Sunday, December 18, 2011

Life is risky....

Love is rare. It is so rare.

I've come to realize, at 25, and with a bit of dating under my belt,  that it is truly rare for me to find a person I can love, because he makes me laugh, and he's kind, and generous and gentlemanly and communicative and handsome and full of love and passion; it's rare to find that person and even rarer for that person, I find, to love me back.

When I was a child I assumed that life was guaranteed to some extent or another, the major things in life would in fact happen, and with some hard work and a lot of determination, the things I wanted would come to me. I would make top marks in high school, get into a prestigious university, study hard, learn what I was passionate about and pursue it, get an educational internship, which would lead to a good paying job, find the love of my life with little effort, and if I wanted to have children in the future, they would come effortlessly too.

It is now, post-degreed and in the real world, with a real minimum wage job, bills, daily realities, that I know few things, if anything in life is guaranteed. Life is risky. That's my new mantra.  It's risky to go out with someone I really like but don't feel romantic towards, and turn him down for something I think is potentially a better fit for me. The age old question....take a bird in the hand, or wait for two in the bush? Friends are pairing up left and right, finding the loves of their lives. I love these friends and are so happy for them, and yet so jealous. What is the secret formula? How have they found the One? What did they do that's different from what I'm doing? When will things change for me? Will they one day be dancing at my wedding?

Life is risky. This I know. It's risky to date, to see what's out there, to get a taste of something great. But I'm taking the risk.

Friday, November 4, 2011

25 and the San Francisco trip, October, 2011

Excerpted from my travel journal:

October 3, 2011

I'm heading northbound on the Caltrain from San Jose to South San Francisco, rolling past modest little homes by the side of the tracks. Jason Isbell is playing on the stupid fucking iTouch in my pocket that refuses to get wifi and leaves me stranded in San Bruno with no internet service and therefore, no maps or taxi cab phone numbers. This is the first time I've been to the North Bay area in almost 10 years. I didn't much like it then, so let's hope I like it better this time around.

This trip has begun with snafus and frustration; missing hotel confirmation information, the afore-mentioned broken iTouch, the decision to take the Caltrain instead of a shuttle from San Jose to San Francisco Airport, taking an airplane instead of driving the six hours from Los Angeles to the city.

It's okay though, time ticks away and trips are often a microcosm of life in general. Sometimes trips start or end roughly, but often there are highlights, turns that lead you somewhere surprising, fabulous, unexpected.
 ------------

10:30pm, October 3, 2011

First impressions of San Francisco go like this; the city so far reminds me less of its Northwest siblings and more so of a smaller, slightly better smelling New York City in so far as the Union Square area shopping is top-notch and Armenian-owned crystal chandelier shops abound. The city even smells reminiscent of New York; a faint urine smell fills the air. Buildings are old and crowded, especially in Chinatown, hallways and bathrooms are scuffed up and paint peels from the walls.

I love the feeling that there's more to this city than I've seen so far and I have a suspicion that there's another flavor-perhaps like that of my beloved Portland and Seattle that I have yet to taste---like those cities, San Francisco lies amidst dense forest and cold water after all.

------------

11:30 AM, October 5, 2011

Yesterday, mom and I took the BART into the Embaracadero Station on the edge of the Financial District. Occupy Wall Street movement had set up camp in the Financial District and it made me feel proud that the activist tradition in this area is once again alive and kicking. I looked out to the warehouses and the piers and thrilled at the idea that I was looking out at the same water and the same view, traversing the same streets that Kerouac walked--the same Embaracadero he talked about.

Fisherman's Wharf reminded me of a less glitzy Times Square; everyone hawking the same meaningless trinkets, post cards, disposable cameras, t-shirts and sweatshirts. I'll be honest, I wasn't impressed with the Wharf.

We took a sight-seeing bus tour of the San Fran highlights, Golden Gate Bridge, Golden Gate Park, the Victorian row houses. I am astounded with Golden Gate Park, so beautiful, so vast.....

Money has slipped from my pockets and I haven't been keeping track of where it goes as I've been traveling. A planner, I usually revel in planning a trip; buying trip books and guides, searching online for information about the city, places to shop, things to do. Planning a vacation is the best part; it's the mental foreplay, all about what's to come before the orgasm of the actual trip.

This San Francisco trip is different though. No guidebooks, little research, little forethought. This trip is a celebration of me turning 25. Maybe, like the trip, my 25th year can be unplanned, unguided. Maybe I need more spontaneity and blind faith that stuff works out.

