Goodbye, Old Gal.

Ralph Barrera/Austin American-Statesman, via Associated Press.

Thank you for your fierce truth telling and for being true to your own voice when others demanded that you betray it.

The world is a far less beautiful place without you.

And yet, you will forever be an inspiration.

Ms. Ivins learned she had breast cancer in 1999 and was typically unvarnished in describing her treatments. “First they mutilate you; then they poison you; then they burn you,” she wrote. “I have been on blind dates better than that.”

But she continued to write her columns and continued to write and raise money for The Observer.

Indeed, rarely has a reporter so embodied the ethos of her publication. On the paper’s 50th anniversary in 2004, she wrote: “This is where you can tell the truth without the bark on it, laugh at anyone who is ridiculous, and go after the bad guys with all the energy you have.”

As I know it

. . . the writer's life ain't so glamorous.

But it certainly is rewarding. Here's what it's been like pour moi:

After a Saturday afternoon of rewriting a new chapter, I went to see for the purpose of reviewing the show. Sunday I taught spinning to a real class of live people for the first time and then hauled my ass to the ballet, also for the purpose of reviewing the show.

After procrastinating by watching 60 Minutes and Cold Case featuring all U2 songs and washing my kitchen floor and cabinets, I went to bed at midnight, woke up at 3, spanked out the  two reviews by 6, went to the gym and spun for an hour, held office hours at a coffee shop and graded papers, took care of some business at the office--including booking my trip to Paris(!)--, spent the afternoon working and reworking the third draft of that now newish chapter and the first act of my old screenplay, prepared them for submission to a competition, went to my narrative theory class and bluffed my way through it, came home and got ready for the next day.
 
I'm learning what a deliberate writing practice takes for me.  I've always had some talent, whatever the hell that is, which has meant I can consistently write quickly and relatively cleanly and I work well under pressure.  But I've allowed myself to get away with dashing things off.  Now I'm getting into spending hours at a stretch revising a couple of pages.  Really working through my own material.  It's good.  I can do this writer's life thing.  I like to work at a coffee shop--it helps ease the isolation.  I don't know if writing for a living is my aim after all.  Perhaps.  Teaching seems to be a good balance.  It would be nice to have the option to live off my writing, though.  Get a place in the West of Ireland near a cliff, surround myself with animals and a big garden, have a pub where I can end my long days of writing, spend a few months out of the year teaching in Dublin.  Or Paris.  Or Sarajevo.

I suspect I'll always desire a kind of split life.  I crave a solitary existence, but I can also be intensely extroverted--on my own terms.  I'm city mouse and country mouse rolled into one, and I like it that way.

Oh so many ways to celebrate Paddy

~Celebrate the "Luck of the Irish" During the
Cricket World Cup in Jamaica
this St. Patrick's Day~

Trade in reggae, Red Stripe and jerk chicken for traditional Irish music, a pint of Guinness and Irish stew to celebrate the fighting Irish on St. Patrick's Day, March 17th, as the legendary all-inclusive Sunset Jamaica Grande Resort & Spa debuts its first-ever 'Irish-Fest'.

As Jamaica plays host to the 2007 International Cricket Council World Cup, Sunset Jamaica Grande Resort & Spa will host several Ireland Cricket team fans and family members. With the luck of the Irish and four leaf clovers in hand, Irish-Fest will celebrate Ireland's entrance into the Cricket World Cup following the Ireland vs. Pakistan cricket match, which will take place on St. Patrick's Day at Sabina Park.

Irish-Fest will fuse Jamaican beats with traditional Irish music in the splendor of this white-sand beach resort, complete with a spectacular variety of amenities, five restaurants, two beach grills, eight bars, spa and stellar location. Five lavish swimming pools, waterfalls, jacuzzis and plunge pools meander through this beachside complex, offering the ideal getaway for singles, couples, families and groups.

The Duffy Brothers, an Irish pop band reminiscent of the Backstreet Boys, will headline the evening, performing a fantastic fusion of traditional Irish music with Celtic rock and reggae following their appearances at Ireland's world cup cricket matches against Zimbabwe and Pakistan. Extraordinary local reggae artists will also perform as guests dance to the island beat.

I have got to start working on my travel writing career. Having to show up for classes is cramping my style.

Sometimes you work hard and it pays off

. . . unbeknownst to you.

