Hi Everybody,

I have to admit I was both awed, and had my senses delighted, watching the world burst into celebration on New Year's Eve. Like champagne corks thrusting off, all over the world, city by city, midnight struck and we all watched some truly gorgeous festivities. We saw images of people reveling from India; Bali; Tokyo; the might and magnificent Great Wall of China; the splendid majesty of the Kremlin in Moscow; the marvelous delight of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, the city of lights, blooming with fireworks; London by the Thames with the Queen crossing officially at Greenwich Mean Time; a woman on a beach in Rio throwing a floral offering into the ocean; a New Orleans Jazz extravaganza; the Washington Monument brilliant with lights, and the glorious Lincoln Memorial; LA's beautiful multi-cultural ceremonies; and of course, for a lot of people, Times Square -- Ground Zero -- with Baby Time and Father Time present. It was a beautiful sight all over the world, even for the Scroogiest of new years eve dislikers.

I hope somewhere in the galaxy or universe, some super intelligent form of life had a telescope (or their equivalent) aimed at Earth that night, and saw the world getting down. What an amazing thing! And what might they make of it? Would they think we're always doing this sort of thing? How nice to think the mood transcended time and space, intergalactically.

Anyway, I suppose that most of us have settled back into the normal routine of school, work, and everyday life. But we can continue that feeling of celebrating diversity, cultural uniqueness, the glorious multitudinous variety of beauty in our style and fashion. This trend had already been evident for a while. Any, and every, sort of style is in style. I love the freedom of choice. Is it the end of the fashion police? Who knows! If you want to be minimal, be minimal, be hippy, be ethnic, be rock 'n' roll, be gothic, be vintage, be neo-punk, be deconstructionist, be preppy, be traditional, be anything, at anytime, 'cause anything goes.

This opportunity of endless possibilities just makes me totally happy -- my eyes won't get tired. Hems can be short, midi, long, ripped, scalloped, whatever. Pants -- whatever length suits the look. It's a relief to not have to match everything -- it's all in the mix, and the mix is what makes it interesting.

To stave off the potential winter blahs, now is a good time to pick up a few new items for yourself. There are sales galore, further reductions by the end of the month. It's a good time to pick up something fun, like let's say some adorable pairs of underpants or lingerie from Girly NYC, they're things are totally cute, naughty/nice with humor, and not frilly in a way you don't want things to be frilly. They have a web site: www.girlynyc.com. I also spotted in a Dutch candy catalog of all places, not only fabulous confections of chocolate, licorice and other delights, but, are you sitting down? Actual authentic wooden shoes! The real thing. For $26.95. Too cute with brightly colored opaque stockings, or bare legs. Be the first person on your block with a pair. All Things Dutch can be reached at 800-879-3882.

I'm having a very heavy "rough hewn" (see my Letter from the Editor in January's issue for further explanation) cum Medieval phase myself. I'm very much caught up in it, enjoying the chaste, ascetic sensibility of the sort of monastic, somber beauty of the period. I spent some time over at the Medieval Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, looking at all the splendid tapestries of fair maidens enjoying falconry, taking part in the hunt, caring for animals, always in fields lushly full of flowers. I love the sculptures and carvings of the lady saints with their pure faces, and the simple fluid lines of their clothing. It reminds me of all the great books and poems we studied in school, like the Arthurian legends, The Romance of the Rose, The Letters of Abelard and Heloise, and all that sort of heavy with carnal love cloaked in abstinence theme -- it's all terribly romantic and tragic.

All my Middle Ages musings prompted me to reread Tennyson's famous poem The Lady of Shalott. The poem was written in the late 19th Century, when the Pre-Raphaelites in England had become very interested again in Gothic style and the Arthurian legends. The Lady of Shallot is a peripheral tale to the legend of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. It was written in the fin de siecle, so how appropriate for it to be relevant now? Anyway it's a great poem, about love both unrequited and unrealized.

The poem is about the Lady of Shallot, a fair maiden (another one), who lives in a castle in the outskirts of Camelot. One day she gazes upon the visage of Sir Lancelot, and falls completely in love with him. He has no awareness of her or her feelings, and instead is deep in the throes of his passion for Queen Guinevere. The Lady of Shallot eventually places herself in a barge, sings a dirge and dies, having pined away for love of a man she could not have.

There is one stanza in particular that I love:

But in her web she still delights
To weave the mirror's magic sights,
For often thro' the silent nights
A funeral, with plumes and lights
And music, went to Camelot:

Or when the moon was overhead,
Came two young lovers lately wed;
"I am half sick of shadows," said
The Lady of Shallot.

Sigh! "I am half sick of shadows." What a great line.

It's better to experience fictional suffering. No need to despair, as I said earlier, variety is here for now, so enjoy it. As the great songwriter Cole Porter wrote, "Anything Goes!"

Love,

Gina