Magazines As A Sport

The most embarrassing thing I ever did in 2009, and it was over a helmet. I was home schooled in 2009, after a brief 3 week stint at a New York Public School. My education up to that year was composed of a Montecito version of a public school, Marymount and a private middle school that let us have class on the lawn if it was sunny out. We were testing out living in New York during my first year of high school. I had the bright idea of attending a real school so I could meet friends. I should have known that I was being wildly optimistic. Since it was October, it was a long shot to get into public school, and because my mom is my mom, I wasn't allowed to attend any public school, I had to attend the Eleanor Roosevelt High School. This school is one of the best public schools in Manhattan so it was a bit of a stretch to get me in. I didn't have stellar grades and the only sport I did was the Thursday Sex and the City marathon. But, I got in. I think they were bribed and/or threatened.
I was 2 weeks in and actually had some friends, I think it was a particularly quick welcoming because Diandra's driver Ben was dropping me off in a Ferrari every day. Hey, I would be friends with me too.
But, by week 3, I wanted out. I had gotten accustomed to being able to "work from home" with my homeschooling and had trouble adjusting to the 6am wake up call. And by week 4, I had dropped out of the Eleanor Roosevelt High School, with honors. Since I was now homeschooling again, I had a lot more time to go out for lunch and to travel during the weekdays. I started visiting my aunts up in Orcas Island. The only issue is that you have to take a tiny water plane from Seattle to get there.

Orcas Island is my favorite place in the world. It's a small island off of Seattle and I had been visiting my entire life. My aunt Bobbie Anne and Uncle Bill lived up there in the most magical house. My aunt Julie lived up there too on her farm. She had a 1000 pound pig that couldn't walk but could eat a watermelon in one bite, skin and all. When the pig, her name was Basil, died, the roof of the barn was taken off and she had to be "airlifted" out. I loved her.
One trip, I was up there with all my cool older cousins. They were allowed to get highlights and had names like Amber and Karissa. I was in a brief period of hating my name, so I was dreaming that I would be adopted and allowed to change my name to Lexi. A cool girl name.
One day they invited me to go on a bike ride with them and I immediately started getting "glammed" up for this bike ride. I had a look for this occasion, black eyeliner only on the bottom, no mascara, blush. But, I called it "rouge" because I read that somewhere in an old Glamour I had found on an airplane. It must have been the April 1980 issue.
I called my mom to tell her the exciting news that I was going on a bike ride and that it was essentially my initiation to hanging out with the age bracket above my own.
"OK, but you have to wear a helmet."
What. The. Fuck. Cool girls don't wear helmets.
"Oh, no it's fine, no one wears helmet up there." I said calmly, sure that my argument was strong.
"Well, that just means you'll be the first one."
My mom and I went back and forth until I received the ultimatum, no helmut, no bike ride. I lost it. I lost the tiny bit of cool that my Jessica Simpson for Kohl's jeans were bringing me. I locked myself on the patio and refused to come out until the tyrant that is my mother, came to her senses and realized that looking cool was more than a head injury.
I was out there crying for a solid hour. My cousins came over and tried to console me by saying they would also wear helmets.
"It's not the same!!" I screamed with my face pressed against the glass that was divided us. I was a prisoner refusing to accept the plea deal. I was innocent, why couldn't anyone see that! I started to confuse myself even, why didn't I just wear a helmut, but I was in too deep. My cousins eventually left for the ride, without helmets, might I add, and the sun began to set. It was getting dark out on the patio and I was getting hungry. I had been out there for 3 hours and all the crying was working up my appetite. I really needed some sustenance if I was going to ride this meltdown into the morning.
So, I gathered myself, wiped the tears off my face and stood up. Immediately, I hit my head on the door handle. If only I had worn a helmet.
After my meltdown, my cousins realized that I might be in high school like them, but I was embarrassing myself like a toddler in Church.
I stayed in a lot the rest of the trip, too embarrassed to show my face, and the bruise that was forming on my forehead from the door handle. I began reading a lot of magazines that I found around the house. I dove into the quizzes from Cosmopolitan, repeating phrases like "that's such a Gemini thing to say," and wearing belts to accentuate my waist. After I read through all those, I moved onto my mom's collection of Elle Decor and Architectural Digest.
After my 6 month love affair with the back logs, I decided I wanted to be a magazine editor. I didn't know what that job entailed but I figured it involved a free copy ever month. This dream curtailed off, but my love of magazines didn't.  The best part of a flight, is sitting down, sticking a "please wake me for food" sticker on your forehead and reading 5 to 15 magazines.
Last week, Ty got a job at the Walla Walla Foundry where my dad works. He's the president so he is allotted one nepotism hire per calendar year. Ty got the job on a Tuesday, I quit my job on Wednesday. We decided to drive up because we don't travel light. We're planning on being here until November, so bringing out TV and collection of Dyptique candles was in order. And I can't check my candles. So, we got in the car and made the 15 hour drive up to Walla Walla. 15 hours means a lot of magazines. But, since one of us would be driving at all times, it wasn't exactly convenient to make Ty look over at the photos every time I had a comment on something. I also learned that even though it wasn't a book, reading a magazine in the car would make me car sick. I keep my car in pretty mint condition, so vomiting up Arby's on the tan leather wasn't going to be in the cards.
I waited until we arrived to flip through the pages. A magazine is no fun if you don't have anyone to dissect it with though. I called my grandma to go through the June issues of Elle Decor with me. And we had some thoughts...

