Personal

Monica: Since I left home for college, it's been my personal preference not to watch much television. Initially, I didn't have the time or money for TV. I was too busy trying to keep up with all the hours of reading and writing I had to do in school, and when I wasn't studying, I was spending my time adventuring or hanging out with friends. This is not to say I was immune to the allure of mindless entertainment. I took to watching movies instead. (What I love about movies is they are uninterrupted —but limited—visual short stories. No commercials. No wait-until-next-week cliff hangers.) My first TV was a 15-lb box with a broken antenna that I could only hook up to a VCR or DVD player to watch movies. I kept it stashed in a closet until it was time to set it up for movie-watching.  I got rid of it when I married Michael, who brought his lightweight 13-inch flat screen TV to our union. (Fortunately, I married a man who has the same aversion to TV and the same love of movies as I do. Though he jokes that if I die before him, he'll get cable.) Sometime early last year, we splurged on a whopping 32-inch flat screen TV. I had to laugh when I saw the brand name along the bottom: VIZIO. It couldn't be more appropriate. "Vizio" means "vice" in Italian, the language of hedonism.

Evelyn: I wondered today how to capture something personal, aside from interactions that FELT personal in nature, I figured I would have to find something. I caught a glimpse of my favorite ring in the sunshine. Nicknamed my mermaid ring, it has an intimate connection to the relationship I have with Monica - representative of our childhood dreams of being mermaids, tossing ourselves with abandon into the torrid waves of life and play. I miss the days of blithe engagement... play that became who I am in many ways ... free and lighthearted, barefoot and creative ... I wear it on my ring finger (it is the only finger it will fit on other than my pinky) and it fills that space, once tightly embraced by a marriage to another, now to a marriage with myself and my own growth. Friends ask me WHY I am wearing anything there... and I can only answer that it feels good there, I love the way it sparkles, the way that it connects me back to Monica, and back to the energy of my own being: inspired and artful... back to who I have always been.