Photo Essay: Top Posts of 2016

I think I grew up listening to too many year-end countdowns on my favorite radio stations, because I've felt compelled to do a "Year In Review" for the last three years, around this time of year.

Maybe it's just human nature—to want to look back and reflect upon where we've been, what we've done, and who has noticed.

I don't pay very much attention to the statistics of this site because I get a lot of satisfaction out of the process of assembling it—and I don't really measure my success by how many clicks or comments I'm able to elicit.

But nevertheless, some posts do resonate with people more than others, so it's interesting—if not meaningful—to at least know what those are.

This year, like many of the past years, certain posts from years ago still get a lot of traction now. So, in the spirit of not repeating myself, I've left those out this year.

As a result, here follows the Top Posts of 2016 that were actually posted in 2016, more or less in descending order:



Crossing the Border (Cruzando la Frontera)



Photo Essay: USS Iowa, The Last of the Battleships



Photo Essay: A Night on the Battleship



Photo Essay: Naples, the Dreamland of Southern California



Photo Essay: A Jeepney Tour of Historic Filipinotown



Photo Essay: The Extinction of Dinosaur Swampland



Photo Essay: A Farewell to the Palace on Mount Yamashiro



Open Letter to Our New President



Photo Essay: A Fake Cemetery (with Real Headstones)



Photo Essay: Belmont Tunnel and the Hollywood Subway's Fade Into Oblivion

I've got about 20 posts still in draft mode that I'm working on finishing up, so there's still lots more to come.

The most I can wish for you—and myself—is that the next year be better than the last.

Onwards and upwards, my friends.

Related Posts:
Photo Essay: Top Posts of 2015
Photo Essay: Top Posts of 2014
Photo Essay: Top Posts of 2013

Open Letter to Our New President

[Photo added 12/28/16 6:34:00 PM - CC0 Public Domain]

I don't think I've ever known a U.S. president as well as I know you. 

In fact, I met you years ago. I met you over and over again in the 20-plus years of my adulthood. You had different faces and different names; you were in different cities and wore different clothes; but you were you, all the same.

You were the man who pulled his car over on Sunnycrest Drive and asked me for directions to the high school when I was walking home, and then pretended not to be able to hear or understand me as I kept my distance, urging me to come closer. You were the first man to show me your penis uninvited, but you were far from the last.

You were the man who lived in the dorm room next door and came to visit me drunk one night, just to tell me how inexperienced and foolish I was and coerce me into doing things I hadn't done before and didn't want to do. 

You were the man who denied doing all of it and then blamed me for misunderstanding. 

You were the stranger who followed me off the Night Bus in London and shoved your hand up my skirt while muttering something unintelligible and then slithering away.

You were the classmate who walked me home drunk just to have sex with me, even though I said I didn't want to.

You were the guy who used a crowded subway train on the way to work as an excuse to rub up against me with your hard-on, so bold and unabashed that I couldn't believe it was happening, and I froze in fear. 

You were the guy that catcalled me on the street and then called me an ugly, fat cunt when I rebuffed your advances.

You were the date who complained that my bra didn't match my panties.

You were the date who complained that I didn't wax my hair down there.

You were the bartender who wanted me to crawl around on all fours like a dog.

You were the bartender who tried to shove it in the back door without asking nicely first.

You were the bartender who only pretended to put on a condom.

You were the friend who started having sex with me while I was asleep, even though I only let you stay because you were too drunk to drive home.

You were every guy who got too handsy with me in the office, and who got every excuse on earth from all those around you. You were just being friendly. You were just joking. You were married. You told me I was being too sensitive and uptight. 

You were the boss who couldn't see past my womanhood. I was smart and successful, but you took every chance to tear me down with a double entendre, and you made sure you had plenty of witnesses.

I've often wondered why I've encountered so many versions of you over the years, what makes me a target and makes you seek me out to harass, abuse, assault, and otherwise victimize me over and over again.

But now I know: It's not me, it's you. 

There are so many Donald Trumps out there, and they all voted for you. 

And there are many more of them than I ever expected, even though I'd met so many of them already.

We tell our girls to stay away from guys like you. We tell them not to put themselves in a compromising situation with you, not be alone with you, not to go home with you, not to get drunk with you.

But how can we avoid you, when you're the president of our country? When grabbing life by the horns -- and women by the "pussy" -- is considered presidential?

