In The Dark

The problem with the whole dating thing is that, at least in the beginning, neither party knows what’s going on in the other’s mind. If you don’t know the person from school, work, or through friends, there’s no social context to ground your impressions and interpretations of the person. Instead, you have to go off of limited interactions to try to get a true sense of who the person is. Your impression of those limited interactions are further colored by your own expectations, your past personal experience, and your own set of generalizations, assumptions, and biases which all come together to create a lens through which you experience the other person.

I try to view each new person that enters my life as a chance to learn and grow, and I believe in the idea that things, people, and ideas are sent to you for reasons, such as to provide opportunities to learn certain lessons. I guess my concern is that I wonder if I’ve learned the lessons I was supposed to learn from past relationships, or if the universe continues to send me the same “opportunities” cloaked in different forms? I’d like to think I had learned my past lessons, had become wiser, and was no longer going to make the same mistakes, but I’m not sure about that and that uncertainty makes me nervous.

A mistake I’ve made in the past is to fall for unavailable men. By unavailable, I don’t mean married, I mean unavailable emotionally. Men who are limited emotionally, or who simply have other priorities that take precedence over caring for someone other than themselves. Not all of the men that I’ve dated, nor even most of them have been like that. However, it’s been a reoccurring theme that I’ve noticed in my past relationships that came out most starkly in my most recent one. I don’t want to set myself up to become involved with another emotionally unavailable man, but I’m not sure I trust myself fully to see the signs of unavailability (especially because, try as I might to resist, I have a penchant for strong, traditionally masculine types). I certainly missed the signs in the past, so it seems possible that I could miss them again.

On the other hand, so what if I miss them? What’s the worst that could happen? I could feel disappointment and hurt again, but I’ve already experienced that and I know I can handle it. I guess my worry goes beyond any fear of temporary disappointment or hurt; it’s about being caught in a cycle and failing to progress. It’s a fear of failing to learn lessons, more than a fear of the consequences of each of those failed lessons.

Unfortunately, in order to learn lessons, in order to progress, you have to take risks. Unless you give someone a chance, you don’t know whether they will turn out to be unavailable or not. You don’t know about their capacity for selflessness or caring. You don’t know, for example, whether they’ve decided to be a bachelor for life and whether the time they’re spending with you is destined to be nothing more than a fleeting affair…

Dating, and more specifically the uncertainty attendant to dating, is nerve-wracking. It would help things out considerably if we could read each other’s souls – not minds because minds can be fickle things – but our souls because they expose our true selves. Then we could figure out before we even begin whether the risks outweigh the benefits.

Future Fears

I was having a conversation this weekend about Hillary’s chances of becoming the next President of the United States. People have strong opinions about her on both sides of the political divide. Personally, I would love to see a woman elected President. However, I don’t want a woman elected just because she’s a woman; instead, I want the best person for the job.

It seems to me that one of the biggest challenges facing the United States and the greater world right now is how to deal with the threats posed by Muslim extremists. I don’t mean to suggest that I’m one with the whole “war on terror” focus of the Bush administration, because I’m not. We are certainly not “at war,” at least not in the traditional nation-state versus nation-state kind of way. Instead, we’ve been dealing with what appears to be a growing movement of extremism intent upon – apparently – destroying our way of life in the United States and the Western World. A movement that, based on the number of suicide bombers they appear to be attracting continually to their fold, may be winning the cultural war.

Why are the extremists winning the cultural war? What makes them able to attract more and more converts to their cause? What makes them able to convince educated young Muslims living middle class lives abroad with their pregnant wives to become suicide bombers?

I think one of the main factors is the vast economic inequality between the United States and the Western world and… pretty much everyone else. We have so much in this country, and I think the people who don’t have as much are angry about it. And who wouldn’t be? If I was looking in on the United States from the outside, I would want what we have as well. And, I would feel entitled to it because we’re all human beings and we all deserve the same things in life.

But, it’s not only about the economic inequalities. It’s also about religion, or at least part of the motivation given for the attacks is portrayed as religious in nature. I wonder though, if there were not the massive economic divide, if the fundamentalist religious message would still be able to attract followers? If everyone had a decent house, educational and career opportunities in their life, clean drinking water, access to health care, the chance to succeed and practice their own beliefs without fear of discrimination and prejudice, and hope for their children’s‘ futures, would the fundamentalist message still find the ground fertile for the recruitment of suicide bombers?

