Zora Travels

Blue Skies

A glistening sky has burst open on my first day home from work.  I thought I might relish sleeping in, Daniel's goodbye kiss brushing my cheek as he left for the airport and I nestled deeper under the covers, but then I knew that this sleep would push close to noon, yoga class forsaken; my body seemingly never able to naturally rise at 4:00am.

I returned from LAX, having taken Daniel for his flight to Michigan for an MBA weekend, and here I sit.  A cup of black tea, sun beams butter the leaves, a slight breeze rustles the bougainvillea vines.  A little girl in a pink sweatshirt with a helmet slightly askew rides by on her skateboard en route to the elementary school on the corner.

This week has been my first as a substitute teacher.  I've taught for over eight years; it's all my mind has known or considered for so long.  Now, I await phone calls to cover classes and there is no responsibility.  No lesson planning.  No grading.  No essays.  No parents.  But there are also no relationships.  No students who you can depend upon to say "Good Morning" and tell you about their day.  It's a lonely job.  I sit at lunch feeling less invested than my friends.  Less involved, dedicated, committed. 

I know that my upcoming time in Peru and Costa Rica holds great promise.  A gift of time for me to give of myself as a volunteer, soak in a culture, language, and environment completely different from my own.  Daniel and I will spoon in beds within family homes.  Families that have known vast poverty and governmental corruption.  Families that encounter, if not personally experience, true hunger and a lack of educational opportunities. 

Sometimes, when I consider our current volunteer choices, I wonder if we could pick easier non-profits.  Somewhere that has an organized volunteer system in place and relatively little contact with abject poverty.  But then I'm reminded just why I should volunteer.  To go where I am needed and my skills and talents can be used.  If that means helping to establish routines, schedules, and organization within a new NGO, then my giving will have had resonance.

***It's now evening...I forgot to post this earlier.  A morning stretch, Vietnamese noodle salad with my Auntie Barbara, and a delectable night eating chocolate cake with Sara and Graciela.  Daniel's interview today went well in Michigan and he's surely sleeping (or trying to) in preparation for an exciting day at one of his potential MBA schools this next fall.  I hope he lathers in Ann Arbor and he can let me know luscious details about our possible new stomping grounds.

Watching Claire

Claire flew in from Chicago this weekend...bringing with her a dazzling smile, a longing for Southern California, and one handsome husband.  The Boose's came to frolic with all their West Coast fans.  Those of us who would have been bridesmaids, fingered her dress, helped her bustle, spread out her veil, and watched the wedding DVD (numerous delicious times).  I felt that a little of the momentous day was recreated and I loved seeing the two of them emerge from Lien's mini in Santa Monica.

 

 

 

Watching Claire miss Los Angeles, the sunshine, the canals of Venice (shown here), the streets and shops...made me realize just how much I may soon be in that same position.  Missing the bright consistent warmth of Southern California while wandering the fog-laden hills of San Francisco or traversing a snow-covered intersection in Ann Arbor.  There are other cities tucked into our possibilities; however, these are the top two. 

3.5 months from now, I'll be walking along a beach in Costa Rica, having just finished a day on the organic farm, ready for a splash in the ocean before a fish dinner washed down with rum.  Life will be in a state of tropical relaxation for five months as we salsa dance through Central and South America.  3 weeks from now, I stop being a full-time teacher.  I want to soak in a daily yoga bath, take long walks, drink my coffee really slow while reading the paper, and enjoy the ocean breeze.

So many changes are coming.  So many adventures, sorting, packing, cleaning, moving, and deciding lie on the horizon. 

Impending move

My mind feels just like the pale yellow tea pot right now.  It sits atop a blue-tipped fire, rumbling, tempted to a boil.  When it whistles, I have to take notice.

Lately, the discussions at home tend towards shrinking budgets, impending moves, potential grad. schools, reciprocity of teaching credentials, and the nightmarish garage.  We try and cuddle on the lopsided couch and pick whimsical, political topics; however, inevitably one of us brings up the notion of how our life will change in the next few months.  I wish I could say that I look down the road and just feel giddy about our adventure to volunteer and learn Spanish, setting up a new home in a university town, and starting our lives anew as a couple in a location we both decide is best...but a thin film, like a hard-water stain, clouds the shine on this experience. 