How can we teach boys who are becoming new men to be kind, loving, and fair -- and not to rape?

How can I have any hope for anything, when the people have most certainly spoken, and what they've chosen is the one thing I've spent my entire life trying to get away from?

Don't get me wrong, President-Elect Trump. It's not all your fault. You're simply the pied piper of all the sexist, misogynist, superficial blowhards who've finally come out of hiding.

They say you should know your enemy. Well, I know you. I know you all too well. 

But you don't know a thing about me.

Related Posts:

Don't Blame It On Me

Dispatches from My Soft, Naked Core

A Case of the Unsecure

Living With the Terror

Open Letter to My Biological Sister

Polaroid self-portrait circa 1990

I have a hard time calling you "Dear." I have a hard time calling you "sister."

It's been over seven years since we've seen each other. It's been at least three years, maybe four since we've spoken on the phone. I don't know, I've lost track.

It's been six months since I messaged you on your birthday. It's been two months since you didn't message me on my birthday.

At some point, you decided to break free from me. I don't know when. I didn't notice.

I'm glad you don't need me anymore.

We grew up 15 months apart, nearly the same size, wearing the same furry winter coats - so much so that we were always mistaken as twins. As much as you always wanted to be the older sister, you were always sensitive, naive, intimidated by and shrinking away from everything. You waited in vain for our parents to bestow privileges on you, but they were too busy manipulating us and pitting us against each other. They considered every permission a favor, every gift a loan. We owed them for our miserable lives, lives we never wanted despite Twinkies for breakfast and Barbie Doll Dreamhouses.

You always thought if you were a better daughter, our family wouldn't be falling apart.

You always thought if I could just be quiet, our mother wouldn't scream and cry all the time, threatening to drown herself in a warm bath.

I could not just be quiet.

I seized life, demanded freedom and lipstick and pantyhose and chorus and drama club, despite the emotionally bankrupting line of credit that I racked up with them.

Throughout our lives sequestered in that house together, I would wonder from day to day if I would be your best friend or your worst enemy. When I cried myself to sleep nearly every night, you told me to shut up because I was keeping you up. When you stayed at home the nights of your proms, I acted out the entire Grease soundtrack in our basement to entertain you.

When you went away to college, not necessarily upgrading roommates from me to a suicidal, evil-note-writing nutjob, I sent you cassette recordings of all of our stuffed animals, singing songs and performing skits to cheer you up and keep you company.

When I followed you the next year to the same college, you didn't want to introduce me to any of your friends because you were afraid they'd like me more. Some of them did like me more.

So there.

I needed you most when we were really young, when I was getting bare-bottom spanked with an unfinished wooden board in the basement, when I was exiled to the hot attic in the middle of summer as punishment for something I didn't do. You couldn't help me then. You could never help me.

And so as I grew up, I learned to not need you.

I haven't needed you for a long time.

I thought I'd expelled you from my life altogether six years ago when I refused to spend Christmas Day with our parents, to avoid seeing you. I'd decided my life was better without you. They were aghast and appalled but agreed to meet me for lunch the next day. That was the last time I saw them, and a month before the last time I spoke with them.

I had a nice break from you after that, letting the toxicity of our family seep out of my pores, learning to absorb the love bestowed upon me by another family who didn't seem to require blood ties in order to love me.

And then two years later you came crawling back to me. It wasn't the first time you'd begged for forgiveness. It wasn't the first time you protested too much. And I knew that eventually you'd crawl back to our parents, to those who've done nothing since we were born but poison the well, rendering us paranoid, discredited, phobic, suspicious, and worst yet, alone in this world.

They tried to convince us that the world was out to get us, when in truth, the world was waiting for us to be brave enough to enter it. They always protected us from everything except the one thing that was harming us most: them.

You always needed our family more than I did.

Then again, I eventually found family somewhere else. Someone's family always took me in: Nicki's, Chrissy's, Jon's, Michelle's, and through it all, Maria's. You never had that. You never found it.

Maybe you've found it now, and that's why you no longer need me. Good for you. You don't have to explain. You're doing what you have to do.

It's not your fault. You're damaged goods, too.

Have a life. Live well. Take comfort in your cats. I hope you're happier without me. Neither one of us needs a reminder of our dysfunctional past.

But don't think you can come in and out of my life as you please. I'm getting off the rollercoaster and focusing on the family whose love I need not question.

To Like Avoiding Regret on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to the Hipper Than Thou, On Thanksgiving Eve

I am livid.

