Friday Morning, 15 April

1) Hmm . . . it’s Good Friday, Tax Day, the anniversary of Lincoln’s assassination and the Titanic’s sinking. That’s quite a bouquet.

1a) This week I did manage to reread Hugh Brewster’s Gilded Lives, Fatal Voyage about first class (spoiler alert: eventually everyone dies), particularly those who weren’t really of the leisure class: military aide Archie Butt, artist Frank Millet, Broadway producer Henry B. Harris, novelist Jacques Futrelle, silent movie star and model Dorothy Gibson, etc. But of course the plutocrats come in for their share of examination.

1b) Have you experienced instant friendship? I was moved by the story of Marian Thayer sitting next to Archie Butt at the Widener’s dinner party for Captain Smith and how immediately they took to each other and communicated so much from the deepest parts of themselves in only a few hours. She survived, he drowned.

1c) The other was that Frank Millet’s sons, mistakenly believe their father had survived, showed up for the docking of the Carpathia with whiskey and cigars for him . . . but he never came down the gangway.

2) We are going to have a day of sunlight, birdsong, and ambient construction noise from down the street.

3) I feel like I should be spending the day making lists. Suggest some lists I should make, please.

Friday Midday, 8 April

Sharing a great deal of random today:

1) On Monday the Boyfriend left after a long weekend visit, taking a very early train because of my grand jury summons (which, as it happened, didn’t actually begin until the next day). So of course I got up before dawn and prepared the breakfast he likes — yogurt, blueberries, Grape Nuts, English muffins with Irish butter and jam, and coffee — served in the dining room on the good china, because the good china is almost identical to his mother’s from when he was a boy.

1a) A pre-dawn dining room breakfast took me back to July, 1977, when we set off on our “Roots trip” to meet Mother’s family in Minnesota for the first time. Daddy liked to get on the road early, so the trip started before sunrise with breakfast next door at Granny’s house. This was surprising enough — we’d gone on vacations before and never been sent off this way — but so was actually eating in the dining room, and off the good china.

1a.i) I sat at the foot of the table, and what I remember most was seeing Granny at the other end in her thin pale blue flannel bathrobe and thin pale pink nightgown smiling as broadly as ever. She loved to have a lot of people around, and she loved especially when it was family. That’s what happens when you grow up with five sisters and a brother in your mother’s boarding house with 20 or 30 college students and no internet, television, or radio.

2) Grand jury service on Tuesday, to my surprise and relief, was concluded by 1 PM. I showed up early at the Moakley courthouse, of course, got checked in, listened to all the instructions, videos, and the interminably oratorical judge, and then got sent up to two courtrooms. In each I failed to be impaneled since my name was near the end of the list. Everything was handled efficiently and courteously, and I celebrated getting sprung with lunch on the waterfront.

3) Since the pandemic started, ye Ynstagrym has really become my preferred social media platform; you should be following @etiquetteer1 if you aren’t already. But . . . it is doing a very poor job of corralling and eliminating fake accounts. In the last week I found three using my photos for profile pics, and yesterday I found three more using photos of a follower. It is almost an obsession now, tracking down and blocking fake accounts (also on ye Twyttyr).

4) Spring has sprung in New England, and I can tell because the star magnolia in front of the house has started blooming. We now begin the three weeks of the year when my home looks its best.

5) Obviously travel takes on a new significance now that I’m dating someone in another city, and I will be back in mad Manhattan near the end of the month for a few days, during which I’ll get to witness the Boyfriend record a podcast episode and also attend one of his public programs. He will then head up to Beantown for the Gibson House benefit and BBC’s Brahms Requiem. It’s time for me to start maximizing every possible points program!

6) A quagmire of unfinished books is building up around me. I am near the end of Maiden Voyages by Sian Philllips (women’s experiences as passengers, crew, and refugees in the golden age of transatlantic liners, fascinating), The Invention of Murder by Judith Flanders (how the Victorians became engrossed in gory public murder trials, etc. — a Christmas gift from Oldest Nephew Who Must Not Be Tagged that I brought to Palm Springs and didn’t nearly make a dent in), and now The Age of Decadence by Simon Heffer (British imperial history and culture from 1880 to World War I, just what I love).

7) Thinking about Etiquetteer content for the spring. What would you like to hear Etiquetteer comment on?

Friday Morning, 18 March

1) So sleepy yesterday evening, so I surprised myself by staying up until midnight reading Carol Wallace’s Our Kind of People, a novel of Old New York Gilded Age snobbery and (soon, I hope) social fluidity. I had to force myself to put the book down, and then had a terrible time getting to sleep. Now I feel heavy as a boulder in a muddy riverbank.

2) But not so unconscious that I can’t do basic math. I realized this morning that today would have been Gramma’s 120th birthday.

3) The recent rediscovery (by me) of Mae West’s Goin’ to Town of 1935 reminded me of the many wonderful movies I discovered as a boy on KHTV Houston Channel 39’s Eight O’Clock Movie. All the Shirley Temple movies, Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast (with subtitles, thank goodness), The Helen Morgan Story, all the Flash Gordon films. And so often next door at Granny and Grampa’s house.

