Catherine Gigante-Brown

The office cubicle is indeed a strange bird. Here's how to survive life in a box without driving you—or your office mates—crazy.

I immediately developed a hot-and-heavy girlcrush on the wild, wacky, brash, candid, feminist, rubber-faced comedian—and you should too.

In the photograph, my great-grandmother, Margarita Cirigliano, is sitting at a small table on the front porch of the family home in Borough Park, Brooklyn.

8. Educate, don’t fixate.

I know it’s not a politically correct one, but I’ve got a confession to make: earth-friendly hotels stink. There, I said it.

raunchy renaissance woman. multimedia artist. probably a slut.

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.

I was 21 –– a Catholic, heterosexual college student, living at home in Brooklyn and still trying to discover who I was. At the crossroads of her life, Lorde knew exactly who she was. She was waging a war against cancer and sharing an old house in Staten Island with her kids and partner. But maybe we weren’t so different after all.

Wrinkles or lifelines? Chunky or curvaceous? The choice is yours.

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