From Teeth to Toes

Yesterday I lost a tooth. It was no surprise really. I was told twenty years ago that I had two baby teeth clinging against all odds to the cliff of my lower gum. Neither tooth possessed roots long enough to take root, nor were there ever any adult chops lying in wait.


Despite countless warnings from more than a mouthful of dentists, I not only continued to chomp down on popcorn over the years as if it were the source of life itself, but I did not have the good sense to stop at the kernels. Instead I lustily cracked them between my tender baby teeth like a woman lapping at a dirty pond located right beside the vast, clean and burbling source of France’s bottled water. I’m an idiot.


I got twenty extra years out my toddler teeth, for which I should be grateful. But I’m not. I wish I had twenty more. Especially after my dentist told me that the price of his implants are cheap at $3,000 a pop. In a desperate bid to change the outcome of my visit, I asked him, mournfully, rhetorically, how exactly toothlessness was going to enhance my new romance. I was hoping to elicit enough sympathy to spark a heroic tooth-saving effort. Not skipping a beat, my dentist offered his sage advice instead, like he’d been moonlighting as Dear Abby his whole professional life.


Dentist: “Your new man will take care of you, you’ll see. And if he doesn’t, then you’ll know he’s not right for you.”

“Except he won’t,” I said.

“Sure he will,” he said, encouragingly.

“No, actually, he won’t. He’s out west on a mountain. Skiing.”

He had no answer to that. But, later, he did try again, god bless him. He advised me to tell my new man not shove his tongue too deeply into the place where my tooth used to be. I think he was making a joke. But I was too busy thinking that my new guy’s tongue would not likely share a hotel lobby with me, never mind a mouth! There was really no other option. I’d have to dump him. Not the dentist, the new guy. The only thing worse than fearing you are liked for the wrong reasons – like because you have a pulse – is fearing you are liked out of duty! And worse than duty is obligation from someone you barely even know (except maybe carnally). You see, I can’t really call this guy a boyfriend quite yet. We are currently in that strange, not-yet-relationship phase of two people who knew each other as friends a decade ago, fell out of touch, reconnected recently and then decided to see if there could be more. That phase. That very, very, very fragile phase. So, although we feel familiar to each other, the truth is, we are effectively strangers (despite having made it past each others’ border guards).


As I sat on the streetcar with a wad of gauze the size of a pillow wedged into my very own Grand Canyon, mouth cranked open so wide that I could not deny I had become, for all intents and purposes to my streetcar mates, a mouth breather, I concocted a number of creative ways to let my beautiful new man go. I can't let him martyr himself on the alter of my new deficiency. He deserves better. He deserves teeth.

But I won't do it until he gets home. Just because I now have Mariana’s Trench in my mouth does not mean he should not enjoy topping a mountain. Why should my wee personal tragedy stop him from wrapping his ski-hill-toned thighs around the side of a mountain like she’s his bitch?


Yesterday morning I was going to write a post exploring the concept of “fashion backward.” But the dentist changed all that. When I got home I popped three blue Advil, downed some soft Ricotta cheese and went to sleep. This morning, however, I realize that writing might distract me, so I'm going to forge ahead as planned.

What is "fashion backward", you ask? It's that item in your closet that is not old enough to be considered retro but not new enough to be fashion forward. While shopping for an 80s ensemble at Value Village last Saturday to wear to an 80s party I’m attending this Saturday, I spotted a pair of red Steve Madden shoes so fracking cool I had no choice but to claim them as my own the way a mother, nose pressed to the maternity ward window, zones in on her baby without the aid of its identity bracelet.

I was so thrilled with my new shoes that I could barely contain myself when, the next day, K and P were gobbling up the food I’d made them for brunch, providing the perfect opportunity for me to prance around in my Wizard of Oz purchase. Look at me! Look at me!

Their reaction was twofold.

Number 1:

Number 2:


K confirmed later that day, when I could trust myself not to cry while inquiring if the problem was that the shoes were simply not old enough to be cool yet, that yes, that was the problem. By way of illustration, she informed me that she had had a similar pair of shoes three years ago. Hence, not long ago enough to command retro allure. Obviously, she no longer wears them. I remember a fellow artist saying something similar to me in my studio when I expressed a wish to paint something from the 1990s. He said that era was not far enough in the past to have retro caché. In other words, my shoes are not old-cool, they are simply uncool.

