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Life is less a series of circles: a cycle of nine-to-five, a left-hand ring for a lifetime, a rotation around other people.

Life is more made up of the right angles: you see you should be your own boss, you realize life’s too short (like your skirt) to care what others think, and instead of needing an audience for a show, you know–

This Citrine by the Stones necklace would look better with nothing else on, alone, than with a little something-something, in front of someone.

Luxury isn’t a third home on the water. Luxury isn’t water designed to cost more than wine. Luxury isn’t frozen water dripping off your right-hand ring finger. Luxury is the hot wet you feel watching the person you decided you’re going home with. Luxury is wearing handmade shoes that fit like your feet were poured into them, just to toss them off for a stranger. Luxury is sliding off your iced watch and feeling time dissolve. Luxury is sweating into your booked-months-in-advance haircut. Luxury is your satin underwear drowning in a sea of bedclothes. Luxury is melting into sheets you barely feel, with however many threads you can’t care to count. Luxury, no matter its form, evaporates into pure pleasure. And despite how steamy luxury can be–

Luxury isn’t always so gorgeous in the morning.

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Published in eVelvetRope.com

Thanksgiving isn’t being bored at a table full of family ties that would otherwise scatter, naturally, like semi-precious stones on a gold leaf pin. Thanksgiving isn’t a boring blessing for fatty foods. Thanksgiving isn’t one day out of the year you try to remember why you love life. Thanksgiving is driving 101 mph with your boy on the 101 freeway. Thanksgiving is weaving through lanes, your speed a pure pleasure that creates opportunity for yourself. Thanksgiving is your risk rewarded, putting yourself in the position to pass everyone. Thanksgiving is–

Seeing someone else get pulled over by a cop.

» 1940s vintage leaf brooch and earrings (not shown) $400, Vintage Textile.com

Forgive me for whistle blowing.

But life’s as short as your skirt.

So if it bores you to spend turkey time with people you wouldn’t know were it not for some random lottery of family ties–

Skip it and get a lap dance in Vegas instead.

It’s called Thanksgiving. Why not give yourself a leopard-print-sacked something to be thankful for?

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“Come shower with me,” calls The Boy, my boy.

I walk into his bathroom, and see him naked in the shower stall, wiping its glass clear with old Wall Street Journals and a jug of vinegar. “Are you pickling your pickle?” I ask.

“You should hope not.” I stand there, watching him through the glass, as he looks over the snaky spaces in the carved Roman marble of the shower, eyes pausing on a New World black and chrome switch box. “I’ve never tried the sauna in here.” He presses its buttons, and we’re quiet, waiting. A couple minutes pass, and we hear the shower stall breath, transforming into the steamer of a giant espresso machine. “Hop in, Little Satan.”

I strip and slip in, sitting on the cold marble bench. Spirits of water begin to kiss me, clinging to my skin, and I watch the temperature climb on the black box. 65° F to 70° to 75°… The steam’s slowly exploding into our marble and glass world, and I steal a little breath, and cough. My lungs choke on the water in the air, but I breath deep, I make myself relax. The Boy sits next to me, and we lie against the marble walls on opposite ends, book-ending the space between us, our legs open to each other. Steam dances and beads on the glass, on the walls, on our skin, though I only see the drops through touch: the steam is fogging my vision. “Just breath deep,” says The Boy. “How calming is this?”

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I’m taking a break from stringing dirty words together, flipping between porn and Money.com, when my iPhone rings. It’s The Boy.

“Sexy one,” I answer.

“I went to check out that table, for the kitchen nook,” The Boy says. “It’s really, really nice. Probably worth 25 grand. But I want to get him down to $7,500. The seller, this Italian dude, wants $10,000. He was freaking out at the idea of taking less. I could tell he’s emotionally attached to this table, so I try to get into his head, to figure out how to motivate him. So finally I tell him, ‘I completely know how you feel, you’d rather donate this table to a charity than sell it below the right price. You call me if you change your mind.’ And he nods his head.”

“You worked him harder than I worked you on our first date,” I say. “So he’ll call you when he knows he can’t get 10 grand for his table.”

“It’s like when you want to get a chick to lick your balls,” says The Boy, “you’ve got to convince her they’re candy.”

“Who needs an MBA when they’ve got you on speed dial?” I ask. “And I think you persuaded me they were a soy latte.”

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“Grab our left overs,” says The Boy, soft shutting his Porsche’s door.

“Why?”

“We can’t leave it in the car.” And though I’m not sure why, I take the food and we walk to my building, an Art Deco bit of bricks. “I’m so curious to finally see your place,” says The Boy. “And I’m so ready to crash.”

I realize he wants to spend the night at my place, and though we’ve slept together in over five countries of apartments, hotels, planes, and trains, I go shy and say, “I don’t think you want to.”

“Why not? Is your other boyfriend coming over later?”

“My only other boyfriend is my right hand. And I like to think of it as a hot chick.”

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