Where’d all the romance go?

Courtesy of Miramax

I have a confession to make.  I’m an epic-romance junkie.

Sure, I’m a happily-married, mother of two, ambitious feminist… but I’m a hopeless, over-the-top devotee of sweeping, all-consuming love stories.  The bigger the drama, the happier I am.   Movies about star-crossed lovers and their tearful embraces make me want to dance.  Complicated stares?  I practice them in the mirror.   Kisses that leave your lungs aching and your throat dry?  I watch the scene seven times without blinking.  A soaring musical score?   Caresses that reach below the skin?   Silences filled with weighted pauses?  I can’t get enough!

Yes.  It’s past midnight again and I’m awake.  The house is asleep and the decaf coffee I ordered at dinner clearly wasn’t decaf.  I’m too tired to map out yet another User Experience flowchart so that means there’s only one thing left to do:  it’s movie trailer watching time.   And damn it if there’s not ONE epic love story in the mix.

Remember all those great sweeping love stories Hollywood used to make?  The English Patient.  Moulin Rouge.  Out of Africa.  I miss them.  I want them.  But I can’t find them anywhere.  Where has the big love story gone??  Enough with all these small independent character flicks about broken marriages or friendships between strangers.  I want passion, damn it!  I want kisses and embraces and longing and suffering and all those great things that keep me glued to my chair, wishing for the movie to never end.

There’s not even a Twilight movie trailer (and there’s always a Twilight movie trailer!)   It’s gonna be a tough night for a junkie without her juice.

So, just in case there are a few addicts out there who need to feel some passionate caresses and witness some love that overcomes a whole bunch of crazy obstacles between two ridiculously gorgeous people … here’s a tiny fix from a greener time not so long ago:

The English Patient

Moulin Rouge

The Notebook

Out of Africa

Titanic

Dirty Dancing

Even Casino Royale had it…

Oh, it’s enough to drive a woman to download Pretty Woman to her iTunes account…

Simple Rules for Monday Nights

1.)  Don’t order a caffe latte at the restaurant at 9:30 pm.  You’ll regret it at 2 am.

2.)  Oops.

3.)  Find ways to amuse yourself quietly so as not to wake husband & kids.

4.)  Don’t Facebook search ex-boyfriends.

5.)  Don’t Linked In search ex-bosses.

6.)  Do surf a lot of shoe sites.

7.)  Don’t answer when you husband murmurs, “What time is it?”  He’s really asleep.

8.)  Do give yourself a mud-mask facial.

9.)  Do shake your head “no” when your son stands in the doorway and asks, “Is it morning time yet?” and Don’t explain the mud on your face.  He’s really asleep, too.  Walk him back to his bed, tuck him in and steal two neck kisses.

10.)  Don’t give yourself a European bikini wax.

11.)  Ever!

12.)  Do pull out the first chapter of your incomplete novel from the armoire.

13.)  Don’t read it.

14.)  Do curse Hemingway, King, Seuss and any other damn prolific writer you’ve heard someone praise.

15.)  Don’t say anything when you husband says, “Huh?”  He’s still asleep.  Really.

16.)  Do read your past blog posts and tell yourself you’re not a terrible writer.  Not really.  You’ve got potential.  Kinda.

17.)  Don’t wonder if your followers are only following you because they’re your friends and they’re afraid you’ll know when they unfollow you and then, wow, won’t that be awkward at the next Christmas Cookie swap party.

18.)  Do send your followers chocolates in the mail.  Guilt is real.  And it works.  Just ask your Mom.

19.)  Do know that you’re fucked in three hours when the kids come and ask you to make their lunches because it really will be morning time.

20.)  Don’t post that blog list you dashed off in a moment of 2 am inspiration ’cause anything that seems witty at 2:44 am is certainly not witty at 8 am.

21.)  Oops.

 

Games with My 8-year Old: Name that Lady!

  

       My Daughter:  “Mom, of all the famous ladies alive now, who do you like the most?

       Me:  “Oh, that’s hard to say.”

       My Daughter:  “But if you had to choose.  Who do you love?”

      Me:   “Does she have to be famous?”

      My Daughter:  “Yes.  Or else you’ll say ‘Me.’ ”

      Me:  “Famous to me or famous to everyone?”

      My Daughter:  “Famous on those magazines the babysitter brings over.”

      Me:   “Can I choose different parts from different ladies?”

