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home, pov, story

My Best Friend’s Wedding

It feels like we were just roaming Newbury Street on a hot summer day in Boston. You were interning for a wedding planner, I was acting in LA visiting. I remember the boy who broke your heart that summer, the same one you were there for. We spent that entire weekend with him, as per your twenty something dream, eating famous clam chowders and watching Tom Brady play with the rest of the townies.

You were cool then, turning me on to beer at a Celtics game. You promised it was an acquired taste. We danced the night the Celtics won to that cover band playing classic American songs, buzzed and without a care in the world, celebrating just because.

And here we are, with all the time in between. You, in Chicago, living your best life with the love of your life whom you met while pursuing a master’s degree in an entirely unrelated career. And here I am, writing in New York City, flying out with him to help surprise you… and I’ve never seen you happier.

Cheers to life not always turning out the way we want it, darling. Every turn leading us to where we needed to be. Sometimes the guy upstairs really does have the better plan, and it may just be in the form of a 2+ carat cushion cut.

October 23, 2018 by Fred Darling

home, story, travel

Turquoise Seas

I remember leaning my head out in the wind, while driving along the high cliffs, day dreaming over turquoise seas of Amalfi.

I wondered about living off a lighthouse nearby and writing about the people from up high.
What I imagined their lives to be like, their hopes, their loves.

It’s probably why I fell for pretending to be a thousand personalities but longed for a place to belong to all at the same time. My parents believe the best gifts you give are trips to see the world and that’s what we did. I say they instilled in us a wonder for people and lust for places near and far.

How fitting that I would end up in a city like New York. Where one can pry, and disappear, all at the same time.

Image by Mike Perkins

May 16, 2017 by Fred Darling

home, story

Red Hot American Days

Holly Golightly: I’m like cat here, a no-name slob. We belong to nobody, and nobody belongs to us. We don’t even belong to each other.

I was born to bright swirls of yellows and greens in the sky, blue bright waves crashing by, Brasil.

My mother remarried and we moved to the States for a safer place to live. When we did, I wanted to be everything American too, like our new grandmother Patsy. A beloved nurse, a wife to a war hero, she was just like the movies.

My sister and I didn’t speak much English then, and we’d sit quietly on the bed watching Patsy put on her drop earrings last. When they came, we were ready.

I’ll never forget our summers spent with her in Texas at the lake. Red hot American days spent eating ice cream and renting VHS tapes from Patsy’s favorite place, the local library.

I remember rushing home to watch Hepburn, Taylor, Vivien Leigh say things and feel things we couldn’t possibly understand.

The only thing that quenched our thirst more then, were Patsy’s famous ice cold, pink lemonades.

Image from Pleasantville

May 11, 2017 by Fred Darling