Bread and Bread

From: Pedro To: Cheryl Subject: PREPARE YOURSELF 9:36 a.m. ...TO HAVE YOUR DAY MADE! Pop Culture Icons as My Little Pony Dolls From: Cheryl To: Pedro Subject: Re: PREPARE YOURSELF 1:49 p.m. OMG. This is getting blogged about. I recognize Apple Jack beneath that Frida monobrow, which is appropriate, because I always suspected Apple Jack was a lesbian.

On Friday Jamie and I saw this amazing documentary called Poetry of Resilience , which profiles a handful of writers who’ve escaped horrific political situations (the Hiroshima bombing, the crackdown after the Iranian Revolution, the Cultural Revolution in China, and holocausts European and Rwandan). All are scarred in ways that cannot be healed—a part of each of them has died, says poet Li-Young Lee . But all write heart-stopping poetry that gets at the essence of things in a way that’s undeniably alive. Watching it (and the other films that were shown as part of Laemmle’s DocuWeeks shorts package; there are only a couple of days left to catch it!), I felt ready to stop being so all-about-me and start engaging with the world again. Maybe even in a helpful way. I recently heard about PEN’s prison mentoring program , and I’m thinking that might be a good place to start. When you’re corresponding via snail mail, you don’t have to worry that you’ll be hanging out in your car on Norman...

Don't ask me which Google black hole led to this discovery (my therapist and I are just glad I'm not Googling diseases today), but did you know that Sanrio's posse of characters includes a bullet train named Shinkansen ? Yep, right there alongside the bunnies and bats and frogs and, um, marshmallow-lemur-puppies . This is why Japan will solve the whole climate change thing decades before we do. I for one will happily submit to my adorable new overlords.

Found, taped inside an empty L.A. Weekly newspaper box in Westwood:

I have seen the future. Or so says the tiny button that Miranda July ’s people handed out at Saturday’s showing of The Future . I’m one of the many people who sort of want to hate Miranda July—because does anyone really need to be a filmmaker and a fiction writer and a performance artist and a visual artist? Also, there’s the quirk factor, which one can only take in small doses. But the truth is, some people do need to be all those things. There are specialists and there are generalists, and Miranda July is lucky enough to be the latter without sucking at any of her métiers (well, actually I’ve never seen her performance and visual art. Let’s pretend they suck). As for the quirk—which takes the form of a magical T-shirt and a talking cat in The Future —it’s not something I’m in the mood for every minute, but she never cheats by trying to make it stand in for depth. The Future is about a couple in their mid-thirties who’ve rescued a cat named Paw-Paw. But Paw-Paw (who subsequentl...

I feel like I’m slowly emerging from my psycho funk (I’m pretty sure that’s the official DSM term for it) only to discover the world outside my fire-damaged brain is also on fire. Republicans are trying their hardest to make Obama cry . They’re taking things away from people who barely had anything to start with and convincing some of those people (I’m talking to you, Joe and Jane Tea Party) that taxes —on their nonexistent incomes—have been keeping them down. That, and the queers, feminists and immigrants, of course. America is a few years away from being a second world country . England, despite its free education and socialized health care, is still full of Angry Young Men. T-Mec is dying. It took longer than anyone predicted , another notch in the mystery that is medical science. She still has good days. She still likes to eat and purr and insinuate herself into the nearest lap. But her leg is swollen, her lumps are big and oozy and she often looks tired and glassy-eyed. It’s n...

My cousin Maria, keeper of Taylor family memorabilia , posted this letter on Facebook; I hope she doesn’t mind my stealing it. Our grandmother—Mommer, as we called her—wrote it to our grandfather about a year before they got married. As a 23-year-old career gal (animating Oswald the Rabbit and, later, Woody Woodpecker for Universal Pictures), she was bucking the norm for her generation. My sister is carrying on Mommer’s (and our mom’s) artistic legacy. She just painted a mural of children’s book characters on the wall of her friend Jenny’s son’s bedroom. See photo. Jenny’s kids insisted that she wear the pirate hat. Can you blame them? I apparently inherited Mommer’s love of L.A., slightly florid prose and stealing office stationery.

Since returning from the cruise, I’ve been meaning to start working on my circus novel again. I no longer have the “but first I need to do some research” excuse, or the “but I have debilitating anxiety*” excuse, or the “but I’m working on this art project ” excuse, or the “but I’m working on this short story” excuse. I don’t even have the “but at least I went to the gym” excuse. Last night I planned to go to the gym, but AK—who’d also been planning to work out—had a really long day, so I convinced myself that she needed me to crash out in solidarity with her. And to pick up pan dulce on the way home. And to watch TV while eating roughly half a bag of the sweet potato tortilla chips that Trader Joe’s was pushing earlier this week. AK is grossed out by Weird Cheryl Food like sweet potato tortilla chips and chile mango popsicles and mochi everything, so I’m not sure how this particular gesture showed solidarity, but it’s all about creating a mood of relaxation, right? Today I’m back on va...

