hello goodbye

Hell yes French kissing. A+ French kissing.

I'll tell you all about it when I get home. See you in a few days!

HEAT WAVE

Boys. French boys. Cute French boys. The Pet Shop Boys. Boyz Noize.

Now this is turning into an adventure. What good is all that beret wearing, all that mime, all that hard long...bread without some action. Here's a question: French kissing?

Here's another question: Portland? Correct me if I'm wrong, but the last adventure to take place near Portland was when those kids went after One-Eyed Willy's treasure, before that it was Lewis and Clark. Oh shit, did I just forget Harry and the Hendersons? Get back to France where the lack of deodorant is charming and where an adventure is already in progress.

The sun has an office in Los Angeles. We're in the midst of a heat wave. 102 in the Valley, 90's in Santa Monica. When I go outside I feel like that nazi in Indian Jones who's face melts off. Caleb doesn't know what's good for him. His white, half Wisconsin-German half Polish-Jewish-New-Yorker-Los-Angeleno skin is naive. He wears more sunscreen in a day than most Pepperdine College sorority sisters where in a lifetime.  

As you know from living in Los Angeles, even though the sun shines through all four seasons, summer does still carry that carefree mentality.  We've been out and about a lot more. We've taken Caleb to the shores of the Pacific Ocean, we've been familiarizing ourselves with the old school soda fountains of South Pasadena, and the Mom and Pop ice creameries of Alhambra.  I've enjoyed the company of men, golfing before work at Penmar in Venice and drinking afterwork at Big Deans under the Santa Monica pier.  Caleb's tearing up the playgrounds of Studio City and Sherman Oaks.  All that's left to do is to smoke a joint in the parking lot of Dodger stadium and heckle baseball players from neighboring San Diego or snobby San Francisco.      

Summer is the time when you abandon your plans to leave Los Angeles and you get excited about all it has to offer again.  Summer is the opposite of having to go home for the holidays.     

Flowers and Fresh Love.

Hello future brainiac. What's new? Over a month has passed and I've written nothing. I feel terrible about it. Do you feel terrible, too? I hope not.

I've been a bit lazy / complacent about correspondence because my perception has been in a constant state of flux and I haven't felt that I can weigh in on any one topic, perspective, or feeling, with a definitive viewpoint. Definition is probably overrated anyway. Do you wanna know why? Boys. Or more to the point, one boy in particular. I'm totally ga-ga over the cutest Frenchman you could ever hope to meet, and it scares the hell out of me.

Relationships really get me nutty. There's so much pessimism and doubt floating around out there in regards to couplings, it becomes really hard to just close your ears and let what you've got going be it's own thing. I hear all these voices saying guys always cheat, women are always overbearing and jealous, everyone's suspicious, you'll never sustain passion..... ahhhh!!! Turn it off, TURN IT OFF!! I feel like I may be finally reaching a state of equilibrium, at least for the time being, so I write to you my friend!

I'm in Portland at the present moment, and it's exploding with flowers and green things. It's so damn beautiful here, and it smells amazing! If it wasn't so boring I might consider moving back. I was thinking about leaving Paris. The dollar situation is so grim, it's hard for me to afford living over there right now, and teaching myself French has proven to be very difficult. Now that I'm gone I'm totally missing it, and the summer was just getting good when I flew out, so I've decided to keep at it and have faith that the money issues will work themselves out, as they so often do. Also, I'm going to start speaking French like I really think I know what I'm doing and filter out all the giggling from the recipients of my broken dialog. I hope that helps. It will be a good exercise for my ego at the very least.

How's the baby coming? Do you know what flavor it will be, or is that a surprise? What else is new?

Bisous.

FUTURE BRAIN.

It's been a strange week for me. We had clients in town from Chicago on Monday and after a day in meetings, going over creative, we went out for one of those expensive meals where you don't feel like you ate anything. Afterwards we closed down Santa Monica with empty-ish stomachs that we filled with drinks. It was classic America debauchery. I felt like I was in a Cassavetes film. No chinese bookie was killed, but If one was, our party would have been investigated.

I awoke the next morning hung over, with Caleb perched on the bed watching the Backyardigans. It wasn't the weekend. It was Tuesday, and I wasn't a carefree 24 hour party person. I was a dude that needed to change a diaper, swap PJs for real clothes, walk a dog, eat a bowl of Golden Grahams, feed a dude some yogurt or something, kiss a wife and get in a line of cars driving slow speeds over a concrete hill. Balls.

That Monday outing gave time a surrealist tone that continues even now. Clocks aren't melting or anything, but I'm feel like Tuesday morning should have been Saturday morning. What I'm saying is, I'm living in 4 days in the future mentally, but I'm physically in the present! Could this be a plot for a Kevin Bacon movie? Answer: yes.