I am not of the frequent complainers. I am not on any customer service blacklist that I know of. If I'm ever of the vocal minority, it's to bestow praises on those that have served me well.

But tonight, on the eve of Thanksgiving, I'm not doing so well. I'm living off my retirement funds and just scraping by on those. I've taken a million steps back to a job at the mall just to fill in the gaps.

I don't have any family to spend Thanksgiving with, and my only invitation this year for Thanksgiving dinner is a standing pity invitation by a very sweet family who wants to make sure I have somewhere to go, if I have nowhere else to go.

I've considered seriously - up to this very minute - not going, for fear of dredging up the old stories of  my family dysfunction and rehashing the failures of my job search and the dead ends of my career.

Worse yet, my sister unfriended me on Facebook sometime in the last couple of months, though I just discovered it this morning.

And so instead of drowning my sorrows in Thanksgiving Eve imbibing - on the night bartenders call "Black Wednesday" - I decided to go see a rare film at the Silent Movie Theatre, hosted by the non-profit repertory The Cinefamily.

I came home from a midnight screening at 12:30 a.m. totally deflated, in tears, carrying a bag of popcorn spilling over in my arms, clutching a Diet Coke dripping with sweat, ridiculously large for this time of night.

I promptly sent the following letter to The Cinefamily to retell the events of my busted, wasted evening, which would have been better spent doing just about anything else:

Attention Management: 

I have just returned home from waiting 45 minutes outside in the cold for a movie that was not going to be shown. 

You knew it wasn't going to be shown and yet you did not tell me when I picked up my ticket at the box office. You didn't tell me while I stood outside freezing until after midnight for the midnight screening. You didn't even tell me when I spent $8+ on a large soda and small popcorn, or when I struggled with the butter dispenser.

When I took my seat in the theater, the announcement was not apologetic. Thanks for the offer of warm beer, but no thanks. 

When I returned to the concession stand, your box office attendant asked me, "What, did you want a refund or something?" Uh, yeah.

I wasted my Thanksgiving Eve on you. Thanks for nothing. 

I am appalled at your poor management and lack of customer service. I cannot believe the cavalier attitude and the lack of communication I encountered tonight. For a small, boutique, niche, NON-PROFIT business, you must value your patrons or you will perish. 

I cannot comprehend how or why you think this is OK. 

Thank you for the refund of the $8 ticket price, but what about the concessions I purchased and had to place between my legs as I drove home? What about the service charge for purchasing advance tickets online? [Note: the ticketing agent refunded that too, thankfully.]

What about the shivering? My sore feet? My wasted evening? 

Please advise. I strongly urge you to make good. 

Regretfully yours,
Sandi Hemmerlein

The thing is, I only saw one other person walk out with me, refunded. No one else seemed to mind. All the people who seemed to know each other in line outside - some kind of insider community of film nerds and hipster geeks who ornament their septums with mustache-shaped piercings - then cheered at the alternate choices of films they were given instead of the scheduled screening, as though it was enough for them just to be there, regardless of what actually happened while they were there.

But I was there for the film, all alone, in my pajama bottoms, slippers, hoodie and glasses, wishing I were in bed instead, shivering in the cold.

Being subjected to yet another insider community I'll never be a part of is torture for me, always.

And wasting my time (and money) on people who don't deserve it - to the sacrifice of doing something else which could have been so much more exciting, captivating, and gratifying, even if it was just sleep - ranks as an utter disaster in my book. Even in the smallest, most meaningless circumstances like a stupid movie I never heard of until earlier this week, at a little independent theater run by a bunch of self-important jerks whose lack of interpersonal skills will ensure their ultimate demise.

Happy Thanksgiving to me.

Time for bed.

To Like Avoiding Regret on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to the Missing in Action

Dear Date Who Has Gone Missing:

I liked you, and I showed it.

OK maybe I didn't like you that much, but I liked you enough.

And you seemed to like me too.

And then you disappeared.

If you didn't like me, just tell me.

If you liked me too much, just tell me.

If you weren't attracted to me, just tell me.

If you got freaked out, just tell me.

If you're otherwise spoken-for, just tell me.

I can handle it.

I've heard it all before.

And I'd rather know than not know.

It's my fault either way.

It's not you, it's me.

I'd just rather hear that than wonder.

