Bill Hicks has been a favorite since 7th grade

"The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. 


The ride goes up and down, around and around, it has thrills and chills, and it's very brightly colored, and it's very loud, and it's fun for a while. 


Many people have been on the ride a long time, and they begin to wonder, "Hey, is this real, or is this just a ride?" 


And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and say, "Hey, don't worry; don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride." And we … kill those people. 


"Shut him up! I've got a lot invested in this ride, shut him up! 


Look at my furrows of worry, look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real."


It's just a ride. 


But we always kill the good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that? And let the demons run amok … But it doesn't matter, because it's just a ride. 


And we can change it any time we want. It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. 


Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. 


The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. 


The eyes of love instead see all of us as one. 


Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. 


Take all that money we spend on weapons and defenses each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would pay for many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace."


Bill Hicks is the man. 


http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bill_Hicks

Ripping My Heart Was So Easy

It’s been a wild year!

One year ago, almost to the day, I had my heart unceremoniously stomped on.

Actually, that description barely does what happened to my poor little heart justice.

This is better:

A hacky sack circle was formed where a bunch of lousy stoners wasted an entire afternoon kicking my heart around before forgetting about it when they left to smoke blunts and watch Entourage.

So

That wasn’t Too Much Fun.

Then came the nightmarish aftermath.

That was…

Actually…

Pretty damn fun!

I mean. It sucked. I was lonely and despairing and all of that great junk.

I could listen to sad songs all day and have them really Mean Something.

Bawling along to Steely Dan’s “Reeling in the Years” - while one person’s tragedy – definitely, super funny.

“The things you think are precious, I can’t understand.”

I may have freaked out a man or two who showed interest.

“Do you want to get coffee sometime?” they’d ask me.

“Sure!” I’d answer.

“OR, instead of coffee…

“Do you want to sleep over at my place every night and cuddle and make food together and NEVER LEAVE ME?”

This is the subtle art of seduction.

No one is able to resist insatiable neediness. ;-) tip tip tipity tip.

So what was the fun part?

Well, you see

“Freedom’s just another word for Nothing Left to Lose.” :-)

Pre hacky sack heart I’d been thinking, “I could settle down in Ohio with this man, get my entry level job, have a little grow op and maybe a dog. Sleep through winters.”

Post blunts and Entourage: “Fuck it. I’m gonna Viva la Vida Las Vegas! And I’m Never Going to Sleep Again!”

My lack of mental stability allowed me to make a series of impossibly risky, unhealthy, and ultimately, super awesome decisions.

“Sometimes shattering defeat is the key to real success.”

One Year Later

I’m impossibly happy.

Happier than I even knew was possible.

My life is going wonderfully.

OR

I often suspect that I’m actually a schizophrenic old woman in an insane asylum simply hallucinating that I’m young, healthy, and free, living the life of (way better than) a rich old dude in Las Vegas.

I became a yoga instructor, and that has changed my life profoundly and beautifully forever.

I’ve gone on some of the most Wild Adventures of my life. And this is really saying something good.

I became my own best friend. I think I’m groovy. 

And, most importantly, I’ve met so many wonderful people. 

Each new person that inspires you makes you grow. Makes your light shine brighter.

Listen, baby, I AM bulletproof.

I lived my junior year of high school in Brazil as an exchange student.

It made me immune to fear.

“Wow! You’re really brave!”

“Thanks, but I prefer to think of it as completely shameless.”

Once I learned at 16-years-old, I could thrive in a foreign country where I knew no one, didn’t understand the culture, and literally, was not speaking the same language

Little things like driving cross-country alone to live in Las Vegas where I knew no one and had no job became EASY.

“Are they going to speak English when I get there?”

“Yes.”

“Ah, I think I’ll manage just fine! That’s my first language!”

Turns out, the hacky sack heart incident has done the same thing for my emotional strength and stability.

