We looked at the world through rose-colored glasses,
sped through the night under blue moons,
parked in cars and gave boys the green light.

Explored gray areas, dreamed of golden boys,
painted the town red and got caught red-handed.

We saw adult freedoms and were green with envy,
we experienced blackouts (I’m talkin’ to you 151 ***),
swam in black water alone and talked to strangers,
told little white lies, yet somehow, we didn’t die young.

I think of college students as dyed-in-the-wool adults.
The grass always looked greener on the adult side,
and we’re tickled pink not to be infantilized any more.

We’ll show the world our true colors  
and pass college with flying colors.
Life won't be handed to us on silver platters,
we’ll get white collar jobs.

Of course, as adults, we’ll have to deal with red tape,
and we can’t be yellow-bellied or try to whitewash things.
We’ll stay out of the red or sing the blues.
We’ll stay off the yellow lines, seek golden opportunities,
attend black tie events, obey the golden rule, avoid pink slips,
support our men in blue and look for silver linings.

Adulthood sounds exhausting.
On the positive side, I’m told adults practice safe ***.  
Practice means what it’s always meant - right?
Is that why adults go to bed so early?
Besides, as adults, we won’t be kept in the dark anymore,
and we’ll get to chase rainbows!

I’ve been cutting Peter’s hair for a year. When covid lockdown occurred, I learned to cut my brother’s hair - and yes, he still has two ears. When I first met Peter, he had a great thick tangle of unkempt black and, in certain light, blue hair. It was **** as hell, in a lost puppy way.

Then, one Saturday morning last year, as summer began to settle in, he buzz cut it - out of the blue - you might say. When he showed up that morning for breakfast with Lisa and I (we were at Stillman), Lisa saw him first and turned just in time to see me, see him. She saw my squint as the sign of trouble it was.

Lisa’s yoda. “Guys,” she said simply.
How can I put this: Eeuuwww, creepy. Peter’s tall and lanky, like descriptions I’ve read of a young Abraham Lincoln, although unlike that great man, Peter’s rather handsome - with hair.

If the stubble were red, I could say he looked exactly like a matchstick, but with his black hair against his bone-white head, he looked more like an escaped convict.

When he got to our table he rubbed his hand over the ruin of his lost hair, and grinning, said, “How’d you like it?”
“Wow,” Lisa said, recusing herself noncommittedly.
I looked up from my phone, “We need to get you a HAT,” I said softly.
“Why?” he said, his grin dimming by a good 50%.

“Because,” I said, summoning all of my notable tact, “you aren’t going to hang around ME looking like Forrest Gump.” I’d just looked up hat stores and found one five blocks away, DelMonico Hatter, on Elm street. They even had the hat I was looking for in stock.
“What?” He started defensively.
“Get something to go.” I said, standing up and starting to gather up my things.
Peter, swimming like he usually does, got an egg & sausage biscuit and a cup of coffee to go.
As the three of us were walking, I asked Peter, “You like 'Breaking Bad', ya?”
“Sure,” he said, with a mouth half-full of biscuit.
“We’re getting you a heisenberg” I said, grinning. “or two.”

“No, I don’t know,” he said, slowing his walk. I could tell he was worried about the money. Peter and I had only been seeing each other casually at that point - we’d never even kissed - but I knew he lived on a small stipend, he received monthly, while completing his doctorate.

“Look,” I said, coming to a stop. We all came to a stop. “I’m flush, this is MY treat and I don’t want you to worry about it.” When he still looked hesitant, I said, exaggeratedly, as I started to walk again, “Don’t worry, you won’t owe me any ****** favors.”
“Aww, ****,” he said with a grin.
“She does this,” Lisa whispered to him, too loudly.

Eventually, we found him two Heisenberg hats for around $200. One, for summer day wear, a light beige Bailey Carver Straw Porkpie and the other, for nightwear, a Roche, DelMonico Palma Felt Pork Pie - just like Walter White’s. He looked quite the bengali menace.

Of course, his hair grew back in a few months, but he kept wearing the hats.  And now I cut his hair - to prevent any sudden, k-mart inspirations.

Rational men among us state plainly
- that no ghosts walk among us.
But they haven’t really searched the shadows,
or smelled the sweet musk-roses you wore
when windchimes twinkle like your laugh.

If ghosts haunt, then spirits linger.
If ghosts bedevil and terrorize,
spirits hangout, abide and remain.
Time is as nothing to them,
they are now and they are then.
We are shadows, that are becoming
shadows, that were shadows before.

