It's Mine

Image: The Always Gentleman

The Imperial City: Washington, D.C.

Images: Washington, D.C.

I have history with Washington. I've just returned from my third visit to America's imperial city. It leaves me breathless every time.

The promise of elegant society avenues. The powerful bronzed statues. The idealistic etchings in the white marble. Washington is a city of political correctedness and southern charm.

Votes and money. Hopes and dreams. Old and young. Washington, D.C. is a dichotomy with something to offer for everyone. For anyone looking to book a trip, here are some highlights from my travels:

Worship at the altar of political hitory and visit the temples of the great American Presidents. The humbling Thomas Jefferson Memorial along the Potomac river overlooks the White House. The somber Abraham Lincoln Memorial boasts an unforgettable view of The Mall's reflecting pool and Washington Monument.

See the somber changing of the guard ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery where you can walk among fallen heroes and see the place where John F. Kennedy and Jackie Bouvier Kennedy Onassis are buried.

Tour the Smithsonian museum (the world's largest museum) is absolutely free! See the original star-spangled banner from the war of 1812 and other historical artifacts. See the original Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights at the National Archives.

Visit Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (an hour and a half drive from Washington) where the bloodiest battle of the Civil War took place. More than 23,000 Confederate and Union soldiers were slaughtered in the three day battle that marked a turning point in the building of an American nation.

Cherry blossoms and magnolia trees line the American capital's historic districts. See the impressive embassies and mansions in Dupont Circle. Walk along the old historic homes and universities, shop at the swankiest stoes, and eat at the best restaurants the city has to offer in Georgetown.

Try some authentic down-home Louisiana cooking at the Cajun Experience in Agnes Morin/Dupon Circle. Live jazz, creole and cajun cuisine, and a bustling ambiance that speaks to the southerness of this political town.

For the best baked pizza the city has to offer, try Pizzeria Paradiso in historic Georgetown. They also boast a great beer list.

Bistro Bistro in Dupont Circle offers a wonderful French Brunch buffet that serves everything from Eggs Benedict to pastries and even caviar.

And don't miss Martin's Taven in Georgetown. Established in 1933 and made famous by the Kennedy's, Martin's has served every sitting President since Harry Truman.

Make the most of the city... Walk everywhere and take the subway!

Kate's Tiara

Images: This is glamourous

The royal wedding is tomorrow. And while every female over age 3 is waiting to see Kate's dress, I am waiting to see her tiara. Any girl can have the dress. Only a princess gets the tiara!

Kate Middleton, the extraordinarily lucky commoner of a girl has had her fun playing dress-up these past months as the soon-to-be-princess and one day Queen of England. Can you imagine the fun she must have had perusing the royal collection of tiara's and jewels to see which one would match her Cinderella glass slippers to perfection?! Let's window shop the possibilities...

The Spencer Tiara



The Spencer Tiara was famously worn by Princess Diana as her something borrowed when she wed Prince Charles in 1981. A family heirloom from the 18th century, it is a composite of several elements that have been added to over the years. It was a wedding present to the Viscountess Cynthia Althorpe in 1919 and Victoria Lockwood wore it when she wed the 9th Earl of Spencer in 1989.

The Cambridge Lovers Knot Tiara



The Cambridge Lovers Knot Tiara was made for Queen Mary in 1911 from diamonds and pearls she held in her personal collection. It is a copy of a tiara owned by her grandmother, the Princess Augusta of Hesse. Queen Mary left the tiara to her granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II in 1953. Queen Elizabeth II wore the tiara on occasion herself in the 1950's and presented it to Princess Diana as a wedding present in 1981. Although Princess Diana did not wear it on her wedding day, she debuted it that November at the opening of Parliament. Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall wore the tiara when she wed Prince Charles in 2005.

The Poltimore Tiara



The Poltimore Tiara was made by Garrard in the 1870's for Lady Florence Poltimore, the wife of the 2nd Baron Poltimore. Princess Margaret acquired and wore it when she wed Mr. Antony Armstrong-Jones, the Lord Snowdon. Children of the late princess, Visciount Linley and Lady Sarah Chatto sold the tiara at auction at Christie's to offset inheritance taxes in 2006.

The Nizam of Hyderabad Tiara



The Nizam of Hyderabad Tiara was made by Cartier for the Nizam of Hyderabad who gifted the tiara to Queen Elizabeth II as a wedding present in 1947. The tiara was dismantled in 1973 and the diamonds were used to create the Queen's Burmese Ruby Tiara with the three large roses still worn as brooches by the Queen.


