Tales of a Delectable Redhead

Found in my inbox, unposted blog entry.

I wrote this on January 3, 2007 and never posted it. Amy, you should get a kick out of this, I wrote it before we reconnected:

But that being said, a funny thing happened on the way to the gym today….

When I was 8 years old, fresh off my communion, that summer I wore my little white dress every day with my best friend Amy. The house between our houses was vacant, but the garden was plentiful, beautiful arrays of lilacs and tiger lilies lined the property. Every afternoon, that summer of 1988, Amy and I would take turns wearing our communion dresses and carry bouquets of lilacs down the sidewalk of our block singing that old familiar tune, "dun, dun, dun….dun, dun, duna." Sometimes we would force her older "cooler" brothers to play along, back when 16 year old boys were gods; they would laugh at us from the comfort of their porch. Mostly there was never a groom, only a young girls dream to be the perfect example of feminine grace and womanly character. My mother wasn't married at the time so I have no idea where my fantasies of married life came from.

During my high school years, I developed a fascination and obsession with classic movies. I watched Cary Grant, Rock Hudson, and Audrey Hepburn movies late into the night to unwind from my long nights at my café job. Long nights at my café job involved hours of Ella, Nina, Sarah, and Frank- singing alone with my lilting mezzo-soprano voice. I idolized everything about romantic love and my old Hollywood idea of it. I daydreamed in English class about meeting my Cary Grant type and spending hours fighting while we secretly fell in love. Chosen selections for book reports included Jane Austen, Shakespeare, and more Jane Austen. To this day, Pride and Prejudice is still my all time favorite book.

Around 1996, I saw Gone with the Wind for the first time and have proceeded to watch it and it's crappy sequel "Scarlett" (I really love this movie and have no idea why) about 50 times over the years. My parents' garage is filled with Gone with the Wind collectables included vintage posters, collectors plates, and even a life size standup of Rhett and Scarlett. For years I drowned myself in stylized ideals of romantic love.

Then I went to college, became a feminist, moved to New York, made all male friends, and finally realized men and women are just people. Despite all that gender difference crap people stuff down their throats to justify every fucking emotion they have, we all have our own hardships, obsessions, flaws, character traits, and charming personalities.

On New Year's Eve, in a room full of decent looking men, I found myself talking to a couple of cute guys early in the night. My old friend Lawrence in a classic Scarlett moment approaches me:

Lawrence: Who are you talking to?
(Rhett: So what costumes have you bought to entice me now?)
Me: What do you mean?
Lawrence: I leave for a year and come back and you are still talking to douchebags?!?
(Rhett: Terrible, too many bows, wrong, wrong.)
Lawrence: Stop talking that guy. He's not good enough.
(Rhett: Orange is a terrible color on you, get rid of it.)
And I agree with him and walk away.

Which is how I ended up kissing all my friends at midnight and other friends at midnight.

Back to what I found on our table tonight as I was high tailing it to the gym- Martha Stewart's Weddings.

Labels: cary grant is my husband, I am crazy cat lady

posted by Betty @ 8:47 PM