Once I learned at 22-years-old that I could be crushed completely by someone I deeply and profoundly loved, and still love very much, and come out of it a better, more complete, more interesting person

Little things like almost anything else became Easy

Why Sweat the SMALL stuff When There’s Fun to Be Had and LOVE to Go Around?

Between yoga and meditating, I just don't get upset for all too long anymore.

I’ll feel down, but then after staring at my arms and legs in different wacky positions while breathing audibly in and out through my nose for an hour or more, I’m walking on sunshine again.

“Ania, look! I can put my leg behind my head! Ania! Are you watching me? Ania! Watch me!”

I yell to Ania from a mountaintop. I’m like a little kid in a pool to their mom.

She ignores me. :P Silly Ania. :-)

It’s you. And you’re breath. And this is More Than Enough.

MORE THAN ENOUGH.

So, happy one year of being over 100% single to me!

I’m looking forward to the two-year anniversary. I’m sure it’ll be even better. 

Between Courtly Love and the Glory Hole

I read a story the other day. 

A man was arrested when his neighbors called the cops.

He’d been making passionate, thoughtful love to the hole in the top of the picnic table in his backyard.

Sorry picnic table umbrella – you have some competition for this fickle hole’s affections.

Wait… so…

What?! Men will have sex with the holes in picnic tables!? The male libido is ridiculous.

I’ve never once been tempted to have sex with an inanimate object I’ve found in my backyard…

It’s hard enough living as a woman, but feminism aside, I’m glad I don’t have to try and control a penis. 

Men at least make it seem super hard.  

Hehehe super hard.

So I was listening to some music with some friends in college, and I was the only girl in the group.

One of the guys tells me, “We were talking earlier, and we said the ideal romantic relationship for a man is the glory hole. You’ve stuck your penis somewhere, you don’t know exactly who’s servicing it, you don’t have to talk to this person, and then you’re on your way.”

*Sigh. Why couldn’t I have been born a lesbian? Why do I love you lying bastards so much?

“How would you explain a woman’s ideal relationship?”

I lay some enlightenment on the Neanderthals.

“Courtly love is the woman’s ideal relationship. Knights used to go on brave quests to prove their Love for a lady. They’d write them beautiful love poems and dedicate all of their honorable actions to their missus, but they felt it was an imposition to actually approach or talk to the object of their affection.”

So ideally, I’d like a man to worship me and send me neato presents from afar, possibly write some groovy music about me, all while leaving me the hell alone.

This sound super reasonable to me. 

So, the trick to a satisfactory male-female relationship?

Find a compromise between courtly love and glory hole.

That should be super easy. 

So This is LOVE?! dodododo - Cinderella

While on a free 10 day trip to Israel thanks to the Jewish Powers That Be, I met Dan when I was standing in (not on) the Sea of Galilee and knew immediately he was the man of my dreams.

Then, like most dreams, I totally forgot about Dan. 

Turns out Dan is super hard to remember.

But he just came up again, because I was feeling gassy and disgusting and kind of sick the other day, so I was thinking about him.

So I’ve dug up our old Love Letters to make a public declaration of our love for each other before I forget again.

My Dearest Leah,

Israel is so beautiful without you.

Dear Daniel,

How I miss your grating voice and abnormal appearance. Standing by you always made me feel like a better, more attractive person.

In comparison, of course. 

Not like, you actually make me a better person.

My Dearest Leah,

It sucks that you miss me so much.. 

What sucks more is that we would actually make a really great couple if I wasn’t completely out of your league.

Dear Daniel,

I'm going to need your telephone number. 

It is really important we get in touch.

Your cooperation might make the judge look more favorably on you in the future. 



Let me explain.

Remember that one night when you were black out drunk and I told you that I took care of you all night and watched you to keep you safe and then in the morning I told you that you were sore because you fell on the nightstand and hit your pelvis? 



Well... That is kind of what happened. I DID "take care of you" all night.

