Danielle Bernstein wrote about getting a new phone and spending eight hours without a phone while transferring her phone data. She said she went on the most present date of her life. When was the last time you went phoneless?
I am on my Flo Living supplement protocol. A month and a half caffeine-free. Just in time for every place to have strawberry matcha, sigh. Hanging in.
As mentioned in previous posts, I am listening to every Emma Grede podcast out there. I can’t wait to start her new book. One of the most recent podcasts I listened to (How to Fail) had two takeaways that struck me:
You are responsible for your life’s balance; and
You must get out of the employee mentality. We fictionalize people’s power over us, but this, too, is a choice.
Are you an employee or a boss in your mind?
I also enjoyed this David Grutman podcast (loved to hear his love for Miami and Florida) and this interesting and vulnerable podcast with Kevin Boehm.
“The first time you live in your car, you think that this is going to make a good book someday.” Kevin Boehm
Fitness-wise, I still feel pretty lost and uninspired. (Working on that). This unexpected heat has us all AC-less and feeling like we are doing heated yoga or something.
Is it warm where you are? Any good podcast recs? What are you reading? When can you leave your phone behind? What has been unedited, streaming through your mind?
My brain is a solar system. So much happening and floating around. Here are some of the highlights— in four categories: Boss, Serious, Hilarious and Nostalgic.
What makes an adult who they become? This is often a conversation. Studies say most children adopt their parents’ values. And yet, at the same time, we see plenty of children who look very different from their parents and their values. Enough to make us question the studies. Is it society that has a bigger impact? Environment? Education? The politics of the day?
Today, I was told that there was interesting scholar research on the children of Moses and that they are reportedly individuals who did not follow Moses’ monotheism. I chewed on that for a while. It’s fascinating. It’s the equivalent of a pastor’s kid being an atheist or Gandhi’s children being pro-British. So what is it that impacts who children grow up to be?
I may be over simplifying, but I guess the answer is not family (as I like to lean toward— I still believe family has a huge influence), or school, or politics— all it comes down to is one thing— the heart. The person makes a choice to be open or closed off to something, and this shapes their heart. It comes down to the decision every human makes for him or herself. Choice, the most sacred thing available to us.
Hilarious: Amanda McCants at YSE Beauty Event
I saw a video of Amanda McCants beating the crap out of a piñata at an influencer event and laughed so hard.
She is hilarious. It reminded me of childhood birthday parties. There was always that one person who went HAM on the hanging candy vessel.
Amanda McCants murdering the YSE piñata.Dead.
Nostalgic: Justin Bieber at Coachella
Justin was playing old footage of his kid self and showing old videos of himself while performing. I am not even a super fan (I liked his music as much as the next person in 2010). But watching it gave me nostalgia. I was happy he looked ok. He seemed happy. It came across in the clips I saw, and honestly, all of us would go back to what the world was in 2010 in a heartbeat. The music takes us back to simpler times.
The past is always simpler but also, more broken. Isn’t it strange?
So much has happened between then and now? Justin seems to be in a better place now. Like most child stars, the rise was tumultuous. So while nostalgia pulls at our heartstrings, may we never forget we need the now. We need the journey that brings us to a better place.
Ok— that’s all for now. I could go on. But signal is spotty on the train. Off to see that hilarious piñata video one more time.
Palm Royale gives us interesting and known tidbits of what it was like to be a woman in the late 60s and early 70s. Nixon, feminists, old money, Vietnam and headscarves.
Season 1 ended (spoiler alert!) with Maxine finding out her husband cheated on her and is having a child with her manicurist Mitzi. Maxine finds out during the Beach Ball (while on stage), where she also finds out her husband’s (alleged) aunt has tried to kill her repeatedly.
Season 2 opens with the truth that women who had warranted nervous breakdowns or just came out of childbirth (and likely suffering from postpartum depression) were often seen as crazy. A human woman with hormones or with real emotions was seen as insane. Men would hurt these women or leave them without support, and then institutionalize them and put them in a 5150. We see Maxine held against her will and drugged because God-forbid she is angry at the man who destroyed their lives.
Dinah warning Perry.
In addition to Dinah’s impeccable fashion in every shot (our black widow— she makes me laugh)— Maxine Drinks Martinis Now? was a powerful episode with a powerful message (yes, I am a year late to the party).
No tv episode has made me more grateful that I live in this time and not the past. While the extreme of modern feminism has wrecked us as a society, feminism itself has also given us gains in that we no longer have to wait for our husbands to check us out of an institution they places us in out of convenience. (Many husbands simply abandoned women to their fate there and moved on with their lives).
Maxine (the most iconic character of the series— truly) tries her escape many times (and does sneak out once or twice). She gets dragged back in and injected with drugs. And while her husband leaves her there to rot and starts planning his new life with the pregnant Mitzi, Maxine convinces Evelyn Rollins to come check her out of the place.
Maxine being iconic.
