"Always protect yourself." -Frankie Dunn

Last night, Howard Hughes, Jr. and I braved the swarming Christmas crowds at the Grove to see "Million Dollar Baby," the Clint Eastwood-Hilary Swank-Morgan Freeman film. It's set in the world of boxing, and allows an intimate look at the issues of relationship and healing from pain by opening your heart and pursuing your passion. Recent professional acquaintance Lucia Rijker also stars in the film, in a powerfully pivotal role; I'll spare you the details, lest I completely spoil it for you. Beautifully photographed, every shot is a work of art. A moving story, even if the script occasionally tries too hard, and a performance from Eastwood that reminded me of a totem pole with moving lips. Swank and Freeman are the heart and soul of the film.

It was the one moment she forgets trainer Frankie's above-referenced admonition that resonated so deeply in me. Because it's the one thing I have so often forgotten to do...and I have the scars (more on my heart than on my body) to prove it.

I got home well after midnight, to a mailbox stuffed with a bag holding a Christmas gift from my ex-husband and the pooch whose custody we share: a striking necklace of red coral and turquoise, from which dangles a silver pendant depicting the Hindu Goddess Durga, riding a tiger. The identifying tag read, "Protective Goddess." Of all things.

Then, in a conversation with HH, Jr. this morning, I heard it again as we discussed the anonymous communications I've been receiving via this very blog.

Heed the Universe. Always protect yourself.

"You can't see the moon without the sun." -Howard Hughes, Jr.

He and I were just on the phone, comparing half-moon sightings on our respective trips home: mine was perched atop a tall, Christmas-lit spruce in San Marino. His rested on an Abbot Kinney building in Venice.

The first time we discussed the moon was when we first met, a year and 4 months ago. I'd told him over the phone that the view of the moon from my house on the hill was spectacular...and, after we'd taken a tour of Downtown LA, he asked if he could come up to see it.

The next time was a couple of months ago, during the lunar eclipse, his first. He called to ask me if I was watching it; we stayed on the phone and described it to each other: the moon was on fire, a burnt orange glow through the clouds.

I told him tonight that, if I had to make a choice, I'd choose the moon. And he pointed out the irony.

So...I have no choice but to choose it all.

Anonymous schmononymous.

You seem like a literate guy -- what part of "in private" was beyond your comprehension?

zantales@yahoo.com

Okay. I'll bite.

Which is not to say, "bite me."

I received a blatantly sexual -- oh, let's say positively pornographic -- anonymous post last week, now hidden from the view of my more sensitive readers. And it would be more intriguing, even flattering, and less disconcerting if I hadn't been referred to as a "beautiful, delicious whore." It isn't the beautiful and delicious I mind, mind you...I certainly appreciate the appreciation, even if it comes from a source I can't identify for the life of me (I had an idea -- he was shocked that I'd think him capable of such a slight -- but I was just hoping it was him so I wouldn't have to worry that it was an inmate from San Quentin or -- worse -- a disgruntled former lover). I mean, I'd like to know who thinks of me as beautiful and delicious; really.

It's the w-word that puts me on edge; it's a moniker I simply must refuse. My self-respect allows nothing less.

I know there are those who find it erotic to call their lover a slut during sex play, and those who are aroused by being called a whore. The dialog goes something like this:
"You're my little whore, aren't you?"
"Yes, baby, I'm your slut."
Your vivid imagination will tell you where it goes from there. Personally, I have always been able to get there without taking that particular path. But, to each his/her own.

I'm not Puritanical by any means ('though I do absolutely eschew the scatological). I simply prefer that such personal suggestions be made in privacy. And by someone I know and (at least) like and (especially) trust. Then I might find it, um, endearing.

So, you there, with the mouth on you: Identify yourself. In private.

"You don't know what it's like/To love somebody/The way I love you." -Barry Gibb

How long does it take to heal from a broken heart? Should the recovery time be commensurate with the length of the relationship? If so, what might the formula be? A month for every year? Given that ratio, if one has been in various states of love with the same person for, say, 15 years, it should take approximately a year and 3 months -- give or take a couple of weeks -- to complete the stages of grief attendant to such a loss.

There are a few rules that should be strictly adhered to during the healing period:

Friends should not comment adversely on the bursts of tears or the late-night phone calls or the wanton eating of Cheetos (or the inevitable weight gain) by the heartbroken at any point during this period.

Any subsequent romantic, or potentially romantic, relationships should be held at bay by the heartbroken until thorough healing has been accomplished.

Suffering beyond the healing period is optional...but definitely gratuitous. Masochism, however masked, is generally unattractive. Martyrdom, however, has certain appeal -- with the right wardrobe.

To the one who would offer salacious commentary anonymously...

...I think the Earl of Kent said it best when addressing Oswald in The Tragedy of King Lear:

"A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a lily-livered, action-taking knave, a whoreson*, glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical rogue; one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar, and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deniest the least syllable of thy addition."

*ironically (Ed.)