Assuredly, with the first cocktail on some Costa Rican beach, after the first morning volunteering with children at a community center or school, and the first afternoon butchering Spanish with a tutor....I will have loosened and shed the knots that tangle my neck and the frantic nerves that cavort in my mind.  But for right now there is a palpable web that scrambles my thoughts, a thickness that creeps up my neck, and a twisting clamp in my back.  All of these symptoms come and go.  There are days when I manage to squeeze through the tunnel just focusing on the light at the other end, other days it is the murky wetness of our unknown future that garnishes my attention.

Today, I wish to see the light.  I have meditated, yoga'd, and soon dark Nicaraguan beans shall course through my veins whilst I drive north on the 405.  Heading towards the bright lights, swiveling televisions, and constant whir of machines and the clank of collapsing weight plates.  The buzzing scene that welcomes me each weekday with friendly faces that only say "hello," some that pretend they never see me, and the little person with OCD who never works out but showers for over 1.5 hours and then dries herself for another 20 minutes with a hair dryer in the front and the hand dryer in the back.  I try not to judge this woman.  I mean she does pay a membership fee to use the facilities.  But a 90 minute shower...every day.  It's a little much.  And parking...wow!  She pulls into a parking spot as if in a chase scene of Die Hard variety, she looks around, rocks a bit back and forth, then peels out of the parking spot and finds a new one with the same rocking routine.  I admit, I am a bit mesmerized by her routines sometimes...and if she didn't seem so intensely angry, I would like to say "hello."  It's hard when our only face-to-face interactions involve her naked with dryers blowing on each side.

Home again, home again, jiggedy jog...

Yesterday

Clifford the Big Red Dog captivates Ewan with his naked butt (how does he always end up without pants under my watch?).  Iris, swaddled and fed, swings with half-open eyes under her fish mobile. Tomorrow morning I'll sit amidst colleagues at school planning the agenda for the new teacher training and my time with my niece and nephew will seem a distant memory.

Today

I just returned from my first work meeting of the new school year.  A pedagogical "to-do" list gathers length in my mind, an empty pasta bowl and near-finished bag of pita chips lie at my side, bright yellow "welcome home" daisys burst from their vase.  Yesterday, I left the comforts of an air-conditioned home filled with three adults, two children and four animals to return to my home with Daniel.  A bright, hot, slightly disheveled home that throughout the day fills with KCRW, a gentle breeze, and often silence.  I am keenly aware right now just how quiet my home is.  Sheer golden curtains flutter in front of an open window, the wall clock steadily ticks, and the neighbor's tree rustles in the wind.

City life; albeit familiar is always an adjustment ---delivered this morning with my first traffic-filled drive up the 405 freeway.  No more picturesque sunrises that bring the velvet carpet of grass and gushing field sprinklers into light along a lightly traveled two lane road (occasionally shared with tractors).  No more salmon hued whispy clouds that dot the Kititas Valley sky as I push the stroller along a shady creek.  No more toddlers who ask for ticklebumps or babies whose lips smack wildly as the bottle warms.  But I am glad to be home.  Grateful this morning at 5:30 as the cell phones began their alarm duet, that I could nestle into Daniel's arms and have my first glimpse of the day be his faint stubble grin.  Energized to find the equipment and weights in all their proper places at the gym.  Enthusiastic to begin a discussion of how to best help the new teachers join our merry staff.

There is really no way to ever make geographical distance painless.  With all of our modern advances, I already can't remember exactly how Iris' eyebrows arch right before she smiles or recall Ewan's squeel as the horse draws near.  I'll look back on pictures, blog posts, and journal entries...but if another whole year passes between visits, a pre-schooler and walking baby will meet me.

Part of me always wishes I could pick up a map, pinch Washington and California, and simply smoosh them together...completely ignoring the boisterous protests in Northern California and Oregon.  Northwest liberals are very noisy...and I suppose it would throw off agriculture and ecosystems; however, it would mean I could run over there tonight and finish that last serving of peach cobbler hiding in the tupperware on the second shelf.  I could watch Ewan's face chortle with glee as Shane tickles him at the dinner table.  I could sample one more batch of my Mom's homemade ice-cream.  I could be an active participant in my brother's family and not just a visitor who comes once a year.