Tuesday Afternoon, the Ides of March -- This Was Not Expected

1) Genuinely touched by all the support after my public Change of Relationship Status on ye Fycebykke yesterday. So many friends, so many good wishes, so much curiosity about Who This Man Is. Now is the time to introduce you to Carl.

1a) One quick caveat: I have the right to tell my story, but not anyone else’s. So if I’m light on details, it’s out of consideration for everyone else involved.

2) The short version: a mutual friend from my Ballet days suggested I check out his friend’s new podcast about the Gilded Age (the era, not the HBO series). Early in January I finally did, and I was very impressed. As suggested in every episode, I emailed with some possible topics for future episodes. Two days later he responded (from his private email) “Our mutual friend has been telling me about you for years!” By the end of his message I was sure any future communication would not be of a professional nature.

2a) Daily email led to Zoom afternoon tea, Zoom dinner, and then to his taking the train up to Boston in early February for the day just so we could meet; he’s based in New York. I took him to lunch at the Oak Room, where the conversation never flagged. Over a month after that lunch, I’d say the conversation still hasn’t flagged.

2b) He spent a long weekend with me in Boston over Presidents Day, and I just returned from a few days with him in New York. We are starting to work out how to do this regularly.

3) Carl’s podcast is The Gilded Gentleman, and it’s superb; subscribe now please (and thank you). He is not on ye Fycebykke. A Maine native who lived for a few years in Boston, he’s long established on the Upper West Side. Like me, he can be everything from stately to silly, usually in only a few seconds. He is considerate and thoughtful in ways I can only hope to emulate after a lot of practice.

4) I have stopped listing all the similarities and coincidences because there are so many — besides, they appear ever green if I can go absentminded now and then. We are both affiliated with 19th-century house museums (mine is the Gibson House Museum, his is the Merchants House Museum). Another Gibson House affiliate was one of Carl’s coworkers when he was in Boston. Afternoon tea is as important a part of his day as the cocktail hour is to mine. We both love china, and my grandmother’s strongly resembles his mother’s china from childhood. We have both been to Venice, and we both bought capes when we were there. We both love opera, and I actually attended performances in Boston back in the 1980s in which he performed as a super or chorister. (Earlier reports that he sang in Back Bay Chorale were mistaken on my part; one of his friends sang in the Chorale, while he sang with another chorus.)

5) I am 58 years old and have never had a boyfriend. How on earth is this happening?! First, I didn’t reach out with any idea of romance; as God is my witness, this was only about the podcast (and possible collaboration with Etiquetteer). Second, I had really and truly given up on the idea of a lifelong love, particularly as I’m so firmly established in middle age. And third, as lovely as this new relationship is, I can’t know how long it will last; this gives me the freedom to enjoy what we have without anxiety about being thought Good Enough for marriage or a lifetime commitment. That may sound callous, but when you consider how much I was raised on the Happily Ever After myth and the (beautiful) example of my own parents’ marriage . . . this is a sea change for me, and I’m not ungrateful.

6) Being old and inexperienced is different from being young and inexperienced. Learning how to walk down the street holding hands is delightful. Learning not to barrel forward when rolling a suitcase in one hand, leaving Carl 12 paces behind, quite another. Oopsie.

7) So . . . I didn’t expect 2022 to begin like this, and I’ll bet most of you never expected to hear me say I was in a relationship. No matter how many other good things may crowd into this year, they won’t be any better than this unexpected gift.

Waiting for my train back to Boston yesterday afternoon.

Monday Morning, 7 March

1) The past few days have offered me a rich return to the arts in person. Friday I went with two friends to the Van Gogh Immersive on Harrison Avenue — truly immersive, truly magical — Saturday I went to the Back Bay Chorale’s performance at the Boston Public Library, and yesterday afternoon friends brought me to the Lyric Stage’s production of The Book of Will. It’s all been wonderful!

At the BPL for the BBC concert.

2) Today’s horoscope from Gold River Astrology includes the phrase “. . . challenges us to be discerning with what we feed our mind with.” To me, that means limiting news and social media intake so I can focus on what really matters to me. Time to tune out the &^%$^$@$%!

3) And more coffee. There can always be more coffee.

Friday Afternoon, 25 February

1) On Wednesday the skies were sunny and my heart was light. I enjoyed a beautiful lunch out with two of my best friends, two hours (including an hour after the check had been paid) of engaging conversation with people rarely seen in person during the pandemic — and all this after the departure the day before of that Fascinating New Personality, who had come to visit for a few days.

1a) Today, Friday, the skies are stormy and my heart — and the sidewalks — are heavy. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has justly alarmed and angered the world, taking us to a place I think few of us are really prepared to go.

2) To add to that growing sense of unease and suspicion, it appears I have been deceived by an IG account that had all the appearances of a professional acquaintance from 20 years ago. This account followed me three weeks ago, an account that had well over 1K legit posts that were not all posted on the same date, and I was looking forward to reconnecting. Yesterday appeared in that accounts Posts and Stories a post related to a, shall we say, uncharacteristic topic: ye Bytcoynne, also known as ye Cripteau, ye Fyryx, etc. etc. etc. I messaged “Dahling, it looks like you’ve been hacked,” and this morning got the reply, “No, I really did it, I made [Insert Whatever Amount of Money It Was] and I’m gonna do it again!”