Although I get it, I don’t feel it. Because the truth is, I love these shoes. I love their bluey-red hue, their lace-upityness and their cute snub noses. I love their square jaw. And I love how they feel. It’s like this: I did not learn to love Led Zepplin until long after their hey day. But would a Led Zepplin lover fault me for loving Zep now? What difference does make when I learned to love them? Isn’t it only important that I love them?

I can’t keep up with fashion in anything – from shoes to painting to music. So I’ve stopped trying. In my little corner of the world, I am stubbornly clinging to my own brand of un-fashion the same way Superman spun the globe backwards to reverse time and the death of his true love. I was not able to reverse time to save my beloved tooth, but I’ve definitely stopped time at the place where my Steve Madden shoes are fashion-Liz, thus always "in". In my world, the only one that really matters, I call this style, "fashion present"!

Seriously Gobsmackingly Great Book

Some books hit you upside the head. Others split your sides right down the middle. This one does both. I'm not even half way through it and I want to buy a copy for every person I know. That's right, I'm extolling the virtues of a book I'm not even finished reading. That's how I-don't-even-have-an-emphatic-enough-word good it is. It has already delivered more hilarity, more poetry and more ass-kick writing than most of the books I've ever read. I can't buy you a copy, unfortunately, because I'm broke but I urge you to run out and buy your own. For those of you who can't read mirror images, the book is called A Fraction of the Whole, by Steve Toltz.

Like a poltergeist jonesing for a little play time with the living, this book threw me on the floor where I laughed myself silly, and then pinned me there with gut-wrenching tales of bizarre sports-loving-related crimes and more-crazy-than-your-own family dramas. It's told with such tenderness and wit-sharpened insight that I'm convinced the point at which the Jewish diaspora and the Criminal diaspora intersect at the bottom of the earth, where no one is really looking (i.e. Australia), is the point at which the right alchemical ingredients and conditions exist to yield what every book lover seeks: gold.

This book could not have come at a better time. I have been struggling to find something to blog about for the last two weeks. No matter what I did – even brunch with amazing French people


who know how to make the perfect brunch food (high-end baguette with pear and double-cream brie and some kind of dijon and honey sauce, all topped with pecans and then grilled) . . .


. . . and, of course, the perfect latte . . .


. . . and every item colour coordinated because the French are born speaking fluent Style . . .



– I still came up empty for a post. It seemed my mind had gone on vacation but forgot to tell me where it went and when it was coming back. Also, I’ve been sick. Also, I’ve been happy. Depression practically writes itself. But contentment would rather do other things, like eat out, watch Peep Show and stay in bed – with company.

As a so-called writer, however, it's my job to do my job regardless of how I feel, the same way actors and CEOs fake their way through their depressions and recessions in order to get the job done.

So, taking a page from Steve Toltz’s book, I will do as Toltz’s protagonist, Jasper, does and let someone else do the talking. Normally I would say this approach to posting screams cop out, but I know my instincts are right in this case because I simply cannot do the book justice. Toltz is too fucking smart.

Like the inexplicable but compelling stuffed bunny sitting on a shelf of the furnished apartment I am renting . . .

. . . I will let Toltz's unexpected and riveting story stand as its own illustration of the weirdly-hypnotic thing that it is.

A little context: Eight-year-old Jasper (who is eight in the same way I am internationally famous – his hilarious, world-weary storytelling belies his true age) hands a great deal of the storytelling over to his eccentric father, who tells Jasper a story about the coma Jasper's father was in for four years in early childhood. During this almost-dead state/time, Jasper’s father saw and heard things he could not possibly have seen and heard. By way of explanation he tells Jasper, “when there aren’t any waking hours . . . for months or even years . . . it’s possible that the restless mind, desperate for activity, might reach . . . right down to the bottom of the unconscious, dredging up stories of things that were left there by previous generations.” Here’s some of what he saw:

