You came over last night. We drank and ate delicious chocolate and had heart to hearts and gazed adoringly at pictures of an old boyfriend's parents.

I cooked us up a lovely dinner

And you were a babe .

Interactions like those make me realize the point of it all and make me appreciate the value of genuinely enjoyable and nourishing company. I love you.

-Camille

Tonight I went to an opening at a gallery where my mother used to work in Tribeca*. Andy Bernard art critic Camille: that art was bad.
And it was. So, so very bad.
BUT! It was worth the subway fare a few times over for the lovely compliments I received (I am sorry, but I love being the young, fresh-faced sex kitten in a room full of droopin' old lady Persian cats) and for the nice people I got to meet. I so rarely get to immerse myself in the refined art world's social scene sans my mother, so it was a super treat to do it tonight.

After I got home, I went for a little walk on Amsterdam and spotted these cuties:
Some bitch (she was not a bitch, I am being sensitive) inside the store said "UM, SOMEONE IS TAKING PICTURES OUTSIDE" in a very "I am the boss of everyone, this could be an emergency, be ready to call the authorities" sort of way, so I popped my head in and said "these are fantastic! The knuckles on the little bloody fingers?!" and then had a mini conversation with the chick who had knit them. That chick was totally happy, but the others were scowly and apprehensive. Overall, though, good interaction!

Also. I kissed and made up with the person I fought with Saturday. I think we'll get together this weekend and I'll knit while he watches a movie. Doesn't that sound cozy? Yes.


* I hate when people write Tribeca as TriBeCa. Don't don't don't do it.

-Camille

PPS
I LOVE harvest moon. Obviously.

-Karen

On Saturday I celebrated the 20th birthday of a close friend, with a party dedicated to the 90s. It felt really great to dress up, while listening to TLC and the smooth stylings of Will Smith, cultural and lifelong icon of us all. In fact, today I was delighted to turn on the TV to TBS and find three consecutive episodes of Fresh Prince of Bel Air on t.v. I'll always have a place in my heart for the Fresh Prince, and the last episode of the series, where he takes one last knowing glance at the camera and turns off the lights, never fails to make my eyes well up. In tribute to Will Smith, I looked like this.
Dressing up for time travel took less than five minutes, as everything I'm wearing here has a regular rotation in my wardrobe. The next day I watched Clueless and lusted after Paul Rudd, and I missed the 90s.
At this party, I had a wonderful realization about New York, as I peered off the terrace of my friend's absurdly inappropriately posh, upper east side terrace and pretended it was mine, all the while craning my neck to peer in the glass windows of a penthouse room which looked to be a ballet studio in someone's apartment, that our city measures wealth by how high you are in the stratosphere, how few other people are at your level, and when it rises and sets, how long you get to be across the way from the sun.

How long long does it bathe you in its glow as you look out the window of your vast dining room before doing your morning routine in your ballet studio? How prominently might F. Scott Fitzgerald featured you in one of his silly pseudo-moral short stories? Might Christian Bale as Batman have to scale your building while tracking a villain? If so, you've made it.

PS, are other people as obsessed with their cats as I am? Because how great is my cat. I mean really.

-Karen

A few years ago, I was friends with someone crazy. I had graduated from high school, I was employed at a local cafe from 5am-5pm, and then during nights I would play in a band (rehearsals or gigs, ~3-5x a week) from 9pm-2 or 3am. I was a huge fan of naps, of not eating as much as I should have (no lie, it was killer for my figure despite the lack of sleep), and getting yelled at by this friend at any or every hour for completely ridiculous, petty things. If I was happy, they would yell at me for not listening to their problems. If I was sad, they would yell worse for me "clamming up" and not telling them what was wrong. Every time my phone rang, I would automatically become nauseated, as the only people to ever call me were my manager or this crazy friend.
Friend would call "just to chat," to "set me straight," or to give me real solid life-advice. Every day. More than once a day.

Look how shiny my hair was. Ahh, those were the days.
Note: that is not crazy friend. That is my beautiful sister, Brawlina.

