My latest essay: "Are New Friends More Exciting Than Old Friends?"

My latest essay The Frisky on new friends vs. old friends. Didn't quote it but will always remember Girl Scouts and "Make new friends but keep the old/one is silver and the other gold." What do you think? Is there a friendship equivalent of "new relationship energy?"

At the same time, my friend K. was just in town from England. We met in 1998, via a Sleater Kinney mailing list, and have since visited each other a handful of times. I have a comfort with her that goes very deep, and we’ve seen each other through all kinds of relationships. There’s definitely something wonderful about friends who’ve seen you at your best and worst, who know how your past informs your present. I don’t want to sound like I’m throwing my old friends under the bus for younger, cooler versions. It’s not about age or “cool” per se, but perspective. Sometimes I get stuck in a rut of how I see myself, and that comes across with old friends.

Lately I’ve been so busy working that I’ve barely had time to see my closest friends, and sometimes I feel guilty about that, and like I shouldn’t be hanging out with new friends when I haven’t even hung out with my old ones. But I don’t think it’s a competition; true, there’s limited time and we may not get to see everyone we want to, but different friendships provide different sources of support. There are friends I mostly see movies with, friends I gossip with, friends I can tell my deepest, darkest secrets to without worrying about them judging me. One isn’t necessarily better than the other, but together they form a network that, collectively, props me up.

Read the whole thing

2 books I recommend: Rad Dad and It's Hard Not to Hate You

Two books I recommend - the new Rad Dad: Dispatches from the Frontiers of Fatherhood anthology (click here for tour dates!) and the new Valerie Frankel memoir on friendship and jealousy, It's Hard Not to Hate You. Crazy deadline week/month but when I have some time I'll write a bit more, but if you're interested in politics and parenting, Rad Dad is great, and Frankel's book is funny but extremely memorable and tackles questions like how many friends should you have/do you need, what to do about professional jealousy (you can play "figure out the chick lit author she's talking about;" it only takes a wee bit of Googling) and bitchy neighbors and more.

I get jealous over at The Frisky

I wrote a piece for The Frisky called "Girl Talk: Should I Be Jealous of His Female Friends?" about my new guy and his many female friends. So far (in 2 days), it's spawned 80 comments (and a few conversations between me and said guy) and certainly hit a nerve:

The other night, after having sex with the new guy I’m seeing, he said casually, “I’m going out for a drink with my friend. I’ll be back in half an hour.” Fair or not, it bothered me that he was going out with a female friend (I’d still have been a little miffed it had been a male friend, but not in the same way). The fact was, I was exhausted after having flown home on a red eye that morning, so perhaps I was overly sensitive, but still, I was jealous … especially when three hours later I woke up and he wasn’t there.

I almost left, but he apologized, telling me his friend had some major issues to discuss and they’d lost track of time. He rushed back and we fell asleep together. The next night, I got to meet the woman I’ll call Alice when we all went to dinner. She was fun and sweet—and has a boyfriend. In just a few minutes, I could tell she wasn’t a threat to my relationship, but still, the fact that the majority of his friends are women, and there are lots of them, has given me pause.

Read the whole piece at The Frisky.

Frustration

Last night's reading went off without a hitch, I will post more about it later, but I'm so pleased. I'll have the next 2 months' lineups up soon. Then October we have our first guest host, Carolyn Castiglia, and it's also the 4 year anniversary of In The Flesh but we'll be celebrating that at spanking night November 19th. Though even if we call it a birthday, 4 spankings doesn't sound like very many. Will have to ponder that one.

Anyway, though, past few weeks have been full of frustration. I'm one of those people who always thinks everything's my fault, and obviously, sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. But even when it's not, I try to look at what role I played, how I fucked up or could've made things easier on myself.

A few weeks ago, I was planning to go to the library during my lunch hour, but got an email about appearing on a local radio station. I then spent about 20 minutes of my lunch hour chatting with the producer, who made it sound like a done deal for the next morning. I asked if we were all set and she said something like, "Unless something major happens in Iraq..." So I took that to mean I was on, and didn't mind having thus wasted my chance to go to the library (it's a slightly far trip).

