A Day in the Life

Where in the world is Natalie?
 
My poor blog has sat empty since August, one lone picture of a blue man gracing the front page. As I wrote here, I was hired for a new job over the summer.

Since I signed eleventy billion confidentiality clauses and contracts, I'm going to call my current company Credit Dauphine. I am employed there as an editor, and it is a surprisingly intense amount of work. It has been an adjustment from my stay-at-home days. In addition to a new schedule and job, I continued freelance writing on the side, and kept up the usual balance of friends, family, a marriage, and time for myself. FitC sat quietly in the backseat. This month, I added NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) to the To-Do List, and it's been a joy. I'm still working on finishing, but even if I don't make the goal, it's been fun to work on a novel again.

A recent trend in the blogosphere is to do a photo essay of an average day; taking a photo every hour and chronicling what the blogger does during a random day. It's been a long time since I've shared anything, and I thought that an average day in my life would be a good way to go. I can't promise this will happen again, or if I will even have another moment to blog this month. But it's a hello, a how-are-you-I'm-fine-see?, a day to let you know that I'm thinking of FitC, even if I can't really do much about it.

And it was a very typical day; nothing really grand or unusual happened. One day last week, Jamie brought me cronuts. That was a good day. And earlier this month, I managed to write a huge chunk of my NaNoWriMo story in one go. That was pretty exciting. Oh, and last week I saw Cyndi Lauper and took a trip to Wilmington, N.C. But Tuesday, November 19th, was just a normal day. Come join me.

7:20 a.m.: My alarm goes off. I ignore it, like a true American.

7:50 a.m.: Whoops. I'm running late. Time to get dressed, make coffee, ponder the universe. I get dressed in a super hurry and discover later I'm not quite that put-together since the tank-top I am wearing as a camisole under my sweater is way too long. (British English translation: My vest under my jumper was in a bunch.)

Weekly Flâneur: Up in Smoke

This fellow was hanging out on the side of Heroes Aren't Hard To Find Comics. 

What do you think his super power is? His name? 

Blue Blunt Man?

Seen in Charlotte, N.C., July 2013

Friday QuoteDay

“I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.”

— Mary Shelley, Frankenstein

Weekly Flâneur: Parallel Reminders

Warning: Reflections in this mirror may be distorted by socially constructed ideas of 'beauty'

InSpiral Lounge, a small cafe in Camden Town, London, December, 2009. 

you are beautiful

Restaurant X, a small cafe in Davidson, North Carolina, July, 2013.

Thanks, bathroom mirrors of the world, for the reminder.

Things That Happened Today On Twitter

"Everything In My Closet Is Slutty Or Casual: A Journey Of Inappropriate Work Attire, An Autobiography Of Every Morning at 7 A.M." By Natalie

Chapter 1: Why is this shirt covered in cat hair?

Chapter 2: It's not TECHNICALLY strapless, so it works, right?

Chapter 3: Why do you own so many pairs of shorts? You don't even wear shorts. Except the purple ones. But not to work. Don't put those on.

Chapter 4: The many ways in which your ass can no longer fit into those pants you have owned since 2003.

Chapter 5: Did you shave your legs? You didn't. How not-shaven are they? Eh, that dress is long enough.

Chapter 6: Sitting in the middle of your floorobe sighing and checking Facebook will not get you to work on time.

Chapter 7: Define skintight.

Chapter 8: Didn't you wear that Monday?

Chapter 9: Damn it, just throw something on already. No, not that.

Chapter 10: How the many vows to buy appropriate work attire will be forgotten by the time you finish your morning coffee.

Chapter 11: Doing it all again tomorrow as if it were a grand surprise.

(Email me at flaneurinthecity at gmail dot com if you want to follow my personal Twitter. Maybe one day I'll actually use the flaneurinthecity official Twitter account. After I buy a proper pair of trousers and a sensible shirt.)

Friday QuoteDay

“I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there is no I or you, so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand, so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.”

 ― Pablo Neruda, Chilean poet, 100 Love Sonnets

Weekly Flâneur: Two-Tone

Image of two-tone glass skyscraper. Click to enlarge.

Blue on blue, reflecting the sky. 

The architecture of this building reminds me of stair-steps to the clouds. 

Charlotte Plaza, Charlotte (duh), N.C., 2013

 

Handfast

There are little things about our life together that I am afraid I will forget. Quiet, daily moments that will be swept aside in memory for the big events. There will always be big events; graduations, birthdays, Christmas mornings. Give me the memory of his spoon stirring my morning cup of coffee. The joke we shared through puffs of breath during a late-afternoon run. I do not want to forget the rise and fall of his back as sleeps on his stomach on a dreary Sunday afternoon. The scent of his hair wet from the shower, shampoo and Ivory soap and something that is only him, indescribable.

The rains come again, heavy and incessant. It is summer, it is green and gray and strange to look at the calendar and think: July. This is July. We take a nap Sunday afternoon, because the rain starts again and the wind sends it sideways on the bedroom windows, and it is dark and cool and the weather of hibernation and secrets. We each claim a side of the bed, legs and arms akimbo, spread out, taking space. When it is hot, we neglect to snuggle close, we are a duo that is solo in sleep.

Despite the length of the bed between us, there are times I will wake in the night to find our hands clasped together; in our sleep we find each other, hold on. We start out sleeping apart, I on my side, he on his, curled around pillows or snuggled tight around blankets. Each lost to our own worlds. But somehow in the night we untangle, we cross the space of cold sheets and tossed pillows, our hands reach out and we weave together, my hand in his, his in mine. Unconscious. Unknown. Unable to let go even in dreams.