I saw all the dawns come up too early and all the middays reminding you you’d better get a hurry on and all the dusks whisper “I don’t think you’re going to make it” and all the shrugging midnights say “Better luck tomorrow.” I saw all the hands that ever waved to a stranger thinking it was a friend . . . I saw all the men wipe down toilet seats before urinating but never after. I saw all the lonely men stare at department store mannequins and think “I’m attracted to a mannequin. This is getting sad.” I saw all the love triangles and a few love rectangles and one crazy love hexagon in the back room of a sweaty Parisian café. I saw all the condoms put on the wrong way. I saw all the ambulance drivers on their off hours caught in traffic wishing there was a dying man in the backset. . . . I saw all the Buddhists bitten by spiders they wouldn’t kill . . . . I saw all the broken dishes in all the Greek restaurants and all the Greeks thinking “Culture’s one thing, but this is getting expensive.” I saw all the lonely people scared by their own cats. . . . I saw all the funerals and all the acquaintances of the dead enjoying their afternoon off work. I saw all the astrology columns predicting that one twelfth of the population of earth will be visited by a relative who wants to borrow money. I saw all the forgeries of great paintings but no forgeries of great books. I saw all the signs forbidding entrance and exit but none forbidding arson or murder. I saw all the carpets with cigarette burns and all the kneecaps with carpet burns . . . I saw inside all the mouths and it’s really disgusting in there. I saw all the bird’s-eye views of all the birds who think humanity looks pretty active for a bunch of toilet heads . . .

Later in the book, Jasper's father describes Paris:

But Paris -- beautiful poor ugly opulent vast complex gray rainy & French. You see unbelievable women, umbrellas, beggars, tree-lined streets, bicycles, church spires, Africans, gloomy domes, balconies, broken flower pots, rudeness that will ring through eternity, aimless pedestrians, majestic gardens, black trees, bad teeth, ritzy stores, socialists moving their hands up the thighs of intellectuals, protesting artists, bad drivers, pay toilets, visible cheese smells, witty scarves, shadows of body odors in the metro, fashionable cemeteries, tasteful transvestites, filtered light, slums, grim, desire, artistic lamp posts, multicoloured phlegm of passive chimney smokers, demented cobblestone faces in terrace cafés, high collars, hot chocolates, flashy gargoyles, velvet berets, emaciated cats, pick pockets running away with glittering entrails of rich German tourists, & great phallic monuments in the squares & sex shops.

. . . but why is it that when I hear someone make a great philosophical argument I get the same feeling as when I see someone has put clothes on his dog?

Photo credit: My friend Philippe took the bunny photo.

Better than Revenge

We've all been there . . . When you are in a good heart and mind space, life feels like an enternity of making love on a sun-denched window sill beside a life-sized old-fashioned brass key that, um, well, that unlocks all the past pains in your heart, setting you free to love absolutely everyone around you. Like when you're drunk.

And then, BAM, suddenly, for one reason or another, something happens that makes you feel like life is an enternity of suckage with only a sickening combination of shame, humiliation, rage, disappointment and grief for company 24/7.

In this state, you'll do ANYTHING to discharge the pain as far away from your aching body and tortured mind as possible . . .


. . . In your head, you line up all your internal demons as well as real-life enemies and take aim with your best weapon: revenge fantasies . . . some of which you might even recklessly act out in real time -- like the ever popular drunk-and-dial, or the tried-and-true long, rightous and raging letter -- hitting the send button before your friends have had a chance to come to your den of insanity and chain you to a radiator until you became a human being again.

OK, OK, I do admit that sometimes revenge can be sweet . . . (and human) . . .


But it only makes you feel good temporarily. Because chances are, your revenge will hurt someone else (even if they seemed to deserve it) and pain inflicted on others always comes back to bite you in the ass, or, more accurately, in the conscience, which is not located in your head as formerly thought, but near the vicinity of your heart, which makes it more dangerous.

If you don't actually do the real work of digging deep into your soul to find out what role you play in your own unhappiness (like inviting it in), and if you don't learn to sit bravely with your pain so that you don't lash out and spread the misery, the cylce will begin again until you do learn . . .


Thankfully, there is a way to find bravery in the face of adversity. And though it may be hard to believe, you can even do this personal work without rocking on someone else's dime. (Although the expression makes a great t-shirt! Thanks, Dale!)


While learning to become responsible for your own contentment is simple, it's not necessarily easy. A friend told me the other day that his friend, who suffers from depression, was told by her therapist that happiness is a skill. This piece of information gave her hope because a skill can be learned. But it requires goal-setting and practice. As well as heavy doses of courage and faith. Not so easy when you are in the trillionth ring of hell, clawing your way up a steep bank of sadness, praying you will find a little air-conditioned hole to crawl into for eternity.


