my boyfriend's boyfriend

vermont diner
Originally uploaded by kristalynn.

my boyfriend's hot.

no, it's not a good thing. it means i have to deal with omnipresent women giving me the once-over ("hmph", they think). i have to endure eyelash-batting girls who twirl locks of hair and sidle up to him. i have to tolerate the laugh/head toss.

i've had to meet a pageant of ex-girlfriends. each one more displeased with me than the last. a succession of models and actresses who opportunely require my boyfriend to "run lines with" or provide "accent coaching".


"do you remember tintoretto? (not real name)" he asked one day. "he used to live in your building."

"yeah, of course. the bald guy. he's hot."

"yeah him. well, i ran into him yesterday and he invited me to go running."

"oh that's nice."

tintoretto is gay.

soon enough, my boyfriend and tintoretto were having afternoon tea, proofreading each other's documents, tearing up each other's linoleum tiles, and swapping scallop recipes. i'd have to listen to sentences like: "well, tintoretto likes my hair this way" and "tintoretto hated 'lost in translation' - it brought bile to his mouth."

enough became enough and i started to aver that tintoretto had to make an effort to get to know me as well. a few dinners were had. all went well; i didn't pick up any jealousy. i had him over for new years and we were up until 4 am talking; i didn't sense any resentment.

then one night i was watching jon stewart and the phone rang. my boyfriend had gone to bed and i didn't want it to wake him.

"hello?" i quietly answered.

i heard a click. and then i heard a dial tone.

*69.

it was tintoretto.

how many times does he have to be reminded that i am, actually, in the picture?

have i mentioned that he is 49 years old?

not too long ago i needed a drill. my boyfriend borrowed tintoretto's, because, despite being gay, he does know how to use powertools (hence his hotness).

it was up to me to return said powertool as my boyfriend had to go to greece to bury his grandmother. i left tintoretto a message one morning (it picked up after he first ring - he WAS home) saying that i was going for a run and i could drop it off, seeing that the running path is right by his house.

he never called back.

when my boyfriend returned from greece, a few weeks later, there were several messages asking for the drill back. my boyfriend came by my place, picked it up, and returned it. "he needed it, you know!"

"i left him a message!" i defended. "i wasn't proposing to have tea with him! i wasn't going to present my vagina to him!"

"i know krista. maybe whoever borrows the drill has to return the drill. maybe that's one of his rules."


over the years that we’ve been together, i've noticed many, many changes in my man. the latest are a surge of gray hairs and an emergent, and i do believe permanent, spare tire. i welcome these transmogrifications with open, flabby arms. hopefully they’ll help keep the nuisances at bay.

untitled (bocca della verità)

Originally uploaded by kristalynn.

i had the great advantage of living in rome during my last two years of high school. there i not only had the privilege of experiencing the most magical city in the world, but i also met some incredible people who i never would have crossed paths with had i not crossed the ocean: my first love, my second love, and a whole whack of international students who found themselves in an international school for a variety of reasons. parents were stationed in saudi arabia where it wasn't safe for their kids. parents were living in new delhi and wanted their kids to get a better education. rich americans sent their kids abroad; rich italians wanted their kids to learn english... and then there were the army and diplomatic brats like me.

i met sophie when i was 17. we were both broody and moody. she and her sister came to our school late in the year because their family was threatened during their south american posting. they are half vietnamese, half french and arrestingly beautiful.

sophie and i bonded through our deep thoughts, gelato, and drinking in trastevere. during my final year of high school, we had a falling out of sorts - i can't remember over what, but it certainly wasn't over a guy - but we there was a reconciliation right before the yearbook came out.

we've kept in touch over the years. it's never frequent, but i hope it's consistent. she came to montreal to visit a boyfriend, i visited her in aix-en-provence.

i got an email a few years back that she had gotten married.

i got an email not too long after that that she and her husband were in lebanon working with an international organization, doing good things in that part of the world. and that they were looking to move on to africa. she told me she reads my blog. i beamed.

i told her senegal was beautiful and that she should go there.

i'm not sure if sophie and bob had time to make their move to another part of the world before this latest crisis erupted in lebanon. she's been in my thoughts for the past week.

soph, i know you don't email often, and you never leave comments, but when you get at a computer, could you please let me know where you are.

