MY ASTROLOGY BUDDIES tell me that the past few weeks have been tough because Mercury was in retrograde. I can probably think of a few other reasons why things feel harder than normal right now, but the stars are a useful fallback.

In any case, I am feeling much lighter today than I have in a while, and whether that's related to astrology, or to the fact that Spring seems to have truly arrived, or because my birthday is this Sunday, I don't know.

I went for a walk with Gerry (hi Gerry!), who asked me how old I feel in my head, one of my favorite questions, and I surprised us both by answering "eleven,"—this is Michaela's age. I love seeing her sense of humor evolve, and how she has the same love of slapstick and silliness that I do. I love her curiosity ("Why is Cuba so poor?"). I even appreciate her sarcasm ("I fell asleep when you were reading the first sentence," she said of a book I was suggesting we read together). I think much of my own identity came into focus when I was eleven, too, and everything since then has been primarily ornamental. That was when I knew I wanted a life in the arts, when I started writing plays and short stories, when I started taking music more seriously. (1986 was an astonishingly fantastic year for music: The Cure, Run-D.M.C., Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Smiths, R.E.M., Lionel Richie, Tina Turner, Madonna, Paul Simon, Janet Jackson, Cyndi Lauper, and so many, many more.) The moral being that the more I can channel the eleven-year-old me, the better off fifty-one year-old me will be.

"Golden" is a great song, but the Oscars performance was underwhelming. The performance of "I Lied to You" from Sinners was the real knockout: nice surprise cameo from Misty Copeland at the end.

Eid Mubarak! Happy Spring! Go out and be as golden as a butter bean, Mushroom Heads!

Love,

Claire