La Belette Rouge

Monthus horribilis (That's Latin for this month has sucked)

2009-11-19T04:00:00.000-08:00

I am not going to minimize or put a good spin on it, things have sucked lately( to name a few: Lily and the raisins; The near Boston move that didn't come through; The case of the stolen penny loafers; Lily and her"False Pregnancy"). While I don't have swine flu or cholera, I do have a dog with a hysterical illness that Freud might have found compelling enough to have made him the first psychiatrist to let dogs on the couch. I am not quite sure how I am managing to survive this time and yet I am. Let me share with you the small pleasures that help me endure this time that even Job might have found unmanageable.

1. Drinking Peet's Eggnog lattes.
Delicious and MUCH better than Starbuck's Eggnog lattes. There are days when the promise of a Peet's Egg nog Latte is enough to get me through eight more hours of living in Valencia. I usually only allow myself one a week but during this time if I need three a week to survive I will not begrudge myself this seasonal serotonin boosting beverage.

2.Watching Craig Ferguson
He makes me laugh and I need all the laughs I can get. I started out with his late night show. I fell for him immediately. He is Scottish. He is filled with self-loathing. He has been known to wear a kilt. He is the only late night talk show host who employs puppets in a way that doesn't have me grabbing for the remote and he has proudly introduced the awkward pause into late night. I am enjoying Craig so much that I have ordered Craig Ferguson: A Wee Bit o' Revolution and American on Purpose: The Improbable Adventures of an Unlikely Patriot.

3. The promise of a good read that could crush my father complex.
I have wanted, for a long time, to read Christopher Buckley's memoir, " Losing Mum and Pup: A Memoir" I wanted to read it not because I am a big fan of Christopher Buckley. In fact there is something about Christopher and his personal life that has kept me away from his well reviewed books. But, I have always had a strange affection for William Buckley Jr. My attraction to him is complex and can at times be a bit ego-dystonic. Every week of my childhood I remember my father, depending on how many cocktails he had before or during, watching or sleeping through Firing Line. I sat and watched because we had only one TV and I would hope that my father would go to bed and I could watch the Brady Bunch, Love Boat or Charlie's Angels instead.

After sometime I actually started to enjoy Firing Line( it was about the same time that I developed an age inappropriate crush on Phil Donahue). Even at a young age I was compelled by Buckley Jr. I grew up in a Democratic family and nothing that Buckley ever said convinced me to go to the dark side( the right side). But I was endlessly astounded by his ability to be totally wrong and yet still win the argument---his ability to do that never ceased to amaze me.

Something about him fit perfectly with my father complex. William Buckley Jr. was smart, a brilliant debater and had the kind of mind and wit that could leave me feeling like a complete idiot, "ah, hello, daddy!" Over the years of my Jungian analysis I would often dream of William Buckley Jr. He would stand in as code for my brutalizing father complex/Super ego. This William Buckley Jr. figure in my head existed to tell me I was dumb, not enough, and completely inadequate. He was a somewhat exaggerated version of my father and I suppose that is why I am so looking forward to reading Christopher's memoir. I suspect that in getting an up close and personal look at Bill Buckley I will see that he is not the omniscient overlord that he has played in my psyche. He, I am sure, is a just a man with weaknesses, insecurities and plenty of flaws. Knowing that, I hope, will help to eliminate that last big of negative father complex that lives in my mind.

I bought Losing Mum and Pup and have it sitting on my bedside table. I am saving it for a special occasion. Just knowing it is there and that I can read it at anytime makes me feel better--- much like knowing there is a piece of coconut cream pie in my fridge and that at any moment I could eat that pie. Knowing about the pie is almost always better than eating the pie.

4. The low temperature in Valencia today is just 10 degrees above freezing!!!
It is cold enough in Valencia that I can wear sweaters and drink Port. Both of these small pleasures make me very happy.

5. Music that is more mood lifting than Morrissey.
Yo-Yo Ma playing the Prelude from Bach's cello Suite No.1

6. Beautiful shoes
Thanks to a gift card and a 20% off promotion, these gorgeous shoes are on their way to me. Note to thieves: We have installed a video camera and I requested signature only on these kitties, so you can't have them.

7. Knowing that in 1 1/2 weeks to 2 1/2 weeks my Lily will be back to her old self.

I guess this makes me a monkey's grandmother

2009-11-17T04:00:00.000-08:00

It started Friday night, Lily was extremely fatigued and was eating less than usual. When we went to bed we found that Lily had decided to abandon her regular sleeping location and was instead burrowed in between He-weasel's pillow and mine and she was not alone, she had brought her two toy monkey's into bed with us and she was grooming them both---all night.

By Saturday Lily was in a self-made nest with her two monkeys and was in a vigilant state of watch for their safety. When Lily wasn't in the nest grooming or guarding her preemie-primates she was walking around the house disoriented, depressed, anxious and whining. It was as if she was looking for something. It was as if she had lost something. As I watched her my anxiety grew. I couldn't stop watching her. But something in my gut told me she wasn't sick as she would eat, sleep, drink and wasn't vomiting and she had no temperature so I decided to hold off on a visit to the ER and would wait to see her vet on Monday.

When her symptoms were no better on Sunday I started to Google to search for explanation of her symptoms. It didn't take long to find them, it turns out that Lily has a classic case of Canine False Pregnancy Syndrome or pseudocyesis. Who knew such a thing exist? I certainly didn't. After researching pseudocyesis I learned that Lily's body and mind are convinced that she is pregnant even though she is not. The symptoms of a false pregnancy are:

Nesting
Whining,panting, and trembling
Mothering inanimate objects
Lactating (giving milk)
Abdominal distension
She can even appear to go into labor.
Restlessness and lack of appetite.
She might be slightly more aggressive or territorial than usual.
Symptoms should subside in 2-3 weeks, or 48hrs after the birth would have occurred.

It is so hard to watch Lily go through this, and yes I know that she might not be going through this if we would have had her fixed (please today is not the day for helpful reminders about spaying as I have run out of Xanax and Igor is out of town and is only available by phone). The hardest part about this for me is other than just not wanting my baby to suffer in anyway is that I know the emotional pain she is in as I have been there. Every time I went through IVF I was sure I was pregnant. I would feather my nest. I would have symptoms. I would shop at Pottery Barn baby and pick out baby names.

As I see Lily search the house for her puppies that she knows that she has had and I hear her cry I can do nothing for her but love her. Lily's phantom pregnancy brings up so much for me, I know what Lily is going through. I went through it for years. And, like Lily I made a nest and brought in a baby that is not my real baby( her) to love and nurture and make up for the emptiness.

I have taken Lily to two doctors and both say she is fine and that there is nothing to do but ride this out. It will be another two weeks of these kinds of symptoms. Both vets refused to give Lily hormones or tranquilizers, they say she is fine. I hate to disagree with them but I can tell you for sure that she is not fine.

As hard as this is for Lily and for us I can tell you that it makes me more sure what an amazing mother Lily would be and this may be what pushes us over the edge into choosing to breed her. I know there are many people who think that is a horrible idea and think that no one should every breed a dog as there are so many in shelters but today is not the day for me to enter into that argument. I would ask you to please not share that with me today, I thank you in advance for understanding that I too am a hormonal mess and that no decisions are being made today. Today Lily and I are in her nest. She and the baby monkeys are sleeping and I am blowing off studying to watch her sleep and I am watching all four episodes of the History of Scotland on Youtube out of deference to Lily's family history. Yesterday I called He-weasel at work four times and Igor twice. He-weasel is trying hard to understand why this is so very hard for me and Igor understood immediately how it triggered all my grief about infertility.

Two to three more weeks of this and I should be a total hot mess as well as an expert on Scottish history and completely unprepared to take the MFT Clinical Vignette Exam. Today I am cooking chicken and rice for her babies and we will all be watching Braveheart and Monarch the Glenn and I will be indulging in a few wee Mc-Xanax's, which is an old Scottish compound used for treating anxiety when the Scottish clans had drunk up all the Scotch.

All the President's A-Z

2009-11-12T04:00:00.000-08:00

I knew since Friday that Aunt Flo and Shark Week should be arriving any moment, only it didn't. I usually only have one day of extreme irritability, hunger and emotionality and the next day the curse arrives to explain why I cried at the Cheerios commercial. Not this time. This time I have had extreme irritability, hunger and emotionality for five days. That is a long time to feel irritable, hungry and teary.

And to make matters worse when one has tried and failed to get pregnant for over a decade one does not appreciate getting one's period a week late. Such a person, especially during the special PMS time of the month which creates greater emotional lability, doesn't have the emotional where with all to fight off delusional fantasies that a late period might mean in fact mean a miracle pregnancy.

When I woke yesterday morning I was satanically grumpy, horns began to sprout from my head and I found a pitchfork on my bedside table. I was the kind of grumpy that made the me of the day before, that placed my cart in the way of kids who were wearing "wheelies" and using the fruits and veg section at Costco as their own personal skating rink and when they gave me a dirty look for stopping their hi-jinks I responded by saying, "This is not a skating rink", seem down right warm and fuzzy.

So as to amplify my mood I learned that there was another theft of my stuff here at my high priced security building. I had ordered the Cole Haan Penny Loafer from Neiman Marcus when they had a one day 40% off sale. I placed the order and forget to get the estimated date of delivery. I was in no hurry to get them so it sort of slipped my mind, until yesterday. Well, I called Neimans and it turns out the shoes had been delivered at 11:00 in the a.m. on October 26th. They were left on my door and stolen. The third time I have had stuff stolen from my door. And, just recently He-weasel and I found in the stairwell a Vera Bradley bag that someone had stolen and then opened the box and didn't like the bag and they left it in the stairwell. Grrrrr! Have I mentioned lately how much I hate this place?????? I bet this kind of crime never happens in Boston( please, don't disabuse me of my fantasy).

My first thought was to pack a bag and Lily and I would go to the airport and get a flight to Chicago and I would call He-weasel when I was checked into a dog friendly hotel and tell him that Lily and I would be here at the Lake Forest Inn waiting for him and that under no circumstances would I ever go back to L.A. again, ever. I instead watched "All the President's Men."

I am not sure how it started or why it is but "All the President's Men" is one of my favorite movies for self-soothing. When I feel so bad I look like one of Harlow's monkeys there is something about Woodward and Bernstein taking down President Nixon that buoys my spirits and makes me forget about whatever it is that drove me to watch the film to begin with. It works better than any Cary Grant film or even any of my favorite French inspired romantic comedies and I think because it is so devoid of emotions and the film doesn't require much of me emotionally. I learned of A.T.P.M's anti-stressing qualities many years ago and started incorporating it into family holidays as a ritual part of the day---some people over-drink and overeat to deal with holiday familial stress, I root for the resignations of H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman.