2a) So then I knew something was rotten in the state of Denmark, and during an Economist Zoom program about Ukraine I scrolled this account’s followers and blocked dozens of fake accounts.

2a.1) It feels like I spend more and more of my time online blocking fake accounts. Is social media worth it?

2b) The only problem: this account now has my email and phone number. 😰

3) Add to all this today’s horoscope from Gold River Astrology on Twitter, which contains this: “Words have a powerful impact on a Rooster day - think before you speak. Keep to your center.” An admonition to be discreet, circumspect, and calm above all else.

Thursday Evening, 17 February

1) After a week away I’m used to going through a stack of mail, especially after Christmas. Returning from a week away in February, however, I was surprised to find five to seven handwritten notes among the bills and junk mail. Such bounty! I am not ungrateful. It was pure delight to open each envelope.

1a) One was from a friend of Mother’s, with news clippings from the Old Hometown Newspaper that mentioned my father, and some other things, and it was like hearing from Mother Herself.

1b) Two others, from that Fascinating New Personality, could be classified as love letters.

1c) In addition, a large padded envelope from an Interlochen friend yielded . . . every letter and card I’d sent him in the last 35 years. This is the sort of thing that used to happen when people died; letters were returned. That’s how James Fox was able to write his book Five Sisters about the legendary Langhorne sisters of Virginia, including his mother Phyllis Brand and his notorious aunt Nancy Astor. I believe they found their letters to each other in a trunk in Phyllis’s bedroom long after she died. But . . . gurrrrlllll, if I don’t write my story, no one else will!

2) I have never missed Begonia and Estonia, my housemaids AWOL since 1994, more than I have today. But with a Fascinating New Personality arriving tomorrow for a long weekend, well . . . as Sir Roderick Bland said in Noel Coward’s “Bon Voyage,” “The moment is urgent!”

3) Today I have veered between Charlie Chan and the 1990 Live from Lincoln Center performance of Sondheim’s A Little Night Music with my beloved Sally Ann Howes as Desirée and Regina Resnik as Madame Armfeldt. I am particularly obsessed with the song “Soon.”

3a) Long ago, when I was a tender sweet young thing working as a concierge at the Vendome, one of the tenants cleaning out his vinyl passed on to me a boxed four-record set of Regina Resnik in the title role of Carmen. I think one of those records was scratched. I’ve never forgotten that recording, not least because Dame Joan Sutherland Herself played Micaela.

Monday, Valentine's Day 2022 -- Palm Springs, Day Eight

1) This Valentine’s Day began differently from every other I can remember: Bitmoji texts and a 30-minute phone call from an actual Valentine, after he received the dozen roses I had ordered for him. Thank goodness I decided to start my day with the dawn after all and not try to sleep on until 7:30, and thank goodness I had my first cup of coffee. We had a really lovely conversation, and later, when I logged on, I saw the email he said he’d sent, with a favorite quote of his from Brideshead Revisited that — that left me in an emotional state, let’s just leave it there.

1a) Who is this Valentine, you ask? Well, never you mind; his identity may be revealed at a later date. He is the Fascinating New Personality I mentioned a few weeks ago, and he is still fascinating.

1b) At age 58, this is my first Valentine.

2) So . . . “New friends are silver, but old friends are gold,” and in my current state I had particular need for a gold friend. Thank goodness Hochmina and I had already arranged to go to breakfast at Sherman’s and we were able to talk through this Brave New World.

3) I’ve been able to act on few of the recommendations made to me of things to do in Palm Springs, but so many people said “Go to Sherman’s!” that I’d’ve been justly shunned if I hadn’t made it there. I love delis and I love deli food, so it is no surprise that I now love Sherman’s, too. We had a table outside on the sidewalk, good coffee, a bacon cheese omelette, and a view of one of my besties backed by a range of mountains. Sherman’s FTW!

3a) “Great for people watching,” I was told, and at 9:15 AM Sherman’s was definitely a magnet for Heterosexual Palm Springers Older Than I. Walking from the car to the entrance, we past an elderly cellist just setting up for a morning serenade; our table turned out to be just next to him, and we enjoyed a series of romantic solos backed by pre-recorded accompaniment. I tipped him on the way out, and then got to notice his sign board with all of his previous symphony gigs.

3b) With most people appearing in T-shirts and shorts, one irresistibly noticed the arrival of a person in a short fringed buckskin dress with long sleeves and bits of jewelry. And I thought, “If Georgia O’Keeffe had ever been part of cocktail culture, this would have been her look.”

4) Then prowling through Ralph’s with one of my hosts on the lookout for egg noodles, flowers, a particular kind of prepared tomato, and some other things. And lunch al fresco with my hosts.

