| |  | | | | July 5, 2016 | Letter No. 41 | | | | | | | | | | | | Hello my Lennys,
These are strange days. It seems as though we are all engaged in a constant struggle to make sense of the ominous headlines, the manic signals from our televisions, the feeling that all is not well. I once had a teacher tell me that every writer feels she is living on the edge of the apocalypse. Be that as it may, right now every writer — and everyone — has some pretty good reasons for anxiety. On the same day I danced for joy because the Supreme Court voted to block Texas's restrictive abortion laws, I also started a weird internet fight about misogyny despite myself and grieved for a man who lost his mercurial love in the Orlando shooting. I watched Elizabeth Warren and Hillary roll two-deep in the blue-pantsuit army (and now I know for sure what Jenni and I will be for Halloween), but then I read about a trans woman failed, like so many of our sisters, by the prison system, and I wondered how we're all slapping our flip-flops against the concrete minute after minute, day after day.
Then I think about how good it feels to walk home on a Saturday night, the teensiest bit wine drunk, staring in other people's windows, and I try to remind myself that things can be beautiful and terrifying all at once. To quote Melissa Broder, our in-house astrologer and guru-poet of Internet-era malaise: "I'm not saying that the universe doesn't give us more than we can handle. But it's better than it giving us nothing."
If this issue has a theme, it is that: love and loss as one singular entity, making us who and what we are. Jenny Mollen's piece about the death of her beloved dog (and comedy partner) Teets is a hilarious and achingly lovely reminder that we can't have passionate connection without the possibility of impossible grief. Through her relationship with a poodle, Jenny became a woman capable of self-expression, motherhood, and success on her own terms. He did his job for her and he left. As a fellow dog codependent, this resonates a little too much.
Then we have Keah Brown writing with humor and honesty about her own painful experiences of otherness. As a black woman with cerebral palsy, Keah never felt like she had any choice but to stick out. But her anger transitioned into a determination to defy expectations, and her radical act was a seemingly simple one: doing her own ponytail.
Deliverance really does lie in the little things, and when we need to shut the world the fuck out, it can help to focus on small goals. It's why I torture Jenni by organizing the contents of her half of our desk into small and senseless piles. Jolie Kerr's new column Quick, Not Dirty gives you nice, tidy parameters for feeling like a champion of home economics without too much exertion. Meanwhile, Gabi Moskowitz explains how to make your bathtub an escapist haven of homemade fancies.
Hey, you — I know it's a lot right now. So just focus on getting home safe. Then scrub your mirror hard and appreciate the view.
Love always,
Lena | | | | | | | | | | | | My Dog Teets | | | | By Jenny Mollen | | |
"Are you allowed to eat someone's ashes?" I stared somberly at my son, belly up in the grass gnawing on a stick of yellow chalk like a rawhide bone. My husband, Jason, took the chalk away from Sid and motioned for me to sit down beside them. It was Easter, and less than a week earlier, my heart had been broken into a million pieces. My dog, Mr. Teets, the love of my life, was now just a tin of granulated sand sitting silently in Sid's stroller, making zero efforts to get in the holiday spirit and resurrect.
I knew he no longer needed to accompany us on walks. That was probably the only thing I liked about his new form. But I didn't yet know how to exist without him. I didn't know how to breathe without him, and yet somehow I was doing it. Functioning. Standing. Living through it.
For fifteen years, my entire adult life, Teets had spent nearly every waking moment planted in my lap. He was my mascot, the other half of my Twitter handle, the co-signer on my first apartment. I could predict his moods and which patch of ivy outside my house he was going to choose to poop in. I could pick him out of a poodle lineup blindfolded and hanging upside down. From his crowded mouth of broken teeth to his sun-damaged penis, I knew every inch of him. He was a part of me, and now, like a cancerous beauty mark, he'd been cut out. I was almost mad at my body for not collapsing right there. I was furious that I was going to digest the pain, that I was going to get used to his absence, that it was going to pass through me and eventually leave, just like he had.