Some summer day it may not be the sole pair of us; we may have children, we may have a wagging-tailed dog, we may have a house shared with parents or relatives. Some day it may just be him, alone and waiting in this world, this life. Some day, it may be just me, a husband gone, children grown, my hair gray and thin and sparse. On that day, I want to remember the space of time when it was just me and him, our bed an island in a sea of dreams, my fingers moving through sleep, his hand sneaking a way through parted sheets, both safely reaching out in darkness to hold the hand that was made for the other.

Friday QuoteDay

“The only thing I know is this: I am full of wounds and still standing on my feet.”

― Nikos Kazantzakis, Greek novelist

Weekly Flâneur: Red, White, and Blue

Take a bite. Click to enlarge.

Happy 4th of July!
Time to get star spangled hammered. For America!

Red, white, and blue, the fruits of summer are for you. Charlotte, N.C., 2013

Friday QuoteDay

“Let everything happen to you:
beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final”

― Rainer Maria Rilke, Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God

Adventures In Unemployment

(September Edition is here. February Edition is here.)

Un, Under, Over Edition

First came the Un. Unemployment, the gift of soft pillows, of endless cups of tea, the quiet mornings of empty driveways and empty homes. It can be post-apocalyptic to walk suburbia during a workday morning. Row after row of houses abandoned for 8 hours every day, 5 days a week. The first time around I was in a city neighborhood, and there was always noise, always people. Seventh Street, Plaza-Midwood, Elizabeth. I could walk them all day and never be alone. This time it was just me and the small brown birds, the occasional rabbit, and once, one cold, foggy morning, three white-tailed deer clacking across the sidewalk to greener backyards.

Then came the Under. I worked, but not enough. An article here and there. Under-the-table editing for a bit of spending money. A contract position that was underpaid but steady for a few months. A blog post, a photo, a blurb. It was sometimes exciting, sometimes dull. All the while, I looked for full-time work. I was digging holes in a desert looking for a spring.

Multiple résumés, cover letters, inquiring emails, applications. Smiling through well-meaning advice from employed family and friends ("Have you tried Monster.com?"). Submitting writing samples, portfolios, editing tests. And more than once, squeezing into a business-appropriate pencil skirt and high-collared shirt, my feet in heels, clacking across marbled lobbies into office towers for interviews that would lead to nowhere.

It seemed an Over was ever just out of my reach. Work harder. Ignore the sweat and bleeding palms and dig deeper for a bountiful well. A field of holes was behind me; cracked dry earth ahead. Keep digging, keep scraping, keep going. Is that damp earth? No.

It was an ocean, it was vast and salty on my face, there was an old man building a boat and there were animals swimming by in pairs. Where was once a desert was suddenly a deluge. I was asked to edit a magazine for the summer while the editor-in-chief was on maternity leave. I was asked come in to do some temp work at my old job at the alt weekly. I was asked to write several articles for more than one publication on topics that interested me and were a pleasure to do. I was asked to submit my portfolio for a corporate job. I was asked to send in writing samples for an uptown gig. Swimming, floating, the tidal wave had finally, finally come in. No more vigils on dry, infertile sand.

But then, just as swiftly as the waters came, the course turned. The magazine I was to help edit for the summer folded after only one month of work. My weeks of temp were up. Word came that the corporate job decided to not hire anyone for the moment. The uptown gig fell through. I was alone again with my shovel, muddy, tired, and thirsty. I couldn't remember the taste of fresh water, and the sight of greener backyards. What next?

The only thing to do was pick up and keep digging. The last of the salt water on my face may have been tears. They were well-earned. When I walk the mornings, the houses stand at attention, faceless windows fitful for human bodies. My desktop overflows with résumés. I keep a spreadsheet of all the job applications I've submitted; the final count since the start of the new year reached 173. I've long lost count of the interviews.

It is June, and the sun shines, and the birds sing, and the rains come late afternoons. My desert story ends not with a tidal wave, but a tiny trickle. After a month of worry and walking, the corporate job which previously decided not to hire, called. If I wanted it, the job was mine.

Here now, in the waning green month of June, comes the Over.

You Find Me: The Advice Round

Much like the recent Weird Facebook Ads, I will occasionally write a routine post after I check my stats and see who is visiting FitC and what brought them here. Previous searches are here, here, and these two here. Today's round is dedicated to those looking to FitC for advice. I'm sorry that I am your source for wise counsel, but I'll do my best at supplying the advice you seek.


1.) DO NOT DO THIS.

FitC advice: Do not do this. This is not a Thing. This will only result in pain and chaffing and, if mixed with vinegar, a penis volcano. Contrary to how cool that sounds, it is not sexy nor comfortable. Nobody wants that for you.


2.) Not Even Close

FitC advice: Well. If you would like to donate funds to make FitC into Dan Feuerriegel's Wikipedia, there's a PayPal button to your right. It will take a few million, so have at it. Dollars or Euros is fine by me. Looks like you get the star for this round.

Other than that, I don't think FitC is quite what you're looking for. (How do you feel about David Bowie? Yes? No? Come for the Dan, stay for the Bowie?) Anyway, here's his Twitter: https://twitter.com/DgFeuerriegel


3.) If I Had It, I Would Share It

FitC advice: Call Iman. She's got the goods.


4.) Are You Asking?