Kids, I have the recipe for the much sought-after Skill of Contentment. But before I tell you this little secret, I have to confess that one of my friends did act out a revenge fantasy once that not only brought her relief, but that still sends both of us into gales of laughter in the retelling. To my knowledge, she's never suffered a day of guilt over it. Nor should she. Her crime amounted to less than a misdemeanor. And the benefit far outweighed the cost. That time.

After being told one blissful evening that she was the love of her lover's life and that he wanted to spend an eternity with her, she was awoken the next morning by said lover who informed her that sometime between midnight and 7 am he realize he no longer loved her and wanted her to leave. Immediately.

To help herself deal with the shock and pain, this friend did something truly innovative. She broke into her freshly exed ex's airline account and ordered him the special bland meal for people who have ulcers, in perpetuity.

Although we all indulge our revenge fantasies when we're in pain, and the fantasies do serve an important function as long as they remain fantasies, a far more powerful antidote to hurt is the old cliché of conjuring the sun-drenched brass key that will open your heart.

Here's a for instance: recently I discovered that an ex from years ago had hotly pursued a close friend the day after dumping me. She would have none of it, of course, because my friends are pillars of love and integrity, but that did not change the fact that he was an ethic-less, heartless beast. I was consumed by a sense of victimization for an entire afternoon upon hearing this news, and, true to human form, I concocted all kinds of revenge fantasies that made bland airplane food seem like a lifetime of free filet mignon at North 44.

But then I was looking through my photographs a few days later and I came upon this one:


This ex hated doing dishes. At his home he had a dishwasher and a cleaning lady. But when he was dating me, he was subjected to my single sink located in my cleaning lady-free apartment. Yet when I made dinner, he always insisted on doing the dishes. And he never complained. In fact, he turned the job into an art, creating beautiful sculptures out of that which he hated. They touched me deeply. Which is why I photographed them.

This ex had what I would call a painful childhood. He had not been properly loved by either parent, and so no one had taught him how to love anyone else, especially not himself. Yet his dish sculptures were the tenderest gestures I'd ever seen. So, if he chased my friend, it was truly because he had no friends. Literally. I was pretty much his only friend at the time. And my girlfriend was the next best thing I guess, since he knew her through me. He was lonely. Deeply. How could I want to wreak revenge on someone already so filled with pain?

OK, he was a big jerk to me. But I'm the lucky one because I have people like this in my life.

World, meet Sara. She is the miseur-en-scene and photographer of the Star Wars action figures above. But she is so much more. She is the woman who made me laugh for four hours straight one night as she drew a picture of me that looked like a cross between a pheasant and a crone (OK we were high, but still). She once made me an animal out of tinfoil that looked like a rat and, strangely enough, also like a bison, which is why I called it RatBison and proudly displayed it on my coffee table. Whenever she came to dinner, she brought me flowers from the flower shop where she worked. And often posed with them in charming ways.

I wish I had spent more time with Sara when I lived in Montreal. I LOVE Sara. Yesterday, when I thought I'd be sad for an eternity, she wrote me a faith-restoring e-mail filled with the kind of compassionate honesty the makes you believe in trusting again. Seriously, all she has to do is draw a smiley face on her thumb and stick it up to the camera during a Skype video chat and I'm done for.

More Menschitude

Since today marks the inauguration of someone I would definitely describe as possessing menschy characteristics (at least based on his kick-ass speeches) into the second highest office in the land (the first highest being that which bestows unconditional love on all, never filled by a person, per se, but always filled by the menschy choices every person is capable of making), it seems a good opportunity trot out a personal interest I believe has larger-than-me implications. Namely, Menschitude.

According to Wiki, and Leo Rosten, the author of The Joys of Yiddish, a mensch is “someone to admire and emulate, someone of noble character. The key to being ‘a real mensch’ is nothing less than character, rectitude, dignity, a sense of what is right, responsible, decorous.’"

Personally, I think it’s more productive to speak of menschitude vs. a mensch, since the former describes a behaviour, something we can all aspire to achieve, while the latter describes a character trait as if it were congenital. Once a sister, always a sister, but a true mensch is the stuff of myth, like Santa. To my knowledge, no one has been born as, or lived life as, an unwavering mensch. But one can choose to act menschitudinally at will. Menschitude is available at anytime to anyone.