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

A Candle and All Hallow's Eve

Last night I participated in an old Irish custom I've read about in books.

When I was but a child, my mother's friend gave me a book for my birthday called Witches, Pumpkins, and Grinning Ghosts by Edna Barth. I've always had an affinity for Halloween and the change of seasons, which in Los Angeles happens in very subtle ways, and I was delighted to read the book.

Barth's book was written at a child's level to help children understand the meaning of Halloween and the origins that spawned the Halloween symbols of carved pumpkins, ghosts, witches, owls and cats.

Barth writes, "There was nothing make-believe about the fears of the Scotch, Irish and English on this same evening [October 31st] years ago. This was the night when ghosts, the spirits or disembodied souls of the dead, were thought to return to their former homes, looking for warmth and cheer.....Throughout Gaul and Britain, huge Samhain fires lighted the skies above hilltops. Their bright flames were meant to guide kindly ghosts on their journeys home and frighten evil ones away."

In Lisa Carey's novel In the Country of the Young, Oisin MacDara is a moody, lonely, solitary artist who, as a child, had the gift of "second sight" where he was able to see spirits that lived alongside the living. After his twin sister's suicide, he loses the sight and wishes every day to regain it. The book jacket reads, "Then on a quiet All Hallow's Eve, a restless spirit is beckoned into his [Oisin's] home by a candle flickering in the window: the ghost of the girl whose brief life ended on Tiranogue's shore more than a century earlier. In Oisin's house she seeks comfort and warmth, and a chance at the life that was denied her so long ago."

In the vain hope and mostly superstition, but also as a link to my Celtic ancestors, I lit a candle in my window, last night on October 31, as a way to welcome my aunt and uncle home, wherever they may be.

Saturday, September 10, 2011

I should blog about.......

Why don't you blog about natural cosmetics and lotions? Why don't you blog about politics? You're a good writer, why don't you blog about art or landscape design or eco-friendly technologies?

These are the things I hear from parents and friends. While I thank them for the kind words and for nudging me along in my writing journey, it's not so easy for me to just start blogging. SilverTonguedLass started out as a very personal online diary; a place where I could write about me and my life with little regard to anyone else reading it. Sure, I figured close friends would read it, and between trans-continental phone calls, it was a way for them to see how I was doing and what I was up to. But mainly, this blog was also a way for me to keep my writing skills sharpened. I was the only editor and these blog entries were up to my discretion; no word count limits; no one editing me or rejecting my pitches. I could write about anything I wanted.

But somewhere, I started wanting to get my name out there. I wanted to write a blog. Amelia has been writing about all things vintage, with a specific bent on vintage clothing, for three months to my three years, and her blog theimportanceofbeingvintage.blogspot.com has already had over 3000 page views. Sure, she's writing about a much broader, and more interesting topic than myself, but I still grow jealous at the thought. Jealous, perhaps also because she's wildly talented as a writer, one more talent to her arsenal. I always thought writing well and engaging pieces was my special talent. Now, I feel often like a jane-of-all-trades and master of none.

Amidst thousands and thousands of blogs written by "writers", I want to be the real deal. I want my blog posts in this digital age to lead somewhere. I dream of a novel or a book. A deal. A web content job. A way to freelance and travel this wide open country the way I want to. Even if it's to learn that road tripping and lonesome wandering isn't as romantic as I think it is. Maybe I won't road trip or travel, but entertaining the idea and a growing savings account are dreams as well.

My issue is that I find too many things exciting and important. I love art and design, whether it's a poster or a well designed landscape. I think solar panels and rain water storage barrels are great technologies that I hope will allow us to use energy efficiently enough to help humans as a species survive into the next century. I love Burts Bees and other lotion/ cosmetics companies that make paraben, pthalate, and petroleum free products and do so using plastic free packaging.

Successful blogs, however, come from one direction, are updated regularly, and discuss one particular topic. My skills and interests have always been scattered, so coming up with an umbrella topic where I can discuss drought-tolerant gardening, efficient, sustainable technological advances, favorite food and alternative country music records in a cohesive way is quite difficult.

Should anyone have any ideas as to how to accomplish this or to narrow things down, please let me know by commenting to this post.

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Competition

One of the senior privileges at my alma mater was that seniors got to choose a favorite quote that would stand as a personal motto of sorts, listed under their senior photo in the yearbook. One of my best friends listed this as her quote:

"In the end, the only person you're competing with is yourself."

