The moment you wake up on Valentine’s Day and realize you wrote a love song!!!
STANDARDS is my homage to many of the greatest female vocalists of all time, who sang with their hearts on the Quiet Storm. Many of these icons’ personal and professional journeys hit close to home to my friends, vocalists Crystal Blackman Wilson and Penny Wilson.
I sent them my lyrics sheet and a recording of myself singing the melody. Penni called me a few days later and said she loved the song, but my vocal skills needed some TLC. Thankfully, Penni and Crystal got to work. They tweaked a few lyrics (Penni came up with the hook, and Crystal came up with the melody). Then, my friend Ivan Hampden Jr. jumped on it and built the song. It was an amazing collaboration. I feel so fortunate to work with talented people I greatly admire. Crystal, Penni, and Ivan bring to life my personal reflections and set them to music. My friend and graphic designer George Corsillo (who designed multiple album covers for Luther Vandross) designed the artwork.
“The women mentioned in the song are legends to my sister and me,” says Penni Wilson. “We grew up listening to Sarah Vaughan and idolized Etta James and Dionne Warwick. They inspired us to sing in the first place.”
Romantic relationships play an important role in our everyday lives. But when diabetes enters the picture, it can complicate even the most loving and open relationships. Divabetic’s e-book, “Sweet Romance: A Woman’s Guide To Love & Intimacy With Diabetes,” Dr. Janis Roszler PhD, LMFT, CDCES, LD/N, FAND, and Donna Rice MBA, BSN, RN, CDCES, FADCES is available on Amazon. Get Your Copy Today!
“Sweet Romance” Co-Authors Janis Roszler and Donna Rice offer advice on discussing your diabetes diagnosis as well as issues related to intimacy, fertility, and menopause,
Living with diabetes can be a challenging experience, especially when it comes to your relationships. That’s why it’s important to talk to your loved ones about your diabetes diagnosis and how it affects your life. It can help you surround yourself with a more supportive and encouraging environment. Co-authors of Divabetic’s ebook, “Sweet Romance: A Woman’s Guide To Love & Intimacy With Diabetes,” Dr. Janis Roszler PhD, LMFT, CDCES, LD/N, FAND, and Donna Rice MBA, BSN, RN, CDCES, FADCES offer advice on discussing your diabetes diagnosis as well as issues related to intimacy, fertility, and menopause with the people you care about the most.
Their podcast interview will air on Tuesday, February 13, 2204.
To help us better understand your unique experiences and struggles with diabetes, the national nonprofits Divabetic and Diabetes Sisters are partnering on the first-ever survey on love and relationships for women with diabetes on the same day. This survey, titled “Love Across All Life Stages of Diabetes,” allows you to share your thoughts and experiences with us so we can create more meaningful programming and resources to serve you.
Please take a few moments out of your day to participate in this survey. You can find the link on our websites, Divabetic.Org and DiabetesSisters.Org, and our social media platforms.
Your input can make a difference in the lives of other women living with diabetes.
Divabetic’s ebook, “Sweet Romance: A Woman’s Guide To Love & Intimacy With Diabetes,” is available at Amazon.
I practically jump out of my skin at the sound of the fire snap and crackle in the Champagne Bar’s fireplace.
Just as you could imagine, the Plaza Hotel is beautifully decorated for the holidays. Plaid ribboned garlands, pine-scented wreaths, and vibrant red poinsettias adorn the gleaming entryways. It feels like a tuxedo-clad Cary Grant with Audrey Hepburn on his arm might appear at any minute, carrying a glass of champagne to toast the holidays.
If I wasn’t so on edge about meeting Jasper, I’d stop and snap photos of the decorations. But all day long, I’ve had self-doubt and worry as my companions as I cross off the steps of my plan. Looking at radiant shades of red poinsettias, I feel my heartbeat grow stronger. To think that it took seeing another woman in my husband’s arms to realize that what I want for Christmas is just what I have. I love my life, my children, and our home. Yes, I love my husband.
I can’t forget Jasper for what he did earlier today. But I am prepared to forgive him. Jasper stood by me in the darkest moments of my pregnancy. He had lifted me up, believed in me, and supported me when I doubted myself. My gestational diabetes created a storm inside of me. My erratic blood sugar levels wore me down. I felt like I was at war with my body. Rescuing my children and delivering them to safety consumed my life. So I closed my heart to Jasper, trying to protect the little lives inside me.
I’ve got to trust that Jasper can do that again if I let him back into my life.
The dining room feels like a cozy den in a Charleston mansion with high gloss hardwood floors, crisp linen, and heirloom silver vases and tableware. Everything is just like I remember when Jasper and I were last here. How long has it been? Nine years? Eight years? Taking care of two babies in diapers can certainly derail the romance in your married life.