Yours Truly,
Miss Saturday Night

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to My Potential Dates

To those single men of the internet -

Somehow I've become convinced to try online dating again. I've had no luck with it before, but since I'm having no luck finding dates on my own after a year in LA, I don't have much to lose.

And I've joined a dating site that's predicated on actually going on dates - and on dates that consist of more than just coffee or a drink while we size each other up. It's supposed to encourage the offline aspect of online dating.

We're supposed to pick each other because we both want to do the same stuff.

That's supposed to mean you want to do stuff.

So forgive me when I skip over you because you haven't posted any date ideas. Forgive me if your date idea is "get to know each other" or "get drunk and fall asleep" or written in ALL CAPS or egregiously misspelled and fraught with bad grammar.

Forgive me if your username repulses me because it includes a four-letter word.

Forgive me if I don't want to "Eat out 69 & have wild sex at urs or my place after diner !!!!!"

Ew.

Forgive me when I don't reply because your photo is that of a kung fu fighter, dead president, Big Lebowski character, Prince, Mick Jagger, or your dog. As much as I'm focused on your personality, I want to be able to see your face. It means something if you don't want to show it.

Hey bald guy, you're kinda cute.

I know I only have one photo on my profile, and technically it's an outtake from my headshot session. But it's a good one: it hasn't been retouched, and it looks like me. In fact, I look better in real life than in that picture. I didn't want to set your expectations too high. I'm cute enough. I'm not on here looking for dates because I'm not hot enough.

I know my profile says that I want kids someday, but I don't know that to be true. I'm not really sure but that wasn't among the answer choices. I just want to have the option in the future.

I do want a guy who lives in LA (sorry dude who messaged me from Denver).

I do want to go hiking. In fact, most of the things I want to do won't cost you any money.

Sorry, I don't wanna chat.

And thanks, JRV, but I don't want to give you a massage.

I do, however, want to go where I "will safe and comfotable" ladiesman2000, but you have to be more specific as to what that might be.

What is wrong with you people?

Who dates you?

Is anyone actually so desperate that they lower their standards to your level?

Or have I just found the ultimate pool of undatables?

No offense. I'm sure you're lovely. But I just cannot get past your profile.

And so for the next three months I guess I'll just be fielding incoming requests in hopes that someone relatively decent, sane, and literate might stumble upon me.

And in the meantime, you can find me sitting at the bar alone, trying to look cute and available.

Deepest gratitude,
Username: [redacted]

Related:
Open Letter to My Potential Matches

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to the Wrong Tree

Dear Tree, Oh Wrong Tree, Oh You Very Wrong Tree,

Show yourself. Show yourself now, while I still know better. Show me how wrong you really are, so I can stop barking up you.

At the turn of the year, I vowed to stop barking up the wrong trees. And if you are wrong, I want to be right. I'll stop right now.

But I am persistent and patient. I have faith in you. I see the best in you. I won't automatically know that you're wrong. You have to show me. You have to really show me.

If you leave me, I won't beg you to stay. I won't try to prove myself to you. I'll let you go. I won't hold out hope.

But you have to leave me. Leave me, and I'll accept it. Don't stick around and give me hope, or pull me by a string, by the thread by which I hang.

Tell me to leave and I will go.

But you have to tell me. Otherwise I'll stay.

Because although every tree always turns out to be the wrong one, I always hope that the next one will be the right one. And I'll believe that you are right, until you prove to me that you are oh so very wrong.

Forever resolved,
Sandi

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to Santa

Dear Santa:

It's been a long time since I've written you. I've never been too keen on receiving gifts, especially since I never really got what I really wanted as a child, so I just haven't thought to write over the last few years.  I wasn't sure you ever read my letters, or even ever visited my house. On Christmas morning, I found your leftover cookies untouched in the kitchen.

But this year, I've made a Christmas Wish List that I must share with you.

Santa, if you have any power at all, could you please bring me at least one of the following this Christmas?

• someone to enjoy my Christmas tree besides me
• a Christmas party
• a tub of Heluva Good French Onion dip
• peace of mind
• rest
• hope
• a sense of purpose
• someone to kiss at midnight on New Year's Eve
• a replacement heart, for mine is too broken

I haven't always been good. I've done some horrible things. But I have been better, at least this year. I got a job. I moved to LA. I lost weight. I hiked mountains. I faced my fears, time and time again.

And now, by writing you, I am facing one of my greatest fears: that you don't exist, and that there's nobody out there to help me, to give me something I ask for, to give me the help I so desperately need.