I view myself this way, or rather, that I compete with this version of myself that I think I should be; the version of myself that took risks, that was rougher and meaner around the edges. There's a part of me that wishes I could flirt easily, pick up good looking men, laugh with them, bed them and then leave them quietly sleeping in the morning. I wish my heart was colder, more detached.  I compete with the version of myself that lives independently, even if it were in a dump in east-shit hook, because it seems wussy that I live with my parents now. There's a part of me that wishes I could jump on a bike or a car with nothing but the money in my checking account and take off the way Kerouac did in the forties. The life that I see one particular person living, with all the calamity of a burning fire; and yet, I don't even know if that's in my head, my skewed perception of his life, or if it's an accurate reading on someone I never knew very well. Something I've learned from my father is that the grass isn't always greener on the other side; sometimes, dare I say it, often times, the grass isn't greener. It just looks that way.

I'm only competing with myself because I only have my life to live with. No matter how close you are to a person, you can never know all the difficulties, the worries and anxieties, the ups and downs and the obstacles of someone else's life.  Life is happening now and I choose to put my life in a particular direction every day, the way I put my feet on the hardwood floorboards when I get up in the morning. I really choose the life I want every day, every second of every day; some seconds I'm happy and some seconds I'm not. But I choose the life I want, and I think it's one of which I can be reasonably proud. There's something profound in knowing that I'm only competing with myself and no one else.

The truth is, that I may want to jump on that bike or in that car, but I don't want it enough. Why does that pseudo dream keep rubbing me the wrong way? I don't know. But, I think that's me. Perpetually torn in two different directions.

 I'm only competing with myself, so either way, I'm bound to win.

 For anyone wondering what my senior quote was, here it is:

"And I heard that highway whisper and sigh, are you ready to fly?"---Jackson Browne.

Prophetic, no? Even when I was 17, I knew that road was talking to me in ways I didn't even know. 

Friday, August 19, 2011

The Fabulous Fuoco Siblings

It seems like I have been grieving for longer than I can remember; grieving over illness, over loss, and now, death. In the last two months, I have lost two relatives I was exceptionally close to. My aunt and my uncle have passed into the infinite, into the space between spaces and are, at the least, together.

Some people believe that the afterlife is a manifestation of what we want here on earth. I like to think that's true. Like the things and places we loved most, the people we were closest to, are the things we experience when we are no longer restrained in our bodies.

So here are where Joe and Linda are now.

A world traveler, my aunt loved the tropics, so right now, she's chilling on the shores of Belize or the Bahamas, a pina colada in her hand, a book in her lap. She's making friends with everyone, in the way that she did, inviting them into conversation in the easiest way.

My uncle is young again, and back in playing form. He's swinging away on the Pebble Beach links and after his game, he will kick back with a glass of single malt scotch. Family and laughter were so important to these siblings, so they'll do what they did here: they will meet for martinis, play marathon canasta games, where they will discuss family, friends and everything else. And they will do what the Fuocos do best; gossip,  love, laugh, joke, and laugh some more.
























Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Shot tastebuds

My taste buds are shot. For food. For people. At the behest of some of my friends who have had good experiences using online dating sites, I decided to actually use a paid service.

I sift through hundreds of photos and find that no one, or VERY few people are attractive to me. It isn't that they're bad looking, they just don't pop from the page, they don't make me thrill, or jump or get the butterflies. And alas, here is my problem.

I'm pretty, smart and a good person, but guys aren't lining up to date me. I want to get out there and enjoy different people and say that I dated, so when the right one comes around, I know it. I can look back and say I really did date and have fun in my twenties, I'm not just settling on what's come into my life.

My friends say that I'm being too hard on people, that I can't just judge a person by their picture. That I should give someone more than a first date to see if they spark me. But I've never had to give anyone more than a first date, an initial meeting, to know that in the past. Chemistry happens, it grows with a mind of its own and comes when it does, usually the second I see that person or talk to them, or know that they like me. That's what's great about sexual chemistry; it just happens, there is no premeditation, no thinking about it, no trying.

But I can't even muster the energy or the interest to just date, because for me, I've always had to be attracted to someone in order to date them. That's the problem. I don't get attracted very often, so I've already self-selected myself down to a few people, and more likely than not, those people don't feel the same way for me as I do for them.
 
So, I'm kind of fucked and the grief I've lived through in the last few months has numbed my ability to taste people or food, although I'm more hungry now than at the start of this year. I'm actually dying for a taste. I dream about tastes, and I'm numbed to it in real life.