Then I get a call from her later in the evening telling me that I'm not on. From the impression I got from her end (something about a guest and scheduling), the segment wasn't happening. Turns out it was...with two people I know and respect. I took that to mean my answers weren't up to snuff, that instead of being asked to be on the show I was somehow auditioning. And, well, I was annoyed and a bit jealous. No, I don't have the proper credentials as those friends. I've never written a book, no longer have any column to attach to my name. I get it, but what frustrated me was the wasted time from speaking with her to researching the topic. And I hated that jealous feeling. Of course I was happy for my friends on the show but I was annoyed that my time had been wasted and wished I'd gotten to do the show. But it made me realize that if I want these gigs, I have to write a nonfiction book. Simple as that. It will happen...not anytime in my foreseeable future (I can only reasonably see about a year or two into the future), but it will. For now, I have other projects occupying my attention. I learned that next time, nothing is final until you are literally on the air. I should know that, but I either didn't or I forgot, so, lesson learned.

This week I had plans with someone. They were made the night before and somewhat tentative, but seemed more solid than not. I was waiting for them to call, and wound up rearranging whatever schedule I'd had to wait. And wait. I finally texted and turns out there wasn't going to be enough time to meet up. I felt stood up, and since this was kinda maybe sortof a date, or something like that, it made me feel like I did so many times when I was dating random people, that it was all about the sex, nothing about me. I realized that if this person thought there might be a future between us, someday, whether I do or not, it wouldn't have gone down like that. Right then and there, I lost my interest, at least, any potential sexual interest. There was a time when I still would've gone out of my way to pursue something like that (yes, I am in a relationship which is going quite well, this was just a mild flirtation), to find a way to work it out. I was a bit annoyed but I also knew we didn't have confirmed plans. And the person's young, young enough to, perhaps, not know better, or not try to see it from my perspective. I learned that I had to either not make future plans with this person, or realize that they're always tentative.

The other frustration is sortof two in one. I can't get into the details but I had a disagreement with a friend that left me rattled. Both were somewhat about the same topic, money, which is almost always touchy and tricky. It reminded me of my ex and brought up a lot of my issues, which I also can't, or rather, won't get into here. After a long night last night, I was standing in the bathroom in my boyfriend's apartment with tears streaming down my face. I don't really know that I was "crying" - to me, that word involves sobs and rocking and being on the verge of utter collapse. It wasn't like that, though it could easily have been. The tears are happening now as I write this. I couldn't get the loop of both my conversation with my friend and my role in it out of my head.

I see exactly how it happened, and it was one of those things where as I was doing something, I was thinking, maybe this isn't right. At the same time, I had the best of intentions, but things don't always go as planned.

I'm not one of those people who has lots of fights or arguments; the person I ever argue with the most is my mom, my dad second. I don't tend to argue with people I'm dating. Before this, I honestly can't remember the last time I had what I'd call a fight with a friend. I'm sure I have, but it can't have been recent. That's not to say there aren't slight disagreements or annoyances but those I move on from pretty quickly. The last one that comes to mind was many years ago, with a friend who'd borrowed a key to my grandmother's apartment after we'd stayed there, then lost it, and I really, really needed it, and wound up getting in trouble about it. Now, it seems silly and stupid, and that is not even on my radar when I see this friend. But this other problem, I don't know how it'll play out. I hope we can move past it because I feel awful to have come across like I don't care.

The lesson I learned there though is that money is such a huge topic it has the potential to make all of us act in less than ideal ways. I reacted from my gut the other day and while I don't think my feelings were wrong, I went about expressing them in a way that not only worsened the situation, but I know hurt my friend. I don't plan to mix money and relationships, friendship, familial, or romantic, again, because every time I have it has led to cracks in the relationship that weren't there before, and that is something I definitely can't afford.

