I loved both of them, men and women. I still do. But women were so much work, so much sifting through things being said and done and wondering what was truthful and real versus what a woman considered truthful and real, always subject to change. Tick-tock and ding, ding - new definition of reality. Thank Christ, there’s none of that with men.
to the universe-at-large. So many thanks to all 89 of you, the First Love/Worst Love backers who’ve shown so much love and support it nearly makes my head spin! This adaptation of my minutelovestories to the Fringe Festival stage is happening because of each and every one of you. with love, RC
BIG THANKS TO YOU ALL:
Megan Stelzer
Anna Deschatres
Matt Allard
Gregg Leonard + Astrid Reed
Beth Adler
Joe Gera
Pete Reed
Diane Powers
Alex Wyse
Cynthia Futino
Jess Dickey (my Scorpio sister)
Danielle Jacques
Chris Greiner
Liz Ludwitzke
John Faggiano
MJ Blanchette + Brian Cox (my brother + amazing sister-in-law)
Leah
Jennifer Judd-McGee
Nicola Skingle
Naomi
Katherine Nelson
Andrew
Matt Allard
Deb Vigna
Alexandra Donovan
Sandy Thompson (my faux-Mom)
Riley Albair
Loree Gold
David A Williams
Angie Light
Jenn Proske
Ruth
Edgar
Raina
Evie Abat
Eileen O’Sullivan
Colleen Carroll Hagyari
Bronwyn Potthoff
Felicity Fee-Doyle
Mike
Renata Lopes-Merriam
Lillianna Pereira
James Tucker
Susan Savory
Peter Hanlon
Lisa Richards
Cathleen Carr
Henry Hereford and Sierra Fisk
Lisa McGowan
Casper Brindle
Elena Apostolos
Jerome
Lisa Bartleson
Caroline Stover
Dominique Gallotta
Francine Dressler Somers
Lori Reck
Pam Sartorelli
Jodie Curtis
Danielle Boucher
Jenne Claiborne
Deb Thompson (my BFF forever)
John T. Woods
Brook Spurr
Kathleen Keith
Ivana Suvak
Sarah LaChance
Jocelyn Casey-Whiteman
Kimberly Kirkland
Jennifer Komisarek
Stephanie Patsourakos
Jill Giegerich
David Eubank
Emily Van Horn
Joe Gera
Guy Capecelatro III
Stephanie Allen
Kris Paulsen
Courtney Lee Pilotte
Barry Campion
Gary Cox (my Pops)
Karen Kang
Carol Fleming
Katherine Williams
Shannon Anderson
Jacqueline Miro (my dear DOE)
Daniel Cameron
Tim Beavis + Hanna Frank
Richard + Heidi (Pengabolsa + Heidipantalones)
Kimba Hills
Jim Evans
“He disappeared into complete silence.” — Louise Bourgeois
Making our reservation at the Divorce Hotel was surprisingly easy. I was chewing gum while I dialed. I never chewed gum during my marriage. Maybe I was shifting into someone else. People shift. That happens. And we erode, too. We’re more like the earth than we realize.
Like all of our travel plans made throughout our marriage, I was in charge of coordinating the hotel, airfare, cab, and discovering the lauded restaurants frequented by locals. For this short trip, I did not pack his bag for him, though I imagined he might be wearing henleys for the entire weekend, the top button always undone, the crewneck collar flapped open slightly.
Checking into The Divorce Hotel, we were not greeted with enthusiasm. None of the staff wished us a joyful stay. The concierge ignored us when you made me laugh loudly in the marble lobby. Obviously, they’d been informed that we were not the usual guests. We were checking in to check out. This hotel would save us thousands in lawyers’ fees. At dinner, I drank champagne, you wore a silk tie. Feeling oddly auspicious even while freedom and failure summoned us with weakening restraint, we toasted, like gleeful spendthrifts, to getaways.
“‘I beg you,’ she said in the gentlest of voices. ‘It was so long ago that I don’t know.’ And when he pressed her further she protested: ‘You shouldn’t always return to the past. It’s enough that we have to devote so much time to it against our will.’” — Milan Kundera, Let the Old Dead Make Room for the Young Dead
You’ll listen to Motown with greater curiosity, brought to surprising sobs by the tragedies of Tammi and Marvin. Your cyclamen will not be neglected. You will swear less. You will learn how to perfect spaghetti Bolognese. You will be more resilient.
“Every relationship has at least one really good day. What I mean is, no matter how sour things go, there’s always that day. That day is always in your possession. That’s the day you remember. You get old and you think: well, at least I had that day. It happened once. You think all the variables might just line up again. But they don’t. Not always. I once talked to a woman who said, ‘Yeah, that’s the day we had an angel around.’” — Charles Baxter, The Feast of Love
“somewhere between a wound and a jewel.” — Lewis Crofts referencing Egon Schiele’s paintings (via descroissants)
(via pour-la-gloire)
“There are few things we should keenly desire if we really knew what we wanted.” — La Rochefoucauld
[video]
“In the very depths of Hell, do not demons love one another?” — Anne Rice
“All Alone in a Crowded Room”, Vivienne Strauss :: http://www.vivienneart.blogspot.com/
How will I stay in love next time? What will I do differently? I will not cling. I will remember to forget remembering the past with mawkish nostalgia, as it is reliably inaccurate. I will learn how to ride a bicycle and I’ll be ready for anything.
Eve knows that dour and droll are not synonymous.
She pulls at her pintuck sleeves and glances at her husband, Ron, his popped collar obfuscating his neck, flat-front trousers taut across his quads. He exercises forty minutes every morning, squats and stretching included. Eve doesn’t bother him during his workouts. She reads the obituaries and tries to discern whether the deceased was, in fact, a moral person while awaiting Ron’s showered arrival in the kitchen. His dark gleaming hair reminds her of chocolate frosting, something she privately consumes. Dressed in mint greens and apricot oranges and Palm Springs’ sky-blue, the couple resemble pleated and pressed sartorial imitations of Diebenkorn’s Ocean Park paintings.
“Remember when Jesus ended up in the ER?”
She refers to Ed Raphael, the lead in the staged production of Jesus Christ Superstar the previous summer. She and Ron found him half-dead in his driveway, victimized by an electric gate gone haywire. Jesus’s understudy, a significantly less vibrant actor, Jeff Dodge, took over the role. Eve says, “We’re now at that age where we risk finding friends unconscious in their homes.” The effect of being droll was lost altogether on Ron, who found the conversation too macabre to continue.
“She Was Determined To Live Without Compromise And With Good Taste”, Vivienne Strauss :: http://www.vivienneart.blogspot.com/