Families smiled as they walked past us on the boardwalk, but all I could see were their dogs. German shepherds, Pekingese, Greyhounds. "Did you know Teets?" I'd ask each canine telepathically. "Do you know where he is?" "Are you him reincarnated?" "Blink twice if you want me to steal you from your owner." No luck.
When we met, I was a 21-year-old unemployed, anorexic, aspiring actress who quit her job at the Coffee Bean because she was afraid of pumpkin scones. My days were spent driving aimlessly, waiting for my flip phone to ring with news that I'd landed a Dawson's Creek audition. I was arrogant and ambitious yet misguided and clueless, with no idea how to apply any of the shit I'd learned as a theater major toward real life, or even a Dawson's Creek audition.
Yet Teets believed in me. He loved me the way I wish my parents had and trusted me in a way that I didn't even trust myself. In retrospect, I'm not always sure he had the best instincts. Especially when he would wedge himself into a ball under my brake pedal while I was speeding down the 405, making it impossible to stop. Which was fine, I guess, because I was never really going anywhere anyway. But his faith changed me. When he looked at me, he saw me as better than I was. Stronger, healthier, more capable. With time, I grew into the woman Teets believed me to be. But up until a month ago, I had never been her without him.
They always say that when your animal is ready to go, he will tell you. Well, Teets never told me. His body was emaciated to the point where I could count his vertebrae, and he still didn't fucking tell me. I just woke up one morning and knew it was what I had to do.
I don't remember how I got myself into my vet's office or who said what to initiate the process. But I remember Teets's eyes focused on me like they always were. Ever confident that I could handle what was coming. All I know is that we were together.
For days I couldn't talk about anything besides him. I sobbed in the arms of Uber drivers and Seamless deliverymen. I kept my eyes peeled for symbolic objects in department stores. Things he might want me to have to remember him by. "Does Teets want me to buy this Jennifer Meyer necklace I can't afford but I've wanted my whole life?" "Is Teets trying to tell me to buy a Gucci suit for his memorial service? He'd be mortified if I scattered him wearing Donna Karan." I ate pancakes for dinner. I drank wine with my coffee. I walked around the block in my bathrobe and wore my grief like a badge of honor.
I'd never mourned anybody besides a couple of great-grandparents and an ex-boyfriend who promised he'd kill himself if we ever parted. I knew Teets's death would hurt me, and I wanted it to. Feeling pain was confirmation that I'd loved him as hard as I thought I did. What I wasn't prepared for was that it would get easier. I'd care again about brushing my hair and ingesting 56 grams of carbs before bed. I'd be distracted by life and absentmindedly take a small step forward. But I didn't want to move forward. I wanted the world to stop. I wanted a Princess Diana–style memorial outside my apartment that would be eternally refreshed by tourists and diehard dog lovers, a procession of women and children sobbing in the streets and chanting his name. I wanted obituaries written and biographers working frantically to find his next of kin. I wanted plaques made, cathedrals built, banners pulled across the sky. I wanted something to hold on to, because the aching was ephemeral.
In the beginning my email was flooded with people who'd known him. My Instagram was flooded with people who hadn't, strangers who understood how exceptional he was, how lucky I was, and how unworthy. But eventually, even Teets's biggest fan in Uruguay went back to posting pictures of Meredith resuscitating McDreamy. It was happening, life was continuing on like a moving sidewalk I couldn't control.
I stared at his tin of ashes that, a month earlier, I'd had to fight the urge not to tuck into bed next to me. I ran my fingers over an imprint of his paws and tried to weep the way I did when the vet first presented them. Somehow, though, it was different. Or maybe it wasn't. Maybe it didn't hurt as much because in digesting the pain, I'd also ingested him. He was no longer next to me, but I was almost certain his soul was wedged inside me, preventing me from pumping the breaks even if I wanted to.
A close friend (a pet psychic) assured me that some day another animal would enter my life and that I would fall in love in a similar way. I want to believe that. But what I want to believe more is that it will be Teets. Ready to groggily come out of hibernation and join me again on Earth. So until that day comes, I'll be strong, I'll be brave, I'll be the woman he helped me become, but I'll never stop searching.
