I'm sitting on my futon, fondling my black cummerbund with my feet, thinking about yesterday. Yesterday was one of those wonderful days which go according to script and result in Total Dramatic Satisfaction: MB was in town from NYC and we went out for brunch and shopping.
There are people on the planet who are not fans of MB. They have their heads deeply up their asses: she is a marvellous intelligent person, and if you look just a millimeter behind the makeup and the screeching giggle, you will be rewarded. But this entry is not a backhanded character-sketch of MB.
Nor is it an encomium to the much-deserving and eminently Canadian John Fluevog, a pair of whose wingtips I purchased at yesterday's height. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
MB and I were being catty and drunk well into the night of the fifth instant, drinking cubas libres, russianized lemonade, and, at the evening's peak, a salmon-colored sherberty drink. The next morning, at ten thirty and eleven-thirty, MB offers me two rather stern wake-up visits. How can I be cross about it, though? We went to J*hnn* D's in D*v*s for brunch, sat for a while in the square smoking and gossiping about Hollywood. But this was all prologue. . . .
We took on N*wb*r* Str**t in a morally-shocking way. I have never stuffed my pockets so full of free samples or been flirted with by so many hitherto inapproachably-hot store-clerks. It's true that the initial energy which impelled me to purchase the above-mentioned wingtips had to do with the desire to whip out some impulsive plastic in front of the fey young gentleman behind the counter. (He looked rather like Rufus Wainwright, but illegal.) I had never bought shoes without checking the price before, but I shall suffer no remorse. They're Fluevogs, for crying out loud.
Well, the whole day went on like this -- shop after shop of beautiful, lovely, gorgeous things -- and, of course, the more money one spends, the more free stuff one gets. I will be using a smorgasbord of Kiehl's facial tonics for the next three weeks, and all for having got a little teensy bottle of moisturizer.
There was one wicked, cinematic moment in Kiehl's. I'm hovering around, unwilling to elbow Mr. Blond Preppy guy out of the way to look at the shaving products, and I catch sight of the most beautiful man ever in a purple t-shirt, smiling enigmatically and chatting with a particularly empty-looking girl. He was about twenty, I suppose, but looked as if somebody had just taken off the shrink-wrap. His skin looks like he has it pressed every morning before stepping into it, his hair looks like a very slick computer rendering, his fingernails have obviously been cared for by somebody else. Gazing deep into his eyes, I swear I could see the first page of the document setting up his trust fund. In short, every insidious sign of wealth (oh, and he's shopping at Kiehl's, too, "shopping" as in "full shopping basket"), and his t-shirt proclaims, "It sucks when you don't have any money." And I realize what a dilettante of privilege I am. Yes, I have more access to money and health-care and education that 90% of the globe, perhaps, but I will never know satisfaction like that.
* * * * *
Ugh. I am amazed at how shallow I can become at the slightest provocation. This goes hand-in-hand with my deep distrust of high-spirited pleasure, of course, and the two of them are in cahoots to keep me calmly miserable to the end of my days.
At some point I should also tell you about the really good tofu with broccoli I had for dinner yesterday, and also CC's housewarming party. But there is world enough and time.
Current Music: L'Incoronazione di Poppea.
Current Food Plans: Rice and dal, an attempt to bring myself back to Earth after yesterday's glamour. Also I have leftover rice to use up.
Current Observation: the sky has been a rather liverish yellow all day long and I fear the apocalypse. I mean, I have a job I'm happy with and no razor burn for the first time since puberty and brand new Fluevogs, and I think there's only one more sign of the coming of the End after those.