To My Valentines

When I was little, instead of making plans for my dream wedding, I was making plans for my dream house. It had a great big wood stove, a claw-foot soaking tub surrounded by hanging plants, the library included a hand-painted wooden ceiling, and at the center a glistening sunroom where I would spend most my days. Instead of imagining my dream man, I was plotting out my dream career - police officer during the day, comedian at night, and a filmmaker in my free time. I designed gardens and shoes, wrote backyard musicals, and built sculptures out of sticks. My future fantasy was all about being independently, unapologetically, me.

And then I fell in love. Over and over and over again. Tender love, fierce love, obsession, infatuation, exciting and scary love. Love that was no love at all but need born of fear and self-destruction. Love with love in return, and love into a void. Love that promised me all I ever wanted, and love that itself was more than enough. I have loved multiple people at once, with both mind and body. I have acted badly in the name of love, and learned how to act after love loss. My roster of lovers is quite small, but some of those loves knew no bounds. The wounds from lovers past run deep, but a memory of a note hidden in a coat pocket, or a lover’s plea to watch me dream - love becomes a salve. Love has consumed me, inspired me, torn me down, and given me hope. Much to that nerdy, awkward, dream-house planning, musical-writing, career-focused little girl’s surprise: I have completely lost myself in love.

And now, I am nearing 38 and single and I am happy. Truly happy. My experience with love has provided an invaluable mirror: I am uniquely, dynamically, lovable. And so I have come full circle, back to that little girl that just dreams of one day building a house, a career, a little creative over-filled life of things that are for me, that make me smile.

So Happy Valentine’s Day to all the loves that got me here. To all of you. And to me!

Movie: Here

This movie isn’t about two people falling in love. It’s not really even about two people meeting. This film is the experience of a moment. It is the emotional space between one day and the next, the suspended air when a stranger’s hello feels like an understanding, it’s the dismantling of time that happens when one truly listens. The story begins with Stefan, a construction worker in the days before traveling to his next gig, as he cleans out his fridge and offers soup to those he loves. It’s not until halfway through the movie that Stefan crosses paths with our other protagonist, a woman studying local moss. Their meeting is not sparks and flames. It is a modest knowing. Like most of my favorite movies, Here is patient and gentle and quietly magical, like love in its purest form. The cinematography is lush, and the sound design is soothing. Little enchantments are sprinkled throughout, such as the isolation of a single sound within a scene or the unexplained green glow from within cupped hands. At one point Shuxiu explains the power of moss, “like a micro-forest. A forest that’s full of life.” And so is the power of Here, reminding that if we are present, if we’re really here, each and every moment is full of life. To continue the heart swell, follow a watch with a read of Sheila O'Malley’s own touching review here.

Soft. Calming. Sweet.

Short: Making Babies

A realistic take on the pressures to conceive and the strain it can place on a once-thriving relationship, this story could easily feel melodramatic and cliché. Instead, the naturalistic and clever writing makes Making Babies an impressive directorial debut. Peppered with humor, the 20 minute film feels short and bittersweet with witty characters, grounded acting, and a driving soundtrack. The short is broken up by chronological “attempts” creating quick chapters that keep the story punchy from attempt #1 all the way through #67. Writer/director Eric K Boulianne manages to touch on themes of male fragility, female pressures, and race without making the film about any of that. At the end of the day, the film is simply about a couple trying their best, learning through heartache and healing what makes things work.

Honest. Playful. Touching.

Art Book: Investigation of Love

Inspired by a Dutch residence permit application, which required artist Lilia Luganskaia to submit photographic evidence of her relationship to an anonymous immigration officer, this project asks whether a notion as abstract as love can be assessed and proven. Images include items the couple own, places they’ve traveled to, longing portraits, love letters and love witnesses. Framed as individual pieces of forensic evidence, even the photograph of their shared dog feels sterile. Attempting to make the intangible tangible for the ruling of a third-party, the book questions what defines love and by whom? In a world where happiness seems to be defined by always-on smiling Instagram stories and breaking news 20-photo engagement posts, there is a hidden warning within Investigations of Love: try too hard to substantiate love, and the fertile ground of love may grow lifeless.

Thought-provoking. Crisp.

Snack: Flourless Chocolate Cake

If love is an action, here are my top 10 favorite most romantic ways to say ‘I love you’:

• A surprise Topo Chico from the bodega

• Share a new, secret swimming hole

• Get me with a jump-scare

• Cook me dinner even though I like to be in control in the kitchen

• Tell a stranger about my newsletter

• A hand-written note for no reason

• A bouquet of flowers found in a field

• Let me fall asleep during the movie

• Helping with errands

• A long Sunday walk that starts at the farmer’s market, pivots to some book shops, and lingers into bops and pop-ins with silence and chit chat and laughter and hands held

This list of ‘I love you’s’ I am lucky enough to get on a regular basis from my uniquely intimate, brilliant, highly romantic friendships. Then at the end of the day I get to crawl into my cozy bed with plenty of room, in my perfect apartment decorated just to my liking, to continue my dreams that are solely for me. Sometimes in love, you really can have your cake and eat it too.

Rich. Luscious. Easy. Adaptable.

• Butter up a square or round cake pan and get the oven going at 350°

• Get a big pot with shallow water simmering and wedge a metal mixing bowl down in there, melting and stirring a cup of bittersweet chocolate chips in the bowl

  (You can also do this in a microwave, but I don’t have one of those!)

• Once chips are smooth, stir in ¾ cup butter until melted

• Stir in ½ cup cocoa powder and ¾ cup brown sugar

• Crack in 4 eggs, one at a time, beaten and stirred with each plop

• Scrape into pan and bake about 45 minutes

• Mix things up before bake with a few scattered blackberries or raspberries, a handful of blueberries, stir in a few scoops of instant espresso, a handful of walnuts or pecans, a splash of bourbon, top with homemade low-whipped cream and a pinch of coarse salt, serve with ice cream if you please

• If you see a little left over on your lover’s lip, kiss it right off!

Let love in,

<3 Julie