BLOOD AND HONEY

I do this thing when I travel where I adamantly refuse to take too many pictures. I want to be able to actually see what I'm looking at, instead of pointing a lens at it all the time.
Budapest is a beautiful city, and one that felt more alien to me the longer I was there. In that way that a difficult and handsome man can be terribly withholding and ambivalent but still captivating at the same time. (I have a type. It's a problem.) We arrived after a five-hour sweltering train journey (the air conditioning was broken) from Prague. That train journey, heat stroke aside, felt oddly familiar and yet utterly foreign. The corn fields reminded me of Iowa; but I had never seen so many acres of sunflowers in my life. The villages and towns we passed all had Soviet-era towers and churches with that distinctive steeple shape, like an elongated teardrop. And in both town and country, graffiti is everywhere.

When we got off the train in Keleti station, I knew instantly that something unusual was happening. Hundreds of people were swarming the platforms, and hundreds more were lining up to buy tickets. I noticed that nearly all of them were young men with no luggage, and then I knew--refugees. (I refuse to refer to the events this autumn as the migrant crisis. More of them are refugees of war than economic migrants.) I had been following the refugee crisis since the drownings off the coast of Italy earlier this year. It's one thing to see that in the paper or in a video on the Internet, but to see it in person does something to your heart. At least it did mine. The urgency of those fleeing the horrors of war, the fight for survival, the vulnerability and the courage of thousands of people all jammed into one little place--it's palpable. You can feel it. It is as tangible as heat bouncing off asphalt. Underneath the train station were tents, where children were playing and sleeping and crying.

This experience set the tone for me for the rest of our time in Budapest. But there were many joyful moments for us, too.

If you go there, go to Cafe Central. The walnut cake there was so good I thought I was hallucinating. (Maybe I was. I had head exhaustion. But still.) I was a total tourist and had chicken paprika there as well, and goulash, and it was far and away my best meal in Budapest. We also went to Dohany Street Synagogue, the largest remaining synagogue in Europe, for a string quartet as part of the annual Jewish festival. I loved the music. They also had this art installation in the courtyard called the Tree of Life, which was metal, and whose leaves chimed in the wind. It was very unsettling and somber and beautiful.

We went to the Gellert hotel for the spa, which was a sumptuous art deco heaven. The water has fancy minerals in it or something. I just liked it because swanning around in an art deco spa, with sunlight shimmering off the blue-green walls and the comforting echo of the spring water gushing out of the pumps, is just so fun. It's like being an off-duty movie star or reclusive duchess. (Can you tell I have an overactive imagination?) However like all spas they make you wear those hideous shoes.

I don't have pictures of it, but our hotel, called the Bohem Art Hotel, was fantastic. Easily the best hotel breakfast I've ever had, anywhere. (Savory French toast with tomato and cheese? Homemade pastries? Raspberry Greek yogurt and fruit salad that doesn't scrimp on the pineapple? Brown bread that rivals the soda bread in Ireland? Cheese-stuffed sausages wrapped in bacon? Perfectly cooked scrambled eggs? WHY DID I LEAVE??) Our room was slightly smaller than the average toaster and the shower doesn't have a door or curtain, which would be sexy if you were staying with your husband or lover or something, but for me just meant that the floor was flooded after showering. But hey, it's an art hotel, so they can be arty and cool. The housekeeping staff gave us free bottled water every day and everything was immaculately clean; the bed was comfortable and the air conditioning pleasantly robust. Located close to the market hall and one metro stop away from the city centre, I cannot recommend it highly enough.

I have been away in Eastern Europe for most of the past month and now I am back. Photo diary to follow.
Since I am also bedridden with the flu, I have been lolling around on Pinterest (for the first time in three years). It's made me remember why I disengaged from the site in the first place. It feels very homogenous--the same things pop up over and over again. There are also a lot of nonsensical myths on there.
Myths make me angry because they trick people. They trick people into buying things they don't need. So, rather than just yelling "Charlatans! Thieves!" to my computer forever, I have culled from like half an hour of hopping around on Pinterest some flagrant myths, and debunked them:

1. You can get your hair to grow super long super fast if you take supplements or eat better.
No. Hair growth and length, like so many other things, is largely determined by genetics. Example? Myself and my college roommate and BFF. She treats her body as the temple it is and eats so well she doesn't even need vitamins but she still takes them anyway. Her hair, of course, is also shiny and healthy and strong like the rest of her, but it grows slowly. When I was in college I ate terribly (and sometimes I still do), only started exercising junior year, and never bothered with deep conditioning or quarterly haircuts. I counted the citric acid in Coca-Cola as Vitamin C. (Well, almost.) My hair has grown about eight inches since February. It will grow all the way down to my hips. You wanna know why? Both my grandmothers have incredible, thick, coarse, wavy hair. There are steps you can take to take better care of your hair, but how long it grows is something you can't really control.