5) In the late afternoon I Lyfted over to Rancho Mirage to see two friends who moved to Palm Springs permanently about a year ago. While Palm Springs is defined by the mid-century modern low ranch house of severe angles and brightly colored doors, this gated community in Rancho Mirage is entirely high-ceilinged stucco cottages with Spanish roof tiles and rather lush plantings. The contrast surprised me.

5a) My friends have arranged their new home luxuriously; my goodness, their living room of pale gray with rich blues and greens was so perfect. As seems to be the practice here, the house came with a great deal of furniture from the previous owner, and they found some marvelous things in the consignment shops here. We had a really nice hour or so catching up and daydreaming about the future.

6) The Lyft driver on my return trip was a native of Indio, CA, full of questions about how New England was different from this region.

7) I rushed into the house with barely enough time to set the table before the Valentine’s dinner guests summoned by my hosts arrived. What was going to be a simple pasta dinner had been enriched by leftovers from polo and a superb homemade chocolate mousse.

8) Like all dinners with absorbing conversations, the evening stretched on, and I knew I was going to have to finish my packing. The night concluded with wide smiles and fond embraces from old friends and new.

PS: I conclude this entry on Tuesday morning, only two hours before departing for the airport. Dawn substituted her hazy robe for her rosy fingers this morning. It feels like forever ago that I arrived here, but that is because I’ve experienced and absorbed so much during this stay. After so much sameness and anxiety in the last two years, this new and different week fed my soul as I had hoped — but not, perhaps, quite as expected. I leave grateful for the generous hearts that welcomed me here in the first place — and eager to welcome my own houseguest in only a few days.

Sunday Evening, 13 February -- Palm Springs Day Seven

1) I had been told by my hosts well before I arrived that on Sunday we would be going to polo with a group of their friends — some of whom I got to meet at Saturday’s pool party. (I am becoming terrible with names and am, of course, adopting the Tallulah Bankhead Approach here. It works splendidly.) Never having been to a polo match, I thought, “Well, that’ll be different!”

1a) I was advised that this wasn’t fancy upper-crust polo but casual clothes and heavy tailgating. So I was not expecting the stereotypical North Shore country club, but something more like the desert polo field seen at the beginning of White Mischief with Charles Dance in the saddle: dust, blazing sun, champagne, and a few laughs, e.g. “Where’s the bloody ball?”

2) The morning was spent in some confusion — I’d say it was a comedy of Mercury retrograde except that that ended on February 3 — but I was certainly seeing parts of Palm Springs I hadn’t yet seen, and the mountain ranges everywhere in the background compelled my attention.

3) Of the two country clubs in Palm Springs, we went first the one that, contrary to expectations, was not open due to a private event. But we were directed to the other, where “family polo” was taking place. There, eventually, we were able to park and to set out our picnic, unprotected from the stronger-than-Palm-Springs-is-used-to-in-February sun.

4) Altogether the assembly spread out an impressive buffet: bagels and lox, fried chicken, potato salad, brownies, lemon squares, something in a crock pot I didn’t get to try, and of course champagne served in plastic flutes. Salut!

Polo!

5) So polo is a lot of horses with men on them carrying long-handled mallets galloping back and forth to get a hard white ball between goal posts at either end of a large grass field the size of nine football fields. This field is surrounded by a low wooden border painted red because, while the ball doesn’t leave the field, often the horses do. A margin of about eight feet stood between this border and the safety line for spectators so that no one watching might, um, make contact with a horse. And we certainly saw the horses cross over quite a few times, and a couple times quite near us.

5a) The six chukkas seemed to go on forever. Suddenly one horseman was actually in the space next to us, with the cameraman filming for the judges — surprise! Apparently he had been fouled, which I was told was quite rare.

I believe this was the start of a chukka, with all the riders gathered with the referee.

5b) Later I saw a riderless horse gallop off the field; it appears that one of the referees somehow came separated from his mount.

5c) Fun fact: the horses of the referees had long flowing tails, but the horses of the players had their tails braided and bound or bobbed.

Chapeau a la Zouave.

6) But really, the sun . . . I had to tuck a bandana in the back of my cap to protect my neck.

7) Once everything was packed up, we had a longish drive back home, where I almost immediately got into the pool. Eventually six of us were drinking champagne in the hot tub and I thought, as another friend has so memorably said, “Well . . . this doesn’t suck!”

8) During this stay I really haven’t seen much of what might be called The Scene, but the dinner decision was for Black Book, a gay bar on a street of gay bars that serverd great burgers. When our party of five arrived they were just shutting down the patio, which would have been lovely. But they had a substantial high top for us in the back of this all-black room, and they did indeed have good burgers.

8a) The one thing: the music was so loud I could barely hear any of the conversation at our table, confining me to responses like “Yes,” “Oh yes!” or “I’m sorry” or “What?” #agingactressyesterdaysglamorqueen

9) Outside, after our bill was paid, the suggestion was made to press on to another bar for another drink. One friend and I had had enough and headed home, where I am now sleepily compiling this entry.

10) This has been quite the California day: sun, sport, swimming pools, champagne, and friends. Now all I need to do is continue to hydrate and moisturize.