FitC advice: Does Daniel Feuerriegel have a girlfriend? I don't know. Or is this Dan Feuerriegel looking for a girlfriend? Well, alright, Danny-boy. Since you asked in such a round-about way, yes. I'll be your girlfriend. I'm sure my husband won't mind. Do you like David Bowie? You do now.

This image totally does not belong to me. Found via every Dan tumblr in existence.

I spelled your name right multiple times. In Internet terms, that probably means we've reached first base. Your move, Dan.


5.) Magical

FitC advice: Is this real? A whole shop devoted to nothing but BOWIE?! Where is this magical place? Take me there. Like Narnia. I will hop in any wardrobe for Bowie.

I want to go to there.

If it's not real, my advice is for everyone to empty out their piggy banks and we'll open a Bowie shop ourselves. AshleyISee has already named it Bowie's Boudoir. Let's do this.

Friday QuoteDay

“You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.” 

― Ray Bradbury, American author, from Zen in the Art of Writing

 

Weekly Flâneur: Rosy

Pink roses by lake. Click to enlarge.

Rosy Summer Days are here!

Happy Summer Solstice, Northern Hemisphere! 

Let's go dance in the sun. 

Wild roses growing by Lake Wylie, McDowell Nature Preserve, Charlotte, N.C.

Friday QuoteDay

"Under the current ‘tyranny of slenderness’ women are forbidden to become large or massive; they must take up as little space as possible. The very contours of a woman’s body takes on as she matures -- the fuller breasts and rounded hips -- have become distasteful. The body by which a woman feels herself judged and which by rigorous discipline she must try to assume is the body of early adolescence, slight and unformed, a body lacking flesh or substance, a body in whose very contours the image of immaturity has been inscribed. The requirement that a woman maintain a smooth and hairless skin carries further the theme of inexperience, for an infantilized face must accompany her infantilized body, a face that never ages or furrows its brow in thought. The face of the ideally feminine woman must never display the marks of character, wisdom, and experience that we so admire in men.”

— Sandra L. Bartky, philosopher, "Foucault, Femininity and the Modernization of Patriarchal Power," in Feminism and Foucault: Paths of Resistance

Weekly Flâneur: Peachy Keen

Image of ripe peaches in wooden baskets. Click to enlarge.

Summer time!

In the last years of my grandfather's life, his home in a wooded area had two large, unruly peach trees growing in the backyard. My mother would send me outside to pick peaches, but I would spend more time sitting in the tree and eating my fill than plucking a supply for later. Since the trees were left unattended and overgrown, the best fruits were at the top, and it took bare feet and scratched arms and legs to climb through the bramble of branches. Totally worth it though, and my memories of summer are forever peach-flavored. 

If you ever find yourself on a road trip in the South, no matter where you go, there will be a stand somewhere along the way selling both fireworks and Georgia or South Carolina peaches by the basket. They will be your best purchase. The fruits of summer are waiting for you.

Sweet peaches from the King's Drive Farmer's Market in Charlotte, N.C., June 2013

Friday QuoteDay

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”

― Louise Erdrich, Native American author, from The Painted Drum LP

Weekly Flâneur: Little Star

Image of hand holding wildflower. Click to enlarge.

Twinkle, twinkle?

Spring wildflowers grow on the graves of Elmwood Cemetery, Charlotte, N.C.

Weird Facebook Ads, Part Three

I haven't done a Weird Facebook Ad round-up in a while (here's Part 1 and Part 2). Maybe it's because Facebook has gotten wise to my aggressive hiding and labeling ads as offensive, but I haven't had as many weird FB ads to post lately. I get the usual Mom Ads, which is just par for the sexist course at FB, but even those are coming up less and less as I click to remove them from my sidebar. Tellingly, my husband still does not receive any ads for newly marrieds, Dads, cleaning, or baby supplies, but political campaigns and movies. I like politics and movies more than I like cleaning, FB, thanks. As I stated in Weird Facebook Ads, Part 1, there must be an algorithm that sees my married, 30-something profile and assumes that I should be having babies by the truckload and cleaning all their little baby ends, while my husband does the voting. Misogyny! Subtle as always. Given all the other info FB knows about me, you'd think it would be able to read deeper while crawling a profile. For example?

1.) Where do you think I live, Facebook?

Hoboken is in New Jersey,  642 Miles / 1033 Km from me.

My recent photos are tagged North Carolina, my check-ins are in North Carolina, and my current employment status is in North Carolina. Facebook reads this as Jersey Shore baby! Yeah! I mean, 2010 was good year, but that doesn't mean you have to live in its pop culture forever. I guess now I have to go Gym, Tan, Laundry.

Speaking of employment ...

2.) FU Cat

Really?

Oh really, Facebook? That kitten can get a job at his tiny kitten desk, collating his teeny kitten memos with his bitty kitten powers of adorableness and shedding? Kittens are taking all our biped jobs! So why can't I find a job? Fucking kittens, Facebook. Maybe I could be working where mini-kitty is working but nooooo the job goes to Fluffy McTunabreath over there. No one wants to work with people when they could work with kittens. This is a fact. The Internet is proof of this. There is no place for me in a job market that hires student-loan-free baby snuggle-face kittens. 

The Internet. (Via WeKnowGifs)

But to cheer me up, finally, Facebook does something right ...

3.) You Finally Get Me

Finally. Yes. Ads that are relevant to my interests. Yes. I DO like Futurama! Yes. I DO love Sailor Moon! Please install all your cookies and malware as I like all the cartoon things. Agreement reached!