Lily and I lounged in repose silently on the sofa and watched Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford trying to get unwilling witnesses to spill the beans. At the end of the film
I was still feeling a bit rough so I turned on Frost/Nixon. He-weasel came home to find it on and said, "Nixon again? Bad day, huh?"

I would also like to share with you a song that a dear bloggy friend of mine, K.T. ,wrote just for me in order to cheer me up and it did just that. I am delighted to share her cheer up song with you.

Cheer up cheer up cheer up.
(I think I learned that song from Sesame Street)
So, here are my ABC's to make your day better
(I resort to ABC's to sort feelings)
A= You are awesome!
B- Your blog is bitchin'
C- I love it when you are catty
D- Damn doorstop thieves
E- Enough of my stupid crap already
F- Feelings. Whoa whoa whoa feelings
G- Gremlins. Little fuckers freak me out
H- How the hell do we ever think some things are good ideas?
I- Insane people might have it all figured out.
J- Just don't listen to me. Half the crap I say is half assed.
K- Kleptomaniacs do it cheaper.
L- Little did you know...
M- Much love to you
N- Never take advice from me. Unless it makes sense.
O- Opulence. I like it, don't you?
P- Puppies. Gotta love puppy breath.
Q- Quelle?
R- Rascals. For real. The first R word that came to mind...
S- Shopping. Nuff said.
T- Tits Magee. Maybe I will change my name to THAT someday. To be considered...
U- Underwear. Someday I will buy La Perla or Agent Provacateur.
V- Very big kudos if you read this far
W- Weasles. xoxoxoxo
X- XRated. Everyone needs a little xrating in their lives, right?
Y- Ya-hoooo-oooo.
Z- Zebras. Pretty cool looking animal, ya think?

The Valencia me

2009-11-10T04:00:00.000-08:00

My short-lived Boston dreams are over. I just learned that the position He-weasel applied for has been filled. The Valencia me is feeling very sad, disappointed and otherwise grumpy. This was so perfect. This was what I wanted. I was sure this was going to be the one. We were finally going to get out of Valencia.

Prior to learning the bad Boston news, I had already been feeling a little mood indigo. For the last two weekends I have been in all day test prep classes that kept me away from my He-weasel. His work schedule, as of late, has been such that he is gone before I get up in the morning and he is in bed almost a half hour after he gets home, so weekends are the only time I get to see him. But thanks to Marriage and Family Therapy test prep classes I haven't seen him even on weekends and instead have spent it learning ways to approach an exam that is so maddening, confusing and anxiety producing that I am feeling sure that the exam was created to serve as a deterrent from California having too many psychotherapists.

To make things worse I have a raging case of PMS, Chicago homesickness, claustrophobia induced by our postage stamp sized apartment and the reemergence of the 16 year old me that has a propensity for eye rolling, audible huffs and puffs, and extremely dramatic body language. The return of the 16 year old me was constellated by having the most irritating and least bright would-be therapist in the state of California sit next to me at the test prep class(even though I put my stuff all over the chair and the desk next to me and went as far as putting my feet on the chair so as to make it PERFECTLY clear that I wanted to be left alone. Yet, my dim and obtuse classmate made a bee line straight for me and seemed attracted to my non-verbal demands to be neighborless. My silent rage at his presence seemed to only fuel his desire to chat with me while the teacher lectured which only made me angrier and so the cycle continued ).

This guy was so annoying that I had other students in the class invite me to come to sit next to them just so I could be a little further away from him as he clearly had a colossal case of cooties. A fellow classmate and I, in attempt to prepare for the exam, felt compelled to diagnose this guy. We concluded that he had "Annoying personality disorder"( You won't find this diagnosis in the DSM-IV and yet there is no question that such a personality type exists). My annoying classmate also FREQUENTLY disproved the well loved academy theory that there are no stupid questions. Stupid questions were asked at frequent and regular intervals. And, annoying guy, if you are reading this, it is my professional, if unlicensed, opinion that if after completing a Masters degree in counseling psychology and 3000 clinical hours if you don't know the difference between major depression and dysthymia you ought to consider another career. Perhaps toll booth operator?

Between the Boston news, the PMS, He-weasel deprivation, and my clueless classmate I am feeling really rotten. I no longer feel hope or expectation. I am no longer waiting for the phone call that will change our life and announce our Boston move. I am back in disappointment, grief, and some mild hopelessness. The Valencia me is not in the mood to study or workout or do anything in the least bit constructive or productive. Today there will be chocolate, naps, bad TV, J Crew online shopping and a temper tantrum or two in which I will grieve the Boston me that might have been.

The Boston me

2009-11-05T04:00:00.000-08:00

When I was 18 years old I went to a psychic. He wasn't the traditional gypsy looking psychic draped with shawls or coin based jewelry and he didn't even own a black cat or a crystal ball. I think he was a an engineer for Lockheed Martin or McDonnell Douglas or something like that and in his free time this middle aged man who wore plaid shirts and polyester pleated work pants did psychic readings in the den of his banal and boring beige track home in Bixby Knolls. I was referred by a friend who owned a boutique in Beverly Hills on Little Santa Monica. This woman went to lots of psychics, at least one a month. She was forever looking for a specific answer to the question "will my business survive" and "will I find love". I think of her every time I drive down Little Santa Monica and I see the chocolate shop where her off-beat boutique used to be and wonder what the answer to her second question was.

As soon as I sat down to hear what the aerospace intuitive had to say about my future I was filled with adolescent enthusiasm and almost complete certainty that this man was about to tell me my future. He said a lot of things, the reading was 90 minutes, but all I remember are two predictions that I have kept longer than my collection of concert tickets from events I went to in the 80's. I was, according to him, going to be a writer and live in Boston. I am not at all sure if I said anything to help him come to this conclusion or if he was just pulling stuff out of an orifice or if he did in fact have some New Agey capacity to see a future me writing in Boston.

It has been a week today since He-weasel turned in his application for a job transfer in Boston. For the last week I have been on pins and needles. I am waiting for the phone to ring. Every time He-weasel calls me from work and he has any kind of elevated tone to his voice I brace myself for the news that I have been waiting for, "I got the job in Boston." A week is not a long time to wait. We could be waiting several more weeks or longer to hear anything.

As I wait to hear I imagine a me that lives in Boston. It is a different me than lives in Valencia. The me that lives in Boston drinks more tea than coffee. I make lots of soups and stews involving fish and seafood that I purchase from a charming fishmonger named Sean McDonough whose family has had their fish shop for four generations. The Boston me has found an unexpected energy for running. I run for the pure joy if it. I get so good at it I consider running in the Boston Marathon. Writing goes really well for me in Boston. We have a home where I have an office that I actually use. Once in Boston my book is sold and it is so successful that I manage to get a part time teaching job in a prestigious writing department at a small liberal arts college. I maintain a small private practice in Cambridge, my practice is made up primarily of students from the universities. On weekends He-weasel, Lily and I travel through New England finding reasonably priced antiques that I later discover were grossly under-priced and if sold at a well publicized auction could finance the purchase of a small villa in France. We'll summer in Cape Cod and Lily will rub paws with the Kennedy dogs.

As you can see my Boston fantasies are not terribly inflated and are mostly in the realm of the possible. Okay, I will admit that it is somewhat unlikely that my practice would be made up exclusively of students or that a fishmonger's name would be Sean---and truth be told I could never give up coffee even if there was a very large tax on it.

I am sorry to do another Lily post (I promise it will be the last for a while)

2009-11-03T04:00:00.000-08:00

but yesterday Lily was given a oatmeal raisin cookie by a very well meaning person who had no idea that raisins are toxic to dogs. We rushed Lily to the vet and she was given an IV with a medicine to make her vomit. The vet found 17 raisins in her little stomach. If we had waited as long as three hours then my baby girl would have gone into acute kidney failure and died. Happily, she seems fine. Yesterday was a very long day and Lily and I are too tired to write or do anything today but rest.

So today I am doing a public service announcements for dogs everywhere. As few as three raisins or grapes can cause renal failure and death in dogs. Do not give your dog grapes, raisins, Macadamia nuts, avocados, chocolate, caffeine, yeast dough, onion, garlic, chives, or Xylitol. These foods can seriously hurt and even kill your dogs. Let everyone who is around your dog know about these no-no's.

Here is a link to the ASPCA and their list of people foods that are very dangerous to your pets.

I will be back to the blogosphere on Thursday. See you then. I am off to throw away my Raisin Bran and pet Lily.

Birthday Pawty!

2009-10-29T04:00:00.000-07:00

I am one of those people that if you didn't know me you might think I was a bit wackadoo in the degree to which I indulge my dog-aughter. No I do not paint her toenails, she does not have pierced ears and I do not push her in a stroller---but I do spoil her. And if you have been reading my blog for very long you know you why ( and if you don't then this might explain). It's just that Lily is more than a dog to me, Lily is my daughter. I am fully aware that I am sublimating my desire to be a parent with my furry child and that is why Lily has a life that is a little on the spoiled side---and it is a life that I wish many children had.

Lily only eats organic dog food and her diet is supplemented with organic fruits and vegetables. She looks forward to her nightly salad( she is a bit low brow in this department as she only likes iceberg lettuce) followed by a tablespoon of Ciao Bella's Sicilian Blood Orange Sorbet as a palate cleanser before her dinner. Lily only drinks water from the crystal blue waters of Fiji. There is no way I am giving my baby the nasty stuff from the tap. Her groomer is a groomer to the stars and she has an impressive wardrobe. I love Lily so much that I walk her for two miles before I have had my first cup of coffee( and that is more of a declaration of my love than anything else).

No matter what I am doing I take puppy play breaks in the day so I can have meaningful bonding moments with my baby girl. Speaking of her toys, she has a lot of them. And when I discover a toy is a favorite I immediately go back to the store and buy lots of back ups. I learned my lesson from the Mr. Bear fiasco. When Lily decapitated Mr. Bear and then looked at me filled with confusion and a crest fallen gaze that his head did not immediately grow back so she could do it again, I went to five different Petcos trying to find a Mr. Bear with a head on it. I could not. I felt so guilty that I even mentioned the Mr. Bear incident to Igor and he quickly turned it into something about my mother and her expectation of me filling her every loss. I reminded him that sometimes a Mr. Bear is just a Mr. Bear.