Monday, June 27, 2011

Leaping from a ledge

And this is what it feels like to take a flying leap off a ledge....I've always been paralyzed by fear, and the need to make it go away leads me to be a bird in the hand is better than two in the bush kind of a person. So, it's very scary to know that someone I loved at one point is engaged. That's it. No going back now.

I sit here, clearly upset about this. If he's happy, then great, but it still leaves me with a question mark on the future. Like.....where's my partner? Do I have one? I was the one that broke up with him, not because I didn't love him, but because we weren't the right fit and I loved him so deeply I was always afraid of hurting or stringing him along, so I ended it. I let him go for good reasons. And I've been rewarded with loneliness, a thing I avoid at most costs, with the exception of co-dependence.

I keep telling myself that I will not be with someone simply because I'm afraid of being alone. Although an empty bed is starting to wear on me in ways I couldn't previously imagine. In fact, I've really been drowning in grief, barely treading the water. I've always been a person to take into account that life is full of suffering, and I'd like to form a partnership with someone, so we can hold one another's hands when the chips are down. There's a great piece of a dialog from an otherwise mediocre movie that is In Good Company; something to the effect of one character asking another how they knew who the right soul mate was. The older character says, you know, life is hard, you just grab who you think is a good partner, get in the foxhole together. That's kind of the way I've envisioned it too.

So here's my leap. I ended it knowing this could happen, knowing he probably would move on permanently with someone else. My leap of faith is the fact that there's no guarantee there's someone else out there. Man, I hope there is. I really do. But I have the cold piece of comfort to know that I made the right choice for both of us.
 

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Cigarettes

What is it about cigarettes that are still so fascinating? Especially in light of decades of empirical non-partisan research that shows smoking causes many types of cancers in the human body.

I ask the question for many reasons; I've been watching the brilliant television series Saving Grace and Californication which both feature self-destructive characters that smoke like chimneys. The characters' love of cigarettes, promiscuous sex and heavy drinking are all signs of self-destruction, but I beg the question: why is self destruction so sexy?

It's not of course. I've seen too many family members die from complications from smoking to know that there's really nothing sexy to it. It's disgusting really; inhaling vapor death. Yes, all people die, but since I've witnessed cancer and complications from smoking firsthand, I can honestly tell other people, that cancer is not a good way to go. No way really is, and few are lucky enough to die in their sleep, but cancer is sickening pain; sick cells replicating themselves and spreading, attacking the inside of the body until nothing but pain is left.

Why is self-destruction sexy? Maybe it's because it's such an intense, passionate emotion. Maybe self destruction is the beginning phase to creating someone better; the way the phoenix has to explode into painful fire and die down to ashes in order to return strong. Or maybe it's because the phoenix only shows its most magnificent feathers seconds before it incinerates itself. Either way, the beauty comes at a price.

Sunday, May 22, 2011

Time's Pain

To say that missing someone dulls with time,
like a scar that heals
shows up on the skin
is to lie about what missing someone is like

It can be years, days, months, hours
but the pain that comes from missing someone is not like a scar at all
for scars eventually heal, and there is no pain, but just an angry design on the skin

yearning and missing is a breathing, stinging and relentless beast
that lays you open and consumes you, piece by piece
leaving you raw and flayed, tears brimming to the eyes with nothing to help

yes, Time dulls the pain, but perhaps
the most painful thing of all, is that it is always there
a sleeping dragon scorching the heart sometimes, even years later

when it's over, it's over, but there's always something to miss
his eyes, his scent, his words, his thoughts, which cannot be replaced by another
......something

and that sadness never completely goes away
that is the worst pain of all

Saturday, April 30, 2011

Brown Penny

There's so much I want to say and so much that I've recently been thinking about. Sometimes I get so sick of my own voice, feeling it's too navel-gazing, too self-indulgent; I get tired of my voice because I feel like it's completely narcissistic to write about me, about my thoughts, my feelings, my opinions, and I start to sound a little whiny to my own ears. After all, who gives a flying fuck what I have to write about? So for this entry, I will type out a poem, although written in a man's voice---it's one of my favorites that emotes much of what I currently feel.  I owe a deep debt of gratitude to that great Irishman, Mr. William Butler Yeats.

I whispered 'I am too young',
And then, 'I am old enough'; 
Wherefore I threw a penny
To find out if I might love.
'Go and love, go and love young man
If the lady be young and fair.'
Ah penny, brown penny, brown penny
I am looped in the loops of her hair.

