Sexy AF Hair

I mean…

Harlow Jean, a really, really good girl who held it together longer than anyone had a right to expect, passed at 16 years old, after a lifetime of quietly saving someone who didn’t know how to save himself. She lived wherever I was, which is to say, home.

She rescued me when she was about five. Not metaphorically. Not in some cute, bumper-sticker way. She actually did. She showed up, decided I was hers, and then stayed… through every version of me, even the ones that were hard to love. Especially those.

She was my safe place when the world didn’t feel safe, and she never once asked me to explain myself. She didn’t need the words. She simply stayed by my side until we made it through another night. And then she did it again the next night. And the next.

At the time of her death, she was deeply loved, more than a little tired, and still doing her job… which, as far as I can tell, was making our family exactly what it was supposed to be.

She is survived by one adult (Justin Bechtolt), two brothers, Monroe and McQueen, one cat, Bridger, whom she ignored with quiet professionalism, and her lifelong best friend… me.

She didn’t need to be loud to matter. She didn’t need to be extraordinary to be everything. She just had to be there… and she was. Every time.

And now she’s not.

Which feels less like she left, and more like the part of the world that made sense just… went quiet.

She wasn’t our dog.

She was our family.

Thank you, Harlow, for years of unwavering love, for every quiet rescue, for every lesson in loyalty, and for showing two humans what a family was supposed to look like.

We’ll spend the rest of our lives trying to love as well as you did.

You might want to get on my books, IJs..

Goodbye my Moira Rose. 💔💔

The legendary actress is mostly known for her colorful portrayals in Beetlejuice and Schitt's Creek.

I finally escaped the salon for a night and ended up at Miracle STL… and honestly, I think I found the inside of Santa’s over-caffeinated imagination.

If you haven’t been, Miracle is St. Louis’s original Christmas pop up bar tucked over on Indiana Ave. They go all in for the holidays. We’re talking tinsel walls, nostalgic lights, ornaments hanging from places ornaments should probably not hang, and cocktails that taste like a Hallmark movie with a little attitude.

I grabbed one of their holiday drinks, sat in a room that looked like Christmas exploded, and realized I needed this way more than I thought. There’s something grounding about letting yourself be silly and festive when life is loud and work is nonstop. The season can feel heavy. A ridiculous snow globe of a bar helps.

If you want a night that feels like stepping straight into holiday chaos in the best possible way, go to Miracle while it’s running through December. Laugh too loud. Order the cocktail with the ridiculous name. Let yourself melt into the glitter and the twinkle lights.

I came home feeling lighter. Turns out a little Christmas kitsch is its own kind of therapy.