Lily even has her own Hungarian down comforter to which she has an unnatural and highly erotic affection for. I am working on not being shocked by my dog-aughter's emerging sexuality. I don't want to shame her for her natural feelings. Hey, I have seen the Vagina Monologues and when Lily is old enough I might even take her to see it if they ever had a mother/dog-aughter performance.

I am not one of those over indulging parents who says yes to whatever their child wants. I know the importance of limits and boundaries. Part of being a good puppy parent is to train them and I feel like I have done an exceptionally good job at training. If you ever meet Lily and me I will coerce you into asking to see all of Lily's tricks. You may at first be unimpressed by the idea but when you can see what she can do even the most disinterested person will be impressed by Lily's ability to sit, stay, lay down, shake paws, circle and dance. I may have mentioned it before, but it bears repeating, Lily is a genius.

This coming Sunday my Lily is turning one, yes she is a Scorpio (and that might explain her sexual proclivities with the down blanket. Scorpios are known for being highly sexual) and she will no longer be a puppy. It is traditional among human parents to have a party for their human children's birthday. I thought I would do the same for my dog-aughter, no reason to withhold a party for her just because she is not a featherless bi-ped(Plato's somewhat amusing definition of man). So we are holding a birthday pawty for our girl. I wish you could come!

We are having guests. I have ordered a birthday cake for her from Three Dog Bakery. I am getting her a steak from Bristol Farms for her special birthday meal. And He-weasel and I are making cupcakes decorated like Westhighland terriers for the human guests.

I am making a CD of Lily related music as a gift for the guests who are attending Lily's Pawty .
The play list includes:
Lilly by Pink Martini
Happy Birthday by Altered Images
God Only Knows by the Beach Boys( a song I sing to Lily a lot. She loves it. She also loves it when I sing "I can't smile without you" by Barry Mannilow to her).
Seasons of Love by Rent
How Much is that Doggy in the Window by Patty Page
Lilywhite by Cat Stevens
Puppy Love by Donny Osmand

Now I just have to decide what to get her for her birthday present. What do you get the dog who helped you heal the wound of infertility? What do you get for a Westie who gave you a reason to get out of bed in the morning during some really dark days? What do you get for a little white ball of unconditional love that healed your broken heart?

Picture of the cupcakes that I am going to attempt to make come from Simply Inspired. I hope mine turn out that good. I'll let you know.

Melange Monday

2009-10-24T14:31:00.000-07:00

1. One word, Boston. Please people, send good thoughts. Cross fingers, light candles, and invoke incantations. I am not just thinking of myself, it is all about Lily. She wants to go to Harvard. She is considering a dual major of International Relations and Bioethics and she also has a keen interest in the Classics.

2. Peter Thomas Roth Unwrinkle Peel Pads. LOVE-LOVE-LOVE these. Thank you, Stephanie, for telling me about them. I used them for the first time last night and my skin looks less ready for Halloween( i.e., less scary).

3. We got a new mattress this weekend to make room for a new dog, when the time is right. Unfortunately the time is not right. The in home date was a fiasco. Lily was, to say the least, not ready to commit. She liked Loki enough to date him. However she did not like him enough to share her toys, her house and most especially her Daddy. My gentle white angel turned into a ferocious bitch when Loki came to visit. After a while she calmed down and was less She-wolf warrior princess and managed begrudgingly some hospitality. She even let Loki have a bone as long as he promised to stay far away from her Daddy. But once Loki left she made it clear that she was not happy by leaving protest poops around the house. Lily's message was clear, "I am just not that into him."

I so wanted Loki to be the one. Only he wasn't. I knew it as soon as he walked in the door. Yet I tried to push past my intuition and follow my heart. However I am old enough to have learned the painful lesson of ignoring intuition. So I didn't. Happily Loki has a good home even though it is not ours. Lily is back to playing the field. She is being pursued by a Brussels Griffon named Thor who she is totally indifferent to.

4. A lip gloss that lasts. Maybelline Superstay Gloss that I found out about from A Femme d'Certain Age. I know! I am usually more of a Chanel Glossimer girl but I am tired of glosses that come off two seconds after you apply them. This colour stays put for seven hours ( Maybelline claims 12 but I think that might be a little of an overstatement). I got Wine Shine and now that I know that it actually works I am going to pick up Radiant Ruby.

5. Today is the day when I start studying for test two of the BBS's Marriage and Family Therapist Clinical Vignette exam. I am making a chart( I am highly externally motivated) for which I get a star for each hour of study. At the end of each row I am giving myself a treat of some kind. Must decide on a motivating reward other than the joy of passing the second test. Suggestions?

6. Pumpkin pie flavored yogurt with Kashi Honey Flax Crunch. Who knew breakfast could be so autumnally delicious?

7. He-weasel and I are watching the Jonathan Creek mysteries and this is making me want to live in a windmill. He-weasel tells me I wouldn't actually enjoy living in a windmill. He says they are noisy. I don't care about reality, I am enjoying the fantasy. The actual fantasy is to be able to hire a fancy shmancy architect to make me a post-modern windmill to live in. I wonder if Frank Gehry,the Don Quixote of design, does pro bono work or is this just an impossible dream?

8. 45 minutes until the studying begins. That is dread that I feel. I was reading a message board on studying for the exam and someone suggested making studying fun. I am open to the idea only I can't come up with a way to make that happen. I am open to suggestions.

9. As I make my study plan I am realizing that part of the non-fun of studying is that during my six weeks of studying I am only going to be able to blog two days a week. I think I am going to, until I am done with this test, only blog on Tuesdays and Thursdays. When I am done with the test I am going back to the old schedule. Seriously, you bloggers with a job and kids, I don't know how you manage to keep up your blog; truly you amaze me! And I under amaze me with how little I can manage to juggle. I have no juggling skills. I throw one ball in the air and I am sure the next ball is going to hit me in the head and then everything comes crashing down and then I want to put all the balls down and take a nap.

10. Lucky me!!!! I got to spend yesterday with Enc. We lunched and did a little shopping. I saw a gorgeous sweater at JCrew that was a beautiful beige. I wished out loud that I could wear a colour like that. Enc told me I could. "Really? "Of course you can," Enc answered. I tried it on and as much as I loved the sweater I was so used to my self-imposed rule that I cannot pull off beige that when I tried it on it created a cognitive dissonance, "but I thought I couldn't". Turns out I was wrong. I wonder what other self imposed rules I am wrong about.

How I spent my four days away from the blogosphere

2009-10-23T00:55:00.000-07:00

I didn't mean for it to happen. I suppose one never does. It just snuck up on me and before I knew it there was nothing to do but surrender to it. It was exhaustion, the exhaustion that comes from studying for the California State Boards for the Marriage and Family Therapist licence. For the last three months when I wasn't blogging or working on the book I was studying for the boards. He-weasel and I have communicated only through flash cards for the last couple of months, "According to Gestalt therapist what is the most important therapeutic goal?" was how we said good morning. "If you have a client who is threatening suicide?" was our code for pass the salt. And the last thing we said before we feel asleep was him asking me to differentiate Structural and Strategic family therapy. Even Lily got involved in my test prep, or rather she protested how my constant studying affected her play time and she has eaten a few flash cards and a pre-test or two.

Last week was my final week of study and as I am prone to pretty severe test anxiety I compensated by over-studying, over-preparing and going through the 800 flash cards close to what felt like 800 times. When Wednesday came around and it was time for me to blog again I just couldn't do it. I was exhausted, the kind of exhausted in which when I was asked a possible test question my initial answer was "I don't f*ck*ng care". Friday I was even more exhausted and growing ever more nervous. Monday blogging was out of the question. Monday at 8:30 a.m. I had to be at the test center to take part one of the board exam. In four hours I had to answer 200 questions and I had to get at least 153 of them right to pass or I would have to take the test again( and I wouldn't be eligible to take it for three more months).

The pass rate of the test is not great. Only 69% of MFT candidates who take the exam pass it the first time round. When I went into sit for the test I was very confident but as I saw the test questions my confidence dropped to well below 69%. Halfway in I was SURE I had failed. I told myself that even if I didn't pass it would be okay and I would be okay and I could take it again. I prepared myself for sharing the bad news with my friends and family. I anticipated their warm condolences and assurances that I was brilliant and the test was stupid. I told myself to keep breathing and just keep answering the questions and soon it would be all over and I could go home and grieve my failure.

The 2 1/2 hours it took me to take the test were the longest I have ever known. Eventually I had answered all 200 questions and it was time to submit my test for scoring. I had to enter "E" three times and then type in "yes" to confirm that I was done with the test. As soon as I typed the "s" in "yes" I began to shake. Soon, I was sure, I would see the words "fail" on the screen. Instead of "fail" I saw a 15 question survey about the test center that I had to answer before the computer would score my test. To be honest at that moment I wasn't interested in giving constructive criticism about the test site, its cleanliness, or the directions I was given to the test center. I saw that #5 was an option on all the survey questions and I continued to enter number five until the survey was done and then I waited. I waited all of thirty seconds but it felt like 2 1/2 hours. Then I saw the words "PASS" on the screen. The computer told me to quietly leave the test center and to see the proctor. I still did not believe I passed. I asked the proctor if I had. She congratulated me. I had really passed. She gave me a document that told me I did. I have proof. Passing this test make me eligible to take the next test. One more test, if I pass it, and I will be a Marriage and Family Therapist in the state of California.

When I got home on Monday I was more exhausted than I had been when I had Mononucleosis. Yes, I let He-weasel take me out to dinner and fete me with champagne but after that I surrendered to my fatigue and I slept and I compensated and I slept some more. My rest is over and I am back to blogging and back to studying. "How would a object relations therapist treat depression in the mid-stage of therapy?" Oooh, I know that one. I think.

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Thanks to all of you who wrote to see if I was okay. Your thoughtfulness and kind concern means more to me than I can say. Thank you!!!!!!!!!!

#26-33 things that don't suck about L.A.

2009-10-12T04:00:00.000-07:00

26. It isn't Death Valley, California

27. Japanese strawberry cake
Truth be told I am not a big fan of cake, I prefer frosting. But if I am going to eat cake it is going to be the light, fluffy, delicious, cream and fruit filled Japanese strawberry cake from Sweetie's bakery in Gardena. Japanese strawberry cake is made of sponge cake, strawberries and whipped cream and you can get it with or without nuts. My preference is with nuts.

