Unmasking the social impresario.

Lately I've been celebrating the small party. I've mainly been celebrating it in my head, since I've been thinking about small parties more than we've been having them. But when I think about ways that I want to spend time hanging out with people, lately all my thinking is casual, intimate, relaxed. Having people over for dinner. I've been thinking about when we're going to have our not-quite-annual dessert party, and my next clothes-swap party, and how to construct the perfect dinner party. I have less patience for the big blow-out, little interest in the neo-frat party, apathy about events that I was really excited about a year ago and might be excited about again in another few months. Right now what I mainly want is time to read.

And yet I'm an irredeemable social planner. I can't help myself. I'm thinking about recipes for Thanksgiving; what I want to do for birthdays in one, three, eight months; how long we'll be heading east for the holidays and who gets what for Christmas; where our next vacation is going to be. I'm thinking about them all at the same time.

Out with Halloween, on to Thanksgiving...