My favorite scene was when Maxine decides she will follow the inscription on the mental hospital doorway, Melior De Cinere Surgo, and she will rise from the ashes stronger than ever. I mean, lesson #1 is never give up. I know if you are reading this, you too would be hurling yourself over the hospital gates and causing distractions to get to the phone to plot your escape from a place holding you captive. (I totally would).
Lesson #2 is that you not only plot an escape, but you plot your rise. Maxine was not only after physical freedom, but she serves divorce papers on her idiot husband, Douglas. She was after true freedom. She was no longer leaving her fate in the hands of anyone else.
She tells Douglas that he is an idiot (which he is) and any power he had was because of her, which is true. Throughout the entire series, he destroys things and gets them into trouble, financial and otherwise. She always finds a way out of it. She even gets him out of prison. He repays her by leaving her institutionalized while he expects a child with another. Maxine comes into her power, which was there all along. She finally sees it.
Image from Palm Royale. Evelyn Rollins doing her one good deed for the year, rescuing Maxine.
Lesson #3 is agency. I love that Maxine calls Evelyn to pick her up and check her out. She calls the other strong woman on the show, even though they are far from being friends. Strength recognizes strength. I love when Maxine tells Evelyn in the car as they leave the hospital that she will never feel like she did inside of that place again. Evelyn asks her what she felt. Maxine responds with “powerless.”
Maxine understands the game. Her advantages and disadvantages. She knows who is out to literally destroy her, and she also knows who she can count on and who is a friend (see episode 2 which revolves around helping Linda).
Palm Royale, Maxine and Linda at the mental hospital.
Our imperfect but plucky heroine is onto something. I have no doubt Maxine will rise. I am sure she will land herself in some predicaments but also, work her way out of them. Palm Royale shows us the struggle for money, position and power. Lies, secrets, and horrific marriages. We see how the women maneuvered their toxic situations in toxic ways.
Dinah, all in helping the girls. (Image from Palm Royale)
But more importantly, it showcases friendship (I do think Linda and Dinah are true friends to Maxine). I feel like Linda empowers Maxine; Maxine never stops helping Linda where she can; Maxine empowers Dinah; and Dinah helps Maxine where she can.
Dinah and Maxine inside of the mental hospital. (Image from Palm Royale.)
Finally, Palm Royale showcases the fact that nothing— and I mean nothing— can keep a determined woman down. It’s about the maturing and leaving behind of the stories we tell ourselves to survive. About gaining agency, and stumbling into truth.
Once a woman recognizes her power, there is no stopping her.
“And then there is the version of you that wakes up and realizes the stability is something you build yourself. If you want a strong body, you train it. If you want a peaceful life, you structure it. If you want a premium brand, you build it brick by brick. If you want financial security, you learn the numbers and you face them.” Kenzie Burke
These neat business cards featured by Sara Foster. Mood after I fixed my broken coat zipper with a screwdriver.My at 50th St.The trees in Central Park are blooming!
Today, I walked down the street with one of my best friends. As we walked, I remembered how we would walk to school together— dweeby middle schoolers with acne, insane hormones, sometimes horrible bangs and uncomfortable shoes that we swore were cool but made our feet bleed. In the whirlwind of pads, band-aids and flavored lip glosses, we were sassy, curious and always trying our best. We schemed and plotted. We spent hours on the phone. We lived in a Lizzie McGuire world. Our rooms had stacks of CDs, magazines, boomboxes in our favorite colors, curling irons on and pots of glitter for moments of shimmer.
Exactly.
These were the days before the lights got shut off in our respective lives by different series of events and loss. We were in our bubble, and it hadn’t burst yet. They were the intact days. The days of music videos on TV before school and stalking boy crushes. Her days of ballet, and my days of collages and writing short stories in Microsoft and making covers with clip art. The days of book reports and bs-ing school newspaper articles to meet deadline (mostly me). Days at the ice cream parlor in town and getting invited to the country club to go swimming. Evenings spent on AIM getting the town tea. Adolescence at its finest.
Always dweebing together.
She is the Paris to my Nicole.
And today, there we were. Both married, one of us a mom. We have come out on the other side of so much life lived in survival mode. Now, we have lives filled with laptops we want to throw off a canyon, blazers, liquid liner, blush that makes us look alive, strapless bras we hate, and thankfully, full wallets. We have good husbands (those dweeby boys in middle school couldn’t hold a candle- jk jk hopefully, they turned out ok), and we are taller (me, not so much), wiser, with better skin, and still in love with glitter (secretly, but also, not so secretly).
We looked back a little. We laughed a lot. We joked about the velour suits we still gravitate toward and talked about the future. Not everything has changed. Some things stay the same.
And when we hugged, it was the type of hug that reminds you that someone isn’t letting go of you. It’s that knowledge that whispers to you while you wave as the Uber pulls away— We are unbreakable. This is sticky like glitter— this is a forever thing.
“Real discipline is clarity. When you know your vision, and I mean truly know it, not as a vague hope but as a specific destination you can see, the hard choices stop feeling hard. […] Before you can say no effectively, you have to know what you’re saying yes to.” Arnold Schwarzenegger
GABRIELA YARELIZ 