I look across the candle-lit room and spot Jasper. He’s dressed in a beautiful navy blue Italian wool suit, pale pink dress shirt, and striped tie. My husband is a sight for sore eyes. Jasper looks magnificent. Not only does he fit into the lush surroundings, but Jasper looks like he owns the place! I see other diners stealing glances at him with the same envy and admiration we had when we gazed across the dining room at others all those years ago. I catch my breath again. Finally, it dawns on me that Jasper and I have achieved the life we dreamed of all those years ago. Actually, our lives are so much better than we could ever have imagined.
As I cross the room, I can tell my husband approves of my choice of outfits from the look in his eyes. The blood, sweat, tears, and tears it took to put myself tonight seem to pay off. My husband locks his gaze on me, drinks me in, and smiles. My chestnut hair is curled in soft waves, and my makeup looks effortlessly alluring. He gives me a quick kiss on the cheek next and then sits back down. Jasper’s eyes rest on my strand of pearls.
Jasper jumps up to pull my chair out of me before sitting down. There’s a beautifully wrapped present next to my place setting. I have a pit in my stomach. Doubt begins to rear its ugly head as I question my decision to not bring a gift for Jasper. Is my plan going to work? Will this Christmas Eve lead us to more beautiful memories of Christmas, or will I forever be looking back at last Christmas wishing with regret?
TO BE CONTINUED …
Click HERE for Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 1
Click HERE for Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 2
Click HEREfor Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 3
Click HERE for Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 4
Click HERE for Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 5
Click HERE for Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 6
It sounds like I’m not the only person thinking and writing Christmas break-up songs this year. Kelly Clarkson has unleashed the beast this holiday season with a new Christmas album, When Christmas Comes Around, featuring not one, not two, but at three Christmas break-up songs, not counting her rendition of Wham’s Last Christmas. Her Merry Christmas Baby is the ultimate tinsel-laced blow-off holiday tune. You go, girl!
Although they always say the holidays are always full of surprises, nothing prepares me for what I see across the room after our waiter takes our order.
The sound of a man’s laugh is so familiar it catches my attention. I glance around, trying to locate the laughter as waiters glide by with trays filled with mouthwatering delectables. Then, a shock hits my heart and explodes. I can’t stop myself from staring. Across the room, the man laughing is my husband, Jasper. And he is not alone. His arm is casually draped around the back of a curvaceous woman. She turns and kisses him on the lips a mere twenty feet away from our family. As if on cue, a strolling photographer stops at their table to capture their embrace. I watch as they inch closer together and smile brightly for the camera. The flashbulb goes off, and the image uploads in my mind, possibly forever. A wave of nausea sweeps over me.
At first glance, the woman isn’t his type. For one thing, she wears her hair natural. Her clothes are loud and funky, not muted or sophisticated. Even her hot pink nails are too long and too bright a hue to appeal to Jasper’s taste. Or so I would think. Of course, this woman looks lovely to everyone else in the restaurant. But no one else has lived under the scrutiny of Jasper’s eye for the past decade except for me.
I wonder if she is Jasper’s new Eliza Doolittle? He made me over, maybe he’s thinking about doing the same with her?
My mother’s first impression of Jasper wasn’t kind. She raised me to be a strong independent woman. She could tell that Jasper’s strong will would one day undermine mine if I let him. Deep down, my mother didn’t want my life to be like hers. My father made the rules for the rest of the household to follow. She wanted my life to be different.
My mother’s warnings about Jasper angered me. I didn’t listen to her because she didn’t make sense to me. When Jasper and I first started dating, I was very opinionated and vocal about it. I didn’t waiver or step down when he challenged me. He said he had never met a woman like me before. Jasper told me more than once that he actually admired my strong will and opinions. But my pregnancy changed me. For whatever reason, I let my gestational diabetes make me feel like a failure as a woman, wife, and mother!
Looking across at this woman with my husband, I see why I am sitting here. All my insecurities that came from mismanaging my blood sugars undermined my overall confidence. It’s just dawning on me what I allowed to happen. I grab hold of the edge of the table in an attempt to settle myself. But I can’t stop myself from staring.
It’s easy to blame the lingering doubts about my gestational diabetes for what’s happening in front of me. However, Jasper’s laser beam focus on his career is also a factor. The same drive and determination that initially attracted me to him now make my blood run cold. Memories of my own father’s absence in my childhood are repeated. I don’t want my children to experience my childhood. Their father needs to be a presence in their life. He needs to be a loving source of encouragement, not just a breadwinner.
Maybe that’s why I hate his art collection. Every time Jasper buys a painting or collectible, the art is stunning but what it represents is so ugly. Every masterpiece on the walls of our home represents more time spent with clients and less time spent with his family. It breaks off another piece of my heart. The twins are growing by leaps and bounds. I hate what his art collection represents so much that I push him away. So why did it take until this moment for me to realize this?
