Single Anxious Females

Our last presidential election recognized the power of the internet, will this election harness the power to pinpoint a specific demographic?

An interesting piece in New York magazine today identifies the ’08 election power demographic as “Single Anxious Females”.

“She’s youngish (between 18 and 44), white (64%), unanchored (36% move every two years), unaffluent (earning $30,000 or less a year), relatively uneducated (only 14% are college grads), and thoroughly pissed off about the direction of America (Iraq, health care, equal pay, and education are top issues).”

Well look at that! This demographic description draws a similarity to the most frequent readers of “She” blogs. You know, blogs written by women for women that have been growing in numbers and intensity in the last few years. Not the typical political blogs like Wonkette, but the personal Chick Lit blogs like This Fish Needs a Bicycle or Belle in the Big Apple. These are the new battlegrounds for politics. So how long will it take for these “She” blogs to be exploited in the upcoming race for the White House?”

Infiltrating blogs with paid marketing messages is the next wave of subliminal advertising. What started with Reese’s Pieces in the movie ET led to a major product placement industry in Hollywood. It followed naturally for marketers to begin their assault on the blogoshpere by getting away from paid advertising in exchange for strategically placed puff pieces and more obvious hawking of products and clients on blogs such as Perezhilton.com.

And who does Perezhilton.com appeal to with his five million hits a day?

She’s youngish (between 18 and 44), white (64%), unanchored (36% move every two years), unaffluent (earning $30,000 or less a year), relatively uneducated (only 14% are college grads), and thoroughly pissed off about the direction of America (fashion, the ever-fluctuating weight of Nicole Ritchie, the latest sale at Barneys, which Hollywood hunk is Lindsay Lohan hooking up with and what happened last night on the American Idol finale are top issues).

If only Hilary Clinton, the Economist pick for the Democratic nomination, could be sexed up and packaged in a YouTube video link, pre-HTML coded for wide blog release, then perhaps the SAF demographic could be motivated to vote in the next election.

Hey, I’m just glad that young single women will finally be courted to get out and vote. And I can’t wait to see what kind of tricks those marketing geniuses are hiding up their sleeves to capture the attention of SAF’s everywhere.

President Mahmous Admadinejad

An article ran in the Metro this morning that criticized Iran for hosting a gathering of "Holocaust deniers".

The EU's top justice official yesterday condemned the conference as 'an unacceptable affront' to victims of the World War II genocide. British Prime Minister Tony Blair denounced it as "shocking beyond belief" and proof of Iranian President Mahmous Admadinejad's extremism....

Although organizers touted it as a scholarly gathering, the meeting angered many in countries such as Austria, Germany and France, where it is illegal to deny aspects of the Nazis' '"Final Solution".

In Washington, the White House condemned Iran for convening a conference it called "an affront to the entire civilized world."

Any one who reads this blog knows that I do not support the beliefs presented at these gatherings. But this latest controversy targeting an Islam country has me slightly confused.

Isn't the 'right to gather' protected under the tenets of freedom? Does the government really have the ability to make laws about what people are allowed to believe? We are willing to risk the lives of Americans to bring freedom and democracy to the citizens of the Middle East, but isn't the freedom of speech - no matter the horrors of its subject manner - protected in those rights?

The idea of legalizing a march of the KKK through the streets of Alabama disturbs me, but I also know that the laws that give them these rights are the same laws that allow me to gather at the foot of the Washington Monument in the name of women's emancipation.

Isn't anyone else afraid that extending the arm of the international moral police may swing back to hit us in the face?

Crime and Punishment

The gossip blogs were buzzing yesterday that OJ Simpson has secretly written a book called “If I Did it”. In this alleged book, Simpson is said to gruesomely describe graphic details about the hypothetical murder of his former wife and her friend Ron Goldman. Because of the laws forbidding a man to be tried twice for the same crime, Simpson could completely confess to the murders with no legal ramifications. The publishers are selling this book as Simpson’s Confession.

Simpson’s alleged confession to a crime for which he was acquitted puzzles me. What drives this man to tell his side of the story? Is it ego, or is it peace of mind?

The case of OJ offers us a window into the humanity of a criminal. A similar window was opened last Friday night after viewing the play adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment at the Arden Theatre Company in Philadelphia.