All of which is to say that it's been a trying time the last few weeks. I need to get my focus back, mostly because the only person who's actions I can control is my own. Much as I know that, sometimes I get aggravated with people around me who aren't behaving the way I'd want them to. I know someone who almost every time I see them talks about how much they want to do something, who says they're going to do it, who laments not having done it, who vows to do that thing the very next day...and then doesn't. I don't personally care one way or the other but to hear it ad nauseum does make me wonder about their values, their meaning. That's what I liked about the integrity vlog.

I do it too, but hearing Kimberlee say it out loud, I realize that I want to be the kind of person who does what she says. I'm about to sign a contract and all I can think is how foolish and stupid and young and dumb I was when I signed another contract about three years ago. How full of hubris and full of myself. This one has no emotion, no elation. It's business, which it always, always was. It's words and numbers and signatures on pages. That's it. Maybe there will be something about it to celebrate, someday, when I approach that baby-making witching hour, when I am 35, a number that looks cold and scary and so not me, at least, right now. I hope there will be something good at the end of the rainbow, but I know I have to make it happen. No one will do it for me or hand it to me, and the greatest sin I can commit is to expect something magical. I learned so many lessons from round 1, which I can't dwell on now, as I'm in the midst of round 2. The point is, I need to retreat a little and look inward. I've been spending a lot of nights alone and I have to say, it's fucking awesome. I am not this social butterfly people seem to think I am. I love going out but I really do love being on my own even more, not feeling locked in to plans or expectations. So I'm trying to limit the going out lest I become too antisocial.

I've also been writing next to nothing, which means no extra money coming in. I have a few fun assignments that I'm excited about, for print and web. I was flirting with attending my first Romance Writers of America (RWA) conference this weekend, but so glad I'm not, as I'd have had to be on a bus to DC at the crack of dawn today, and would only have gotten 2 days of the conference. Instead, I will live vicariously by reading my pal Lauren Dane's novel Restless and look forward to next year in Nashville. And maybe get a hot stone massage.

And keep on sweating buckets at New York Sports Club - that has been so wonderful. I'm keeping myself on the elliptical machine by reading the new Sophie Kinsella, Twenties Girl, which has all the Kinsella hallmarks but actually takes things up a notch. It's about a young women with a failing business and love life who's visited by the ghost of her 105-year-old newly-dead great-aunt, Sophie, who regales her with stories from the 1920's (and beyond) and meddles in her love life and shows her a new side of things. I like Sophie because she takes lovers and smokes and has a much more devil-may-care, let's-have-fun now attitude than the protagonist, Lara. I've been trying to only read it at the gym, but now that I'm in the middle it's getting really good, so I either have to step it up at the gym, or break that rule.

This weekend I also plan to have a Mad Men marathon. I don't have cable (or even regular TV) and just got hooked in time for the DVD release of Season 2. If you're a fan--or even if you're not--check out Jezebel's "15 Feminist Moments from Mad Men."

On bromances and romantic friendships

Interesting perspectives, and so glad people are talking about the fact that, well, sex is not everything.

"Bromance: Drawing the lines of male relationships" by Stacie Foster, Daily Orange:

The real-life Joey and Chandler, Chace Crawford and Ed Westwick of "Gossip Girl," are also forced to dodge rumors about their alleged homosexuality. The two share an apartment and are often seen together publicly, but they've also both been romantically linked to A-list celebrities (A-list women celebrities). In Chace's case, he's dated country superstar Carrie Underwood, and Ed's been spotted kissing both Drew Barrymore and co-star Jessica Zhor. Obviously, Chace and Ed share a bromance, not a romance. Try to tell that to the media, though.

My question is, why haven't Jennifer Aniston and Courtney Cox Arquette or Jennifer Lopez and Leah Remini drawn the same criticism? It's not fair to question the pay disparity between actors and actresses, like many have, and ignore the social disparities.

I say kudos to Brody Jenner for trying to set the stereotype straight. Bromances aren't morally wrong, and they certainly aren't innately homosexual. Jenner may not be the most insightful Hollywood celebrity, and "Bromance" may be more about a paycheck than changing American culture, but Brody still made the leap. I respect him for that.