So far the near future is just okay mentally. I can't speak to how I'll feel physically or what will happen historically, but I do know that mentally I just feel okay about 4 days from now. I still support Obama despite what may be revealed about him between now and say Monday. I'm not excited about or frustrated by the Lakers despite the outcome of the two games that occur between now and Monday. Also, my weekend, the one that I'm about to have, wasn't that exciting I guess.

Watching paint dry, and babies.

Hello my friend,

My god! Another baby! I am blown away. I really did have to read that sentence twice. I don't know why I get so amazed by all this baby business. Everybody can do it. Everybody is doing it, but suddenly it's happening to my friends and my cousins, and I'm totally in awe. I suppose in some respects I still feel like I'm an inept child myself. I still give myself a big pat on the back when I manage to make the bed and pick my clothes up off the floor, and here you are doing it for yourself, plus two other little people! Mon dieu!

For some reason I keep remembering the week I got my driver's license. I drove over to your parent's place to take you on a victory drive, or demonstrate my new skills, or something like that. I was in my little silver Ford Festiva, remember that thing? I had a bunch of change sitting on the dash, and you said you were going to test my abilities as a good driver based on the amount of change I could keep on the dashboard when swinging around corners. I think a bunch flew off. I remember feeling as though I had really messed up my challenge. Were you disappointed dad? Heehee. Is this how you'll teach Caleb to maneuver through the streets of Los Angeles?

I've been watching paint dry too, figuratively, not literally. Paris fooled me into thinking the sun was about to burst through the clouds and ask all the little buds and green things to show themselves. Alas, the sun is not ready to be put into spring service just yet, and instead the rain is working double time, and here I sit, thinking about babies.

I have two babies. They're much furrier and less maintenance than your kind of baby, but I love them intensely, nonetheless. My babies are a bit bored and dissatisfied with the Parisian lifestyle. They scoff at the idea of art museums and architecture in lieu of private gardens and large living spaces. In protest of our current living arrangements, Olive has decided to get fat. She's gone from 8 pounds to 10 pounds since we arrived. It's hard for me not to see how unhappy they are, all cramped up in this apartment. It's not a good life, so I'm considering moving down to the French Riviera, where the rent is cheap, and there are gardens galore, for kitties and humans alike.I'm going to try to make it down to Cannes for the film festival, and hopefully I can check out some places then. We'll see.

Drinksy? / Porkchop's Pants is sounding very appealing to me right now. I wish I could join you for a drink. I've been feeling really nostalgic for LA lately. It probably has a lot to do with the rain.

I hope your painting project turned out lovely. I'll talk to you soon. xo.

EVERY SUNDAY NIGHT IS LIKE SUNDAY (to be sung in Morrissey Voice)

I'm waiting for paint to dry. Watching paint dry isn't so bad. I'm enjoying it. I finally polished off this weird bottle of scotch I've had in my arsenal for some time. It was a hand me down. It was called Beam. Not Jim Beam, just "Beam," and it had a stamp like label with a small crew of red headed ducks flying across the sky. Every time Eric came over I'd poor him a small glass of Beam and we'd sit on the the edge of my bar, ("Drinksy?" that's the name of my bar. With a "?". Eric named it, It has another name, "Porkchop's Pants") we'd sit on the edge of my bar and smirk at the Beam in hand. "What are you Beam? " I'd wonder. Are you something Jim Beam released back '70's in an attempt to class yourself up? Are you Canadian? Probably, you seem kind of full of yourself, and you're not all that. One think is for sure, you're as free as those ducks that brand your face and you're all gone. Thanks for the memories.

I'm going to fill the empty Beam bottle with Jim Beam and keep the dream alive. After you figure out Santa isn't real you have to keep your own dreams alive. Did you know that? Finding out about Santa is actually the real defining journey into adulthood. You should be able to vote when you know that Santa isn't real. I'm going to put a second coat of paint on now. Good night.

The Kitchen to the Garage Monologues

There is a hole in the wall between the kitchen and the garage. It's a bold carefree hole that says, "Hey man, you're plumbing used to be here, but now it's there". It was made today by some combination of three plumbers and two contractors. To me it's a peep hole into a world of hope. It's a world where laundry can be done in the garage, and not the kitchen. It's a magical place like Disneyland or Narnia or something. One day the hole will be a door and the garage will be a laundry room/ art studio/ spider-free zone. It will be a much needed space, especially if we have another baby, like the one we're having in August. Wait read that sentence again.

Yes that is correct, I had sex a second time, and alas a second child in the works. Soon we will have the all the pieces on the table and we can look at the puzzle and say, "Oh shit, this isn't a kitten and a daisy, this is a puzzle of two chimps riding a tricycle". We're excited and scared, but mostly we're excited. Cheers.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Hello Andrew!

