iPad

I watched Steve Jobs present the iPad today and I had an A-ha moment.  Glued to the screen during the entire hour-long presentation that included guest speakers with titles like Director of Technology and VP of Gaming Technology, I ACTUALLY ooh-d and aah-d like I was watching a 4th of July fireworks show.  And that’s when it hit me: I’m not just a geek-lover, I AM a geek.

The term geek always seemed to me to be reserved for Programmers or “The Squad” at Best Buy, or anyone listed under the Help Desk department.  But these are just folks who enjoy technology, or at least find it interesting, and have the talent to perpetuate its presence in our daily lives.

And guess what?  That’s me!  Despite never having worn a Star Trek costume on Halloween, I have managed to steer my life down a path that is merging with geek highway.  And hell, I like it here.  It’s fast and smooth.  And sexy.

Just down the beach from Windansea - La Jolla, CA

This is where my husband proposed to me.  And this is the image that stays with me like a ghost image burnt on a screen. When I close my eyes and breathe fresh air deep into my lungs, the rushing sound becomes an echo of waves rolling over soft sand, and the image floods back to me. Again and again.

* * *

I wear a suit. The pieces are cut from music, from movement, from images. From words that cry out.

Underneath the suit I am a conduit. Pulsing with a mass of buzzing frenetic cells, I relay skewed ideas through my voice. Through my hand I transmit unusual.

They’re pesky truths, these laden thoughts. Most days dismissed. But sometimes, when I’m distracted or completely occupied, the flood pushes through and I create. So the suit gets a new vest or brooch. A spark lights in someone’s eyes and I’m charged again.

Three words today:  Ancient, visionary, coma

Extra bonus points: Incorporate words into a dream sequence.

***

It’s the last time I’ll visit her in this confounded hospital, but I don’t know it yet.

I spend the first hour chanting at her bedside with the monks and other temple members, prodding at her consciousness with our gently insistent monotone. The nurses scowl and begin to talk to Dee over the incessant hum, as if she weren’t in a coma. As if it could be their voices to finally wake her, and not these ancient sanskrit words that have been healing bodies since one humble prince sat under a tree and found Nirvana thousands of years ago. The chanting rolls on. It takes on the lilt of a song. I begin to hope.

The seat next to her is finally empty after 11 o’clock when the monks leave.  I take it and put her velvety brown hand in my palm. “Hi Dee. It’s me again.” The seat cushion is plush but low beside the raised bed. My chest leans against the mattress when I sit and I stretch my arm across to keep her hand in mine. Now, with my weight supported this way, my body gives a sigh and I realize my energy is gone from two days of little sleep and mere scraps of food.

Her hand is heavy of abandoned muscles. I rest my head on my outstretched arm and I count to the slow cadence of the machines. One blip, two blip, bliddy-blip. One drip, two drip, three drip. I follow the wispy trace of blood that’s leaked back into the IV tube from the vein. It disappears into the clear liquid. Blip. Blip. Drip. Drip…blip…drip…

The blipping and dripping slow down. I lose count. I smell paint and packing tape. The blips are gone.

I notice the arches above me as we move down the hall to her new pride and joy, the spacious kitchen she’s finally remodeled to accommodate her wheelchair. “Oh Dee! It’s really gorgeous.”

She smiles her proud, sweet smile – the one that changed my life. “Would you mind helping me put the dishes in their spots?” She asks as if she weren’t asking a favor but giving me a gift. Because she is. “The movers packed them in these deep boxes, and I can’t reach down without rolling right off this chair.” Only she could find it amusing that without legs she doesn’t have the leverage to unpack her own dishes.

“Ofcourse I will! Now you’ll remember me every time you cook.” I grab a box and begin tearing away tape.  Inside the box, all I can see are thin plastic tubes and syringes.

I look up and Dee is wearing her blue hospital gown in the kitchen. Under her gown, two long beautiful mocha-colored legs extend to the floor. “I’ll always remember you sweetheart.”

I hand her the next set of dishes. She stares into the open cabinet tapping a finger on her chin, appraising the best spot for salad bowls.

“Thank you for believing in me. For being my mom when I needed you.” Tears well sideways in my eyes.

