Richard Avedon, the photographer who “invented” modern fashion photography, had a career spanning sixty years, and the MFA is hosting one stupendously fashionable retrospective of his work.

No, it's not a piece of paper stuck over her head, it's FASHION.

Put your best dress on, Martha, because you are going to want to go.

Wait, I'm almost ready!

Dorian Leigh, hat by Paulette, Paris studio, August 1949
Photograph Richard Avedon
© The Richard Avedon Foundation

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I have a curiously intimate relationship with the World Cup.

Far and Away

My first encounter with the World Cup was in Ireland circa 1990, where I was living at the time.

Wait, I thought all roads lead to Rome...

I was trying to find myself a bedsit (a.k.a. a studio  apartment), and one afternoon I left work early in order to wander the streets of Ranelagh in search of one (at least the one listed in the paper).

This place looks nice...

I noticed that I was the only creature moving in the entirety of the neighborhood. Not a person, not a dog, not a car was in motion. I was the only articulatedly living thing as far as the eye could see. Not having been in Ranelagh before it gave me a creepy feeling, and it got me to thinking that I didn’t want to live in that part of town if that’s what it was going to be like.

Someone in the office had mentioned “the World Cup” that morning but that was an inconsequential sporting event in which I like most Americans had no interest.

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My father taught me so many things, among them:

1. I wasn’t good enough;
2. Me being me was a pain in the ass to others;
3. My intelligence was something to be embarrassed about;
4. I didn’t know anything that was important;
5. I could be anything I wanted to be, as long as it was what he wanted me to be;
6. Whatever I wanted to do, I didn’t have what it took to do it.

When he died, I burst into tears, I was so relieved.

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They won’t remember that it was late, but they’ll remember that it was wrong.

Jus’ sayin’.

Even though the tragic loss of Buffy at Thanksgiving was heartbreaking and horrible, we both knew that we would, when we were ready, adopt another kitten.

We still miss you, Buff

Getting a Kitten for a Cat

One of the things we realized about Buffy was that she didn’t want/need a feline companion, but of course we only realized that after we got Buffy a feline companion, a lovely little fella named Eliot.

In spite of Buffy being entirely non-interactive with him, Eliot remained affable and happy, even though he spent an inordinate amount of time trying to get Buffy to play with him.

Don't tell Buffy, but our butts are touching

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The head of the United Nations, Ban Ki-Moon, said of the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti, “The damage, destruction and loss of life are just overwhelming.”

Maybe it’s because I played Winston Churchill in 8th grade, but my only thought when I heard that was, “You are the head of the United Nations, dude, step up to the plate with strong leadership and determination to succeed, or step aside.”

Because good lord, if the United Nations is “overwhelmed” by what’s happened in Haiti, why even bother trying?

Dear Martin,

I was five-going-on-six when you were murdered.

I was a little white girl living in a nice working-to-middle-class seacoast neighborhood of Quincy, Massachusetts.

I can’t say I remember anything about your murder, although as I grew up the the three murders that defined the country were never far from anyone’s recall. First President Kennedy, then you, then the President’s brother Robert.

I remember understanding that John Kennedy was killed because he was president, and Robert Kennedy was killed because he wanted to be president.

And you were killed because you were black.

In my seacoast community, the one where Mr. Boudreau from up the street would go out clamming on the flats at low tide, nobody was black, although I think back then the nomenclature was “negro.”.

So in a way, Martin, you were the first black person I ever knew.

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I need to get this out up front: I hated this movie.

I. Hated. This. Movie.

Why? It was a crap movie.

It was boring.

It was boring because the story was dull and derivative and just more of the same-old same old.

And I was pissed off that I had to sit through nearly three frigging hours of it to find out why: the director and the screenwriter were the same person.

"In our world, man does not suffer shame for asking directions."

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The backstory

One of my most memorable Christmases occured many years ago when I ended a relationship on Christmas Eve day: we had been seeing each other for over a year and I was terribly fond of the fellow, but I could no longer pretend that his excessive drinking didn’t bother me. Since he didn’t think he drank too much (or too often), I ended it.

Because he was a generally good person, his overarching concern on that Christmas Eve day was that I not spend the next day on my own. He offered to not mention our breakup to his family so that I might join them for Christmas dinner, instead of our planned dinner-à-tête. I declined.

He couldn’t believe someone would want to be alone on Christmas. And he was doubly disbelieving that someone like me—a single woman, living alone in a foreign country (Ireland) that celebrated that holiday in a big and meaningful way—wouldn’t be unbearably lonely on that particular day.

How could I tell him that not only couldn’t I wait to be free of this unhappy, untruthful encumbrance, I was positively thrilled to have the day to myself?

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This is Buffy.

We got her when she was this big.

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