I have heard in Japan that this delicacy is considered a Christmas Cake called the Kurisumasu keeki. Really, we should take on this cake as a Yuletide tradition and dump the nasty, dry and inedible fruit cake and take a cue from our friends in the East.

It is not a beautiful cake and is nothing fancy, I admit. And I feel sure that Martha Stewart and the Ace of Cakes guy would be horrified by its lack of fondant and its very low brow presentation. I don't care. No matter how amazing a cake looks I can usually only get myself to eat the frosting. With this cake I could eat my piece and yours if you found it too frightening looking or if you were on a low carb diet or if you had left the table and were taking too long to get back. You can't say I didn't warn you.

28. The Disney Concert Hall
I love this building so much that when I lived in Chicago, the city known for its architecture, I would dream of this Los Angeles landmark. I have made special trips downtown just to see it. Without question it is my favorite building in Los Angeles. I think it is the building that has changed the energy of downtown L.A. To me the Disney Concert Hall is a kind of ship, and each time I see it I am transported to a place I have never been before. And for a building that stands still to be able to transport you---that is quite a special building.

If you come to visit me in L.A. I promise this is one of the places I will take you to, not necessarily to go to see a concert as I am not as interested in that as I am the brilliant building. If Frank Gehry didn't have this fantastic building in L.A. I would be much more miserable here. I love you Frank.

If you love Frank too I highly recommend the Sidney Pollock's documentary,"Sketches of Gehry". Here is a clip of the film in which Gehry talks about this magnificent building.

29. The Botox is cheaper
In Chicago I was paying $650. In L.A. I am paying only $250.

30. The coleslaw at the Original Pantry
As soon as you get seated at a table at the Pantry one of the waiters brings you a plate of coleslaw and a loaf of sourdough bread. I am VERY picky about coleslaw and the Pantry's slaw is not too sweet and too vinegary---it is just right. As much as I enjoy some good coleslaw I would never make a trip downtown just to go to the Original Pantry but if I am there already to go to the Museum of Contemporary Art or the Disney Concert Hall( these are the two reasons I go down town) then going to the Pantry is an obvious choice. The Original Pantry is an L.A. institution and is old timey and old school. The waiters are older men who are grumpy and will not abide special orders. It's cash only. There are very long lines. And those are just a few of the good parts of the Pantry experience. I don't really go there for the food, other than the coleslaw, it is just okay. It is more for the experience of being in a place in L.A. that has history. The Original Pantry opened in 1942 and in L.A. years that is ancient history. I also like the mix of people you see at the Pantry, it is one of the few places in L.A. where you will see business men in suits, Mexican families, Hollywood types, USC students, tourists and the very few that actually live in downtown L.A.

31. The parking lot attendant guy at Igor's
Did you ever see the movie "Under the Tuscan Sun"? You know the guy that brings flowers to a vase on the wall by Frances' villa? Everyday Frances tries to say hello to the man and everyday he ignores her and after a year or so she finally gets a hello from him. Well, I have my own "Under the Tuscan Sun" guy. He is the parking attendant at the two hour free park in Beverly Hills. Every time I saw him I was friendly. I said hello. I asked him how he was. I wished him a nice weekend. Each time he would ignore my overtures at friendliness. Last month I finally broke through and now I get a smile, a "hello" and when he is feeling very chipper he will wish me a nice day.

32. The light
Paris obviously( obvious to me) has the best light in the world. And there is something incredible about the light of a sunny yet freezing cold day in Chicago. As much as I hate to admit it L.A.'s light can be beautiful. On a clear day( not often), when the Santa Ana's ( which He-weasel tried unsuccessfully to convince me that Santa Ana means "Hot winds from the north") blow away the smog, there is a certain quality to the light that makes one understand what initially drew people to this place when it was nothing but a big traffic free orange grove.

33. The Real Postmodern Philosophers of the O.C.
Jacques Derrida and Jean-Francois Lyotard these two gods of postmodern philosophy could have stayed at the Sorbonne. They could have got teaching gigs at Harvard or Oxford or anywhere. They chose instead to come to the University of California at Irvine. Irvine? Have you been there? To my mind Irvine is the Valencia of Orange County. There are MPCs (master planned communities) everywhere with names like Portola Springs®,The Gated Oak Creek Community, and Crystal Park® and there are plenty of potential cast members for the Real Housewives of Orange County roaming the streets in their SUVs. That said, I am sure that there was plenty of post modern irony in Irvine to keep Jacques and Jean rolling in material. I wonder if Jacques and Jean ever ran into Vicki and Jeana at happy hour. That would make for some ironic post-modern fun. Bravo, are you listening? Pair two French academics in an Orange County beach house with two real housewives from the O.C. and let the fun, philosophical debate and irony begin. I feel sure there would be an episode where Vicki would take J&J to South Coast Plaza and try to talk them into some Ed Hardy clothing and some man-scaping at the Red Door Spa. If only I had come up with this idea for a reality show before Jacques and Jean died. I could have been rich!!!!!!!!

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Good news on the Kindle front, as of October 19th there will be a Kindle for those outside of the U.S. The international Kindle will be available for $279. Why do I tell you these glad tidings? Just in case you wanted to get a Kindle so you could subscribe to La Belette Rouge on it and thought you couldn't because you live in glamorous locals outside of the USA.

Lily's love

2009-10-09T04:00:00.000-07:00

I have mentioned in the past that my darling dog-aughter has a boyfriend ( and no, I am not talking about her unnatural and somewhat disturbing affection for the green blanket that always puts her into the mood for love). Lily's love at first sight romance is with a Yorkie-Schnauzer mix named Loki. The minute Lily and Loki set eyes on each other the ran towards each other as if in they were in a movie and the setting for their love story---time slowed down as they ran towards each other. We immediately fell for Loki too and were very happy about the match.

Their dates have always been chaperoned and limited to quick nuzzles and excited hugs. Over time the love between Lily and Loki grew and our love for Loki grew too. He-weasel and I would often say after a meet and great with Loki and his mother, that if anything ever happened that Loki's mother had to give up her beloved pup we would take him. We were aware at the time that was a strange thing to say as Loki's mother obviously loved him madly.

Wednesday night Lily, He-weasel and I were out walking when we saw Loki, who was strangely not with his mother but instead with the neighborhood dog walker. Well, a long story short, Loki's mom is not able to keep him and the dog walker is trying to find a good home for Lily's love. Reflexively He-weasel, Lily and I all said, "We'd be interested." Lily did not actually say it with words, rather she jumped up and down on her hind legs and made her happy bark.

Tonight at 6p.m. Loki is coming over for a house visit. We want to see how Lily reacts to having another puppy in her home. Our first commitment is to Lily and if for any reason she seems less than excited by the prospect of having Loki move in then we would of course respect her wishes. If tonight goes well we are going to see if Loki can come and stay with us for a few days before we make a life time commitment to the darling dog.

Our other concern is that we are in a very small condo, 750 sq. feet. We are concerned that two dogs and two humans in such a small place would be a very bad thing. So listen to this, I who has been anti-house commitment is so excited by this idea that I am calling a realtor to find us a house to rent( I am still far too commitment phobic to buy) and this time I think I am really serious. Besides needing a bigger house, we need a bigger bed as there is barely room in our bed for me, He-weasel and Lily.

I told Igor about all this. He seemed genuinely excited and he seems to think that Lily and Loki could turn out to be the parent's I always longed for. I found his assertion a little confusing. I thought I was the parent to Lily. He seems to think she is parenting me. He also was excited about the fact that L+L might get me to do what he couldn't, get me into a house. I'll let you know how it goes.

Happy bloggy birthday to me

2009-10-07T04:00:00.000-07:00

Statistics show that most blogs only make it two months before tossing in the towel. 1.09 million blogs have only one post and were abandoned after just one day. 1.63 million made it for 126 days. 132,000 blogs were abandoned after just one year.

I have had moments in which I thought I would be part of the grim blogger burn out statistics but I have beaten the odds. Today my blog is two years old or in statistical language La Belette Rouge is 720 days old. Yet in someways I feel like I have been blogging forever. So much has happened in the last two years that I feel like I have been blogging for years. For a 720 day old blog I think my blog is pretty mature and is not at all tantrumy or showing any behavior that indicates it has entered the terrible twos( if it does I promise to give it a time out and come back after it has learned to play nice with others).

I remember the very moment I began to blog as if it was just two weeks ago. I remember sitting on the sofa in our home in Lake Bluff and writing the very first post. The blog was going to be my place to talk about things that were important to me but that I had no place in my life to talk about, such as my love of France, skincare and shoes. My blog was going to be about daring to say the truth about what I liked and disliked---but it most certainly wasn't going to be about me. Well, that plan didn't work out. Two months in and I was spilling my guts and telling you everything I thought I would never say. When the last IVF failed I lost my mind and started writing about me in spite of myself. What gave me the courage to be so bold? I suppose having a nom de plume and being hopped on inhuman levels of progesterone helped.

The summer before I started blogging I decided that since I wasn't writing because of a complete lack of discipline I would give up the identity of "writer". If I wasn't writing and/or publishing how could I continue to claim that identity? I was a writer no more. I hadn't published anything for years and I needed to just be honest with myself about it. There was no ceremony in which I was defrocked or had my Mont Blanc pen taken away but there was a stripping of the identifier of writer from my self concept that was equally humiliating.

So when I started blogging I swear to you that I never had any hopes of really "writing"again. I had no secret hopes of becoming the next Petite Anglaise. The thought never entered my mind until I started writing everyday and strangely I started liking to write again. I somehow magically, via blogging, developed the discipline around writing I never had before. Blogging gave me what countless writing classes and books on writing couldn't give me. The daily practice of blogging gave me the discipline to write everyday even if I didn't feel like it and even if I seemingly had nothing to say. The development of discipline may not sound like a big deal but to me it was akin to a magical and miraculous miracle.

I never imagined when I started blogging all that it would give me---the lovely friends I have made, the community I feel a part of, lovely Lily, and so much more. http://labeletterouge.blogspot.com has been a home to me when I felt homeless and you all gave me a sense of continuity in times when I felt utterly destabilized. No matter if I was sitting on the white Ikea couch we had in Lake Bluff or the brown leather sofa in Austin, Texas or the microfiber Crate and Barrel couch in Valencia--- Leah, WendyB, Randal, Shallow Coffee and so many other were there with me through it all. I am grateful to you all for sticking around---no matter when you got here.