2. You can get flat abs by doing nine thousand crunches. 
There is no such thing as targeted fat loss. When you burn fat, it happens all over your body. Additionally, crunches are sort of a lousy exercise, I think. You can and will strengthen your core with all of the major lifts, like deadlifts and squats. Far more effectively, too, since you have to use muscles in the front and back of your body to stabilize yourself during these lifts, rather than just the six-pack muscle in the front of your body. 

3. You can get rid of blackheads by doing something with Vaseline or charcoal or whatever the hell else. 
Blackheads are hard to get rid of. The only reliable method is to have them extracted by a facialist who's really good at it. If you try to do it yourself, you could scar, and all that those homemade treatments succeed in doing (or those pore strips) is inflaming your skin. You can reduce their occurrence with the right products, like AHAs.

4. Cellulite creams work. 
This one isn't from Pinterest, this is from Kylie Jenner. She claims that she uses butt plumping creams that stimulate fat cells. Okay. NO. Whether you're trying to get rid of them or stimulate them, no topical cream is going to do anything to the fat cells in your skin. It doesn't penetrate deep enough. Don't let anyone make you believe you shouldn't have cellulite, or that it's abnormal. The majority of women do. The outer layer of our skin is thinner so the connective tissue and fat beneath it is more visible. Even slender people have it. Any boyfriend who complains about it is a douche canoe, unworthy of beholding you in all your glory. Throw him out, and then send him an invoice for all those cellulite creams and years of psychological damage because, let's face it, if he's judgmental about cellulite that's probably the tip of the iceberg.

5. Detox ANYTHING. 
Detox is this buzzy buzzword applied to everything from tea to body brushes (first of all, what?? what's wrong with a washcloth?) and I hate it. Your body already flushes away the junk that you don't need, that's what your liver and kidneys spend all day and night doing. And the word "toxin" implies that we constantly ingest massive amounts of formaldehyde or something. Which we don't. I'm as wary as anyone about bizarre substances companies may put in our food or skincare, and there needs to be more transparency and rigor in the FDA's standards, but what bothers me about this trend is that the products that claim to be detoxing don't work. Is herbal tea, or hot water with lemon and cayenne pepper, going to magically flush any tiny molecules of BPA from your system? No. If you chronically drink to excess, is some detoxifying mask going to be able to reverse the dehydration that alcohol causes? No. It's total snake oil and scaremongering.

6. You can get rid of dark eye circles with tea bags.
Ah, genetics rears its ugly head again! If you have chronic darkness under your eyes, it could be due to sinus problems, anemia, or just having more pigmentation under your eyes. The likely truth is that those shadows won't go away unless you treat the underlying cause. Even then, you may not be able to get rid of them. Take heart. I leave mine uncovered whenever I need to appear especially serious and studious. Does it work? Who knows. Do I feel more like the heroine of a Victorian novel set in Yorkshire? Absolutely.

Now if nothing else you can walk free in the knowledge that most of the time the stuff people are selling you is junk. I hope this was useful for you. I'll be back with something prettier soon.

the OG of classic, unstudied, breezy cool. nobody can say "sit your narrow ass down, hot shot" quite like Lauren Bacall can--with her eyes.

In all things except skin care and bathing suits, I am a traditionalist. Part of this is because it is low-risk in some ways, and I have an engineer for a father. Engineers are allergic to risk. I have inherited this. 

And so when it comes to clothes, I detest trends. Trends only exist to convince women that they need to buy more things. I don't think you should have to do that. 

And seriously, most trends are not that flattering. Do side cut-outs or dresses made of netting and strategically placed doilies flatter most women? No. When people look back on this time period, they will marvel at the fact that so many celebrities and fashionistas walked around in full-body pantyhose. Remember super low-rise jeans from the early aughts? God help us. I was in elementary school then. It was apocalyptic. I don't know how anyone survived.