Friday QuoteDay

"I’ve been told by producers, 'Well, you know we need to get on this because you’re not getting any younger ...' Women are reminded of their age all the time and it’s usually by a fricking fat, big-bellied old man with a comb-over and you look at him and you’re like, 'Really? Give me a break. You just have more money and more power in this situation than I do, but not in my life.'"

— Zoë Saldaña, American actress in InStyle UK, June 2013

Image property of InStyle UK. Click to enlarge.

Weekly Flâneur: Time Warp

Diner delight. Click to enlarge.

East coasters dream of retiring in the South. Mattie's Diner was built in 1948, and came from New Jersey to live in Charlotte in 2010. Sometimes I work within walking distance to the little trailer diner, and when I do it's nothing but nifty fifties milkshakes, french fries, and tuna melts for me. 

 Mattie's Diner, Charlotte, N.C., May 2013

The Integral Bowie Swag Post

In case you haven't noticed, my kittens, I have a wee, teeny-tiny, slight thing for DAVID BOWIE. Pause for gasps. Yes, it's true. And I have amassed a few items with Bowie's lovely face on them over the years that I would like to brag flaunt fuck yeah lookit all my sweet Bowie shit share with you.

The first Bowie Swag Posting comes to us courtesy of the irreplaceable Ashley (I See). Sent straight from London and from the heart, these were purchased at the current exhibit, David Bowie Is, at the Victoria and Albert Museum. You have until August to sell your kidney and visit London to attend. (Sell both and buy me a ticket too?)

As seen in this sadly blurry photo (like holy relics and alien encounters, the mysterious rarely allows itself to be photographed clearly), Ashley sent me a Ziggy Stardust mask/card, a lovely postcard, and a Bowie paper doll book, Bowie Paper Doll The Best Dress-Up Fun You'll Have With A Pair Of Scissors! (And a sweet heart drawn on the envelope, just because.) Let's look inside, shall we?

That's not a glare, that's DAVID BOWIE'S penis shining. Even when made of paper, ethereal BOWIE peen cannot be contained.

David Bowie doesn't NEED two pants legs, mugglefuckers. Two legs are for plebes, humans, and mortals. David Bowie wears what he wants.

Lest we forget that this is a published book available for purchase in retail stores (and does not contain a magical doll that will come to life if placed in a cupboard overnight), this disingenuous figure features Bowie in briefs. I will never be convinced that guitar-playing Ziggy from Mars went anything but commando.

Tuesday QuoteDay

"I really don't care about being the first.

So long as it inspires someone else to be second."

— Raha Moharrak

From the BBC:

A Saudi woman has made history by reaching the summit of the world's highest mountain.

Raha Moharrak, 25, not only became the first Saudi woman to attempt the climb but also the youngest Arab to make it to the top of Everest.

She is part of a four-person expedition that also includes the first Qatari man and the first Palestinian man attempting to reach the summit.

They are trying to raise $1m (£660,000) for education projects in Nepal.

Weekly Flâneur: Faded

Faded street art of men in uniform. Click to enlarge.

The ghostly bobbies on the mural outside of Sir Ed's disapprove of me forgetting to take a picture of them while the sun was still high in the sky. Silly mural ghosts. Beer is much more important. 

Sir Edmond Halley's Restaurant & Freehouse, Charlotte, N.C., May 2013 

To Walk After Midnight

I want things I cannot articulate, laid out before me like a garden of red peppers, now barely seeds.

Walking in suburbia after midnight is walking in the land of cats and small beetles, open windows and blue lights of TV screens. The smell of honeysuckle by the creek. Darting insects under sandaled foot, the sidewalk white and winding under streetlights. I think of cities. I think of Paris in Autumn, the taste of apple pastries. I think of rain in a city I have never seen, the long fogs of Seattle. I think of London, I think of home. I walk through writer's block, I walk through excessive adjectives, I walk through damp grass from the day's thunderstorm and try to make it into a metaphor. I walk slowly, the lights of passing cars my only human contact. A cat eyes me warily from under a mini-van. The houses share walls, share street space, share small squares of grass before long lines of cars. We are jammed up on one another in the middle of nowhere, anchored by a suite of big box stores and a bus stop. I think of Oakland Avenue, of late night walks down 7th street. I think of Roehampton Lane and the stretch of darkness between the council houses and the sole shop open later than 8 pm. I think of other Natalies, other women to walk alone on late night streets and never make it home again.

I tell myself that it is OK to be tired, to crawl into bed with damp hair curling from the moist air, to write tomorrow. Tomorrow may be kinder, brighter. Tomorrow there may be bright red peppers to wash in the sunlight streaming in from the kitchen window.

"Dummy," I tell myself. It is tomorrow. It will be what I make it.

Tonight's Jam

Patsy Cline, "Walking After Midnight"

Friday QuoteDay

“There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that is your own self. So you have to begin there, not outside, not on other people. That comes afterwards, when you have worked on your own corner.” 

 — Aldous Huxley, English writer, author of Brave New World

 

Weekly Flâneur: A Thousand Eyes

Image of a cherry tree covered in blossoms. Click to enlarge.

"The Night Has A Thousand Eyes" 

by Francis William Bourdillon

The night has a thousand eyes,
And the day but one;
Yet the light of the bright world dies
With the dying of the sun.

The mind has a thousand eyes,
And the heart but one;
Yet the light of a whole life dies
When love is done.

