Last night was so much fun but I am sworn to secrecy. Moratorium for one week, and then I can spill the beans all over my wall.
But a few highlights included enthusiasm uncurbed, a Newfoundland dog wearing a tie who was my date, great laughter with great friends, and then after a certain ceremony the fun continued, devolving into a cake fight, which I stealthily avoided participating in, other than to watch and laugh my head off as the delicious cream was smeared into the eyes and hair of the unsuspecting.

Despite no alcohol the lateness and the laughter has crippled me, therefore this post is short and I am going back to sleep for about 12 hours or maybe until next Sunday when I post again and reveal the details of this great great weekend.

Thank you Friends for all your comments, I do agree, as someone pointed out I have been in the Florida Keys too long since it didn’t occur to me not to wear flip-flops to visit the Palace.

Being there and seeing a painting of my grandmother I had never seen before from when she was in her 20s and knowing that she and my grandfather had walked on those marble flagstones at a time when the future was not known to them and yet strains of unease must already have been palpable. While today there is a leak in the skylight that illumines the grand entranceway, and water puddles on the floor. It was all profoundly moving, I’ve been crying ever since I got back to Key West. I keep wanting to say I’m home but I notice I only say I’m back. I think Serbia is my home. I’m more torn than ever.

Towards the end of my grandmother’s life when a little bit of confusion began muddling her thoughts we flew from Paris to London together. When it was time to get off the plane, this being the 80s when the stewardesses would line up at the front as one exited, they still do, but it used to be more formal. The formality confused my grandmother and took her back to a time when long lines of uniformed servants would wait outside fancy dwellings to greet or bid farewell, and it was her habit to stop and shake everybody’s hand and speak a word to each. So she stopped at every stewardess and shook their hand and said something sweet and special to each one. I could have shuffled her on, I could have explained it wasn’t what she thought, but I let her do her thing.

I remember one summer house, called Pratolino outside of Florence, and I remember arriving and departing and seeing the composed army of staff in a long line leading to the front door. This was a world and a life my grandmother was familiar with, the only one she knew growing up. Years later after settling in Paris and after the death of her husband she learned to get around town on buses.

I loved her and I love her and miss her still, and it was a thrill to be on land that once belonged to her at Villa Olga, Belgrade, Serbia.

Villa Olga, a house that once belonged to my grandmother HRH Princess Olga of Greece wife of my grandfather HRH Prince Paul of Yugoslavia has been returned to my family by the Republic of Serbia. In 1941 the Karageorgevic Royal family was asked to leave rather unceremoniously and sent into exile beginning with 10 years of house arrest in Africa. The diaspora of the family have been rootless nomads ever since, some settling in America others in England and yet more in France. I grew up being told our family would never be welcome back in Serbia and if we ever dared step foot in the country we would be killed. I don’t really know how true this threat was but that was what my cousins and I were told, so I hope we can be forgiven for our lack of enthusiasm to return, or even to learn the language.

After communism crumbled gradually the official policy toward my family was adjusted and one by one, starting with my mother, they trickled back to see, to feel, and to learn.

The purpose of my first visit to Serbia was to support my mother and to celebrate her achievement with the return of property. This was the first, and while the family hopes it will not be the last, either way this was a significant turn for us to acknowledge.

This week I have seen a country I have only heard of and read about, I met cousins some of whom I have never even heard of, and we all rousingly toasted a beautiful moment.

A great friend sent me a perfectly elegant white dress, made by J. Mendel which had me feeling like a princess! Thank you my darling friend, you know who you are!

The evening began with a ceremony with priests to cleanse the house of bad spirits. Guests began to pour in bearing gifts of flowers and with hugs and smiles.

There was no denying my emotional connection to this land, perhaps entirely romanticized, but nonetheless felt deeply in my heart.

My Serbian friend Rasko Aksentijevic, a natural historian, marched me all over Belgrade, introducing me to the history of buildings and statues and museums, and an ancient Fort overlooking the meeting point of the rivers Sava and Danube.