going fishing, or how i learned to take one to know one

Originally uploaded by kristalynn.

there are blogs out there that get a gagillion hits a day and ones where people vie to leave the first comment . it gives me blog envy, or blenvy.

i, on the other hand, check my sites 239 times a day to see who has commented. i do have readers - i see the numbers. but the better part of them – you – lurk. you lurk in, you lurk out, without leaving any evidence of your visit.

i don't know why this comes as any surprise. i'm a wallflower (“a shy or retiring person who remains unnoticed at social events, especially a woman without a dance partner.”). so it should be commonsensical that i attract that type of reader. birds of a feather lurk together.


i'm the one who'll be conversing with a charming young man at a party when someone else will step right in front of me to greet this person. i used to walk away, but now i often just stick around, a mere two inches behind said impertinence until they inevitably step on me.

"oh," they'll say looking over their shoulder, surprised to see someone.

they'll receive an explanation from the person to whom i was once speaking.

"oh, this is your girlfriend?" they'll say, reluctantly extending their hand to me.

i've also been at perfunctorily horrible weddings when the perfunctorily horrible "get-up-on-the-dance-floor" song plays.

"woo!" i'll exclaim, raising-the-roof.

and as "mambo #5" plays on, the ever-enthusiastic "dance circle" will form, and consequently close, sealing all breaches and leaving me on its periphery.

lou bega and i will tough it out, with my "internal dialogue" telling me that i don't need to rely on being part of this kinship assemblage.

and then someone will step on me.

that circle member will turn around, curious as to what they could have possible stepped on (does anything exist outside of a dance circle?), wave in attempted apology, and then take his or her place in the center of the circle. it's time for their solo.

and with no further delay, my inner dialogue tells me that i'm actually not the "independent girl who doesn't need to be part of the dance circle", but instead "that loser who's dancing alone".

i retreat.

just the other day i was sitting with someone at a cafe when an acquaintance walked by.

"sit for a second," i offered. "pull up a chair."

they grabbed a chair from another table and promptly placed it on my foot.

"ow…" i mumbled, rubbing my toe.

"oh, sorry. didn't see you there..."

i'm extra careful when getting out of the back seat of 2-door cars due to an unfortunate door-slamming-on-leg incident during a visit to see my ("oh, she was on my side?") sister.

i'm invisible at parties, i'm unheard at dinners, and i'm stepped on during gatherings.

keep it up, commenters!

congratulazioni azzuri miei!

forza
Originally uploaded by kristalynn.

wish i could be there isa...

on perineal censorship

"you EDITED!" she accusatorily hurled at me, a glass of champagne in one hand, a whiskey in the other. "you removed 'labia majora'."

"but i left ‘perineum’!" i defended.

"a ‘perineum’ is not enough! put the ‘labia’ back!"

my retract had been discovered. and i was getting in trouble. and it was merited.


in a related conversation a few days previous, i was speaking to a friend who was having censorship issues. i told her that whenever i came to that roadblock, the roadblock of whether or not to type "rectum" or "anal cavity", i realized that was the tipping point between creating something interesting or simply (e-)publishing some more white-washed drivel.

"your blog is great krista - just remember to keep it clean!" wrote one of my uncles several months ago. he signed it "your puritanical uncle".

"how am i supposed to deal with this?" i asked my sister.

"don't censor yourself! that's the worst thing you can do!" advised the woman who'll blog about how much her daughter is on a mission to make her lose her mind. “if he can’t handle it, he doesn’t have to read it. there are far worse things on the internet.”

there certainly are. the worst thing i’ve blogged about is someone taking an aqua-dump in a lake and throwing it at someone else’s chin.

so it was with great remorse and against my better judgment that i removed the 'labia majora’ from my previous blog. people were becoming too upset. i was advised to alert the authorities. i heard that another woman lost a night's sleep. i write these things to amuse, not to upset. it wasn't as though there had been actual contact with my labia majora or perineum; it was more as though his sights were set and there was great intention, aim, and aspiration. and a tiny slip of the lavender-lubricated hand would have realized those targets. all under the guise of "oopsies. well, isn't this quite the fervent massage..."

"i like 'perineum', but i like 'labia majora' more. put it back!" she barked.

the table next to us looked over with disdain.

"oops," she said. "i guess we should keep it down."