Recently, a friend of mine – not me, of course – had some dating experiences that left her (and me) wondering if menschitudinality is heading the way of the dodo. Characteristic of her dates were their self descriptions as being persons of strong moral compasses, or having done years of personal work, both things easy to say, but when situations came up that required courage, honesty and menschitude, these self-described do-gooders scored low on the mensch-o-meter.


Always the optimist, I believe, as Obama believes, that we will be remembered for what we build, not what we destroy. Worth remembering. Although a bad exchange between people can crush a spirit so excruciatingly that the urge to destroy surges to the surface faster than a smart missile, I still believe the only antidote to pain is love. Love never destroys. It builds. And it is an elegant self-sustaining system that continues to build upon itself. The more you love, the more you love.

So, in the spirit of building, I would like to contribute a cherished idea I’ve been chewing on for the last few weeks towards helping increase opportunities for folks to act with menschitude (it's a learned behaviour after all).

Allow me to humbly put forth what I think to be one of the most vital building blocks for menschness that we all have at our disposal.

Ask a question


Hell, ask two questions. It won’t kill you. If I hear the excuse, “I don’t like to pry,” one more time for why you don’t ask questions, I will personally speak to your maker and demand a total recall. You like being asked questions, don’t you? Of course you do! I know because you answer them as if you were a famous novelist at a public reading, soaking up the adoration of your fans.

While I’m sure you have lots of interesting things to say, every good novelist knows that really good writing -- which demonstrates a true understanding of, as well as sensitivity and compassion to, the lives of others -- requires keen real-life observation, and observation means you speak less and listen more.


Cultivating some heart and soul while you’re at it wouldn’t hurt. If it means you need to treat the person across the table from you like a character study, so be it. Whatever it takes. And, yes, while you’re absolutely right that solipsists do get laid, I would argue that the quality of their encounters declines in direct proportion to their self-absorption. Sex is an exchange, like conversation. If you can master the give and take of either concept, I swear your relationships will improve, both the public and private.


Otherwise, go find a dark corner and take care of yourself. Oh yeah, here’s a little bonus factoid you might not have considered: when you show interest in someone else, you usually learn a thing or two. Maybe even a thing or two about your favourite topic: yourself. I'm telling you, this simple trick of asking questions holds untold benefits for you. But you have to begin with them first.



Recently, my friend (not me) dated a guy whose only question to her after three dates -- posed while surrounded by her paintings (about which he asked nothing) -- was “how long are you renting this apartment for?” Now this friend of mine does not pretend to be the most fascinating creature anyone's ever come across, but I do think her date lost an opportunity to step outside himself for a nanosecond and see that someone was potentially interested in him.



"Was" being the operative tense.



Also, for god's sake, if you really have only one question in you, try at least to make it meaningful. A question about a person's apartment should come after a question about the other person's views/dreams/passions/even hatreds.

OK, I lied. I have one more tip.

Speak up!

You and I both know you don’t mean to cause harm. But when you slip out the back door instead of bravely speaking your truth, you cause untold harm. What happens is the person you were just talking with (or at) is left wondering what he or she did wrong to make you run in the opposite direction without explanation. If the person you were talking to made you want to run for good reason, at least have the courtesy and decency to tell him or her that before you take off. Yes, it's scary to step up like that. It requires courage to be honest and up front, but that’s what menschitude is all about. It’s never about doing the easy thing. It’s about doing what would help another person not feel bad. It's about seeing what's required and making it happen. It is above duty. It is a gift. It is an act of generosity and love. And it will make you feel good. Like you have integrity. I think integrity might even feel better than sex.

Also, return e-mails and phone calls, even if only to say you won't be returning them anymore. It's just the kind thing to do.

My father’s second wife once said two smart things to me. #1: if you are low on cash but need to buy a gift, buy a $20 lipstick over a $20 dress. Self explanatory. #2: a real gift is something that causes the giver a little pain. Example: my friend Jacline gifted me a pair of her favourite earrings because I expressed a delight in them one day. That’s a gift.

What does this have to do with Obama's menschitude and the world beyond me? Good habits start at home. I.e. the personal is political. I'm just saying, don't compartmentalize. Don't do good outside but treat the people around you badly. Be nice and do good whenever you can. Nice is sexy.

I wrote this post to mitigate a deep sense of disappointment I felt this week. One thing I know for sure, we all want the same thing: to love and be loved. We just don’t always know how to behave. Me included. So, I’m going to work on my own menschitudinality starting right now. I'd love to know more about you . . . can I buy you coffee?


