So today is about turkey and stuffing and football. Really?

If you have family and friends.

If you have your health.

If you have food and shelter.

If you have a job.

If you have love.

And you love.

Then.

“If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, “thank you,” that would suffice.” – Meister Eckhart

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

Love, Michele

So, the phone rings, I answer, it is my mother.

Mom:  What do I do if I can’t move my mouth?

Me:   What? Go to the hospital!

Mom:   What?

Me:   You can’t move your mouth?

Mom:   [cracks up] – My mouse!

Me:  [sighs] – Oh! Reboot. I thought you said your mouth.

Mom:  [still cracking up] – If I couldn’t move my mouth I wouldn’t be talking.

We went to see “This Is It” yesterday, the rehearsal footage for the Michael Jackson concert that sadly never came to be.

He danced and sang as good as he ever did. There was no lip-synching while he danced, either.

He was spectacular. Even the night before he died.

It was so enlightening to see how much work went into the preparation
for this show.

The choreography, music, special effects, including 3D, and the music videos.

The note by note, step by step, detail that Michael paid attention to. He was in charge of this show, and he was very excited about it.

It is ironic how much work went into this, how much excitement there was around it. They were close to done rehearsing, and everything was coming together. And then. The horrible shock and sadness.

But this movie does not go there, to the sadness. This movie is pure joy. And love.

Last week’s episode of Larry David’s Curb Your Enthusiasm, with guest stars Jerry Seinfeld and Julia Louise Dreyfus, had me convulsing in laughter.

Here’s …. the middriff girl…

[watch this until the end - the end is classic!]

A hefty groundhog eats leaves in the backyard. Raises up on its hind legs to glance around between bites.

A gray fuzzy caterpillar wriggles its belly across my screenporch.

2 deer sleep under the trees.

A pair of voices echo through the woods. Boys. Snapping wood. A tree in our forest falls down, dead. The boys cheer. They are stoned out teenage boys knocking down dead trees with sticks.

When we decided to go to the “Butterflies Live!” exhibit with friends the other day, I had not exactly registered the “live!” part.

The exhibit was at the botantical gardens in a greenhouse-like room loaded with plants and water-misters and – free-flying butterflies.  

They were so beautiful and so fragile-looking. Some perched on plants and flapped their wings, some nibbled on fruit, some fluttered past my face, some rested on the ground (careful not to step on them, man!).

We spent at least a half-hour with the butterflies that day.

I didn’t know Warren Schor, the 20 year-old Cornell student that died from swine flu a few days ago.

But – I went to Cornell. So, I have been reading about him, and about the 520 students there that have contracted the H1N1 virus.

He walked and lived in the same places I did at that age, on the beautiful, but sometimes cold, stress-inducing Cornell campus. He lived in the same dorm I did. He majored in the same major I did. Studied in the same buildings I did. He lived in ZBT last, a fraternity where I spent some time. And I cannot imagine that fate befalling this guy as I cannot imagine this happening to any student walking through this 4 years of Cornell life. 

But – he didn’t get 4 years. And, I feel really sad. For him, because he was a nice young man in his prime. For the family and friends who loved him and were worrying about him during the 9 days he was in the hospital and who are now grieving.

For the loss when there should be dreams of the future.

I wore my high heel pumps to work one day, and apparently the stress fracture on my cuboid bone is not totally heeled because it was screaming by the end of the day – “get me out of these damn heels!”

So, last weekend, I went to Richie & Co. looking for black mid-heel shoes for work and for tooling around Portsmouth this fall. As in – two pair.

Great finds!

This Beautifeel Kimberly shoe is the most comfortable shoe ever.

The moment I put it on, it fit like a second skin, and I have worn it all day at work with no rubbing or pain at all. Plus, I like how they look – they are made of leather and patent leather and stretchy material on the top edge. Very Mondrian.

I also got these Everybody Monza short booties.

They are black with a gray flap on top, with a stack wood heel. Short boots are in style this season too, which is a plus.

I so love shoe shopping.

When some friends told me they were going to NYC this weekend, I urged them to go to the Barney’s warehouse sale. I urged them so hard that I almost decided to get in the car and go myself. This is the sale of all sales, the deals of all deals, the best sale ever, not only for the great clothes at incredibly low prices, but for the scene itself. Crazed women undressing in the aisles to try on clothes (there were no fitting rooms for many years – it is in a warehouse building).

Alas, common sense ruled – I am not driving to NYC on Labor Day weekend.

So, we decided to drive an hour to the local outlets. ["We" is myself, my husband, and my mother.]

I hadn’t been lately. New stores!

At Kate Spade, everything was 40% off already marked-down prices. I got the Yardley Serena bag in black textured leather. I like the outside side-pockets – great to slip in cell phones, the BlackBerry, even a pack of smokes.

We hit BCBG Max Azaria, where the trendy clothes got  some husband-frowns but where I bought – anyway – a really long black cardigan sweater with 3/4 sleeves and a black and white silky top with a waist-sash.

And then we stepped into Escada. The original prices here are outrageous, but the sale was up to 90% off. 

This white button-down shirt has a V-neck, but a tie sash on the collar. Some random shopper woman who already bought this shirt showed me how to tie the sash in the back, on the side, and other various ways.  [That kind of sounds odd.] Also, there was a black cashmere sleeveless shell with white stitched edges reduced from over $400 to $29. No brainer.

I did leave behind the $1,100 fuschia safari jacket (on sale for $80) that the saleswoman and other customers kept urging me to buy because “the color looks so good with your black hair!” 

Even the best sale cannot sway me to enter a room in a puffy-sleeved fuschia safari jacket.

It’s not real, but it may as well be. These days the “news” is all about fear.