What’s it going to take to make the ground less fertile for their recruitment?

If I’m right – that one of the sources of the extremism is economic inequality – it’s going to take a lot more than military or intelligence efforts to stop the extremists. It’s going to take a massive cultural and economic shift, and as history has shown, cultural shifts take a long time to happen and economic shifts take even longer. It’s also going to take the United States living up it to its ideals of freedom, liberty, equality, and democracy, owning up to its past mistakes, and eliminating it’s hypocrisy – something it has failed to do miserably under the current administration.

I don’t know if Hillary could lead the nation effectively against the tide of extremism now threatening us. I think she could do a better job than Bush, but since he presents such a low standard to beat, that’s an easy thing to say. I haven’t been following the debates closely enough to know if there’s anyone I think would be better than Hillary, but I’m thinking I should start paying attention.

The situation has been bad for a long time, but I’m afraid that unless the United States changes its course soon, it’s going to get a lot worse.

Date De-Briefing

IP didn’t flake! In fact, he was quite the gentleman. He texted me early in the afternoon with two suggestions of cute places to have dinner, got to the restaurant before me and ordered us a nice bottle of wine, and then put me in a cab at the end of the night. The date itself was fun. We had good conversation, the food was great, and overall I enjoyed myself.

I think he did too because he asked me to go out again tonight. Despite my reticence about allowing things to move too fast, since he’s only in town for a few days and since we hadn’t seen each other for a month and a half, and as I would like to see him again, I said… yes.

Tonight, I have a work happy hour to attend, and then after that I’m going to meet up with IP, probably for dinner, but again, we haven’t nailed down our plans. He’s working, I’m working, and all we’ve agreed upon so far is that we’re going to meet up. He said he’s flexible and that he just wants to see me. Awh…

I’m off to happy hour. Happy Friday!

Date Tonight, Maybe

Unless IP totally flakes, as males are wont to do, I have a date tonight. In New York, I’ve observed that relationships have a tendency of developing very slowly or moving at warp speed only to end in spectacular explosions after a couple of weeks. I think this is because everyone’s so busy, spinning around in a billion different directions, that dating doesn’t happen on any kind of normal, regular schedule.

Out of the New York context, I would imagine (though I could be dead wrong) that dating follows a certain basic, dependable, sweet pattern, something like this: Girl meets boy, boy asks girl out, girl says yes, and they go out that Friday night. In that same strange world, I would also imagine that if boy liked girl, boy would call girl on Saturday or Sunday – or if he’s being a bit of a player jack-ass not until Monday morning – ask girl out again, girl would say yes (if she likes boy), and they would go out again that weekend. If girl and boy continue liking one another, I would imagine that their dates would continue each week, probably picking up pace so that girl and boy would see each other here and there during the week as well as on the weekends. At some point, girl and boy would have “the talk,” decide they were exclusive (because they’d been being exclusive already), and the parameters of their relationship would be established.

In New York, more common would be the following scenario: Girl meets boy, boy calls or texts eventually, boy asks girl to meet him for a drink that night or the next, girl says she’s busy, negotiations ensue, girl and boy decide to meet one another, and they go on a date. Boy calls the next day or several days later, or even a week or two later, and acts like everything is fine. If girl and boy have both been dating other people in between the time of their date and the call, it is fine. Girl and boy talk about going out again and compare their over-booked schedules to see if they can find time to meet up again in between their concerts, benefits, work functions, dinners, and plans with friends. Girl and boy pencil each other in for a Tuesday night after-work drink two weeks later, while thinking about who they can pencil in for later that night.

Dating, under those circumstances – where the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd dates can be stretched over weeks and weeks, or even months, where no one is exclusive and everyone has another possibility waiting in the wings or at center stage – can move very slowly.