Or, maybe you do exist, but you've just chosen to skip over me. Or you couldn't find me. Have you been looking for me?

Santa, please find me this Christmas, and if not Christmas, then definitely New Year's night.

Much gratitude in advance,
Sandi

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to the Lovers

I wrote a series of "Dear Lover" opening lines, mentally addressed to a variety of lovers past and present, and I deleted them all.

After all, if I can't say it (or ask it) to their faces, what's the point of writing it on a blog they'll never read?

Loneliness is not poetry. Desperation is not art. Neediness is not literature.

People come and go within minutes, hours, days, weeks - if you're lucky, months, years, a lifetime.

There are those I lost a few years ago. There are those I lost a few weeks ago. There are those I never really had at all, and those I haven't lost yet but am sure to lose.

So I can't write, "Dear Lover, Please don't leave me," because they surely will. Or I will surely leave them.

And I can't write, "Dear Lover, Where are you?" because they surely will not respond.

Am I better off asking the question that will never be answered than not asking it at all?

I choose a third option: ask only the questions that will be answered. Make only the requests that will be acknowledged.

I will not fall upon the deaf ears of life and scream.

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to My Readers

To those who are reading this now,
and to those who have ever read my blog:

I know that all of you don't like all of my blog posts all of the time.

I know that some of you actively dislike some of them but read them anyway.

I know that not all of my blog posts are always nice, pleasant, affable, upbeat, optimistic, humble, cordial, or obedient.

But they are always honest, raw, personal, and true to my mission of seizing every opportunity to live, love, laugh, hurt, feel without limits.

Although Avoiding Regret is a creative outlet and passion project (as well as somewhat of a mantra), the rest of life's endeavors don't always turn out exactly how I'd planned, so I've begun accepting donations to keep it - and myself - going.

If you enjoy what I write, and support what I do, please consider donating a dollar or two.

(Click on the "Support" button in the top right sidebar of any page on wwww.avoidingregret.com)

Yours in adventure, exploration and romance,
Sandi

Open Letter, For Whom I Linger

I'd never been to the place where we met before. I didn't even live here yet.

A friend brought me to the place where we met.

Our eyes met from across the room in the place where we met.

You took my number from across the table in the place where we met. And you used it. The very next day.

We tried to meet again, but I didn't live here yet, and I was with a friend.

I told you I would come back.

And I did.

We found each other again, in a different town, far away from the place that we met.

Our eyes met from across the pool. They met again from across the restaurant, and then again from across the parking lot. We didn't know we'd already met.

You gave me your name again, and I gave you mine. And then we realized, we'd found each other. Again.

But I still didn't live here yet. I told you I could come back.

And I did come back. I came back for work. I came back for vacation. I came back for myself. I came back for you.

I kept coming back, and you kept coming to meet me - late night, overnight, early morning, never letting go, never holding back.

And then you stopped.

But I was coming, I was almost here.

And then I was here, and you were gone.

And so I had to find you. I couldn't stay away.

And now I return to the place where we met, just to see you.

I went on a date to the place where we met, even though you weren't there to see me.

I feel close to you in the place where we met.

You're mine in the place where we met.

Our eyes still meet in the place where we met, across the room, across the bar, across the table and across the stool.

My heart leaps and my fingers tingle in the place where we met. My eyes well and my legs cross. My arms fold but my hands reach.

But there's no tonight after the place where we met. I have to leave you in the place where we met.

I know I can find you in the place where we met.

I'll keep coming back to the place where we met.

Even long after you're no longer there.

And maybe we'll find our way back to each other again.

Related:
Alone on Valentine's Day

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to Michael McDonald, Post Script

For the main Open Letter to Michael McDonald, click here.

Dear Mike, Mr. White Lightning,

I know you didn't see me walk into the catering hall backstage at the PNC Bank Arts Center last night, but I saw you.

I saw you in your summer hat, hunched over your dinner plate, in the farthest seat from the door, white hair beaming from under that hat.

I gasped.

Maybe you heard me gasp, because you got up from your seat as my eyes widened, trying to keep my cool. I was getting a pre-show VIP tour, and as I was introduced to one of the crew members, I looked away from you. When I looked back, you were gone.

The next time I saw you was when you were on stage, looking more confident than last December, hiding behind your keyboard's piano-like case but occasionally emerging to rock the accordion, banjo or ukelele.