"Lustless love affairs: Girl crushes, bromance and other unsexy relationships" by Kate Carraway in Eye Weekly:

Romantic friendships require all of the focused care of a traditional romance, and related kinds of co-dependent intimacy and intensity. In a social context where fewer people get married, or get married young, and where more lose their relationship to divorce at some predictable point, the resulting emotional void demands the building and maintenance of magical pal-doms. I have maybe five romantic friendships among my first string. With them, my phone voice changes. They play with my hair. We are in love. Romantic friendships aren’t the same thing as regular, close friendships: my best ladyfriend and I aren’t at all romantic. We make fun of stuff on YouTube, play tennis and say goodbye by bumping fists, as detached and harmonious as adolescent next-door neighbours. My solid friendship with an ex-with-benefits isn’t romantic either, owing to our extreme competitiveness, mostly about our respective Jeopardy! prowess and the ongoing question of whether journalism or engineering is harder.

The collective, dreary absorption in getting laid means that the richness and radness of no-fucking friend-romances are usually undervalued, especially those between women. Girl crushes are often understood as precursors to lezzie stuff, even though most straight ladies grew up amid a close set of shrill, clutching girlfriends fed by a dramatic romance unfamiliar to most straight adult couples. Devotion to women-friends is a whole other thing when it’s felt by girls putting off babies and baby-daddies for a while longer. Although it’s sometimes maligned for its frattishness, bromance has of late gotten some kind of cred and been personified by reality douchemaster Brody Jenner, whose MTV show (yeah, Bromance) has men competing for his bud-ship. Outing man-love as a cool and appropriate thing is great, but I like bromance better when it’s about one unthreatened guy friend ironing the other one’s button-downs, just because, rather than glorifying wing-men.

Tower of Power, or cupcake and cheese queens

Tower of Power
Originally uploaded by editrixie.

I have more to say about this photo of me and three of my favorite people ever, Allison Bojarski (aka my trainer), the most positive/connected/partygoing/hardworking multitasking blogger chick I know, Nichelle Stephens, and cheese lady/erotica writer/multitalented "sadistic Southern belle" L. Elise Bland, but the details of how awesome they are will have to wait. Allison, Nichelle, and I run Cupcakes Take the Cake and we are having our next Cupcake Meetup on Saturday, June 16th at 2 pm in Central Park. It's a picnic, so please come and bring cupcakes if you're so inclined (not required though). The first NYC Cheese Lovers Meetup will take place Saturday, June 2nd at Artisanal at 3 pm. I can't go because I'll be at Book Expo but it sounds like a totally delicious event!

This photo was taken by the wonderful Stacie Joy, who went out of her way to brave the rain on Wednesday, even though she was sick, and you can see the rest of her awesome In The Flesh photos here.

Nichelle in The New York Times

Photo Shoot
Originally uploaded by candiedyams.

My friend and fellow cupcake blogger Nichelle Stephens was interviewed in Marci Alboher's "Shifting Careers" column in The New York Times this past Sunday! Woo-hoo! Cupcakes Take the Cake even got a link. If you need a small business accountant, contact Nichelle. I loved the part about how if you google her, you'll find her right away.

SheNANNYgans that move me to tears

Sometimes I worry that this blog is too schizophrenic. For who, I'm not sure, but I'm sometimes tempted to make an all smut/sex blog and then an all everything else one. But as much as I love the niche blog, this one's ultimately about me. And my seemingly infinite interests that may go from, say, sex and sluttiness, to mommyhood and beyond, in an instant. So feel free to click away or skim or skip as you desire. And since my main interests in life are pretty much babies, cupcakes, Boggle, books, feminism, high heels, sex and smut, well, you're gonna get a mix. Those who get it, get it; you know who you are.

One girl who gets it, who I will post about here every day if I have to (but just add her to your rss reader, why don't you?), I love her blog, and her, that much, is Rebecca Woolf. I met her at a party at SXSW and was so glad to have the chance to just say hello. In a huge understatement, her life is very different than mine. She's 25, I'm 31. She lives in LA, I live in New York. She's a married mom, I'm neither. But...we get each other. And her blog makes me cry from joy and cry from just sheer overwhelming emotion.

