, we spent five consecutive nights together here, at her house in Staten Island, and in Mountain Top, PA, skiing with her family. In 2010, we've spent Labor Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas with her family and close family friends, and we’ll spend New Year’s weekend and a wedding in late January with many of them too. What a big difference from last year when I was not invited to accompany them to Baltimore for Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve, or the year before when taking me as her date to her sister’s wedding raised a few eyebrows.

Another big development this year was the growth of Open Love NY, and my role as the president. I never wanted to take this job, but it was either that or watch it fail after all the work I've put into it. By most accounts, I’ve done a fair job in the first 10 months, building the membership up from nothing to over 200.

As I look back on 2010, I’ll also remember seeing Carmen at the Metropolitan Opera, our impromptu trip to Albany, my first touristy visit to the nation’s capital, the start of my new life in the middle of Manhattan, and my first full calendar year of working that I didn’t miss a significant amount of time due to surgery, layoffs or quitting to transition since 2005. I went back to my hometown Houston for the first time since leaving four and a half years ago, and went with Polina to see Porcupine Tree at Radio City Music Hall and Poly Living 2010 in Fort Washington, PA, where I finally met Danielle, one of my oldest online friends.

What will 2011 bring for me? The New Year is approaching more quietly than in years past, so whatever it will be, I’m sure to be surprised. Wherever my path leads, I am excited to take the journey, and I thank you, as always, for reading and coming along for the ride.

Haircut

Here's a proper challenge for my singular talent at winning ticket lotteries - How to get tickets to Saturday Night Live. Someone remind me to do this next August.

I love my new haircut - it's now all one length, and falls to just below my collarbone in front and curves to frame my face. It looks much neater and more professional than the long uneven ends I used to have. The stylist took off about 3-4 inches from the longest part in the back. Since my hair grows so slowly, it's the first major cut I've had in length since 2005.

It feels so different too when I brush through it. Since it's all one length now, the resistance of the comb or brush builds as I get to the end and then poof! it's gone as the ends slide through. So much different from the gradually diminishing resistance I'm used to with my long tapered cut. It makes my hair feel thicker, which is nice.

Had kind of a difficult talk last night with Polina. She's ready for this semester to end. I was trying to give her a pep talk for her last final today, but I think it came off sounding like a lecture. It's hard to find that balance between being a cheerleader and being a nag. Sometimes we all just need to be told everything's going to be ok.

I've also been trying to reconnect with Lori - we've been swapping messages the last few days. I miss having a biffle, and I should be mindful of keeping those connections active.

Taylor Swift

I’m rather ashamed to admit it, but I’ve been listening to Taylor Swift’s new album a lot lately. It’s so cotton candy fluff, it makes my teeth hurt. But it’s also carefully designed to speak to the inner girl in all her fans. I actually only got the album because I was a few dollars short of a free shipping credit from Amazon when I bought my most recent Y: The Last Man book online.

Speak Now is almost an exact reproduction of the successful formula she established with her last album Fearless, which has sold nearly 10 million copies worldwide and won two Grammys. Both opening tracks (“Fearless” and “Mine”) speak of a perfect love. Both closing tracks (“Change” and “Long Live”) are new generation anthems.

Both have childhood songs (“The Best Day” and “Never Grow Up”); fantasy love songs (“Love Story” and “Enchanted”); songs about longing (“You Belong with Me” and “Speak Now”); reminiscing about lost love (“The Way I Loved You” to “Back to December”); and plenty of breakup songs (“You’re Not Sorry” to “Dear John”, “White Horse” to “The Story of Us” and “Forever & Always” to “Last Kiss”).

Anyway, tonight is the first (hopefully) annual Open Love NY holiday party. We’ve come a long way as an organization since Polina and I planned her 19th birthday party together as the first OLNY public event. I wish she could be here tonight to be a part of it – she deserves as much credit as anyone for getting this train out of the station. Tonight I’m wearing the pendant she gave me for our anniversary, just so I’ll remember that.

Losing weight

It's chicken parmigiana day here at the office, which is hard to resist, but not impossible. It's the second week of eating healthy, and I'm definitely noticing the results. It's helpful that Polina is doing it with me, so we can support each other and swap cooking tips.

I always felt like my problem is not losing weight, but keeping it off. But I also recognize that my life over the last two years has been so chaotic that I haven't been able to focus on healthy eating, which leads to shortcuts like eating too much takeout and junk food.

It's also not helpful that Nearing provides tasty hot entrees, soups and desserts at work that are not always very healthy. It's like eating out every day for lunch already. Thankfully, they also provide healthy salads, sandwiches and fruits too - it's only a matter of choosing them over the other stuff.

Even after just my first week, I've noticed a difference in my waistline just by cutting out carbs and fat. I've also noticed a reduced craving and appetite for food, and I've come to realize that a lot of times I eat not because I'm truly hungry, but just because it's mealtime, or I'm bored, or I have food cravings. So by taking away food cravings and putting stricter rules about what I allow myself to eat, I'm drastically reducing the number of calories I consume per day. I also mistake thirst for hunger a lot too, so I've been drinking a lot more water at home than I did before.

Another plus is getting back into the habit of cooking food, which I used to do regularly when my family spent Saturday nights over at my place for dinner, playing cards and watching movies. Without that regular interaction, I got lazy with the cooking. I've only hosted one dinner at my current apartment (the True Blood marathon this past summer) which is too small for anything more than four people (and they'd better be cozy with each other). But this past week I made a grilled chicken breast with artichoke hearts in a balsamic vinegar sauce, a Chinese chicken stir-fry and fried tofu with hot bean sauce and pickled bamboo shoots. So I'm going to try and keep inventing new things as I go along.

I think more and more that I must be a submissive personality at heart. I like having the boundaries on food and feeling in control of what I'm eating because I'm following rules. I suppose the people who know me best would say I show similar patterns in other aspects of my life. I think I've always thrived with structure rather than chaos. I like routine, to a point. I don't know if it's a reaction to the maelstrom my life has been in the past six years, or if I've always been this way. If I was always this way, I don't see how I would be the person I am today because my old life had a lot more structure in it than this life ever will.

The New World

I watched Terrence Malik's The New World today, starring Colin Ferrell, Christian Bale and Christopher Plummer, about Pochahontas and Captain John Smith. It was certainly one of the most unusual movies I've ever seen.

The film, as the entry describes, is shot almost entirely with natural light. To modern audiences, this small thing itself is a revelation. We're so used to artificial light in the movies (or even digitally created CGI lighting) that to watch an entire movie that shows the different quality of light on sunny, cloudy, rainy days; candlelight inside wood cabins - it's visually stunning to behold.

The description on IMDB pretty much says it all - this is a long, plodding, sometimes boring movie. I started it last night and finished it this morning because it was putting me to sleep in the middle. But, it did make me think a lot about how a lot of people, including me, who live in cities, get their food from supermarkets and rarely walk barefoot through fields of grass have lost an essential contact with nature.

This movie reminded me that there is much humanity that we put ourselves in danger of losing when we distance ourselves from the natural world.