      My Daughter:  “That’s not the game.  But.  Okay, fine.  But you have to write it down.  And you have to choose ONLY ONE who you want to be when you get older.  Those are the rules.”

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Some Famous Alive Ladies & Their Part(s) I Really Like

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Tina Fey

Her perfect funny and perfect nose.  Both are sharp and pointed.

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J. K. Rowling

Her copious, creative writing skills.  870 pages in one volume?  And kids read all of them?  The first twenty pages of my “great American love story” have taken me four years to write.  And no one wants to read them.  Trust me on this.

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Michelle Obama

Her seriously awesome “Don’t Fuck with me” thing.  In a gorgeous State Dinner gown or a “growing your own organics” stained sweatshirt, I wish I could exude that kind of scary.   Oops.  I meant to say, ‘Her “Don’t Fool with me” thing.’  My bad.

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 Arianna Huffington

Her accent, perfectly-coiffed hair and reasonable “Left-Right-And-Center” comments.  But mainly, for her accent.  And her blog business.

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Julie Andrews

Her cross-generational If-that’s-singing-then-I-want-to-do-singing inspiration.   There’s nothing sweeter than hearing my son lull himself to sleep with “those songs that the pretty lady sings in that mountain movie.”  It’s one of my favorite things.

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Meryl Streep

Her grace at being the most talented woman in the room.  No one wants to see her trip up (or down) the steps.  Not even other women.

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Hilary Clinton

Her enigmatic ambition.  Clearly she’s smart and driven but otherwise, impossible to define.  Actually, I don’t think I want to be like her but what I wouldn’t do to be a fly on her wall!

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Oprah Winfrey

Her wealth.  Billions.  Self-made.   She wields the same kind of influence as a dozen male Forbes billionaires.  What woman doesn’t want that?

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Ellen DeGeneres

Her next-door neighborliness.  Self-deprecating but not insecure.  Up-on-gossip but not catty.  Smart but not arrogant.   She makes you want to bake a bundt cake.   That’s good for America.

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Madonna

Her deep, unrelenting love of herself.  Every woman should love herself this much.  Just think about the problems we could solve if all women around the world felt as good about themselves as she does.

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One Alive Lady Who I’d Like To Be When I Get Older

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Betty White

Because of her charmed octogenarian life.  When I’m 80, I want to be that involved in the world around me, even if it’s just doing fun stuff.  Wait.  She’s 90?!   Well then, it’s settled.  I SO want to be Betty White when I grow up.

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And that’s a list that People magazine could stand behind

Competitive day-dreaming

There’s no hiding I’m type A.  I’ve never used the expression “Dude, chill,”  I’ve never watched an episode of a daytime talk-show and I believe driving was created as a multi-tasker litmus test (if you’re not posting stamps on Christmas cards or pumping breast milk while you drive, I think you should question your legitimacy behind the wheel).  It’s true.  I rarely do something “just for the sake of doing it.”  So you can imagine my initial dismissal when, trolling for tidbits on how to be a better business-woman, I stumbled over a Stanford Business School blog post about of a psyche study that said day-dreaming was good for me.  Sounds like it was written by some transplanted Seattleites high on her “quality of life,” eh?

Since it was on my lunch break, I delved deeper.  The Journal of Consumer Psychology study, “If Money Doesn’t Make You Happy, Consider Time” (Nov. 2010) does, in fact, postulate five “time-spending happiness principles.”  In short, it says how you spend your time affects your happiness.  And day-dreaming supposedly makes you weirdly happy.

Research in the field of neuroscience has shown that the part of the brain responsible for feeling pleasure, the mesolimbic dopamine system, can be activated when merely thinking about something pleasurable, such as drinking one’s favorite brand of beer or driving one’s favorite type of sports car.  In fact, the brain sometimes enjoys anticipating a reward more than receiving the reward.  Thus, the pleasure derived from window shopping for a dress may exceed the pleasure from actually acquiring the dress.  Similarly, reading guidebooks to plan for a big vacation, anticipating the pleasure associated with the food and activities on the vacation, and then cancelling or postponing the vacation until next year could actually give you more pleasure than going on the vacation as originally planned (particularly since the logistical stresses of finding a cat-sitter, getting the necessary vaccines, and taking the days off from work mount as the vacation draws near.  In short, this research suggests that we might be just as well off, or even better off, if we imagine experiences, but not have them.  So, spend plenty of time happily daydreaming.   (Page 8)

If day-dreaming was good for me, then time was a wastin’.  I went into the backyard, threw myself onto a chaise and stared up at the sky.  Here’s where I forced my mind to go:

1.)  Me sitting on a beach in Cabo San Lucas

2.)  Me running a huge successful company

3.)  Me flying around the sky like a bird

4.)  Me dating Daniel Craig

5.)  Me cleaning out the clump of pine needles sticking out of the pool filter

6.)  Me should be working instead of sitting outside thinking about me drinking cocktails on beach with Daniel Craig

7.)  Oh wait.  Me and Daniel Craig again.