Not that moving slowly is always a bad idea. In fact, I prefer moving slowly to the blitz-n-burn dating scenarios that many of my friends (and I) have experienced. Blitz-n-burn situations are those in which girl meets boy, girl and boy go out, (Blitz) boy tries and tries to have sex with girl, girl has sex with or makes out with boy, girl – confusing desire with genuine emotions, or just feeling hopeful – starts to like boy, boy wants to have sex or make out again with girl, girl and boy go out again, boy tries and tries to have sex with girl, girl has sex or makes out with boy, and after this happens a few times, (Burn) boy stops calling or girl realizes it’s all about the sex or the making out and stops returning boy’s calls.

Getting back to the situation with IP. After meeting IP two months ago, I went out on a first date with him about two weeks later. He called two days after our date (which was not perfect but acceptable), and since then, for the last month or so, we have been calling and texting one another a couple times a week while he’s been out of town. At first I was quite opposed to the “texting relationship” that appeared to be developing, but he was entertaining, attentive, and cute so I decided to just have fun and see where things would go. There are worse things I could be doing with my time than sending occasional texts to a boy who seems, at least from afar and from my limited interactions with him, kind of cool.

So, after almost a month and a half – can you stand the suspense? – we are now supposed to go out on our second date tonight. As the date and time were set up via text (I know, could be a problem), I have no additional details to share at this point. I assume, even though I’m not supposed to be making assumptions, that we’ll be going out to dinner somewhere. If he calls this afternoon and invites me over to his apartment – as opposed to a public place where things other than nookie time are appropriate – I will have to assume it’s a Blitz-n-Burn situation in the making and decline. Here’s hoping he acts like a gentleman and invites me to dinner at a restaurant sometime in the next couple of hours.

If this date does happen, and I’d say there’s a 75% chance of that happening, the only thing I’m annoyed about is the fact that OF COURSE I have a zit on my chin. It wasn’t even a big zit to begin with. It was one of those tiny annoying ones that I know I shouldn’t have attempted to pop but did anyway, and then created an ugly, dark red spot that’s pretty much impossible to cover-up. It’s possible that even if this date happens he could take one look at my zit and run screaming away from me down the street. So much uncertainty.

White Stripes Rocked

The White Stripes concert tonight at Madison Square Garden was SICK! I thought Ani rocked, and she did, but Jack and Meg White really ROCKED. Parts of the show – like “7 Nation Army” with the spotlights shining on the disco ball, spinning red and white starbursts of light out across the entire expanse of the arena, highlighting the sea of people screaming, clapping, and waving their arms while Jack stood over the crowd – were unreal.

The show has converted me from someone who appreciated their music but just didn’t get them or the whole ambiguous sister-brother, wife-husband relationship thing, to a fan who now couldn’t care less if there was actual incest afoot. That is how good they were.

Whatever it was that brought them together, they’re dynamic is an integral, fascinating part of their music. It’s awesome that two people with a drum set and a guitar can create that level of intensity. Jack White is Rock Star. It’s that simple. I now understand what Renee Zellweger saw in him. He has incredible stage presence, his guitar playing was awe-inspiring, he switched effortlessly between the guitar, the keyboard, and singing, and his raw energy appeared limitless. At certain times during the show, it felt like he was playing around, inside of, and through me. Streams of vibrations were thudding against my chest and throat. Sex crossed my mind.

Jack was also, endearingly, pretty low key and chill for performing in Madison Square Garden. I got the sense that he was happy to be there, happy about the fans, but not overly impressed with MSG. He referred to it as a “bar” that he and Meg hadn’t played in before which was kind of cute.

Meg, to my surprise, also kicked ass. Her drumming was good, and her voice sounded great on the one song she performed. Going into the concert I had clearly underestimated her talents. She’s a key part of the performance, not just for the drumming and the occasional vocals, but also for what she adds to the overall look and feel of the band. She’s a damn sexy drummer, and the way they had the lighting set up for most of the show with a shadow of her silhouette blown up against the background of the stage, makes me think they’re quite conscious of her sex appeal.

She worked it, he worked it, and it was all awesome. Dutch and Wood, you were so right about them.

Busy B

I don’t know what it is about this summer, but it’s way more busy than I had anticipated. Each week I think, this week I’ll have time for [fill in the blank with anything lazy, luxurious, and having to do with sunshine, curling my toes in the fresh-cut grass, and margaritas on the rocks with salt]…

…and then BAM! Five thousand things pop up and shoulder their way into my tightly packed schedule. I’ve had invitations to leave the city for the Hamptons, Pennsylvania, and this weekend, Chicago, but there’s so much to do, I can’t seem to find the time to make airline tickets, let alone leave! Not that I’m complaining, I’m just saying. Eh hem.