Right now, the seventies and the nineties are both massively on trend (which seems odd to me as in silhouette and color palette they are disparate) and I hate the fads from both these decades, which means I have been continuously vomiting and ping-pong-ing back and forth between shops looking for something, anything, that is not fringe-y or suede or a velour turtleneck.

I AM NOT SUGGESTING that if you want to try out trendy things that you are wrong. I am saying that you don't have to. It's just marketing. You can still be stylish without constantly adding lots of different pieces to your wardrobe.

And this brings me to my point about personal style: it comes from consistency, not trendiness. Why does any of this matter, you ask? And you are absolutely right. The fact that any of us worry about such things shows us a) how privileged we are, and b) how blown-out-of-proportion-important image and personal branding have become in this digital age. It is not as important as feeding the hungry or protecting the innocent. But we can't get away from it. And if you want to create a personal style, that requires understanding which silhouettes, fabrics, and colors work best on you and running with it. You will find that if your top priority is flattering your body, similarities and themes will emerge. Most of us are best suited to a few silhouettes or styles. For me, this means shirt-dresses or shift-dresses cut well above the knee, high-waisted and narrow jeans and trousers, muscle tees, and motorcycle jackets. I can tart around with the Free People gauzy maxi-dress thing, and I can do WASP-y tweeds and cable knits if I really need to convince someone I'm a good student and/or employable. But I don't feel my most confident in those things. I feel most confident in red, blue, white, or green, in little shirt-dresses and simple sandals, in cuffed jeans and a muscle tee with my Vans. (I'm 1000% a closeted bro.)  I love ornate embroidery and beading but I save that for evening wear. My style is very specific: it's what Betty Draper would wear if Betty Draper went to high school in Venice in the early seventies and dated a Z-boy. (Z-boys would rather cut their own hearts out than wear fringe. You can bet on it.). 

So, you know, I've created a character of sorts. For you it may be totally different. You may be that New England prep school girl who nonetheless has a weakness for skate shoes and leather. Or maybe you're a total IDGAF diva in the vein of Rihanna, or a breezy bohemian languid under the weight of turquoise rings. Maybe you're that rare person who was born to wear yellow sheath dresses. If you're having trouble, think about the movie stars you admire. We often subconsciously choose to admire famous people who share our coloring or body type. For me, that's Lauren Bacall and Francoise Hardy. It takes a lot of trial and error to figure out. But when you find a look that makes you smile in the dressing room in that half-embarrassed, half-exhilarated flush of I feel like a goddess, that's your look. Stick with it. It will serve you better than hi-lo hems.*

*Remember those? What a time to be alive.

    
     I was going to write a skincare post today but then I thought, I should really talk about something that moves me. (Of course, skincare also moves me. Ole Henriksen's moisturizers smell like orange creamsicles. That would move anybody.) And weight lifting is that absolute highlight for me. It's always the best part of my entire day. Which I guess makes me sound like a drug addict or something. But it's true.

     I cannot overstate how improbable this is for me. I took ballet and gymnastics as a little girl, and I've been surfing since I was eleven. So I have great balance and I am a strong swimmer. But apart from that I am about as athletic as a sea anemone. Owing to poor depth perception I have outrageously bad hand-eye coordination, and I hate competition and confrontation of all kinds except for explaining why BuzzFeed is bad for America. I was an awkward, gangly, bookish, gap-toothed towhead with a big vertical scar above each eyebrow and easily hurt feelings. (Ah, how little has changed. Except for the gap teeth.) So nobody wanted me on their dodgeball team in elementary school. I'm not kidding. I was always chosen last unless my best friend Cailend was team captain. By the same I was seven I had suffered two major concussions, had a fork stuck into my eye by my infant sister, and been hospitalized for fever seizures. I was a risk-averse kid. If anything spherical came hurtling towards me from anywhere, I ducked and called on the Holy Family (the Olsen twins).

     Then in middle school I developed Osgood-Schlatter syndrome, which is hilarious in itself because it's far more common among young boys. Basically, my patellar tendons hated me, and running or prolonged walking caused darting pain just below my knees. Despite written medical exemptions from both my pediatrician and a specialist, my PE teachers made me run the mile every other Friday anyway, as they lumbered behind the stragglers on their golf carts. So as you can imagine I grew to hate running.