My cousin HRH Crown Prince Alexander arranged for me to visit the palace where my mother was born, the experience was deeply moving.

I was born in New York City and I was raised in England and I have mostly felt like an outsider everywhere. I’ve moved a million times because I never belonged anywhere. I have only ever moved forward, though perhaps it was sideways.

The last thing I did was to visit my friend Zeljka Milanovic, in Topola, coincidently the same town where the history of my family began 200 or so years ago. I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to take a walk in the forest. And I will, I’ll be back soon.

For a couple of years I have lived comfortably in my dollhouse at the center of the island. I love it but with no view and no breeze and after a childhood believing in castles I do at times feel cramped.

When I tripped across a second-story apartment on the water, with a balcony and a view of the Gulf of Mexico, I fell hard. That it was a houseboat, listing at an angle, and with a spider the size of my hand swinging in a closet, did not deter me and I sped blindly ahead and signed the lease. A village of friends with muscles and trucks moved me to my new domicile, everybody congratulating me on my find.

That first night I lovingly arranged my things but I noticed it was a bit warm and when I checked the thermostat it was in the 90s. I opened windows and in rushed the breeze, and I hung over the balcony and gloated at that gorgeous view of darkness and the lights of sailboats in the bay. And I waited, and then I checked the thermostat again, it was hotter. So I closed all of the windows and switched on the AC as low as it would go. And I waited and waited and checked the temperature again. Hotter.

I stood on a chair and waved my hand in front of the vent where sure enough cold air feebly exited but it was too weak to cool the rooms.

The faintest whiff of panic hit me. With every second I found my breathing was more labored, until gradually I was hyperventilating, pulling in short tiny breaths and soon I was dizzy and I knew I had to get out of there.

As if walking on the moon I slowly made it down the stairs and across the courtyard to my car. I got in and blasted the air conditioning and I sat there in the icebox car and acknowledged I had made a terrible mistake. Mercifully a sweet friend took me in for the night, letting me sleep on her sofa.

Now I must overdose on humble pie and beg for my deposit to be returned from the houseboat disaster and must now beg for permission to return to my dollhouse. I know one large hairy closet-dwelling spider will be relieved by my retreat.

Today I am back in the dollhouse and I have never loved it so much. I’ll blame my super freaky behavior on the Super Moon. Howl On!

Due to the severity of my hungover condition today’s post will be short, sweet and to the point.

Many friends came to town and we are having a very groovy time. Most amazing of all is Rachel came for a visit. First class all the way, she was even seated next to a hot young billionaire. Rachel’s world is full of magic.

All my local friends wanted to meet the fabled Rachel and there have been dinners (where the famous lobster basil quiche was served) and also lunches, and studio visits and boat trips to private islands and on and on the fun has rolled.

Amazing fusion of perfection Xperimento, the best band in the world, were in town and performing at The Green Parrot which, in case I haven’t labored the point enough already, is way and above and by far the best bar in the world.

And yes both nights Xperimento played I herded everyone I could think of and led the way and merrily and uninhibitedly I danced my ass off! That we ended up, at the end of the first night, in a swimming pool with the band until dawn, should not be misconstrued as anything but pure clean fun, and with only the merest dash of Boogie Nights.

Having Rachel with me has been beyond heaven and I’m so grateful to have my friend back. We’ve had a ball and I’ll cry when she goes home tomorrow.

Now I’m sitting on a terrace in the breeze listening to the wind in the trees and with my hurting head I acknowledge for me to dance through another evening I would need to be borne on a platform carried by those who carry platforms. The bearers could be in loin cloths and drenched in scented oils, oh I must stop dreaming.

And speaking of dreaming this was a dreamy perfect weekend and I hope the same fun was had by all.

This was 1982 and way ahead of my time. I was in Palo Alto and applying for secretarial jobs at those drab colorless new tech enterprises. Hushed cement bunkers with soft spoken staff in conservative outfits. My guffaws broke the windows. I was not hired by anyone, my feather-light resume resoundingly discarded in my wake.