First of all, I lost my loyalty to Architectural Digest when they featured Kylie Jenner's mansion. Let's not even talk about it. They should have featured Kim's house, but I guess she was out of budget.
The June issue of Elle Decor features Lisa Perry's 1960's style French Rivera home. It is wonderful. It's more so the furniture house that I am obsessed with, the actual structure of the house is the most important part. She has floor to ceiling windows, actually it's mainly all windows. The article talks about Lisa Perry, who is a fashion designer now turned interior designer, and that she moved out of the USA when Trump won. I like her. Her newest venture is basically my dream job. "I'm renovating and branding a house, and choosing all the furniture and art. If you like my style, you just move in and hang your clothes up." I already applied to be her assistant so everyone else back off.

This issue also has a small article on de Gournay wallpaper and the two daughters of the founder, Rachel and Hannah. Wallpaper has always been a part of my homes growing up. I remember the most vividly, a bathroom we had in Santa Barbara. My mom had covered the walls in an orange floral print, super bright and busy. It worked so well in this small space that I've always dreamed of not caring about my security deposit and just wallpaper the damn bathroom already. The company creates all different styles of wallpaper, from Chinoiserie to geometric, and it's all perfect. I love that they even put the wallpaper on the ceiling. My grandma mentioned that the ceiling is the "fifth wall." Don't just stop when you hit the ceiling. My grandma certainly did not. At her house in Montecito, she hand stenciled the entire ceiling of the dining room herself. What has your grandma done lately?

Another large feature of this issue is a house in Los Angeles designed by Kathryn Ireland. It's not like her usual stuff either. This home is very minimal and Spanish. It looks like a Nancy Meyer's set. She actually cites her inspiration to visiting Axel Vervoordt's chateau in Belgium. Vervoodt is Kanye West's guy, making my theory that Kanye has excellent taste a confirmed fact. This home keeps things tranquil and calm, very Californian cool. The walls are white and soft, with large dark metal accents throughout. I especially love the blue room. It's different from the rest of the house but it doesn't look like it was the only room left untouched to classify this as a remodel and not a rebuild. It blends.

Also, I think it's worth mentioning that the editor in chief of Elle Decor, Whitney Robinson, has a show on Bravo. He even plugged it in his letter from the Editor. He needs to stop. Bravo is a sacred place for wine throwing and Kim Zolciak lips, not style and grace. Another thing that Elle Decor, and every other shelter magazine out there, keeps doing is mentioning celebrities as examples of good taste. Becoming a celebrity does not mean you inherently have good style. If going by this logic, is Snooki the next Veranda cover star? This goes back to Architectural Digest's love for the Kardashian's. I've never once watched the show and been like, "wow Khloe designed an excellent 'champagne room.'"
But, my overall impression of Elle Decor this month was an 8/10. It lost two points because after I saw the Spanish house I began to get bored. That might be my problem though. But, the very last page was a photo of a chandelier that I could have looked at for hours. It was created by the designer Julie Neill from a steel-frame and then dipped in plaster, to create the illusion that candle wax was dripping off from the last party at Versailles. Unfortunately, it's not for sale.

If you're like me and don't have a job to go to everyday anymore, I highly recommend buying this issue and spend 3 hours marking it up with post-its like I did. Really get into each issue. Highlight and write "wtf" next to a $6,000 plain metal planter, write a letter complaining about the chandelier not being for sale, pretend to gag every time you read the phrase "designer to the stars." Take up magazine reading as if it were a sport, it may help you get an unpaid internship or something.