You get the drill.  It was warm.  It was sunny.  I was… happy.

I lasted 12 minutes.

Tomorrow, I’m gunning for 15.  Rain or shine.  This lady is going to nail this day-dreaming assignment, even if it kills me.

Trapping Happiness: It’s an elusive cat

Last night, I finally read the last chapter of Daniel Pink’s “Drive” (I typically can’t put a book back on the shelf until I’ve read the whole damn thing, even if reading the book is akin to plucking my stray eyebrow hairs with dull tweezers.  I’m half-Italian.  My eyebrows are bushy.)  This is my gift to you.   I’m going to save you 3+ hours of your life and tell you the secret to happiness.  (Don’t get me wrong —  I liked the content of “Drive.”  It just should have been edited down to a 4-page article rather than a full-length book.)

In the last three pages of the book’s main section, Pink refers to a study that asked college graduates about their life goals as they left the university.  Here’s the excerpt:

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“Some of the students [had what sociologists call] ‘extrinsic aspirations’ – for instance, to become wealthy or to achieve fame – what we might call ‘profit goals.’  Others had ‘intrinsic aspirations’ – to help others improve their lives, to learn, and to grow – or what we might think of as ‘purpose goals.’  

After these students had been out in the real world for between one and two years, the researchers tracked them down to see how they were faring.  The people who’d had purpose goals and felt they were attaining them reported higher levels of satisfaction and subjective well-being than when they were in college, and quite low levels of anxiety and depression.  That’s probably no surprise.  They’d set a personally meaningful goal and felt they were reaching it.  In that situation, most of us would likely feel pretty good, too. 

But the results for people with profit goals were more complicated.  Those who said they were attaining their goals – accumulating wealth, winning acclaim – reported levels of satisfaction, self-esteem, and positive affect no higher than when they were students.  In other words, they’d reached their goals, but it didn’t make them any happier.  What’s more, graduates with profit goals showed increases in anxiety, depression, and other negative indicators – again, even though they were attaining their goals.” 

The findings suggest that even when we do get what we want, its’ not always what we need.  ‘People who are very high in extrinsic goals for wealth are more likely to attain that wealth, but they’re still unhappy.’ ” 

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What does this mean for me?

In the context of Pink’s whole book, it means not only will I have more natural “drive” (motivation, commitment to getting the task done, and heightened creativity & quality output) if I’m autonomous in my job and if I have the opportunity to master my skills… but it turns out, I should be doing something that’s “bigger than myself.”

I can handle that, right?

I mean, it’s not that I say, “My goal is to make one billion dollars!”  That would be… ridiculous.

But okay yes, I do (publicly) say, “My goal is to be successful.  I want to build a huge internet company!  I want my kids to succeed in whatever they do.”

Hmmmm.

Maybe that’s my dirty little lie… I mean, secret… of (not) balancing work and family.

Despite my attempts otherwise, my daily “life goals” are extrinsically-directed.  Earn paycheck for first time in 8 years.  Build successful company.  Raise independent children.  Profits?  For sure!

And since I’m on a “honest-roll,” I’ll admit that I don’t have alot of daily purpose goals either.  Pack waste-free lunch for kids by 7 am.  Help K study for (and get good grade) on math test.  Post witty blog.  Give notes to web designer about company website.  The list goes on-and-on.

They’re not (totally) obnoxious goals.   Some may even consider them efficient.  Responsible.  Mature.  But yeah, I see it now.  They are externally-focused.  They are “results-driven.”  And sure, my husband might say that I’m “anxious.”  But I want HAPPINESS, damn it!

So, fine.  I’ll add it to my To Do List as soon as I’m done with this blog.

#52.)  “Find new set of new meaningful life goals.  Incorporate into daily and long-term plans.”