Every time I have had a bout of blogger burn out I think about how much I would miss you all if I quit. I am reminded of how much you add to my life and how much blogging has changed my life for the better and I am ready to blog again. Over the two years my blog, topic, location, pet ( went from adored cat to adored dog), and other things have changed---and I have changed as a result of blogging. I look forward to another year of blogging and to see what happens in year three. From what I read it is likely I will be more "cooperative and capable". I will exude confidence and feel more at ease. I "may have setbacks, but for the most part, 3-year-olds are friendly, talkative and downright helpful. Oh, and yes, they want to see and do everything." Does that mean I will travel more this year? That would be nice. My "speech should be clear enough to be understood by strangers" and I "should have a speaking repertoire of at least 300 words" and using my "burgeoning vocabulary to speak in sentences of up to six words long." Watch out Proust, here I come.

Please, even if you are a lurker and NEVER-EVER comment, please leave a comment today to help me celebrate my blog birthday and let me know you are there. Actually seeing you say hello in the comments is one of the best parts of blogging. Thanks again for everything! I make bye-bye now( that is me being two).

Having a baby changes everything

2009-10-05T04:00:00.000-07:00

Last week happiness and women seemed to be a very hot topic. I wrote about my newfound happy and Sallymandy wrote a very thoughtful post, "Why women are unhappy" in which she quotes two of my favorite saucy redhead writers, who I feel sure are both pretty happy women, write about happiness and how women are generally not as happy as they used to be. Saucy redhead # 1, Arianna Huffington, wrote, The Sad, Shocking Truth About How Women Are Feeling and Maureen Dowd, saucy redhead #2 wrote “Blue is the New Black” . Both articles are fascinating and worth reading even though I am feeling uncharacteristically happy and was slightly worry that Huffington and Dowd might impinge on my hedonia. They didn't. Rather in reading why women are feeling so unhappy I was left feeling very happy to have a He-weasel husband who shares the housework and that I, unlike the women that Huffington and Dowd write about, feel like I have lots of choices, freedom and time to pursue what I want.

As one who has had a long term case of the baby blues, I was especially struck by this quote in "Blue is the new black": “Across the happiness data, the one thing in life that will make you less happy is having children,” said Betsey Stevenson, an assistant professor at Wharton College who co-wrote a paper called “The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness.”

Really? Can it be true? Sure, I have heard this research before but I was always unhappy when I heard it and dismissed it as statistics can be manipulated and I try to be cautious about who was producing the studies and what their motives were. I was much more influenced by the irrefutable hard science of Johnson and Johnson's ad campaign that "having a baby changes everything" and/or Faith Hill's lyrics.

Dowd's article, and Stevenson's quote in particular, got me to Googling to find more on the impact of those who talk goo-goo-ga-ga on glee and I found an article in Newsweek,by Lorraine Ali, "Does having children make you happy?". Ali writes about the childless couple on her childhood street:

"When I was growing up, our former neighbors, whom we'll call the Sloans, were the only couple on the block without kids. It wasn't that they couldn't have children; according to Mr. Sloan, they just chose not to. All the other parents, including mine, thought it was odd—even tragic. So any bad luck that befell the Sloans—the egging of their house one Halloween; the landslide that sent their pool careering to the street below—was somehow attributed to that fateful decision they'd made so many years before. "Well," the other adults would say, "you know they never did have kids."

All through infertility treatment, each time we would fail to become pregnant, I would think of that couple. No, not the Sloans. I had my own version of the Sloans. Lynne and Lenny; Mirjam and Paul; He-weasel's Aunt and Uncle. They were all that sad couple, that sad childless couple with no children that I pitied. They were the couple I didn't want us to be. I wanted to be the couple with the house filled with kids, bikes on the lawn, and a tree house in the yard. We would not be the couple who spends holidays at others homes---we would have a family, or so I thought.

Lorraine Ali continues: "Each time I visited the Sloans, I'd search for signs of insanity, misery or even regret in their superclean home, yet I never seemed to find any. From what I could tell, the Sloans were happy, maybe even happier than my parents, despite the fact that they were (whisper) childless." It is this and the research that makes Ali conclude that having children does not lead to happiness; the statisticians agree with her:

Daniel Gilbert, the Harvard professor of psychology and the author of "Stumbling on Happiness," claims that marital satisfaction decreases dramatically after the birth of the first child. The happiness rate, according to Gilbert, increases only when the last child has left home.
Gilbert claims that studies show that parents are happier when eating, exercising, shopping, napping, or watching television than when they are spending time with their children. Arthur C. Brooks, the author of "Gross National Happiness" reports that parents of children are nearly seven percentage points less likely to be happy than their childless counterparts.
Robin Simon, a sociology professor at Florida State University, finds that "Parents experience lower levels of emotional well-being, less frequent positive emotions and more frequent negative emotions than their childless peers."
The National Survey of Families and Households done in 2005 looked at data gathered from 13,000 Americans, concluded, according to Simon, "No group of parents—married, single, step or even empty nest—reported significantly greater emotional well-being than people who never had children. It's such a counter-intuitive finding because we have these cultural beliefs that children are the key to happiness and a healthy life, and they're not."
According to the National Marriage Project's 2006 "State of Our Unions", parents have significantly lower marital satisfaction than non parents because they experienced more single and child-free years than previous generations.

I share all these statistics not to make the argument that my new found happiness is caused by my childlessness, especially as for so long I have been very unhappy just because we couldn't have kids. Truly, if I could, I would give happiness in order to have the "unhappiness" that comes from having children. Lorraine Ali concludes her article by saying that even if having children doesn't make you happy, "Parents still report feeling a greater sense of purpose and meaning in their lives than those who've never had kids." Purpose and meaning, at least for me, are a better and more noble pursuit than happiness. Don't get me wrong, happiness doesn't suck. I am grateful for the happiness I have and all the freedom, choice and sleep I have. I really am. And even though I am happy, I do ache knowing I will never know how having a baby changes everything.

La Belette Rouge blog on Amazon.com

2009-10-02T04:00:00.000-07:00

For years I dreamed of having my writing for sale on Amazon.com. My dream has come true. I am on Amazon.com. No, it's not my book, "Thursdays with Igor"( not yet), it is my blog. For 99 cents a month you can get La Belette Rouge Blog delivered right to your Kindle.

Why would someone want to read their blogs on Kindle? According to Amazon.com "Kindle blogs are fully downloaded onto your Kindle so you can read them even when you're not wirelessly connected. And unlike RSS readers which often only provide headlines, blogs on Kindle give you full text content and images, and are updated wirelessly throughout the day." Pretty cool, huh?

If you have Kindle I would obviously love-love-love it if you would subscribe. Or, maybe you want to join Lily and me in the happy dance ? That would be great and I assure you that our dance routines require no talent. We are very low on choreography and high on freedom of expression. Something like this ....

Happy weekend!!!

Give a hoot and tell me, does this make me a Hooters girl?

2009-10-01T04:00:00.000-07:00

Not sure how it happened, but I, a weasel, have fallen hard for owls. I have a feeling that in the natural world owls and weasels might not be the best of friends. But as I am a metaphoric weasel and not a literal one, I feel sure that wearing an owl does not infer any self-destructive impulses.

I however have some concerns about following my heart and not my head on my present state of hootophilia.
First, I have a hard and fast rule about never wearing sweaters with appliqués as it is a slippery slope from appliqué sweaters to Christmas sweaters. That said, when I was perusing Kate Spade's new clothing collection and I saw this Beacon Hill Graphic Cashmere Sweater. My eyes got big. My head went in circles. I hooted wildly and I started to have a craving for field mice.

Owl's are wise and, I am sure, infer the wearer of any owl item with their above average I.Q. I feel sure if I get this sweater my I.Q. will go way up. I will understand economics, the meaning of life, higher math and finally understand what it is that people love about the Sound of Music.

Yet, I worry this sweater might be indirectly giving a hoot to Hooters. I wouldn't want to send a subliminal message of any kind to indicate that I have ever even been in a Hooters.

The brilliant, lovely, and wiser than even the brightest barn owl, Enc, shares my love of Kate Spade's owls. She introduced me to the Sherwood coin purse. This coin purse might make more sense than the sweater if I am afraid of wearing my owl love on my chest. Besides being stealthy and not in anyway making one wonder if I have secret ambitions of wearing orange shorts and working happy hour, Sherwood the owl makes saving pennies fun.

That said, I am still wanting the sweater. Hoot once for yes and twice for no.

Just FYI: Owls do more than wise things and/or sell hot wings at sports bars. One of my favorite old school owls is Woodsy. I even had a stuffed animal owl back in the 70's who I named for the environmentally friendly bird. "In the city or in the woods, help keep Belette from looking like she works at a sports bar." I think that is how the song goes. Click play on the video and hear for yourself.

Compensation and why Carl Jung might have watched Keeping up with the Kardashians too

2009-09-29T04:00:00.000-07:00

Swiss psychoanalyst, C. G. Jung believed that the psyche contained a self-regulatory tendency. He called this function of the psyche "compensation". When one becomes too one-sided in their attitude or energy, the psyche in an attempt at establishing balance will induce an opposite or balancing action or attitude. For example, let's say there was a weasel who was spending all her time writing a book and a proposal and when she wasn't doing those things she blogged. After weeks and weeks of doing little other than studying and writing, this weasel woke one day, Monday for example, and could not bring herself to even touch her computer. She spent eight full hours on the couch wrapped in a down blanket and silently and thoughtlessly and happily sat through three episodes of the House-husbands of Hollywood and two episodes of the Kardashians---and accomplished nothing else of any intellectual or creative importance.

If one didn't know about Jung's concept of compensation one might worry that such a fictional weasel might have lost her mind. Thanks to Jung we know that if such a thing were to occur it would be the psyche's attempt to compensate from an imbalance of too much thought. The psyche is wise and knows that no thought is possible when watching the Kardashians, other than the stray thoughts about Bruce Jenner's unusual and somewhat effeminate appearance.

One hopes that with this kind of extreme compensation that such a weasel would quickly get back to homeostasis and step away from the Househusbands of Hollywood and quickly get back to her computer and creative work. If such a weasel were able to write a blog post about such an experience it would be a sign that a corrective compensation has occurred and that said weasel was getting back to normal, hypothetically.

