Ok, so...I'm Back....

Hi Guys...I have missed you all so much. I know, I admit it...I have been kind of quiet this summer. It was a self-imposed respite, really....a little social detox. And you know what I have realized? Hiding out isn't for me...I am an unabashed extrovert/social butterfly/overgrown (overaged??) teenybopper. So I need to check in on occasion with my posse and blather on about goings-on and happenings and moments in time...so here I am...

So many of you have asked me to start writing again...you have lamented the dwindling of our weekly blasts from the late great Great Fridays...yeah, me too...things change, the old cliche. It was Gwen who was craving a fix of some useless rambling, witty banter, pointless musings and a general distraction when she politely (ha!) suggested I get off my a** and start blogging again. Well, to be honest, Rob said so too, but being that he is my husband, I rarely do what he asks or even suggests. He is supposed to support me and pump my ego no matter what, so, poor dear, I tend to blow off his recommendations until a friend seconds them...another example of my poor wife-ing skills (I am a kickass cook, however, which scores me some points...my house is warming up with the smell of my perfect roast chicken as we speak...). Either way -- you know the drill...I have always been a writer...as soon as I could pick up a pen I was writing stories -- the greatest of my early works was about a blind girl named Eliza who rowed across the Potomac river to go to school because her mother had too many other kids to have time to drive her...not quite sure blind folks can row boats, but whatever. How the eff that idea came to my 7 year-old brain is still a mystery (could my mom and my four siblings have been the inspiration??? Nah...must have been my fascination with Little House on the Prairie and the prissy blind older sister, Mary Ingalls...).

Anyway, I just need to write because it brings me joy...that is really the very best reason I see to engage in this exercise...because putting my thoughts into writing makes me happy. Ok, so...I'm back and Thus It Continues...

Most of you know that I am working fulltime again at a funky/cool/fabulous PR agency in Manhattan filled with paranoid barracudas, gay boyfriends and sweet, insecure twenty-somethings who assume it is completely normal to work until 2:30 a.m. listening to some major cosmetics brand manager yell at them 'round the clock. At any rate, I am an anomaly in the office--the only female in the entire place who has given birth and actually has three little responsibilities taking precedence over saving up for a Marc Jacobs bag and Facebooking all day long. It is kind of fun being back in the mix with the young-uns...even though re-entry could have been smoother. But of course I miss the days when I was on a lighter schedule...when I was able to pick up my kids after school and blow off any freelance work for a few surfs across Dlisted.com. And as much as I like being back in the Big City, surrounded by movement day in and day out and enjoying some cosmopolitan social interaction here and there...I would love it if I could spend lunchtime with my adorably jealous and possessive 5 year-old (who now seems to prefer his dad and my sister, his Aunt Cathleen, to me...just like a man: out of sight, out of mind....).

So, because I am a tad frazzled these days, I try my best to stay connected to the suburban pulse through my friends....This past Friday I joined a group of friends for a monthly girls' dinner, at which we enjoyed cooking, eating, giggling...oh, ok, and drinking...The girls were all anxious to hear about my glamorous, sexy life as a professional in the Big City...and all I wanted was to hear about the birthday parties and teacher's conferences and playground gossip. So it struck me how we tend to conjure up romantic images in our minds of what people are actually doing with their lives when we see it only in glimpses. We all do it -- case in point, the mere existence of People, Us Weekly, Page Six, E! News...So I know the girls tell themselves my days are filled with "fun" and "creative" brainstorms (about menopausal-relief products...), jetting to business meetings (so far Cincinnati has been the highlight) and daily Cocktail Hours at chic clubs (every blue moon in a scuzzy dive bar, maybe...)...And I am convinced they are all dropping their kids at school every morning and then meeting for breakfast, strolling, lunching, tennis-ing, going to movies, shopping. And whatever they are doing all day long, I want to be doing it too.

So what do we do when we finally get a few hours alone to enjoy eachother's company? No, we don't debate the Sarah Palin hullabaloo or even download all the Back to School week happenings...why would we? Instead the dinner conversation centered solely around the one subject that universally unites women, the topic we all cackle about incessantly: men. That's right, guys...give us a glass of wine and all we do is talk like we are in some girly-centric locker room filled with inquiries and declarations such as "Are you into bad boys?" and "Of course I'd sleep with Tony Soprano!"...So after we all burst into tears laughing at our lovably daft husbands and then discuss in detail our shared attraction to the bloated yet still studly Food Network chef, Tyler Florence, my friend "A" shares her theory that marriage, by law, should allow for some extracurricular fooling around to honor our instinctual multiamorous inclinations while still preserving the family unit. Of course it doesn't take much to convince the rest of us that this plan would save the world...well, except for "R" who wondered why any of us would want more than one man pawing at you all the time. Well, maybe she has a point...but what place does the voice of reason have amongst a bunch of cabin-feverish suburban moms???

Then "T" begins telling a story about how she recently stole a ponytail holder (just one) from CVS, which then brought her to preface the narrative with a blurb about her weekly early Saturday morning meeting with her friend Gayle at Starbucks...and the wealthy, older bachelor named Sam who joins them. Each week Sam picks up their tab and tells them how gorgeous they are, asking "T" to remove her flip flop so he can better admire her pedicure.... We are all-ears when she is talking...this all sounds like a bit of innocent fun and right up our alley (not the ponytail holder part...although I would have stolen one too in her situation...). So she continues on and tells us that another guy, Bill, has been joining them lately and it has become this little Saturday morning rendezvous...at least this is how I am hearing it. I think, Hell, I am missing more than I thought now that I am working again....

And then the story takes a turn when "T" admits that she started wearing gym socks with her flip flops to hide her pretty feet...and the secret suburban fun we are all hyped up on deflates once we realize "T" and Gayle are actually kind of skeeved by Sam, his garish pinky ring (this is New Jersey, remember...) and tendency to lurk. And then she reveals that this guy Bill is actually the local alleged flasher who not only jogs around town in nothing (and I mean nothing...) but spandex bike shorts and running sneakers, but also waves to anyone and everyone he passes along the way with this giant clowninsh grin...so odd....

Ugh...totally creepy...On second thought, maybe hanging out at the local Starbucks at daybreak isn't quite as enticing as I had imagined...

Photo 1: Suburban Mamas/Wyckoff Swingers, Sam, me and Amber, this past Memorial Day on my deck...have I even seen Amber since?!

Photo 2: My chicken is better...

Photo 3: Whiny and blind: Mary Ingalls...the inspiration for my earlier works...

Photo 4: Marc Jacobs bags...all this could be yours for a mere $1,100...wish I could say I was above coveting one...
Photo 5: My little boos...5 year old in center looking off to the side, searching for the next best thing...

Photo 6: Highway Jesus...the only thing to see in all of Cincinnati!

Photo 7: Two favorite things: Tyler Florence and a table full of food...

Photo 8: They are calling out to me with their enticing candy colors -- who couldn't resist shoplifting a single Scunci ponytail holder???

Photo 9: Not Bill...this guy looks waaaay hotter in his spandex shorts...