I swear I spent most of this weekend recovering from last week. Between shuttling back and forth between Los Angeles, Seattle and Vancouver, I was freakin’ wiped. I’m so not 21 years old anymore! I get so tired so quickly. I guess this is what aging is like.

I turn 28 in a few weeks. Twenty-eight! It’s not that old, I know, but I never really thought I’d be in my late 20s. I remember being terrified of the aging process when I was younger. Turning 22 was very upsetting to me — all of a sudden birthdays weren’t about being allowed to do things, like drive a car or buy cigarettes or drink alcohol. They were just about being closer to death. My 25th birthday was a hard one, too. I’d always seen myself as being married with kids and the CEO of a Fortune 500 company and a prize-winning novelist by 25. And I wasn’t. I was newly single, working a nine-to-five office job I hated, and I didn’t understand how my life had gotten so off-track. I ran to the bathroom to cry in the middle of my birthday dinner, and I was tearful most of the night.

In my early twenties, I was terrified that I would be one of those women who doesn’t age gracefully, who’s 50 years old wearing a midriff-bearing halter top, chain-smoking in a college bar, hitting on 21-year-old men and begging girls like me to do shots with her and be her BFF. Those women were tragic, and I didn’t want to be like them. But I had no idea how to age. I had no idea how to go about existing as someone whose primary social value was not in her sex appeal and her youth. I had no idea how I’d navigate that. I was so terrified I’d fail, that I’d spend the rest of my life trying to be a 21-year-old party girl because I didn’t know what else to do.

I can see now, though, that my story won’t look like that. The older I get, the more I appreciate getting older. I value experience now, and I can see how it helps me today. I can hear my mother’s advice and realize that, perhaps, she actually does know things I don’t. I can see how my experience will continue to benefit me. As society views me less sexually, I find that I am able to more clearly see my other qualities, and I’m more able to value them. I’m more capable of demanding that I be valued for everything else I am, that I be respected and loved for things substantial. It’s beautiful and it’s empowering and I love it.

I’m not going to be the tragic floozy at the college bar. I’ll be a woman who ages with dignity and grace, who is surrounded by wonderful friends and family who love her deeply, for anything and everything she is. I will be one of those old ladies who just radiates grace and love, to whom you’re drawn because you know she is comfortable in her skin and she is full of joy and peace, the kind of woman me and my girlfriends look at now and say, “That’s such a beautiful woman. I want to look like that when I get old.” I will be like that because I will choose that life for myself.

My Olympic day was the best day ever!!!

We got a late start, because I couldn’t fall asleep the night before, which was fine because Trisha’s ultrasound appointment ran late. She was super bummed because they couldn’t tell if the baby was a boy or a girl — I guess its legs were crossed and it was “inconclusive.” Also apparently the ultrasound tech she got that day was a bitch and rushed through the whole thing and barely answered any of her questions, didn’t print out any photos for her, didn’t take the time to explain what was on the ultrasound, and just all-around sucked about it. I was so angry for her. I hate when medical people take a situation that is clearly SO IMPORTANT for you and treat it like part of the hassle of their day-to-day job. I’ve had it happen to me in the past and it was crushing. Like, if it were my job to show people photos of their baby in-utero, I think I’d do my very best every single day to be as excited and involved as possible, because this is like this biggest thing that’s ever happened for Trish, or for anyone experiencing their first pregnancy. Anyway. I was really pissed off about it, but the baby is healthy, and so I did my best to stay positive and upbeat and take her mind off it. By the time we were in Canada, she was laughing again.

When I originally started thinking about going to the Olympics, several months ago, I naturally assumed the border wait times would be hours and hours. When I’ve gone to Canada in the past, I’ve waited over an hour to cross the border, so wouldn’t it be at least double that during the Olympics? I guess not. There was no wait at all.

We met the guy who had our tickets in downtown Vancouver. Just like with the border wait, I had tons of worries about this — Would he actually be there? Would the tickets be real? Would he take my money and run off? But, no, he was super friendly and helpful and had our tickets for us.

We headed over to the parking lot where we were supposed to meet our bus to Cypress Mountain. More worries — would we have to wait for hours to catch the bus? Would we actually be able to find parking? But, again, everything went very smoothly. The Canadians have people wearing light blue jackets, pants and hats stationed practically all over the city to help direct people and answer questions. Trish and I just started referring to them as the “blue people.” It’s like the Canadians perfectly predicted exactly where everyone would need help. Whenever we started to get lost, there was a blue person to motion us in the right direction. We parked with no problem.

