Purple tights and polka dots

Congratulations! You are reading the 100th Island of Misfit Toys blog post! Do you feel amazing? Has your life been forever altered? Let's hope so. Thanks for reading and I hope that you'll stick with me for 100 more. If Google brought you here from the dark recesses of a search, I hope you enjoy your visit and come back again soon.

So what to discuss on this historic day? I thought about this a lot and had several ideas planned. I settled on this one today because I'm supposed to be working towards a goal this year and what better way to check in on that goal than to talk about it for the millionth time? Back in the heady last days of 2012, I shared my goal for 2013: to be the leading lady of my life. One would think that this would be a super easy thing to do. But when you've been the sidekick most of your life, it's hard to step into the spotlight of leading lady. I'm trying, I really am.

I also figured out some things I could do to quantify this goal since there has to be a way for me to know that I've achieved the goal at the end of the year. Or at least made progress. One of the ways that I thought I could quantify this goal was to "Be more daring in my fashion choices and dress like a leading lady." Originally I thought I'd make progress towards achieving this by wearing a pair of purple skinny jeans my mother gave me. Skinny jeans are not my favorite fashion trend but I liked this pair for whatever reason. Unfortunately, I have failed at wearing these pants so far. The boots I bought really don't work and I have not been able to move past that yet. Let's put it this way, I have a vision and that vision includes boots. Yes, I could wear other shoes but when you're a leading lady, you're cultivating a look. Until I find the right boots, those jeans will stay in the closet staring at me and judging me.

Another thing that often stops me from being more daring in my fashion choices is the very casual work environment of my office. I can wear jeans every day. I used to joke that I could probably wear pajamas to work and no one would say anything but that's not really true anymore. Anyway, working in a casual office makes it harder to try more things because it's obvious you're trying something. Or people think that you have a date (thank you dear co-worker for asking me about this every time I wear a skirt) or something official is happening during the day. I had a conversation with a co-worker recently in which we both revealed that we wear some variation of the same five outfits each week. This made me sad.

So I did what I think a leading lady would do (no, not go on a shopping spree - I am not made of money): I looked in my closet to see what was really in there. I found some pretty great things that I forgot I even owned - girly tops, pink things, dresses I usually only wear in the spring or summer, skirts, so many skirts. All I really needed to do was mix some things together, buy some tights, and reassess my shoe collection. And that, my friends, is exactly what I did. If this was an actual movie, there would be a fun montage of me trying on all the clothes set to a fantastic soundtrack with really flattering lighting. I vote for some Go-Go's and maybe the Soup Dragons for the music.

It's fascinating to see the reactions of people to a small thing like a pair of purple tights. But reactions there were when I rocked purple tights this week. It wasn't about being outlandish or over the top (I wore gray and black as a balance). It was about having a little fun on a Wednesday and not wearing jeans for the 500th day in a row. I love my jeans but I'm so bored with them. I got compliments from people and felt confident in my appearance that I usually only feel when I get my hair cut (you know the new haircut feeling I'm talking about). I felt like I had pulled off being a leading lady for once and dare I say it, I felt pretty.



And also, I'd like to point out that I'm regularly wearing skirts in cold weather. Like a boss.

The same day I wore the purple tights, I also read two articles about women and their inability to admit that they're pretty. The original article, "Why Can't Women Think They Are Pretty" hit close to home because I've often felt the same things the author describes. Women and girls are taught to be modest but also that appearance is so important to happiness and fulfillment. So what are we supposed to do? Admit we're pretty and be accused of being vain? Be modest all the time and not ever take pride in something? Can we ever do anything without feeling bad about it later? Feeling pretty and being able to admit it is empowering and God forbid any of us feel empowered about anything.

