Catherine Gigante-Brown

raunchy renaissance woman. multimedia artist. probably a slut.

The Daily News quoted one painted lady as saying, “People come up to us sometimes and say what we do is disgusting,” she said. “But what is disgusting about the female body? They shield their kids sometimes, and I think, ‘Kids come from the female body.’”

What Stephen didn’t know –– what no one knew –– was how weak my knees grew when I pushed through the swinging doors of the ICU.

From New York to LA, this lady knows a good story.

You learn a lot about people when you live in their home. The Taylors seemed to lead a joyless, Spartan existence.

All bets were off after 9/11. In a twisted way, it proved to me that worry was fruitless. No one ever saw the terrorist attacks coming.

Candida Royalle pretty much invented couples erotica. She made it socially-acceptable. Respectable. The women in her films looked like real women and had real, comfortable female bodies. And her movies actually had stories. Good stories. She hired her friends—adult legends like Annie Sprinkle, Veronicas Hart and Vera, and Gloria Leonard — to create Femme films too.

Although America’s “lying in period” fell by the wayside in the 19th century with the disappearance of the frontier, it’s alive and well today in many cultures globally. Seclusion traditions where both mother and child recover and bond are still the norm in many cultures worldwide.

Even when I explained to my son that he came from a long line of short people, it didn’t help. David still felt bad about being small. How could a five-year-old possibly get this type of size-shaming message? From other people, mostly insensitive adults. They gave him the idea that bigger was somehow better.

I’m a firm believer that Tiny Kindnesses can change the world, one sweet, loving gesture at a time.