Mad About Mad Men

Tonight the first episode of the last season of Mad Men aired and I’m on cloud nine. I love Mad Men. I know I use love a lot in this blog but it really is true (and I seem to be consumed with movies and television—no surprise since I grew up watching way too much of both). I fell in love with Mad Men before it actually hit the airwaves. I saw a preview about it and fell hard immediately.

I love the 60’s fashion, hairstyles, architecture, office politics, sexual politics and even the sexism inherent in the workforce back in the day. God, especially the sexism. Odd I know, but how can you appreciate where you are if you don’t know where you came from?  But most of all, I love Don Draper. He’s everything I adore in a hero, movie idol handsome, sexy as all get out and confident as hell. A liar and a cheat, complicated and compelling. Flawed without doubt but undoubtedly worth saving. Le sigh, I mean, what more can you ask for?

Ever since the first season I have been toying with a character based on DD—and this was way before fan fiction was allowed to see the light of day. My character (still unnamed) is tortured by a past he’s hiding and consumed with controlling his world and the new lover in it. He thinks that just by the force of his will he can make everything perfect and right, but sadly, my heroine isn’t cooperating. Hmm, the more I think about it, the more I’m tempted to drag the story back to the front of the queue. Well, while I’m figuring out how to torture Mr. No Name, every Sunday night I’ll sit down and enjoy the Don Draper experience. After all, this season marks the end of an era.

Married At First Sight

I’ve been really inspired by a show (big surprise considering how much TV I watch). If you haven’t seen it, Married at First Sight is a show about strangers who don’t meet, see or know anything about each other until they are at the altar. Instead they are matched by a group of experts. Obviously these people are desperate. And optimistic. And hopeless romantics. And I love it all. I find the idea of going out on a limb and doing anything to find one’s match, swoon worthy. As humans what we want most is to make a connection with another person, give them our heart and trust. This of course can take forever to find, or we may never find it. Meanwhile, it has been incredibly heartwarming to see men and women on the show who long so much to find their partner they are willing to marry a stranger with the hope this person will turn into a helpmate. How can you not sigh at their romantic chutzpah?

In reality arranged marriages have always baffled me. Why in the world would anyone let their family pair them with someone they don’t know? And yet, the sort of arranged marriage on the show doesn’t seem so far-fetched. If I hadn’t met my honey I could totally see myself putting my love life in the hands of experts who are willing to find the best match for me (they say there is no such thing as a perfect match, and I tend to agree). I asked my honey if she were still single if would she go on the show, and she said she’d give it a shot. I guess that says something about our own compatibility. We’re both hopeless romantics. Or just crazy J

Submissive Lives

I just recently read an article about submissive wives. Not wives who are submissives in bed, but instead wives who let their husbands take the lead in their marriage. The author allows her husband to have the final word in family discussions and she defers to his decisions. I’ll be honest, this sort of blows my mind. Full disclosure, I am not in a relationship with a man so I cannot fully understand what it is like to be married to one. Also, I’m a pretty accommodating person who hates to fight, so many times I wind up giving into my honey’s wishes. But with that said, the feminist in me truly resists the idea that one person in a relationship is always right simply because he has a penis. Perhaps I’m being a little naïve here but I think compromise is always best. If that won’t work, the final decision should be made by the smartest person in the relationship or the person who has the better grasp of the situation or the person who has the most at stake. But that’s just me.

The article’s author says that by being submissive in her marriage, it allows her to have a more satisfying sex life. She believes that by giving herself into her husband’s care she can trust him with anything, including her freaky sexy side (okay, those are my words). It is an interesting concept. I don’t know if I buy it, or if would work for everyone, but I am a firm believer in doing what makes you feel good. Marriage is tough, and if letting your husband decide what yall do with your income tax money makes you both happy in and out of bad, then I’m not mad at you. I’m just a little perplexed J

BDSM Anyone?

