Lucky now.

My intern told me today she's only just started listening to Ryan Adams. [Insert shock here.] 

She immediately gained credit for stating the first song she heard - the song that reeled her in - was "The Sun Also Sets." While not the first Ryan Adams song I heard, it did move me. I've been thinking how lucky she is; about the total discovery of each and every Ryan Adams song that is ahead of her. 

There's Gold, touted by the man himself as a 'modern classic,' with its heartfelt lyrics and rocking anthems. "New York, New York" is on that album. That song still brings me to my knees. Then there's Love is Hell Part 1 + 2. The album names alone let you know you're heading into his darker days. And that's fine, some of his best work came from those days, those hours. She's still got "English Girls Approximately," "Come Pick Me Up" (forever a favorite), "Oh My Sweet Carolina," and "Memories of You," "Crazy About You"...the list is long. And the songs are incredible. 

Let's not forget (as if I ever could) all of the albums with the Cardinals. "Dear John," "The Hardest Part"...I have a fond memory of walking to work when I was still living in Raleigh with "The Hardest Part" set to repeat on my gen 2 iPod. It was winter of 2006. (I note this because it meant something to me at that time.) When the elevator doors of my office building closed, I danced my ass off to the lyrics 'I've been turned around, I've been mystified by a true love, and that ain't the hardest part.'

I just played her "If I Am A Stranger." The acoustic version off Follow The Lights, and I think she's hooked. She loved it. Particularly the last line: 'I will try to be there for you, If I can, what if I can?'

What if I can?

No idea who took this photo. Unfortunately it wasn't me. Damn good shot though, right? 

These things I know.

I've had a memorable summer. Not in the sense that there were epic things happening at every turn, but in the sense that I will always, always remember - and fondly - the summer of 2012.

I'm a big marker-of-time. I always have been. Usually it's on New Year's, a birthday or maybe a landmark date (say the day I moved to NYC). But as I'm finally sitting down to write on the blog I've neglected, I'm looking back on the summer - from the beginning of May to now, the end of August - and marking the passing of time and events. Next week I'll leave for North Carolina, to spend the last week of summer vacation in the very place I began it - on the sand in Emerald Isle. A fitting bookend I think.

In May, as the lazy, hazy days of summer stretched before me, full of the bright promise that really only summer brings, I sat on a beach with my parents, my book, my iPhone (shhh!) and a smile on my face. 2012 was turning out to be a good year. Business, by which so many of us use as a litmus test to the times, was good, my personal life was rich with friends, a new relationship full of potential and excitement and chemistry was blooming, my family was as they always have been - supportive and inspiring and hysterical - and life was good.

This isn't a tale of how bad things got, or how quickly it all fell apart. Far from it. This is just a look back, a reminder of the events of that time in my life, the music that was on non-stop rotation on my iPhone, the people I knew and how lucky I was, and am.

So, I'm going to make a list of the highlights of Summer of 2012. Since this blog is for me, and the five family members that follow, you'll allow me this. A list is really all I need to remember how the days felt, the music sounded, the Txakoli flowed, of the conversations had, the bike rides taken, the plans made, the heat, the storms, the tears, the worries, then how they stopped, the sunsets, the nights + mornings that followed and the people. These are the things I know.

Kelli Beale Fletcher. The 'rents. Wendy Burns. Deby Pan. Jennifer Powell. Lil Bro. Dr. Shapiro. Patience (the bike, and having it). The view from the rooftop of 248 with Emily Williams. Emerald Isle. Jackson Hodges. Derby de Mayo. Txikifest. Lesa McHale. fun. Sundays at 10 Degrees. Steven + Tommy in NYC. Youth by Foxes on repeat. Midnight City cranked to e-le-ven. Kittypants. The Modern. Lesley, Mona, Helene + Emma. Sleepovers with ice cream - lots of ice cream. Heartbreaker (The film). Rooftop sunsets and sunrises. Kevin. A holiday in Vermont. Rosé, rosé, rosé. Florence singing her heart out at RCMH. Heirloom tomatoes for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Micheladas. Sunday dinners with Marissa. Learning to sear scallops. Conversations and confessions over Turkish Eggs. Frenchie brunches and boozy lunches. Bandaids as accessories. Beach House. Floating in the pool. Nick of Time. Hours spent at Edi + The Wolf. Ryan Adams. Mallory + Jess. Betting, and winning. The Paris Wife. Revel + Riot. 6th Street CSA. Pulled pork 'n Maryland crabs. Foster the People under the stars at Central Park. Late-night, last-minute karaoke trips. Ameztoi Txakoli. "Yeah, It's all alright." And how it turned out to be.