And you did fall and hit your pelvis on "something" repeatedly.

Against my will. 



Basically, you horny asshole.

NO means NO and I'm keeping it.

AND You Are Paying For It! So call me!

Dear Leah,

All I was doing was trying to populate the Jewish race.

You can’t be mad at me for that, right? Birthright told me to do it!


I can't wait to hear your voice..  it’s like a whisper from an angel to a child :) or like a devil woman screaming NO when she really means YES.

either/or.

My Dearest Daniel,

The first night we met, I saw fireworks! 

It ended up being from dehydration (I almost died), but I at first thought it was because I liked you so much. 

I miss you.

Dear Lumpy butt,



The first night I saw you, I was a little nervous at first that people would wonder why I would be interested in someone so below me physically, intellectually and so on.

However, I figured that people would eventually pity me for my poor luck with women and decide to buy me gifts to compensate.

Since then, I have received a ridiculous amount of charitable gifts including a trip to Vietnam, fine jewelry, and charitable donations in my name to the American Association of Plastic Surgery.

I am so happy that we have met and that you didn't die of dehydration (it just would have been embarrassing for you.)

Hope all is well in ugoville,


Dan

To The Love of My Life,



Ever since I met you, you've been all I can think about, other than: myself, my friends, my job, how much I dislike China, and getting things for free.

I want you to know that I've remained completely faithful to you. 

Not physically faithful, of course - I've had sex with more guys (and girls) than times you've gotten the clap.

I trust that you've been faithful too. 

I'm sure you have, it's way harder for you to get someone to have sex with you than it is for me.

I want nothing else than to be with you. And a puppy. And chocolate.

Someday I shall see you again, meu amor.

Until that day, I'll totally miss you a lot. 



with love and lust


Leah

*p.s. I'll fill your necklace for you any time you want.

* The necklace in question, on Tom's forehead in this photo, is disgusting and Really Exists in Israel. I’m not going to explain the entire concept because it’s very boring. But it involves vaginal juices in exchange for sleeping in…

My Dearest Leahkins,

Saying nice things to me?

Wow life must be getting pretty desperate for you.

How embarrassing.

I bet it’s hard to show your weird face in public sometimes. You already had an unfortunate amount of my pity.. but now?

We better have sex very soon then.. I'm sure it will give you a slew of new insults. My awkward sexual inabilities will force you back into a pattern of cruel jokes and immature degrading.. 

And after all isn't that what the Jews would want?

For us to work so hard to preserve this tradition of sarcastic snobbery and wit.

I'm pretty sure that's what Birthright taught us.

Lachium

Dear Daniel,

I miss your sexy ass. I want to touch you in naughty places and fill up your necklace vial so you can sleep in for a week!

If I'd planned better I could have tried to visit before Christmas... maybe this summer.

Every night in my dreams, I see you, I feel you.

That is how I know you go on!

Can't wait to serenade you to sleep with our song just like it used to be.

Dear Leah,

I don’t remember you ever serenading me to sleep will Celine Dion, to be honest. 

Maybe it was so horrific my mind did me a favor and blacked it out..

Next time, you should try stripping for me.

I’m sure nothing would put me to sleep more quickly.

 

It would be so awesome if you came to NY (for you at least), but I have to warn you that I can’t really be seen in public with someone of your physique and stature.

Sometimes its hard for me to be so beautiful and loved because it makes me inaccessible to homely people like you.

Hopefully spending time with you can be put towards my community service hours the courts have sentenced me with for driving my car through that football practice after my afternoon Jack Daniels binge.

Either way, I’m sure we can hang out in dark places or at strange hours of the night to catch up.



I miss you like a recovering addict misses crack and I look forward to reading your creepo magazine.

♥ Dan

Happy Birthday Jess Hughes! I Love you!!!

“You could get adderall prescribed to you. Just tell the doctor everything you just told me about your life,” Jess says.