     Then in college my freshman roommate was really into fitness. She would run almost every day, and lift weights almost every day. She ate more vegetables than anyone I had ever met. Her skin glowed. Her eyes shined. She usually handled stress a lot better than I did. All of this is also because she is the best person in the whole world and a gift from God, but it was only amplified, you know, by her exercising. It took two years of occasional and gentle peer pressure, but after I had my first significant bout of panic attacks, I asked the question that changed everything:
"Kayla, can I go to the gym with you?"

     She of course said yes, and the next day I followed her into our college rec center. She taught me how to use the rowing machine, a few free weights exercises, and told me which machines to use and which ones were a total waste of time ("that hip adductor thing," she said with a raised eyebrow, "is pointless"). That was where I started. I kept up with it for some of the summer, but I traveled a lot so it was spotty. This past year, my senior year of college, was when Kayla taught me how to do deadlifts and squats and lunges and the more serious stuff. She taught me to lift heavy and only do a few reps, and adjusted some of the moves to take pressure off my knees, which still give me trouble.

     At first, I didn't really notice a difference, but I mostly did it for my head. I liked the floaty feeling after a workout, and for the hour that it lasted, I knew I wouldn't have any panic attacks and I knew I would feel okay for a little bit, and when you have panic attacks, anything that makes you feel safe is invaluable. Then when I took a dance class I stood in front of the mirror in shorts and I noticed that my legs looked different. (I always worked out in sweats and we didn't own a full-length mirror so I had not seen myself in about five months. College dorms make preening difficult.) They were shapely and firm, and when I did plies my quads looked prominent and strong. My triceps actually rippled through port de bras, like I was a girl in a movie about a ballerina who secretly wants to join the crew team. My stomach was taut. I had, for the first time in my entire life, something that resembled an ass instead of a depressed pancake.

     And as I continued to lift heavier and heavier, I gained confidence in the gym. This is probably the most powerful thing of all; it's very gratifying to be able to go into the weight room full of men and lift just as heavy as some of them, proportional to respective body weights--without compromising my form and without grunting like a gorilla in labor. It feels good to be able to hold my own in there, mostly because I don't often feel like I can hold my own in very much. To feel like an athlete in my own right, even if I still cannot shoot pool or hit a baseball or run a four-minute mile, is to feel competent and strong.

     That's why I like weight lifting so much.

*I also feel that it's especially important for women, because resistance training increases bone density, thereby reducing the risk of osteoporosis. If you're a woman I think you should incorporate some weight lifting into your workouts for that reason alone.

Photo by Rocky Morgan. I don't really have one of me lifting weights because I feel preposterously silly taking gym selfies.

    One of the reasons why I try to hold my tongue in public is because I have this tendency to harp on about things that don't matter for half an hour and irritate the people around me. Since I am not a venerable silver-haired Jesuit or a very small child, people don't indulge me with this so I have learned to stop.
     Most of the time.
     I'm a loon. But I am old-fashioned in a lot of ways. Whenever I would feel overwhelmed or sad in college I would go down to the basement of the library and read La Morte D'Arthur. That's where they kept all the books, in the basement, because not that many people check out books anymore. But I would sit there and read and I would understand what people talked about when they talked about reading the Bible. It gave me deep solace. It's not that I thought, oh, this world is better, because it's not. Everyone in those stories is a bad feminist, absent fathers abound, and all those knights they killed they could have just arm-wrestled to make a point. No, I would think, I would fit better in this world. I guess the relative simplicity and the innocence appeals to me. I never imagined myself as one of those ladies of the court, demanding dragons killed for me and halls razed for me and grails sought for me and fainting all over the place. I always saw myself as Galahad's sidekick, riding out with him in chain mail, sleeping on the margins of forests at night and giving food to the homeless. We would rescue orphans and widows in their distress. We'd have a secret handshake. I would trick him into incorporating several gang symbols.
     But I have to live in this world, where there are no dragons or knights. And it's a mess because I'm trying to get back to the other one anyway, subconsciously, no matter how hard I try to be hip and trendy. This is why I care about etiquette and why I love vintage style, old movies, and old books, but also those old ideals of honor and love. I am completely unironic about this, to the bewilderment of jaded hipsters everywhere. The world may have broken my heart (as it does everyone's, in the end) but I am still longing for honor, love, and justice. I'm longing for them like they are lovers who got away.

     Oh also--that Guy Ritchie adaptation of King Arthur with (my husband) Charlie Hunnam that's coming out next year? You know I'll see it. I just don't fucking get why they're leaving out Lancelot. He's ninety five percent of Arthur's problem. Without him there is no story! Everyone can go home! But when a movie gives you Charlie Hunnam in his rough-trade swashbuckling prime, you say thank you and God bless America.