Three actors brilliantly bring Dostoyevsky’s classic to life in a mysterious, exciting and always thought provoking story about the search for a man who took an axe to a pawnbroker and her sister in 1866. The set is built backwards, divided by hazy clear screens that remarkably create the illusion of time. The adaptation does not reveal the identity of the killer until the audience has questioned and analyzed the morality of each character. The banter between the police chief Porfiry and the protagonist Raskolnikov is written with such wit and delivered with such natural flow that you are transported behind the curtain of an 1866 police precint. The adaptation, the writing, the set, the actors, it was all simply fantastic.

But the best part of any good theatre is that it makes you think and question. In combination with Simpson’s recent confession, I’m left pondering the following:

Can a person ever really get away with committing a crime? For if not caught and punished and a prisoner of the state, aren’t you but a prisoner of your own guilt, rationalization and internal sickness? Is confessing to a crime the only way to free yourself from it? Are there those among us who are seemingly normal individuals that one day snap, push aside all social boundaries and commit a heinous crime, only to just fall back into normalcy with the calm and cool of a 007 spy and no feelings of remorse? Do people without a conscious really exist?

The twelve-steps of Alcoholics Anonymous includes a step that forces accountability for every significant harm of your past. Skipping this step could mean a return to drinking, using and addictive behavior. Inherent in this step is the idea that there are mental ramifications for crimes gone un-noticed. As I’ve learned first hand, we are only as sick as out secrets.

What has brought about Simpson’s recent confession? Is it an attempt to find inner peace? Or is it ego run riot? And how does society respond appropriately?

Does this mean I can’t buy the book until it hits the 99 cent bargain bin?

Nicole Ritchie

She was ten. Her tiny little girl legs dangled from the kitchen chair, occasionally kicking me under her mom’s Formica table. She rested her body on her elbows, a spoon in one hand and the other hovering over her Lucky Charms. She picked out the Marshmallows and popped them into the air so she could catch them in her mouth.

She was twelve. We swam together on the swim team. Her body was rounding through the belly and she was already taller than the rest of us. Despite her changing body she was the quickest swimmer. And the quickest to make me laugh. She swirled around me in the cool blue water, her blonde curls bobbing, her head falling back when she laughed. She dripped with sarcasm, bundled in her towel, licking her fingers and dipping them into a box of dry lime jell-o, waiting for our next event. We swam the relay together. We passed the time wagging our green tongues talking about the boys we thought were cute and what we would wear on the first day of school.

She was sixteen. Mom told me she had seen her out jogging along Gravelly Lake Drive. Mom said she had lost weight, that she wasn’t a chubby little girl anymore, that she looked great.

“I don’t remember her ever being chubby mom.”

“Well, she was fuller. Chunky. She had big cheeks. She was 'rounded'. But she has really slimmed down. She runs a lot you know. She looks fantastic.”

She was seventeen. Her sister and I worked together at The Taco Shop. Her sister told me that she dominated the track team and set new records for Cross Country. Her sister said that she was training for the Olympics and making their mother quite proud. Her sister also confided to me that their was concern about how thin she was getting.

She was twenty. Mom told me she had heard that she was sent away to a clinic because she wasn’t gaining weight. She said she saw her out running along Steilacoom Blvd. and she had looked like a ghost. She couldn’t believe those little legs were able to carry her frail frame.

“It was like seeing a corpse run. You could see all her veins, the blood pumping through her thin skin. She’s really sick.”

She was twenty-three. I saw her for a moment. She was walking behind her mother in a crowd. My boyfriend squeezed my leg under the table and raised his eyes towards the sickly figure. I didn’t recognize her. There was no smile and no laughter. Her thin skin caved in around her cheek bones, aging her severely. She looked tired. Her skin was pale. Her once bouncy blond curls had thinned and you could see her scalp behind the hair pulled back in a small pony tail. She didn’t see me. She didn’t see my look of horror. She just walked by quietly with her head lowered. It was only an instant.

She was twenty-nine. It was in passing that Mom mentioned she had died.

“Oh yes. Did you hear? She died. It’s so sad really. With all of us watching what we eat and worried about getting fat, can you believe someone could starve themselves to death? How dreadful for her mother. I can’t imagine standing by and watching my daughter die that way. I know she tried everything to help her.”