Last week, in between the gym, the nutritionist, and therapy, there was work, an explosion, the Ani concert, and Harry Potter. Though I started off thinking that this week would be kind of slow in comparison – other than work which has the potential to get a tad intense towards the latter part of the week, potentially screwing up all of my plans – I think it’s actually going to be even more busy than last week. I have an event every night, and was so jammed up that I had to switch therapy from tomorrow night to Thursday and forego running except for tonight. I guess this is what they call “burning the candle at both ends.”

I’m going to the White Stripes concert tomorrow night, to a fancy dinner and public interest law benefit on Wednesday, (potentially) out on a date with Mr. Reunion (aka “IP”) on Thursday, and – probably – to a party on Friday night that Pirate (who’s in town from London) and his brother are throwing. I say “potentially” about the date with IP because this is not the first time he’s said he’ll be back in the city and that he wants to take me out, only to have work and polo keep him away from New York for yet another week or month. It would be interesting to see him again, but given his track record I’m not holding my breath.

The weekend is going to be really busy too, although part of that depends on whether I try to scrape together a last minute trip to Chicago for the Blogher Conference. If I went to Chicago, I’d fly out early Saturday and then have to fly back Sunday. I think it would be cool to go to Blogher, and I’d love to be able to see my girl friends who are going to be in the area, but I just can’t decide if it’s worth it to fly all the way to Chicago for one night. Plus, I don’t even know if there are tickets.

What to do, what to do? For now, I’m off to do some work. There’s a lot to do between now and the White Stripes. Too many events, too much work, and too little time. Luckily, I stopped by Origins today (Mr. Eye Candy was back) and bought some fun, new make-up, including navy-colored mascara. Ooh la la. At least I’ll look cute while sprinting from one thing to the next!

I must say, after burning the candle at only one end for such a long time, it is rather fun to have two ends to burn. Now, if only I had a third for sleepytime.

Blog Bits

Happy Monday! I hope everyone’s week has gotten off to a good start. I was lagging a bit this morning after slogging to work in flip-flops through the rivers running down New York City’s streets and getting soaked to the skin from my thighs down, but just pepped myself up with a small coffee and some berry-flavored gum from Starbuck’s.

I have two blog-related questions for you all:

First, I’ve been thinking about changing the layout of Tout de Suite Buttercup! Among other things, I want to add some graphics and a cool header that captures the spirit of my blog better than the plain dark purple, light purple combo. If I was more tech-savvy I’d do it myself, but alas, I’m not. I’ve found a couple of people who do that kind of work but they use Typepad instead of Blogger.

Does anyone have any recommendations for a person who could help me give Tout de Suite Buttercup! a make-over?

Second, are you going to the Blogher Conference in Chicago this weekend?

Ani’s Set List – Celebrate Brooklyn (July 18, 2007)

As promised, here’s the set list from Ani’s concert in Brooklyn last Wednesday night. It was an awesome mix of older and newer stuff, and she rocked on all the songs. My favorites of the night, although all the songs seriously were fantastic, were “Napoleon,” “Shameless,” “Gravel,” and “Little Plastic Castle.”

Not a Pretty Girl and Dilate continue to be my two favorite Ani albums, although I was so inspired by her show that I bought Knuckle Down off of i-tunes and have been listening to it for the past few days. There were two songs from the concert that I didn’t recognize and couldn’t figure out what their titles were. Anyone know?