"You mean, how I'm dating a bunch of guys and it's obvious it won't work out with any of them?"

"Among other things."

"What else should I say?"

“That you go through cities like most people go through Christmas trees. And that you like to imagine yourself as Hunter S. Thompson running around Las Vegas.”

“I see.”

I take a hit of my bowl.

“I could really use an adderall script, you know? Nothing like a little amphetamine salt to get the juices flowing.” I’m stoic about my disability.

“It would also make it easier to clean my room.”

My room is awful. I move a banana peel on to a plate and place it on top of a pizza box beside the bed. 

Jess tells me that she’s one of the top 20 in the nation in her group for her job as a Financial Advisor. Where she’s one of the only women. Yay, women!

I, now, never have to learn to manage my own financial situation - assuming one day there will be a financial situation to manage. Jess is going to do it for me. :-) 

From the time of graduation, my best friend Jess has been grinding it out, making connections, like nothing I’ve ever seen before.

The yin to my yang, I got broken up with and moved to Vegas to follow my he(art), and Jess moved in with her long time lawyer boyfriend and his dog  and she got a real job.

Jess is super smart.

The first time I met her we were in an honors anthropology class that was impossible. The tests were ridiculously difficult. It was like learning an entirely new language in a few short weeks.

Australopithecus Afarensis, indeed.

We got our first test back.

Usually, I’m an expert test taker. The adrenalin rush of being tested gives my brain joygasms and it performs at this heightened level.

I’m a nerd, I love tests, and I am not ashamed.

So, I get my test back and it’s a 64%. NOT OKAY.

I know I had been drinking last night, but that was only because a new bar had opened on the walk home from my classes, and it was empty after my classes, and the bartender was cute, and funny, and gave me free drinks.

It wasn’t my fault.

So I’m pissed about my test score.

I look a row over and this super fine blonde lady has a 94%, and a SMILEY FACE, AND the notation, “GREAT JOB!”

Later, in our life together, Jess would complain to me that the 6% was deducted unfairly and that there had been nothing wrong with her essay section.

The professor just hadn’t been confronted with this sort of brain before – his ego couldn’t take it.

I am sad.

I write in pen, “Great job!” on my paper…

It doesn't feel the same when I write it..

“She’s better than me!” I realize.

“I must make her my friend!”

The last day of class we finally speak.

“Oh man,” Jess says, “I’ve got to study for this Portuguese final.”

“Portuguese? I happen to be fluent in Portuguese.”

“Oh really!?” Jess is impressed with me.

I’m so in.

“Yes, yes. I was a high school exchange student in Brazil for a year. Learned through immersion. No big deal…”

Jess is definitely going to be my best friend. It’s fate. Why else would she be studying the one language that makes me seem cool?

We don’t make plans.

Suddenly, the following quarter she’s in two of my classes! And apparently works out at the RPAC the same times I do!

Like I said, fate intervened.

Now Jess and I are best friends. <3

An entire college senior year of some of the most fun night and days of my life was to follow. :-)

I LOVE JESS HUGHES!

So

Happy Birthday, Jess!!

Whenever it’s your birthday!

And get Skype! So we can talk in real time! I just tried it yesterday and it’s awesome!

My Favorite Pickup Line

After meeting someone new, I’ll discover that we both like music, or sleeping, or eating way too much pizza but not getting fat.

Then I get to say

My favorite pick-up line:

“We have so much in common!”

"You like beer?! I like beer! We have so much in common, Marshall!"

This line is hilarious, because you’ve just met this person.

You have no idea if you and this person have anything in common, and you both know this – it’s fake flattery.

Which makes it super effective. :)

The Origin Story

My line, “We have so much in common!”

Was given to me by the comedy gods the summer after my freshman year of college.

I was working as a camp counselor/lake lifeguard/boating instructor at a coed, two month long, summer camp in the Pocono Mountains.