She would have been thirty. I try not to comment on the way my friends look, their weight or their appearance. Not when they look good, not when they look thin. I try to tell them how happy I am to see them. I try to get them away, from the clubs and the gym and the pressured existence of Manhattan ambition. I try to laugh at their jokes, tell them how funny they are, engage their souls, connect. I don’t allow the gym clothes to hide the reality that my friend is becoming too thin. So thin that I need to reinforce through my actions that boys, and party dresses and the pursuit of glamour, adoration and the thinnes reserved for the naturally petite is not what will make us feel full. I try not to read those magazines. I try not to stand in front of the mirror too long.

I am thirty-three. When I pass by the news stand on the corner of 14th and 6th Ave, I see the little girls in their knee high socks on their way to school, standing on their tippy toes to catch a glimpse of the fashion magazines behind the counter. The magazines display glossy covers brandishing glamorous Hollywood starlets who are “dying to be thin”. I see their tiny wrists. I see their thinning hair. I see their sunken cheeks and protruding clavicles. I see her, tiny, little girl legs, dangling off the chair in her mother’s kitchen.

The Comeback Kid

I can't think of a better day to return to blogging then the day of Britney Spears emancipation. Where were you when you heard the news?

"I was at work when my mother called to tell me," said Philly Fashionista. "I fell over my desk and cried tears of joy."

Girl-Next-Door tells me, "I got the message on my Blackberry. I was walking through Bryant Park on my way to the subway when CNN released a breaking news bulletin. I read it and literally jumped up in the air yelping and pumping my fist. I'm not sure why. But somehow, it just made me feel hopeful."

I heard the news when The-Philly-Mrs. spontaneously erupted from her desk with the proud announcement, "Britney is getting a divorce." Ever since, my Gmail inbox has been jammed with family members, friends, ex-boyfriends, and fellow bloggers, all wanting to be the bearer of the good news.

No one seems to be able to contain themselves.

Outside the dry safety of my umbrella today, I could hear the business men chatter about the explosive news as I walked to work.

"That lawyer of hers really knew what he was doing. Great timing. The elections overshadowed the worst of it. I wonder how much money he will get."

"Dude. Britney Spears is single again?"

"Yeah. A single mom with two kids."

"Maybe she will get back together with JT. That would free up Cameron."

Yes, this news suddenly made the impossible seem reasonable, the intangible seem within our grasp.

I must admit that when I saw Britney on Letterman the other night, I received the sort of satisfaction reserved for studio audience make-over's. It was like seeing Liza Doolittle finally learn to spit her gum out and properly pronounce "the rain in Spain". I vicariously felt the relief of her transformation as if I had just rolled around in the wet mud and finally emerged clean from a lemon scented shower.

It was not too long ago that I was certain you were hopeless. But see Britney... Underneath all that dirt and sleaze, their really is a nice gumless girl hiding.

In times of war and fear of right wing world domination, even the tiniest pieces of good news offer hope. Hope that no matter how far you stray, you can always come back, pick up the pieces, and start again.

Wait. What's this? Rummy has resigned. Am I asleep? Well don't wake me up just yet. I want to roll around in this bliss a little longer.

Oh Happy Day!

Gloria Steinem's Living Room Floor

Last Tuesday night, I met Gloria Steinem, Jane Fonda and some of the most powerful female voices in America at the launch party for Greenstone Media. Carpe, Black Sheepish and I strode down the green carpet ready to get inside and pump our fists whilst shouting feminist slogans into the air. But once inside we air kissed, gossiped, giggled and shoe shopped vicariously through our new blogger girlfriends. I left, wrapped up in the soft warm bond of female community.

Soft and warm was the theme of the night, from the little green quiches served on silver platters by smiling waitstaff to the message of light and fun programming designed to bring back slowly dwindling female audiences to radio. Soft and warm is also how I felt when Gloria Steinem stood up to speak to the cast of famous women assembled in the room and tell a story about Jane Fonda.

Gloria tells the room that Jane is her friend. She tells us that Greenstone Media was born from a few nights of female fellowship enjoyed while sitting on her living room floor. I imagined navajo blankets, overstuffed pillows, framed photos of Christian Bale, and half empty cartons of Indian take-out. Gloria looked over her shoulder at Jane and told the audience that even though at 73, she is much older than her friend Jane Fonda, Jane’s wisdom and strength make Gloria feel like she has finally found a big sister.