I have lost 17 pounds since September. Can you believe that shit? I mean, I've been working out consistently and feeling good and all, but I had no idea.

I love calculations that turn out in my favor. Now I'm going to try to take that vibe into doing my taxes. . . . and ride it all the way through end-of-term grades on to bikini season!

I'm also thinking about taking a trip. I need an adventure to look forward to, and a break mid-winter, early spring always does me right. Now it's down to Paris or Atlanta. They both have reconnections on the table; Atlanta has better weather in March and a writer's conference that could be a career booster; and Paris, well, I mean come on! I've been hankering for visual art, sophistication and fun--is there any better place for that combo? I reckon, considering the facts at hand, the trips would each cost the same. But I could write off Atlanta. I guess I could write off Paris, too, if I produced an article or something about it. . . .


Obviously I'm leaning toward Paris. Wouldn't you?

You never know what a quiet Saturday will bring

Do you remember when the world was fresh and new? When you believed you were the only person who felt emboldened by a song heard for the first time? When there was so much more ahead of you than behind you? When all that you could only imagine in the future was more thrilling than terrifying? When you believed there was more out there for you, and that you would indeed grab it? When you hadn't discovered love but you could taste the sweet, dripping juices of its possibility?

I had forgotten. For a long damn time. But yesterday I walked right into it in the form of a used record shop in Ann Arbor with the boys. I saw music on vinyl that had given birth to how the world sounds to me--yet I'd forgotten. I bought obscure cds from alternative bands (when alternative existed--before Nirvana) that I'd listened to before I could drive on cassette so many times that the tape squeaked louder than the singer sang. But I hadn't thought of that music for fifteen years. I put the cds on for the drive home, and I was right back in my bedroom with my headphones on singing every angst-laden lyric by heart.

I had forgotten that budding young person--her intense sense of wonder, her unshakable belief that a glorious undiscovered world was holding something beautiful just for her and that if she could hold out, she'd find it and escape the desperate isolation of that second-floor bedroom and days filled with monotony and school hallways packed with narrowly-lived lives that wouldn't dare fathom the expansive imagination of her interior world.

I had let all that go. Why? Partly because I've grown up, I've found what I had dreamed of--quite literally in some cases, and I've become accustomed to living outside of awe. I don't fear who I am anymore; I'm not afraid of being too much in the context of others. In my life these days I'm quite often the loudest, most-laughing, chatty, charming person with the best shoes on in the room. I'm usually in charge, and if I'm not, I often think I should be; therefore, I find a way to lead the way.

But there was a long stretch there when--unbeknownst to me--I gave up on myself. I let an Other take over; I provided a stage in which he could shine, and I submitted to his sense of the ways things should be, even when they didn't jive with mine. I straightened my hair. I quit leaving my car to idle in the summertime at red lights to run through sprinklers on the side of the road. I changed out of my pajamas to go get ice cream after dinner. I let him control the stereo. He became the maestro of the soundtrack of my life. I willed discovery to him. I let him be right, even when no one was wrong.

And yet one foot into a dusty old used record shop brought me a couple of steps closer to the dreamy world that lay the foundation for the sumptuous life I now lead. Closer to me.

Reclamation number 167,892: rediscovering my music.

"The judges of normality are present everywhere."--Michel Foucault

Hot fun in the wintertime

. . . means I've been to Chicago!

Highlights:

*the drive through three states with Kiki and The Bear (thanks, Sid!), including a stop at an Indiana Dunkin Donuts in which I saw my future

*Two makeovers, one in which I actually looked like someone socked me in both eyes even after I told the lovely 12 year old named Lorelei with a rhinestone stud piercing where Marilyn Monroe's painted on mole was specifically not to make me look like I'd just lost a boxing match


*Cat on a Hot Tin Roof: a very interesting production in which the dude who played Big Daddy would have been better cast in a KFC commercial

*running into Bill Murray at a hip little Italian joint not far from the theatre

*bloody mary brunch with the always delightful Woog and Oog at The Lincoln

*bloody mary and Kir Royale brunch with the ever-lovely Shasta,

the fabaluss and also made-over Sid,

Kiki and the Bear at Angelina's

*shopping, shopping, shopping, scoring big on January sales at H&M

*drinking, eating, drinking, drinking, drinking, drinking at the usual haunts with the usual suspects, except this time I initiated a tart-like dance off between a doughy jock from Glenview and a wiry, 23-year-old Oaxhacan . . . the latin with the hips outdanced the golfer with the lips, but ultimately I won the prize for biggest whore on the dancefloor. I mean, really? Must I be loyal to a single dancer when there are so many others out there willing to give me a better spin? I need to go dancing more often. And spend more time with pretty MexiCANs.

