Strongly Worded

Romance Intolerance?

The title of this post is a reference to a particularly ept Sex and the City episode, in which the girls are horrified by Petrovsky's gradiose gestures of love, and Carrie wonders if she and her cynical New York friends have become "romance intolerant".

I'm shocked to report that I may have developed this affliction. I noticed it when Mr. D and I had dinner at his place, and he set the table with plates, flatware, and votive candles. It was sweet, and a subtly romantic, but some bitchy postmodern cynic rose up within me and cackled. And then, last night, I had the same reaction when he spoke sincerely about his faith in love. Perhaps I registered disdain, because he asked: what's the matter, aren't you a romantic?

And I shrugged and wondered the same thing. Especially since I myself had prepared a votive candle set-up in my apartment, thinking it might add a cozy and cuddly element to our surroundings. But then when we walked through the door I scrapped the idea. Too contrived. Too cliched. I just couldn't pull it off. I'm not a votive candle kind of girl.

But then I pondered while squinting next to my unromantic 60-watt reading lamp. I told Mr. D about a vacation with a former love interest, in which we stood on a rooftop in Lisbon under a full moon, and the guy took my hand and said something about the beauty and the romance of the moment, and I deliberately ruined it by sneezing emphatically and suggesting we go back indoors. Around the same time, we had a trite encounter with strawberries, candles, and massage oil. And what I vividly remember is feeling utterly ordinary, and fixating on the growing pile of gnawed strawberry stems on the bedside table. I tried to be all enchanted when really? It was just like any other night. The trappings did not bring on real romance.

It's hateful to scorn sweetness. Candlelit meals are delightful, and I can too pull off votives. I need to temper my Miranda impulses with a big infusion of Charlotte.

Posted by Dori at 7:22 PM 5 comments

Much Ado About Doing Nothing

Gentle readers, it's been a while. I keep having these half-assed blog topic ideas, and then my brain succombs to turkey-induced torpor, or I get an overwhelming urge to take a nap, or I become engrossed in the Beauty and the Geek marathon, which, like Girls Next Door, fills me with equal parts revulsion and fascination. Since Wednesday I have also watched the first Big Love DVD, as well as some netflixed West Wing. Plus: an Italian movie, a French movie, the appalling 1980s Sandra Bullock movie Practical Magic, and the very lovely Prizewinner of Defiance, Ohio.

I also got a facial and a haircut. The facial included much tough love during the extraction phase, and repeated murmuring from the aesthetican about the deplorable state of my pores. So I bought a $30 enzyme mask that supposedly I'll be using twice a week. Since it's all natural, made from organic pineapple extract, you see.

On Sunday night, Mr. D (divorced guy) made me dinner. This was date #4 and by 10:34 p.m. no making out had occurred, and this state of affairs became unacceptable. I was about to give up and leave when he finally made a move and some bliss ensued. Tonight we are going to eat some more fancy food and then hopefully make out some more. I am trying very hard not overthink this, and to stop worrying about where this is going and what signals I am sending and whether things are moving too fast, and whether my reactions to the accumulating evidence of his exorbitantly fancy life makes me seem like a gold digger. I realize that most normal people date and make out for prolonged periods of time without all this fuss, and I wish I could be one of them.

Anyway. Break out your smallest violin because there are diver scallops pan seared with cauliflower purée, tarragon braised endive and cider glaze, in my immediate future.

Posted by Dori at 3:41 PM 4 comments

This Is What It Would Mean

I am fortunate in that four of my friends are therapists. J. (who works with severely emotionally disturbed teens) is wacky and tough about all matters of the psyche. K. is still in training, but she's in a doctoral program and she is brilliant and she knows about all these studies that are often relevant to my life. Blogger/therapist Jassy occupies the office next to mine. And R.I.S. is a newly minted clinical social worker. She is wicked wise. We had a long conversation last week in which I described my decreasing ability to spring out of bed in the morning and head to work. And she asked me #1 Therapy Question (Maybe they teach this on the first day of therapy school? Maybe they write it in big letters on the blackboard?): What would it mean if you just didn't go?

Well, aside from my eventual financial ruin, the demise of future professional prospects, and gradual organizational meltdown? Not much. Especially now, when things are in a holding pattern between the sanity of autumn and the insanity of winter. I keeping remembering how one tough middle-school teacher threw up her hands around Thanksgiving, and had all of us eighth-graders create turkey-themed craft projects. Why shouldn't I do the same?