But one never knows where the journey will lead.  We may end up on Mercer Island or Catalina, driving to work on the 90 or the 91, living in a cramped apartment in Noe Valley or a spacious house overlooking the Columbia.  No matter where we settle, I can't fathom seeing them less than once a year.  That's my absolute max...when I start to get that ache deep in my chest and squeeze the children a little too hard at the airport.  Oh, I miss them already. 

With a tinge of sadness, I'm off to take one of those rare and relished summer naps that the school year does not permit.

Columbia is a possibility

I just plucked an aged Berenstain Bears book out from under my tush and grinned.  Tomorrow night I'll be snuggling Daniel under our faux-suede duvet in our monstrous bed; there will be no puzzle pieces lodged in between our pillows, no sincere requests to read Llama, Llama, Red Pajamas "just one more time," no warm babies lying on my chest and occasionally gifting me with a blue-eyed gummy smile...and I'll think back to this patchwork place that I spent so much of these past three weeks.  Thorin who suns himself in the bright corner leaving behind a carpet of dark hair; Ewan who stashes his books and plastic dinosaurs for evening play.

Before writing this post, I had just come in for a drink of water after sticking various rubber finger puppets in the copper twirly on the porch.  This doo-dad is guaranteed to deliver hours of optical illusion to any eave from which it drops.  My mother bought one for each of us at the Sunday farmer's market.  Tucked between the white tents bursting with blueberry lemonade, buffalo jerky, and donut peaches was a gnarled wood pyramid dripping with copper twirlies.  As the metal spirals spin, the object appears to splash up from the coils, when actually there is no movement.  It really is quite fun and I hope all of my future guests will enjoy the orange hued contraption once we hang it on our porch.  I will be certain to document future visitor's reactions in their varying forms of amazement.

These past few days have been luxurious for my senses.  Warm oiled hands kneaded my doughy back at an Aveda spa (Gracias, Kathy), my mother arrived sculpting blintzes swimming in berry sauce, peach cobbler melting in homemade frozen yogurt, and snapper lightly resting in butter.  She has a way of placing both food and memory into the mortar and pestle to mash the two inseparably into your consciousness.  I shudder to think of others, including myself, making these dishes...pure sacrilege to fathom someone else dishing up these delights; however, I'm keenly aware these recipes were not genetically ingrained.  They came down from a quartet of influential women.  Seasonings and general culinary knack hail from Lola, Southern staples from Deanne and Bettie, and the coup d'etat ---peach cobbler from Margaret.

Iris and I both watched as my mother, hopped up on iced-coffee, and maybe slightly in response to my sour-faced response to "maybe we'll wait on the cobbler," began to plunge into our 22 lb. box of Johnson Orchard peaches with vigor at 10pm.  She pealed and diced each peach, juice spilling over her hands into the pan below.  Flour, cubed butter and water danced delicately in a glass bowl until a rolling pin could nudge the crumbling strips into being.  Soon, the sugar-sprinkled buttered pastry mounted gushing peaches and the pair caramelized together in a hot oven.  Cobbler wafts began just as the ice-cream maker slowed its churn of homemade vanilla frozen yogurt.  My own twin contraption awaits my lactose intolerant fantasies when I get home to Long Beach (thanks, Sparky).  And that was just on Saturday.

Crusty sourdough plunged into bowls of vibrant carrot ginger soup; yellow beets, pears, and shaved parmesan dressed in a delicate vinaigrette; velvet spring risotto with peas and drizzled with olive oil; Tuscan chicken with goat cheese on foccacia found us on our mother-daughter Sunday afternoon.  We drove for several hours through valleys, in the shadows of the Manastash ridge, into the lush Cascade greenery to find Snoqualmie Falls.  A waterfall splashes 268 feet below the picturesque Salish Lodge (our dining digs are in the upper left of this photo).  Flower baskets gushed, mist from the falls dabbled the chamomile flowers clinging to the cliffs, and the sun shone with gentle radiance on a day filled with conversation.  Both our minds and mouths wound along the highway with questions and perspectives.  We discussed the beauty of sisters and female friendship (when sisters didn't come), my eventual wedding (of which we lightly plan even though "the question" still looms), my parent's divorce (an oldie-but-goody), and a passionate discussion of how Daniel and I "should absolutely NOT go to Columbia" in January (about which I could not muster up enough evidence to counter adequately).