1) Manhole – Knuckle Down (2005)

2) Done Wrong – Dilate (1996)

3) You Had Time – Out of Range (1994)

4) Lag Time – Knuckle Down (2005)

5) Napoleon – Dilate (1996)

6) Paradigm – Knuckle Down (2005)

7) Alla This – (New)

Subdivision – Reckoning (2001)

9) Lyrics about a Polar Bear (?) – (Don’t know the name or album)

10) Lyrics about Insecurity Glaring in the Mirrors (?) – (Don’t know the name or album)

11) Everest - Up Up Up Up Up Up (1999)

12) Gravel – Little Plastic Castle (1998)

13) Little Plastic Castle – Little Plastic Castle (1998)

14) 32 Flavors – Not a Pretty Girl (1995)

15) Shameless – Dilate (1996)

16) Overlap – Out of Range (1994)

Running, Explosions, and Ani

As you could probably tell by the infrequency of my posts last week, I’ve been incredibly busy. I miss my blog! I miss you all! Mostly, the busy-ness is related to work. I’m doing all these things I’ve never done before and there’s a steep learning curve. At my new firm, it’s like I’m a real lawyer! Insanity.

After finally finishing my work this afternoon, I went for an awesome run around the reservoir in Central Park. There’s a 1.57 mile loop that goes around the reservoir and I did it THREE times for a grand total of 4.7 miles! After a week of stress-related, late-night binging on creative peanut butter concoctions and tamari roasted almonds, I was incredibly proud of myself for going on the run. Running outside is so much better than running on a treadmill inside a stinky gym.

Now that I’m done with my work, I finally have a chance to post about the Ani concert. It was AWESOME! Awesome, awesome, awesome. She freakin‘ rocked. I almost didn’t go because, as you might have heard, there was an explosion in Manhattan the night of the concert, and it happened two buildings away from mine. That was some nerve-wracking craziness, but thankfully it wasn’t a terrorist attack, and it didn’t prevent the cabbies from driving to Brooklyn.

Because of the explosion, I got to the show late and missed most of the opening acts. However, I made it in time for Ani and that’s really all that mattered. Standing around on my own before Ani came on, in a sea of dread-locked hair, pierces, patchouli, and girls caressing one another, I felt a little out of place and just the tiny-est bit lonely. I’m no longer a college kid with hippy-esque leanings; I’m a boring lawyer. Sometimes, I think that I might be one of the “Napoleons” of Ani’s songs; not really, and not on the inside, but I certainly must appear to be that way on the surface at times. None of my friends had wanted to go to the concert, so I had to go on my own, and I think those kind of things – like most things, probably – are more fun shared.

But, the minute Ani took the stage, all of those feelings were banished, and I was overcome with a sense of exhilaration and excitement to be seeing her perform again. Her guitar sounded fierce, her vocals were incredible, and she peppered her set with the usual bits of laughter and stories in between songs. Watching her up there, I was so happy that I had made the decision to go to the concert. One of the things I love about her is the sense of joy she brings to her performances, songs, and commentary, even while singing or talking about profoundly serious issues, such as our infamous President, the state of the world, war, poverty, and issues of race and gender. She’s constantly giggling. She sees humour and irony amidst pain and sadness, and that’s inspiring.

While the show was going on, I texted myself the playlist and will post that later. The show sparked a lot of feelings and thoughts that I also plan to post about, but at another time. I’m still letting them percolate. One thing I learned at the concert that I had not known is that Ani recently gave birth. How awesome is that? Thirteen years after first listening to her music, I still have a mad girl-crush on her. I hope she’s happy. She deserves nothing less.

* * *

By the way, the picture above, which was taken at a different concert than the one that I went to, shows a shot of Ani’s fingers wrapped in black electric tape. That’s how hard she rocks; she plays so intensely that she has to wrap her fingers in electric tape to keep from shredding them against her guitar strings. That’s pretty much one of the most bad-ass things ever.

Date With Ani

I would be hard pressed to express in words what a profound impact Ani DiFranco has had on my life. I listened to her religiously for most of college, and for many years after, until her tastes shifted, and mine stayed the same, and she got more funky than fierce. I could easily track at least 6 – 8 years of my life by Ani records if I felt so inclined.

I can’t remember the last time I saw her in concert, but I think it might have been a few years ago while I was in Law School. Tonight, after a multi-year hiatus (mine, not her’s), I’m scheduled to see her in concert down in Brooklyn and I’m so excited! The only problem is that New York is experiencing torrential downpours at the moment, and the concert ticket says “rain or shine.”

I’m crossing my fingers that the rain will let up by tonight, but even if it doesn’t, I’ll be there. It’s not every night that you have the opportunity to relive so many years of your life.