For more ideas on how to be a mensch, especially on an airplane, check out Guy. That's his name!

Self Portrait with Bidet

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: the only way I seem to grow is via a process of extreme public mortification. Kind of like mugging for the camera, thinking you might just be the most sumptuously gorgeous creature on the planet, while remaining utterly oblivious to the bidet lurking in the background. That's my life in a nutshell.

I swear to god I don’t know why I can’t learn from the mistakes of others instead of trying them out for myself. It’s as if I believe that having my whole family, and an entire wedding party, witness my poor judgment is the most rockingiest good time, right up there with farting on a first date.


I can’t figure out if I am slow on the uptake because my mistake models tend to be characters in novels whose entanglements with life seem so very romantic, or because my friends have such well-honed self-preservation skills that they don’t provide the mistake lessons I so badly need. Or, perhaps the characters/friends dichotomy is really two sides of the same coin and my mistake is to decide against changing my money at the airport, thinking I can do it at the resort, which I discover upon arrival I cannot, leaving me stuck with my useless currency. I’d like to blame my self-respecting friends, who sensibly avoid embarrassment, for forcing me to act like Bridget Jones, but the truth is it’s me who has a taste for mistake porn, and then the supreme bad judgment to try out the novel moves in real life, not to mention the even worse judgment (worse than supremely bad) to blog about it as well.

Exhibit A: publishing this . . .


. . . instead of this . . .


(My cousin's wife's brother who was part of the wedding party in Costa Rica last week, and, no we did not . . .)

Here are a few other mistakes I'd like to share with you because, well, because I can't seem to stop myself. . .

Mistake Number 1:
Through the innocent and involuntary response of my own laughter, I effectively encouraged my brother, Justin's, shenanigans in Costa Rica where we were attending our cousin's wedding. Justin, the bad brother, is on the left. The one on the right doing the enabling is Andy, the good brother.


With the best of intentions I’m sure, Justin tried to pimp me to every waiter, tour guide, pool boy and male iguana (the real kind, not even the metaphor) that crossed his path: “Hey, Manuel! Are you single? Si? So is my sister! Don’t you think she’s guapa?”

Exhibit B: our guide on the sunset cruise. Apart from looking like he's twelve, and the fact that he lives in Costa Rica and hangs out on boats with drunken tourists, I think he's married and has a son. I'm many things, but not a craddle robber or a homewrecker.

At any rate, Justin’s voice is as resonant and far-reaching as a fog horn. But the real problem is, he’s extremely funny. Also, he’s my boss. He signs my pay cheques. I could not stop him. And I didn’t really want to. My mistake was to let my enjoyment of his humour get in the way of my self-preservation instincts. I don’t believe there was one resort guest, vendor on the beach, or grain of sand that did not know I was up for grabs. Which meant my comings and goings became something of public interest and conversation. Your imagination can fill in the rest.

Mistake Number 2:
Telling you all here right now that one of my goals this year is to practice travel writing so that I can travel later in the year and write about it. For money. I should know better than to make such public announcements, setting up expectations I might not meet. And yet here I am reporting on Costa Rica where I was surrounded by unspeakable natural beauty, and gobs of time in which to write a trenchant piece about the wasteful and blindly exploitative all-inclusive resort expreience, except that I did not write about any of it. I did not write at all. Why? I blame the sun. It forced me into a prone position on a white plastic thing they called a lounge chair located beside a body of water they called the pool. The sun distracted me to such a degree that I forgot to reapply 45 sunblock. While everyone in my group slow cooked to an even golden brown that glowed sexily against their whitish ensembles . . .


. . . I fried to a blistering red from my clavicle to my calves, turning all my new vacation clothes into exercises in contrast, visibly highlighting, as it were, my searing shame. Thankfully, some of my trip mates had the good graces to avert their gaze.


Mistake Number 3:
My unwavering ability to believe every New Year (no matter how old and ostensibly wise I get) that this year my ship will come in. A disproportionately large section of my grey matter activity seems devoted to this glorious sea-change myth, and, worse, I believe it’s something that will happen to me instead of from me. In this case, I blame chick flicks.

Exhibit C: A plausible photograph of me with a staggeringly good looking man . . .