Six months earlier a friend and I set off from NYC to travel the earth. After one month we were no longer speaking and when, on Patmos after a moped accident (I swear I had nothing to do with it) she warbled about needing to visit her ailing mother somewhere in California. I was thrilled, “I’ll help you pack,” I said. And on I went East with my adventures, first stop, India. Take that Columbus!

I did not discover the meaning of life, and here I was, half a year later, re-entering the Real World via California, and lo, Gia’s mother’s bungalow in the outskirts of Palo Alto. We lounged around at her mother’s and we dreamed up get-rich-quick schemes. We ate a lot of ice cream and played with Gia’s mother’s brand new microwave oven, blowing up eggs and melting sneakers. Disgusted, Gia’s mother pushed us out of doors. On our strolls to the nearest Baskin Robbins we noticed real estate flags on lawns. Clearly a thriving business and eventually we hit on a bankable idea.

We printed up flyers presenting ourselves as a catering company, specifically designed to cater to the multitude of open house showings.

One day the phone rang and we got a job. We ran off to the supermarket to buy a tray of cubes of cheeses and from a warehouse we rented chairs and tables and linens and stemware etc. Then we stood on the side of a highway and hitchhiked, which required flagging down a truck, slowly traveling with the party equipment and souring food, to the job site, a model home. We asked the truck driver to pretend he was our employee when we unloaded all the gear.

The event happened, in a surreal blur of earnest questions we couldn’t answer, and our evidently bumbling lack of expertise, but we survived the experience. The realtor lady handed us a check for an amount that didn’t come close to clearing our costs. Thank heavens we were never hired again so we abandoned the get-poor-quick scheme.

What are the odds of moving to Palo Alto and not becoming a billionaire. One in a million, that’s me!

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In the Hamptons one summer Anna and I lucked upon a spare house, don’t ask! Sometimes merely by forcing our way through a hedge we found our way to parties. At these parties, invariably, Anna beguiled, while I mostly grazed at the buffet. From one such evening Anna wrangled herself a suitor.

One Sunday the suitor came to pick up Anna for brunch.

We watched from the living room bay window as he parked his maroon car. “Is he driving a taxi?” Anna sounded horrified. We observed him bow over the passenger seat and gather up an armload of white flowers with long dark green stems.

“What is it?” Anna begged, with urgency.

“It’s an Infiniti,” I said, peering at the logo on the rear. The suitor exited his maroon car, and strode toward the house. Ignoring the ringing doorbell Anna said, “What is an Infinity? Is it an expensive car?”

“Try not to be so superficial!” I exploded.

“What? Should I like him?” asked Anna with genuine consternation.

I snorted at her and skipped off to welcome the man and his flowers.
“I’m here for Anna,” he announced, and for some reason he passed the sagging flora to me.

With the flowers cradled in my arms I lolled on the front porch and I watched the suitor settle Anna into the passenger seat, carefully tucking all of her in. Anna pressed the button to lower her window and she grinned at me, and we winked at one another.

I waited to wave off the improbably matched duo.

Suddenly my hands and arms were ablaze from pain and I stared down shocked to see an insect invasion charging over me and I hurled the infested bouquet to the ground.

As the maroon mobile slowly began to rumble off I heard Anna say, “Honey, what is an Infiniti?”

Don’t try this at home but allegedly a potent Caribbean island spell requires the ritual slaughter of a white rooster. How does one find such a creature? I contemplated the tracking of a white cock and I wondered how much of a metaphor this is, just how elastic are the rules? Which reminds me of a lady who referred to herself as a ‘pedigree’. Not a beauty, but toned and groomed and with perfect champagne glass titties, she married her boss, a screamer named, what else, Dick. It was the 80s and the masters of the universe threw dinner parties for the new power couple. For a stretch she inhaled the heady froth of power and her inner ruthless side proliferated, like a virus. Dick and the Pedigree bred boys who would engorge from the interlocked toxic DNA. To my eye they promised to become little pricks. Then it was the 90s and in a slippery move the company was arbitraged and Dick was sent packing. Dick was no longer sought after by society. “This was not supposed to happen,” the Pedigree complained. Now Dick was just a raging screaming old, well, dick. They divorced. Now she lives with her clutch of college age chicks. Seeing as they are Caucasian I wonder how they would work as ingredients in the potent island brew?