"Did you know Teets?" "Do you know where he is?" "Are you him reincarnated?" "Blink twice if you want me to steal you from your owner …"
Jenny Mollen is the author of The New York Times bestsellers I Like You Just The Way I Am and Live Fast, Die Hot. | | | | | | | | | | | | Five Projects You Can Do in Fifteen Minutes to Improve Your Life | | | | By Jolie Kerr | | |
Five years ago, I stumbled into a career that turned my lifelong tidiness into a job offering advice to people who had made a mess of something when I started writing the column "Ask a Clean Person." That column became the basis of my book, My Boyfriend Barfed in My Handbag … And Other Things You Can't Ask Martha, and spun off into a podcast. I spend a lot of time thinking about home care, as you might imagine, including and especially the amount of time and effort involved in everything from hand-washing a beloved stuffed animal to doing a major overhaul of an impossibly messy bedroom.
It's the time-and-effort aspect that inspired this new column, Quick, Not Dirty; each month, I'll suggest a set of cleaning and organizing projects that can be completed in 15, 30, 45, or 60 minutes. These discrete jobs are easy to pick off and will earn you the satisfaction of seeing a task to completion without an enormous amount of effort. Maybe you're feeling down and need to focus on something other than your circular thoughts. Maybe you'd like to justify an otherwise slothful weekend of Seamless and binge-watching by completing a task that sounds impressive but really didn't take much effort. Or maybe you'll read this and think, Huh! I never really thought about how little time it takes to do my chores. Yeah, I've got fifteen minutes I can spare.
Whatever your reasoning may be, here are a few cleaning and organization projects that will make your life so much better in just fifteen minutes, a.k.a. the time it takes to watch a quarter-episode of The Bachelor and wonder when your Thai food's coming.
Tupperware purge
May I confess something to you? I am a jar hoarder. I just find them so enticing! But there came a day when I had to admit to myself that I was keeping more empty jars than I could ever hope to use in my lifetime, and since then I've managed my jar-hoarding tendency by having a dedicated space in one of my kitchen cabinets in which jars may be kept. When that space is full, no more jars are allowed in.
Like jars, Tupperware (and food-storage containers in general) is an easy thing to keep too much of — luckily, it is also blessedly easy to cull a collection down to a manageable assortment. So if you've got fifteen minutes, do yourself a favor and get that mess under control. Here are a few helpful parameters:
- ● Take everything out so you can assess your collection in its entirety.
- ● Sort all the storage containers into groups by size and/or shape, and then match the lids to their containers.
- ● Stained, warped, and lidless containers, as well as items you just never use for food storage, can go.
- ● Plastic or glass storage containers can be repurposed for use in places like basements, garages, and toolboxes to corral tiny things like nails, cords, coins, etcetera.
Once you've pared down your collection, put everything back into one specific place, which will help you to keep it under control.
Wash your bras
Fact: None of you are washing your bras often enough. OK, maybe one of you is washing your bras enough. The general rule is that bras should be washed every three to six wears, and I'm sorry to tell you this, but hand-washing is ideal. But also, hand-washing is really easy and truly will take you only fifteen minutes*. Here are the basics of how to proceed: the kitchen sink is a good place for this operation, because it will be roomy enough for you to submerge several bras under water without creating a huge drippy mess (just be sure that it's clean!). Fill the sink with lukewarm water and add a small amount of detergent — you don't need a specialty detergent, but if you'd like one, may I suggest Soak? It comes highly recommended by the product-testing geniuses at the Sweethome and is a no-rinse formula. That's right! No rinsing, how marvelous.
Add your bras to the mix and swirl 'em around in the water to allow the detergent to get into the fibers, then leave them alone to soak for ten minutes. If you're using a no-rinse detergent, drain the sink and roll the bras in a towel to press out as much water as you can, then hang the bras by their center gore (never hang them by the straps!) to air dry. If you used a regular detergent, rinse the bras very well before drying.
