There were two shifts at the dog park on weekdays before noon. The first was an early rising crowd of professionals and retired baby boomers in fleece pullovers, cargo pants and water resistant hiking shoes. They greeted one another with quiet smiles, friendly nods of the head and kept their conversations to a low hum. They shared highlights from recent east coast college tours, rare political opinions and jokes about how their dogs, unlike their teenage children were always happy to see them and never asked for money. Occasional bursts of laughter pierced the misty stillness as they watched their purebred retrievers, shepherds, poodles and wiry hunting dogs writhe, wrestle and run across the five acres of uninterrupted green grass.
The open land was irresistible to neighborhood dog owners who occupied the park outside the organized AYSO, recreational baseball and high school La Crosse team practice. On days when the City Parks Rangers had complied enough complaints and had little else on their agendas, they drove their porcelain white SUVs past the steel and aluminum bleachers onto the pitch to issue citations.
The word around the dog park was that the rangers were LAPD cadets who had on more than one occasion failed to pass the written test and had accepted their fate policing the city's many parks, trails and scenic overlooks. Exercising authority over the well-heeled west side residents who were major donors to campaigns for local and state politicians proved difficult for the rangers. Even Robert, the park's resident homeless who lived in the northwest corner behind a tree, condescended to the officers whenever they tried to address him. Though he slept just beyond the brush at the edge of the grass under a weathered and wrinkled blue tarp with trash strewn all around him, Robert was a Ph. D who had taught at Queens College in the 1960s. He smelled sharply, had dirt ground into his skin and fingernails but his diction was impeccable and he still had strong opinions about film, music and literature.
The second shift clocked in when most people were sitting down at their desks. They were more of a clique than a crowd. They were a Starbucks toting posse in Seven for All Mankind jeans. Unlike their designer sunglasses, their beloved dogs were brindle colored mixes and mutts who had limps, scars and quirks that told of their journeys from trash cans, desert highways and county animal shelters. Their husbands were CEOs, COOs and CFOs of movie studios, cable news networks and Internet start up companies.
Life was turning out not to be linear for me so I liked the anonymity of the early morning group. I wasn't married, engaged or even dating anyone. Every day I woke up with anxiety about my finances and my future. A job as a film development executive for a Manhattan billionaire hedge fund manager with an interest in producing independent art-house films had been a dead end instead of a ladder. It had concluded very strangely with me sobbing at a performance of Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club where Alan Cumming kept making eye contact with me as he danced with a gorilla. A job as City Editor for a webzine which had floated toward me like a paddle in a sea of uncertainty, had fallen victim to the "slash and burn through capital" mentality of the new start up economy.
There was no blueprint for becoming a writer. My days were filled with faxing unsolicited resumes to production companies for freelance work on television commercials and emailing unsolicited query letters to magazine and newspaper editors. For weeks, I had been pitching a nostalgia piece on The Brown Derby restaurant and researching a story on location extras. In between, I chipped away at copy writing assignments sent my way by friends who managed accounts at publicity firms and web development companies.
Despite the instability, this was the happiest I had been in years. Lucas was a wiry, scrappy, raccoon-eyed bundle of love. As soon as we arrived at the park, his playful, exuberant energy dissipated my woes. He crawled all over Samson the Great Dane and hunted for gophers with Blue the Bloodhound. According to Scott, the dogwalker, Lucas had given a second life to Sasha the black Standard Poodle who until then had only been known for nipping other dogs and the occasional jogger who saw it fit to run through the dog park. For at least one hour every morning, I lived in the present. I didn't futurize, catastrophize or wallow in regret.
One morning Lucas and I were late and somehow managed to miss both shifts at the park. There was only one solitary figure at the northern end of the park throwing a ball for a dog. Lucas had a keen eye and a sharp mind. Before I could stop him, he spotted the fluorescent orange "Chuck-It" ball thrower the person was carrying and made a break for it.
I was slightly panicked as he cantered away, fading into the bamboo and chain link boundaries of the park. A few minutes later, he returned proudly carrying the immaculate color blocked rubber ball. I pried it out of his little jaw and waited to return it to the statuesque woman, who strolled about a hundred yards behind Lucas. When she finally approached with a forlorn American bulldog at her side, I handed her the ball and apologized for my wiry toy thief.
"Sorry about that."