And there it is. The people, places and things that made my summer 2012. And because I don't hate a sunset. Here's one of my favorites. Ever.

August 2012, 248 East 2nd St. rooftop.

Full-on humanness.

I didn't read "Heartburn." (Though now I want to.)

I wasn't even a massive fan of all of her movies.

But Nora Ephron got me. Actually, she got all of us gals, but I like to think me in particular.

I remember the first time I watched "When Harry Met Sally." It wasn't Meg Ryan's oft-quoted (wholly remembered) orgasm scene that got me. It wasn't even their arrival in New York (though as a girl I dreamed of that day for me). It was Harry's line on New Year's Eve - "when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible" - that did it for me. Nora knew. She just knew.

Those words weren't laced with complicated thought or clever innuendo or adjectives of how we should feel. Those words were simple and spot on.

In reading some of the articles and farewells following her death this week, I stumbled across one written by Virginia Heffernan at Yahoo News. This particular sentence struck me. I copied it and sent it to my sissy and my Mini Me.

Ephron rejected the "counterintuitive" -- a crude commodity among female essayists, to write the opposite of what's felt and true -- and embraced, instead, the intuitive: good food, romantic love and full-on humanness in the form of vanity and laughter and grief and dorkiness. Ephron rejected the imperative to care about things she didn't care about, or get alarmist and guilty about her pleasures.

Heffernan wrote she wished she'd had the chance to become Nora's friend. From that paragraph, sounds like she already was.

And I know it well.

I spent last weekend with my sister + brother (in-law, but not a necessary descriptor) in Cambridge. There's something about Cambridge. I've felt it from the first time I set foot there with Kelli's cat in a box. True story.

But this time - this visit - was even more special. Maybe it was the rebirth of spring and its ever-fulfilling promise to renew. Maybe it was having been a long while since I spent good time with my favorite two. Maybe it was because we had weathered the winter, the last year and were finally facing the sun. It was most likely a combination of all, and each of us felt it.

There were picnics and playlists; long, honest conversations that only the closest of people can have and the silences made comfortable by the presence of loved ones. There was laughter too, and more rosé then we knew what to do with, but it was the conversations, the silences and the knowing that left its marks on me.

Perhaps that's why our Trifecta, never one for drawn-out goodbyes, said farewell-for-now listening to Blood Bank. Without knowing exactly what was in the others' minds, we were all struck by the same lyric. That's what happens when you know someone so well. And in return they know you as well as you know yourself - maybe better at times. I needed that reminder last weekend. And there, in the streaming Cambridge sun with my family - our heads down for the first time that weekend - I got it.

"And I know it well, I know it well."

Rose-colored glasses at Radcliffe.

March 14.

'Tis almost 'the Ides of March.' You're probably wondering what rock I've been under. Let's call it Paris. I've been living 'la vie du luxe.' And I've been cheating on the view. You know how it goes - life can get in the way and before you know it - BAM! - a calendar month or two has flown by without a post. And then the words just flow. Or so one hopes. I'll be back soon. Have much to tell. Many views to share. x

But for now, my most favorite view ever. The one from my rooftop.

I see London, I see France

Good is sticking with your New Year's goal (resolutions are so over) to go to yoga every. single. day. Not good is sticking to your New Year's goal and going to yoga wearing your most favorite (equally new) Stella McCartney high-waisted panties. Before I totally alienate all 7 male readers, these are 'granny panties' only on sight unseen. In truth they are the epitome of lingerie chic; gorgeous and leopard print. They are not, however, ideal for an intense hour and a half yoga class where one attempts numerous inversions only to come crashing out of one upon realizing there is more leopard than Lululemon showing. Center shaken, church laugh happened, maybe I swore. I definitely swore off any skivvies that may have been fashionably appropriate during 'Mad Men.'

Whatever.

Well, that happened.

Pulled out the old puffy coat for the first time this season. As it's not my most figure flattering outerwear, I attempted to counterbalance its bulk with wool tights and a pair of heels that I wouldn't want to chuck out the window after walking 15 blocks to the office. (Long blocks; avenue blocks.) It is here that I should thank my true friend Jennifer for convincing me not to get the ankle-length down coat my cold weather-averse Mother suggested. I believe her exact words were, "Do you want to look like a sleeping bag?" Point made. I'm not totally convinced today's puffy/slim combo was successful as I was 1) Sweating like a whore in church (Thanks Dad for that gem) when I arrived at le office and 2) Still wanted to send my Sigerson Morrison booties out the window. But there's Bon Iver on my iTunes (can't deal with Spotify's commercials + connectivity) and leftover collards in my lunch bag. So, the [immediate] future is pretty bright.

Happy New Year y'all.