All content copyright 2009 by Holly Gleason. Web design by Lauren Carelli.
If you’re looking for the fuel to thrive rather than survive… A reason to believe… or even the root of futility, you can begin and end the journey here. Without dreams, what is there to fire the soul? Think about it. Then get one of your very own—and something that reflects the essence of who you are.
In its little old fashioned looking tin, Rose Balm promises to be the most healing substance in the world. Can’t attest to that. But applied to horribly dry skin on my face - the softening started, flaking stopped and break-out never happened - and there’s nothing like it for chapped lips. Add in the fact that it also makes your lips look ready to be kissed and the perks just keep on coming. A bit of a quest, but most specialty or high end drug stores - in addition to Barney’s - sell it, so it’s worth the effort. Promise.
The man who gave you Hanson redeems himself with a bony ass British white girl who is utter old school rhythm & blues meltdown. Her voice is the dust in the attic on the trunk that holds every glittering, shining moment of sexual undulation, deeper fulfillment and the devastation of betrayal that is the place where Motown should have intersected with the Delta’s ground zero blues witness. Take this to river, revisit all these beyond-belief soul classics reinvented by a girl willing to throw herself face first to the bottom of the water and wait til the current returns her to the surface with a new witness to it all.
It’s rare that you can touch a true icon, someone who’s impact on culture reaches beyond the broad spectrum and becomes part of the actual fabric. Manuel - who sewed Elvis’ solid gold suit, made Gram Parsons’ his pot, pills and naked girls Gilded Palace of Sin sartoriality and put high-test rhinestones, piping and gabardine on the backs of the Stones, Elton John, Linda/Dolly/Emmylou and everybody beyond - still cuts a line like scraping your skin like a straight razor, and the Coco Chanel of cowboy couture knows how to transfer your deepest truths onto the suits he sews. But to sit with the man, to drink tequila and talk about life… To consider what love means in his time, his realm, his reality, it is wisdom boiled down, it is better than Gabriel Garcia Marquez as filtered through Frida Kahlo’s paintbrush. There is grace and honor and poetry - and laughter, much much laughter. We should all take a lesson
A clay pot or just a casserole. Scattered around a roast or surrounding a chicken. The fall is here. The root vegetables are being dug up. It is time to bring the earth’s rich bounty to its mellowest, most intense peak. A little olive oil, some sea salt, a slow oven. Dinner—with or without protein— is served.
Few turn a phrase as well as the American queen of real life fiction and short stories that pay-off better than most novels. But here, Joyce Carole Oates brings one into the process in the most non-linear, yet utterly inspirational collection of writings. Look inside what struck the match for her pilot light. See how vividly she paints the root of her writing, the truths that have driven her, the reasons for reaching. In a world where anyone who can type can consider themselves a writer, Oates’ gossamer choices can inspire even the clumsiest to seek more grace in the way they employ the language. For there is no greater gift than the connections words make - deeper and more meaningful than anything except love at first glance across a crowded room—and this heightens the promise, the potential and the pay-off.
As Italian bakeries go, this one is knee-buckling. Canolis that are crisp and airy, releasing that vein of sweetened ricotta studded with bits of candied fruit and chocolate chips. Biscotti that’s quick-crunchy but dense enough to satisfy. The usual array of confections, cake and cookies that practically jump through the case and melt in your mouth. And pepperoni bread that is chewy and bursting with the essence of Little Italy’s tang and history and savory goodness.
Truth has nothing to do with what comes back to you. It’s knowing where you are, what you feel, what truly matters. With no thought to the results, you work even harder, bring even more and have faith that what you’re giving is hitting the cosmic bulls-eye—creating a vacuum of light and love that will wrap itself around you in ways you can’t even recognize. You have to know it’s there. You have to believe even when faith can’t be found. You have to be smart about the first rule of Rodney Crowell on sensitivity: knowing not to cast your pearls before swine—and recognizing swine even when it’s dressed up fine and pretty. Bring your awareness. See people and situations for what they are. Then let the transformation begin… because there’s nothing so thrilling as bringing the deserving through the channels, and that can only happen when it’s utterly about the other reality with no regard to yourself.
Sleepless nights. Or must get it done deadlines. There’s a hipness to this from the desk newsreading that feels a bit more authoritative and less recycled than some of the other newsproduct outlets. There here and now, the how it is, the willingness to bring humanity and joking without the sludgy depths of forced local affiliate conviviality. It’s almost a reason to stay up all night. Insomniac Theatre for the Mind.
You can spend the serious money for Kiehl’s Creme de la Corps—or you can go to your drugstore, as the weather’s turning and one’s skin is turning to crocodile touch. This thicker-than-a-Georgia-drawl lotion takes its sweet time to soak in and you can feel the very richness in your palms as you warm it up before application. In the morning, though, it’s better than Original Sin, snakeskin shed, you’re the softest you you can be—and at a pittance compared to those expensive beauty creams.