The crushing realization that my marriage may be over hits me. What have I done? I love my life. Why did it take this woman kissing my husband to see it?
My son, Darren, slams his spoon down and declares the hot chocolate the best in the world. The sound snaps me back to reality. I look at my two children dressed in their Sunday best and burst out laughing. It takes me a good thirty seconds before I can stop myself. Thankfully the restaurant is too busy with waiters and customers for anyone to notice. The twins look at me and smile. I quickly grab some whipped cream off my son’s hot cocoa and dab it on my nose. Suddenly being refined, elegant, and soft-spoken are the last things I want to be. Both kids are laughing. It feels good.
Looking at their two sweet faces with whipped cream mustaches, I see what’s at stake. Suddenly I know what I have to do. And I have until precisely 8 PM to do it. I quickly ask for our check and scramble to get the kids home. The kids don’t notice their father, and Jasper didn’t see us either, which means I still have a chance.
TO BE CONTINUED …
Click HERE for Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 1
Click HERE for Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 2
Click HEREfor Pink Champagne Christmas Story Part 3
The way Jasper thinks he knows better than me about the finer things in life hasn’t helped our relationship in the romance department at all. I’ll be the first to admit that classical music, decorative arts, and art collections are not my forte. It wasn’t Jasper’s forte either when we first met. Now, he’s one of New York’s most respected “collectors”, and I’m scratching my head trying to remember the last time we were intimate. Go figure.
No one in my family brought art or real estate strictly for investment. I was brought up in a modest working-class family in the suburbs of New Jersey. My family didn’t have four-poster beds with Egyptian cotton sheets, leather wallpaper, a Lalique crystal dining room table, a Picasso hanging in the foyer, or a built-in pool. But I still managed to be happy. I loved my simple childhood.
I used to think it was cute when he schooled me about the names of artists, architects, and operas that are popular with the partners in his law firm. Back then, he’d even consult with me before he’d actually set foot in an auction house. Sometimes, he’d blow my phone up a million times during the day with details about an upcoming auction. But over the past decade, my husband’s love of art has become oppressive. It hurts deep in my heart when he lets an auction take precedence over our family’s needs. Missing a soccer game or two or a recital is understandable, not an entire year’s worth. He’s missing out on the twins’ childhoods and they’re missing out on their father. If you ask me, deep down, I think Jasper is addicted to the adrenaline rush from ‘winning.’ It doesn’t matter what it is – if it’s considered the best of the best, he has to have it. As a result, we have amassed a top-notch African-American art collection worth several million dollars. At the same time, I attend family gatherings or social functions alone.
He certainly hasn’t paid half as much attention to me as the Christie’s catalog for the Cox Collection that he’s been carrying around. I could shave my head tomorrow and I doubt he’d blink an eye. He’s too busy memorizing the province of each piece of art from one of the most significant American collections ever to even notice. When I remind him we don’t have any more wall space available for another so-called ‘masterpiece’, Jasper just laughs and keeps flipping the glossy pages of his dogeared catalog. I miss the days when he used to make me feel like the only woman in the room.
Is there anything wrong with a wife wishing her husband would spend more time looking at her than some silly art auction catalog? If so, I am guilty because I have gone to a lot of trouble to make our dinner at the Plaza Hotel romantic.
First off, I managed to get my stylist, Joe Murray, to squeeze me in for a last-minute appointment at his Hale Organic Salon. Jasper loves it when I wear my hair up, and Joe is the master of the updo.
Secondly, I found the perfect black dress online at Nordstrom. It’s off the shoulder, silky smooth, and the boning inside makes my waist look like it did before I had twins. My stationary bike workouts while our nanny, Carla, watches the kids have paid off. My legs look great in a shorter hemline. Thank you, Peloton! And Jasper’s Christmas gift from last year, a strand of pearls long enough to make Coco Chanel jealous, adds a touch of stated elegance that Jasper appreciates.
Finally, there isn’t a setting that’s more romantic than the Champagne Bar at the Plaza Hotel. The intimacy of only ten tables overlooking Fifth Avenue is only enhanced by the world’s finest champagne, caviar, and wines available upon request. Thankfully Jasper has already agreed to turn off his phone, so there will be nothing to interrupt us. Tonight will be just the two of us like when we first met. Two people in love celebrate the best time of the year. Plus, the Champagne Bar is conveniently part of a hotel. So if things go according to my plans and the magic of the holidays cooperates, Jasper and I may get a room. I already called ahead to confirm they have a few vacancies for tonight, which is why I took the extra step to ask my mom to stay overnight and watch the kids.
Click HERE to read Pink Champagne Christmas Story PART 1