Tooting my own horn, drinking champagne and He-weasel and Lily do a Paw-de-Two

2009-09-25T04:00:00.000-07:00

I am, as one would be in my shoes, a little hesitant to discuss my happiness. My fear, because of my history, both recent and ancient, makes my hypervigilant about not saying in too loud of voice that I am happy as I fear as soon as I say it my happiness will be taken from me. It has happened. My mother is especially gifted at taking any good thing that happens to me and turn it into an occasion of grief. She will remind me how short lived happiness is and that this good thing isn't as good as it could be and that in fact it really isn't that good anyways. Or, if she is in a different kind of mood she will envy the good thing and ask how it can benefit her. Either way the happiness is taken and I am left feeling worse than I did before the good thing arrived.

There have been other happinesses that have been taken from me by no fault of my own and no fault of my mother. Fate, dumb luck, or bad luck have on occasion taken the happy out of my hands before I had time to even notice that I was happy. Not this time.

Thanks to Igor and to my hard work, I have somehow moved from sort of happy, mildly hedonic and happy-ish into full blown happy. I only came to that conclusion yesterday when in my session with Igor I did a little review of my accomplishments in our almost one year together and I felt truly proud of myself. I had survived a year in L.A. I am no longer depressed. I am no longer on Vitamin W. I have managed to end friendships with bird friends. I have established healthy boundaries with my mother. I have completed two book proposals. I just finished Chapter One of Thursdays with Igor. Chapter Two is almost finished. By next week the proposal for Thursday with Igor will be ready to submit. After I shared all my successes with Igor I felt strangely self-satisfied, "That's a lot for a year" I said in an uncharacteristic tone of glee. Igor agreed in a tone that communicated that he too was celebrating my success and his.

I left Igor's office floating on Cloud Seven( only two clouds away from 9) and thought the strangest thing, "I am living in Valencia and I am happy." If that doesn't sound like a huge accomplishment to you that means you have never been in Valencia. As I drove home I thought of even more things I have accomplished this year: I have the best hair I have ever had ( thank you, Hair Angel). I got my darling dog-aughter. I have trained her to do many amazing and impressive tricks. I managed to maintain the blog during some really difficult times. My joy grew to the point that I realized a celebration was in order.

I stopped at Whole Foods and bought a bottle of champagne, two ridiculously expensive steaks and I came home and made a cake. I felt so good that I even wanted to work out. Weird, huh? I wish you were here to celebrate as I know that you, dear reader, have played a large part in all of this. I feel sure I wouldn't have managed all of this without you. Thank you for your support, encouragement, and for being here. Your presence makes a difference in my life and for that I thank you. Since I can't give you any cake or champagne I give you Lily.

In your honour Lily does her celebratory dance of joy. Care to join her?

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Someone's been sitting in my chair

2009-09-23T04:00:00.000-07:00

Last week there was a mix up about my regular time. It wasn't Igor's fault. The fault was mine. I arrived 50 minutes early. Well, it would have been only one minute early if I hadn't messed things up as I did with getting the time wrong. I walked into Igor's waiting room and there was this girl. Girl? Well, she is young--younger than me; much younger than me. I am guessing she is in college. 20's. Maybe mid-20's? I don't know. But I know that she is beautiful, really beautiful, the kind of Persian beauty that makes me wish my blue eyes were brown.

She sat on the sofa, a place I have never sat. I stood there for a moment dumbfounded to find someone else in the office. I just stood there. I stood there a little too long, actually. But I suppose shock does make people do strange things. I couldn't go on standing there. I had to do or say something. So I asked, "Is your appointment at 12:00 or 12:50?".
"12:00" she answered flatly.
I think I said "oh" and then I turned to walk out the door a bit flumoxed by seeing someone in my time and space.

I know I had given up this time. It was my choice to do so. But now that she had it I felt a twinge of something. It wasn't jealousy or anger or anything like that. Sadness is as close as I can come to naming it and yet there is something under the sadness.I don't really have siblings ( very long story) but I imagine that whatever it was that it was nothing like sibling rivalry. I realize Igor is not mine. I share him with a case load of other's who also have Igor for an hour a week. I am really okay with that. I don't need him or want him to myself. Even though I am technically an only child I do share well with others( except the remote control and the last Skinny Cow in the fridge).

I went off to get a manicure and tried not to give any thought to this young girl having my place and time. I kept my eye on the clock as fifty minutes go very fast when you are getting your nails done and not so fast when you are at Igor's.

As my nails were being filed I developed a whole fantasy about this girl. She lives in a high-rise on Wilshire Blvd. with her parents. She attends UCLA and is in a sorority. She models occasionally but really wants to be a pediatrician. She is the oldest child of three siblings. Her father is an antiques dealer and has a small but successful gallery on Little Santa Monica. Her mother is more like a best friend than a mother. She is very over protected by both parents and she likes it and yet rebels about it in an age appropriate manor. She is dating a guy in law school who wants to marry her. This is one of her problems she brings to Igor, every guy she meets wants to marry her. Up until now her parents have been very against her dating seriously. But her parent's really like the boy and think she should marry him. She really likes him, maybe loves him, but if she marries him she knows she will never go to medical school. She is sad---this pretty, smart and beloved girl---or so she is in my fantasy of her.

Now here is the really strange thing, not once did I think to myself, "I bet Igor likes her more than he likes me" and there was a time in my life, thanks to my father, that thought thought would have immediately come to mind. Even after I created this elaborate fantasy in which the girl is younger, prettier( so pretty she models), is adored by her father (unlike me) and all men, smart enough to get into medical school( my SAT math scores couldn't get me into a nursing assistant vocational school) and yet never have I ever feel more certain that Igor enjoys our time together and that he really likes me and thinks I am smart and funny.

The even stranger thing is that for all "her" beauty, potential, love, and father adoration, I wouldn't trade with her. Yes, being adored by your father and so beautiful you can model and so smart you can go to medical school and being a size two and being an exotic Persian beauty with no need for Botox has its up sides. But, really and truly I wouldn't trade with her. For all my imperfection I kind of like where I am in my life. How did that happen? How did Igor do that? How did I get to the place of not wanting to be her and being happy-ish with being me?

When I left my session with Igor I felt especially happy--ish and hedonic but then my thoughts went back to the girl who had my 12:00 time and the fantasy that I constructed and that strange sadness returned.

This week I will be on time.

Belette malade

2009-09-21T04:00:00.000-07:00

Friday night, when He-weasel and I were out walking Lily, I started to get weak, dizzy, chilled, achy, nauseous and I had completely lost my appetite for the dinner I made before we left for our walk. Two hours later and I knew all my weekend plans were going to have to be replaced with a treatment plan.

My weekend wardrobe( an essential element in my treatment plan)has been this healing hoodie and immune system boosting lounging pants( I highly recommend both. I love the pants so much that I am ordering three more pairs, as they are now my favorite PJ pant of all time, and I will also be getting a few more of the fantastic light weight hoodie---LOVE them both!). I also had on my favorite pair of the World's Softest Socks that Lily usually loves to chew on. However, Lily seeing that I was sick let me wear the socks for the whole weekend without once trying to turn them into a chew toy.

My activities have been limited to moaning about feeling like crap, sleeping and watching TV. In the last 48 hours I have watched more television than I have watched all month. I am not sure if it was the specific shows I watched that helped me heal but just in case I though I would share the details:
3 episodes of Poirot
1/2 of the Sex and the City movie( I couldn't bear to watch the whole thing)
Trinny and Susannah (I wish Trinny would reveal where she gets her necklaces. She has the best costume jewelry wardrobe).
Little Children.(Great acting but sad, depressing and creepy)
A Very Long Engagement (Love this movie!)
2 episodes of Inspector Lewis(My new favorite mystery)
2 episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm(I am so happy it is back on!)

I am feeling much better. One more day of pajamas, Gatorade, bad TV and rest and I should be back in the pink. Or should that be red? Either way I am taking today off. I should be back to your blog and back to being Belette Rouge, and no longer Belette malade, by Wednesday.

Why I am happy-ish, hedonic and not unhappy

2009-09-18T04:00:00.000-07:00

1. "Thursdays with Igor" is going well. My new chapter one is done-ish. I am hoping this weekend to move from done-ish into done. Please send good mojo. I am not sure I believe in mojo but there are times in life when you are so aware of your own limitations that it is best to ask others for help.

2. I received in the mail a DVD of Spalding Grey's Monster in a Box. I have a VHS of it in our storage unit but as it is back to being 100 degrees in Valencia I didn't have the physical and emotional strength to hunt for Spalding in a Box( Get it? In a box!!!!:-). Monster in a Box is one of my favorite films on writing and I am using this DVD as a reward for when I actually move from done-ish to done with chapter one. If any of you have not seen Spalding's monlogues, I suggest you see all of them immediately. He was a tremendous talent and I continue to grieve his loss.

3. Igor was especially on yesterday. There was no crying, profound insights, or unlocking of buried unconscious content. All he did was normalize introversion and for me that is something I need this to be done on a regular basis, kind of like an oil change. Every 1500 miles I need someone to remind me that I am not a freak for hating parties. It's just that the U.S. culture is so extroverted that us book loving introverts can be made to feel like we are freaks for not wanting to go out, go to parties or make small talk (Tell me, are there people who love small talk? I judge not, I just want to know).

As it turns out Igor is an introvert too. He didn't say that he was, rather he shared a story in which the obvious subtext was that he too suffers when in large groups and when real connection is not possible. It was a comfort to hear that I am not alone in my inability to enjoy parties.

Igor also spent some of the session talking about the importance of me preparing for when I go on book tours. He advised that I use every extroverted activity( groups where more than four or more meet) as a practice session for my book events. What I loved about this was not his brilliant idea of using BBQ's of obligation as a practice session for when I am traveling and promoting the book, no, what I loved is that he seems to be certain that I will sell the book. He really and truly believes that one day I will be on a book tour. I love Igor!

4. I have been having really good hair days lately. I want to give credit to Jonathan's Hydrating Mask and yet I feel that it may just be dumb luck. If I am wrong, and it turns out that it is Jonathan who should get the credit, I'll let you know.

5. I had the best manicure of my life yesterday in Beverly Hills. It wasn't that it was especially luxurious---there were no rose petals, orchid water, massages, or glasses of champagne to sip on as I waited( yes, I have had that manicure). It was just that this manicurist managed to make my nails look really good. Before meeting my nails best friend, Kitty, I thought I just had funky nail beds and that I was incapable of getting the shape I wanted. It turns out that my nails are perfectly capable of a good shape when placed in the right hands. Kitty is such a brilliant manicurist that she even picked out a nail colour that she though would best work with my nail bed. I had never heard of that before. My nails look so good that I cannot stop looking at them. I even have asked He-weasel to admire them at least five times. He is being a good sport and continuing to tell me how great they look. I fear if I ask again today he may grow weary.