Fans of Kenny Chesney may know him as “Daniel Burns,” but the man who turned the pride of Luttrell, Tennessee into one of People’s Sexiest Men understands gentle motivation, safety first and one’s need to be inspired on their quest to personal best. Never one to mock or belittle, but rather inflame your faith in the ability to hit the mark, this is proof that the right motivating force can make the difference between want to and got-to. If you can’t get to him (Inner Strength Training), find someone just like him—the difference is exponential.
Thicker. More biting, though still sweet. This is apple juice in its rawest, less distilled reality—and if you like that deeper sense of what something is, apple cider is the truest form. If you wanna know what autumn tastes like, pour yourself a glass. And if you want your house to smell like the warmth, closeness and relaxation of a season to consider, all you have to do is pour some of this in a pan with cinnamon, a bit of nutmeg, maybe a bit of ginger root, some brown sugar perhaps or a squeeze of lemon and let it simmer. As the scent wafts through your house, you’ll settle into a world of thick sweaters, hand knit shawls, children’s laughter, good books, warm fires and time to enjoy all that you’ve been working for.
Rob Brezhny’s hororscopes are a mainstay of the killer alternative weekly nation (figure even The Village Voice buys in), but his take on the world is far deeper and more empowering than merely reading the stars and offering insight into the forces and gravitational pulls working upon us. Along with collections of some of the most provocative readings culled for a broadening perspective, the man who gave the world Free Will Astrology weaves a life plan that’s about joy, celebrating the good things about ourselves rather than dwelling on the less than aspects and always trying to find a higher truth. Perhaps a little touchy feely goddess-oriented for some. But if you strip away the parsley and apply what’s being advocated, the world could be a much much better place in fairly short order. Now that’s something to embrace as truth and beauty, huh?
Beautyandtruth.com
With long forelocks sweeping across their eyes like soignée French hooker bangs, Paso Fino horses have all the tiny nuances of an Arabian without being so fragile they look as if they’d break if a good wind came up. If long-necked beauties flamenco dancing in huge arenas, with thick strong muscles and a smoothness of motion that makes swans seem clumsy sounds beyond the realm, then one need only to go to a show for paso fino horses… and know that some fairy conjures come true.
My beloved Kathie Orrico always has cake before she flies… even if it’s pan-cake! A brilliant woman who lives a life of vibrance even in the smallest, most mundane places, she espouses a far more compelling gospel about the way we live our lives in terms of the pleasure principle than nearly anyone I know: “Before I fly, I need a goodie, because IF the plane goes down, I know my soul will not rest because it’s thinking about that last brownie a la mode or piece of cake I could have had. It’s unfinished goodie business, which can keep you from eternal peace.”
Just when you’re sure you understand what’s known in some quarters as Jewish penicillin, leave it to a sweet Mexican family who owns a little restaurant in Green Hills to turn up the volume on one of the great comfort feeds in the world. With bits of jalapeno and chunks of avocado, it has the richness and depth of slow cooked chicken soup, but there’s lime making the other tastes pop—and great chunks of white meat chicken making one’s heart dance, mouth slather and lips curl up in a big happy smile. And just in time for cold and flu season, when trying to taste anything is the ultimate perk there is.
As a kid growing up, my bottom was riveted to the master bedroom floor every day at 4:30 for “Batman.” With its cartoon flourishes, ham-fisted fighting that was WWF pre-WWF and overwrought dialogue, it was my kinda camp-action. A friend recently turned me onto my hero’s true ground zero - under the guise of “You like farflung dialogue and commentary… Well, here you go” - without even knowing my childhood obsession with do-gooders-in-tights, and I was hooked. The morality plays and peaked conflicts firing the story, this is where the rubber meets the road. Drawn with a bit of sinister underpinning, The Dark Knight Returns offers a temerity that makes the live action punctuated by cartoon sound effects seem trivial, but it also sweeps you up like all those afternoons ago.
If you already like the other person, what a wonderful pre-screening web in the pursuit of a broader net of friends. You cast it wise and with confidence and more than likely reap the things you respect and admire about the person already in your life. Funny, huh?
Imagine Mississippi mud ice cream bars. Though not crystallized or icy, just smooth and rich and thick and exploding with the depths of coffee’s best instincts. Cool. Creamy. Like very refined pudding chilled to the point of solidity on a stick. A true treat.