This story and Jane’s teary eyes warmed my heart like I’d just eaten Szechwan Chicken and forgot to tell the waiter to hold the chili’s. I expected to be wowed by the presence of these two legendary women, but mostly I was moved by their extreme normalcy.

When Gloria finished speaking, Jane brought her a over a glass of green champagne and said something in Gloria’s ear that made them both start giggling like school girls. I mean school women. I mean women. And that was the real story on Tuesday night. It was women supporting women. It was laughter. It was friends. It was women acting like women.

You see, I have long assumed that when I want to be taken seriously in the world, it is best to display as few stereotypical feminine characteristics as possible. Wear a suit, display no emotion, be ruthless, and act as much like a man as possible. Therefore, I was surprised to see this collection of powerful women wearing party dresses and tight jeans, giggling over cocktails, talking about babies and husbands and rallying behind the cry for non-hostile radio programming. These women were embracing pink, wearing heels and exchanging emotional banter. They represented all I love about being a woman. They were living examples that you can cry during a movie, giggle with girlfriends on their living room floors and still ask for equality in the workplace. You can be a feminist and not have to sacrifice your femininity.

In that room, surrounded by those women, I felt like I belonged to something much bigger than me. I felt like part of a community. A community of women, all trying to make a difference. All trying to create a world, that could be a little softer and a little warmer.


See party pics here.
Read other bloggers perspectives here, here, here, and here.
A heated blog debate spurred by the event can be found here.

Connecting the Blog to the Axe

Gloria Steinem has the sort of voice you recognize, even if you have never heard it before. It is deep and poignant and focused. Just hearing it makes me feel proud to be a woman and want to sit up a little taller in my chair. Her voice evokes the strength and the wisdom of a woman that has changed history and changed herself over the past ten decades. Her voice once rallied thousands of women to make the changes that have given me the choices I have today. Today, Ms. Steinem’s voice is rallying the key boards of nine women bloggers making waves in the blogsphere.

I have been invited to participate in a conference call with the talented writers of Her Bad Mother, Motherhood Uncensored, Mommy Needs Coffee, Mom 101, Leah Peah, Escape from Cubicle Nation, Que Sera Sera, Escape from Cubicle Nation, Brazen Careerist and Almost Literary. We have each been told we can ask Ms. Steinem a question about anything we so desire. While we wait for the call to begin, I can hear them all breathing heavily into their receivers, hoping the sound of their nervous pounding hearts won't be transmitted over the telephone.

Ms. Steinem begins the call by thanking each of us for giving her the platform to talk about Green Stone Media. Green Stone Media is a privately funded “for-profit company dedicated to meeting the unserved need on radio for innovative, topical, relevant and entertaining programming of particular interest to women.” The company creates female-inspired radio programming and is currently attempting a launch in new markets.

Her introduction coincides with remarks made from Conclave on July 16, 2006.

"It seems to me that commercial talk radio has become less about community and more about conflict. Less about information and more about repetition. Less about improving ourselves and more about being angry at the world. At the same time, new technology -- from the Ipod to Satellite -- has challenged mainstream radio as a delivery system for music, and music was the refuge of many women from the yelling and lecturing of talk radio."

She goes on to say that while audiences in general are leaving radio, even fewer women are listening to the radio. Amongst many reasons for this decline she claims hostility on the airwaves is one factor. And what she and the other board members of Greenstone Media (Including Jane Fonda and Wallis Annenberg) hope to do is lighten programming and give women less confrontational radio programs.

This instantly piques my curiosity.

But I only get to ask one question. And I'm not going to waste it on pointing out the hypocrisy of asking a group of women bloggers to embrace conflict-less dialogue with their community. Or how even the idea of 'light programming' juxtaposes the kind of media assault that once made feminism possible.

So what do you ask a woman that has already been asked everything. A quick Google search brings up full transcripts of her most famous speeches and interviews. If you want to know her feelings on marriage you can find lively debate amongst some of my favorite journalists and women’s advocates. Indeed it was pretty difficult finding a question to ask Ms. Steinem that hadn’t already been asked, documented and heavily debated in the past. So I turned to my readers.

"Ms. Steinem, I have followed your journalism career and read many of your addresses and essays written during the early women's movement. You and the work and writings of your colleagues have truly inspired me and my generation. So my question for you is what do you expect from us, this new generation of women writers with a new platform for approaching and influencing other women? What can we do to continue to carry on some of the work of you and your colleagues began forty years ago?”