Then we realized we only had one bus pass with our tickets. CRISIS. We rushed over to one of the blue people to explain the situation, panicked that we wouldn’t both be able to get on the bus. We told them we had two tickets to the event and we’d paid for two bus tickets, but we’d only gotten one. (This is the truth, although I think it was an accident on the ticket seller’s part and not anything malicious.) The blue people were amazing and helped us get on the bus without buying another bus pass. Oh, and I’d expected to have to wait forever to board a bus, but the wait was only like five minutes. They had everything choreographed like a fine science.

The bus ride was about 40 minutes, and then they dropped us off about a mile from the stadium. There was a giant line of people — basically the entire mile long — waiting to go through security. Again, it moved surprisingly well, and it gave us a bunch of opportunities to take photos in the snow, which is really half the reason of ever being in the snow. We got through security and then they checked our tickets. Again, I was worried — Were our tickets real? Would we get in? Yup! No problem! Both were real!

We found our seats at the ladies’ freestyle skiing event. They were amazing seats — right in front of the skiiers at the very top of the bleachers, so we had a wall to lean against, which was KEY for Trish. When we first sat down, it was so foggy you could barely see the mountain. The ladies were practicing, but you couldn’t see them coming down the mountain because of the fog. Every now and then, out of nowhere, you’d just see a skier shoot up into the sky, flip a bunch of times, and land. It was actually very cool.

It had cleared up a little by the time the actual event started. It was so amazing to be there with people from all different countries cheering. I was on cloud nine. It rained a little bit, so we put up a huge black umbrella we’d brought. When I watched the event broadcast on NBC later, I noticed that every time they panned the crowd you could clearly see our giant black umbrella. We were on TV at the Olympics!!! (At least our umbrella was.) I’ve watched freestyle skiing on television, but it was so much cooler to see it in person. The girls go WAY higher than they seem to on TV, and it’s just surreal to watch them twist and turn and flip and then land from such a height. It’s super-human.

The walk back to the bus after the event was exhausting and RAINY, and we were totally worn out. But there were blue people every 200 feet (meters?) or so to overwhelm us with Olympic spirit, so it kept our mood high. On the bus ride home (again, we barely had to wait at all, once we got on the bus), we sat behind a married couple with their 2-year-old daughter, who was singing the “Wheels on the Bus” song all the way down. It was ADORABLE. It topped off the whole night perfectly. I felt like I was floating, I was so happy.

By the time we drove back to Seattle, it was 1 am. I was exhausted. I am exhausted today still. But it was a purely magical day. I want to move to Vancouver now. The Canadians were so incredibly kind and friendly and helpful. The transit system was well-organized. It went soooo much more smoothly than I predicted, and I credit that to the people of Vancouver and the people on VANOC. Job well done, folks, at least from what I saw.

There’s a billion pics below. Will couldn’t come on the trip, so instead I brought him along in the form of a stuffed bear he got me for Valentine’s Day, during the weekend we went to Poulsbo. I named him Poulsbear because I’m witty like that. Poulsbear went everywhere with us as Will’s proxy, so that’s why there are a million pics of a stuffed bear.

All in all, I have so much gratitude that I got to go on this adventure. I feel incredibly blessed to have been a part of something so spectacular and positive and unifying. I love that everything orchestrated so perfectly for me and Trish to have this opportunity.

LONDON 2012, bitches!!!

The event in LA went really well. It was so great to go back to my old grad school and speak to the students there. It felt like coming full-circle. They asked a lot of good questions and they have a lot of great business ideas themselves. I betcha I’ll be working for one of them some day. :)

I’ve been just DYING to go to the Olympics, since they’re so close to me, but tickets to the events at this point are ridiculously expensive and hard to come by. I’d all but given up my Olympic dream. Months ago, I registered for rentatthegames.com looking for a place to stay up there, but had no luck finding anything affordable that would let you stay just one night. However, by registering, I was on their mailing list. As I was hanging out with my friends in LA yesterday afternoon before my flight, I got an email from them. They suddenly had great tickets available at cost! I guess some guy’s son was supposed to compete in the men’s aerials final, but the athlete got appendicitis at the last minute and had to have surgery. So the guy was selling his tickets at cost for both the men’s and women’s ski aerial finals. Actual SEATS, not just general admission standing. I called IMMEDIATELY, thinking they’d probably already been sold. They called me right back, and I got two tickets for the women’s competition!!! I felt bad for the athlete who had to drop out, but apparently he’s 21 years old, so he’ll have another Olympics, and the spot he gave up went to his best friend, so he was at least pleased about that. And he has made ME very very happy!