Sunday Morning, 13 February -- Palm Springs Days Five and Six

1) Friday morning I woke early and allowed myself just to Start the Day and witness Dawn tint the mountains with her Rosy Fingers. There is a beautiful spot to see it at the other end of the pool. It’s a sight one does not see in New England. At least I haven’t . . .

2) Friday the first of two Big Events was a jovial lunch at 8Four9 with two Interlochen-affiliated friends. We sat on their beautifully shaded patio and there were laughs aplenty.

3) Afterwards I got to tour their beautiful mid-century home. Thank goodness I was able to keep from salivating over their cabinet of Fiestaware. Like mine, they were family heirlooms. Unlike mine, they’re in mint condition. I don’t know what Mother’s family did to their Fiestaware that it is so dinged, chipped, and cracked, but . . . oh well.

4) I got to ride in a convertible!

5) In the evening a surprise dinner of Chinese takeout for Hochmina’s birthday. Most excellent takeout, but I confess that after one of Martin’s cosmos I had a little difficulty following all the conversational cross currents at the dinner table.

6) Saturday, yesterday, there was a pool party here, for which the pool was specially heated starting sometime on Thursday. Roughly 18-24 men, friends of my hosts and a few friends of mine they hadn’t met. A pool party is, in fact, just a waterborne cocktail party, and the same sort of maneuverability between groups is needed — just don’t splash pool water into anyone’s drink.

6a) I got to witness more PS life with a quick trip to Townie Bagels,

7) I remember Fresca from the late 1960s as basically like drinking acid, so it’s sort of a surprise to find it a staple of Palm Springs home entertaining. The Vodka Fresca is quite the popular drink here. And, I’m told, when out and about, the Vodka Press is in demand: vodka, club soda, and a press on the soda gun for Sprite or 7Up.

8) The party hours were 1:30 - 5, so at 6:15 or so a small handful were still on hand enjoying good conversation. Afterwards five of us went off for cheap Mexican food and margaritas, sitting outside at a large tile table and making jokes.

9) Sunday we are going off to polo (!), so who knows what that will be like! I gather it is more casual than East Coast polo . . .

Friday Morning, 11 February -- Palm Springs, Day Four

1) Rumors to the contrary, I am also experiencing the flora and fauna of Palm Springs. The dominant feature of my hosts’ home is a type of oak tree I’ve never heard of before, a silk oak or silky oak. There are actually two here, but the one closest to the house is less than half the size of the other.

2) Ravens are the dominant bird life, swooping about and cawing and making me hope there’s no male child in the neighborhood named Damien. Yesterday morning I saw a smaller and sleeker bird with a hooked beak perch in the silky oak, which was identified to me as a Cooper’s hawk. Quite a beautiful bird in silhouette. When it moved into the tree foliage, three lesser goldfinches popped out of the top of the tree, flying away with alarmed twitters.

3) Eggs Benedict is one of my favorite “special breakfast” dishes, and my host’s homemade eggs Benedict pole vaults to the top of the list.

4) One of my hosts gave me a choice of activity for the midday: estate sales, or a light hike through the Andreas Canyon. I chose the latter — estate sales are everywhere, but there’s only one Andreas Canyon — but first, drive-bys of beautiful mid-century homes in the Deepwell neighborhood. Everything so white or natural stone, with a brightly-painted door and house numbers in a Neutraface font. Driving through one veddy veddy exclusive subdivision we saw two white French Provincial chairs near a front door, and I heard myself say, “Finalmente, curves!”

4a) In all this beautiful town, only one house made me raise my eyebrows, surrounded by brick walls of battleship gray and with a bright blue door. The wrong sort of blue. It looked so marine for a desert town.

5) Driving and hiking through Andreas Canyon brought the kinds of new sights and sounds I have been craving during the pandemic. Barren landscapes of green tumbleweed and heat, narrow river oases of gigantic palms, cliffs that look like medieval parapets made of faces. And many opportunities to twist an ankle on this one-mile circular trail, but we emerged unscathed.

5a) Note: Fine dirt on rocks makes them slippery.

5b) We also noticed one little cairn of four or five flat stones that a hiker had constructed. Noticing a sign at the end that hikers were warned not to do this made me glad we saw only one.

6) The afternoon brought my first Palm Springs pool party, a unique local form of hospitality that is basically a waterborne cocktail party. Because shade is an ever-present consideration, we were fortunate that the pool was in shade during that period of the afternoon. There was a great deal of tossing the ball for Gizmo, who took great joy in fetching it and returning to drop it into the pool. Sometimes he would manage to get it back, otherwise he’d make a bit of noise for attention.

6a) They say no one in Palm Springs drinks gin, but I must say I enjoyed my gin and tonic. Also the magnificent homemade guacamole.

7) Pizza at home for dinner, and by 9 PM I had fallen into bed sawing gourds.

Thursday Morning, 10 February -- Palm Springs, Day Three

I write this account of yesterday curled up by the pool with my second cup of coffee listening to the breeze in the palms, the bells on the wind chimes, and the gentle trickle of water over a four-four-tall black stone monolith fountain. I do not feel like I deserve this.