Some poor misguided soul had put me in charge of 12, 14-year-old girls, about to enter high school, whose only interest was boys.

My only interest was is boys!

(my british co counselors :-) ) 

“We have so much in common!”

All of the counselors were in the middle of the healthiest summer of our lives.

When you’re up at 6 am every morning and never alone until you go to bed at 10 pm, you don’t have idle hands for the devil to play with.  

One of the very few times in my life that this has been my situation.

Usually, my hands are free for just about anything…

I was spending my days hiking through the woods to get to the lake. Then I’d paddle around in a rescue kayak, yelling at kids not to rock the boat.

No kid was allowed out on the lake without a life preserver AND a floating device, so a camper would have to go out of their way to drown.  This made being a lake lifeguard a lot like meditation. 

I’d lead kayaking excursions and, in my free time, I’d try to teach myself how to sail.

It was a nice summer - lots of stars that summer.

I’d made the long distance relationship mistake that summer. :-( Sad face.

“Two months isn’t bad,” I’d thought.

In the normal world, this is very kind of true.

In camp world, in two months, you’ve spent so much time with the same group of people, and been awake for so long that it might as well have been half a year or more of interacting in the normal world.

Coupled with the fact that you’re Never Alone, so there’s never any You Time… if you’re picking up what I’m putting down. ;-)

(I'm talking about masturbation.)

After a month, the gap between the counselors who were getting laid and those of us who were not had grown obvious. 

Those getting laid were almost unbearably happy all of the time.

Those of us in solitary confinement were really, fucking irritable.

A couple nights a week, I would get a night out from 10 pm to 12:30 am back at the campsite, and in your cabin by 1 am.

Finally it was my night out!

My boyfriend was driving out to see me and would be there the next day! So I was a little bit Too Excited.   

A group of us went to the lake for some drinks.

And.

Oh damn. Again?

I drank a little too much.

Didn’t drive… as far as my memory serves me.

Made it to camp.

Checked in without appearing too drunk.

(This skill later became essential in Sydney Australia, where they will refuse to sell you alcohol for appearing too drunk.)

Stop smiling. Don’t talk more than necessary. Get in. Get out.

I’m a master of deception. 

Leah Davis: tiptoeing to the bed, jumping over clothes, sliding under the blankets for the win!

Usually, it’s no problem sneaking in to the little cabin bunk beds to sleep. The girls have lights off at 10 pm.  

But, Ah Me!

This night the wretched monsters were awake!

And wanted to hang out with me!

Such super bad influences those girls were on my behavior.

I believe…

What ensued…

Was a mini dance party.

And at one point, a camper, allegedly, asked me what my name was, and I proudly told her that,

“My name is Leah!” Because that is the truth, and I was raised to tell the truth, you see. 

I then, being polite I thought, asked her what her name was.

“My name is Leah too!” she lied to me. Some people have no manners.

“That’s great!” I was so happy to meet another Leah, even though I knew her name was Jessica.

“We have so much in common!”

Those Adorable Girls are Evil Monsters!

It was a lesson in futility trying to control them. They knew I had no real power over them.

An Unhappy Home


My co-counselor, Jamie, was the other person in charge of these 12 horny, little brats

Perpetually irritated, especially with me, Jamie was not pleased about the dance party.

Exactly like the angry priest in the movie Footloose.


Jamie hated happiness and dancing.

OK GO understands me: “You can’t stop these kids from dancing!” 

In our summer co-counselor/life partner relationship:

Jamie was the mom that stayed home with the kids all day and took them to activities.

I was the father figure, leaving for the lake during the day. Coming back at night and just wanting to have the kids out of my hair.

Just like on the TV show Modern Family, mom Jamie was the disciplinarian and I was the useless father figure who didn’t see what the big deal was all of the time.

I was camping out in the middle of the beautiful Pocono Mountains all summer, my girls were practically old enough to drive cars, and I was getting paid for it!