Trish and I are driving up tomorrow morning. It’s extra exciting because she has a doctor’s appointment that morning to find out whether her baby is a boy or a girl. (Did I tell you guys Trish is pregnant? SHE IS!!!) We’re going to get either a blue or pink baby Olympics T-shirt depending on what the doctor says. Hooray!!! (Trish thinks it’s a girl, but I kind of think it’s going to be a boy.)

It’s going to be a SUPER long day, because we’ll drive up in the morning, spend the day in Vancouver, and then at 4pm we have to take a special bus up to Cypress Mountain. Then we have to walk like a mile in the snow to the stadium, and the event doesn’t start until 7:30. Then we have to take the bus back down to Vancouver and drive all the way back to Seattle. It’s going to be EXHAUSTING and FREEZING and I CANNOT WAIT!!! I’ve been an Olympics junkie my whole life, and I never in a million years thought I’d actually get to GO and watch an event. I AM LIVING MY OLYMPIC DREAM! Don’t worry, there will be LOTS of pictures!!

Los Angeles is my ex-boyfriend. That’s the simplest way to put it. And it was a rough break-up, and my sense of self was shaken to its core and then bashed into tiny fragments and finally just the dust of me flew daintily from the Malibu cliffs, kept aloft and in dance by the January breeze that whistles against those rocks and trees; then the dust of me twirled, leapt, spun, touched its pointed toe in the ocean and went down with the currents. I was no more.

I left him then and I swore I’d never go back to him, not even to meet for coffee and gossip. Because Los Angeles is the douchebag who would bring his new girlfriend along without telling me, and she would be magazine pretty with bones where her legs belonged and bright big wide-set eyes, the kind that people look at and say “You could lose yourself in those eyes” but that will never be the case for me because I lost myself in Los Angeles and I was looking for the eyes that would find me.

Los Angeles and I were finished. We didn’t call. We didn’t write. We didn’t email. I began to rebuild. To start from scratch. I spent more time with my girlfriends. I learned to call them when I couldn’t stop crying. I learned to listen to their advice and put it into action. When I left Los Angeles, I let my guard down a little, for the first time in many years. I gained ten pounds. I dyed my hair black. I allowed myself to be vulnerable. I allowed myself to let go of old ideas, to do it a different way this time. The woman I am today is built from different material than that of the girl who fell in love with Los Angeles. She is better engineered, she is loosely coupled, and she comes with blueprints now. You can knock her to bits, but she can put herself back together in no time. She knows where everything is supposed to go.

And yet. When I go back. When I acquiesce. When I survive that plane ride and I visit that ex-boyfriend, when I spend the day in his house and on his freeways and his landmarks and his sunlight and amid the energy of the City of Los Angeles. The brightness and the motion and the dreams of the City of Los Angeles. The possibilities of LA. He takes me back to his home, holds my hand as we walk up his steps. He lays down on his living room sofa, the oversized leather one, and pulls me on top of him, so we’re hip-to-hip. He wraps his arms around me, squeezes. He doesn’t want to kiss me. He doesn’t want to take his clothes off. He just wants to hold me like this, to thread my hair with his fingers. “I want you to feel safe for a moment,” he whispers, his cheek pressed against my ear. “I owe you that. I know.”

“Thank you,” I mutter.

“I haven’t changed,” he says.

“No,” I agree.

“You have. And you’re still in love with me.”

“I’m seeing another city now. Exclusively.”

He laughs. “Call me when you’re single again.” I lean my chin against his chest and he twirls a piece of my hair around his finger. “You’ll always have a place to stay here. I still love you, too. That won’t change.”