So. Bring on the construction paper. I am heeding R.I.S's advice and taking six consecutive days off work. I will spend much of it in my hometown, bonding with my family and gorging. I will also spend at least one evening with the classy and gentlemanly Mr. D, with whom I've been exchanging many emails. I intend to sleep a lot, exercise, sit in the gym's steamroom, avoid holiday madness, and watch Netflix.

I hope you have a similarly restorative holiday weekend in store. Gobble gobble!

Posted by Dori at 12:08 PM 3 comments

Weekend Post Mortem

On Friday I heeded all your advice and enjoyed an exceptional meal at Oleana, sponsored by the generous Mr. Divorced. Days in advance, I launched an inner debate about how to get to the restaurant. I could take public transit, or drive. Driving would involve parking stress, but then I could just go home on my own and avoid the whole saying-goodnight-on-my-porch -and-maybe-asking-him-in quandary. However, if things went well, having two cars would impede a casual, natural “why don’t you come in and make out” scenario. It would require too much boldness to suggest that he come over after dinner if we had to do it in two cars.

After thinking way to much about this, I decided to drive, but I cleaned feverishly just in case we did decide to go back to my place afterwards. The incredible dinner included pumpkin falafel with tahini, yogurt, beets & crinkled cress; tamarind glazed beef and smokey eggplant puree with pinenuts; and the most amazing tangerine-granita-and-mousse parfait. We had a good and reciprocal conversation. It may have helped that, early on, I described an obnoxious Friday afternoon meeting in which a colleague from another agency talked nonstop about his career challenges during a so-called joint networking session. “It was like a bad date”, I said pointedly. Mr. D snapped to attention and asked me plenty of questions and listened to my answers.

Afterwards we went to see Shut Up and Sing, an excellent documentary about the Dixie Chicks (remember how they expressed shame about sharing a home state with George W., and their fickle right-wing “fans” skewered them?). Even if you don’t get to see the flick, you should immediately buy or download their new album, or at least the song “Not Ready to Make Nice”. Mr. D graciously agreed to see the movie even though he is not a Dixie Chicks fan. He liked it and even followed up by sending me a link to an article about NBC’s refusal to air promos for this film. I am equal parts enraged by NBC and pleased by the fact that a) he followed up immediately and b) was similarly enraged.

Afterwards we hugged and got into our respective cars and there was absolutely no weirdness.

On Saturday E. and I went for a long walk which included a foray into the tailgating area near the annual Harvard-Yale football Game (note the capital G). We scored some free snacks and hung out briefly with drunken Ivy leaguers.

On Sunday I did homework for my Spanish class (which sucked, I hate homework and can’t fathom how I used to do it on a regular basis). I also attended DM’s lovely housewarming party. I sat near the wood-burning stove and experienced warm, zoned-out feelings in which the conversation lapped up against me.

Then I went to Mr. D’s stunning apartment and made dinner. He has lives in a swank apartment in Brookline with towel warmers in the bathroom, a convection oven, and framed prints of photographs he’s taken in foreign countries. I had flashbacks to Dr. Surgeon, who had a similarly beautiful home just blocks away. I spent about four thousand years wondering if we were going to make out, and we did not. We did, however, listen to the song “Cold November Rain” on his souped-up-high-tech-impressive-sound system.

Then I drove home and cried a little because the weekend had ended.

Posted by Dori at 11:10 AM 3 comments

Putting Up And Putting Out

Last night I went out on date #2 with the guy we’ll call Mr. Israeli. We met over the weekend, had a very cordial encounter at a café, and agreed to get together again. Despite his niceness, I felt unenthusiastic. However, I’m unenthusiastic about everything these days, so I decided to rally. He’s a science guy, so we went to a reading of The Planets, which was held at 7:30 in a church building.

At about 7:57, Mr. Israeli stretched his arm against the back of the pew where we were sitting. I thought to myself: is he putting his arm around me? In a church? During a book reading? When we're sitting next to a bearded astronomy fan? When we’ve known each other for less than two hours total? It can't be.

Oh, but it can! The initial clichéd stretching morphed into a full-on enclosure. I felt myself freeze up with discomfort, and he retracted his arm. I felt a rush of indignation (do I seem like that kind of girl?) and also shame (why can’t I just lighten up?).