Having captured ‘70s California culture with a sharp eye and a hairpin turn of the word in books like The White Album and Slouching Towards Bethlehem, having taken her rapier eye for detail and conflict to Salvador in her later work, Joan Didion is a first class archer of American letters. Always pulling her bow taut and putting her verbal arrows through the target with speed, clarity and style, she knows how to create truth from mere language. With Where I Was From, she goes to the genesis of both her family’s experience in the Golden State—and its own origins of do-your-own-thing-tolerance. When you start thinking about pioneers and their legacy and trace forward from there, the commentary on the eras she embraced takes on a new poignancy. Sociologically, culturally, even verbally, Didion is a must to must not miss.
The lightest floral based perfume ever. The promise of sweetness and grace, fine lace, lawn dresses, innocence that’s not dumb, knowledge that’s not bludgeoning, romance at its most pristine. Not cloying, overpowering or gag-inducing—just the scent of an invitation that one deeply yearns for and now has in the palm of their hand.
Anchored by the photos of Annie Leibowitz, the woman who pretty much slung compelling portraiture against rock stars 30 years ago during her tenure at another great pop culture temple Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair creates a context for the best icons of music in this country to look their most heroic, their most them. The images are startling in what they reveal, the prose pointedly analytical. And if sometimes they miss the mark (and sometimes they do, it is New York/LA-based after all), Lisa Robinson’s remembrances of life on the road with Led Zeppelin and the always hilarious Rock Snobs dictionary alone are worth the price of the newsstand.
You sign on. There they are. In your cue. Hunted you down from some place you’d never imagined. Funny thing about it, too, is this: utterly a gift from your past. Someone you might never have thought to find, no matter how profoundly the impacted you. And—unless you’ve recently become rich or famous or both—they come only out of love for something you gave them - usually something about their spirit, more than anything. They know those secrets no one can share, can laugh at what nobody realizes. We should all try it more often.
Urged to see “Shrek” and finding myself without the energy for something more serious, I plopped down on the couch. Engulfed in the sweetest tale of the shortchanging power of judging books by the cover, not thinking things through, the beauty of inner soul and a lot of slapstick comedy, I was delivered from something that had somehow descended. It didn’t change the truth, just how the moments felt inside me—and that’s what the right movie at the right time can do: deliver from the sensation, so you can deal with the reality that must be handled.
Driving around, listening to advance music, thinking about life with the spaniel. And there it goes - a dark disc covering the full moon, sliding in front of it, reminding us that everything can be obscured. Feel the power and the pull. Know it was a moment of natural “wow,” and that it’s over. Feel the tug on your soul and the beauty on your lips.
Gary Stewart, the soul of Rhino Records for longer than anyone can remember, lived through the Southern California punk explosion. But like a lot of us, he was a witness from the fringe of the record coming across the water from the UK, the band exploding out of NYC dives—and you can feel that anticipatory reverence listening to the ultimate 4 CD mixtape/tribute to a time when every revved up rhythm, every yowling vocal, every rage against the status quo came from a place that was adrenalin and firethrowing and the utter boom! Of breaking through. The Dead Boys. Early Blondie. Ian Drury. Nick Lowe. Television. Iggy Pop. Generation X. The Gerns, The Mekons. Hate. The Voidoids. Patti Smith. X. Dead Kennedys. Elvis Costello. The New York Dolls. Black Flag. The Pretenders. The Ramones. The Boomtown Rats. And and and and and and… Johnny Thunders’ always aching “You Can’t Get Your Arms Round A Memory” and Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” close it out as an elegy to what was and a witness to how brightly it burned. If you were there, you’ll remember; if you missed it, you’ll understand.
Gary Stewart, the soul of Rhino Records for longer than anyone can remember, lived through the Southern California punk explosion. But like a lot of us, he was a witness from the fringe of the record coming across the water from the UK, the band exploding out of NYC dives—and you can feel that anticipatory reverence listening to the ultimate 4 CD mixtape/tribute to a time when every revved up rhythm, every yowling vocal, every rage against the status quo came from a place that was adrenalin and firethrowing and the utter boom! Of breaking through. The Dead Boys. Early Blondie. Ian Drury. Nick Lowe. Television. Iggy Pop. Generation X. The Gerns, The Mekons. Hate. The Voidoids. Patti Smith. X. Dead Kennedys. Elvis Costello. The New York Dolls. Black Flag. The Pretenders. The Ramones. The Boomtown Rats. And and and and and and… Johnny Thunders’ always aching “You Can’t Get Your Arms Round A Memory” and Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” close it out as an elegy to what was and a witness to how brightly it burned. If you were there, you’ll remember; if you missed it, you’ll understand.
Five rib-warming, lighter than Monday morning carbohydrate discs with butter melting down and into them. Sprinkled lavishly with coconut and pieces of pecans, lengthwise uberquarters of fresh bananas whose fragrance gets inside your nose before your fork gets close to your mouth - making yearning for the tropics a perfectly inspired trigger response. With a cherry on top and real maple syrup on the side. The perfect welcome fall breakfast that’s a little festive, a little escapist.