Crickets.

“My job is to support you in what you are doing. Because you are living a unique personal experience and a different historical experience. And as long as we keep on supporting each other in what we are doing, I think we will be okay.”

Great. That's it? She has nothing else to tell me. My question is a dud and I’m a complete idiot.

"But wait, just to follow up on that, this 'softer, gentler' non-hostile type of communication you are promoting on your radio programming, how is this about action? How can we do this on our blogs?"

"Look..."

And from the sternness that has invaded her voice I am afraid that she has found us bloggers out. Everyone on this call knows that the hostile radio environment to which Ms. Steinem refers is the proverbial voice to our blogger rants. Bloggers bitch and whine and complain. We do in writing what Howard Stern does on the radio. That is what we bloggers do best.

"If I had any cautionary words it would just be to always connect the blog to the axe. To make sure that we don’t blog or talk or find community instead of action, but as support for action. We have five sense and we are supposed to use them all. We can get frustrated and bitter if we use words but aren’t acting on them.”

"We need to make sure we don't think we have acted because we have passed around emails, written, blogged, but have not yet demonstrated, voted refused to buy whatever is offensive. We need to make sure we don’t cocoon."

"I'm too old to get involved with any project that is not about action."

She says this graciously. Everyone laughs. She takes a few more questions from the other bloggers. She tells us all we should keep in touch. And the call ends.

I'm left thinking about how many axes I've raised in the last few years. Not nearly as many as blogs I've written.

When Gloria Steinem addressed millions of women struggling for equality in the late sixties and early seventies, she called for action. When Gloria Steinem speaks to me and nine other 'bloghers' this cool September evening, she asks us to put action behind our angst.


Hear the call for yourself here.

The Devil wrote this screenplay...

Is it still true that a woman can not have a successful career and a successful relationship?

The movie The Devil Wears Prada would certainly like us to think so. When I heard about this movie, I was looking forward to seeing all my favorite hot spots in New York, seeing the latest fashion trends and seeing a triumphant nod to powerful women and the choices they make to be successful. For that was the buzz this film was garnering.

Unable to patiently await the film, I read the book by Lauren Weisberger one afternoon on a train ride back to Philly. I was stunned.

For those of you who have not read the book or seen the film, allow me to summarize: A young writer arrives in New York with a graduate degree and limited journalism experience. She scores a job as an assistant to the editor of one of the top fashion magazines in the business. However, our main character thinks fashion is stupid. So although she name drops every designer on a New York fashion week runway, she is somehow way too good for this business. And to make matters worse, her boss wants her to act like a personal assistant. Oh yes, but did I mention that this is her job title? Anyways, it totally sucks being on-call 24/7 and having to answer the phone and run errands in a private car service. Her boss is cold, invalidating, and grey. If your young like our main character then you know how gross grey hair is!

You might wonder how someone this cruel rose up so high in her field. But why bother trying to learn from this obviously neurotic demon devoid of emotions. Our heroine gets fed up after being dragged to fashion week in Paris. In the book, our poor little worker bee tells her boss off and flies home to the comfort of her boyfriend and rent free dwellings of mommy and daddy. In the movie, our heroine becomes disgusted with her boss. Not only is her boss unable to hold together her marriage, but when threatened with being replaced by someone younger and prettier she makes a business savvy decision to save her career. Our heroine walks away from the job without two weeks notice.

For starter, this is a poorly written novel. The first few chapters are filled with clichés and amateur writing mistakes. Further pain is felt in the writers attempt to convince readers she is way too cool for this shallow world, while making the mistake of painting a vision of enviable glamour, and sophistication. On the positive side, the book moved. I could look past the horrendous writing style for an inside glimpse at the world of fashion. I found myself relating to the feeling I was too smart for my industry and daily humbled by bureaucracy. But what was difficult to overlook was the naiveté of the author about her career. Her sense of entitlement and her outrage with the elements of having a job that the majority of the working force endures daily, made her an unattractive heroine. I found myself cringing at the end of the book, when she tells her boss to "Fuck Off" at a runway show. Hopefully this pathetic ending that was wisely not incorporated into the movie, did not really happen to Lauren Weisberger. Because the 'Princess and the Pea” sensitivities of this spoiled little sheltered girl will not serve her well if she wants to carve out a career anytime in her future. Especially if she continues to reside in New York.