. . . only this staggeringly good looking man is none other than my uncle. All I can say is, at least he's not my Drunkle.


Take Two


This year, I plan to make some changes. My first order of business is to short circuit all my particularly ROI-deficient neural pathways (i.e. the ones that run back and forth between ChickFlickVille and FalseHappinessTown). Then I plan to build a one-way superhighway that runs from Fantasy Island to Survivor (Toronto and beyond).

One destination; one winner.


Here are a few things I wish to tackle this year (and blog about, either to pressure myself into doing them, or to prove that I really am addicted to public shame).

1. Jewish Restitution Money Plan
My family just got some money from the German government for property we lost in the war. My grandmother’s family owned a department store on Alexander Platz in Berlin, as well-known as the Eaton’s Centre at Queen and Young. My mother generously divided her portion of the money amongst her children, enabling me to do something I’ve been wanting to do for a few years: travel. Destination: Australia. Also to SE Asian countries where I have friends: Japan, Korea, Thailand. Also, to go back to Manila to finish my book. Hopefully. Maybe. If I don’t lose my nerve.

I’m thinking September.


I am also earmarking some of this money to provide funding for an emerging Jewish woman artist to spend a month of studio time in Berlin. I’m researching how this can be set up. I welcome all suggestions. This project is dear to my heart.

2. Blog-on-Brunch Plan. Blunch.


I love brunch. I’d trade it for dinner any day. One of Toronto’s greatest treasures is its plethora of amazing brunch places. Montreal has great brunch but not as many venues. Berlin has many venues and some spectacular brunches, but they don't do traditional North American brunch the way I like. I admit, I don’t love Toronto (I don’t hate it either) but I do think it tops the world (i.e. Montreal and Berlin) for brunch.

So, every Sunday, after my long run, I plan to find brunch, photograph brunch, eat brunch and blog brunch. I am looking for suggestions for places to go, as well as offers of companionship. For brunch, that is. If we fall in love over eggs, that’s a whole other blog post (girlfriends, don’t let that deter you. I want your company!)

3. Train for a Half Marathon Plan

It’s been three years since I ran my first and last half marathon. And it shows. The good news is I trained for the last one all through a Montreal winter (outside, not on a treadmill) so I know it can be done. The bad news: there's no excuse. Also, I’m not H Murakami so writing about running will be a challenge. But since running is all about challenge, I can't back down from this one, either. Run. Write. Run. Write. Run. Write . . .

My reward for all these accomplishments?

Bliss?

(We See You Shit was a piece by Michael Davidge)

Two Indispensible Decision-Making Tools: Part 2

The response to yesterday’s post on decision making was so overwhelming in number and expressions of relating that I’ve decided to gift you all, my dear readers, with two great items given to me just the other day. Think of this offering as the blog equivalent to the loot bag Oprah gives members of her studio audience at the end of each show, except my booty bag does not contain a smart car. But it does send you home with two smart suggestions. They will cost you, mind you, but only if you decide to purchase them. Good news: they are affordable, which is not to cheapen the gift from me to you, or from its original giver to me, so that’s something.

First, the original gift giver requires proper credit: a friend of mine who lives in mortal fear of being blogged about (specifically by me), and who also thinks, not surprisingly, that every one of my blog posts is already about him, is finally going to have his worst fear come true, but in a good way (I hope). This friend, who shall remain anonymously neurotic, always knows exactly what to get me at gift-giving times of the year. Clearly understanding the true nature of a gift -- a one-way offering that enhances the life of the gift receiver in some way -- my friend bases his gift decisions on which critical (crisis) situation I happen to be currently obsessing over.


This Jewmas he gave me two perfect self-preservation tools that I should have blogged about yesterday because they are soooooo apropos. Oh well, better late . . . So, here's the first one:


How perfect is this? For the times when your brain (untrustworthy 99.9% of the time) and body (a fairly good barometer for how to make a decision, or how to detect if the one you made was a hideous mistake) are not sending you clear messages about how to make your next move, this low-tech decision-maker application takes the pressure off your mind and body and gets the job done practically by itself. All you need to bring to the exercise is the raft of crap floating around in your head. And the basic skill of dividing up your mind junk into the two opposing categories and then adding up each category to see which total wins. If you lack these simple division and addition skills, however, then no one can help you, my friend. Not even me.