Cherry tree at midnight, downtown Charlotte, N.C., Spring 2013

Saturday QuoteDay

“The model for tomorrow, and this is the model I’ve been using with enormous enthusiasm since I started blogging back in 2001, is to try everything. Make mistakes. Surprise ourselves. Try anything else. Fail. Fail better. And succeed in ways we never would have imagined a year or a week ago.” 

— Neil Gaiman, on blogging. 

(Previous Mr. Gaiman quotes here, here and here!) 

Why Don't You ...

This past week, I had my very first food story as the section lead in the local alt weekly paper. It's a personal stepping stone for me, because I never really write about food or music for pay. I've written about restaurants and interviewed chefs, but I've never had a lead story or written about the actual food itself. I never really wanted to. I still never want to have to write about music. Musicians, sure. And occasionally, here on this space, I've waxed poetic about pop stars. Once, I managed to become inspired enough to even break down a song and write a post on it. (Hello, Lady Gaga!) I unabashedly love pop music and musicals and never-heard-of-thems, but I don't want to write about them.

If it's not in your blood to enjoy every aspect of working with something, it quickly sours. That's why some hobbies can't translate into paying work. Writing is something I am good at and love to do, so I sweat it out and still enjoy it. But when it comes to music, it is the one area, the one subject, in my life that I can turn off my brain and just enjoy.  I like it, because I don't have to think about it. No analyzing beats, no dissecting lyrics, no questioning motives. No digging out the Five Ws. No reviewing. Listen, enjoy, repeat. This isn't to say I do not recognize problematic lyrics or artists, or will listen to just anything. But since I do not have any ambition to write about music, or to be a music reviewer, or a singer, a songwriter, or to learn a new instrument or critique musical arrangements, I am free to be dumb and listen to things that make me happy or invoke nostalgia or make me cry. It's freeing. I loathe to give it up. A good, tasty meal has the same effect. It's why I steer clear of penning Yelp reviews and why I do not share recipes on my blog. But after this past week, I think it's time. So food, sure. I'm taking the step and adding it to my list of things I can write about. Music is still a no. It's still mine.

So, why don't I write about David Bowie's new album? That's between me and him.

Tonight's Jam

I was slightly obsessed with this song in 2011, and it pleases me that Emeli Sandé is finally playing on the Top 40 radio stations in North Carolina.

Emeli Sandé, "Next to Me"

Friday QuoteDay

"It's the disconnect of being trained since birth to look a certain way, only to have dudes turn around and go, 'Don't you know we hate all that stuff on your face?' Like it was our idea! Like women collectively woke up one day and thought, 'Wouldn't it be awesome to slap a bunch of chemicals and dyes on our faces every morning from now on?'

We've got a multi-billion dollar industry doing their best to remind us daily that we need what they're selling, so don't act all befuddled about where we got the idea that we looked better this way. Plus, it's not like men don't still expect us to look beautiful. They just don't want us cheating with cosmetics. Hope your face is naturally flawless! 

And while we're talking, don't you ladies know how annoying it is that you're all hung up on your weight? Sure, we expect you to have a great body. But don't be one of those lame girls who orders salads on a date. We like to see you eat! 

Most of the time, when men say they prefer 'natural beauty,' they don't mean that they're ready for us to start leaving the house the way we roll out of bed in the morning. They mean that they want us to look perfect without appearing to try. 

Basically, it's a trap. 

— Emily McCombs, Editor at XOJane, "On Men Who Don't Like Women In MakeUp" 

Weekly Flâneur: Book It

Click to enlarge.

The Main Library of Uptown Charlotte has featured a multitude of literary quotes on its outer columns since 1996. (Though the building itself has been around as long as I can remember. And I remember being kicked out of Main as a small child for being rowdy* with a friend in the late 1980s, so that's at least 20 years. They let me back in. Eventually.) It's a lovely way to enjoy some light outdoor reading on a lunch break from the skyscrapers that dwarf the building, before heading inside to grab a book on hold or wander the stacks.

Since I missed both Weekly Flâneur and Friday QuoteDay last week due to travel, I'd like to think that a photo of a quote can make up for it? What say you, dear friends? All smiles and forgiveness, or will you take your flaneuring needs elsewhere? (Kidding, I know you'll stay here with me forever! BBFFs, best blog friends 4eva!)

Mr. B is fond of Groucho Marx's quote, and so one recent night out on the town I snapped this pic. The first shot I took was without a flash, which ironically made the photo ... too dark to read. All the quotes can be found here.

"Outside of a dog, a book is probably man's best friend, and inside a dog, it's too dark to read." Groucho Marx

The bonus side quote reads:

"The beautiful thing about learning is nobody can take it from you." B.B. King

And hidden behind them both is this quote:

"One of the greatest gifts adults can give – to their offspring and to society – is to read to children." Carl Sagan

Let's all go take a blanket outside to the newly sprung grass and read a book in the sunshine. Don't wake me if I fall asleep. See you there.

*Well, not so much rowdy. More like a champion of justice. Another child stole my friend Katie's purse, containing a prized $2 bill inside, so I tackled him while she punched. We were in full Brownie Troop uniform. The attending librarian who found two girl scouts sitting on a boy's chest and beating him took pity on the thief and hauled us out of the kid's section and straight to the troop leaders, who happened to be our mothers. Sorry, Mom/Scout Leader!

A Few Things That Have Happened Lately

•  Yesterday I wrote that I wouldn't be writing this week. Humans are creatures of multiple contradictions. Looks like I'm blogging after all!