Work is hard. You have to do things that sometimes feel demeaning. When you start out, you are not the boss. In New York especially, you are often underpaid for your efforts. You have to be at the bottom before you can be at the top. And this was a reality that seemed lost on the main character of the book, The Devil Wears Prada.

Although discouraged by reading the book, my NYC friends told me the flick was still a must see. I set out to see the film version and escape the Philly heat in an air conditioned movie theater on a warm and sticky Wednesday afternoon. I reveled in the comfort of the NYC street scenes and hit my friend in the arm every time the characters ate at one of my favorite coffee shops. I hoped the film version of this book would exploit the obvious message of this poorly written novel. But instead, the film added insult to injury and ended with the firm message that pursuing your career and success in your field will only leave you alone. Alone and grey.

In the final moments of the film version, rather than risk losing her college boyfriends affection again, our heroine gives up her burgeoning career to move to Boston where her boyfriend will be cooking food at the local Applebee's. See ladies, there are only so many men out there willing to love us and we don’t want to risk screwing that up so hold onto them and throw away whatever you must to assure he stays present in your life.

A double punch to this females gut. First, the book tries to tell me that this work stuff is demeaning and degrading and I'm just so wronged by being asked to get coffee for the boss or meet her unreasonable demands. Then, the movie tells me that it's okay to be complacent about my career choices because people who dedicate themselves to career fulfillment are destined to live a life of solitude paved by the sharp reminders of broken relationships. If we don’t get too distracted by career or too grey, we might find some boy still willing to save us from the harsh realities of the corporate world. Why don’t we ladies just go back to focusing on being good wives and mothers and leave the career stuff to the boys. What do you say?

Is this the 21st century version of the double standard? Because this story seems to be recycling the pre-Gloria Steinem concept that women are not meant to pursue fulfillment through career and should stick to rearing family and nurturing friends. It shuts the doors opened by the women that came before us. It doesn’t simply tell me to seek a sense of purpose outside of my career, it tells me that the only place I will find that is in the arms of a man. In Karl Marx’s book Estranged Labor, he talks about mans ability to create and control his destiny in the workplace as transformative. Why should I have to be cut off from that source of self fulfillment? Why should I have to make a choice between two worlds that men have been encouraged to infuse.

Well, I have news for the men that adapted this screenplay, and the characters of this breezy summer film. I can have both a job and love. I can have it all. I can have a successful career, friends and family that love me and not a single grey hair in my head.

Just watch me!!

Privacy Please

“I could never do that. I could never put my picture on Friendster or give people access to information about me on MySpace."

Candy is sitting across from me at Veselka in the East Village, drinking an Ukranian beer. Her skin is bronzed from weekends in the Hamptons and her hair is perfectly flipped out in frosted bleached tips. Even though she speaks with an heir of superiority, she looks over at her boyfriend after everything she says. He is a Republican, so I’m sure she’s afraid she will say the wrong thing and be banished from the bedroom .

“I just value my privacy too much.”

Republican drops his hand into Candy’s lap and squeezes her thigh under the table with pride. With his other hand, he lifts his beer but drops it from his lips to visually rape a young girl passing by in an uber short denim mini. My friend Skippy is busy scrolling through the messages on his blackberry and completely misses the mini skirted chippy.

Candy, the Republican and Skippy are three of the only people that I have met in New York City who are not on Friendster or My Space. Lately, it seems I can’t go out in NYC without hearing a version of, “I’ll Friendster you”. Who needs cards or digits in the age of Google, MySpace, and Friendster. I discovered the merits of Friendster at a wedding party in Los Angeles three years ago. Since then, while my use has ebbed and flowed, it is as reliable as my g-mail for a quick validation. See, I have friends, people like me, people view me.

Skippy rests his texting fingers for a moment and takes a swig of his beer.

“Isn’t Friendster sort of ‘out’ now anyways?”

“Yes. All of the cool people have moved over to My Space. That’s why I like Friendster.”

Candy’s boyfriend rolls his eyes. “Whatever. It’s all ridiculous. And I agree completely with Candy about the death of privacy.”

I laugh. “Republican, what have you got to be so private about? I mean, what’s all the fear about putting your profile on line? No offense, but it is not like you are Brad Pitt and people are stalking you. How is a Friendster profile going to ruin you?”