Maybe if he’d been really hot or even really engaging, I would have happily snuggled against him. But it was such an out-of-the-blue gesture, something that belonged in a whole different category of interaction. I suspect it would have been weird coming from anyone.

So. Tomorrow night I am going out on my second date with the guy we’ll call Mr. Divorced. I like Mr. D a lot better, even though he uses the term frickin’ too liberally. (I dislike the term. I think people should own their profanity). On our first date, Mr. D insisted on paying for dinner, and then he proposed that we go out to his favorite fancy restaurant, a place I’ve only lustfully talked/read about.

I accepted the invitation, but I remain conflicted about it. I recognize that for him, a meal at Oleana is no big thing. But it is for me, and I feel strange accepting such generosity from someone I barely know. Normally I wouldn’t do this. I favor coffee dates for this reason--I don't want to feel beholden to anyone (plus, a coffee date is short and you can leave anytime--dinner can drag on for awkward eons). I also believe that it's unfair for men to have to pay for dating.

But he seemed genuinely taken with the fancy meal idea, and also my friend E. (who loves the restaurant) kept emphasizing that he wants to go, he suggested it, and that I should just shut up and eat up. I keep reminding myself that it's OK for men to pay for dating sometimes, because of the gender wage gap, and because we bear children, and because we have to pay for all the products/services and discomforts that make us hot enough to go out with in the first place.

I really hope that he doesn’t expect me to put out. I’m happy to put out under the right circumstances, but those are very rarely early encounters, be they in church basements or in fine dining establishments.

Posted by Dori at 6:28 PM 7 comments

Cold November Rain (and two mini UpDATES)

The weather has been extremely blech lately. Cold and dark and rainy to the extent that I feel I deserve a Nobel Prize for getting out of bed, and then out of the shower, and then out of the house without succumbing to the siren song of the fluffy purple comforter, which I've been craving like a lover lately.

I had a busy weekend in which city life grated on my nerves. It is an ongoing struggle to get a parking space, dinner reservation, movie ticket, groceries. On Saturday night I finally procured tickets to Borat, after a frantic episode involving three theaters, two batches of fandango tickets, the sale of scalped tickets to frat boys, and dinner plans cancelled sans cell phones. Thanks to the diligence of E., we ended up perfectly poised in the center of the theater, breathing cleansing breaths after all our effort. The movie was hilarious, even with all the hype. I seem to be the only one perturbed by the anti-semitism. The New York Times didn't have a problem with it, so I think I should lighten up. I also saw The Queen (impressive, if a bit dry) and a netflixed movie about a Jewish/Nazi lesbian couple (Aimee and Jaguar). An interesting cinematic mix, no?

I also had two dates. One guy was divorced and expressed at least four times that he is over his ex, really over her, and increasingly convinced that their breakup was a good thing and really, he's never been happier. He was also well-dressed, funny, and nice (he was a big brother to two different inner-city kids). Thus, we're going out again. (When I have more energy, I'll relate the story of the last divorced guy I dated, who turned out to be a doctor banned by the AMA for addiction to prescription sedatives. That guy was really over his wife as well.)

The other guy was also super nice. He volunteers with homeless kids, and is computer genius, all that. I fear we may have a case of NGNS (nice guy, no sparks), but we're going out again too.

The other thing that happened? I tried to change the lightbulb in the ugly fixture that adorns my sky-high dining room ceiling. (That fixture that the landlady promised to replace ... back in ... oh I don't know ... August?)

You know where this is going. I stood on the footstool which I stacked on a chair, telling myself as I climbed up: This is a bad idea. If you fall, you could lose consciousness and lie crippled on the floor for days before anyone would find you.

Well, that didn't happen, because before I could fall and crack my head open on my Crate & Barrel Madison dining table, I very gently nudged the edge of the light fixture (while thinking: you should give up now because you still can't reach the lightbulb), and it crashed onto the dining room table and then the floor and shattered into approximately seven billion shards. I think the naked lightbulb looks only slightly worse than the hideous light fixture. At that point there was nothing left to lose, so I changed the bulb and declared embittered victory. Then I spent approximately nine billion years sweeping/vacuuming glass fragments.

In the words of dear Axl: It's hard to hold a candle in the cold November rain ...

Posted by Dori at 10:14 AM 6 comments

First Things First

This is a good meme, compliments of Madness Rivera.