“Now, now. Don’t worry about these little things. Be strong like a lion!” She grabs both of my shoulders, then turns me toward her. “I see your life baby. I’m standing on the edge of it, your visionary. And I want you to trust me.”

“I do.” I look down. “Ofcourse I do. It’s just…” She lifts my chin with a cupped hand. She kisses both my cheeks, then turns and kicks her wheelchair to the floor.

The loud crash and yelling wake me. A nurse pushes me away from the bed, toward the door.  “What happened? How long have you been here?” she barks. “When did the alarms go off?”

“No!” I shout from across the room. My eyes dart to the IV lines and bag lying on the floor, then to the rolling hook stand toppled to the floor where only I could have kicked it. “Dee, what did I do?”

Another nurse pulls me from behind. “We need you to leave.” She shows me to a chair down the hall. “Wait right out here.”

Stunned, I drop into the chair, my body erect with horror. Doctors scurry in, voices elevate, nurses scramble around, blips and beeps scream out.

And then it’s quiet.

I stand, but the weight of the silence pushes me down again.

A nurse emerges from the room. She walks toward me and I count.  One step, two step, three step…

I bring up my hand to stop her advance. “Just tell me. Whatever it is.”

“We need you to come back.  She’s asking for you.”

On the other end of the beach, a fisherman stands on a jetty, pole cast and waiting. A still, smiling hunter.

Two young lovers lay their pink bodies uncomfortably across thin towels. Denied the velvety soft sand of a low tide, they do their best to smooth the rocky bed with what scraps of apparel and material they can pull from their bags. The makings of an enduring relationship.

It’s called Sandy Point. But the rocks, rounded and steadfast, are lovely too.

So before I resort to the usual feel-better formula of coffee haagen-dazs, thick blanket, couch, Sex & The City DVD and cheap red wine, I’ve decided to buck up. And cheer up.

In the past, it’s helped to change my focus from myself to others. But since I just spent the last twelve hours either feeding children, bathing children or getting clothes and meals ready for their school or summer camp, I’ve sorta met my quota for now.

Anyway, so ME ME ME.

Marc Jacobs - Patriotic Fashion?

I think I’ll take a drive down to Fashion Valley mall and score myself a sweet new pair of shoes. You know the kind with the spikey heels and thin straps, maybe something festive for the 4th of … wah? what is that you say? I don’t live in San Diego anymore?  Oh shiznit, that’s right. Let me step out of delirium for a moment.

Mental fog lifting…

It’s okay. The mere existence of these shoes by Marc Jacobs is like a Red Bull shot of happiness. Who needs caffeine? I’ve got a sprite new step just thinking about pairing these babies with a striped skirt, a crisp patent white belt and how about a light knit off-the-shoulder red blouse number?

That outfit could possibly redeem me to Bebe, my best friend and fashion advisor (since he’s the one who went to FIDM), after decades of forcing him to bear witness to my oh-so-many fashion crimes. Like bad perms, colored contact lenses, and pink suede jackets with shoulder pads and 6 inch fringe.

It makes me exceedingly happy that I’ve finally found people with whom I can share my Twilight obsessive compulsive disorder – tocd. My sister is reading New Moon and my sister-in-law’s husband (my brother-in-law-in-law?) is now my Twilight boyfriend (def. – Twilight Boyfriend – noun – the rare male who appreciates bizarre love stories; one who is secure enough with his masculinity to be able to read 400+ pages of impassioned vamp-love).

Yes, I know there are Twilight haters, and I realize I’m not a 14 year old virgin with unrealistic expectations of men, so I’ll leave it at this – it’s not that Edward Cullen is a vampire, it’s that he’s Superman – for women. And I loves me some Superman. Don’t get it? Read the story. And stop hating.

I remembered just now that I have an important anniversary to celebrate. I guess I’ve been in such a state of bliss that time has lost all meaning. A year of fulfilling each other’s needs, sharing laughs together and having the world in the palm of my hand… Rapture, I tell you! Ofcourse I’m speaking of StudMuffin, my iPhone.

iPhone Apps-olutely Splendiforous

Oh StudMuffin, how do I love thee? Let me count the … apps.