*Drying time not included.
Clean the bathroom sink, mirror, and toilet
This is an easy one, which is great because I know that cleaning the bathroom isn't super-high on most people's lists of fun activities. But with just a small amount of time and effort, you can make your bathroom look visibly better. This is helpful to remember if you have last-minute guests dropping by and aren't keen on showing off the toothpaste Rorschach art project you've installed in your sink, or in the event the Rorschach art is obscuring the mirror, keeping you from seeing your lovely face. This isn't exactly a deep clean, but man, will it ever make a difference. Here's what you're going to do:
- ● Get a can of foaming bathroom cleaner like Scrubbing Bubbles and hit the sink and toilet with it, including the inside of the toilet bowl.
- ● While the Bubbles do their work, grab some paper towels and glass cleaner and clean the mirror(s). And hang on to those paper towels for a sec.
- ● Once the Scrubbing Bubbles have had a few minutes to do a lot of the work for you, wipe them away using a damp sponge. Start with the sink, then wipe off the toilet seat and rim of the bowl. Use a toilet brush to scrub the bowl itself.
- ● Then, using that same wad of paper towels, remove any lingering residue.
That's all! That wasn't so bad, was it?
Wash your makeup brushes
Even I am guilty of not washing my makeup brushes often enough, and I know better. Keeping makeup brushes clean will help to prevent breakouts, is crucial if you've had any kind of eye-infection situation, and, most important, will save you from looking like this. Don't let muddy makeup happen to you!
Here's how to do it: fill a small bowl about halfway up with brush cleaner (or use the recipe below), then place just the bristles of the brushes in the cleaning solution, with the handles leaning against the side of the bowl. Let them soak for 30 seconds or so. Once the bristles have absorbed some of the cleaner, take the brush out and swipe it back and forth on a paper towel, repeating the process if necessary (this will be especially true of bronzer and blush brushes) until there is no more residue. Once the brush is clean, lay it flat, reshape the bristles, and allow it to air dry.
DIY Brush-Cleaner Recipe
- ● 1 cup distilled water
- ● ¼ cup isopropyl alcohol
- ● ½ tablespoon grease-cutting dish soap
- ● ½ tablespoon baby shampoo
Combine ingredients and pour into a 12-ounce bottle to store.
Clean your sex toys
There are nuances, of course, when it comes to cleaning your sex toys — are they motorized or no? Are they made of stainless steel or glass? Are you using them solo or with a partner? — but, generally speaking, a damp cloth and dish soap are all you need to keep your toys clean. And cleaning your sex toys is a thing you should be doing! Allowing sexual fluids to build up on toys can lead to yeast infections, or, worse, can transmit STDs. Plus, your toys give you so much and ask for very little in return. Surely you can show them a little love from time to time!
Jolie Kerr is a cleaning expert and advice columnist. Her weekly column "Ask a Clean Person" appears on esquire.com. | | | | | | | | | | | | The Freedom of a Ponytail | | | | By Keah Brown | | |
I am 24 years old and I can finally put my hair into a ponytail. This may seem trivial, but it matters, especially when you have spent most of your life keenly aware of all the things you can't do. I have cerebral palsy, and it affects the right side of my body. Putting my shoulder-length hair into a ponytail by myself had always been out of reach, until last year.
I didn't feel embarrassed about needing help with my hair until high school. I'd watch enviously as my classmates put their hair up before gym class. My eyes would follow them as they walked through the halls without limps, ponytails bouncing along happily as they made their way to their boyfriends' lockers.
My identical twin sister, Leah, was one of those girls. She doesn't have cerebral palsy, and she can put her hair up without even thinking about it. I spent a lot of our teenage years resenting everything about her — from the shape of her face to the tips of her toes. I wanted to be her. I wanted a body with completely functioning hands and feet, a body without a right leg that was shorter than the left. I wanted to wake up glad that I had woken up. I didn't want to resent God for giving me crooked lips and fingers, aching knees and hips, but I did. Since I couldn't take my anger out on him, I took it out on her, calling her the names I called myself when no one else was listening. I was cruel. Still, Leah stuck by me, always the first person to defend me when someone made a snide remark about my disability.