Who was your first love?
I guess officially it was this guy, Ross, who I met in youth group. He was a senior at a private school and I was a ninth-grader at a public school; he was sarcastic and funny and our relationship made me feel accomplished and important. I really cared deeply for him, even though I was 15. Ultimately, he dumped me for my (then) best friend. They've been living together for the last eight years.

Who was your first kiss and when?
Aforementioned guy. In the bathroom of the aforementioned "friend". It went well. And I definitely liked the subsequent making out.

Who was your first roommate?
This chick Sarah, in college. We both were raised by professor parents within 16 miles of our college. And we looked uncannily alike. We got along fine--we never really bonded, but never fought, either.

The next year I lived in the same dorm with a close friend. We referred to one another as "Homey P." and "Homey D."

The year after that I lived in Spain, with Rosa, an anorexic veterinary student. We shared our tiny room with her rabbit and hamster. The rabbit chewed up my books, and the hamster died halfway through the year. Rosa was not excited about having an American roommate, and she is one of the unhappiest people I've ever met. Periodically, I wonder what happened to her.

After college, I had tons of roommates before getting my own place three years ago.

What was your first job?
Infrequent babysitting gigs in high school. My first official job was washing dishes and vacuuming in my college dining hall. I still get nauseous when I think about cleaning out the vats of salad dressing.

When was the first time you got drunk?
I've never developed a taste for alcohol, but when I lived in Spain (the only time in my life that I actually "clubbed") I downed many "vodka limons" (vodka mixed with lemon fanta). That is some good stuff, and on several occasions it made me extraordinarily giddy. I never threw up, though.

What was your first car?
The adorable Sybil, my beloved Honda Civic. (She is named for Cybill Shepherd and not that woman with the multiple personalities.) I've had her for less than a year.

When did you go to your first funeral?

How old were you when you first moved away from your hometown?
I was 18 when I went away to college, 16 miles from my parents' house.

Who was your first grade teacher?
Ms. Canner. Best teacher ever.

When you snuck out of your house for the first time, who was it with?
I confess I was a goody-two-shoes with permissive parents and I never had to do this. I did stay out until all hours of the night with various boys. I had no curfew.

Who was the first person to send you flowers?
Probably my high school boyfriend, Dave, who had a well-paying job and pampered me with all kinds of lovely, generous gifts. He was very, very good to me in many ways.

Whose wedding were you in the first time you were a bridesmaid?
I first rocked out as a bridesmaid at the nuptials of my beloved friend R.. I had a phenomenal time, felt extremely honored to be there, and came to understand why people have bridesmaids to begin with. In September, I was in R.I.B's amazing L.A. wedding. (This was the wedding with the professional hair/makeup artists at which I looked ravishing.) I got to sign the ketubah and the civil wedding license, which was very, very special.

What was the first thing you did this morning?
Hit the snooze button. After getting up, I slapped some Eggo Waffles into the toaster. Then I checked email while waiting for them to cook.

Posted by Dori at 10:50 AM 0 comments

Stone Age Meets This Age

As many of you already know, I am pretty old-fashioned. I don’t have a palm pilot, I still haven’t figured out IM (but suspect that it would instantly erode any vestige of work ethic I have left), and I refuse to become slave to my cell phone, which I carry around purely for automotive and social emergencies. It is never, ever on. I just recently discovered how to check messages and how to “text”. And text-ing, I think, is a poor substitute for emailing or calling.

However, I am starting to covet two things.

1) A digital camera. If I had one, I could share photos of my colossal apartment (and other stuff) with all of you. I could also sell things online.

2) An iPod. I am starting to feel embarrassed about my discman and its accompanying geeky cheap headphones from Radio Shack. On the bus, I look around at everyone with their sleek, white mp3 players, and wonder if I should be wearing a loin cloth, carrying a club, and eating filleted boar for lunch. Those iPods are wicked cute and easy to transport. But … is the expense justified? I listen to music on my computer all day at work. I can plug into the radio and movies at the gym, where my discman suffices for the rare moments in which my attention wavers from Good Housekeeping and Glamour. Should I shell out $100 or so for one of those things? (They’re deeply discounted on Craigslist.)

Thoughts from my tech-minded readers? And you know who you are?

Posted by Dori at 10:26 AM 9 comments

Gimme an E! Gimme an S! Gimme a T! Gimme a J!

