tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36017122024-03-07T20:53:28.447-06:00Unexpectedly OrangeVanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.comBlogger153125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-1825544848654492662011-05-17T20:27:00.106-05:002012-08-05T13:15:34.071-05:00In defense of screamers
Brooks Salzwedel, Nest High
Pretty in Pink
Scene:
Andie walks up to Blane in the hallway to confront him about reneging on their prom date. Previously, Blane succumbed to the pressure of the wickedly delectable villain, Steff, played by James Spader, to stop slumming it with Andie. Andie has no intention of letting Blane cut and run. Nope. She wants him to Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-62647204723322641242011-04-18T18:50:00.006-05:002011-04-19T12:18:18.177-05:00perfectly ripe for pairingI go to the nail salon every few weeks to see my favorite friend and technician, Quynh. We first exchange niceties about our families and dogs, but this is only small talk to stave off a direct inquiry into the status of our love lives. It’s as if through our note-comparison we hope one of us has found a seed. At times we trade off wearing a rosy glow, brief happiness that is visible from the Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-65991062898850621532010-01-20T00:37:00.009-06:002014-05-15T13:15:52.407-05:00heaven on earthMy mother tells me in Heaven we have jobs uniquely designed for each of us. I imagine a span of bodies like a wheat field, toiling with purpose. The individual aspects have fallen away in the face of greater good, much like the features of Earth disappear as you zoom outward from a satellite image. You cross over into a new realm when you can no longer see faces, only evidence of their energy, Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-33982906755667847842009-12-19T21:51:00.004-06:002010-11-07T15:47:34.715-06:00first love"In your life I see everything that lives," Pablo Neruda.At seventeen, when the world was still new, and just ten months shy of me getting the chance to take it on, I fell in love. He wasn't someone I had known. We were in school together, but our paths hadn't crossed. I asked about him through a friend. We were introduced, and that was it. I was swept up and away, just like any of you who have Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-51523405491949751122009-12-09T17:23:00.016-06:002010-03-31T23:29:48.986-05:00miracles on larkin streetDo you find things, or do they find you? Writer Heather Sellers has an opinion on the matter. She says, "I don't think we look or don't look for love; the heart is a receptor, always working. In spite of our best efforts to protect or hide it, love looks for us, regardless of how we orient ourselves." She's talking about love, but I'm thinking in general terms, about things. Miracles are Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-19384010331289381392009-09-13T19:19:00.005-05:002010-11-07T16:36:58.859-06:00my mom's not a slutI don't subscribe to the notion that you should wait until you're married to have sex. No surprise there. But somehow folks are surprised (and by folks I mean some women), when I reveal that I don't believe you should tell young girls not to give it up.One fine day I was sitting in my living room with "Oprah" on in the background. The topic had to do with women and sex, not really sexuality or Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-84878849171430979722009-08-06T14:29:00.011-05:002010-11-16T15:08:38.454-06:00habitsI don't know what I'm doing here. It took thirteen hours to cross 800 miles west on I-10 up 285 toward Ruidoso, New Mexico, to pop a squat at a little spot on the tail end of the Rocky Mountains. Besides wanting to stop one thing and start another, I'm not sure what else to do. The problem is that I brought myself with me, and it would be really nice to get a break. Coworkers: Vanessa. Roommates:Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-40512376154623062192009-07-08T15:48:00.004-05:002009-07-09T11:05:37.269-05:00chris rozzi's paintingsSee more right here. Buy them here.Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-88625989221026565832009-07-04T13:01:00.006-05:002009-07-06T11:01:11.021-05:00design yummy enough to eat top image: watermelon blu dot strut tables in powder-coated steelbottom image: duravit vero washbasin; reminds me of the ice cream in the middle of an ice cream sandwich.Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-48833803602842528792009-06-14T20:58:00.006-05:002010-11-16T15:12:30.742-06:00revolvingI said goodbye to the one-hundred and twelfth one tonight. Of course not to his face. Via text. Something about leaving his stuff by the door. There doesn't seem to be any time for goodbyes anymore. Life's busy. Not like in airports where you see plenty of people lapping up farewells, but they are in love, not out. The first goodbye was Ian when I was four. When I was four I thought his name was Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-46720173228319361782009-05-16T02:13:00.008-05:002009-07-06T11:43:31.860-05:00travel journal (circa 1999)Today is Monday, and I'm on my way to Dover Priory by train. Last night I stayed in the Hyde Park Hostel in Bayswater. It was a brief visit but a bit more lively than the last hostel. The place was full of French people who played Eminem and Lauryn Hill loud and smoked cigarettes, putting them out on the floor. In my room was Stephanie from Toulouse, Danilo from Sao Paolo, and Ash from South Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-88772326253719484912009-05-13T15:56:00.007-05:002010-11-07T16:45:45.519-06:00derailedMy plan to churn something out at least once each month tanked in April. I actually crafted a little number called "Crazy Bitches" (inspired by my client), but it didn't make the cut. Truth be told, that New Year's resolution to get something published, yeah, I've only made one pitch. You have to keep pitching. It's like acting. You try out, audition, stand in long cattle call lines, usually to Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-51685974008710190872009-03-09T22:48:00.006-05:002009-07-06T00:30:18.911-05:00finalmente y otra vezI wish I could reach the place I'm longing to go. I have been waiting. But then it seems the thing I have been waiting for no longer matters after years pass without it. Other things bring happiness in surprising ways. Writer Monica Ali describes the fickle nature of our desires in a revelation about different kinds of love. She