She crouched down, raised her oversized sunglasses and gently reached out to touch Lucas's lower lip.
"That's quite an underbite you've got there."
Her voice was somehow familiar but it was her eyebrows that suddenly created the context for the woman standing in front of me. It was Brooke Shields. All through my awkward, overweight adolescence, it was her face that stared out at me from countless magazine covers and advertisements. I still remembered leafing through Vogue magazine and reading a quote from fashion photographer Francesco Scavullo where he called her "the most beautiful girl in the world." She had also starred in a pair of controversial films that sexualized innocence. The first was a French film where she played a pre-teen prostitute. Later, she starred in a period romance about shipwrecked cousins who survive on an island.
The exploitative nature of both films was lost on my own mother. Having been known for her own beauty as a young woman, my Mom was awed by Brooke's beauty and had immediately gone out and bought herself a pair of Calvin Klein jeans. She had offered me a pair as well but my body had never been coltish and I was under no delusion that I could squeeze myself into a pair of Calvins. Brooke seemed almost like an apparition as she smiled down at Lucas, a strange mirror of the second awkward adolescence I found myself going through. She looked down at her bulldog.
"At least he chases the ball. You don't do anything, do you dopey?"
The bulldog felt her judgement. She hung her head and averted her eyes.
As Anderson's pregnancy progressed, she began sleeping more and persuaded me to meet her at the park later where she had met a group of friends, coincidentally all from New York City. I didn't want Lucas to miss his time with Miles so I gave in. It was an alternate universe where there was another Brenda with dark, curly hair like mine. This Brenda was all confidence. She strutted onto the field flanked by her two rescue dogs. One looked like a coyote and the other was a Golden Retriever mix who looked like he had been through it. Brenda's face broke into a mischievous smile and she spoke with a thick accent from one of the boroughs of New York.
"Okay, we can start now."
With her was a sophisticated beauty with stunning eyes that were blue, green and brown. Her feigned Long Island accent was made even funnier by her natural elegance. I knew from Anderson's description that this must be Cara. Cara had recently moved to Los Angeles from Manhattan. She was a freelance Creative Director for high end beauty and luxury brands. Her husband Schorsch, a tall and lean metrosexual was a composer for film and television. He flashed the New York hand sign at Brenda and made her laugh.
"What up, B?"
Schorsch had a self-consciousness about him that made it hard for me to relax around him. In the first few moments of our conversation, he quickly mentioned that Amos Newman, the son of musician Randy Newman was his best friend. His awkwardness reflected my own feelings of insecurity so I shifted my attention back to our dogs.
Blue the gigantic Bloodhound jogged onto the field with his big floppy ears bouncing with every step. Just behind Blue at the end of a six-foot leather leash was a petite blonde who seemed to float behind him like the tail on a kite. This was Erin. She and I had a mutual friend who went to SMU with her but we had never met because until very recently she had been living in Houston so her Texas born husband could spend time with his terminally ill mother. Erin had made the ultimate sacrifice and abandoned her career as a television development executive then found herself working at Neiman-Marcus in Houston just to have something to do.
It seemed strange to know so much about her without knowing one another so I introduced myself. Our friend Clay's name brought a bright smile to her face. She quickly connected the dots when I told her Lucas and Blue sometimes played together in the early morning when her husband brought him to the park.
Erin and I had more in common than just our friend Clay. The timing of her move back to Los Angeles during the guild strikes was making it difficult for her to find a job. Despite the fact that her Dad had been president of a television network and her godfather was the chief of another, she was still having trouble regaining her footing in that world. She and I were sort of in the same boat except that she had a husband with a successful career in global energy.
Lucas and I were already friendly with Miriam and her Golden Retriever puppy, Sammy. We had met in our Saturday morning puppy class at the recreation center across the street. She had joined us on a couple of hikes so that Sammy could run off leash with Lucas.
Even more surprising was the revelation that Miriam was a libidinous twentysomething trapped in the body of an eighty-year-old woman. Happily married to a movie studio chief responsible for greenlighting dozens of Academy Award winning films by auteurs, she also had an overt and lustful eye for handsome young men.
After just over an hour at the park, it was time to go. The next stop for most of the ladies was a workout class followed by a trip to the grocery store then home to prepare dinner for their husbands. They had the opposite problem I did. No financial worries but instead they needed to prove to their husbands they were making good use of their time.