We passed cows grazing near lakes dotted along the highway, horses galloping near dilapidated barns, and she told me of the temperature alarms and smudge pot lighting that used to wake up our neighboring orchardists in the Methow Valley.  During the spring, if the apple buds freeze, the crop is ruined, thus, back in the 70's low temperatures would set off a string of alarms.  Our family friends, the Stennes Family, would awaken, throw on some work clothes and hastily run from row to row, lighting smudge pots.  The thick black smoke and heated oil slightly warmed the air amidst the trees saving the buds and ensuring for at least one more day that the crop would survive.  I was fascinated by the romanticism of this frantic lighting.  I saw dark images of overall-clad farmers, soot on their faces, kneeling down beside the gnarled apple trunks and fanning flames they prayed would cast a warm enough embrace.  Flickering flames casting shadows on worried faces spread throughout the lush apple valley...livelihoods completely naked to Nature's lashing.

With full cameras and bellies, we drove towards home with fewer words and stopped in an old mining town that used to play Cicely, Alaska on television.  Passing time listening to gravel crunching underfoot and leathery Croatian men banter outside of a store hawking dusty Northern Exposure memorabilia.  An enormous Marlin Brando mural (from Wild One) painted on a lumber canvas and famous cafe facades and radio booth windows were captured.  My favorite Roslyn moment was looking up to watch the lanky biker cross the road, all but a denim heart around his genitals covered in worn black leather, faded boots grinding gravel, a tobacco stained beard hiding a gentle smile as he put out his cigarette in the coffee can at my feet, twisting the butt in his fingers until the filter and unburned remnants sprinkled into the sand.

My mind spun with images and my stomach churned the cheesy memories of Shane's homemade pizza as I wriggled under the quilt last night.  My mother and I each lay with our backs facing our opposing lamps, pajamas and pillows, feet and books, all slowly settling into night.  If only Michael Landon had popped his head up the ladder, kissed my braided bonnet head, and said "Goodnight, Half-pint" I would have been certain that I had just spent the day on the prairie.

Letting the Girls Free

Here I am this morning.  Chipped ruby toes, slippery lotioned legs, and a wrap that I picked up on a hot summer afternoon in Portugal.   I was walking along the beach of Portimao, trailing farther and farther behind this Australian guy that I'd met on the Lisbon train.  I immediately noticed the mounds of glistening skin bubbling on the beach and knew that nude sunbathing was the norm.  I needed a wrap; a garment that would allow quick cover for my girls in the event that I was traumatized.  At any moment the two German girls we had met were going to bare their mambas and frolic in the water.  I cast furtive glances as we settled into the sand.

I rationalized that everyone was nude on the beach.  All shapes and sizes were browning quite nicely.  British pensioners with opaque rolls of flesh spilling onto the sand; fathers in the buff hauling water up to an awaiting sand castle.  Look at the face....only the face.  Yet my distorted American sense of body image, the notion that only young taut bodies should ever don swimwear near water, held me captive in my new wrap.

I did eventually let the girls free.  In an instant, the wrap flew back and my chest plunged into the gritty hot sand.  There I lay.  Nervous.  Now, I was technically sunbathing nude.  My back bare to the Iberian sun.  I prayed the Aussie would soon invite the Germans into the water and I could shift positions.

My body image has never been higher than the months that I lived in Cologne with Fadi.  Turkish and Kurdish women, confident in their curvaceous figures, infused my life.  Women who sauntered through their apartments, nibbling chocolate, smoking cigarettes, indulgently smearing Nutella on pumpernickle, and sipping sweet Turkish tea from delicate gold-rimmed glasses as I scrawled the translation of "Alle Beni Pulla Beni" in my journal.  Their grace and sensuality in voluptousness created a more forgiving and accepting space in my mind.  A space that I've long since been seeking to recapture despite my society's persistant reminders that my body is far from the Western ideal.

If there was a nude beach in this valley...I'd run down their right now and let my girls free.

Hmmm...just writing that made me a little nervous.  I think I'll just play Barış Manço and twirl around in my wrap. 

Bubbles and the Sharp Shooter

It's amazing that at 33 years of age hearing my father enthusiastically say, "I am so proud of you!" feels so validating.  Albeit, the circumstances were a dusty ride into the hills, nestling cardboard targets into the bushes underneath buzzing transformers, and firing his .22 gauge pistol.  I was good- apparently, really good.  I had "good grouping" and while the targets moved farther up the hill, my aim strangely improved.  I beat my dad (if it had been a competition).