Rational men know what they see,
but they’re dull and though waking,
remain unaware that lemures tamper,
with impressions, subconscious voices
and barely perceptible shenanigans,
across death’s thin, permeable veneer.

Here’s a playlist, Mr. Ex President:

'I Fought the Law' by The Clash
'Chain Gang' by The Pretenders
'Locked Up' by Akon
'My Own Prison' by Creed
'Prisoner' by The Weeknd
'Famous-in-A-Small-Town' by Miranda Lambert
'FatMan on the Run' by Paul McCartney & Wings
'Jailhouse Rock' by Elvis Presley
'Prison Grove' by Warren Zevon
‘Who’s Sorry Now’ by Connie Francis
‘If I Could Turn Back Time’ by Cher

If convicted, Trump should claim to identify as a woman

Lisa and I went to a reception, yesterday evening, for students who’d landed summer fellowships at a particular hospital in Boston. (Yeah us!) It wasn’t formal, so I wore a crimson cropped sweater, a beige circle skirt (with pockets!) and beige Sarto soft-leather ballet flats.

I’ve disparate feelings in these situations. I was excited - this was a goal I needed to achieve - that next notch - and my mom might even smile.

At the same time, I felt like an imposter. ‘If these people knew the trouble I’m having with physics this year,’ I thought, and ‘I know my sister could do this - and my brother - but can I?’

I try not to let my nervousness show, because the stories you tell yourself can hold you back.

The reception was small, there were only four students, their mentors and a few hospital and Yale people. As we signed in, we got name tags and tote bags with the hospital logo containing fellowship info. There were picture posters of the hospital all around and an intro video looping on a large screen TV. They took some snaps.

Several tables along one wall had coffee, sodas, water bottles and finger snacks - which I guess you’d call canapes - and melon ***** of all colors. The centerpiece though, was a big silver, smoked salmon with a lemon stuck in its mouth and a wreath of parsley about its neck - all on a bed of lettuce, surrounded by various crackers and French bread rolls.

I was working my way along the tables, because there were honeydew melon-***** and they’re a personal weakness. Honeydews aren’t in season now, so I was full-on, honeydew foraging. I’m sure I looked like a starving homeless girl who’d somehow gotten in and was trying to eat for the week.

A slim, attractive, black lady in a very stylish dark-gray beaded jacket & sheath dress, had stopped as if transfixed, staring solemnly at the salmon. As I drew next to her, my plate half full of honeydew *****, she said, “It’s a fitting memorial.” That hit me as so funny - I laughed embarrassingly - spitting half a melon ball under the table. She started laughing too - we were like two sillies at church. Her sad face, the way she’d said it - you had to be there.

After a few minutes, the hospital administrator gave a little general welcome, ending it with, “Now it’s time to meet your mentors.” The fish lady turned out to be my mentor. She was still standing next to me - she turned, offered her hand, and said, “Hi, I’m Rebecca.”

Her voice made those simple words seem warm and inviting. She looks to be in her early fifties (but I’m a bad judge of age), her short black hair was peppered with gray and white like she had just come in from the snow. We became instant old friends, cracking each other up.

Dr. Rebecca’s (again, I’m not doxing anyone) specialty is neurological surgery. She’s a Baltimore girl - born and raised - who attended Johns Hopkins from bachelors through medical school. Of course, I mentioned that both my siblings went to Johns at some point - Brice being a sophomore in med school there now.

Besides four years of medical school, Rebecca completed seven years of neurological surgery residency (yummy). “A doctor never really finishes school,” she said, “things constantly change and there are new specialties to master,” but I knew this from my parents.

“The plan is for you to shadow me this summer,” she confirmed, “and gain some clinical experience.” I nodded enthusiastically, saying, “Yes mam.” We talked for about thirty minutes and, as we parted, she gifted me a copy of ‘Skandalaki’s Surgical Anatomy.’

“If you want to be a surgeon, you’ll need to know anatomy better than God.” She’d said. “So start now. I made some notes for you in the index - we’re going to lean into this,” she finished, tapping the book, and giving me a wink.

I was walking on air as Lisa and I made our way back to the residence.
It’s going to be the BEST summer.

Darkness has pressed up against our lattice windows. Classes start again in the morning. I’m being reabsorbed by college life. I’m a planner. I’ve been going over my syllabuses, repacking my bookbag, charging my power banks, checking and rechecking the assignments due tomorrow. After watching me prep for hours, Peter said, “You’re not going to the MOON.”