Oh Michael, if only you were so confident being the star you are.

After the show ended, I never saw you again, even when I returned backstage. But I will find you again, and one day we will meet.

Your faithful correspondent,
Me

P.S.
When you sing, you make everything better. Christmas music, "Lowdown," Steely Dan...But why oh why will you not play "Peg" with Donald Fagan while you tour the country together??

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to My Future Roommate

Dear Roomie:

You seem really sweet and laid back. You waited and held your spare room for me for weeks while I investigated other potential shares with a number of unsuitable roommates. And now you genuinely seem happy that I'm moving in next weekend.

So for that, for all your sweetness and calmness and patience, I feel I must let you know what you're getting into by choosing to live with me.

I haven't been a roommate in nine years. I don't think I remember how to be a good one anymore. I don't think I ever knew.

I might buy my own toilet paper. I only like Angel Soft.

I might set the toaster oven on fire when cheese drips off a slice of leftover pizza I'm twice-baking.

I might cry a lot.

I might hide from you in my room.

I might leave dirty dishes in the sink for a long time.

I might drink too much wine and spill all my secrets.

I might blog about you.

I will try to take up as little room as possible in our small apartment we'll share, as my body slowly disappears and my possessions follow suit.

I will definitely walk around scantily clad in a nightie, because that's what I actually sleep in every night. I can't sleep with pants on.

I will pay the rent and the utilities. I will lock the door. I will turn off the stove.

I will leave the lights on because I don't like walking into a dark room.

I might not ask you how your day was.

I might not seem very happy to be there.

I might not stay very long.

O my roommate, I am heartily sorry for what I might do, and what I might fail to do.

Love,
Me

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to the Universe

Are you there, Universe? It's me, Sandi.

A year ago, I put my fate in your hands. I turned myself over to you and took a flying leap into a pool of cliches about seizing the wind and throwing caution to the day and other such nonsense.

At first, I gave you a little time to think about things. I didn't look for a job or ask anyone for help. Instead, I traveled to London and for the first time since 1995, I realized I don't want to live there.

When I came back to New York, I started receiving some signs from you. I ran away from the city again to escape to Joshua Tree, CA, where I spent Valentine's Day drinking red wine and eating chocolate by myself in the desert. The next morning, my hosts invited me to spend the summer there.

When I came back to New York again, I was recommended for a consulting gig by a former coworker, and was flown to LA on the company's tab just a few days after returning from there. I spent two days being anywhere from 15 minutes to two hours late for a number of meetings. I squeezed in a few minutes with Ziggy Marley's wife, who'd also been referred to me by another former coworker. To be honest, I didn't really want to work another children's album. I kind of played hard to get. And I got the job.

And it's been one of the most rewarding experiences of my career.

But you know all this, don't you?

After spending a month in Joshua Tree, a separation from New York that I hoped would reignite our romance, I returned to the city looking like a different person, thinking like a different person, and even more isolated than before I left. My ears hurt from the constant noise, the cars honking and the drunks yelling, the trains screeching and the sirens wailing. I couldn't hear you anymore, Universe. Were you still speaking to me? Were you sending me signals that were just drowned out by the fever pitch of everyday life in New York City?

I spent almost two months waiting for you to tell me something. I wasn't really working. I wasn't really going out. I wasn't meeting people; I wasn't talking to the people I already knew. I didn't want to miss your call. I just waited. And waited.

You didn't call. Did you? Did I miss your call?

For three months last fall, I worked because I thought I had to. I worked because I thought I wanted to. But your silence was deafening, and I started to doubt my ability to make my own decisions. I was convinced I was doing everything wrong. I was abandoned by you, the universe, as I had been abandoned by my own parents, by my former employers who pretended to love me and then cast me out of their family too. By then, I'd gotten used to abandonment and betrayal. I'd been betrayed by New York City, too.

For the last three weeks, I've sleepwalked through every day. Eyes open but not seeing. Heart open but not loving. Body moving but not touching, not advancing, not impacting.

I'm ready to wake up now, Universe. Are you there? Do you recognize me? Is it you that startles me at night, when I sit straight up in bed and try to focus on whomever is watching me sleep?

Is it you that called me back to QVC?

Will you send me back to California, maybe this time to stay?

I don't know what you have in store for me, but I'm still in your hands. Cradle me and tell me everything's going to be all right. I'll try to listen to what you have to say, and I'll try to not make mistakes. But I need to do something, and something soon.