The Grand Duchess Vladimir Tiara



The Grand Duchess Vladimir Tiara was inherited by the Queen from her grandmother, Queen Mary in 1953. It is named for the Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna of Russia, wife of the Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandovich, the 3rd son of Czar Alexander II, and brother of Czar Alexander III of Russia. Following the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, the Grand Duchess escapted to Venice leaving her jewels behind and hidden in the Vladimir Palace in St. Petersburg. Britain's secret intelligence service recovered the jewels and the Duchess died soon thereafter in August 1920. The tiara was purchased by Queen Mary in 1921 from Princess Nicolas of Greece, the daughter of Duchess Maria Vladimir. Queen Mary modified the tiara to add emeralds.

The Girls of Great Britain and Ireland Tiara



The Girls of Great Britain and Ireland Tiara was a wedding present for Princess May of Teck (the future Queen Mary) from the Girls of Great Britain and Ireland. It was purchased from Garrard. Queen Mary gave the tiara to Queen Elizabeth II as a wedding present. The Queen has appeared wearing the tiara on many commonwealth currencies and in a portrait.

The George III Tiara



There is some speculation that Kate might wear the Queen Mother's George III Tiara (also known at the Russian Fringe Tiara) that was commissioned in 1830. Queen Elizabeth II wore it as her something borrowed when she wed Prince Philip in 1947. The Queen Mother loaned it to her granddaughter, Princess Anne when she wed Captain Mark Phillips in 1973.

I hope that rumour isn't true. The spikes are yikes.

Spring

Image: Muddy Glam

"We would lie in those afternoon beds, afterwards, hands on each other, talking it over. Possible, impossible. What could be done? We thought we had such problems. How were we to know we were happy?"

-- Margaret Atwood, “The Handmaid’s Tale”

A little girl jumping around in the mud. That's how I feel. That's who I am.

The month of April has been happy choas for me. I've had a flat tire and car woes, money expenses and family conflict, I'm painting and taking an art class, and soon I'll even be moving houses. It's been just a little bit crazy!

Sometimes, life can be a Winter. Where months drag by slow and uneventful, and your life feels cold and isolated. But then the season changes and one fine day you wake up in Spring and suddenly your life is filled with change and surprise. New life springs up where there was once nothing; and you find yourself overwhelmed with roses and weeds that now need caring for.

We think we have such problems. How are we to know we're happy?

Truthfully, we are happy! We have no problems. There's no such thing. All of life is learning. And even the impossible is possible. We are "I am" all the same. Life is an art and it only lasts a little while before the seasons change. So we may as well play around in the muck of things.

Happy Spring!


Image: stylinonyou

Ask to See

A Buddhist priest prays for the souls of victims still not found in the rubble. Yamada, Japan.


A Lebanese protester whose relative is an inmate in a Beirut prison, challenges riot police guarding the main entrance. The riots were started by prisoners demanding better conditions.



Egyptians demonstrating their dissatisfaction with the Egyptian military in Tahrir Square on April 3, 2011.

Images: Kateopolis

The darkest places need the most light.

These images are stunning reminders of the human condition that needs to be dark so we can fill it with light. To see.

You don't have to be a survivor in Japan, a protester in Lebanon, or a demonstrator in Egypt. Your life is spectacular. Every tragedy - personal and world scale - is an opportunity to create. To make what you'll take.

But caution! The lighter you try to live, the heavier you'll get to. Ask for strength and you'll carry burdens. Ask to see, and you'll be aware of the obstacles.

How I Saved My Life (if you need some advice)

Image: Marilyn Monroe

I used to suffer from depression. The kind that makes you withdraw from the life you can't face, replace eating with drinking, and contemplate ways to end your life.

I used to suffer from Crohn's and/or Celiacs disease (the doctors could never decide which). The kind that leaves you bowled over in pain bleeding out pints in a hospital emergency room.

I used to suffer from chronic pain in my back, arms, and legs. The kind that paralyzes you and has doctors counting inexplainable bruises that cover so much of your body they test you for Leukemia only after ruling out domestic abuse.

I used to suffer from anxiety. The kind that wakes you with a mini heart attack so frightening you have to force feed yourself tranquilizer pills to ease the terror.

I survived all that in the span of 3 years as I fought my way through two breakups, family tragedy, financial ruin, personal failure, and near professional suicide. But I'm happy to report those days are over. I have no health concerns, no life drama, and I'm the happiest (and healthiest) that I have ever been. And so I wanted to share with you the how and why of my healed life.

