2000-04-24 | 22:56:06

this weekend i became a woman. it was a very special time. becoming a woman is a special time in every girl's life. it is a ceremonial rite of passage that opens up whole new vistas to her. what marks this landmark event in a woman's life? her first period? i think not. her first sexual experience? um, naw. turning the legal drinking age? i won't even dignify that with a response.

the tradition of mexico is to celebrate a girl's 15th birthday as the symbolic step into womanhood. the celebration is called the quincenera. there should be a little curly line over the second "n" in that word, but i don't know how to find that symbol on my keyboard. please imagine that little curly line whenever you see the word "quincenera" in this entry. it'll be a fun little game. kinda like when the lead singer of a band gets the audience to sing one word when he signals them. you'll see the "quin" as you begin to read the word and that'll be your signal to imagine the curly thing, OK?

so my friend patricia and i were talking over boba tea one night a few months ago. have you ever had boba tea? it is a special, special drink. i will have to tell you about it in another entry since this one is already running too long and i could talk about boba all day and night. ok, so patricia and i were talking about how we would both be turning 35 in april, 2000. we discussed that numerically speaking, it marked a landmark of sorts. of course, it is the rumored age of the average woman's sexual peak, so that in itself is noteworthy. it is also kind of a "last gas for 5 years" mark before the big 4-0. we then decided that we should throw ourselves a party for the occasion. i can't even remember how it came to be, but we decided that we could have our 15th birthday party 20 years late. our belated quincenera (did you remember to imagine the you know what back there?). since patricia is part ecuadorian, we had some latina authenticity in our back pocket, in case some hotheads found our celebration to be non-PC.

well, this weekend it happened. our party. our coming of age. we dressed the part in lace dresses and tiaras. one friend said we looked like barbie dolls. (she meant it as a compliment.) we served trader joe's finest and margaritas and had a special cake scrawled with "feliz quinceneras" on it. After we blew out our candles, we did a impromptu (yet incredibly choreographed) dance to neil diamond's "girl, you'll be a woman soon." some in attendance were almost moved to tears. others made crass lesbian fantasy comments. whatcha gonna do?

after the crowd had dispersed, patricia and i did a review of our successful soiree. (i think there should be an accent over one of the "e's" in that last word. if you know which "e," please imagine the accent there. merci. doh! over the "i," too, please.) we felt pleased that we had entertained and amused our guests. two of the fellas had even offered to deflower us blossoming girls. big of 'em. yes, we became women that night by celebrating what made us women...our humor, intelligence, caring, beauty (vain 'o me, no?), and our wonderful friends. ah, sometimes vida es muy bueno (please insert curly thing over "n" again).

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