The Republican begins talking about stalkers and potential clients and all sorts of legal mumbo jumbo and I just sit back and let him fade into a hazy Charlie Brown undecipherable adult and I think how wonderful it is to not be the slightest bit ashamed about having my public life on the internet for anyone and their mother to peruse.

“Jane has a blog.” Skippy sounds like he is telling on me to the teacher.

Candy and the guy who voted for Bush twice just stare at me.

“She was on a reality TV show too.”

Candy drops her jaw and the Christian Right registers shock and horror with raised eyebrows. But then he relaxes, and smiles.

“Candy was supposed to be The Bachelorette. Tell ‘em honey.”

“Well, they asked me if I would be on that show, The Bachelorette, and like, actually be The Bachelorette.” She straightens up her back a little. “But I just said no. I’m not going on National Television and making my life public like that.”

Now I really think Candy is full of shit and just saying this to impress her boyfriend, because women that act and look like Candy don’t turn down the chance to be The Bachelorette. Women who go to tanning booths, have French pediicures, spend an hour a day at the gym, purposely style their hair like Farrah Fawcet, go to places like Butter and wear low cut Marc Jacobs sweaters to an East Village eatery are exactly the type of women who want to be on reality TV. I can see her prancing on the Real World, making out with six guys in a hot tub after too many shots of Jagermeister.

I know, because I was once on a reality TV show. But i’m nothing like Candy.

“Do you really think your life is anymore private than mine? I can track the blogs you read at work, I can Google your name and find out your track scores from high school. You leave your receipt on the table at the restaurant and I have your credit card number. You use the same username and password for your news subscription as your bank account. I can get your job title from a PDF of attendees at your last alumni function. I mean if someone wanted this information, it’s not as if you are a secret.”

“Nice job Jane, but I don’t write my feelings on the internet. I don’t publish details of my last date for the world to see. I don’t have photos of my latest travels posted to My Space or Friendster. I didn’t spend ten weeks having my life filmed on national television and have people in the chat rooms talking about my bra size.”

“Republican, it’s not like I’m avoiding the Paparazzi at every turn. I’m nobody. No one cares about my life. And if a few people want to check out the inner workings of my brain then I‘m happy to have the company.”

“Bloggers are just narcissistic attention whores.”

I know that there is truth in what he is saying. But I can’t let the Right win tonight.

“Yeah you are probably right. Most of them are. But just like some Republicans aren’t judgmental homophobic Christian Right hypocrites, this blogger doesn’t fit that stereotype. I just like to write. I’m a writer. Blogging is a way for me to get my writing out there. Blogging is the only way to get my writing out there.”

Without diverting his eyes from his cell, Skippy throws his head up to give me a little support.

“She is a good writer.”

“Thanks Skippy. But I’m still not going to sleep with you tonight.”

“No worries hon. I’ve got three girls on deck already.’

I’m still not done with Wall Street boy. “What is more narcissistic, being afraid to put photos of yourself on the internet because you think everyone will be seeking them out to ruin you, or putting your thoughts and feelings out into a flooded forum where you are just one of a million?”

Seriously. Who are you afraid of? What are you afraid of? Am I so self-centered that I think there are people out there who will become taken by those pictures of me rolling pita on the floor in Bosnia that they will hunt me down and ask me out? Because those stories are pieces of me. I am proud of my past, my present and where I’m going in my future. So if someone else wants to read it, why should I care?

Writing is a magnificent conduit to the soul. It connects me to the friends I have met overseas, it allows me a forum to share my life with my family, it gives a woman alcoholic a voice in the blogoshpere, it is in itself cathartic and healing. It connects me to people and to a city that can be very lonely without connections. And the feedback makes me feel connected outside of myself, a piece of the world. So that even with consequences, I can’t imagine sacrificing my public life.

Ask me again when I am being dogged by Paparazzi and having to explain stories of my sketch past to a pack of journalist in the Rose Garden. But I somehow don’t think this is the path I’m on. No, I think the path I am on is leading me to a place where it is simply okay to be just your average Jane. Serene, connected, happy in my own skin.

After the bill is paid, Candy and Cheney go home together, Skippy zips off to Aer and his three ladies in waiting, and I walk off into the Village alone. But I’m not really alone. I have 167 friends on Friendster. And three of these friends are on the corner telling me to hurry up or we are going to be late for that party in Gramercy.