1) It was simply impossible to come up with new material for Etiquetteer yesterday, so I published one of the Lost Columns from earlier volumes, and then had my entire notify list bounce back due to some tech issues. #tedious.

2) The big event of the day was to get in a Lyft with a very friendly and chatty driver and go to Pinocchio’s for lunch al fresco with my friend Kyle, unseen since well before the pandemic, and just off the plane for a short stay in town. We got a table right at the sidewalk, bottomless champagne (they don’t mess around at Pinocchio’s), and a club sandwich for me. You can never go wrong with a classic. After so long we both had lots of news to share, and the conversation never flagged.

2a) Nor did it with the trio of ladies at the next table who were very eager to see what we ordered (which always makes me uncomfortable) and who I got to teach the Dickensian custom of “taking wine:” when you look meaningfully at each other, raise your glasses a tiny bit, and drink. With your pinkies in. Kyle totally backed me up that the eye contact is the most important part of this, which it is. They were actually a lot of fun.

3) I drifted in and out of the shops after lunch, casually searching for peridot jewelry, but not really finding anything that interested me. And of course I saw the famous statue of Marilyn Monroe in The Seven Year Itch, which - why is it even here? That movie was made in New York.

4) In Palm Springs pool maintenance is a fairly constant topic, particularly heating, and I understood why when I came home and waded into the pool for the very first time, a bracing 58 degrees they told me. It was actually wonderful — for about 45 seconds, which was all I needed. The rest of the afternoon was spent on email and a little tete a tete with one of my hosts.

5) 6:00 PM cocktail hour featured a shaker of whiskey sours, some tasty little meatballs arranged by Walter Gropius on the plate, and a portable table lamp straight out of the Jetsons. Also a large moth, drowning in the last half of my cocktail. Not the sort of roughage I need in my diet. I fished it out with one of those bamboo cocktail skewers with a loop at one end and prayed the alcohol would kill of any residual cooties.

6) For dinner we drove to El Tropicale, a long-established PS restaurant that has significantly and beautifully expanded its outdoor seating in the back due to COVID. My hosts knew the staff well. An inclination to small plates led us to the bar menu and a) angus sliders, b) popcorn shrimp with remoulade (OMG, fabulous), and c) truffle garlic fries. Also, for dessert, a slice of “mile high” chocolate cake so large I thought it came from the rib of a cake dinosaur.

6a) The joint was jumpin’, as they say, and my hosts noticed one randomly assembled table of eight men that they said looked as though they were all staying at the same resort, met around the pool, and said “Hey, let’s go to dinner.”

7) From the hot tub after dinner I got to watch two lanterns like silk balloons floating over the surface of the pool and changing colors, one a couple seconds later than the other, from gray to white to rose pink to purple to deep red to blue to green and back to gray. A beautiful image for the end of the day.

Tuesday Evening, 8 February -- Palm Springs, Day Two

1) After a leisurely morning of indirection and indecision, Hochmina came to call for me a little before noon to go to lunch someplace outside. He is spending the winter here, luckily for me!

2) We ended up on the very large white-furnished patio of Eight4Nine, next to a party including a Gentleman Older Than I who kept not seeing the salmon salad on the menu instead of the chicken salad. I was getting so caught up in that drama that I rather wished we’d been seated at some more distant part of the patio — but in Palm Springs, where the shade is going to fall is of greater consideration.

2a) At any rate, they finally figured it out.

2b) On our other side was a pair of ladies with two tiny dogs in a stroller — I think one of them was a Malted Poo or something — blech! — but we had a nice discussion with them about the doggies and Gizmo.

3) Aperol Spritz + Cobb salad = predictable + delicious.

4) We strolled down the street popping into interior design stores. This being Palm Springs, everything is about mid-century modern, mid-century modern derivitave, and sleek clean lines. Not one curlicue in the whole place, much less any gilt. The closest thing we got to fringe was a chenille throw pillow.

5) Then I actually had a mission in the world of Fashion Retail, which can be very depressing, and was: the search for swimwear. Of course I would rather not be bothered with it at all, but even so, the locals all seem to entertain in the pool, and a) dangerous to assume, b) Fashion sometimes overtakes Style, even here, and c) one might wear rags to the beach in New England, but that is clearly not a West Coast Thing.

5a) That said, few entities are as pitiless as a dressing room mirror. But I left Division with two suits that work.

6) Hochmina brought me home via his place so I could greet Martin and Gizmo, which was Most Pleasant Indeed. And then back to my little casita for a NAP. My hosts are also proponents of naptime. I have found my people.

7) I also discovered the lemon tree behind the casita, next to its bright yellow door, and my host pointed out a rose — currently in a state of suffering — that blooms a brilliant yellow. So of course I have dubbed this charming cottage the Casita Rosa Limón.

8) To say thank you, I took my hosts out to dinner at Chi Chi at the Avalon Hotel, where we sat poolside in the most quiet and refined atmosphere one could hope for. I had some sort of cocktail involving whiskey, ginger beer, and the essence of a few woodland herbs and flowers, I don’t remember precisely what, oysters, and a wonderful strip steak.

