Life

So I'm standing in line at midnight in Walmart and thinking. (Dangerous, I know, on several levels.) How could the husband of a beautiful, Oscar-winning actress cheat on her? Is no one safe, ever? The tattooed paramour of Sandra Bullock's husband ( or who says she was his lover) told a magazine reporter that he was lonely. With that kind of money and three kids how could he be lonely?
Why are so many people so lonely? It's really sad. Is that deep gnawing feeling inside loneliness, or something else?
Weirdly, I was thinking about her and Meryl Streep on Oscar night. Beautiful, smart women. Sandra gave the most touching, normal speech. She sounds like such a sincere, down-to-earth person. But I sat there thinking that with all the talent, money and good fortune, they're no different from the rest of us. They probably have the same feelings of inadequacy and insecurity as we do, if not more, and cry over the same things. And so often, celebrities wind up doing that on the world's stage.
I mean Marie Osmond had a crew from Entertainment Tonight at her son's funeral for Pete's sakes! The camera shot closeups of her face, wrinkles, grief and all. For the record, and I've told all my co-workers this, I would never, ever let the news media in to witness the grief of my most private moments.
A woman here in DeBary lost her teenage son in a tragic accident a couple of weeks ago. Incredibly, she let a reporter into her home the next day to discuss her feelings and the accident. How very sad she must have been. I agreed to take the photo of her son back to her three days later and when I arrived, she answered the door. I couldn't believe it. All the grief, all the agony I imagined she felt and imagined I would feel if I lost any one of my three, welled up into my throat and stuck. I couldn't even say a word to her.
Which brings me back to Jesse James and his supposed lover. These are the people that truly, truly shouldn't talk to the media. Why do we buy this drivel and support these people who lack ethics, integrity and good taste?
I had almost decided I could side with Rielle Hunter, John Edwards lover. He was under a lot of stress and his wife sounded like a shrew who may have flaunted her family money and ridiculed him. But then Hunter goes and gives up her story to a magazine and lets a photographer take pictures of her without essential pieces of clothing. Then she has the audacity to say she was distraught over the pictures. Here's a clue: If you want classy photos, never, ever, under any circumstances let anyone with a camera in the same room if you're not wearing all your clothes. The same goes for video cameras.
This reminds me of another subject I've pondered at some length this week. I attended a home party last Saturday night, but not the kind you'd think. No plastic bowls and air-tight lids. No stoneware, kitchen implements or decorations. Just lotions, candles and items that might require stock in a battery company if you used them very often. We're talking vibrating, pulsating power here, in several shapes and colors, including one the consultant suggested keeping in your car in its velvet pouch in case you're stuck in traffic on I-4. Stuck in traffic? I'm afraid that might cause a whole lot more fender benders.
You won't read about the Passion Party or the very kind hostess -- June -- in a story from me. We decided we just couldn't do it justice in the pages of a family newspaper. However, the party was fun and wild, with the guests -- fortified with Vodka-laced Jello shots and large glasses of wine -- getting more relaxed as the evening wore on. But the hostess and one of the guests said one of the important points of the evening was empowering women. And they weren't talking about Energizer or Everready.
Which made me think - a lot. Freedom to have sex at any moment in any way you see fit wouldn't be on the top of my list of empowerment tools. I think more about removing glass ceilings, giving women the same pay for the same day's work as a man, letting a woman work in an environment free of sexual harassment (without being asked to serve a cup of coffee blonde and sweet), giving women the right to vote and to speak out on issues. But other people have assured me, part of the basics of empowering women around the world really is about sex and giving them the most basic freedoms over their own bodies. I'm just not sure what I think about that.
However, clearly, to bring this back full circle, no matter how much power or presence a woman has, some things can still bring us down, shredding our self-confidence and sending us right back down to the deepest, darkest, back spot in the cave.