The second article "Why Don't Women Say 'I'm Pretty?' Here Are Ten Reasons", takes it a little further. I appreciated the different takes that the author's friends had on why we don't say "I'm pretty" with ease. Again, I found myself agreeing with all of them. I tried (in vain) to remember a time when I have said "I'm pretty" and the only thing I could come up with was when I was much younger and used to change clothes all the time (like a fashion show that my mom didn't appreciate). I'm certain that when I was 6 or 7 I thought I was pretty and had no problems telling anyone that. Now, I would probably never say that out loud even if I might occasionally say it in my head. And that is unfortunate.

Here's the thing: in order to truly be the leading lady of my own life, I have to embrace all the things about my life that I love, like, and loathe (and apparently only use words beginning with an "l"). It's taken me 30ish years to be happy with who I am, what I look like and how I feel about living in my particular body and world. I can admit I'm pretty and damn anyone who doesn't agree or thinks I'm being vain. I am never going to look like anyone in a magazine ad or a fashion show and that's fine. But I can have fun with fashion and let it be part of who I am. If it's purple tights one day and a polka dot dress the next, then so be it. Let the fashion flag fly. That's what this leading lady is going to do.

 And because I know only like four of you know who the Soup Dragons are:

He could have been a cult leader...

I am late to the Girls party. I only watched season one the day before season two started. I figured that I needed to watch it since everyone was talking about it and kept saying things like, "Erin, I'm surprised you don't watch Girls. It's such a you show." Or "You don't watch Girls? Aren't you a feminist? What's wrong with you?"

So I watched all of season one in a single afternoon (thank you HBO On Demand - I'm glad we're friends). Before we get into my reaction to a recent episode and the brouhaha that has ensued, let's clarify a few things:

1. I like Lena Dunham. I think she's smart, talented, funny, interesting and all manner of other awesome things. Her confidence is overwhelming and epic.
2. I would not personally want to be naked on tv as much as she is but I will say, you go girl. 
3. Tattoos are personal so we should all just shut up about them.
4. Shoshanna is my favorite character on the show.
5. I think many of the male characters on the show are better written and more clearly defined than the female characters.
6. Jessa annoys me but she's supposed to. However, I secretly hoped she wouldn't be a big part of season 2.
7. Michael Penn is in charge of the music so all is well with the world.
8. I just can't with Marnie. It's hard to explain but something about her makes me want to lash out irrationally.
9. Ray is my third favorite character.
10. I think it's funny that Hannah is from Michigan.
11. It's entirely possible that I missed out on a large portion of the fun of being in my 20s by being the most responsible person in the room.
12. Adam is my second favorite character.

Now that we have those things out of the way, let's tackle the first comment that people used to throw at me about this show - "it's such a you show". What exactly says "Erin" about this show? I'm not in my 20s (thank whatever deity you believe in) and don't ever want to go back to being in my 20s because being in your 20s is terrible. It can't be the fashion or the music (except for Michael Penn) since I'm not what one would call "trendy". And it certainly isn't any of these girls and their relationships with men. My relationships in my 20s were nothing like this. To my knowledge, none of my exes were gay or came out after we broke up so that can't be it. And honestly, I didn't randomly hook up with guys or even date all that much. So what exactly makes this "such a me show"?

I actually think it's the second question that answers this. I have opinions on things. I say them out loud (oh no) and I don't regularly wear make up. And I can hold my liquor (according to 1949, I'm doing everything wrong). I question women (and men) who aren't interested in the political and social discussions that impact them directly (you should know about legislation that specifically impacts your lady parts - just saying). I have had a conversation with two guy friends about a documentary called Sexy Baby that includes a woman who wants to have labia surgery for cosmetic reasons and thought this was a perfectly normal conversation to have with them. I was impressed that neither were shocked by the topic nor did they have some bizarre reaction to the larger point I was making about young girls, the porn industry and sexuality (or if they did the reaction wasn't to my face which was very gentlemanly of them). I defended Sandra Fluke on this blog. For me, feminism is about equality, respect, and defining femininity and sexuality on my terms not someone else's.

