Gabrielle Reece - My Foot Is Too Big for the Glass Slipper: A Guide to the Less Than Perfect Life

I share my experiences in this book in an attempt to remind people that happiness is not defined in one way. Its up to each one of us to figure out what it means from moment to moment.

Thank you to Karen Karbo, the smartest, funniest writing partner I could have ever hoped for. I could bounce my ideas off her honestly and safely, and I learned so much from her in the process. Thank you for the honor of collaborating and helping me to have the balls to just say it. You are an amazing friend, and my love and respect for you are boundless.

I would like to tip my hat to everyone struggling to get it done and still figuring out a way to keep a smile on their faces and love in their hearts. Thanks to all of the people who have helped me to figure it out along the way:

My friends, who are bright lights in my life year after year and who are willing to call me on my BS when I need it: Jennifer Meredith Castillo, Becky Pollack Parker, Kelly Meyer, Nancy Truman, Cirene Revan, Alexandra Drane, Caridyn Colburn, Tiffany Spencer, Jessica Hall, Shannon Lickle, Twanna Walker Taylor, Harper Reese, Sara Ell, Hutch Parker, and Cecile Reynaud.

Katie Dawson Roberts for your time and love for my family over the years, and for offering a single womans perspective on the book.

Susan Casey for taking time to read the book and give me your thoughts and support.

Courteney Cox for your love and support.

Chelsea Handler for a complete hard time.

Don Wildman for your friendship and for being a constant source of inspiration to our family.

Jane Kachmer for helping me to have the vision to turn the blog into a book.

Carol Kachmer for help keeping the Hamilton clan on course. We could not do it without you.

My love to the Reece, Borde, Glynn, and Zuccarello families. You are all a part of me wherever I go.

My wonderful editor, Shannon Welch, for her stellar guidance, and Scribner for taking a chance, giving this book a home, and seeing it through from start to finish.

Todd Cole for creating images that give us a sliver of the chaos, but making it seem just a little more dialed than the reality.

My beautiful and crazy daughters, Bela, Reece, and Brody Jo. You three are the greatest teachers I may ever know, and I am honored to be able to share life with you.

Last, to my king, Laird. Thank you for your understanding, love, passion, and for giving it your best each day. You have made my life so full of color and excitement, and without you. I may have just played it safe. I cherish the gift of knowing you, your love, and your partnership. Oh, and when our girls are difficult, I do blame you for those traits.

is a former womens beach volleyball star, television host, fashion model, fitness expert, and author of the bestseller Big Girl in the Middle. She lives in California and Hawaii with her husband, professional surfer Laird Hamilton, and their three daughters.

is the author of many books, including the bestseller The Gospel According to Coco Chanel and the award-winning The Stuff of Life. Her writing has appeared in Elle, Vogue, Esquire, Outside, The New York Times , and Salon . She lives in Portland, Oregon.

MEET THE AUTHORS, WATCH VIDEOS AND MORE AT

SimonandSchuster.com

JACKET PHOTOGRAPHS: FRONT TODD COLE; BACK: COURTESY OF THE AUTHOR

EXCEPT BOTTOM TODD COLE, HELICOPTER BENJAMIN THOURAD

COPYRIGHT 2013 SIMON & SCHUSTER

My happily ever after began on November 30, 1997. On that day I married my prince in the middle of the gently winding Hanalei River, on the north shore of the garden island of Kauai. Ever resourceful, my prince lashed together a pair of canoes and affixed a platform on top of them, then decorated it with purple orchids, tuberose, and plumeria. During the only sun break of the day, we exchanged vows.

My prince was bare-chested and wore a pareo , a wrap-around skirt traditional for men of the Pacific Islands. He looked even more studly than usual. I wore a white Calvin Klein bikini beneath a sheer white Donna Karan dress. I might as well just confirm what youre already thinking: I looked completely fabulous. (What you dont know, of course, is that I was a hot mess only an hour before, madly doing laundry and scrubbing the bathroom for our out-of-town visitors.)

After the ceremony, we repaired with our dozen guests, close friends all, to Hanalei Bay, where we had a champagne picnic. It was the perfect ending to the fairy-tale courtship that had begun two years ago that very day.

Naturally, four years later I filed for divorce.

My childhood was rough enough to knock the belief in happily ever after clean out of my heart. My parents split when I was too young to remember; then, when I was five, my dad died in a plane crash. Ive always been one of those hard-headed chicks who believe that were all responsible for our own happiness. Still, when I married Laird I was confident Id found my soul mate. Who could be more perfect for me than a guy who was my heightsix feet threeand was even more intense and focused than I was?

Laird and I met in 1995 while I was shooting a TV show called The Extremists . Like pretty much everything else these days, you can find it online. I was twenty-five and wore an oversized white T-shirt. My hairare those bangs ?is whipping around in the wind. The sky behind me is angry with bruise-colored clouds.

Today Im hangin with an extremist who catches some serious waves, I say. His name is Laird Hamilton and he lives for the big swell.

I ask him whether he considers this to be a big swell day, and even though it looks as if a hurricane is about to roll in at any second, he says no. Laird looked exactly the same way he looks right this minute: tan and focused. You can see us falling in love right there on camera. Ten days later we moved in together.

We didnt even make it to our fifth anniversary before our sexy fairy tale turned into one of those unwatchable Swedish domestic dramas that makes the audience want to throw themselves off the nearest bridge. We were so simpatico in so many ways, but stupidly wed counted on this fact to remain immutable and provide an unshakable foundation for our relationship. Our love was and is complex. We were lovers, friends, and partners. We werent simply hot for each other, or companionable good friends, or a couple who had been together so long marriage was the obvious next step. We had it all covered; then, without knowing how it happened, wed become two really tall near-strangers stomping around the house, fuming, slamming doors, and glaring at each other over our green smoothies.

How clueless was I about marriage, about living under the same roof with another human being withsurprise!his own personality and his own life? Those who know my husband call him the Weatherman. I dont put a lot of stock in astrology, but he is one of the worlds primo watermen and a Piscesknown for their deep sensitivity and mutable moods. It took being married to him to learn that he was more emotional than Id ever imagined, and moody. Life with Laird: its windy, no wait, its raining, wait, wait, now its sunny. It hardly mattered what put him in a mood (if you guessed it usually had to do with there being no surfable waves that day, youd be right), because like the temperamental weather in Kauai where he grew up, it would all blow over in a few hours.

The problem was not the moodsthats who the guy isbut me. I took every slammed cupboard door personally. I thought, if he loved me, hed be happy most of the time. Im not the Weatherman, its never windy/rainy/sunny with me. Its San Diego with me, 75 degrees all year long. Im constant and true, but I hang on to shit. His mood, the one that would make me feel unloved, would be long gone, but Id still be feeling the sting of it, the injustice. Id still be experiencing his mood, long after he was out of it.