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Lady Bret Takes a Bite Out of the Big Apple
I’ve been a beach girl my whole life. I was born in Santa Barbara, lived most of my childhood in Newport Beach and Laguna Beach and then moved to Malibu when I was 19. I did move to Westwood to attend UCLA and I did live in Beverly Hills for a nearly a decade, but I am, at heart, a beach girl.

Yet, as much as I love living in Malibu, every once in a while it’s just good to change it up, broaden your horizons and go some place completely different, some place like New York. I hadn’t been in four or five years and I had never gone solo.

The Mandarin Oriental had sent a black Mercedes to bring me to the hotel, it is the same one I have at home, but in grey, so I felt comfortable and relaxed but…

The moment you enter New York you feel the pulsating energy and, in the winter, the bone chilling cold wakes you up in a way that only the icy New York wind can. It seems like anything can happen there. It feels as though your whole life could change in a “New York minute”. You could run into someone around the next block who changes everything. Looking up at all of the surrounding skyscrapers, imagining the incomprehensible amount of individual lives being lived inside of them, each person like a god or goddess living out their daily lives up in the sky supported by steal beams, the truly amazing engineering feats and constructions of mankind, makes me feel like possibilities are limitless– as if the sky is literally just the beginning of the limit. I wouldn’t be surprised to see penthouses popping up on clouds soon… As I strolled the city, I could see myself living there. Fascinated by the dark, reaching branches of the leave-less trees, I did vaguely wonder if the cold and the fast pace of New York would get to this California girl after a while. I wondered if I would become stripped dark and seemingly lifeless as the winter branches after a while…

But I’ve always dreamed of living in New York… for a year or two… Who knows maybe it would become a second home to me, as Hawaii has.

I went to all of my favorite places– Bergdorf Goodman, Barney’s New York, Madison Avenue, Central Park… I suppose I could have gone to some museums, but it was such a short trip and I’ve seen all of the best museums of the world already. So it was wonderful for me to just ride around in cabs, walk and feel the streets, thrill with the energy pumping through me and imagine living in New York…

And yet it was better to NOT live there, because when you are out of town, there is a loosening of restraint, a carefree feeling, a loss of oneself in the anonymity of the city that you wouldn’t have if you lived there and had the possibility of running into someone you know that would demand of you that you act like yourself…. Have you noticed experiencing a different side of “you” when you are in a different place– maybe bolder, maybe more relaxed, maybe more alive– but different you? A you who smiles more, a you who notices her surroundings, a you who has a brisker walk than normal… Maybe you become who you really are away from familiar eyes that are used to seeing you as a certain personality with certain behaviors, with certain thoughts and patterns that can really make one feel locked down, as if you are have been sentenced to Siberia inside your own skin… Even when you live in Paradise, even when you have a wonderful family or a good life and marriage, everything anyone would ever want, still, still there is a lightening of the spirit and a deepening of the breath when you are out of what can be the suffocating monotony of the commitments you have made in your life. A freedom from your usual roles and personality can be a tremendous relief– especially when, ironically, you are a good person, for being good is not the easy way many times. There were many years of my life, in fact, that I was so good that I became completely miserable. One day while having lunch at Mozza in Los Angeles, my beautiful, wise friend said, in her french accent, “You know, Bret, sometimes there is such thing as being too good. Maybe you should stop being so good and you should be happy instead.” A divorce ensued soon afterward. Her comment had awakened something inside of me that had been long ignored, my need to Live.

It is some kind of perfect fate or timing that his trip to New York, afforded me the opportunity to do something way out of character for me. It is an opportunity that has presented itself many, many times in my life, but I, for what ever reasons– pride, moral restrictions, thoughts of consequences or future needs– had denied myself. A wild, unbridled moment. A delicious secret to carry with me always… An absolute perfection. Something that has had me smiling, tripping over cracks in sidewalks and acting like I may not have a brain in my head and not really caring at all whether I do or not… Yes, I did something I never would have done at home…

Well, “never” is quite a strong word, but it would have been very unlikely… especially in my small, gossipy hometown.

Though it is a moment of passion which may be regarded by another as insignificant, it has been described to me by my ex-husband as “meaningless,” but I have to say, I think it is more real than anything in a certain way. Not if you measure it in length of time or by commitment, or by anything else we normally measure the importance of things by, but if you measure it by a complete respect for the fact that life is too short and the need to feel truly alive, then, it gets an A+ in importance and significance.

I am so grateful for it, I’m still smiling days later, though I did feel my conscience wanting to stroll me down the walk of shame… Irritating… But, for a few brief days I lived in utter shamelessness and bliss. It made me see the restraint that I keep myself under in order to please others around me and make them feel safe and protected from the power of my beauty and sex appeal. I wondered at this and began to re-think my thoughts on life… It got me pondering change…

You see, it’s not only good to get away from your familiar surroundings, no matter how wonderful they may be, it’s good to get out of who others think you are and even who you think you are and throw caution to the cold, New Yorker wind for a while. Explore what life has to offer without thinking about consequences. It makes you feel alive and awkward and vulnerable and real…

I found myself not wanting to leave New York and all of the endless possibilities that whisper to you in the wind as you are absorbed by the streets and surrender to the vibrancy of the world’s best city.

Landing in Los Angeles is usually not a heart warming experience for me, as I am usually coming back from some place far more beautiful, like Hawaii — There was one exception years ago, when I had taken a long, excruciatingly horrible trip to the eastern block of Europe, where I felt that I literally wanted kiss the dirty, cold ground at LAX when I had returned because I was so relieved to be back in the USA. But, usually, feel sorry to be back and wonder why I live here at all, because the ride home from the airport is ugly and congested, traffic is hardly a welcoming sight. My spirits do lift as soon as the car hits Pacific Coast Highway because as long as I can see the Pacific, I’m good.

…But this time, after my affair with the Atlantic, I didn’t feel joy until I kissed and hugged my children and gave them their presents from the Big Apple…

I dare you to take a bite!!!