When I went to school, I was delighted, as it was a brilliant way to painlessly extricate myself from friend's clutches. And so they kept calling, albeit with less frequency, until one day the calls--without my realizing it--had stopped! I was free and boy oh boy it was good. Then, a few months later, friend texted me a few long epics to see if I was interested in a business venture. It was a big deal in their life, I knew, and it was actually pretty nice for them to want me to get in on it, but no fucking way was I walking back into that trap again. No siree.
So I ignored the texts, every single one, until I finally received the last which said, "So I guess that's a no...?"
and I ignored the shit out of that one too. My reasoning was this: oh, I've changed my number. I didn't receive any of your texts, crazy, so sorry that I missed out on this big deal of yours!
And I've felt fine about it since. No guilt, easy explanation.

But just now, a few years out of that truly draining relationship, I had a thought as I was washing my hands in the bathroom at work.
If I ever do want to rekindle things with them (or be in close contact with any of our mutual friends again--yes, it got to that point), I'm going to have to change my number for real so I don't look like a bona fide dickfaced liar. Which got me to wondering which cell phone carrier I'd switch to. Maybe an iPhone? Maybe a Blackberry? Maybe this this that when I realized:
shit girl, you crazy. Bitch was crazy, but you are just as bad. You are a total crazy enabler.

You, Karen, familiar with my dating and friendship histories, know this.
I am some delicious, endlessly regenerating fodder: luring them in and then keeping them around until they die or I finally have the guts to lie to them and then run away as fast as I can.

Whenever I think of the word fodder, I think of the game Harvest Moon. So many fond memories of so many hours wasted.

-Camille

Friday I went to Sandy Hook, a beach at the tip of New Jersey, with my forest ecology class to look at the holly (Ilex opaca) forests present almost impossibly close to the shore. The forests were absolutely glorious, had some of the most dense canopy covers we'd analyzed yet, and were filled with this STUPID understory thorny vine (Smilax rotundifolia) which every time I got snagged in, I'd yell "SNORLAX."
It was absolutely spectacular and throughout the trip my professor was obsessed with all of the edible plants/berries (of which there were many!) along the way and made sure to show us one of the most beautiful things I've seen yet,
Winged sumac leaves:
The leaves are composite alternate in formation, but are structured in a way that look simple and opposite. If you look carefully, you'll see that every little thing that looks like a leaf is, in fact, connected to its neighbors by more little leaf-appearing things. One full leaf is actually much larger and much more complex than it appears (composed of many little leaflets), and it's absolutely fantastic and mind-blowing.

Saturday I went to Long Island and went to the Brookhaven marina and then to... another beach with my friend Brian.
Do you realize how beautiful our hometown is? So beautiful! The tides had wiped out this perfect little ledge, and I kept imagining how, if we were much, much smaller, it would not be a stretch at all to imagine little homes carved out of the face of this wall.

"How believable does this look?"
Not believable at all. But please don't stop.

-Camille

Yesterday I was treated worse than I have ever been treated by anyone in my adult life.
I learned a very important lesson through this, however. Appearances are often not deceiving, and Aesop's fable of the scorpion and the frog is more true than we'd like to acknowledge.
You cannot blame the scorpion for acting in accordance with his nature, just as you cannot blame a child for behaving like a child, even when you most desperately wish he wouldn't.
Yesterday I was treated very badly by someone with whom I had tried to have a romantic relationship this past summer. I had been attracted to his delightful immaturity, his profound thoughtfulness, and his strange inability to relate to the real world. Nothing I did to him warranted the cruelty and complete disrespect which I was shown, but I cannot pretend that I am still upset. He was immature (not so delightful, in this case), he overthought everything, and he was completely unable to relate to or participate in the very real-world situation we had on our hands. His personality is wonderfully intriguing in most cases, but apparently not in all cases.
I was absolutely livid last night, but now I am okay. I am glad he spared me more wasted time, more hurt feelings, and more future confusion. I tried something new this summer, and it backfired. New rule: no children allowed. There is a reason why every single man I've ever loved or been attracted to or even had flings with thus far have been significantly older: because that's what works best for me.

I will still care for him affectionately, I've got some very fond memories of our experiences together, and I am overwhelmingly and completely happy to have our relationship done with!
Bob Dylan - Don't Think Twice, It's Alright

Kern ( I Want to Be Dylan ) Little | Myspace Video
So long, honey babe
Where I'm bound, I can't tell
But goodbye's too good a word, babe
So I'll just say fare thee well
I ain't sayin' you treated me unkind
You could have done better but I don't mind
You just kinda wasted my precious time
But don't think twice, it's all right

-Camille