45, to be exact.

Waiting in the lobby of my doctor’s office, flying in cramped quarters cross-country, sitting in traffic – I have found the cure to my impatience. Not only is the iPhone a…you know, phone, now with internet access anywhere and countless cheap to free downloadable apps (mini software or applications) you can view your bank accounts, connect to your computer, compute the calories of your meal, get step-by-step directions to any destination or entertain yourself in various media forms.  Here are my fav’s:

. Facebook – Sitting at a Yankees v Red Sox game, I took a picture of Fenway Park and uploaded it instantly to my FB page.

. YouTube – Currently bookmarked: Evolution of Dance (an oldie but goodie), New Moon trailer (tocd!) and Hok & Jamie’s Hummingbird and Flower Dance

. Stanza – Download books and read easily on your horizontal screen. Most classics I’ve gotten for free!

. Gratitude Journal – The icon is a baby buddha. LOVE!

. USA Today – Better than the tree-killing subscriptions because you get NEW news, even on weekends

Apple isn’t paying me for this endorsement. In fact, they should realize that I’m the anti-promoter, since I’m a Mac snob of the highest order and most people quickly tire of my apps-talk, vowing never to buy a device that could singley morph a nice, peace-loving girl into a bristly Spartan-like warrior wielding my iPhone as shield against the barbarous PC hordes!!. …inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale…

Ahh, that felt good.

I think I’m ready for my day now.

But one more thing to love before I go.

Incubus – “Wish You Were Here”
I dig my toes into the sand
The ocean looks like
A thousand diamonds strewn
Across a blue blanket
I lean against the wind
Pretend that I am weightless
And in this moment
I am happy

Ooh, here’s a goody.

It’s PROMPTuesday at San Diego Momma! Today is PROMPTuesday #61: Imagine That…

• Describe an experience you have never had but have heard about and can imagine. Describe this experience in the first person singular, present tense as it is happening (rules)
  

pondering…  pondering…

Ah, yes.  I offer this brief moment in the sun to the haunting Peruvian/German dark eyes of my beautiful Benjamin.

People often ask me, “Talisa Soto (because even though I’m married to Benjamin Bratt, I don’t use his surname, and who cares if it’s odd to use both my names when addressing me), what is it like to wake up next to such a babe?”

Really, I don’t mind when fans ask such prying questions, because I’m happily resigned to my life as Benjamin’s wife first, his Baby Mama second, and an actress/model third. “Oh, yes [I giggle and toss my hair back] he IS such a babe, isn’t he?”

As far as waking up next to him, I’m usually up by sunrise so I can enjoy every moment before he wakes admiring his sleeping face and air-tracing the outline of his rock hard abs.

When he’s away from home – on location shooting The Cleaner or a movie – I usually spend the mornings with my face in his pillow taking in the delicious lingering smell of his hair. Then I’ll send him the first of many love-texts throughout the day, like “I love you Benny-boo! Smooches from your beautiful once-super-model wife who’s now quite content to raise our genetically perfect children.”

Oh, and Julia, if you’re reading this, stop giving me the stink-eye at the Academy Awards. You may have an Oscar, but I WAS in Mortal Kombat and I WILL take you down!

Er, ahem, what’s was I saying? Anyway, I’ve gotta go. I’m meeting Benjamin for afternoon cappuccinos, and I don’t want to miss wiping the foam off his goatee.

She looked around her pretty lavender bedroom with the morning light peaking gently through white and purple polka dot curtains. She stretched a leg out over the edge of her mattress, then drew it back in under the warm covers and considered curling back up for a bit more dreamtime. Then she remembered the plans she’d made the night before.

She quickly climbed down from bed and pattered over to the activity table in the corner of her room. Yesterday she’d taken some clear tape from the kitchen drawer and the small scissors with orange handles from her mother’s desk. They were still planted where she’d hid them in a Minnie Mouse backpack on the floor. She laid a large sheet of paper and some crayons in the center of the table.

On warm days, her door would get stuck in the door frame, so it took her a few cautious tugs at the door handle to open it without a loud wood-on-wood screech to disturb the morning quiet. In the hallway, she listened for her father again. His snoring continued, so she proceeded downstairs.

