Finally, ladies....

I'm having profound moments of procrastination right now, as evidenced by the previous blog entry. I really *could have* been working on those two finals, the paper and the presentation but ... I'm not. I'll do that in a few minutes. I just ate a donut and drank a 16-oz cafe au (soy) lait, so I need to get some excessive brain chemistry issues worked out before I try to be a ... student.

In the meantime, I'll share this little tidbit about our little experience at the wine bar the other night.

A few weeks ago, I was talking to Single Gay Female (who is still, technically, single even though she's got this girl who is *all over her*), and I said, I really wish several of these people from school knew each other the way that I know all of them.

Specifically, I was talking about her, The Debutante, S2, Dr. M and Dr. R.

SGF asked, "Why would you want something like that?" There was actually a slight tone of derision in her voice, which is utterly abnormal for SGF. She's a very open, big-hearted, gentle, love-for-everyone kind of person, which we all uniformly love about her. I was confused.

Why *wouldn't* I want something like that? I asked.

"I dunno," she said. "I just think that's weird."

All I can figure is that SGF just didn't know enough about these other women to see something I could see. I don't know that I can put my finger on any particular trait and say This is what they all have in common, but my instinct said that something fun and interesting could come from bringing their personalities together in a social atmosphere, rather than at school. They are all intelligent and possess great senses of humor, but that's not what made me think they'd all click somehow.

I've had the pleasure of socializing with each of them one-on-one, and in doing so, I've seen them in more relaxed states than gets displayed at school or in our little salon discussions over coffee. The Debutante and SGF are pretty consistent across environments, but the rest of us are older, have worked in Corporate America or academics for a long time and have learned -- OK, me excepted -- to enact professional demeanors rather well.

So it's been my desire to see them all slip into a more easy-going state at the same time. Wine is the perfect medium to help that along, so when The Deb suggested we all gather at a wine bar on Friday night, I was gung ho. I wanted to see what would happen. (Dr. R was absent.)

What happened: I think at the end of the night, SGF no longer wondered why I wanted to experience these women together. It's all about chemistry, and this group has simply fabulous chemistry. The hard-edged humor of S2 and Dr. M was balanced by SGF's and The Deb's softer approach, with me being ... I can't tell you what I am -- that's too meta of me. Maybe "absurd" is a good word?

There's also this interesting balance between those who have excellent social graces -- Dr. M and The Deb -- and those of us who are still working on it. (I'm thinking of how Maya Angelou once told S2, "You need to learn grace." She's surely come a long way since then, so that probably just leaves me as utterly graceless, while, as mentioned previously, SGF was too distracted by her kissingkissingkissing girl to affect the balance too much.)

Add our outstanding intelligence -- even I will claim this one -- and the fact that we share a common experience (grad school) and are all very left of center politically and all leaning hard toward atheism or something of that sort so no one gets offended by religious jokes, and the pump is pretty much primed.

We had a splendid time. Everyone has since said, in one way or another: "We should do that again. And again."

And I, who had a much better experience with Maya Angelou than S2 did, kicked back in my chair, far too many glasses of wine in my gut, and thought, I was right about this. (Of course I was. As Maya noted some time ago, I am "one smart cookie." And no, SGF, that is *not* a joke.) ... I may not necessarily be a Good Thing myself (perhaps only because Martha hasn't met me yet), but I know a Good Thing when I see it.

This group of women is a Very Good Thing.

That said, I return to my studies. Just what the fuck would Jay Haley say about "inverted hierarchies" anyway?