Chronic unhappiness. I believe all of my dis-eases were manifestations of my misery. My life and the people in it were toxic. I was serving other people and abandoning myself. The physical and emotional responses I was feeling were extreme cries of help by my self (mind, body, and soul) to make changes.

The realisation that I was chronically unhappy should have been obvious. But when you're in it -- it isn't. The self-awareness of my situation didn't just occur to me. I learned it. It had taken me years to create all these unhealthy habits, to change them would take time. Years. A forever in fact that I'm still working on.

The source of this understanding came from a remarkable set of people - healers, spiritualists, and survivors of real life and plenty of personal trial and error. I learned to save myself from myself and for the first time in my life, I abandoned everything and everyone I had been carrying and chose to care for myself instead. My life profoundly changed almost as soon as I began to place my own well-being first.

I learned that I would always have myself and I learned how to listen to myself. I became the force of change in my life. I learned to accept that I would never be able to change other people but it was within my power to change myself -- my thoughts and my actions.

Then, I detoxed my life. And by this I mean more than a diet. I got rid of everything and everyone toxic around me. Every source of pain, grief, guilt, sadness, and anger. I eliminated the relationships and people that drained me, the job and work that pained me. I realised I wasn't as essential as I liked to think I was or as people had led me to believe I was (to get their own way).

My healing work with Algonquin shamans taught me that our wounds are not free -- we pay for them. That resonated with me. We are free to choose whether we deal in a currency of love or pain for gain. According to shamans, we all want to be victims. We learn at a young age that it's the easiest way to get our way. The people closest to you are likely the worst victims in your life. But the biggest obstacle to your own happiness is believing this lie about them and/or yourself. There are no victims. Only unhappy people who carry the pain of the past into the future (most of the time) by being victims in this moment now instead of letting go. Most of us happily waste energy complaining and fueling surface problems we create to mask the real issues we avoid. The truth is we don't really want to fix and heal our lives. The solution is always so easy: change! Admit and eliminate the real problem. But then what?! Then you have to face your self.

Finally, I learned to avoid random relationships and time fillers that were filling the empty spaces in my life. I realised I didn't want other people to complete me. And I didn't want to feed and foster addictions. I learned that empty space is good. In fact, it was divine because it's where I finally found myself.

To all my teachers, I offer deep heartfelt thanks and the humble hope that one day I may repay you. To my greatest spiritual teachers - the people who caused me the most pain in life, I thank you for our experiences and wish you every happiness.

For anyone looking for recommended reading or holistic healers, feel free to send me a message.


Image: fight like a girl

My Dream

Image: Punk Rock Barbie Doll


This has been a long-time dream of mine. This is what I imagine my backyard will look like when I find a place where me and things and people go together.

I have always wanted to do this.

Ravaged Love

“She is like the tide, she comes and she goes, she runs to me as in this stupendous photographic image. In my poor and tormented youth, I had always dreamed of this woman. And now when this dream occasionally returns, I extend my arm and she is here… by my side. If you have not met or known her, you have lost much in life.”

- Richard Burton wrote that on the back of this photograph of Elizabeth Taylor running towards him.

Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor never really fell out of love with each other. Taylor kept the last letter Burton ever wrote to her before his sudden death in 1984 by her bedside. Until today.

Elizabeth Taylor
27 February 1932 – 23 March 2011

The last day of March,

My darling Sleeping Child, I am oddly shy about you. I still regard you as an inviolate presence. You are as secret as the mysterious processes of the womb. I’m not being fancy…I have treated women, generally, very badly and used them as an exercise for my contempt - except in your case.

I have fought like a fool to treat you in the same way and failed. One of these days I will wake up - which I think I have done already - and realise to myself that I really do love. I find it very difficult to allow my whole life to rest on the existence of another creature. I find it equally difficult, because of my innate arrogance, to believe in the idea of love. There is no such thing, I say to myself.
There is lust, of course, and usage, and jealousy, and desire and spent powers, but no such thing as the idiocy of love. Who invented that concept? I have racked my shabby brains and can find no answer.

But when people die, those who are taken away from us can never come back. Never, never, never, never, never (Lear about Cordelia). We are such doomed fools. Unfortunately, we know it. So I have decided that, for a second or two, the precious potential of you in the next room is the only thing in the world worth living for. After your death there shall only be one other and that will be mine. Or I possibly think, vice versa.

Ravaged love,

And loving Rich

-Richard Burton in a letter to Elizabeth Taylor (1973)

An extraordinary woman. An extraordinary life. An extraordinary love. Elizabeth is finally with her Richard.

He was right. We are such doomed fools.