Her mother had told her, “Sweetie, the ‘Happy’ in Happy Father’s Day is said for celebration.  It doesn’t mean the day is only for HAPPY fathers.”

She’d thought it was a day meant for fathers like hers, the ones who acted silly and smiled a lot. And the ones who had funk dance parties in the car on the way home from the ice cream store. And the ones who cheered when their kids did cannonball dives in the pool.

Everyone told her she was just like him.  Like father like daughter, they said.  So for Father’s Day, she wanted to give him things that made her happy, because surely the saying worked in reverse too – “daughter like father like.” (Her first idea had been to buy him a toothpaste dispenser she’d seen on TV, but she couldn’t find her allowance.) As she went from room to room collecting items in an old felt trick-or-treat sack, she hoped her father would be proud of her idea.  She grew excited to see his reaction and quickened her pace.

Back in her room, the coordination and concentration to quietly assemble her father’s gift equaled a hero’s effort for her young hands and mind. She labored over placement of every article, many times befuddled by disasters like long strands of tape lifting other loose pieces and flinging them indiscriminately. A confetti of misguided paper snippings and broken crayons were scattered capriciously around her. Tangles of tape knots were coiled in her hair. But eventually the finishing touch, a purple ribbon, was threaded heavily through a hole where she’d punctured the sheet with her pinky. She was ready for the presentation.

Standing beside her parents’ bed holding the gift against her chest, her father’s eyes would not open soon enough and she could no longer wait. “Hi Daddy!” she exclaimed, startling him awake.

“Wh-What’s going on?” He propped himself up on his elbows. “Oh hi Baby. Whatcha’ got there?”

“You’re a happy father today.”

“That’s right. It’s Father’s Day,” he answered, his voice still hazy and thick. He reached with one arm to pull her into a hug.

“No, don’t smoosh it Dad. It’s my happy daughter, um, I mean happy father gift.” She held it out for him, the looped purple ribbon on the tip of her finger. The sheet, weighted with clumsy adornments, swayed its floppy corners this way and that. The crude hole supported too much weight, and the ribbon began tearing through. Her father hastily sat up and grabbed the bottom corners with both hands.

“Wow! When did you do this?” His morning eyes struggled to focus.

“You were sleeping Daddy.  I woke up this morning and did it.” When she put on her huge smile, her plump cheeks squeezed her almond-shaped eyes nearly shut and her eyebrows raised in high arcs that disappeared behind her bangs. It was a naive smile, completely unaware of the conventions and fabrications of beauty. It was that sweet innocence that had claimed every fraction of his heart since the day he first held her newborn body.

He eyed her creation in his hands. He was ready to offer the standard encouragements. It never mattered to him whether his daughter presented him something she’d weaved together with gold thread or toilet paper. His appreciation was unconditional.

“Dad, see, it’s all the BEST stuff. I get happy from this stuff!” She pointed to the Scooby Doo stickers she’d placed in one corner and the beaded bracelet taped precariously in the center. The show and tell continued, “And here’s the picture of my cousins, and you know what? Here’s the flower that smells so good!”

Uh oh, he thought. Her mother had just picked a few buds of the rare roses from the garden, and he knew she would frown on pilfering from the fresh bouquet. Then he noticed a silver glimmer through the ribbon hole. “What’s that Baby?” He lifted the sheet to his eye level, but the glimmer seemed to slide back along the ribbon toward her finger.

With her other hand, she reached for the ribbon and drew up his platinum wedding band that had been strung on but had dropped behind the sheet. “You know, Dad. This is your marriage ring.”

His groggy mind struggled to process the reason for the ring being so alarmingly absent from his finger and so miraculously manifested on this purple ribbon.

His daughter placed a hand on her hip. “Da-a-ad,” she sang in sassy accusation, “I always find your ring under the couch where you fall asleep at night. Then I put it in your bathroom where you put it on after your shower.”

He risked a glance at his wife, who thankfully remained in deep sleep. But the horror and relief hit him all at once as he envisioned the innumerable mornings of desperate searching that had been saved him. And then he felt freed of a low-grade nagging feeling that had been haunting him for months – he’d just figured he’d taken off the ring before the shower but could never remember doing it. He’d been shrugging it off as just another fuzzy detail of his morning routine.