My initial reaction to the firing invitation had been an instantaneous and emphatic, "No thanks!" and then I saw in his face something rare...a true whimsy and desire to share with me something he loves.  I suppose it would be the same if I offered to wax up a surfboard and frolic in the ocean with him; however, this was a rare occasion for us to bond - his style.  And from the first moment that he unzipped the case and showed me how to load the cartridge, I was slightly smitten with the activity.  I used yoga techniques of cleansing breaths and calming thoughts as I increased the pressure on the trigger.  Just before I exhaled completely, I fired...the pistol jerked, a puff of smoke, and my dad would yell out, "Wow!"

Occasionally, in between loading bullets, taking a sip of water, and readjusting my yellow safety googles, I would think about how at this very moment my friends Claire and Greg were getting married.  Literally, as the neon yellow splatters confirmed yet another sharp shooter moment, they were exchanging vows and bubbles flirted in the air outside on the church steps.  It made my smile to think how differently, and yet joyously, we were both experiencing our Saturday morning.  When I spoke to the newlyweds yesterday as their ferry boat left Martha's Vineyard, I shared my story with Greg who got a kick out of it.

Side of buttered Texas and the camera

There is always this subtle twang that I hear in Central Washington.  It is an ever-so-slight Canadian-Minnesota with a side of buttered Texas rolled in.  I never picked up on it as a child.  It wasn't until years after our move to California that my ears would notice this lilt and within a few days of my return, I would casually drop a few of my own words back into it.  Last night at the Cottage Inn, my dad and I stopped for some pan-fried chicken and lemon meringue pie (my stomach was truly baffled by these entries).  The cashier's twang was so pronounced and familiar.  Their floral wallpapered walls also posted the best sign I've seen in a while (see photo).  How wonderful is that?

Passing grand pastures, open fields, and knotted apple trees along Blewett Pass was always significant as a child.  This route meant we were either leaving or coming back to our small town existence...which only happened every few years and usually entailed driving or flying to Southern California.  Last night, it signified yet another trip home as an adult to wallow knee-high in the memories of childhood.

As we were driving, the mini-cooper wheels ground to an abrupt stop in the gravel as we spotted a herd of elk (I had yelled out, "Look at the deer!" and was soon corrected).  This majestic herd (all females because they're missing the enormous antlers, also a tidbit from my dad) bathed in the last swath of evening sunlight as they grazed.  My father has a photographic monstrosity that can capture the hairs on your head from 500 feet away.  We quickly lugged it out and snapped a few shots.  One lovely lady did not immediately run, instead, she stared straight ahead, long pale tongue lashing the grass into her mouth, ears twisting in satellite dish fashion.  She was regal, strong, independent and apparently completely unfazed by our presence.

I want this camera.  I looked at my little silver 7.1 mega-pixel Cannon and felt embarrassed for it.  How can it squeeze out its little turtle lens, blur up an entire field of elk, and shrink back inside with any pride?  With my box, this elk would have looked like a fuzzy brown spot behind a tree; while with my father's fancy camera, you can see the strings of drool falling from her mouth, subtle variations of coloring in her fur, and defined needles in the tree branches.  So, when will my dad sell this gadget to me?  He purchases the latest gadgets every year and between my brother and I, we usually get offered first dibs on them when he's tired.

I mean look at this photo of Ewan and Iris.  It could have been taken in a studio. (If you thought today there would potentially be a post without these two, I'm just not ready yet.)  I finally get that it's all about the camera/lens quality.  My brain aches with the potential photographs that we could take next year: swinging monkeys in the Amazon, sweeping vistas at Machu Pichu, cobblestone boulevards of Bogota, and German villages along the Chilean coast.  Wherever we end up in January, we NEED this camera.  So, I must convince the old man of my need...confuse him that it has too many features to ever be truly enjoyed.  He gets very befuddled when he can't figure something out...and over time this leads to him making the inevitable phone call to negotiate.  What about a wedding gift? an engagement gift?  This goes way beyond a birthday gift....but he does like to barter in such a way that maybe "10 birthday gifts" could be the asking price.  I'll work on it.

Coming Home

As soon as my suitcase wheels zoom into the terminal at Sea-Tac airport, I find myself always thinking, "Wow, there's a lot of white people here."