I just got off of a train that was infiltrated by about 30 four year olds. It was amazing. All the riders had unwittingly been entered into a very smiley situation. Kids were striking up conversations with strangers all over the place, cracking people up, doing goofy shit, staring like only kids can do, in that totally non-offensive, and completely adorable way. It pretty much made my whole week.

No! I did not get a holiday card! As a result I’m feeling perplexed and sad, and extremely disappointed in the French postal service. I will imagine it as a lovely and heartwarming greeting, with a chuckle thrown in, as I’m sure that’s just how it was intended to be received. In light of this dark news, it’s lucky for me that the Patron Saint of Metro Toddlers has saved the day.

Well I think you’re resolutions are top notch. In fact you’ve done such a splendid job with them that I will adopt them as my own and skip right over the messiness of having to cook something up for myself (I might not get too deeply into #3 though). I feel like a better person already. Thanks Bush, or Cheney, or wait…. Who’s the lame duck? Who wrote the law? I can’t talk politics.

So much has happened in the interim betwixt now and our last correspondence. (Oh, I’ve just thought of a resolution, I will begin to use the word “betwixt” on a regular basis.) I have been busy busy busy, so so busy, a busy busy bee. The busyness is stemming from:

1. Becoming an enlightened being.
2. Traveling, as an enlightened being, to Amsterdam with your friend (now my friend too) Eric.
3. Acquiring a roommate.

Instead of spending the holidays alone in Paris, I decided to go on a seven-day retreat being held at a Buddhist monastery in Bordeaux, Plum Village. I went through a bit of a back and forth before deciding on this course of action, mainly because the daily wake up call was at 5am and I’m getting up around 1pm these days, but after departing for my journey, I realized I had made the right decision. I spent the first 45 minutes of the train trip ruminating over how badly I wanted to clock the guy who had made me move my luggage so he could sit in the seat it was near, even though the train was otherwise empty. I tried to be a good Buddhist and practice non-attachment, but nonetheless, I was very attached to sending him dirty looks and openly hating him, after I brattily stormed to an empty seat on the opposite side of the train.

Throughout the week I also became attached to many other things. I attached to the idea that I must chastise my chatty French roommates for never shutting up during the damn Nobel Silence. I attached to the idea that the nuns were secretly plotting against the lay people, or “Dear friends,” as they would call us. I attached to the idea that I must pile as much food as possible onto my plate, because it was free. I attached to the idea that the mouse who was nightly gnawing at the wall from the inside out may eventually break through and head for my bras and panties (not an unfounded notion, as I once had two hamsters who made a hobby of turning my undies into Swiss cheese). So I decided it was best to not remain impervious to my reason for being there. I needed to calm down all that incessant monkey brain chatter.

I practiced non-attachment by taking pictures of dewdrops, fat cats, and ripples on the pond, while wandering through the brown vineyards. The nuns reminded us all to “Just enjoy breathing.” I did that too. I placed my feet squarely and firmly on the ground as I walked, feeling every step, taking every breath, letting thoughts pass. I liked this. The monkey seemed to have a bit less to say, although we were still having disagreements from time to time. The monkey really REALLY wanted me to reprimand my roommates for never ever shutting their big fat mouths (I think this is the monkey talking right now) but luckily the monkey didn’t really know any good French, so I won that battle. I often thought of Positive Positive Positive Drew, and what his advice to me may be. “Breathe in, Breathe out, don’t scream and shout. You’ll be a hip, happy monkey, that’s what I’m talkin’ about!”




The monkey did spend some time complaining with the other campers, but ultimately I just chalk that up to some good old-fashioned bonding amongst people who would otherwise be total strangers, without much in common. I’m letting the monkey off the hook for that one. So, after a week of living mindfully, and enjoying my breathing, I haven’t totally gotten the monkey off my back, but we have a much more kind and understanding relationship with each other now. At least he’s not throwing feces at me any longer, or when he does he apologizes after. I consider it a success!

Then I got home and there was an orphan from LA on my doorstep! I’m a self -proclaimed roommate-less kind of a woman, and the monkey is a whole other story that shan't be addressed here. Needless to say I was a tiny bit worried, but I decided to accept this as my post enlightenment challenge. So pack two people, two cats, and one monkey into a tiny Paris apartment, and also factor in a lot of breathing betwixt these elements, and you have my busyness in a nutshell. It’s actually all been going wonderfully, I am happy to report.

I've blabbered on too long. I'll have to tell you about Amsterdam another time. Quick summary: It was great!

It may be too soon to say this, but I feel spring is in the air. I’m getting giddy.

When are you going to bring that baby and your special lady on out to visit? Soon, OK? Make it happen.

Two hugs and a kiss from your good buddy Sonya.