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Belle

So yesterday I finally rented the movie Belle and it was much more than I was expecting. I had seen previews for it on other DVD’s I had rented and to be honest I didn’t really know what the movie was about. When I picked it up I knew it was about a biracial woman in 18^th century England. That was enough for me to be intrigued.

What I learned is that Belle is based on a true story about Dido Elizabeth Belle, a woman born to Captain Sir John Lindsay and a former slave he had rescued. We don’t ever learn much about her mother, or even her father, except he wanted her raised with her aristocratic white family. How revolutionary! There were many levels to the movie and of course a romance. What I found most interesting was poor Dido’s position in the world. She was obviously much better off than most blacks at that time. She was raised a lady and even had her own fortune, and yet she lived on the edges of society, not fitting in anywhere. Even worse, her family did not want her to marry because they believed no one worthy of them would make an offer and they (and thus she) were too good for anyone who would want a black wife. Oy, quite the conundrum and truly quite sad.

But Dido does find not one but two suitors and even love while battling for the rights of blacks in England. To say that Belle is interesting is very simplistic. It has a little bit of something for everyone. You can find romance, lush costumes, social structures of 18^th century England, and a court case concerning slaves I had never heard of before in Belle. But best of all, it had Dido, a woman ready to take on the injustices of her world. Pick it up some time, you won’t regret it.

RIP Bertrice Small

My heart broke yesterday. I was visiting with a group of romance writer friends when someone informed me that Bertrice Small had passed away this week. I immediately went into denial. Bertrice couldn’t be dead, she was somewhere in an ivy covered tower, pounding away on a typewriter, producing another awesome bodice ripper (and I use that term lovingly). As a writer I know that vision is a little ridiculous (okay, a lot ridiculous) and yet it brings me joy to think of her that way.

Bertrice wrote great old school romance classics like Skye O’Malley, Adora, The Kadin and I loved her for it. I have so many great memories of curling up with one of her books and falling into another world. I learned so much from her, things my mother would have been appalled I knew about, like droit de seigneur, eunuchs, harem culture, the line of succession in the Ottoman Empire and so much more. Bertrice was an original and I already feel her absence from the world. Rest in peace Bertrice. May you forever be creating sexy romances for the angels—they need a little spice in their lives too J

I'm In Love

I’m in love. No, not with my honey, though I do love her. I’m
in love with Ed Sheeran’s video Thinking Out Loud. I love the song too. I know what you’re thinking. Uhm, Mila, that video has been out for at least four months, what took you so long? Well to be
honest, I’m kinda old and can’t keep up with what’s going on in music. Most of the time I’m like ‘who the heck is singing now?’. I kid you not, I thought Hozier was Elton John. Meanwhile, Ed Sheeran has been on my periphery for a couple of years. I mean I knew he was besties with Taylor Swift, I knew he was a singer and I knew he looked like a Muppet. He was famous, but I just didn’t
know why.

Turns out I love his music. I didn’t know until a month ago the guy who sang the painful A Team
was the same surprisingly soulful dude who sang Don’t (and it took me forever to figure out the title of that song, thanks YouTube). Then it blew me away yet again that Ed sang and wrote Thinking Out Loud. It is my new favorite song.

Being kinda old, I don’t watch music videos like I used to, but I wanted to hear Thinking Out Loud
yesterday so I went to my beloved You Tube. That’s when I fell in love. Did I say Ed Sheeran looked like a Muppet? Well the man dances like a sexy mf. I mean, I knew he could sound sexy as hell because of Don’t, but when you marry his voice, lyrics and moves you have to stop and fan yourself a bit. Or at least I do every time I watch the video, and I do, a lot. It helps that the girl he’s dancing with is also sexy as hell and together they have great chemistry and make this perfect, romantic sensuous couple. Seriously, it is probably the most erotic thing I’ve seen in a long long time
(and yes, I did just see Fifty Shades of Grey last week).

So, if you’re in the mood for romance or want to feel that tingle of lust, but you only have five minutes, go check out Thinking Out Loud, you won’t regret it. I promise!