8a) Our waiter, who was also the host and serving in a couple other positions that night, could not have been more delightful and enthusiastic. We three were admittedly underwhelmed with the way the dishes had been described on the menu, but one friend asked the waiter what he liked. And he began “When I’m light hungry, I like [Insert Dish Here with Descriptive Rapture]. When I’m medium hungry I like [Insert Dish Here with Descriptive Rapture]. But when I’m bottomless hungry, I get the New York strip steak with fries and without the usual sides.” And I said, perhaps too loudly, “YES!”

8b) Did I mention they were garlic fries?

8c) The dessert, which was not on the menu, was a salted chocolate caramel brownie with pistachio ice cream and extra pistachios. Om nom nom.

9) Once home, talk of watching Down With Love dissolved in the satisfaction of the beautiful cool evening watching the half moon in a black sky flecked with stars, a half moon with a bright rind and darker center — very much like a slice of watermelon, or lemon. Someone could make a neon sign out of that moon, and it would be a hit.

Tuesday Morning 8 February -- Palm Springs, Day One

1) My first time on a plane since August, 2019, off literally in the middle of the night for the first leg of my first trip to Palm Springs, to stay with friends who retired there last year. Friendly Lyft driver — a basketball coach from the North Shore — and of course no traffic.

2) Not having traveled by air for so long, I was disoriented by tech and procedure changes. Security went smoothly. The rub, though — having gotten through security by 3:30 AM and with a flight boarding at 4:25, nothing was open where I could get coffee or sustenance of any kind! Thank goodness I was able to tuck into a large omelette at O’Hare.

3) I am happy to report that, contrary to all the news stories, I didn’t witness any bad behavior around masking.

4) At Palm Springs, we disembarked not through a jetway, but in the old-fashioned way in the blazing sunshine down a ramp. The glorious views of the mountains! Turns out most of the airport is also al fresco, delightful.

5) My friends found me in baggage claim, cutely carrying signs with my name on them. A drive of only ten minutes brought us to their little jewel of a house! I have been installed in a small, perfect guesthouse with every comfort and immediate access to the hot tub. This is going to be a wonderful week.

6) Following a tour of the house filled with many stories, we whisked off to Bongo Johnny’s for an al fresco lunch, and then a spot of antiquing in the midst of errands. Under the circumstances I think I showed admirable restraint.

7) By this time jet lag was telling — I really hadn’t been able to sleep on either flight — and I fell like concrete into bed for two hours. I needed that.

8) After more storytelling — we haven’t seen each other in quite awhile — it was time to accompany one friend to Ralph’s, the — or a — big supermarket here. Driving there at night down these wide streets of low houses made me think of the Old Hometown, Lago di Carlo, and so did the supermarket. “Well, you know Ralph’s is really Kroger’s, right?” That explained it!

9) Cocktails on return, rye manhattans served with homemade cheese puffs. And then dinner, a rich and luscious Yankee pot roast. And a tumbling conversation of many threads and much excitement.

10) But then the time, for me, of serious sleep came, and I had to retire to my little casita. Waking periodically in the night I noticed how dry my throat would feel, and I remembered stories of “Las Vegas Throat,” when unacclimatized singers would be unable to sing after a week of performances in Vegas. Hydrating is going to be very important this week!

11) When I finally started the day around 7 AM, twin experiences offset each other. The view of the pool outside, calm and shadowy with a beautiful tree, and the mountains beyond, coupled with my snore score of 124 (very high) and recorded proof that I was trying to compete with the Palm Springs airport for a noise ordinance.

12) This is the start of a week with new experiences and old friends, my first real travel since the pandemic, and I am ready for it!

Wednesday Night, Groundhog Day, 2022

1) Last night just before bed I had the horrifying, enraging discovery that not one, but two fake accounts on Instagram were using my photographs and words. And based on the experience of other users, Instagram just does not care about these fake accounts.

2) This afternoon’s dental appointment brought me by ye Instytytte’s new Welcome Center in Kendall Square, which made me think about the Very Old Motto “Tech Is Hell.” Because that Old Motto is helpfully evoked in the New Windows! I had a good laugh over it.

3) En route home I stopped by a pen shop downtown to see what could be done about two wooden pens I found in the vase I keep on top of the piano. One was very easy to fit with a replacement cartridge: a pen made of the original stage flooring of Boston’s Symphony Hall and given to me by the Boston Pops staff when I retired in 2019. The other was a felt tip pen made of rosewood that had been given to me when I graduated from high school by my sweet beautiful cousin Margie Bess Tims in Mississippi (may she rest in peace). Made by Hallmark, that pen’s cartridges are no longer made.

3a) That said, the pen shop’s entire staff of four got involved in everything to do with both these pens, and seemed delighted to see out-of-the-ordinary writing instruments. And one of them did some internet research and found that the rosewood pen could use a cartridge from Levenger. So now I have that to pursue. What fun!

. . . it entirely depends on your perspective!

Friday Night, 28 January -- Pre-Blizzard

1) Gurrrrrlllll, I am so ready for this. Taking my blizzard cues from Sarah Bernhardt.

2) Seriously though, I just took out the trash and my street, usually respectably full of parked cars, is nearly empty.