O love is the crooked thing,
There is nobody wise enough
To find out all that is in it,
For he would be thinking of love
Till the stars had run away
And the shadows eaten the moon.
Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,
One cannot begin it too soon.









Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Green Lake, Seattle

A year ago I was witness to my dear friend Emily getting married in Portland. Andrew sat beside me, his arm reassuringly around my shoulders and his hand in mine.

It's been about a year and it hurts when I think that he and I aren't together. It's strange, that I have this compulsion to want to make things permanent with all things and all people, as if having the relationship with the same person in the future makes the memories of our past that much more real. A falsity I know, since past, present and future exist as separate entities; memories made in the past can't be touched or erased because they exist no matter what the present or future holds. In this way, I know, as I get sad from time to time about us, that the time Andrew and I spent together remains, pristine and special, hanging somewhere in the ether, protected.

I'll be going to Seattle this July, and Seattle only conjures up memories of him and I, sharing a hotel room, showing him my favorite city, the kick ass EMP-SCI FI museum, the Space Needle, the way Seattleites dedicate wasted sidewalk grass strips to vegetable gardening. I remember that it was gray and a bit damp (shocker), but the greens, oh my gawd, the greens of the grasses and the leaves, the vibrant colors of the tulips that just jumped from the petals to hit you in the eyes, all of it was glorious.

My favorite Seattle memory from that time was this: although it was evening the sun stayed out late, so much in fact that Andrew and I were walking around and taking buses at 9pm, because the sun had set so fast, catching us off guard.

It was about 7:30 when Andrew and I got off the bus from the University district and we were lost, but decided to walk around anyway. There in the distance, ahead of newly built townhouses and modest, lovely homes, was a big lake glimmering in the sunlight. The sun peaked low on the horizon  but strong, and shining its rays on the water so that the reflection was a light orange. A large running path wound its way around the lake. A desert girl, I appreciate rain and water the way most Mid-Westerners appreciate warmth in the depth of winter. I looked on this stunning view and thought, wow, what a beautiful place to live.

He and I will always have that memory, that sun set and the Green Lake.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Saddle Up

Mom made me promise her, as I lay in the hospital bed, to keep riding; in her own words, she was saying that though I'd taken two hard falls, she wanted me to get back in the saddle and ride, immediately.

She reminds me of that now, that I can't let too much time go before I get back in the saddle, otherwise, the longer the time between falling and riding, the harder it is to take that risk again.

I remember her words when I start to drag my feet on something, when I read an overview for a job position and my throat slides into my belly with anxiety, with the possibility that my skills are as impractical and feckless as my shadow whispers to me, in the back of my mind. A constant, dull voice that says over and over again, what if......what if I'm not good enough, or I can't take the critique, or I fuck up, or worst of all, if I get fired. I don't know what to do with this voice but to remind myself of previous accomplishments, of the many struggles I faced before crossing the graduation platform to receive my diploma, that stuck it out in Oregon post-graduation for a miserable ten months, and that I look back now and see an entire portfolio of written articles.

It's the same for relationships, although in this realm I'm much more optimistic. So it didn't work with Andrew, but I still believe I can meet the right one as some of my friends have done. For some reason, I'm more optimistic about my future love life, although I have no proof to show for it, but I remind myself that unlike the job search, relationships aren't dictated by the booms and busts of a marketplace, globalization or automation.

I'm apprehensive and shaken, brimming with self-doubt, but I'm tightening the girth and one day not too far off I'll have my foot in the stirrup.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

How much of it was me, and how much of it was her? I don't know and the reality of it is that no matter how much I try to be objective, I'm living in my head, so my world is already shaded. I remember once in high school, an English teacher told my class that people tend to see themselves and their viewpoint in a more positive light than that of their opponent's when it comes to an argument. All of this being said, when I detach myself from the situation I can honestly say that she was a terrible manager; discouraging, negative, picky, impatient and critical of me with impossibly high expectations, she had no understanding that people need to know what they do well, along with the things they don't do so well. To focus solely on the mistakes made and the things that could be better is no way to inspire someone to do better or play to their strengths. A month and a half is not a long enough time to allow someone to do well, learn and get better before getting hard on them either.

These are the things I can be objective about. Nevertheless, I have found myself rootless and shaken, my confidence all but gone. There have been times in my life where I say I don't know what I'm doing, but right now, I feel like that's the truth. I was trained and loved but one thing when I was in college. That one thing was writing, journalism, but it's extremely daunting to me now in "the real world" to know that fighting for a j-job takes a willingness to constantly self-promote, to expend energy every second of every day thinking of what stories exist, how to pitch them......And at the end of the day journalism jobs are highly unstable and pay little to nothing, rarely a decent income with benefits.