“Daddy?” she called him back from his absent stare.

“Oh, I’m sorry Sweetie. I was just…out of it…for a second.” He blinked hard. “I think that’s the best gift I’ve ever gotten. What would I do without you?”

She thought for a moment, then shrugged her shoulders. “I really don’t know Dad. But you know what? You’re my best Daddy ever.”

Cue groan from whomever has the misfortune of being the innocent bystander to yet another one of my random, unanticipated rants.  My favorite theory goes like this, “…that if we could just use another 5% of our brain, we would need less sleep, less food and less talking.”  (In case you’re wondering, the decrease in verbal communication comes from gaining the ability to read minds.  Uh yeah…duh. Well, maybe not hearing every word of our thoughts, just getting more of a stronger read on people, a la Deanna Troi from Star Trek Next Generation.)

But then all that time saved from sleeping, eating and talking begs the question, “And then what would we do?”

My turning-on-of-wasted-brain-space theory was created at a time when my life was playing at warp speed (yes, another Stark Trek reference).  It was more of a fantasy born of exasperation than hope for what might actually be one day.  I could have answered the question with an infini-list of things like reading from my dusty stack of books, playing with the kids more, getting the tattoo of my ex-husband’s first initial finally redone, or catching up on Oprah.

Well, lately I’ve had enough time for all those usually neglected things, and I’m feeling somewhat, dare I say, balanced.  Egad!

Not me

This shouldn’t be too surprising.  How else could I endeavor to start this blog?  Hey man, these posts don’t just jump out of my head and onto the page without long sessions of pacing the floor around my desk, staring blankly at my computer screen, and not to mention the requisite drinking of wine. But I digress…

What would our lives look like if we didn’t have the excuse of being too busy?  Let’s assume that you’re not a workaholic, so you can’t say “I love my job so much, I would work more.” You’d have to consider your life outside of the productivity of your career or job.  If you can’t do that, then good for you for doing what you love.  No really, good for you.

Most of us have never imagined a life without limits.  There’s always the matter of finishing college, or staying with the kids, or minding the budget, or getting vested for our pension.  Heck, I’ve never REALLY tried to access my innermost Life-Without-Limits Wishlist.  But now seems like a good time.

So this is the beginning of my Bucket List, and a new blog category.  This list will be a work in progress until I do actually Kick The Bucket, because I fear if I were to ever check off the last thing, a freak lightning storm would zap me into a crisp cadaver as I took out the garbage the next day.

I’ve taken some helpful advice from lifehack.org and will make my first list item part of a larger context.

1.  Take my daughter (“PF” for PureFabulosity) to Paris.

Joy

- My husband and I share a passion for the restaurant industry which my daughter has inherited.  PF is 5 now and has seen the Disney movie, Ratatouille, many times.  If you haven’t already seen this movie, it’s a sweet story about a rat turned chef extraordinaire, and in the self-empowering style of most contemporary children’s movies, it teaches us “Anyone can cook.”  It’s set mostly in a Parisian restaurant kitchen with beautiful graphics that sometimes look so real, you feel as though, if you stretched your arm out you could actually julienne the vegetables yourself. One day about a year ago, she asked me if she would ever go to Paris, and I said I really hope so.  “But I want to go with you Mommy.  That would be the best dream of my whole life.” Then my heart exploded into a sparkling mess of love shrapnel.

Sara was perched at her grand piano on an elevated stage surrounded by tranquil, moonlit water.  Her voice was smooth as chocolate and her charm – just as delicious. After a few lyrics got my attention, I was curious where else her music would take me. And then only two songs later, I was glued to my seat by the earnest soulfulness.  Everything she sang reverberated in me. I got it.

Too bad most of the audience was busy stuffing their gobs with Kobe beef tartare or shaking the sand out of their Pradas.

I made a mental note to see Sara Bareilles again at a more intimate venue.  The opportunity hasn’t arrived yet, but I found this video and can see that she really does flourish with an audience that, unlike all things Las Vegas, cares who you are beneath the skin.

Enjoy…