Last month felt like a big reading comeback. Books are great! (Even though I have resumed neither the sound nor the fury .) Stealing Angel by Terry Wolverton: Even most indie bookstores don't have a shelf for "spiritual thrillers," but if they did, Wolverton's newest novel would no doubt be facing forward with one of those "staff recommends" cards beneath it (at least if I was on staff). I devoured this book--about a woman who kidnaps the daughter she's raised with her ex, the girl's bio mom, to protect her from abuse--in two and a half days. As Maggie and Angel travel through Mexico, Maggie struggles to square her actions with her spiritual practice, something Eastern and yoga-like that the locals find cultish. The question seems to be: How do you maintain agency in your life without being a control freak? It's something I've been thinking about a lot lately, and even though I'm still not sure about some of the novel's apparent co...

Highlights from last night’s dance show, Shout! : Some of the dancers are Broadway/Laker Girl/ So You Think You Can Dance -finalist good. Some are more on the level of the high school kids I took jazz classes from in eighth grade. But I idolized those kids, so saying you dance like Stella Choe is not an insult. They opened with an oldies medley: “Born to be Wild,” “Yakety Yak,” “Rock ‘N Roll is Here to Stay.” But again the show took a Red State turn, with cowboy hats and a Jesus-praising gospel number with purple choir robes covering the swimsuits from the Beach Blanket Bingo number. There were a couple of songs from Hair —I liked seeing a nod to actual musical theater. Were they taking us through the decades? From poodle skirts to Mad Men- style beachwear to psychedelic? With detours through early ‘90s country, calypso and yet another America tribute? Final note: The Macarena is alive and well and living on the Carnival Paradise .

After lunch I took a “’70s dance class” because I had a crème caramel* to burn off and because I thought it might be the kind of thing Ginger would do during the day. Teach the class, that is. It consisted, as I suspected, of some grapevining and John Travolta finger-in-the-air action. When I was younger, I would have been so absurdly envious of the cruise ship dancers, the wise and talented townies. I’m still envious of their talent and the summer camp vibe that must permeate the halls of the crew quarters, but I can see why this is a young person’s gig: You have to be completely nomadic and able to endure orange formica for months at a time. I also spent some time by the pool (with my blue Carnival towel covering me like a blanket because it was still pretty damn cold) reading Terry Wolverton’s new book, Stealing Angel . I think it’s hard to write about religion in a way that’s sincere rather than cynical, and I respect her for taking on the challenge. I’m still puzzling thr...

I’m writing this from the ship library because 1) I’m a nerd and 2) it’s effing raining! I packed a bunch of shorts and sundresses. Wishful thinking, I guess. Yesterday was our big Ensenada day. It did not feel so big—maybe because I’ve been before, maybe because I’m so distant from my writing these days. I kept waiting for that tickle of inspiration—for the words to start arranging themselves like dominoes in my head as I saw things I wanted to describe. And eventually it started—just a tiny bit at the end of the day when I thought, Pelicans: graceful and awkward at the same time. The rust is just beginning to fall off the gears. There was a lot more security getting on and off the boat than I remember from last time. They checked our room keys against our photos as we went out. There were armed guards, two metal detectors and a bag search on the way back. Terrorism or drug stuff? Both? The city smelled like ocean. It felt nice to have some elbow room. The air was balmy,...

I’m writing this from our orange formica stateroom on the Riviera deck of the Carnival Paradise. There’s a little cubby hole with two round windows, so I guess we got upgraded to an “ocean view” room. Maybe the ship isn’t full. Rumors of violence in Northern Mexico have an upside, I guess. When Stephanie and I took this same cruise, more or less, in like 2004, we thought our room steward folded our towel into an animal shape each morning because she’d decided we were extra special. We were so naïve. Today Pedro and Stephen noticed that from the front, our towel seal looks like a vagina. AK named it VagiSeal. When we boarded she looked around and said, “This looks like the Titanic, but much, much tackier.” “And with more lifeboats,” I added hopefully. I made everyone sit through the Welcome Aboard! show because did I mention this is research ? (Ginger and Amalia work on a cruise ship when the circus goes belly-up.) There were some amazing break dancers, but mostly the...

In April, just days after finding out I was pregnant with twins, I got a letter notifying me I’d received a grant from the Center for Cultural Innovation to work on my circus novel and do some research in Ensenada. Despite putting a lot of effort into the application, I’d long ago deemed myself The Kind of Writer Who Just Doesn’t Get Grants, so this seemed to be too good to be true. Good news on top of good news. We all know how the first piece of good news ended , with a D&C and an anxiety disorder. But I’m happy to say that at least things are going well with the grant so far. Two words: research cruise.* The posts above are from my travel journal. *Because I’m a hipster snob, this is the part where I assert that normally I’d never go on a cruise: They’re tacky and pre-planned and don’t let you think for yourself. But more than one friend had cautioned us about driving through Northern Mexico. One of those friends was a woman who was disappointed that, when she’d visited Egyp...