Good hair, good Igor, and good nails. Can life get better than this? I dare not dream.

6. For the last couple of months I have been pretty much devoid of retail desires. I am not sure if it was depression or I just don't need anything or if I was too busy to think about stuff or that lately J Crew has been too ruffly to make me want. Yesterday all that changed. Thanks to LPC at Privilege, I want these J Crew pencil skirts!!! Never before in my life have I wanted a peacock blue or orchid skirt. I do know that it is psychologically significant that I want these skirts. I would say that they reflect my current state of happy-ish-ness.Who am I and what happened to the me that had only black skirts??? As I have never owned these colors before I have no idea what to wear with them. Advice, please!

7. I finally got Lily her tutu. Pictures soon to come.

8. Starting in late October I am going to be spending every Wednesday in Santa Barbara. I love Santa Barbara and cannot wait to begin this weekly getaway. More news to come on this. For now all I can say is that I am pretty sure that my time in SB will help me deal with the other six days a week in Valencia.

9. I made Randal scream in silent terror. Trust me, it was all in good fun.

10. Lucky me, I am seeing ENC tomorrow. There will be shopping, lunching, and delightful conversation.

Please share something you are happy about. I'd love to share in your happy. I hope your weekend is highly hedonic and happy filled.

#19-25 of 365 things that don't suck about L.A.

2009-09-16T04:00:00.002-07:00

19. Roscoes chicken and waffles
A town cannot be all bad that has a restaurant where you can get waffles and chicken on the same plate. I am sure that to many of the uninitiated this combination sounds disgusting. Let me assure you that it is not. And yes, the syrup does indeed go on the chicken.

20. Lake Shrine Temple in Pacific Palisades

The first time I ever went to Lake Shrine was on a field trip in the 5th grade. It was the kind of field trip that is completely devoid of an educational merit but it was a decent day walking around the gardens and it was a relief to get out of Mrs. Grumpypants classroom. As I went to parochial school I don't think we were told that Lake Shrine was built to honour Paramahansa Yogananda the author of Autobiography of a Yogi. I think Mrs. Grumpypants focused on the botany of the place and ignored the theology.

It was years before I went back to Lake Shrine and it was in my seeker phase when I was trying to find insight, enlightenment, and a great job all in an afternoon. I thought maybe a two hour trip to Lake Shrine might change my karma and turn my life around. I didn't find what I was looking for but I did find beautiful gardens---and the fish, swans, turtles, windmill, are nice too.

I like all of the beauty of Lake Shrine but I am not a big fan of the woo-woo and there is plenty of woo-woo to be had if you look in the right place. I had a friend who was a member of the temple at Lake Shrine and she had a priest who lives there tell her that leprechauns and fairies frequent the place. He literally believed they were there in the garden. I have been to Lake Shrine and I have yet to see any mythical creatures coveting among the gardens. You aren't likely to see any either but you might run into celebreties. I have heard that it is a favorite place for many celebrity moms to take their kids to feed the swans.

It's free, beautiful and better than a day at the beach( less noise, less kids and less chance of getting sun burnt).

21. Lily will be in a parade
I can take Lily to the worlds largest Halloween dog parade, "The Haute-dog Howl-oween parade" located in Long Beach, CA( a suburb of L.A.). There will be pictures and videos of Lily's first parade but until then here is a video of the 2008 parade.

22.Casas Fantisticos y Romanticos
Spanish style architecture that can be found in the L.A. area( only not in Valencia. Valencia doesn't have architecture. We have master-planned communities). California Romantica is a gorgeous book by Diane Keaton that beautifully illustrates her love for California architecture; Casa California by Elizabeth McMillion gives a tour of Spanish architecture up and down the coast. I would love to have almost any of the houses in these two beautiful books, I just would prefer if the house happened to be in Santa Barbara instead of Los Angeles.

23. Diane Keaton lives in L.A. and maintains a style, sophistication and joie de vivre that would seem to be more at home in NY, Paris or London. But, I suppose if I could afford a Spanish mansion in Beverly Hills I might be somewhat happier about being here. On a side note, many moons ago, I had a short-term boyfriend who told me that the way I talked reminded him of Diane Keaton. I think I dated him longer than I should have just so I could pretend for a moment more that I was Diane and he was Warren Beatty. Truth be told he was more like Woody Allen. "La-de-dah, la-de-dah!"

24. Andersen's Split Pea Soup
I only like the vegetarian kind and not for health reasons but because I don't like the kind with bacon and I don't like the split pea soup that they serve at the Anderson restaurants as it just tastes different, maybe the can adds to the flavor). It is my favorite canned soup of all time and a definite comfort food. I always have at least six cans on hand just in case of an earthquake, an apocalypse, or worse, in case Andersen quit making my favorite soup. Since moving back to L.A. I have learned that I could have bought the soup mail order ( or you can get a case from Amazon.com for $32.99) and I didn't need to have friends and family send me cases of the stuff.

25. King's Hawaiian Bread
My favorite accompaniment to the Swedish soup is King's Hawaiian bread, the two pair perfectly together. King's Hawaiian Bread is a actually a Portuguese sweetbread which is made here. I rarely indulge in the bread as it is almost as sweet as a donut and is a white bread with no redeeming health benefits, but it is delicious and even more delicious with the soup.

Note about this series: The farther I get along in numbers the harder I am working at this. I just want you to know that it is back breaking and soul straining work---- that often requires naps and chocolate just to recover from---for me to come up with things that don't suck about L.A. I may make it look like it's easy but that is because you don't see me doing( it is kind of like sausage making in that way). So just because I am amassing a significant list of things that don't suck about L.A. doesn't mean that "I love L.A." is in on my I-Pod. 25 down and 340 things to go.

Charmed I'm sure

2009-09-14T04:00:00.000-07:00

There is a magical, seductive and almost mystical power to a charmer. A real charmer can charm the pants off of someone who had fully intended to keep their pants on. Charm is what Cary Grant had. It is a quality of sparkling attractiveness and attentiveness that bubbles like champagne. Prince Charming has oodles of charm, or so people who have made his acquaintance say. A charming individual makes everyone he or she meets feel special, interesting, and appreciated. Wearing a charm protects the wearer and adds to the wearers good fortune, and perhaps even makes them more charming---and you can never have too much charm.

This post will not tell you how to be charming, but if you want to up your charm click here, or stay right here as I am going to share with you some of my favorite charmers.

Charming Book

Charmed Bracelets by Tracey Zabar is a charming book for those charmed by charm bracelets. Tracey is an expert on the subject. She is an avid collector and a fantastic charm bracelet designer. She has designed charm bracelets for Kate Spade and for Barney's New York. This is a fantastic book and is a must have for any charm bracelet junkie. I definitely cannot get enough charm in my life. I have five J Crew charm bracelets, my mothers and a few new ones( that you will read about below). Tracey gave me some wonderful ideas for starting theme bracelets and her book has me cruising the web for a few charmers to pine for.

This bracelet(pictured) is loaded with charm. I would love Santa Weasel to get it for me for Christmas( are you listening He-weasel?).

It is the Francisca Botelho Charm Bracelet at Barneys New York, and it was $5750. Yes, it is wildly expensive and was so charming that it sold out and is no longer available. But, you never know unless you ask.

But this is the one I really, really, really want and it it is much cheaper than the Botelho one---and it may seem less charming. However, simplicity can be incredibly charming.

Charming Music

Charming Friends

Imogen of Inside Out Style gave me this beautiful butterfly charm on the day we met. Thanks to lovely Imogen I have a reminder of our friendship and our meeting. I was deeply touched by this lovely and charming gift of friendship.

My lovely and generous friend, KT of KT Sassy's Blog read my post about wanting to make a charm bracelet for the daughter I would have had, if I had one, and what did she do? She sent me this charm bracelet with my dog-aughter on it and an aquamarine gemstone which is my birth stone. When I received it I cried as it felt like the fulfillment of a wish. I took it to Igor for him to see(he knows how highly symbolic charm bracelets are for me).

My dear friend, Kirie, the author of Three Little Chickies, knows of my big love of charm bracelets and she made me this gorgeous one. This highly customized bracelet reads like a symbolic biography. Here is a map and the meaning of the bracelet that Kirie wrote for me:
The owl: Athena
The eye chart: Because you see things so well
The book: Your future
The tickets: Your pass to the kingdom
Fleur de lys: Vive la France
Paw: Lily, sweet Lily
Purse and shoes: Who could resist?
The blank: You can write your own way, the open page
The key: To open your dreams
The pi, with aquamarine: Because it's for you.
The Tour Eiffel: Encore, Paris
The hearts: One open, one solid; because you are loved and love.

Beyond a gift of a bracelet, this bracelet is a huge of gift of friendship. When I look at this bracelet and each charm I am reminded how lucky I am to have a friend like Kirie who knows me so well. This is not just a bracelet this is my life, my hopes, my loves and my wishes. Words cannot say how much I treasure this very thoughtful gift. I will tell you that since I have received this bracelet my life has felt much more charmed and that is a huge gift.

BIG Igor news

2009-09-11T04:00:00.000-07:00

For those of you new to my blog you may not know but I often write about my "Thursdays with Igor". Igor is my Beverly Hills psychoanalyst who, as the title suggests, I see every Thursday. I have written about Igor ever since I started seeing him in November and it wasn't until late spring that I even mentioned my blog to him. What took me so long? Well, the truth is that I thought he might not approve of blogging and have some judgment about it. I thought he might give some non-verbal tic that might make me feel like I should shut down the blog and only do "serious writing"( whatever that is). Yes, I have a father complex and a raging Super-Ego that has lots of rules about legitimacy and only doing x if Daddy approves of it. Even with my fears and doubts it felt like it was important that Igor know about my blog because it is such a big part of my life. Yet I couldn't take the risk.

After much rumination and even blogging about it I finally told Igor that I had a blog. I think I said it fast and quickly, the verbal equivalent of ripping off a Band-aid. Once the words were out I waited for him to say something. However, I got very little reaction from him. He seemed somewhat indifferent to the news and I got the same reaction from him as if I had told him I had eaten mashed potatoes the night before. I thought maybe he didn't get what blogging was as Igor is not up on trends and he knows practically nothing about popular cultural. He had never even heard of Sesame Street or Sex in the City before meeting me. I once spent a segment of a session explaining to him the characters on Sesame Street and answering his question, "No, Sesame Street is not at all like The Simpsons". How does one manage not to know who Big Bird or Sarah Jessica Parker are and that Homer and Elmo have nothing in common? What kind of cave must my Igor live in? Clearly a cave without cable.