I feel tortured; the one thing I love is the one thing that won't support me financially, but I cringe when I think of spending years chained to a 9-5:30 desk, performing a job by wrote, with little or no room for creativity or for anything else that matters.

I try reminding myself that just because I have a tendency to place things at opposite poles does not mean they exist there. Just because a job is a desk job doesn't mean it won't allow for fulfillment or creativity. Just because journalism doesn't pay now, doesn't mean it might not lead down a road towards a content position that does pay. I tend to live in opposites and must remind myself that life consists of multiple shades of gray, rarely black and white.

And why lose ALL confidence in myself? I'm personable, hard working and quick learning. Although I didn't know Excel or Word proficiently while I was there, I did learn details about the programs, things I didn't know before starting the position. It is possible to learn these programs,  and once learned, no one, not even a negative manager can take those skills away.

Daniel Pink writes in A Whole New Mind that story telling is one of those high-touch, high-concept skills that can't be easily replicated in Asian markets, where systematized, logical work can be done via computer, for much less money. Maybe journalism jobs are disappearing and maybe it's no longer a viable career option for me; but if what Pink says is true, there must be room for some solace in his words. After all, I'm a story teller, and it's true that my voice cannot be easily, or cheaply reproduced by someone else. 

So, right now, I'm trying to self analyze and figure out how I can learn from this failure. The most dangerous thing I could do would be to latch on to this experience the next time I'm working a new job and facing a critique. I don't want to create a self-fulfilling prophecy like "if I get critiqued, I'll be worried about my job, which will make me worry more, which will harm the quality of my work, which will inevitably lead to someone firing me because my work's gotten worse." This is the mantra I need to stay away from.  I need to realize that events, although linked, do happen in finite, separate times, and are unique to themselves. They may be linked by a thread, but experiences are not like dominoes. Just because one thing falls through doesn't mean that it pushes everything ahead of it to fall through as well.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

The Card

Seattle-----April 2010

That's strange, the maid changed the stuff in the bathroom.

What? What's wrong with the bathroom, I said as I walked across the hotel we had booked for our stay. There on the counter was a lavender teddy bear and a card behind it. I carefully opened the envelope, savoring every moment of this impromptu gift. The card was beautiful, some shade between purple and lavender with an iridescent gold embossing in the background color. A blazing sun on the front and red Chinese characters covered the front of the card. I opened it and there he'd written about how proud he was that I had successfully pitched two articles to a publication.

I was so touched. Earlier that day, he had secretly purchased this gift as I was preoccupied in trying to find the right card for my friend's wedding.

I remember slowly reading the card when I opened it, stunned that a man could be so proud of me, could love me so much that he would commend me for being me. For simply doing what I do.

I'm no longer with him but I still have the card, tucked away safely in a beautiful box where I keep treasured mementos.

I was reminded of him, his love and the moment we shared in the hotel, when I opened the card I'd got from Annie last week. It was the same card, with love written all over it. She was congratulating me for getting my job at the Saban Clinic.

It's not lost on me that they both picked the same card. Of course they would, because they both love(d) me.

We aren't together any longer, but I still have his card.

Saturday, January 1, 2011

1886 Bar Opens in Pasadena's Raymond Restaurant


December 12, 2010
1886 @ The Raymond
Pasadena’s Raymond Restaurant has gotten just a bit hipper and chicer with the recent opening of it’s 1886 Bar. Housed in what used to be the caretaker’s cottage of the old Raymond Hotel property, the restaurant has been serving upscale food amidst Pasadena architectural history for years; now it’s serving equally decadent and period appropriate cocktails too.
1886 is the latest brain-child of Aidan Demarest and Marcos Tello (of First and Hope, Edison fame) who created the drink menu featuring cocktails inspired by the turn of the century history of the building. The bartenders serve classic, neat cocktails with whiskey, bourbon and gin bases that differentiate this bar from the more trendy-mix-anything-try-anything-type watering holes. One bartender described 1886 Bar as “The Varnish of Pasadena.”
Fall into the luxurious padded suede banquet and sip a drink with throwbacks to Pasadena, like the Orange Grove Cocktail or the Rose Parade Punch, a drink that mixes roses, cucumbers, gin and soda.