*discovering why I scored a riverview room on the 17th floor of the Hyatt Regency for $65 a night on Priceline: Annual Narcotics Anonymous Convention. First it looked like a roadie convention, then it looked as if the pimpmobile made a delivery. Lots of smokers in the bar. Even more men in fedoras and floor-length minks. My kind of partay!

Unfortunately, after many, many martinis and very little sleep, my body rebelled, my throat screamed bloody murder, and I am still recovering from a nasty virus. My virtuous, spinning, gym-rat self isn't accustomed to such fun and debauchery. So, I've cancelled everything this week and undergone a fruit flush. Feeling better. Strep throat ruled out.

But speaking of spinning, the weekend before last was mad. The phrase "that really chapped my hide" has whole new meaning for me. Two days on a stationary bike'll do that to a gal. Damn. I start teaching my own classes in two weeks. Fun times. This is going to be good for me. How do I get myself motivated and committed? By motivating and urging on others! Does that make me an extrovert? Or perhaps a control freak? Whatevers. If it gets me into the kind of shape I think I'm capable of, then so be it. Not to get all Oprah on your ass, but I think that if one's aim is to live the best life possible, it means making the decision to embody that by getting in the best physical shape possible. That's what LL Cool J said on The View yesterday morning, so it must be true. This is why I cannot take any more sick days. (I also found out by watching The View that Rupert Everett wrote an autobiography. I love him. I want that book.) (I also discovered by accident that there is a transgendered character on "All My Children" and since absolutely nothing has happened on "Days of Our Lives" since 1985 when I stumbled upon it, I might just switch to the more progressive and by far more interesting Soap.) See?

Good Lord. I better get back to living my actual life. Off to Ann Arbor to workshop a new chapter I haven't yet written, see Volver, and do din dins with Kiki and the Bear this weekend. Wouldn't life be grand if we could call in sick every Monday through Friday and jump right into weekends? In other words, I need five days to recover from my weekends these days, folx.

Happy New Year!

I know, I know. Divine has been on extended hiatus, but I'm back for 2007!

It's not that I haven't been living or writing, it's just that I've been leaving evidence of my whereabouts and goings on elsewhere.

Things such as getting drunk and ringing in the new year with a front-porch dance party in Ann Arbor with my buds,


turning 30!, getting drunk, putting up my Chri-muss tree and dancing in a new personal decade at home with my buds (and in style),


fun with power tools! and reconfiguring reclaimed furniture,


visiting my old haunts and buddies out East; loving and getting loved back by Philly, as always, and reclaiming Boston--

--seeing it for what it is and what I couldn't see while mired in graduate school and the sinking ship that was my love life at the time. (You know, I friggin' like that place and the people I know there and I could easily see myself living there again, even though I feel much more at home in Philly--and having nothing to do with HB, just as I had nothing to do with him this time around. Funny how the trip was utterly delightful without inviting him into the experience or even telling him I was in town. Note to self: remember how life can be smooth yet filled with passion when one chooses to step out of chaos's path.)

In addition to such highlights, I've spent a heap of time doing much less photogenic things such as teaching classes; attending meetings; writing papers, chapters, reviews, Chri-muss cards; grading papers; spending hours every day at the gym. Not that it's done anything but kept me from piling on holiday cheer in the form of many, many pounds. Meaning: I have lost no weight, simply maintained. And that's fine by me. Next weekend I'll train to become a spinning instructor. Me: officially becoming a gym rat. It suits me, especially now that they've redone the women's locker room so that it clearly resembles a spa. Ain't no effort I won't make when I know I can spend 20 minutes in the steam room afterwards. I've also discovered the finest masseur in the history of ever--and ya'll know I know massage; I got rubbed every chance I could by anybody willing last summer all over the Eastern Block. But in the 'zoo? Two. Hour. Massage. $65. Magic hands. Biggest, most beautiful queen north of the Mason Dixon. Enough said.

This is the year. I'm saying it now. My year of transformation has begun. 28 was about reclamation. 29 was about clarity. 30 is about transformation.

Watch me now, y'all!

And happy, happy days to us all! What's 2007 about for you?