     As with most of the important things that have happened to me, the way I wear and care for my nails now started by accident. It happened because I was staying at my friend Mandy's house for a few weeks before going back to college for my senior year. Of all things to forget, I forgot nail clippers. For most people this would not matter; but my hair and nails grow like bamboo (that is, alarmingly fast). And despite my occasional outspokenness on matters such as Taylor Swift's inability to match her accessories, I am very shy when it comes to asking for what I need. So I didn't ask to borrow her nail clippers. Mandy's, that is. Not Taylor's. I did, however, have a nail file. And because I was marathoning Mad Men with Mandy's mom, I subconsciously began to shape my nails in the long, slightly pointed oval shape of Betty Draper. And then, because I thought they looked funny unpainted, I painted them the only color I had, which was a metallic red. 

     And there it began. Red nails have become as integral to my sense of style as long hair, high-waisted silhouettes, and top-handle purses. Which is to say, an absolute signature. I do sometimes wear a light pink, but in the main, I wear bright red, coral, or burgundy. It's funny how big a difference something like nail polish can make in your day-to-day life. The writer Marian Keyes said in an interview with journalist Sali Hughes that wearing bright nail polish is like having sweets cellophaned to the tips of your fingers, and that even when she hasn't any makeup on, bright nail polish helps to cheer her. And I agree.

     Red is one of those colors that can stand for thousands of things--fast food chains use it in their branding to make us hungry, and just think of what a name like Scarlett conveys--but to me it means power. And I don't normally think of myself as all that powerful. I know in an absolute sense I am, because I have hot water and a car to drive and a surplus of food and the right to vote and everything, but in my interactions with other people I get very nervous and shy. I like the idea that long, Gothic-arch shaped, bright red nails project a different image of me. You know, a woman with red nails is unafraid to call a guy an ass if he's being one. Her glares are like arrows in full flight, and her smiles are like an invitation from the Queen or something. 

     Some tips for shaping your nails like Betty (Hofstadt) Draper (Francis): 
Get a metal nail file. Those cheap-ass floral emery boards are no good. 
File in one direction rather than sawing back and forth to prevent snagging. It takes longer but it's worth it.
File the very corners of your nails as far down as you can, and only touch the tips slightly to smooth out the shape. Rather than filing your nails into all-out claws and then having to smooth out a sharp tip, work from the outside in. 
A strengthening base coat will help you grow out your nails if they are brittle or weak. I would advise against getting gel manicures simply because everyone I know who gets them says they're hard on your nails long-term.
My FAVORITE, ride-or-die, take-with-me-to-a-desert-island red is Revlon Red by Revlon (I know it sounds redundant. I felt silly even typing it. Moving on). She's Pampered by Essie is cooler in tone and completely beautiful, but I find that their packaging causes the polish to dry out faster than any other brand I've used. OPI excels at reds as well, especially darker ones.

My name is Amber. I'm making this blog so that I can have a somewhat organized place to shoot off my mouth. That's all that blogging really is. "Thinkpieces" aren't even all that clear or well-argued (trust me, I've penned a few); they are essentially five hundred words of "LISTEN TO ME" because if someone else doesn't listen to you or see you in our digital age, are you really there?

The following, in no particular order, are my abiding interests. I cannot promise commitment to these things only, but they will probably be most of what I talk about. I'm including all of them because, while I love beauty/fashion only blogs, I hate the myth that if a woman loves lipstick she doesn't know anything about current events, science, philosophy, or any of those other grown-up topics. So, I like:
1. Makeup and skincare
2. Clothes
3. Literature
4. Vintage style and culture, especially old movies
5. Surfing
6. Astronomy
7. Philosophy
8. Television
9. Writing

I will probably talk mostly about the first three but I don't see why I have to confine myself to just one. 
As for you, you don't have to read anything I write. If you do, I'm grateful and flattered and hope you enjoy it. I want to hear what you have to say, too. 
My schedule for this thing is to post once a week. 
PS: It was inordinately hard to choose a picture of myself for this. I have this quirk in pictures where I either look like I've just eaten a Lemonhead or of a nearsighted tourist in the glare of the midday sun. I will post examples of this, I promise. But anyway, it's hard to find a picture that looks nice but isn't also self-serious. I'm not sure I avoided this. Oh well. I'm learning.