Even though Leah or my mom would help me every morning without complaint, having to wait until they were done getting ready and then ask them to fix my hair really bothered me. I couldn't allow myself enough space to be OK with how much I had to ask for help, because I was striving for a kind of independence I knew I might never have. I would go to school and my friends would say, "Oh, you put your hair up, it looks really cute," but I knew that I hadn't done it, my mother or my sister had done it for me. The ability to put my hair into a ponytail was just another thing that I couldn't do, regardless of how hard I wished for it at night. I imagined boys thinking, She can't even put her hair up. Why would I go out with her? Nevertheless, I didn't really work on my ponytail dream in high school. Being one of the girls with the long, swinging hair just seemed out of reach.
In college, without my mom or my sister to help me, I tried every trick imaginable to put my hair up. For a while, I used a claw. I had a black one and a brown one. But the claw didn't give me a ponytail, it just pulled all my hair up. The claw was quickly followed by a bejeweled tuck comb, which never worked either. I always ended up sending the comb skittering across the room.
I would ask my roommates or hallmates to help me, and they were happy to do it, but I was the only black person in my friend group. I knew that my hair was very different from theirs. My hair is thick, and it takes a lot of time and patience to get it to cooperate. They weren't sure how to approach it. I was thankful to them for even trying, but it really pointed out the glaring differences between us, so I tried not to ask very often. Asking for help made me feel like an outsider, like the younger me watching those girls with the perfect hair. Instead, I used the claw or the comb, or I wore my hair down.
I graduated from college in 2013, and while I was living back at home and looking for a job, I had a lot of free time. I made a list of all the things I could and couldn't do: I couldn't walk for long periods of time without leg and hip pain, I couldn't ride a bike well, and I was paralyzed with fear at the idea of running. I couldn't skip, or swim, or sing, or dance. I knew I couldn't teach myself to swim, but I decided I was going to learn how to do a ponytail, no matter what.
I tried YouTube tutorials. Search: How do I put my hair into a ponytail using one hand? There are lots of videos on this topic, mostly by amputees. But the videos showed only white women with hair long enough to position between their shoulder and chin to keep it in place, hair long enough to put between door frames and dangle behind chairs.
Search: One-handed ponytail with short hair. The results were more of the same, until I found a video I thought might actually work. It featured a special hair tie called the 1-Up — basically an elastic string with a toggle. My aunt Renee made me one, and I followed the video's instructions. The hope was that my nondominant right hand would be able to help my stronger left hand and create this seemingly easy ponytail. I envisioned a new morning routine where I would stand beside my sister while she did her hair and I did my own. I imagined walking into a dressing room at the mall and trying on clothes with the ease and nonchalance of a girl who could confidently put her hair back up when she was done.
I was proud of a ponytail I hadn't successfully made — until reality crept in. I needed to pull the string with my right hand while my left hand held down the toggle, and my right hand wasn't strong enough. I wasn't strong enough. After two weeks, I had to give up on the 1-Up.
Search: What's wrong with me? Why can't I do this simple thing? Will there ever come a time when I do not need to ask my sister to put my hair up once she is finished with her own? Doing my own ponytail was part of a dream of self-sufficiency, a chance to believe that if I could do that, I could achieve other things.
I felt desperate to be able to do this. I began practicing in secret. As soon as my mother and my sister left for work, I would park myself in front of the mirror, brush in hand, and try to put my hair up all day. I practiced for weeks in the same chair, in front of the same mirror, with tear-stained cheeks.
On a Wednesday in April last year, in the middle of a rainstorm, after trying for three weeks, I finally did it. I gathered as much hair as I could in my left hand and put the elastic around it, then put the low ponytail into my right hand and used my left hand to twist the elastic around and tighten it. The resulting ponytail wasn't perfect, but I cried like I'd won a Pulitzer.