So I think that's why people think I should think of Hannah and her friends like kindred spirits or little sisters in feminism. But I don't. We're not "sisters" and I don't empathize with them (except that being young sucks sometimes). I'm proud of them but I don't want to hang out with them and I have problems supporting a lot of the choices they make. A lot of what happens on the show annoys me and it's supposed to - the show is provocative and infuriating on purpose. I also have a problem with people who harp on the poor behavior of the millenial generation but then give a pass to the girls of Girls for the same behavior. And I love/like a lot about it too (in addition to the above list). Shoshanna and Ray are more like actual couples I know than most others on the show and Marnie's struggle with finding a job is hard to watch but supports my idea that everyone needs to fail. I also can't get over Hannah and Adam's role reversal last season.

Which brings me to the most recent episode, "One Man's Trash". In this episode, Hannah spends two days with a hot, lonely older guy played by Patrick Wilson. There's been a lot of talk about this episode because people are saying it's unrealistic that someone like Patrick Wilson (Joshua, not Josh) would be interested in someone like Hannah (and his real life wife has been brought up in Hannah's defense which is wild to me). A lot the discussion boils down to this: We can all suspend our disbelief when some schlubby dude ends up with a super model but we can't let a normal looking woman have the hot guy. Fantasy only works out for dudes (which is bullshit). I'm actually totally cool with Hannah and Patrick Wilson even if it is just for two days. Or forever if that's what had happened. We need to stop talking about the plausibility of this happening because it did and it does. And we also need to stop thinking about women in only terms related to their appearance but I will say that when you're not considered traditionally pretty or considered "hot", seeing someone like you end up with the hot guy is very satisfying.

However, I will be Hannah's big sister for a minute: why did you go into a strange man's house and then stay? This seems like a really bad life choice (and I know you like to make bad life choices) because he could have been a serial killer. Or maybe the house was a front for a cult and he is the leader. This is usually how really terrible Lifetime movies begin.

But even this is not what I was most troubled by while watching. What infuriated me enough to text my friend Allison to see if she was as incensed as me was the assertion that being normal and wanting normal things in life and relationships is somehow a bad thing. Hannah's monologue about wanting a more traditional version of happiness and love and that this was somehow a bad thing pushed me over the edge. Being happy isn't a bad thing. Nor is wanting normal in your life. Not wanting to date screw-ups and losers does not make you a bad person or a traitor to some ideal of your generation. There is nothing wrong with being happy in a traditional sense (or whatever sense you define) or feeling safe. I don't think those things are at odds with being a feminist or being confident or independent. You can still want those things and be a confident woman with opinions and thoughts and feelings and needs. There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to be loved and taken care of by someone. (Who doesn't want fresh fruit in a bowl?) The trick is to find the balance and not lose yourself.

Hannah wanted to be normal and it freaked her out and that's what bothered me about this episode.

Sometimes being normal is perfectly, 100% fine. What's powerful is when you embrace that as what you want because then you've defined your life and not let someone else set the expectations for you. It's dizzying how much time we all (including fictional characters) spend being things for others and not for ourselves. Just be your version of normal. It'll make you happy.

And don't randomly go into and stay in a stranger's house. Cult deprogramming doesn't always work.

Sweet Home New Orleans, or Psychological Zombie Apocalypse Part Deux

I'll begin with a story: Once upon a Jazz Fest week after I was out of college but before the storm, my friend Mary and I were discussing our plans for the fest (since we love Jazz Fest) and hadn't yet figured out when we were going to go or for how many days. At the time, Mary worked in the music department at one of the universities and happened to talk to a professor about the same thing. This professor was performing that weekend in the Economy Jazz tent and offered to get us in for free. Free is always good in my book so we agreed. Now, if you're going to the festival with a musician you have to be with said musician when you go in so we had to plan where to meet. Our professor friend came up with this brilliant idea:

We would rendezvous on Mystery Street.

