Buddhas & birthdays

In mid-April, I went to Spirit Rock for a three-day silent meditation retreat. The grounds were very beautiful. Highlights from the full set:






A few weeks later, I headed to Monte Rio to help celebrate my step-grandfather's 90th birthday. Highlights from the full set:

Fantastically snarky things not written by me

Because of the diverse sources of the wine [Two-Buck Chuck], absolute consistency is impossible. "It's a moving target," Karen MacNeil, a prominent Napa-based wine writer and educator, told me. Charles Shaw cabernet, which she had tried on a couple of occasions, left her unimpressed. "I thought, What's the fuss? It's merely a cheap wine," she said. "I don't understand how people put this in their mouths."
—Dana Goodyear, The New Yorker

Tonight, Tyra Banks will shrug her shoulders from her perch at the edge of the abyss, and halfway around the world, a young child in Madagascar will be overcome with a bout of heaving, uncontrollable sobs, the force of which will be so great that he will fall to his knees, tears leaking down his face, until the great wave of sadness finally, mercifully passes (at around 9 p.m. EST). Yes, it's that time again—time for Tyra to nod her impossibly teased hair in the direction of one shivering, frightened Popsicle-stick person and say, "You'll do."
—Amelie Gillette, The Hater

You might argue that I'm nuts for thinking Two-Buck Chuck and TV* are both gross, but at least I'm in pithy company.


* Except family/school dramas made in the mid-'90s. Completely awesome and available on Netflix.

Puzzlement

I walked too much for my poor IT band today. It's sore.

But that's not the point, I'm just feeling sorry for myself. I'm really here to tell you about last Saturday and how it kicked off a series of run-ins with my past (and my brother's).

Everyone plus their kids and dogs and skinny jeans and sundresses and drum circles goes to Dolores Park on warm weekends. I usually avoid the crowds, but some of Cooly's friends were having a picnic, so I stopped by to say hi.

One of the guys looked familiar—not in a recent way, but in a face-from-the-ether way—and it didn't take us long to figure out that we were a year apart at Wesleyan. I also knew another friend of theirs who showed up shortly. He used to date a close friend of mine, another Wes grad (I'll see her in Seattle this weekend, just to tie it all together neatly). I'd never met classmate #2's wife, but it turns out she's a journalist with an English mom, and she used to live in Paris. We're planning to have tea soon and discuss how we're pretty much the same person.

That night, I went to dinner in North Beach and spotted a friend's ex. He came over to say hi and introduce his date, whose face rang a bell. As soon as we heard each other's names, she was instantly familiar: a childhood friend of my brother's. Hadn't seen her in at least 20 years, but we both got a big kick out of the chance meeting. We're planning to get a beer soon and reminisce about Avi's five-minute-long love affair with horseback riding.

And my college friend in Seattle? Her current boyfriend is also from my brother's toddler days. She just figured that out when they were talking about holiday traditions and he mentioned the Chanukah parties he used to go to at his buddy Avi's house.

On Monday, I ran into another Wes classmate on BART on the way home. Yesterday, I posted this Facebook status update: "Mia keeps accidentally finding little puzzle pieces from her past."

This morning, a package landed on my desk. That's normal—one of my job perks is constant delivery of free books. But this one wasn't a book. It came from an art PR firm, and inside was an unassembled puzzle.