These new sloppy ponytails give me a taste of the self-sufficiency I long for. They are a promise of more to come, a promise to keep working at them until they are the best that they can be. I find myself wondering back to that list of things I can't do and imagining a world in which I can. Now that I am able to do this one thing, the others don't seem so impossible. Maybe I will drive one day or learn to run again. Being able to put my hair up didn't make me instantly love myself or my body, but it helped me see that I could one day.
I no longer have to ask my sister for help unless I want a ponytail that will last a while, or a touch of makeup. My ponytails feel like a revolutionary act, a celebration of disability and of me. I will never blend in, and I am recognizing the beauty in that fact. However, with my ponytail, I feel less like an outsider and more like the badass, black, disabled feminist I am.
Search: What's wrong with me? Absolutely nothing.
Keah Brown is a writer and lover of books, language, and pizza. She tweets about them all and more @Keah_Maria. | | | | | | | | | | | | DIY Bath Time | | | | By Gabi Moskowitz | | | |
I believe there are very few things in life that can't be solved by a long soak in the tub. Anything from run-of-the-mill stress to painful heartbreak to PMS to deep, dark despair can be made at least a tiny bit easier to bear, even if just for a little while, by a good bath. A few years ago, I went through a particularly rough breakup, and every night I took a long bath in an attempt to speed my healing. Yes, I sobbed every time — my crying volume magnified by both my raw pain and the bathroom acoustics — but I always emerged from the tub a little bit calmer, a little bit soothed. These days, baths are a primary component of my self-care practices. I'll take a long soak over a shower every damn time.
And sure, you can just fill up a tub with warm water (or cool water, if it's really hot out), climb in, and probably really enjoy yourself, but with a few extra steps, you can turn your bath into an at-home spa, fit to heal your body and soul.
First, I like to make sure I have a fluffy towel or two nearby, plus something good to read. (I'm currently deep into Stephanie Danler's Sweetbitter.) The towel is to dry off with after the tub and to dry my hands on while I'm in the tub so I don't ruin every book or magazine I read while I bathe (if you are going to read on an iPad, Kindle, or phone, consider slipping it into a large plastic zip-top bag first).
Then I pour a beverage. Sometimes I take a glass of wine or bourbon on the rocks in with me. Sometimes tea or a tall glass of ice water. I'm an anxious person, and sometimes have a hard time quieting my brain down after a day of deadlines and fluctuating emotions, so when I need a little help relaxing, I'll make a hot mug of this stuff called Natural Calm. It may be 100 percent placebo effect, but I swear it soothes my nerves after just a few sips.
Once I have my beverage and reading material ready, I'll light a couple of candles and step into the empty bathtub for some exfoliation. There are many body scrubs on the market, but honestly, nothing compares to a brown-sugar scrub you can make yourself with ingredients you probably already have at home. This is how:
Brown-Sugar Body Scrub
Ingredients
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup olive oil
Optional: I like to add a little peppermint or eucalyptus essential oil, something that invigorates the senses while the scrub invigorates the skin.
Directions
- 1. Stir ingredients together in a jar or other container with a fitted lid.
- 2. To exfoliate, scoop a small handful of the mixture and rub gently all over wet or dry skin (it will be a bit more aggressive if you exfoliate on dry skin, so be extra gentle if you go this way).
- 3. Note: the oil may coat the floor of the tub and make it slippery, so make sure to completely rinse it clean after use.
After exfoliating, I rinse the scrub off in the shower and then get the bathwater running. Once I have the temperature adjusted (I like to go warm but not hot at first, settle in, and then when it starts to cool as I soak, I crank up the hot water for a minute or two to heat the whole thing up), it's nice to add salts, bubble bath, or a moisturizing milk bath. Currently, I'm loving a half-cup or so of regular pink sea salt (the kind you would use for cooking — I buy it in the bulk section of my local natural-foods store — way cheaper than fancy "bath salts") and a bubble bath I make myself. The bubbles don't puff as high as the kind with lots of chemicals, but they make the bathwater silky and luxurious-feeling. Here's the recipe:
Homemade Bubble Bath
Ingredients
½ cup of distilled water
½ cup Castile soap, like Dr. Bronner's or a generic brand. I like the kind sold at Walgreen's.