I like white people.  I'm white.  I chuckle at the website Stuff White People Like, although I do think it should be more aptly titled "Stuff the College-Educated-Middle-Class Like," since Daniel (not white) also fits many of their profiles. 

The white people here at gate C2 (compared to my California folks) look like they've had a better breafkast (yes, perhaps granola), walk a bit more with their ruddy cheeks, don't tan as much, wear utilitarian backpacks into their 50's, carry Nalgene bottles, often prefer Seattle's Best to Megabucks, eat apples from cold storage (because the best apples are shipped down to us in California), live in a state whose capital is deep blue in swaths of red, carry lovely purses made of fabric, wear glasses and smile more.

I like Washington.  The Methow Valley envelops my entire childhood.  Under the boughs of weeping willows, I imagined friends.  In the river currents, my father taught me to swim, or rather, how not to drown.  I built stick and leaf dams in Pete's Creek, discovered (and ran) from enormous bee hives, twisted leaves into necklaces, hose bathed our dog Sandy, stacked wood for the fireplace, and felt God's presence at daybreak of every first snow.

I marvel at the nature easily ignored in childhood that now casts such an allure.  Summer is here.  Fruit stands will spill their cleavage, rivers will splash their smile, forest fires linger with their smoky breath on the horizon.  In some ways, this is always coming home.

Gentle Traveling Abundance

Riding up the blue vein to the heart of LA on Saturday, I spent time with the Columbian whores and nonagenarian journalist in Marquez' novel.  We disembarked at Pershing Square.  Wafts of urine, scurrying pigeons, and incense-burning street dwellers awaiting our arrival.  We circled the streets looking for the market.

Blond wood shavings curl on the contrete floor of the Grand Central Market.  It's a luscious sensory slip into the fruit, herb, and fruit stalls.  Amidst the piles of ripe melons and avocados, gentrifying couples and chin-strapped tourists jostle alongside sweaty day laborers.  Salvadorian pupusas competed with shiny kung pao chicken, aged falafel patties, and Mexican sopes.  My Berkeley memories of cheese oozing from thick cornmeal pickets, smothered in pickled cabbage salad and salsa, found us awaiting our calabeza, hongo, espinaca, and pollo surprises.  And soon, with laborious plastic-knife precision, lunch was finished and we waddled with greasy lips back into the subway's belly.

The Olvera Street of my adolescent recollection is highlighted by virgin margaritas with my aunt and uncle, stalls sprouting from the brick pathway enticing tourists with folkorico dresses, wooden toys, and vendors hawking the latest in Chinese and Mexican crap.  Saturday's vision was not an extreme diversion; however, the hammered tin crosses and thick shot glasses sold at my beloved Iguana were not only cheaper here, but also enchanted by the Mariachis and blind accordion player's ballads.

From El Salvador to Mexico to China we scurried.  Daniel and I make a point of visiting every Chinatown on our travels.  I think for him this honors his mother, who adores the plastic-wrapped, bamboo shoots, and dangling caramel pigs of all Chinatowns.  We have fingered satin slippers, ginseng root, and Boba tea in New York, San Francisco, Portland, and now in our own back yard.  San Francisco's dragon-tailed gate and hilly contents rise far above the rest; while Portland's one block of shuttered stores with cheesy Chinese accents lags behind its urban brethren.

This adventure spawned from Daniel's morning cyber-hunt for fatigue remedies.  Upon reading about the powers of ginseng and Wing Hop Fung Emporium, we both ignored the red tea box already lurking in our kitchen cabinet, and decided upon this tourist journey.  Red lanterns  (an image that never tires) swayed across the stone plaza, complete with dead-serious old men smacking tiles onto a wooden board, cursing (I'm confidently assuming), and leering with cigarettes dangling from their mouths at those tourists who found them irrestible to photogaph.

As we hustled towards the fanciful gold line station, we came across this spiral of Chinese characters.  This statement woven in concrete suited our adventure perfectly:  Encouraging the gentle traveling abundance.

***This is my first post sinced receiving a wonderous post on my friend Claire's blog, Life in Chicago.  I appreciate all of my new readers and encourage you all to visit her personal blog and the hilarious blog, She Wrote, He Wrote, that she co-writes with her "soon-to-be husband" Greg.***