What I love about this tool is the layout: how there is very little space allocated to the nature of your dilemma (because, really, most problems can be boiled down to one or two simple statements, such as “X is not doing what I want! How can I mold him/her in my own image?” or, “How can I suck my boss’s/coworkers’ brains out through a straw and then replace them with something I can actually work with, like chocolate?”) Equally miniscule space is given to the action plan, and that’s because by the time you get to that point, it should be pretty clear and simple what needs to be done – Trade X, boss and coworkers for a big box of chocolate, preferably 72% cacao studded with dried sour cherries. Done, done and done.

Now what?

And that’s what this snappy decision-making note pad is really for: the now what. As if invented by a Nobel-prize winning genius, which I’m staring to think it is, this pad provides acres of space for where space is actually required – the sprawling and endlessly entertaining amusement park of problem wallowing. If you are really honest with yourself, you know as well as I do that problems are where the fun is. Seriously, once you check the “problem solved” box, you have nothing left to live for, unless you have convinced yourself that you really do get a high from scrubbing toilets to a blinding shine, or checking your e-mail a gagillion times an hour to see if someone loves you, or watching yet another episode of Battlestar Gallactica, which would surely be more gripping in once-a-week doses rather than in day-long marathons. I mean it, give me a good old family or relationship drama any day, and make it look utterly unresolvable, and I'm all over it like Liz on a two gallon bag of popcorn.

This crisis-love theory of mine, BTW, is not just some hair-brained idea I came up with during the long boring days of peace. It is based on an article I read a few years ago (although I can’t remember where, when or who wrote it) in which the author proposes that problems, and their attendant stress, are essential to the development of our well being. The author cited a study of monkeys in the zoo who threw their food into their swimming water before eating it because their usual hunting instinct had been thwarted by excellent cage service, screwing with the monkeys’ evolutionary programming. Thanks to their uncanny human-like resourcefulness, however, the monkeys solved their problem by inventing a different problem. Throwing their food into water created the stressful situation of having to retrieve the food, and quickly, before it got spoiled. Voila: proper development of their psychological stability creatively solved. This problem/solution thing seems as obvious to me now as breast feeding: It's a self-sustaining system. And since we humans have evolved from monkeys, it only makes sense that the overwhelming body of evidence – just look at our love of soap operas, both virtual and actual – suggests that problems and stress are essential to our happiness. You don’t believe me? Turn on your TV. Or, call any one of my family members. I’m talking hard science here. Empirical, double-blind fact.

Conclusion: We don’t hate problems at all. We love them! No, wait, we don’t just love them, we lerve them. We loave them. If we hated them, we would have made peace with them a long time ago, putting a decisive stop to their endless sieges.

Next. David Shrigley. He is one of my favourite everythings. His books are doodlerific and brilliant. And it's comforting to know Shrigley faces the same life or death decisions we all face.


Who has not stood in front of a closet, or in front of a font, and had to make these choices? Remember high school? Remember baptism and confession? (Well, neither to do I but in both cases my Jewishness provides a good excuse).


Then, just when you think Shrigley has courageously given voice to his deepest fear, he bravely gives concrete form to the spectre of his deepest wish. I don’t know about you, but “etc.” is one of my greatest wishes, too. I'd do almost anything for etc.

And then, just when you lose all hope about the human condition, Shrigley swoops in with what I believe to be the most incisive, elegant and even hopeful summing up of the human experience:


That's it.

And those are my gifts to you.

Now before you slink off to scrub your toilet with a toothbrush, please, I want you to know that you should not feel any shame for needing to resort to either of these tools to help you make a decision. I don’t. Feel shame, I mean. Feel free to cite me as your shining example of someone who, from time to time, must rely on the pro/con pad, which can be purchased at Grand and Toy, or, if you have a neat hand and no feeling for copyright law, you can just copy what’s here. The David Shrigley book can be gotten at any quality bookstore. My current fave bookstore in Toronto is Type on Queen west, but I don’t know if they have this book. It’s just a great store, and I recently discovered it's the brain child of an old friend of mine who has the life I want -- husband, kids, store -- which is my current crisis. I'm sure my spot-on gift-giving friend will find the perfect item for this painful situation by Valentine's day.

And, last but not least, I want to say thank you to my friend, M.P., for providing the content for this post. You, too, are one of my favourite everythings. I would purchase you if I could. And, yes, this blog post is about you. (And so was that other one you kept asking me about).