As we moved en masse toward the first base line that bordered the concrete walkway, Erin, Brenda and Schorsch's radars all seemed to pick up on something. Schorsch slowed his pace and his body language became more animated as he looked toward the parking lot.
There was Brooke Shields again, walking straight toward us with her bulldog and a ginger haired man in aviator sunglasses. Schorsch gave him a wide smile and a high-five as he approached the edge of the park.
"Hey man!"
Brenda's eyes brightened but her confidence waned. She and Erin almost seemed to exchange personalities as Erin smiled and waved at Brooke. Brenda shrunk back and tried not to stare at Erin as she exchanged warm hugs with both Brooke and her boyfriend.
"Hi, sweetie. Hi, Jake."
Anderson's baby bump was like a magnet for Brooke. She immediately moved toward her and gently placed her hands on Anderson's belly. Lucas and I continued on our way to our car. As I waved to everyone over my shoulder, I could see Erin, Anderson and Brooke chatting away while Brenda and Schorsch stood a few feet away from them, watching.
"Well, she must not have any friends if she's inviting all of you up to her house to bake cookies." The words of my friend and sometimes boss, Grady, in NYC, with whom I am hopelessly in love, echoes in my mind as Brooke pulls open the front door of her retreat style home and welcomes me with hug. At the suggestion of her boyfriend, Brooke, who has become part of our dog park friends' group, has invited all of us up to her home for an afternoon of holiday cookie baking.
Grady's suspicions about Brooke are on my mind as I walk around and see the brand new Kitchen Aid mixer, silicone spatulas, baking sheets and holiday cookie cutters being set up by her assistant in her immaculate chef's kitchen.
I have just returned from New York City from producing a public service announcement about religious tolerance and 911. I was terrified to fly to New York and to leave Lucas for three weeks but I needed to work. The job was also an incredible opportunity to produce the directorial debut of pioneering cinematographer, Ellen Kuras.
Seeing the aftermath of the bombings was haunting. The twisted metal of the skyscrapers and all of the broken glass that covered lower Manhattan looked like something out of a surrealist painting. On our location scout of Liberty Island, we met with the park rangers who showed us the multiple triage areas set up on the day of the bombings that went unused.
After three very quiet months, there is finally some momentum in my career again. When I returned home from New York, Erin offered me an opportunity to line produce a series of 911 related public service announcements for children that she and her Mom have come up with. Through their network television connections, they have set up a meeting with the President of the Jim Henson Company and through their Texas connections, they can contact First Lady Laura Bush. They have already had lunch with Brooke to discuss the possibility of her making a cameo with the Muppets. When I arrived at our meeting with the Henson Company, Sean Connery was climbing into the car parked next to me carrying a stack of Christmas gifts. I had no idea what Sean Connery would be doing at The Henson Company but I take my random run-in with the original James Bond as a positive sign.
With everyone present except for Erin, Brooke takes us on a tour of her cozy home which is decorated in flea market finds from all over the world and countless images of herself taken by the world's most famous fashion photographers. She is surprisingly candid about having received the house as part of her divorce settlement from her tennis champion ex-husband. As we continue the tour, she shares intimate details about her much publicized divorce and the attachment disorder which led her from a domineering mother who managed every aspect of her life to an equally controlling husband.
Just as we sit down to a Tuscan style lunch set up by her assistant, Erin calls to says she is a few minutes away. Brooke tells her sweetly not to worry but rolls her eyes when she hangs up the phone. A talented mimic, she somehow morphs her expression to look just like Erin then tells us about her lunch with Erin and her Mom whom she refers to as a namedropper. I have met Erin's Mom. She is indeed of a generation of women in Hollywood who achieved their creative goals through their marriages to powerful men but she was also very kind. Brenda wastes no time grasping onto this unconstrained thread of conversation.
"You know, I tried talking to Erin the other day about how her job search was going and she was so defended. She folded her arms across her chest and just like didn't want to talk about it."
When Erin arrives twenty minutes later, she insists Brooke play the newly released CD of the soundtrack from the Broadway revival of Cabaret in which Brooke starred. Erin's voice is the loudest in praising Brooke's singing even though it is almost impossible to hear her in the mix. Having seen Natasha Richardson as Sally Bowles at the Kit Kat Klub in New York City, any compliment I dole out to Brooke would be disingenuous so I choose to say nothing and ignore the topic altogether.