Oh, and speaking of children…

After a couple of years teaching creative writing at the county jail I’ve decided I need more of a challenge, more of a thrill. I’ll keep going, of course, but I’ve decided to augment with the same template but for the kiddies at the Key West High School. After 74 school shootings in the past year alone, I know where the action is. Jail is the blues and high school is hip hop circa Tupac. Campus is where the real danger is. I’ve proposed myself and I’ll let you know if I get a response, watch this space!

I bought a jasmine tree, stout and abundant with bushy foliage and tiny white flowers which I was assured would exhale potent smells on the night of the full moon. A magical plant lined up with astral insinuations, I was in love. The gardener installed the shrub into chocolate earth in a terra cotta tub. “Water twice a day,” he said, wiping his hands on his overalls. Of course, I said, I’ll water the thing, and never thought about it again.

Until the gardener returned a month later which is the first time I noticed the tree looked like winter.
“What is wrong with my jasmine tree?” I asked, crossing my arms in a gardener employing kind of way.
“No rain,” he said, his hands out palms up. “You didn’t water?”
Not once had I considered the plant.

After the admonishment, morning and night, I aimed the hose and showered the bugger until the grey twigs like chameleons turned green and incrementally uncurling dark leaves squeezed forth at tips. The tree and I were in a battle to show off who could create more leaves versus who could spray more revivifying water. This was a fantasia of fecundity and I couldn’t wait for the supercilious gardener to return and be awed by the return of life itself.

Then I got invited to Miami, to visit a friend. The whole drive I snacked on Fritos as I tried to think of who I could ask to water the jasmine tree. No one came to mind and then the issue of the tree was obliterated when the first person I met at my friend’s place was Sean Puffy Puff Diddy Daddy’s mama Mrs Combs, in a short movie star blonde wig and some very high heels and a stiff couture suit. As I openly stared at her, like I was meeting a narwal, I’m fairly sure Mrs Combs was eyeing my Fritos.

Days later, on the drive home to my outpost in the Gulf of Mexico a storm pelted, and for the first time I twinged about the jasmine tree, my forgotten love, and I thanked the heavens for the raindrops.

It was mid-morning and I was invited out. Night bat that I am I scarcely step outdoors before dusk and instead, especially now as the summer amplifies, I am committed to a nocturnal life and bow down to the polar blast of my a/c. But here was my friend Sunny texting, suggesting an adventure. Yes I replied and searched for my bathing suit, eventually found with a seam of dust at the fold.

Sunny picked me up in a rumbly pickup truck with kayaks in the bed and we drove to her favorite secret spot. I could sooner reveal the coordinates to an active treasure site, so let’s just say we pushed off from a slash of green mangrove tangled shore.

I followed Sunny’s lead into the emerald water. All around were crystal rods of light and its play on the blue-green tiled seabed with its wittering wavy baroque diamond shapes. I was hypnotized.

“Didja see that?”
“I heard the splash!” This went on all afternoon but I missed every sighting.

We paddled in the kayaks and then dove in the water, tumbling and rolling. To swim hard in one direction and then shoot down to the coral bumpy ocean floor was paradise. On the beach we drip-dried, luxuriating in the sun’s coddling rays.

“Thanks Sunny,” I said. “I should really get out during the day more often.”

To the setting afternoon Sunny returned me home. Feeling wobbly I took a shower which is when I felt my skin running off me in tiny balls. I looked down to see I was a flaking coconut cake. Tenderly I patted myself with a towel and lay down in the path of the frosty a/c and passed the hell out for almost a week straight. My bathing suit will once more gather dust as I gratefully return to a nocturnal schedule, at least until the fall.