Your servant,
Sandi

Open Letter to 2010

Dear New Year, oh Baby Decade:

I dressed up for you last night, but now I have dirty hair and haven't showered yet. It's our first day together and it's not filled with the romance I hoped for, instead plagued by a headache and a loneliness that together relegate me to shut-in status.

Since our relationship is new, I thought we should get on the same page about what we're doing together here over the next 12 months, nay, 10 years. I know you would like me to lose weight, to be kind and to cry less. I will do my best, but there are a few things I need from you:

I would like to not be sexually pillaged, assaulted, or otherwise victimized. However, I would like to have sex.

I would like insurance, or some assurance that I will not be hit by a car, catch malaria, get pregnant, or cut my finger while slicing limes.

I would like to remember the good times and be able to stop thinking about the bad times.

I would like to get married. I don't need a house in the suburbs or babies or curtains or a bridal registry. Just somebody to love.

I hope to sleep well at night and get up early in the morning.

I don't need a fancy job with a prestigious title and corporate perks. I would just like to work on something I love and not worry about paying the rent.

I need things to take pictures of. They can be people, color, lights, fruit, dead leaves, abandoned buildings, or sand-buried bottles, just something to inspire me.

I would like a pet-friendly apartment with a bedroom and then, a pet. Preferably one I'm not allergic to.

Less alcohol, more intoxication.

Love.

Generosity.

Music.

Art.

Challenges.

Forgiveness.

You don't have to understand me, 2010. Just accept me for who I am, and accept the things I cannot change.

Don't break my heart on Valentine's Day. Don't leave me alone on Independence Day. Don't make me regret my own birth on my birthday. And please don't make me cry on New Year's Eve, like I always do....

Love, your servant,
Sandi

To become a fan on Facebook, click here.

Open Letter to Michael McDonald

At Westbury Music Fair

Dear Michael McDonald, oh DEAR Michael McDonald,

I don't remember when I first heard your voice, but I know I had "Yah Mo B There" on a K-Tel cassette tape from the early 80s.

I never really remembered your big solo hit "I Keep Forgettin'" until Warren G reminded me of it in his classic tune "Regulate."

But I remember the moment I really fell in love with your smooth vocal stylings, and your heartbreaking  composing: the first time I listened to the Razor & Tie compilation Easy Rock, whose TV commercial led me to not only buy two copies, but to go work for Razor & Tie. Sure, it was more than 20 years after "What a Fool Believes" was originally a hit, but the song's lyrics struck me. I made my friends listen to it while I cried out, "It's SO SAD!"

After that I started finding your voice in whatever other songs I listened to. Christopher Cross, check. Kenny Loggins, check. Steely Dan, check. Robbie Dupree (of "Steal Away" fame), check. Patti LaBelle, check. David Pack told me he co-wrote one of Ambrosia's biggest hits ("You're the Only Woman") with you. I even found you in a post-Africa Toto song ("I'll Be Over You.")

You, sir McDonald, are not only ubiquitous in all pop music that I love, but you are all-powerful in your ability to make me gush about easy rock, the genre you created. Razor & Tie now pays me to talk about you on QVC.

You wrote a cajun Christmas song that does not sound ridiculous. You make "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" sound like you wrote that one too. And you can channel Donny Hathaway and Stevie Wonder so well, you make housewives across the country squeal in delight.

So please, Michael McDonald, with all the power of your stark white hair and your great trimmed beard, don't deprecate yourself with old jokes, fat jokes, stupid jokes, and dorky jokes. Even in a sweaty white dress shirt with no undershirt (oh, please wear an undershirt), you rock the hell out of a circular rotating stage in Long Island. You give Kenny Rogers more than a run for his money for best easy rock Christmas show ever. People give you a standing ovation at the mere suggestion of the first few keyboard strokes from "What a Fool Believes."

Go on, play your accordion and your tiny guitar and your acoustic guitar. I like to see you stand rather than always hunched over that keyboard.

playing the accordion

And do talk to me, talk to me in that very normal, average-sounding speaking voice of yours that, in comparison, makes your singing voice sound ever so much more luxurious, like a fine velour...Just keep it short and cute, and leave out the complaints about joining the AARP. I didn't mind how old you were in the "Sweet Freedom" music video when I was just 11 years old. Don't remind me of the time that has passed since.

Love,
Me



To become a fan on Facebook, click here.