Once I came out of the blog closet I would occasionally tell him about the blog in session when the time seemed right. I would tell him little bits and pieces about the blog as it made sense to do so. I told him all about the series,"Home is where the guest blogger post is" which he was very interested in, so much so that he suggested that it would make a fantastic book. I've told him about blogging friends I've made and about all the support and community I experience on the blog and unbeknownst to him I have brought you all in with me for a session or two. I tell him all kinds of things about the blog except that I blog about him. That was the one thing I was still afraid to say.

Igor has never seen my blog. He has never asked for the url. And, to this day, he doesn't know the name of my blog and that is just fine by me. He could, if he was really interested in finding my blog he could faster than you can say Freud. With just a a few good search terms that I use frequently in our session, words like "writer+memoir+psychology+Lily+Valencia+Chicago
+blog". Just with seven little words he would end up right here.
If he was feeling more terse he could choose a shorter search term and still find me, "blog+Lily+Valencia+Chicago" brings you right here. That said, I think Igor is far too good with boundaries to go hunting for me or my blog and I like that about him.

As I am currently working on version two of the "Thursdays with Igor" book proposal and it will soon be ready to send out. It seemed like a good time to tell him he was the co-star of my memoir. "Uh, I thought you might want to know that the title of my book is "Thursdays with Igor" and you are Igor."
"You can't push away the smile " Igor laughed.
I couldn't. The smile demanded to have its full expression.
I told him more about the book and the blog and his co-starring role and then I sat back and waited for him to be angry, enraged, outraged and have other feelings ending with the suffix "-raged". I was even ready for him to fire me as a client. I was ready for all kinds of things except the reaction he gave me.
"So what do you think about me writing a book in which you are the costar and in the title?"
Igor answered,"Whatever is best for you is fine with me."
I almost cried.

For months I have carried guilt, worry, and fear about how he would react. Today the guilt, worry and fear are replaced with relief. Relief feels good.

Picture taken by me in Igor's waiting room.

#11-18 of 365 things that don't suck about L.A.

2009-09-09T04:00:00.000-07:00

11. Cesar Millan is my neighbor
I am not a big fan of Cesar's. I would much prefer it if Victoria Stillwell lived in Valencia. If she did we could walk our dogs together and share sources on red lipstick and brush each others hair and she would teach Lily amazing tricks and we would go out for tea. I have no such fantasies with Cesar. But it kind of cracks me up to think I might run into Cesar at the local Petco making those crazy noises at his dogs. If I did I would point him out to Lily and tell her that I promise never to make those silly noises at her. She would thank me by wagging her tail wildly and kissing off my red lipstick.

12. No ice and that's nice
I have recently had some fantasies of moving back to Chicago, as I am wont to do, and lately the winter weather has put a kibosh on some of my favorite fantasies. I hate ice. I hate the bogeyman of black ice that I anticipated as I drove on highway 41. I hated tip toeing on ice in terror of falling. I hated falling on ice and the resulting pain in my tailbone that made it impossible for me to move for a week without enormous agony, loud and dramatic wails, and Vicodin. There is no ice in L.A. other than the ice that comes from my ice machine and I will admit that that doesn't entirely suck.

13. In-and-Out urge
If you come to L.A. you MUST go to In-and-Out Burger at least once, unless you are a vegetarian. It is a California culinary institution and for sure the best hamburger one can get at a fast food restaurant in all the world (yes, I realize that is big talk). All they serve at In-and-Out are hamburgers, fries, shakes and sodas. that it is it. No chicken; no salad; no tofu patties--- nothing but burgers. But, there is a secret menu for those in the know.

When we lived in Chicago I often had the In-and-out urge and had to sublimate my double-double desire with a Chicago dog. Whenever we would visit L.A. our first stop after landing at LAX would be the In-and-Out right by the airport. My order at In-and-Out is the Double-double with grilled onions and no fries. I hate their fries. They are bland and tasteless and not worth the calories. But, now that I know about their secret menu I might try the fries "animal style".

14. I am free to look ridiculous
In L.A. I can wear the big sunglasses that make me look like a big bug without feeling completely over the top. In Chicago I always felt the need to apologize for anything that was close to the top, let alone over it.

15. Brushes with boughs of greatness
When I was little my parents took me to a Christmas party and the next door neighbors of the hosts happened to be Bob Newhart and family. I was invited over to help decorate Bob's Christmas tree. I suppose the hosts were mortified that my parents hadn't found a sitter and were delighted that the Newhart family took me in. Bob wasn't there, but it was Bob's tree and tinsel that I touched.

16. No GPS required
In I am never literally lost, metaphorically I am, but not literally. I know this town. When I lived in Chicago I was always afraid if I made one wrong turn I would end up in Indiana or Wisconsin. You drop me anywhere in L.A.( except Culver City, I always get lost in Culver City) and I can find my way home.

17. Easy freeway access to childhood trauma
I am never more than 30 minutes away from a location of a childhood trauma. If I need material for the book I can drive to a PTSD location from my past and be filled with inspiration for the book and/or material to take to Igor. No need to go to Google Earth to find the vortexes of my childhood wounding. Yes, I suppose, this kind of sucks.

18. Conducting chickens or free range Strauss
Esa-Pekka Salonen and Koo-Koo-Roo. I love a good alliteration and I love how the name of the charbroiled chicken chain and the conductor of the L.A. symphony's names roll off of my tongue. I know that they have nothing in common but Pekka's name makes me think of poultry and, who knows, maybe when Esa-Pekka isn't conducting Tchaikovsky he enjoys a little Koo-Koo-Roo chicken. I certainly do and there is a Koo-Koo-Roo just a block away from the Disney Concert Hall so Esa-Pecka can have a two piece plate before he performs.

Ask Igor

2009-09-04T04:00:00.000-07:00

It is that time of year, the end of summer, when psychoanalysts everywhere flee their caseloads for their annual summer getaway. A reprieve from repression; a break from breakdowns and an escape from all things Oedipal. Igor is no exception. Igor is not in Beverly Hills. He is spending his Thursdays without me.

I imagine he is somewhere exotic and glamorous. I am guessing Monaco or the Amalfi Coast. He is splitting his day between lounging by the sea, deep sea diving, touring museums, dining at elegant bistros and putting my months worth of fees on red at the roulette table. I could be wrong. It might merely be an idealization in which I am giving Igor the glamorous life I wish for myself. For all I know Igor could be doing a staycation and is working his way through a honey-do list and taking short excursions to Home Depot. I think not, but you never know.

Having had no Igor for the last two weeks has not been easy. I have had a lot on my plate and a lot in my psyche and I could have really used his help. It is pretty classic that when one's analyst goes away that the patient falls to pieces. I anticipated this and told Igor before he left, "I feel a moral obligation to not be the kind of patient that falls apart while you are gone. I don't want you to have to worry about me. I want you to have a good time and I want to never come to your mind." He seemed to appreciate my concern and commitment to stay consolidated when he was off in another continent. Hmmm... maybe he is in Cuba or perhaps he is on a cruise to the Galapagos Island.

When he is here, week after week, my dreams never seem as urgent and in need of interpretation as now that he is off somewhere sipping Sangrias in Seville. I would never, no matter the crisis, pull a "What about Bob?" maneuver and call him while he was on vacation. Seriously, even if I turned into Cybil or aliens told me to wear a aluminum foil hats, I would never call him while he is on vacation. If it was an emergency I know he wouldn't mind if I interrupted his tango lessons or his touring of ancient tombs, if I had a real trauma, but still.

I decided to keep a notebook as a way to contain my anxiety while he is off on safari in Tanzania and I am calling it my "What I would tell Igor if he was here notebook". At the top of the list is the dream I had at about being at Club Med with the cast of Big Brother and being really sad about leaving Club Med and feeling real grief about saying goodbye to my cast mates. I found the dream incredibly disturbing as it is so at odds with my sense of self. I hated working at Club Med and I would never go on Big Brother. As an introvert I treasure alone time and privacy and both Club Med and BB never allow for either. There aren't even locks at the door at Club Med and in the Big Brother house they even video tape you when you are in the shower. I get chills just thinking about it. Any armchair Igors want to take a stab at this highly extroverted dream?

I have written a lot in the "What I would tell Igor if he was here" notebook about the roller coaster ride( with more ups than downs) of finishing my "Thursdays with Igor" book proposal without my Thursdays with Igor. It seems odd to not be seeing him when I am constantly working, thinking, writing an re-writing a book proposal in which he co-stars. The other things that have made it into the notebook are: things my mother said; the book he recommended; and my continual reluctance to change my cell phone number.

Since I am compiling a list of things to talk to Igor about once he returns from his cabin in Cape Code, I thought it might be a good time to ask you what you would ask Igor if you could. Go on, don't be shy. He is not grumpy or prone to incomprehensible colloquialisms like Dr. Phil and he is not going to put you into celebrity rehab like Dr. Drew. If you could ask Igor or an Igor anything about anything what would it be? You don't have to lie down on the couch to ask your question, unless that makes you more comfortable. He won't really answer your questions as he is off hang gliding in Hawaii, this is just my curiosity.
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The photo above is not of Igor or of his office. He, as I have told you before, looks like Omar Sharif and his office is much more restrained and is older and is much more womb like. The photo is a self-portrait of Dr. Mark Gerald, a 64-year-old psychoanalyst who practices in NYC, and it is from his exhibition,“In the Shadow of Freud’s Couch: Photographic Portraits of Psychoanalysts in Their Offices". Dr. Gerald "has taken advantage of his insider status to tackle a subject previously closed to portrait photography: psychoanalysts in their workplaces. To date, he has photographed 55 analysts, more than half of them representing a legendary breed: the New York psychoanalyst. "

You can see several of the photos of the psychoanalysts offices here. Some of the offices are so interesting that they would put me off of doing psychoanalysis with the practitioners. I won't name names but I will name locations: Chelsea and Paris are not places I will be going for therapy. Which of these therapist's office can you imagine yourself in? Do interiors matter in one's pursuit of mental health or is a couch just a couch? I can tell you that I once quit seeing a therapist because she had a framed picture of Holly Hobbie in her office. I just couldn't give access to the deep workings of my psyche to a woman who thought that Holly Hobbie was appropriate art work to hang in a professional office.