A month or so ago, I got invited to participate in an art show at the Shoshana Wayne Gallery called Chain Letter . You were probably invited too. As best I could tell, approximately twenty percent of the world’s population showed up at Bergamot Station this morning to unload their artwork. I guess that’s what happens when the premise of your show is “Invite ten people who will each invite ten people who will….” Pretty soon you get people like me, who aren’t even visual artists, making little collages. The next thing you know, it’s installation day and Cloverfield is backed up all the way to the 10. It was like an effing Dodger Game, or what the Glendale Galleria does to the 5 at Christmastime. And once I got to the actual gallery, it was pure Hollywood Forever. I immediately turned around, which tells you something about my commitment to visual art. I sent some of the people I invited—Sara, Pedro and Jennifer—mission-aborted texts. Suzanne actually made it in, so it will be...

Carmageddon —a.k.a. the shutting down of a ten-mile stretch of the 405 for two days, allegedly prompting a citywide traffic nightmare in a city that is already a daily traffic nightmare—is now old news to Angelenos, who collectively decided its effects were overhyped. Of course, it was hype that kept people off the roads and prevented what one writer called Sepulvedapocalypse. Never underestimate the power of fear as a motivator. Carmageddon was never exciting news to my four non-L.A. blog readers (shout-out to Tracy , Sizzle , Keely and Claire ), but whatever. I’m blogging about how I spent Carmageddon anyway. My strategy was basically to make people come to me. So arguably I cheated. A nobler carless weekend would have involved finally visiting one of the 75 galleries within a one-mile radius of my house, or taking public transportation. Instead, I: Stayed in Friday night and graded student reading journals while AK and Amy worked on a paper about dental care for poor children and re...

After seeing Midnight in Paris a few weeks ago—about a guy who romanticizes Paris in the 1920s—AK, Meehan and I tried to figure out what our own overly idealized Golden Ages would be. “There aren’t many eras when it would be good to be brown and queer,” AK pointed out. “Time traveling doesn’t work out well for me.” I remembered how, during my Little House on the Prairie phase, I wanted to travel back to pioneer times and buy a couple dozen acres of land for $5, like Pa did. I could do that with my allowance! But now I’m pretty sure washing one load of bonnets by hand in the river would cure me of any prairie lust. Saturday AK and I went to see Art In the Streets at the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA, the first national exhibition of graffiti art, and I landed on my Golden Age: New York in the ‘80s. Wandering through the nooks and crannies of a huge multi-artist work that recreated not just graffiti art but the streets themselves—a sort of impressionistic playground of rundown shops and...

June was a special month: I only read one book, and I gave up on two. I’m usually really stubborn about finishing books, but I’m trying out this new fuck-you attitude. So I said a (respectful) fuck-you to The Sound and the Fury . I’m sure it was very original in its time, but I had to Google the plot to figure out what the hell was going on, and when my car’s CD player refused to play disc five, I decided that my car was performing an act of passive resistance. Who am I to argue with the literary tastes of a wise old Honda Civic? I did see a really good play this weekend, though: 100 Saints You Should Know at the Elephant Theatre . Written by Kate Fodor and discovered for us by Christine, it’s about a scholarly, uptight priest who decides he’s had enough of the theoretical God and longs for the more touchy-feely spiritual experience that comes from, well, actually touching other humans now and then (but not in a creepy way). Cheryl Huggins and Kate Huffman as the rectory cleaning lady...

Since a one-night work trip to Fresno didn’t cure my blues, oddly enough, it was time to enact Operation: Get Outta Town Part Dos. I.e. a two- night, non-work trip to San Luis Obispo. I’m working up to Italy, okay? Over the years San Luis has become AK’s and my place—although she went to college there, so I guess it was her place and I just glommed on. It has small town charm—but not so much that you start to wonder if people actually live there (like Cambria, which we visited Sunday)—windswept bluffs and good food, but mostly it is not L.A., and even though AK’s radiator blew last time we were there, it feels like a place where nothing can go wrong. We spent the first night at the home of the Millers, who rescued us after last year’s radiator incident and this time fed us olala berries and baked French toast, which is like the love child of French toast and a cinnamon roll. In exchange, we read picture books to four-year-old Hattie and watched two-year-old Tilly dance ar...

The org I work for co-sponsors writing workshops at places like community centers and senior homes, and we spend a lot of time talking about how literature enables self-expression, healing, etc. When you say something enough, it becomes an abstraction. But lately, while crashing a couple of workshops in the name of evaluation purposes, I’ve been floored by the power of writing-as-therapy, to the point of getting choked up by my own tragic profundity (an embarrassing, little-discussed side effect of being a writer). Yesterday at the Burbank Senior Artists Colony —where I totally want to while away my golden years sculpting and writing plays—the teaching writer passed out fortune cookies and asked us to write poems based on our fortunes. Mine was “YOU DESIRE TO DISCOVER NEW FRONTIERS”: You begin like all pioneers, your ears full of stories: streets of gold milky rivers open-armed natives in need of restaurants and apothecaries. You think it’s only a matter of packing the right iron skil...