• If you follow me on my personal Twitter, you'll know I'm somewhat obsessed with the TV show Spartacus ending, and if I was a true Internet writer worth my salt I would have already written at least 20 feminist critiques and analyzed the show and its nuanced performances of gender reflected in hyper masculinity and the blatant examples of the failings of a patriarchal society but then I open up this picture of Dan Feuerriegel in a tub and I'm just like, hi. Um, hi.





Source: Coffee-table book In The Tub by TJ Scott, available at Kickstarter.



I mean, I just, what. I can't. With this. Abs. Seriously. Hi.*


I sincerely hope that there is another writer out there in the wilds of the Internet who can entertainingly dissect this show with a critical and informative lens the same way other shows like Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead are constantly dissected. I'm sorry it's not going to be me. Because, yeah.

• Bullet lists are still a thing at FitC. And everywhere else on the entire Internet for the rest of history.

• According to collective cross-over pop culture and literary knowledge, Hemingway stood at his dresser to write. A few of my colleagues praise the stand-n-write mode. Me? I dunno. I'm trying it now, safely away from prying eyes in my bedroom, and it makes me feel silly. But I can step away to pace, which I frequently get up to do when writing anyway, so I suppose it erases the whole push-away-from-the-desk-in-my-chair-to-stand step in my writing?

• There's a pond near my house with a pair of Canadian geese, and recently one goose got too close to the road and was hit by a car. And everyday this week I've driven by and seen the lone mate near its fallen friend and my heart breaks a little each time in ways that I never knew it capable of breaking for a small, mourning goose.

• I'm so sorry for that last bullet point. I know. I know!

• Here's some crocheted bunnies I have made. They are all going to good homes.
  






It's true what they say about bunnies. I left them alone and boom! Room full.

• If you're wondering why March has fewer posts than February and January, may I remind you that David Bowie has a new album to listen to? That's why.

• A Thing I wrote today: This week I am working temp in an office and writing two stories. After being unemployed for so long it's so much activity. It's like, WHOA whoa there. All this activity. Shouldn't we be taking a nap or something? I mean, isn't it time for a TV marathon break in this office? No? Man.

• I wasn't even going to blog this week. I blame Dan Feuerriegel.

*If you want to follow me on my non-anonymous personal Twitter, drop me a line and we'll continue this intelligent discussion.

Working Girl

As many of you know (and are tired of me telling you), I work as a freelance writer and will occasionally take a job writing in-house for a company. For the past two weeks, I've been hired to do some temp work as an editor at a newspaper while the current editor is on vacation. I started last week, which means that poor FitC didn't get any love. I also interviewed and accepted to cover another editorial job with a local magazine in the coming months, which is great for my bank account, bad for blogging.

Sadly, there was nothing new here last week and I'm afraid I have nothing new for this week. But please stick with me and know that I will be back to snapping pics and loving on David Bowie with my words soon enough. A working Natalie is also a happy Natalie, so I'm sending extra smiles and love to each and every one of you. Thanks for reading, and see you next week!

Weekly Flâneur: The Riverbend

Click to enlarge.

The Oconaluftee River is sacred to the people of the Eastern Band of Cherokee, and I feel very lucky to have spent a day enjoying the late winter sun on its shores.

March 16, 2013, Qualla Boundary, Great Smokey Mountains, Cherokee, North Carolina, USA

Friday QuoteDay

“I want you to know that it is not always easy to love me. That sometimes my chest is a field full of landmines, and where you went last night, you can’t go tomorrow. There is no manual, there is no road map, no help line you can call; my body does not come with instructions, and sometimes even I don’t know what to do with it. This cannot be easy. But still, you touch me anyway.” 

 — Ivan E. Coyote, spoken word performer and writer. Quote from Missed Her. 

Weekly Flâneur: Taste the Rainbow

Click to enlarge image.

Happy early St. Patrick's Day! The only rainbow I am interested in are these French Macaroons. How beautiful are they? If they look familiar, it may be because you've seen them in your dreams, or in The Hunger Games film. Amelie's French Bakery supplied Katniss and Peeta with the bounty of food for their train ride to the capital, and these lovelies were stacked high on their table. (Does that mean Charlotte, N.C., is District 12?)

Have a safe and happy drinking and green-wearing holiday, my loves! 

Amelie's French Bakery, March 12, 2013, Charlotte, N.C. USA

Hollywood Lessons For Young Ladies

Nothing in media or pop culture exists within a vacuum. Today on FitC, we visit three recent films that are aimed at children and young adults. We are forever absorbing messages through media, and these three films are perpetuating subtle and sometimes blatant lessons for young women and their expected place in the world. (A reminder: To pass the Bechdel Test, a film must have 1.) At least two women 2.) who have a conversation 3.) about something other than men.) Let's have a look, shall we?

Jack attack. Image via Wikipedia.

Jack the Giant Slayer 

Plot: There's Jack, some magic beans, a beanstalk, and fee fi foe fumm giants. Standard fairy tale stuff. This version includes an intrepid princess who Jasmines her way out of the palace to escape her arranged marriage and seek adventure. She is the Smurfette of the film, and doesn't do much except become giant bait and provide a way for Jack to become a hero. This isn't necessary a bad thing; we can't all be heroes. Sometimes we need to be saved. It's Jack's story. The problem comes when the damsel in distress the ONLY representation of women we see. And in this particular batch of movies? Jack the Giant Slayer is not only the film that is (surprisingly!) the most entertaining, but the most tolerable when comes to positive representation. Chew on that for a minute.