Over the holidays Brooke and Brenda along with a few of Brenda's girlfriends; Giana and Ellen, a movie studio marketing powerhouse with the personality to match, begin joining Anderson and I on our early morning hikes. One day Brooke suggests we make her home the meeting point so we can walk on the paved trail down the street from her house. Brooke is very sweet and has coffee waiting for us, but instead of our hikes being my time to catch up with Anderson, our mornings become about Brooke. We hear about her auditions, frustrations with the syndication deal from her cancelled network show and her creative ambitions. She and Brenda commiserate about their fertility struggles. This is not where I am in my life so I can't participate in the conversation.
I am under no delusion that Brooke wants to be my friend. I know that Anderson and her ginger haired baby, Ainsley, are aspirational to her. On a morning where Ainsley has kept Anderson up all night, she is a last minute no show to the hike. Brenda and her girlfriends also cancel last minute leaving Brooke and I to hike alone. Our conversation is halting and stilted, punctuated by silence. Brooke does her best to fill in the pauses by half joking about her hope of running into Steven Spielberg who lives nearby. I return home to find the Chanel mascara I had splurged on has bled and left me looking like an NFL quarterback. Looking into my bathroom mirror at my black tearstained face, I know that one day I will laugh. For now, I want to cry, knowing the whole time Brooke and I were marching along, I had black mascara stripes on my face like an NFL quarterback.
The only thing more uncomfortable than hiking alone with Brooke are the days when she and Brenda both cancel last minute and I am left to listen to Brenda's chorus of girlfriends, including Anderson, take swipes at Brenda and her marriage. Alternatively, when Anderson is a no show, Brooke and Brenda unpack what they feel is Anderson's co-dependent relationship with her husband Rob.
In contrast to our hikes, our girls' night dinners where Brooke holds court, are an odd form of group therapy for me. It is hard to believe that the most beautiful girl in the world, with all of her influence and financial success could have ever felt as she describes, lonely and unattractive. Her sense of self is as undefined as mine is. She is also as naive with men as I am and just like me often found herself in pursuit cycles with ambivalent men.
In her case, her ignoble dates were with the world's most eligible bachelor – JFK, Jr. Her decade long courtship was all curated by her devoted mother and began when "her people" as she said, called "his people" and invited him to her Sweet Sixteen party. It all culminated years later in a Christmas vacation humiliation on a black diamond ski slope in Aspen.
This holiday season I find myself anxiously waiting for it to pass so we can get to work on the public service announcements with the Muppets. The Henson Company has already confirmed the availability of the puppeteers and given the fact that Laura Bush is a former elementary school teacher, the campaign seems like a sure thing. With Ellen Kuras' project on my resume and now the Muppets, I feel like my career will be back on track and hopefully my personal life will follow suit. I will finally be able to stop worrying about my future.
January comes and goes without word from the First Lady so Erin reaches out to a friend in Texas who is friendly with the Bush family. In the meantime, Brooke comes up with an idea for a Valentine's Day couples dinner at her house. I am on the fence about going for a few reasons. The idea behind the whole evening is very traditional, even a bit backwards, where the women will spend the afternoon together, preparing dinner for the men.
Except for Merri, another dog park acquaintance whose long term relationship is in jeopardy because her boyfriend had just been cast in an Eminem film and he has been away for months, I will be the only single woman at the dinner.
I had recently noticed that none of my pants would button at the waist. Not my jeans or the collection of cargo pants I had bought at The Gap. Even my yoga pants are snug. Somehow all of my clothes have shrunken. The culprit is obviously the overused and underserviced washer and dryer in my apartment building.
It actually takes me several minutes of trying on more clothes some of which I hadn't worn or washed in a while before I realize the painful truth that despite all of the hiking and walking I do with Lucas, I have gained weight. I have gone up almost a size.
I feel even worse about attending the dinner now but the alternative of just staying home doesn't appeal to me either.
When we arrive at Brooke's house that afternoon, she has the whole menu planned out: low carb eggplant lasagnettes and a salad from the 21 Club in NYC where she ate regularly as a teenager. She hands all of us little gift bags with thoughtful Valentine's Day novelty items from a local bookstore. When she hands me mine, she stares at me with her famous blue eyes.