1/3 cup liquid glycerin. Look for this at drugstores near the laxatives … which is the other thing glycerin is used for.
A few drops of your favorite essential oil. I am a big fan of lavender, which I find so relaxing, and rose, which makes me feel like I am bathing in an English tea garden — something I would very much like to do!
Essential oils can be easily procured at natural-food stores. I'm fond of the 365 brand, which is Whole Foods' store brand and is pretty reasonably priced, and Aura Cacia.
Directions
- 1. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the water and Castile soap with the glycerin.
- 2. Add 4 to 5 drops of your choice of essential oil.
- 3. Continue whisking until completely combined.
- 4. Pour your bubble bath into a clean jar or bottle and cover tightly with a fitted lid. You may also mix all the ingredients in a wide-mouth jar or bottle and shake with the lid secured until all the ingredients are completely mixed.
- 5. Run the bathwater and pour a couple of tablespoons of the bubble bath into the running water.
Once I'm settled into the tub, soaking away, losing myself in a good book (or stalking my Internet crushes on Twitter, or Instagramming my bubble-coated feet on my plastic-bag-protected phone), I like to take the opportunity to do some sort of beauty treatment. Sometimes I'll coat my hair in coconut oil, or I'll cover my face and chest with a homemade mask. My favorite recipe is gentle on skin, but effective enough on any underlying acne that may be trying to ruin my night. Oh, and, if I wanted to, I could eat it.
Smoothie Mask
Ingredients
2 fresh strawberries
1 teaspoon honey
2 tablespoons plain yogurt (the Greek variety is a bit thicker and makes a better mask)
Directions
- 1. Mash the strawberries in a small bowl with the back of a fork.
- 2. Stir in the honey and yogurt.
- 3. Smooth the mixture all over your clean face and let sit for 15 minutes, or until it dries.
- 4. Wipe the mask off with a clean washcloth and rinse your face with water.
- 5. Eat the leftovers in the tub, obviously.
Note: If you are allergic to strawberries, try blueberries.
The final step to any good bath is moisturizing all over. Coconut oil straight from the jar or cocoa butter will leave you feeling soft and smelling good.
By this point, I hope, you have achieved bliss. Repeat whenever needed, as often as needed.
Gabi Moskowitz is the editor in chief of the nationally acclaimed blog BrokeAss Gourmet and author of The BrokeAss Gourmet Cookbook; Pizza Dough: 100 Delicious, Unexpected Recipes; and a forthcoming book, Hot Mess Kitchen. Currently, she is a producer of Young & Hungry, a Freeform comedy now in its fourth season inspired by her life and writing. | | | | | | | | | | | | July Lennyscopes | | | | By Melissa Broder | | |
CANCER
(June 21 to July 22)
Turn off the lights. Lock the door. Light a candle. Burn the incense. When at home, really be at home. There is nowhere else you need to be right now. It doesn't matter if people tell you life is elsewhere. There is nothing else you are supposed to be doing. There is nothing really to do at all.
LEO
(July 23 to August 22)
If you suddenly gained the ability to remember in every moment that people are thinking about themselves more than they are thinking about you, and that it's human nature to self-obsess, you would be heartbroken at first. Then you would be heartbroken less often than you are now. Then you would be set free.
VIRGO
(August 23 to September 22)
Just try not to fall in any psychic holes this month. Like, it's OK to have a worrisome thought every five minutes. It's your Virgo nature, you're alive, and there's a lot beyond your control to obsess about. But this month, try to put a lid on the narrative of terror that follows those first creepy thoughts. If you find yourself thinking It's all _____ or Everything is _____ or It's going to be like this forever, say to yourself, "I know nothing."