Main Female Characters: One. Apparently giants reproduce asexually, as there are no lady giants in the bunch.

Does it pass the Bechdel Test?: No. There's a brief prologue scene of young Isabelle reading a story with her mother, but the story is about a brave king and the giants.

Lesson for Young Girls: Be an adventurer! But only if it helps a random dude. Waiting for the array of knights in shining armor to show up and save you is a great way to pass the time. Have you brushed your hair today?

Subtext: Your grand adventure is to wait for the male adventurer in your life to save you. Try not to screw it up by being self-sufficient.

Side Note: At one point, the princess is put in gold-plated armor. It gave me false hope she would actually join in the giant slaying. Sadly, this was just for show.

Beautiful Creatures: Ugly Stereotypes. Image via Wikipedia.

Beautiful Creatures

Plot: Teen Cardboard Cut-Out Forrest Gump is in love with Lena, a teen witch. Lena is on the verge of becoming a good witch or a bad witch. Dark "casters" are shunned by the good witch community, and Lena is being trained by her uncle to chose the light and become good. Her mother and cousin plot to have Lena join the dark side and rule the world with them. I think? I dunno, this movie was, like, 20 hours long, with terribly repetitive smooching between Teen Witch Barbie and Ken, mind-numbingly boring, and managed to fit in every Southern stereotype possible. (Even Civil War re-enactments!)

Main Female Characters: 3. A cringe-inducing Magical Negro character (played by Viola Davis, who deserves better), spends the entire movie helping white people solve their problems and playing nursemaid to Forrest Gump. Lena, who plays the role of exceptional girl and rejects the women in her life in favor of Forrest and the approval of her uncle. And the mother and cousin witches, who are all sex and evil and of course must be destroyed and seriously, ugh. UGH. This racist, sexist movie.

Does it pass the Bechdel test?: Maybe? At one point the mean mom witch and teenage girl witch were talking about her future, and how powerful and strong and dark she could be? But they probably jumped right back on the topic of Teenage Dream Forrest Gump before the audience could get uncomfortable ideas about Lena's independence.

Lesson for Young Girls: Your boyfriend and male influences are way more important than your mother. Mom-witch is no longer virginal or matronly, and failing to fit into the assigned spaces of womenhood, must be destroyed. Does your uncle like you enough? Work on that. Have you sacrificed enough for your teen boyfriend so that his dreams of college and a bright future can be met? Try harder. And if you're a young woman of color? White people aren't gonna clean up their own messes.

Subtext: Work hard so your menfolk will be happy. If you have the approval of the men in your life, you don't need any other women. (Except your one black friend, who lives to serve you.)

Side Note: Aziz Ansari and Stephen Colbert are two actors who were born and/or raised in South Carolina. Neither sound anything like Ken Doll Forrest Gump's atrocious accent. The Hollywood stereotypes of the South seen in this movie are a whoooole other post.

Oz the what now? Image via Wikipedia.

Oz The Great and Powerful

Plot: The hero of the story is a conman who lands on Oz to stick his penis into things. And save Oz? But his name is also Oz? And it's all kind of a 3-D, technicolor mess with a middling, passive storyline that puts James Franco and his penis around beautiful women who are stuck with a dull script that leaves little for them to do? Oz claims to be a wizard and all the witches fall all over themselves for him. After a nighttime romp with one witch, who declares the next morning that she is happy to become the future queen of Oz, he runs off to meet another witch and lust after some gold exactly like Scrooge McDuck and I don't know, y'all. There's munchkins and fireworks and I mean, why can't the witches just run Oz on their own? Look. This about sums it up: At one point the movie even addresses the manipulative way Oz ups and leaves the ladies who love him, and the sidekick monkey states, "You broke that poor girl's heart." Prompting Oz to answer blithely, "She'll get over it. They always do." When a bellhop-clad flying monkey voiced by Zach Braff is your voice of reason, there is something wrong with your movie.

Main Female Characters: 3 or 4, witches and a living China Doll, all dependent upon Oz to save or woo them.

Does it pass the Bechdel Test?: Ha.

Lesson for Young Girls: If you have a sexual encounter ("Dancing," as Disney says. They stay up all night "dancing.") with someone who is charming and kind and says all the right things but who is really a conman, it's still your fault for falling for it. Congratulations. You are now a wicked witch woman who deserves warts and scorn and not even the reprieve of a nice spa day because you can't get wet. Watch out for falling houses.

Subtext: No sex before marriage, or you will turn green and warty. But only if you're a girl. Boys get to become consequence-free kings.

Side Note: This prequel film taints Judy Garland's heroics. When the wizard sends Dorothy to kill the wicked witch in 1939's The Wizard of Oz, now it isn't so much a test of her faith and courage, but a way to dispatch his ex-girlfriend without getting his hands dirty. What a hero.