"You remind me of my ex-best friend, Jennifer."
I am not sure how to respond to this so I ask a question instead.
"You mean I look like her?"
Brooke squints her eyes and peers at me.
"No, she's blonde. She was very smart like you are."
I still don't know how to respond.
I am not sure if it is a coincidence that I, who remind Brooke of her ex-best friend and Cara whose beauty rivals Brooke's, are assigned the grueling task of frying countless eggplants in hot oil. It takes hours to slice, sweat and fry a pile of eggplants. Cara and I take small breaks to laugh hysterically at our circumstances. By the time we are finally done, we are as greasy and shiny as the eggplants. I had gotten to know Cara over the last few months when she offered me a copy writing job and she is the salt of the earth. Overwhelmed by pitching a glamorous prestige brand, she walked me through creating my bid and setting my fees to increase my chances of being hired without under selling my value. The payment from the project weeks later was only the second check I deposited into my account that wasn't an unemployment check. I happily returned the favor by hiring Schorsch to compose a piece for Ellen's public service announcement.
Despite the awkwardness of being the only one without a partner told cozy up to, the Valentine's dinner is a warm and lovely evening. Erin's husband plays the piano and all of the couples tell the stories of how they first met. Brooke and Jake share that they met on a television studio lot while she was trying to re-home her bulldog. At the end of the evening, I drive home with Anderson and Rob in his Jaguar coupe. As we wind our way down the palisades riviera, Rob makes a prohibited left hand turn onto Sunset Boulevard. It is a blind curve and we come within a nanosecond of being hit by an oncoming car heading west on Sunset. I make a mental note never to drive with Rob again.
Not long after the Valentine's dinner, our morning group hikes conclude. I find out accidentally that Anderson, Brooke and Brenda have begun going to Billy Blanks' Tai Bo work outs together every morning instead. I am at once relieved not to have been included but hurt that Anderson for whatever reason has kept this activity from me. I take it very personally, as a comment about my enduring struggles with my weight. I feel like a reality television contestant forced out of a secret alliance.
I learn later from Cara that she too has not been included in the Tai Bo group workout but she doesn't care.
"Why are we all supposed to do whatever Brooke says? Schorsch wants me to drop everything every time she plans something. I told him, 'I can't go bake cookies with Brooke. I have a career'."
Erin had also been excluded and she was a size zero so my theory about why I had been ostracized ended there. This was actually the second death blow for her. The first came when Brooke invited Brenda instead of Erin on a weekend trip to Hawaii where she was making a paid appearance. Erin took it on the chin when she heard the news but her surprise and hurt feelings were obvious. her best to conceal her surprise and hurt feelings In spite of the slight, Erin, who was known for her culinary and entertaining skills, still offered to host a group couples' dinner in her home at the end of the month.
Weeks later, on the evening of the dinner at Erin's, Brooke decides at the last hour that she will not be attending. Brenda calls me to speak for herself and Anderson as if they were one unit.
"We're not going."
The very next call is Erin. I imagine she's been at home poaching and shucking and deglazing all day long. She sounds very vulnerable.
"Are you cancelling too?"
I honestly don't understand the animus toward Erin.
A few days later, the President of the Jim Henson company calls to say Laura Bush has declined to participate in the public service announcements. I am in disbelief. I watch the entire path I had envisioned for myself, erode before me. I am in desperate need of comfort and encouragement. Four years ago, on the day I had lost my job working for the hedge fund film financier, my father had surprised me with his wise words as I sobbed in my parents' kitchen.
"This is where character counts, mija."
Overcome by adrenaline, I drive the twenty-eight miles to my parents' house seeking emotional support. I bring Lucas into the house on leash. We find my parents watching television in the den. I pour my heart out to both of them even citing the mistake of seeing Sean Connery as a good omen. My mother smiles a smile that I have grown to distrust.
"You should have a baby."
Her suggestion is so outrageous that the feeling of claustrophobia I felt all through my adolescence washes over me.
"Have a baby?"
"Yes, you should have a baby."
"What would I do with a baby? I don't even have a job."
I look to my father to be the voice of reason but he is conveniently preoccupied watching television. My mother continues on.
"You could move here and live with us."
I flee their house despondent. As I drive home back over the hill, I think to myself that only a Mexican mother could possibly think having a baby is a solution to my career struggles.