LIBRA
(September 23 to October 22)
For some people (ahem, Sagittarius and Aries), every decision should be considered a big deal. This is because they don't do enough hemming and hawing and sometimes make choices lightly that should be weighed with gravitas. For you, it's totally the opposite. This month, practice throwing caution into the ocean. If no ocean is available, write the possible outcomes of a pressing decision on a piece of paper and flush it down the toilet. You'll know what to do.
SCORPIO
(October 23 to November 21)
The world continues to astound you, dear Scorpio, with its hurtfulness, madness, and lack of self-reflection. Is it that you're better than everyone else? As a Scorpio moon, I'd like to say yes, but I think it's really that we just see differently than others. Remember that our curses are our blessings, even though that kind of sucks, and that for every experience in which your sensitivity causes you pain, there is another experience where it takes you to a dimension that most humans don't get to feel.
SAGITTARIUS
(November 22 to December 21)
Other people are more scared of freedom than you are. I know it's hard to accept this, that another human being wouldn't value the thing you probably consider the biggest gem on Earth, but it's true: other people are different. If you want other people in your life, you're going to have to learn to be patient with them. Annoyingly, that means you are going to feel imprisoned sometimes. For most people, it's a universally bad thing to feel imprisoned. But for you, it's a sensation, and to sit through it and see what happens on the other side is growth.
CAPRICORN
(December 22 to January 19)
OK, so you definitely waste a lot of energy worrying about a future that is largely beyond your control. You imagine the worst — perhaps because it gives you more of a sense of control. It's simultaneously terrifying and soothing to future-trip. Like, you may drive yourself nuts with bad scenarios, but at least you're prepared. Sort of. Anyway, I'm not going to tell you to stop future-tripping. I just want you to notice yourself doing it. The next time you do, maybe ask yourself if there is anything more fun or exciting you could be thinking about.
AQUARIUS
(January 20 to February 18)
If you aren't willing to accept the fact that you're human, it's going to be a difficult rest of your life. The thing that's so bonkers about your self-judgment is that the perfectionistic ideal you set up for yourself isn't even a universal ideal. It's some weird, convoluted image you've created based on idk, what? Adolescent trauma and some other shit, probably. In any event, feel free to continue trying to keep yourself inside a small box of what's "OK." But just remember who created that box.
PISCES
(February 19 to March 20)
Not to be judgmental, but why are you playing the martyr? What are you afraid you will lose if you don't? Are you scared that if you set to work on healing your own shit, then the universe that has slighted you won't step in to give you what you rightfully deserve? But what if it never does?
ARIES
(March 21 to April 19)
You don't need anyone else this month, Aries. Don't read any love horoscopes. Don't wait for anyone to behave the way you want them to behave. Don't try to convince anyone of anything. Let go of other people's reactions entirely. There's an army of people inside you. Like, seriously, there's a posse. If this sounds woo-woo, fine. But if you find yourself alone this month, I want to remind you that you aren't doing anything wrong.
TAURUS
(April 20 to May 20)
So I know you've already done a lot of unfamiliar shit this year, but guess what? It's time to do more. This might feel like punishment. Haven't you stretched enough? Unfortunately, my dear Taurus, it seems like you've made massive changes in your life, only to do the same old things in a new place. Maybe it's about micromovements? You don't have to make massive, external changes that look like you are moving. What's most important this month is that you commit to one small thing you are going to do differently right where you are.
GEMINI
(May 21 to June 20)
Oh God, your situation is asking you to grow again. Seriously, who wants to grow more? Haven't you learned enough lessons? Aren't you an amazing person as it is? The truth is that life is grow or die, and as much as you grumble about adapting to change, you would be bored as shit if you weren't continually challenged. I'm not saying that the universe doesn't give us more than we can handle. But it's better than it giving us nothing.
Melissa Broder is the author of four collections of poems, including Last Sext (Tin House 2016), as well as So Sad Today, a book of essays from Grand Central. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The email newsletter where there's no such thing as too much information.
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