On Friday, I attended a day-long training on the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory (MBTI), which is a test based on the premise that everyone fits into one of 16 personality categories, based on four sets of preferences (Extraversion/Introversion; Sensing/iNtuition; Thinking/Feeling; Judging/Perceiving). While it may sound kind of flaky and horoscope-esque, the MBTI is legit. (It has been validated many times and is used by corporate and career counseling experts.)

(And, even though the training presenters strongly discourage this, you can check out a free fake version of test here. (Completing the official version costs more than $100.)

I am an ESTJ, which means I "approach life with confidence and energy" am "active, ambitious and pragmatic"and "mistrust lofty visions, ideas or philosophies." What can I say? These guys have me pegged.

I loved the training. The presenter was dynamic and we did lots of cool group work.

Usually I loathe group work. I generally want to sit quietly and sip my lukewarm conference-continental-breakfast coffee and doodle on my handout, and absorb the trainer's expertise.

Even though I'm theoretically grown up, I still feel panicky when instructed to find "X other people to work with". The phrase always elicits this scary exchange of glances as everyone tries to instantly nail down a group and avoid awkwardness and pariah-dom. I hate being asked to introduce myself to people I will never see again, "share" answers to pointless questions, and appoint a timekeeper, note-taker, and reporter in preparation for the mind-numbingly dull practice of "reporting back to the larger group". (I'm not sure if this is typical of all trainings everywhere, or just the ones I attend--which are usually related to social justice topics.)

Anyway. The group work in this training was fun, because we were broken into groups by type. So I got to chill with other ESTJs. During one exercise, the Js and the Ps exchanged advice on how to deal with one another. In another, we had to plot our own career paths and identify how type had played into our decision-making.

I left feeling much more comfortable with the instrument, which I may someday administer if I pursue college career counseling--a long-term interest. I left the training with a heightened awareness of myself and all my ESTJ-ness.

Which is useful, because my identity has become murky of late. My email has finally succumbed to the world of spam. I used to get maybe 15 junk email messages a day, now I get way over a hundred. And? They're all addressed to Leslie. Out in the spam-o-sphere, some techno-mechanism decided that I'm Leslie, a person who shops for v*i*a*g*r*a, is desperate for an iPod, and corresponds with Nigerian prisoners.

Thank God for the identity-building Myers Briggs. Without it, I might lose track of who I am.

Posted by Dori at 4:55 PM 0 comments

upDATE #233,176

So I went out again with Mr. Computer Code. I cannot describe to you how much I didn't want to go. I was dreading it all day, thinking about how much I'd prefer to hunker down on my couch and watch Top Chef, which thus far I've missed entirely. To be honest, I was feeling like I'd prefer to go to the dentist or lift weights. I still don't know whether this reflects general malaise or disinterest in this particular person.

I was also feeling resentful about Mr. CC, because the ratio of his emails to mine was like 14:1. He sent me a bevy of options for our date, which included a play and an a capella concert. So yes, I'm glad he's all cultured and smart, but come on. It's a Wednesday night, I barely know the guy, and as I mentioned, I'm in a Top Chef mindset. Definitely not a schlep-out-to-the- venue-and-shell-out-$17-per-ticket mindset. When I suggested an alternate plan, a free book reading in much closer Harvard Square, he agreed but was the tiniest bit prickly about it. In fact he wrote that initially the book reading idea gave him "the shivers", but then conceded that it sounded interesting. He concluded by saying "I guess I can check out the MIT a cappella group some other time." This irked me, mainly because of the money. I don't like to think of myself as cheap, and I really believe in supporting the arts, but I believe that college a capella (which I generally love) should be free. Or at least inexpensive. And I was also miffed to be pressured to spend money on a second date.

The book reading, which focused on the role of income (rather than race) as a major cause of inequality, rocked. It was televised on C-SPAN's Book TV and broadcast on WGBH (the local NPR affiliate). Mr. Computer Code asked two (provocative and articulate) questions, but I cringed anyway because the moderator asked him to "step aside" before asking question #2 and give others a chance to speak. And he argued with the moderator. Afterwards, we had a really good discussion during which Mr. C demonstrated that he is smart, thoughtful, and progressive. He is also super, super nice and brought me samples of the pastries he made over the weekend.

It's just that I can't imagine kissing him (much less having sex with him). Despite all the right ingredients, I feel absolutely no sparks. He emailed me a few hours after the date with some very detailed follow-up info and not one--but two--invitations to get together over the weekend.

I feel bad, but that is just not going to happen.

Posted by Dori at 8:37 AM 7 comments