Calm down, Jamie! Life is good!

Jamie assured me that I only felt this way because I got a break from the kids, while she had to slave away at home.

Our arranged marriage fell apart until finally, Jamie and I, in front of the children, had a screaming fight where I broke down crying and ran from the room.

Jamie chased after me. By this time, I’d stripped naked and jumped in the shower.

A misguided attempt to hide the fact I’d started crying.

Jamie ended up apologizing to me through a shower curtain.

Always a strong man, I said, “I’ll be fine. I just don’t want to talk about it right now - or ever.  Just please, leave me alone until I’ve regained my composure.”

The Telephone Game

Between Jamie already hating me and wanting me fired and my girls having just had the most fun night ever,

By lunch time, I had many male counselors asking me if it was true I’d come home wasted, woke all my girls up, and insisted they strip so we could have an underwear dance party…

Rumors are so vicious!

And at summer camps where many of the counselors are busy not getting laid, the prospect of an underwear dance party with drunk me and jailbait campers might as well have been Girls Gone Wild filming in the woods.

Well, it wasn’t true!

The stripping part, at least, was patently untrue.

I'm positive my girls would have told me about a stripping dance party.  And I didn’t hear anything about any of that from anyone who was there on the night in question. 

You’re Fired!

There are a number of reasons why this could have been…

but I’m pretty sure it was the whole dance party incident; I wasn’t invited back to be a counselor the next summer.

But I also wasn’t really fired!

And that’s, historically, tied for the best work I’ve done at any job! 

Even with "the machine" trying to keep me down, while I raged against it

It was a great summer. :-)

A Letter to Romy in Israel

Dear Romy,

I miss the way you eat cookies, and tell me jokes, and hang out with The Ohio State varsity swim team.

I like to do all of these things too.

How are things in Israel?

I hope you haven’t been arrested or deported yet.

There’s no need to rush your International criminal record. Put some thought into what crimes are really important to you and then dedicate yourself fully to committing them.

I lost my camera on the beach in Tel Aviv when I was there three summers ago. So be a pal and go find it for me? Thanks in advance for being such a diligent searcher. 

PS We can't be friends anymore if this takes you longer than a week.

How many Israeli hearts have you broken so far? My guess is 38.5 hearts.  

I told you not to date Israeli men but you never listen to me when I tell you how to live your life – you need to work on this.

How many people have you tricked into believing that all we eat in America is ice cream and cheeseburgers?

Do they have ice cream and cheeseburgers in Israel?

What do they call ice cream and cheeseburgers in Israel?

Probably not a “Royale with Cheese.” That’s what they call a quarter pounder with cheese in Paris. I know this because of the movie Pulp Fiction. Isn’t that fascinating?

Can you say, “I want to make out with you,” in Hebrew yet?

I can. I can also say, "Shalom."

What stereotypes have you discovered are true? Any of the really offensive ones? 

Have any conservative Jewish communities chased you through the streets throwing rocks at you for immodestly showing your bra straps under a tank top?

If not, I highly recommend doing this and then putting it in slow motion on youtube and dubbing it with the Matisyahu song “Jerusalem.” I'd watch that and then click the little "like" button on the left hand side. 

When I was in Jerusalem, on my birthday, I snuck out of the hotel I was staying at with two cute Israeli soldiers and my friend Rachel, and we smoked a 4-year-old spliff on the roof of a kibbutz overlooking the city and Bethlehem, and I got a headache.

Have you had any similar religious experiences in the holiest of all cities?

Are you sick of falafel yet?

Is Adam Sandler there? Say hello to him for me! And tell him I thought the movie Grownups was “cute” and "okay." He’ll appreciate my input.

I miss your face.

Be safe, remember not to openly support Palestine, and let me know how the walking on water at the Sea of Galilee goes!

Shalom

Your Sin City friend

Leah

Xoxoxo