The new roommate checking out the sites.


Totally loved Amsteram, and it had nothing to do with pot.


Paris is still beautiful, of course.


Love from Plum Village.

Resolution Day.

I sent you a holiday card. Did you get it? It was the holidays you know. The holidays. Do they have any good holidays in France? There's a new one here since you left. It's called, Resolution Day. It's the night after the day after new years eve. So the 2nd. I think McCain and Feingold got together over a glass of spiced nog for one last bipartisan hurrah before the presidential mudslinging excelerates to sign Resolution Day into effect. It's amazing. It's founded on three principles.

1)People are Inherently Bad
2)People are Inherently Lazy
3)People need to write shit down or they'll forget shit.

Since it's a new holiday the traditions aren't well documented or defined. From my understanding though, generally it involves enjoying a glass of wine and sitting down with a quill pen and parchment paper over candle light while wearing a powdered wig and a pair of bifocals (after flying a kite in an electrical storm). Then it's customary to write your new years resolutions with the exuberance and vigor of (and these are Feingold's words not mine) "...a thousand canons into the night sky!"

I got off to a slow start spending much of my first sheet of paper doodling a whale with a huge dong. The dong had gills and a hatch for a torpedo. I titled it, "Whale Dong W/ Gills & Torpedo Hatch 1". Note: It's hard to draw whale cock with a quill pen. I thought of old Ben Franklin, Benji, drawing whale genitalia over two hundred years ago. It must have been hard, no internet, nothing. I used that as my motivation for my new found resolve. I titled my resolution, "The Great Resolve of 2008: What Would Benjamin Franklin Do? (W.W.B.F.D?)"

THE GREAT RESOLVE OF 2008: WHAT WOULD BENJAMIN FRANKLIN DO?

1) Prepare and eat a Turkey once a month.
That's 12 Turkeys a year. They're really not that difficult to make and they alway signify a feast. I had a Turkey for Christmas after missing Thanksgiving Turkey due to a stomach flu, and I wondered why we deprive ourselves of this treat for most of the year. At least one of these delicious birds should be consumed a month. I think this is especially important in months like March when really nothing is going on. Maybe Birthday Turkeys, Full Moon Turkeys, Day Light Savings Turkeys, Turkey Awareness Turkeys. It doesn't matter as long as wishbones are pulled and the times are celebrated.

2) Write anonymous letters.
It's great to communicate traditionally in a classic correspondence as we've begun here. There are however people that I need to say things too without them knowing who I am. For example there is this store in the Sherman Oaks Galleria that sells a bunch of ugly shit. It's the kind of merchandise that can ruin a civilization. It's mostly bad jewelry, and stickers that declare, "My Hair Has More Attitude Than Most People" or "I'm So Sexy There Is A Support Group For My Stalkers". Someone needs to formally protest this type of commerce. I doubt one voice alone will make a difference, but I can no longer sit on the sidelines as '80s honda accord after '80s honda accord is littered with this sparkling vinyl diarrhea.

3) Call in to sports radio programs more often.
Sports Radio is to the AM dial as Tranny Prostitutes are to the Benito's Burritos on Santa Monica Blvd in Hollywood. It's where they live. It's were the magic happens. Maybe even where dreams are born? I've long been a critic of ESPN Radio's Colin Cowherd and his ridiculous morning show, "The Herd with Colin Cowherd" He and his producer once argued several months ago that there hasn't been a legitimate hard rock band since Korn. I'd also like to think that I contributed to the firing of one time radio host, Roger Lodge. His sign off comments included the phrase, "Support Our Troops, Vote for Bush" Even as I write that now, years later, I throw up in my mouth a little bit. My small circle of sport radio listening friends launched a swift email campaign that received a speedy apology from his producer. The gist of it is I don't listen to sports radio to hear opinions about music or politics, I listen to hear people weigh in on whether or not Tony Romo is effected as a quarterback by dating Jessica Simpson. But then there are my Heros, Kevin Wheeler, his knowledge of everything from professional Basketball to Canadian High School Hockey is unparalleled. There's also the relatively new, Matt "Money" Smith. He's able to blend his love of Indie rock with Lakers analysis seemlessly, all while advertising for California Carpets. Vaya Con Dios Matt "Money" Smith. My favorite is Lee "Hacksaw" Hamilton. He's probably number 17 on my personal heros list, just behind Mark Rothko and Duke Ellington's arranger, Billy Strayhorn. He's gone from having a daily show to being relegated to a weekend recap show, but his on air stylings are still poetic and his call to arms for the greatest amount of on air callers doesn't go unnoticed. I feel you Hacksaw. I'll call you all. Except for Kevin Wheeler. I think he's no longer on the air. RIP Wheeler.

These are my goals.