3) I’m afraid I’ll spend most of this blizzard reading, writing, and washing dishes.

Tuesday Midday, 25 January

1) Something new always arrests my eye when I walk through the cemetery, and yesterday it was this tombstone by the lake, marked by a harvested sheaf of wheat bound with ivy. The wheat sheaf symbolizes resurrection and immortality, while ivy, of course, means marital fidelity. So let’s hope the husband and wife buried here really did enjoy a happy marriage.

1a) Interestingly, my copy of Kate Greenaway’s Language of Flowers (purchased in junior high school at the local mall’s Wyldyn Books [long since closed]} only gives the symbolism of a stalk of wheat, which means Riches. I guess Miss Greenaway didn’t expect any swain to woo his beloved with an entire wheat sheaf.

2) This morning, in the midst of email and dishwashing, I have been reaching back into the deepest recesses of my YewTybbe favorites list, and this came up — which, well — let’s just say it currently has an added importance to me.

2a) And then there was this poignant clip of Kathryn Grayson singing about the murder of Vienna, which, well, feels more current than I’d like.

3) Everyone’s chattering about HBO’s new The Gilded Age, which reminded me that France kind of missed out on the start of World War I because they were distracted by a high-profile murder trial. Admittedly it’s a big deal when the wife of a high government official assassinates a prominent newspaper editor in his office and is then driven in her chauffeur-driven limousine to the police station, but still . . .

Friday Afternoon, 21 January

1) Sending out love to everyone who needs it today. Sure, it’s National Hugging Day — I ask you — but over and above a Frivolous Internet Holiday, I’m seeing a lot of anger, sadness, and despair out there. You’re not alone, dahlings. I’m here for you — shout out by DM if you need me.

1a) Because, in the the words of the late Mae West, “I’m a lion tamer, not a mind reader.”

2) Etiquetteer turns 21 — 21! — at the end of the month, and I have finally — finally! — started going through the big box of email that Daddy printed out for Mother to read, because it includes a lot of my early columns to which I no longer have access. All that, and the baby books and photo albums she created (much of which Laura has) — what a valuable record of my life she prepared and preserved for me. Fitting to think of it since her birthday was yesterday.

2a) Some of that early material makes me cringe now, but some of it has stood up rather well, “with a bit of trussing here and there,” as Auntie Mame said of Agnes Gooch’s figure.

3) This morning, while I was absolutely not thinking about my former life as a reunion planner, I got an email from an old volunteer looking for advice. Thankfully my network has remained vigorous enough that I could refer him to volunteers from another class who already do very well what this person was asking about.

3a) I have actually been invited back to speak at a class reunion event in May for one of my old classes of which I’m an honorary member. This has resulted in several honorary classmates subscribing to my notify list.

Tuesday Morning, 18 January

1) I love how just one morning meeting of no more than 30 minutes can leave one spinning sparks like a pinwheel with ideas.

2) This also gave me a chance to revisit one of my favorite quotes from Hawthorne, from his “Old Esther Dudley” in “Legends of the Province House,” part of his Twice Told Tales: “Then with tottering feet, which age and tremulous joy caused to tread amiss, she hurried down the grand staircase, her silks sweeping and rustling as she went, so that the sound was as if a train of spectral courtiers were thronging from the dim mirror. And Esther Dudley fancied that as soon as the wide door should be flung open, all the pomp and splendor of by-gone times would pace majestically into the Province House, and the gilded tapestry of the past would be brightened by the sunshine of the present.”

3) It is so easy, so very easy just to slouch through the day in lounge pants and a sweater, but I dressed for this morning meeting — dress shirt, bow tie, cufflinks, actual trousers — and I must say it made a difference. In these trying times we have to take our motivation where we may.

Monday Morning, 17 January

1) Because you never know what the day will hold, today started with learning more about the Fabergé Sandringham Commission from Edward VII of all the farm animals at Sandringham in semi-precious stones. One of my English friends brought this to my attention, part of the big Fabergé exhibition at the V&A. I wish I could be there to see it!

The Fabergé Dexter Bull from the Sandringham Commission.

2) I am eager to add a recaptcha to my Contact Etiquetteer page, and having found the info page about it on ye Squyrespyce’s website, I thought I could get it taken care of with relative ease. Well . . . as Sidney Greenstreet so memorably said in The Maltese Falcon, “Well sir, we mere men should have known better.” ‘Cause it turns out you can’t just add this thing, first you have to enable it via ye Gyygle.

2a) And you can’t do that without “registering your site,” which in my case would be a new website.

2b) And you can’t do that without “getting started with Enterprise,” which means watching a video that explains nothing helpful and then “agreeing to ye Gyygle’s Cloud Platform Terms of Service and the terms of service of any applicable services and APIs.” All I want is a step-by-step guide, and instead I’m getting a Gilded Age marriage contract written in four-dimensional chess.

2c) So I guess it’s really a question of who’s going to strip-mine me for personal information: corrupt spammers or Big Tech.

3) Feeling snug at home during this storm — but this late in January it does feel spooky not to see snow on the ground.