Mystery Street is not too far from the Fairgrounds and has a place in Jazz Fest geography/history and has even made it into a few songs over the years. If I ever write a book about New Orleans, Rendezvous on Mystery Street will be the title. So we rendezvoused on Mystery Street and spent the day Jazz Festing it up like proper New Orleanians (you know, eating great food, listening to amazing music, dancing, drinking, and maybe getting a little sunburned despite our best efforts not too). It's one my fondest memories of being an adult in New Orleans and a story I think about often.

It is not, however, Jazz Fest time. It is Carnival Time and everybody's having fun (sing along with me if you know the words). It's around this time every year that I seriously consider taking a break from social media (particularly FB) since I know my newsfeed will be flooded with pictures and status updates of all the fun people are having back home. On Tuesday, I will be reminded in a very real way that it's just Tuesday despite Clarendon's efforts at a Mardi Gras parade and my best efforts to get my friends and co-workers excited by making king cake (which I may or may not do given my current mood).

I've previously written about my inability to come to terms with not living in New Orleans. That's the problem when you move somewhere else - you no longer live in New Orleans. You can try your hardest to bring a little bit of home into wherever it is you do live but it's never the same. I can bring home bags of my favorite coffee (PJs) and Camellia red beans but all that means is that I went to the grocery last time I was in New Orleans. And it usually means I have to explain something to someone about a culture that they won't understand until they experience it (and even then, they may hate it entirely).

And so I am grumpy. I don't want to be but I am. I was even in New Orleans recently (the weekend before the Super Bowl) for a surprise trip to attend a baby shower. I always think a trip home will be restorative, like it will somehow be the cure for what's ailing me but this is never 100% true. Usually, it just makes it worse. This trip was awesome (I'm shocked that Heather and I kept a secret for so long and that glad the Hillary was truly surprised) but it was just too short. Going back for 48 hours is never enough.

The other thing that I struggle with this time of year is explaining that Mardi Gras is not the stuff of countless Girls Gone Wild videos (and I can't believe I just referenced those videos here - sigh). We moved to the area when I was in the 3rd grade and Mardi Gras was always and has always been about community and family not about booze, beads, and boobs. Having experienced Mardi Gras as a child, a teenager, a young adult and an adult, my favorite experiences were as a child catching beads and toys and having fun. It was fun to compete with your friends to see who got the most beads or if you got toys or a Zulu coconut (I have exactly one and no Muses shoes). Don't get me wrong, the party aspect of Mardi Gras is always there but there's absolutely no reason to dismiss the traditions and pageantry of Carnival season because of the behaviors of a small number of people who are mostly from away.

So what's a Misfit Toy to do? Do I take my social media break like a moron and pretend like the next few days are not happening? Do I make the king cake and wear my new Fleurty Girl shirt on Tuesday? Do I stay home like a petulant child and sulk?

Maybe I should just listen to the wise words of Big Chief Monk Boudreaux and just appreciate that I've even been lucky enough to experience New Orleans and call it home.

"Appreciate the culture that you have in New Orleans cause you don't got it nowhere else...there's just a bunch of happy people all the time."*


Photos by me
*Quote from "Preserving the Heritage of the Mardi Gras Indians" by Chris DiBenedetto Where Y'At Magazine

All I Needed to Know I Learned from Bill Murray and a Rodent

"Good morning wood-chuck chuckers! Don’t forget your booties because it’s cold out there!!”

Of course, Groundhog Day is perhaps the greatest Bill Murray rodent-based movie since Caddyshack. It’s one of those movies that features Bill Murray at his Bill Murrayest, back before he met Wes Anderson and doing a bunch of serious type movies and before he became the coolest guy in New York by going to bars with fans and playing random games of kickball. Bill Murray is the man! Do you know who doesn’t like Bill Murray? Bad people and super villains.

