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My first two years of high school were as turbulent as a washing machine on spin cycle.  Family dysfunction, the death of my grandfather, and a surge of hormones sent me spiraling out of control.  I skipped out of school, ran with a tough crowd, got into mischief, and challenged anyone in authority. In my junior year, I took a creative writing class.  Mr. Schriener, my teacher, urged me to release my teenage angst through blank verse poetry.  Finding it terribly cathartic, I filled spiral notebooks with poems about the girl I had been and the woman I hoped to become.  I wrote about the pressing issues in my tiny world:  The vapidity of the popular clique, my first love, my unrequited desire for expensive designer jeans, my stepfather's frequent forays into adultery, battles with my mother, the uncertainty of my future. Mr. Schriener read some of my poems and suggested I submit them to magazines.  With a belly full of nerves and doubt, I sent...

Portofino By Leah Marie Brown   Portofino has long been the vacation destination for the rich and famous.   Elizabeth Taylor, Grace Kelly, Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, and Sophia Lauren forsook the artifice of Tinsel Town for the natural beauty of Portofino, a picturesque Italian fishing.    When Stephanie and I began planning our grande aventure  from Provence to Tuscany, I insisted a day in Portofino be added to our itinerary.  For me, it wasn't about Grace or Humphrey.  It wasn't about Sophia or Elizabeth.  It was about Rex.   Rex Harrison.  The legendary British actor who starred in one of the most romantic movies ever filmed.  The Ghost and Mrs. Muir .  (Yes, I just sighed.)  I was a child when I first discovered the cinematic greatness of The Ghost and Mrs. Muir , a romantic fantasy about a young widow who falls in love with the ghost of a swashbuckling sea captain.  Rex Harriso...

Serendipitious Traveler, Day 11 ~ Cannes The Hotel Martinez in Cannes, France Photo by Leah Marie Brown With Stephanie visiting childhood friends, I suddenly found myself alone in Cannes, Mistress of My Own Fate.  I opted to book a table at Z Plage, the beach side restaurant owned and operated by the Hotel Martinez.  The Martinez is the super swank hotel movie stars stay at while visiting Cannes.  I wanted to dine al fresco , to sit and gaze at the French Riviera, to sip champagne.  I wanted to create my Cannes moment. Sitting at the swanky beach side restaurant, I pulled out my journalist's notebook.  I decided to do a writing exercise.  I call it Tapping Into My Inner-Ellen Degeneres...that free flowing, uncensored stream of consciousness.  Hoping to capture that small, sophisticated corner of Cannes, I wrote my observations.  I wrote whatever came to mind.   September 15, 2012 Hotel Mar...

I am sucker for movies about people who have the courage to reinvent themselves, especially people who shirk the shackles of modern life in favor of a simpler existence in some charming European town.  Under the Tuscan Sun .  A Good Year .  These are films that have lifted my spirit and emboldened me to dream because they feature main characters who reinvent their lives.  So, when Stephanie came up with the idea to spend a day visiting the places featured in  A Good Year, I had a fan girl moment.  I imagined myself following in Russell Crowe's gorgeous footsteps, driving down the roads lined with plane trees, sipping wine in a quaint Provencal cafe. For those of you who have not yet seen A Good Year , it is a romantic comedy directed by Ridley Scott and starring Russell Crowe.  The screenplay was adapted from the Peter Mayle novel by the same name.  It tells the story of a cynical investment banker who inherits a ...