Madame Sunday has returned and recovered (read: I got drunk) from the four day attempted suicide mission vacation known as family fun time!! Yipppeeee! I travelled to the edges of the Earth - you may have heard about it through my previous complaining and Twitter rants - it's called West Texas. Getting there required two cars, an airplane, an underground subway and passage through a mystical portal known as My Comfort Zone.
It's a beautifully rough landscape full of rusted oil horses, worn out towns and quite a few multi-million dollar ranches scattered about. I like all of that - especially the old stuff. But to a madame who revels in mediocrity it's a state full of extremes - both the physical landscape as well as the sociopolitical environment. Bulls costs as much as my house, schools change history and sometimes it takes an hour and a half to get to a mall. Also it's home to my kinfolk and there is plenty of delicious brisket.
Starting at the end (it's easier this way) - I had spent the final morning driving to the airport for my return flight talking about Obamacare and socialism so once through security I stole away to the Magazine Orgasmisplosion Store to hoard Sour Patch Kids and smutty mags, my own personal brand of escapism, for the flight home. I was lucky enough to find DHome, a local Dallas home and garden magazine, and inside lay pure editorial bliss exploring the OTHER side of Texas I had yet to see: the pink lipstick, lavender walls, Cadillacs and over-the-top big city Dallas life.
So sparkley...
Here's the owner of the featured house - grandson of Mary Kay Ash as in THE Mary Kay of pink Cadillac makeup fame. He's posing here with his favorite pussy on the dining table (I'm sorry I had to) and beard wife. One look at her in that dress that I KNOW he picked it out for her and I knew this spread was my decorating salvation. I bet the chandelier was purchased because it is reminiscent of Cinderella's pumpkin carriage. Just like a Texan fairy tale. This whole thing was a glittery and overly-styled fairy godmother sent to shine a soft pastel light on the softer side of Texas I had yet to see. Quite a far cry from where I just came from...
Oh ahahahaha! Dearest Uncle CattleRancher - I can't tell if that was a derogatory joke or you were informing me about a hate crime you were planning to commit but I'm going to laugh anyway because I know you are not afraid to use that gun strapped to your ankle or the one holstered under your shirt or the two in your glove compartment. AHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA! ehhhh......
Lemme tell ya, this ain't my style. But after four days of Sarah Palin and Jeezus (in that order) for breakfast, lunch and dinner this was like a design blogger lovefest. There was 'swooning' and 'melting' and a lot of other shameful things. It reminded me that I have a place in this world - a place where I can squee over that art in the corner, marvel at people who upholster things in silk and also give a middle finger to the shitty layout of this room. FUCK YOU randomly placed felt poof! Ahhhh..... I feel right at home now. Well, almost.
A few compassionately texting friends reminded me that back through the portal to my home that we shop at Ikea and yes global warming does exist and no it is not just Jeezus giving Mother Nature a hot flash and gay marriage really isn't a sign of the coming apocalypse. Whew! I was starting to forget!
mmmmhhhhh chandelier.
That foyer on the right is probably as big as my living room. Seems reasonable - everything IS bigger in Texas. And even though that antique desk on the left serves absolutely no purpose other than mildly hinting that someone in the house might sit there and pen notes on monogrammed stationary amidst the Murano glass collection it is kinda purty. In that completely useless way that only works in decor magazines.
My grandmother has a desk. Well it's really a lap tray that she uses in her recliner where she does the daily crossword and writes letters to San Francisco (the city itself) telling them why she won't visit their town. You know, because of all "those people" - the ones who voted for Nancy Pelosi. Oh and the baby-killing, ass-demon homosexuals too.
So here I am standing in the airport awaiting my sugar rush and all I can think about is how it's all just Texas - young millionaires with Baker furniture that might have never been used and poor families out in the middle of nowhere eating Velveeta casseroles all just tied up in bow of unabashed lone-star pride.
Where do you think Madame Sunday gets her badassical attitude?! Duh.
maybe this is bit more than pride. I'd still do dirty things to get a closet like that.
Christ is this the Mariah Carey MTV Cribs edition? This is the closet where her "husband" probably does her hair. Looks like a stray pair of Louboutins wandered away from their home in a Rubbermaid bin under the window. I can assure you that part is fake because everyone knows when you buy a pair of Louboutins they come with their own shoe angel that flies them up to the heavens to sleep at night.
In West Texas you wear cowboy boots. Not because it's cool but because you are an actual cowboy. Ok real cowboys are pretty badass. I don't have anything flip to say about them.
Ok that bedroom on the left is pure hotness. I won't deny.
But this? Didn't we JUST talk about white? My family says godless liberals (I love you too grandmother) are ruining this country but I think it might be people like this who decorate in all white and use ridonkulous amounts of pillows on their beds.
click to blow it up. seriously.
On the left are framed sketches of the custom wedding dress designed by her husband Austin Scarlett of Project Runway fame - yeah THIS lady! But in all honesty - I almost wept at seeing this picture with the baby. Not sure if I wanted to weep because the wallpapered ceiling had glass beads, the custom-designed crib was conceived even before the baby was and the plethora of PINK all made me want to throw up and vomiting makes me cry (and pee) ORRRR weep because that baby's head tilt is so fucking adorable it melted the wall of recycled water bottles and liberal guilt I was forced to build around my soul over the past three days.
I think that baby is just reminding me that all is right with the world (except for that crib of course) once I get back to my middle-class boughie life, eat some organic vegetables and see what's on clearance at Target at a manageable 5000 miles away from the family I love.