 As readers to this site don’t really know, I’m a bit of a Bill Murray fan, and the running theory over at Bad Shakespeare (www.badshakespeare.blogspot.com... just reminding you... you know, for the kids)is that there is a Bill Murray movie for every occasion. And while we tend to lump Groundhog Day in with the annual event on the second of February where a rodent with a record of predicting the weather that’s just a little worse than meteorologists predicting snow in Washington, DC, this movie is actually about life. Not just the day where we use a magical rodent telling us about the weather as an excuse to get drunk before 8 a.m.

In Groundhog Day, Bill Murray is forced to live one day over and over and over and over again. And over. Harold Ramis (Egon Spangler/Director) said on the DVD commentary that Bill Murray’s character was caught in that time loop for either 10,000 years or 10 years.  That’s a bit of a time gap, but I can kind of see where he was going with it I mean, he’s the director, but he should probably know, but he’s also Egon so he can really do no wrong as long as he’s not unleashing giant Twinkie on New York City. I kind of like the 10,000 years, because it goes with the theme of movie, that being that life can suck big time, and ultimately, life is what you make of it.

Bill Murray (Look, we can call him Phil, but he’s playing Bill Murray.) is living the same day over and over again. Take a look at the day he lives on the first day of the movie, then take a look at the day he lives on the last day of the movie. That is the exact same day. Yes, Bill Murray in his 10,000 (or possibly 10) years learns the real secret of life is to be nice to everyone, and make the most of every single day. And yes, by the end of it he does that. You don’t need me to tell you that. You just need to watch the movie. You should go watch it again. I can wait.

That was a fun two hours, and hopefully you cheered as you recognized a young Chris Elliot before he let himself go all weird and fun.

The point that people tend to miss when watching Groundhog Day and learning all about living each day to its fullest is the fact that Groundhog Day shows us how HARD it is to live each day to it’s fullest. And that’s a great message. (Relax, folks. It also shows us that you should keep pursing the ability to live each day to the fullest.)

While living this day, Bill Murray gets so frustrated he kills himself in a hilarious (?) montage sequence of ending it all. He doesn’t get it right the first time. Sometimes, he’s selfish and eats a ton of pastries. He gets depressed and kidnaps a rodent. He doesn’t get it right.

And that’s the lesson that’s difficult for us to learn. We want to make things better, we want to improve, we want to live each day to it’s fullest, but we tend to let ourselves get set back by the little things. Hey, I’m on this diet, but I’m CRAVING a cheeseburger. Hey, I want to start cooking more, but I got home from work soooo late. I promise to spend less time watching television but there’s a Star Trek marathon on. Hey, I want to stop punching squirrels but this one just cut me off in traffic and I think he yelled something anti-Semitic. The thing is, and the message of the Bill Murray classic, is that we don’t let those things set us back. We take our lumps. We go out for that fast food. We watch that Star Trek marathon. We spend a night in jail for attacking a squirrel. But the point of this movie is that we just keep trying to be better.

Movies are littered with inspirational methods and inspirational quotes and inspirational moments and inspirational everything that are quoted and put on T-Shirts or on black and white pictures. And while they’re great, they skip past this messy part where we try to figure everything out and put ourselves on the journey of being better people. That’s what Groundhog Day does. It takes us through that messy part, it takes us through the terrible growing pain that is life, and improving ourselves.

We should all strive to improve ourselves. We should all strive to be better people. Just one small step at time. One day at a time in our 10,000 year journey towards winning Andi MacDowell’s love. Bill Murray didn’t figure it out all at once. And even when it look like he was winning he still got pulled back to meeting Ned on that street and stepping in that puddle. He had to learn to navigate the complexities of that one day... and it took him 10,000 years to do it. We’re given considerably less time. And that’s half the fun, figuring out what works, and what doesn’t work.

That’s the sheer brilliance of a movie that features Bill Murray and a groundhog driving a car off a cliff.

Bad Shakespeare:  www.badshakespeare.blogspot.com