says there is "the kind that starts deep and slowly wears away, thatVanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-69859766570491592792009-02-02T19:37:00.002-06:002009-07-06T00:30:18.911-05:00a dedicationI'm finally starting to feel my age. This next birthday I'll be thirty-seven. I've lived a selfish life when you think about it. It's been for me, not for a partner or for any children. The only time I understood what it was to give every day for the good of someone else was when I taught school. Everything that was in me was for them, and it was an easy gift, easy to give. They needed Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-83161877473754174622009-01-20T09:48:00.001-06:002010-11-07T15:52:45.231-06:00tennesseeOnce I took a road trip through the South. My favorite spot for viewing was the low mountains near Chattanooga, Tennessee, dark mountains where the clouds wind through them like roads. You may find yourself driving through cloud or just under it, like down covers resting over you with the light breaking through. I was there in the morning, the brilliant holiness of morning, with the Tennessee Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-22165027719511757582009-01-20T09:32:00.005-06:002009-07-06T00:28:08.625-05:00the old neighborhoodWhen I was a little girl Texas was all around me. Limestone riverbeds plumped up the landscape. Chalk rock crumbled in my hand. Carlos Castaneda books, Mexican dresses, Santana music, toe sandals, nude hippies at watering holes, deep blue spring pools, and my house on top of a hill in the middle of a whole neighborhood full of where I came from, we never left. I grew up in The Four Seasons on Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-63585846093676896742009-01-01T20:02:00.004-06:002014-05-15T13:07:27.867-05:00misanthropeI usually write a new year's post. Usually I feel a contagious sense of possibility from getting to start over. January 1 coming around again is like a do over. What will I do this year? What plans can I hatch? This year my mind is elsewhere. It's too early for a backlash, but it's found me.
It's been, what, half a year since gas prices got to $4 a gallon, since we realized we're in an Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-75896942936863127872008-12-21T11:23:00.013-06:002008-12-21T13:58:02.186-06:00christmas wish listnest high http://brookssalzwedel.com/pages/67heldon.htmlfuji finepix s9100Backroads biking trip through Provence, Francephoto by Flickr mc559Nana DeBary eau de toilette bronze Winter in Central Park.photo by Daniele SartoriVanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-55167809650568968172008-12-18T20:06:00.005-06:002010-11-17T15:11:03.805-06:00repeat the sounding joyfor JohnI've been thinking about joy and where to find it. My friend and I have one of those trigger lines--as soon as you say it you both know kind of thing. I'm actually not sure what it is we both know except that we fall on different sides of the fence. The line is from a Lucinda Williams song. She hollers, "You took my joy!" And then she clearly states: "I want it back."Lucinda's not my bag.Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-41927360211694954862008-12-01T20:21:00.002-06:002008-12-01T21:49:43.085-06:00the last month of the yearI feel like it's a race, and I've just won. December 1, the first day of the last month of this break-neck year. I was driving home tonight in the pitch blackness that comes with falling back this time of year and saw the white twinkle lights of a huge Christmas tree in one of the town homes sprouting in my neighborhood. A tall bright tree. Oh yes. Time can stop for a moment to take it in. Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-34424558025959513122008-06-12T21:25:00.005-05:002010-11-07T16:54:35.756-06:00belated . . .So friends, I owe you some stories. I've been in the new house for more than a month. Can you believe it? Me neither. It's so very beautiful. I find that my favorite parts end up being a patch of wall brought to life by some mish mash of mixing old and new. I am so sad that I don't even have a digital camera so that I can show you. I wish I had a fairy to bring me things.I live in a Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-1885738451500747312008-03-29T11:37:00.022-05:002009-07-06T11:01:36.469-05:00new homeIt's been a busy March. My girlfriends and I kicked it off by hosting a baby shower for Michelle at her lovely home in Dallas. Last week we celebrated Match Day for med students all across the land. Envelopes passed out, "one, two, three," presto, they learned where they'll spend the next four years. (Stephanie got Dallas, and Heidi got Chicago.) On Saturday night before Easter, I got a little Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-28775061347314992672008-01-28T20:10:00.003-06:002010-01-10T19:43:28.676-06:00Gang leaders on "The Wire"My dear friend, Joel (pronounced ho - el, an important descriptor I think), introduced me to the wide wide world of HBO's The Wire last season, a show that is like sitting on the edge of the plains, looking up at the West Texas night sky, everything wondrous and yet barely perceptible upon first look. While striving to decipher the language of the street and at least two dozen characters' story Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-91576571631044588412008-01-10T13:56:00.002-06:002009-07-06T00:04:40.957-05:00"Ding-dong, the witch is dead! Which old witch? The Clinton witch!"Unexpectedly Orange may turn political for the next eleven months. (The entry title above comes from a line in a piece by one Rebecca Traister, writer of my favorite explanation of the Hillary win in New Hampshire, published on Salon.com.)Excerpt: "So no, I have not been a Hillary Clinton supporter. But the torrent of ill-disguised hatred and resentment unleashed toward a briefly weakened ClintonVanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3601712.post-81698771206979868292008-01-03T12:47:00.000-06:002008-01-03T13:08:35.604-06:00I'm not a very good bloggerHello! More than two months since an entry. Hmph. Blogging requires you to be home in your spot where you enjoy blogging rather than filling all your time with social engagements and travel. My mother sent me a new year's email that included this quote: "Most of us have been given many more blessings than we have received. We do not take time to be blessed or make the space for it. We may Vanessahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01933562739094918827noreply@blogger.com1