Peter asked me last Friday, “Are you excited for Monday? (I’ll find out if I get my fellowship.)
“I’m more excited about tonight,” I said, “I like going out on the town.”
“Wow,” he said, “you’re so different - not like the other girls at all.”
“No!” I said, laughing, “We’re stuck in a rut, we only go to one or two places, ever - if we go out at all. When people come to New Haven, I need places to take them - places besides pizza. At home, in Athens (Ga), I know twenty places - this is RESEARCH.” I assured him.

Peter settled back into his doctorate-fraternity-house yesterday. Tonight (Sunday), there’s music in the suite, the crazy noises of people and the comfort of returned friends. All the roommates are back, greeted with hugs and kisses, as they dragged in their luggage.

Lisa arrived with dinner, for 10, from Dominick's, in Manhattan. Spaghetti, salads, rolls, extra sauce - in six, small, suitcase-sized insulated bags. It was a logistical marvel. It’s only 90 minutes from Manhattan to the residence - we didn’t need to rewarm anything. “I KNOW we could have just eaten in the dining hall,” she said, shrugging, “call it zany - one last hurrah.”

Everyone seemed happy to be back. There were travel stories, questions, and laughter. Oh, and Zeppole, little powdered sugar custard desserts that seemed the worst for travel. Everyone seemed to have an eye on the clock though. By 11pm the suite was quiet. Très unusual.

I watched “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” last night - we’re going to be reading Truman Capote’s book after the break and I wanted to start thinking about it. The movie rewrites Truman Capote’s story, turning it into a romcom, completely eliminating the book's gay themes. I’d seen ‘Breakfast’ before, but now I’m a little older, and as a single woman, I can better appreciate it. I’m looking forward to studying its socio-****** themes. These are some first thoughts.

Let’s take the opening of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” The images are iconic and some of the most widely repeated in pop-culture today (Hello, ubiquitous dorm room decor), but they’re never used in a way consistent with their function in the film. Instead of seeing a horribly depressed girl who has nothing left in her life but pure escapism, people see a beautiful woman with apparent access to luxury.

When “Breakfast” came out (in 1961) there was a sense, within the press and wider public, that even a neutered version of Holly Golightly represented a cinematic moral nadir that posed a threat to society. Whether Holly was a “moral character” was up for debate in countless reviews of the film. Today, this seems absurd.

Today, Holly is seen as an aspirational figure. With her opera gloves, her intricate updo, pearls and Givenchy little black dress, she looks like someone who belongs at Tiffany’s (of course, the casting the euro-elegant Audrey Hepburn didn’t hurt). Truman Capote wanted Marilyn Monroe as Holly - that would have been a very different movie.

Watching the film, I was struck with how contemporary Holly felt. She seems so familiar - so similar to the countless imitations we’ve seen since. People watching the movie for the first time today may be underwhelmed, but Holly seems so contemporary now, because she was so ahead of the curve back then (just over 60 years ago).

If you look at the popular romantic comedies that surrounded ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’, like “Pillow talk,’ ‘Gigi,’ and ‘Giget’ - their leading ladies were nothing like Holly. Being a heroine in those films meant you strived for marriage, you saved yourself for your one true love and, as a woman, you avoided certain subjects altogether. They imply happiness only comes from following a certain good girl ethos.

An example of what could happen to a girl, if she strayed from that path, was shown in Elia Kazan’s ‘Splendor in the Grass’ which also came out in ‘61. Its theme is the consequences of ****** repression, and it outlines a specific cinematic binary. There are good girls and bad girls. The bad girls were usually presented as sad and mentally unstable - and they paid for their sins in the end - usually by dying by some karmic punishment (car wrecks usually).

Holly sits somewhere in between good and bad, complicating the cinematic binary. Because Audrey’s elegance plays her as classy, warm and accessible, she doesn’t come across as a dangerous wild child - although she makes all of the bad girl choices - like partying, drinking and having ***.

For women who grew up in the repressive 1950s, Holly represented a new path forward. Holly lived on her own, she didn’t crave marriage above all else, she didn’t want to live in a cage, and she managed to have a good time without being victimized or doomed. Holly was noticeably different. The pill came out in May of 1960 (one of the watershed events in human history). Holly was Hollywood's first post-pill heroine, representing the ****** revolution before Betty Friedan’s ‘Feminine Mystique’.