Her post today about SheNANNYgans, the new section of her blog written by her nanny, made me and many other readers cry. It defies everything that the word "nanny" brings to mind. It's as far from the Upper Anything Side and The Nanny Diaries as you can get:

Today, watching Lauren chase Archer around the park, it is impossible to believe that three years ago she was bedridden. That she had tubes in her chest and couldn't walk or expose herself to any kind of light. That she couldn't eat or feel her feet, numb and paralyzed. It seems like the whole thing was a dream.

Finding someone to trust enough to be with Archer is almost impossible, but having him in Lauren's care is such a blessing. I don't know if there is someone I would trust more.

Read the whole thing

And we'll both be at BlogHer in July! I so can't wait.

I love her

Courtney - Mod
Originally uploaded by Rob Boudon.

Rob just notified me about this smoking HOT photo he took of our friend Courtney, who's living it up in Aruba with her man (but still managing to blog and send emails), has a show next month ("Super Glossy!" - about women's magazines) at FRIGID (and the San Francisco Fringe Festival), and rocked "Call Me" and countless other songs last week at karaoke. I had no idea I was entering into the presence of karaoke royalty. Next time, me + sake = joining them. Yes, I am drinking again once in a while, when it's fun and silly and I'm in the mood.

I truly love this girl and she's beautiful inside and out. I can't believe I've only known her since October. Brett was like "you have to email Courtney!" (I'm paraphrasing, I don't think he's as exclamation point-happy as I am) and I did and was just in awe and continue to be. She inspires me all the time with her energy, gratitude, and all around awesomeness. She's an honorary guest at my little "you rock my world" dinner on Monday I'm hosting (and by "hosting," I mean whipping out the credit card at Sushi Samba) but I'm sure we can emulate her spirit. She's one of the most positive people I've ever met, and yet we both have very similar dark sides, I think, and I like that we get each other without endless explanations.

And if you are intrigued by her, she's a waitress at a yummy NYC restaurant. Not sure if I can blog exactly where but trust me, she won't be a waitress forever.

I could gush more, but I won't. Courtney knows how awesome I think she is. And now you do too. And mark your calendars for April 18th - she's reading at True Sex Confessions night at In The Flesh.

Rachel on Rachel action

DSC_0798
Originally uploaded by brianvan.

Me with the fabulous Rachel Fershleiser (with Allison in the background) at the SMITH Magazine party at Sutra last night, post-In The Flesh. Proper writeup and media roundup TK. I was out way too late last night talking about sugargliders, nutrition, and other random but amusing topics.

Friend gratitude

I may not blog my gratitude every day, but it's there. For reals. Not only my friends but readers and other people, some of whom I know to varying degrees, have come out of the woodwork to show their support, and that means the world to me. Believe me, I'll be fine. It'll smart for a while but then, like with any breakup, I'll feel better. I'll find a new suitor who's even richer, sexier, and who makes way better arm candy (and does not smear ink all over my fingers). Maybe even one I can cyberfuck.

One of the people who's just been making me laugh and delighting me generally since we met is the man of many blogs, Mr. Brett Jackson.

I love Brett because he writes things like "Self destructive tendencies make for world class parties" and advises me on who's "breeding stock" and who's not, can manage to give spot-on advice, especially from the guy perspective, while also being very witty and clever (the latter of which is probably redundant, but whatever) and I never get the sense that he thinks I'm ridiculous. I mean, he may find me entertaining but on a very basic level, he just gets my often convoluted thought processes and is an excellent partner in crime. Add to the mix Emily and Courtney and I feel like we could take over the world. Or at least, New York City.

I have thus far broken 2 of my 3 unofficial resolutions, though I still reserve the right to make more. Perhaps this weekend I will be tempted into the dark side and get crazy drunk, just for the fun of it. I'm not anti-drinking for myself, just anti-drinking when I have the potential to truly damage my friendships and relationships, not to mention my liver. But surrounded by my favoritest people (who I know really could care less whether I'm buzzed or not, which does make a difference), I think I'll be okay.