So, yeah. If you hadn’t guessed, I’m here in Hell-ay, just for a day, to speak to UCLA Anderson’s MBA students about Entrepreneurship in Entertaiment. It’s a part of their annual Entrepreneurship Week, and I am honored and humbled and excited about the opportunity, and I am going to do the best job I can with it tomorrow morning and then get right back on a plane before I start apartment-hunting in this city, beloved, and haunted by ghosts who are trying to kill me.

I ::heart:: the gays. I had the most amazing time last night at a Mardi Gras celebration at a gay club out here. Chelsia’s friend, porn-star manager extraordinaire Jason Sechrest, was hosting the event, and had brought along some of his talent to help get the party started. The event raised money for the Seattle faction of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, whose mission statement is to fund non-profit organizations that serve the queer and sex-positive community. “Sex-positive” is a term I hadn’t heard before moving to Seattle, but I love it — it’s all about teaching people that sex doesn’t need to have a negative connotation and that we don’t have to be afraid of people who practice sex differently than we do, whether it’s in their choice of partners, the frequency with which they have sex or how they have sex. “Sex-positive” organizations preach safe sex and acceptance of a variety of sexual identities and lifestyles. Obviously, this is the kind of thing I’m all about. The members of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence dressed full drag-queen style (but as nuns, ‘natch) and they hosted a Big Dick contest at the end of the night. No one could tell if the dicks were big or not, because none of the guys could actually stay hard up on stage, and I don’t blame them one bit.

Anyway, here’s what I have to say about this: The people I met last night absolutely could not have been friendlier or more welcoming. Everyone took the time to say hi. Many wonderful and sexy and gay men took the time to give me beads and tell me I was pretty. I now count Jason Sechrest among my best friends on earth — he was hilarious and intelligent and talented and kind and warm. The gay porn stars I met were fantastically sweet to me in a genuine way, not in a “I have to be nice to you because this is my job” kind of way. Usually when I go out to parties with Chelsia’s crew, I meet people and they’re like, “Oh, right, hi Chelsia’s Friend” and that’s the last time they so much as glance in my direction, because I wasn’t, ya know, on a network television show. That was not the case here. I felt included and relevant. This may or may not be because I brought along a date, an attractive heterosexual man, who was probably the only heterosexual man in the room (and definitely the most attractive man in the room, IMHO, hee hee). It was clear he was straight, and the guys went out of their way to make him feel welcome and safe at the party.

And the dance floor was the best I’ve been on in ages. I felt that dance-floor high that’s been so elusive since I abandoned the obnoxious meat-market clubbing scene. I can’t wait to go back to that club.

So someone, please, explain to me again why these are sinners who don’t deserve basic civil rights?

This weekend Will surprised me with a trip to Poulsbo. I’d heard the name before, and I knew it was near Seattle, but my perception of it had been as a really worn-down depressing industrial area. I have no idea why I’d thought that. I think it’s the name. Doesn’t “Poulsbo” just sound like somewhere you don’t want to go? We took a ferry ride to Bainbridge Island, which is one of my favorite little getaway areas surrounding Seattle, and in my mind I was like, “Can’t we just stay in Bainbridge?” But Will lived in Poulsbo as a teenager and was set on taking me there.

It turned out that my perceptions of the place could not have been more wrong. It’s a charming little Scandinavian village lined with Norwegian flags and high-end gift boutiques. We browsed the shops for awhile and had a lovely seafood dinner. It could not possibly have been more adorable.

We went by a house that he’d lived in as a kid, and I pretty much spent the whole time making Bachelor jokes. You know on The Bachelor when he does the home-town visits and the girls show him, like, where they went to elementary school, and where they had their first kiss, and where their dead grandmother lived, and he’s always like, “I’m just so happy that I’m getting to see all this. I feel so honored.” And you know that he couldn’t possibly care less about her dead grandmother’s house because she’s totally not getting the final rose and EVERYBODY knows that but her? Yeah. So I spent that portion of the day grasping my heart and saying things like “I’m just so honored that you brought me here. I can feel the passion that you have for this fence and this rock and this tree swing, and now that passion is within me. Is it time to sit down with your family and talk about the abusive ex you divorced and cry? Because that’s really what this day is missing.”

All joking aside, though, it was cool to see where he grew up, and I just love the areas surrounding Seattle so much. The old homes and the rocky beaches and the tree-covered hills. I never want to leave this part of the country. It’s so good for me. Perfect weekend!