Film.com published an excellent and well-researched article on this topic, and gives us this great quote:

In a bitter reversal of Baum’s stories, “Great and Powerful” casts the women as the sidekicks, standing by to aid the Wizard should he need it. No longer instigators of action, the witches Glinda, Theodora, and Evanora now clasp their hands at arrival, thrilled the prophesied hero has arrived (“Aren’t you the great man we’ve been waiting for?” asks Theodora, voice trembling. Actually, all the female dialogue seems to be on the wobbly verge of tears). Whereas Baum’s charlatan Wizard accidentally became ruler of Oz, making a mess of things in the process, now we have one who has a place carved out for him, and is hailed as the man “who can set things right” (silly witches, always making a mess of their kingdoms!). Who knew three sorceresses –- who were all-seeing and all-knowing in prior Oz tales -– were actually helpless compared to a man from Kansas? And helpless against him! Yes, Michelle Williams’ Glinda is smart enough to see through our hero’s lies and bluster, but otherwise she’s completely stripped of any real agency. “Great and Powerful” corrects Baum’s grievous abstinence, and reminds us all women must fall for a handsome traveler. The modern day Wizard now wins at least 2/3 of the onscreen hearts instead of being shamed as a liar.

Best to stick with director Sam Raimi's previous work, Xena: Warrior Princess, if you're in the mood for watching something that doesn't involve a demeaning female lead.

Friday QuoteDay: International Women's Day 2013 Edition

Image via stfuconservatives

Today is International Women's Day.

While we raise a toast to the amazing, brave and intelligent women in our lives, we also have to remember why today is still a necessity. Visit internationalwomensday.com to learn about events in your area and ways to reach equality in our lifetime.

Weekly Flâneur: Inky

Click to enlarge.

This giant phallic landmark is supposedly a pen in an inkwell. It sits in the middle of the main campus at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte. The illustrious creators of this statue were much more optimistic about the maturity of their students than I ever could be; every time I was or am on campus my sense of direction is marked by the location of the super stone penis.

Who's ready for some green leaves to color this black and white winter dreariness?

Taken at UNCC, February, 2013

Friday QuoteDay

“Courage is the most important of all the virtues, because without courage you can’t practice any other virtue consistently. You can practice any virtue erratically, but nothing consistently without courage.”

— Maya Angelou, African-American poet and civil rights activist.

Weekly Flâneur: Books in the City

La Bibliothéque de la Cité. Click to enlarge.

Found via AshleyISee, from Simon & Schuster Canada, via a Seattle blog post, to your computer screen this lovely winter's day. 

From Simon & Schuster Canada:

"This beautiful fresco adorns the exterior of the La Bibliothèque De La Cité (Library of the City) in Lyon, France."

Books are literally the windows to the world at this library.

A Little Help

You know, sometimes, the world just feels like a dark and endlessly frightening place, and even the thought of getting out of bed and finding clean socks is a momentous task. Sometimes it's an outside battle, and sometimes it is solely the chemicals clashing in our minds, but there are fights that are bigger and heavier than what our bodies can handle. And when it gets this way, it's hard to remember anything else but the sadness. You have to be brave, and you have to be strong. But if you need a reprise from the battle and want someone else to help carry your sword, I want to pass on this site for you. Because there are always people who care, even strangers on the Internet.

Screengrab from IMAlive. Click to visit site.

IMAlive is an online crisis center which uses instant messaging to help people in emotional and physical crisis. You can receive help right now. In this instant. Or tomorrow, or 2 AM or whenever you need it. From their site, https://www.imalive.org/index.php:

"You are panicked, short of breath, and the pain is so palpable that you cannot feel or think about anything else. The terror of picking up the phone to call a hotline not knowing who will answer prevents you from doing so. Or, even if you have the courage to pick up the phone, the sound of the person's voice scares you and you hang up. We know this happens because over 30% of all people who call suicide hotlines do just that—they hang up as soon as they hear the human voice.

More importantly, we recognize the technological age we find ourselves in today and we know that millions of people in crisis will never pick up the phone. We believe that IMAlive is part of the solution to the problem. IMAlive is a live online network that uses instant messaging to respond to people in crisis. People need a safe place to go during moments of crisis and intense emotional pain."

As some of you may remember from this post, a family member of mine recently committed suicide. I don't know what words I could have said to him to make the weight of the battle a little less, but I am glad that there are people out there who do know. Who know what to say and what direction to point in to help others find a way to a healthier place. So, if you can, pass IMAlive to others who may need it. There are always people who care.

Friday QuoteDay

“I suspect it’s difficult for men to imagine a world in which their bodies have long been inextricably linked to their value as an individual, and that no matter how encouraging your parents were or how many positive female role models you had or how self-confident you feel, there is an ever-present pressure that creeps in from all sides, whispering in your ear that you are your body and your body defines you.

A world where, from the time of pubescence on, you can feel the constant and palpable weight of the male gaze, and not just from your male peers but from teachers and sports coaches and the fathers of the children you baby-sit, people you’re supposed to respect and trust and look up to, and that first realization that you are being looked at in that way is the beginning of a self-consciousness that you will be unable to shake for the rest of your life.

Even if they are never verbalized, the rules of bodily conduct for females become clear early on: when school administrators reprimand you for the inch of midriff that shows when you lift your hands straight in the air or youth group leaders tell you that the sight of your unintentional cleavage is what causes godly young men to fall, you learn that your body is dangerous and shameful and that it’s your responsibility to cloister it in a way that is acceptable to everyone else. You learn that your body is a topic of public debate that everyone is entitled to weigh in on, from a male classmate telling you that those jeans make your ass look huge to the male-dominated United States Congress dictating the parameters that rape must fall within to be considered legitimate.

To be a woman, and to live life in a woman’s body, is to be held to a set of comically paradoxical standards that make you constantly second-guess yourself and jump through a million hoops in pursuit of an impossible perfection.”

 — From Thought Catalog's Stop Catcalling Me by Kendall Goodwin