An Urban Girl

To a three year old girl life seems to be blissfully literal.  Simple.  Things mean just what they do and nothing else.  And very few things are very important.  Birthdays are very important.  As are Birthday Parties.  So are any sort of costumes related to royalty, dancers, fairies and weddings. Everything else in life somehow takes its importance from the above categories. For instance: "Eating fruits and vegetables help me grow into a beautiful princess". "Can I get this for my birthday next year (& this, & this, & that, & this, & ........). "I will finish all my food so I get really big and we can finally have my 4th birthday party".  Last week my parents, along with my sister and her beau descended upon Silicon Valley for Birthday celebrations.  My sister's and mine.    My girl's heart was seriously ready to explode with all the excitement around. We had a lovely dinner celebration at Saha.  She helped us blow th

Despite Mr. Urban's disapproval, I purchased Episode 2 of Shah's of Sunset from Amazon and watched it on super low volume on my laptop, scandalously hunched over at the kitchen counter, while Mr. Urban and our girl played Lego after breakfast. I laughed a lot, but I assure you I felt very guilty doing so. If you already don't have the background, bear with me for a moment.... In 1979, Iran had a revolution, the reasons for which no two people can agree on as far as I can tell.  But, there are a few things we know for certain. Following the revolution, Iranians that could have possibly worked towards reversing it were either executed by the new regime (shot at close range), or if they were really lucky they fled the country in tragic, clandestine, heroic ways that most of us can't even fathom. Around that time, the dreadful Iran Hostage Crisis came to unfold, when a bunch of hot-headed rogue revolutionaries stormed the US Consulate in Tehran, and took 52 America