"I don't understand it myself," she said, tapping her fingers on the
worn wooden tabletop just like her father had done when she was a child.
"Mona,
it's obviously latent father stuff, I mean, seriously." Rachelle was in
no mood to dick around with Mona's pseudo confusion. She knew that Mona
knew exactly what was going on.
The restaurant was loud with a buzz like yellow light through a
glass of Prosecco, effervescent and warm. Tables of two mostly, with a
four-top in each of the three corners in the main dining room. Mona's
back was to the dark red velvet curtain which separated the foyer from
the bar on one side and dining room on the other.
Mona swilled her wine like a trucker, pushed her course brown hair
behind her ears with her pudgy fingers and looked at Rachelle drunkenly.
"Look Rachy, I realize you wanted to fuck your father, or wait, maybe
he wanted to fuck your best friend. Whatever." She looked around the
room as if she were in a swirling fishbowl. "But I have no desire for
daddy sex, okay?"
Rachelle rolled her eyes and folded the paper from her straw in half
lengthwise. "Honey, I know this is hard for you to believe, but no one
in their right mind would want to fuck their 69-year-old crabby-ass
neighbor unless they were dealing with some ancient childhood shit."
"Oh for the love of..." Mona picked up her glass and took another
drink. "God, I really like this Gewurztraminer. I mean, who knew right? A
wine I can actually remember. It's a first." She paused, inebriated.
"Maybe you're right. Maybe it's time I did something really bad."
Rachelle looked at her friend with satisfaction. She was sick of all the talk and no action.
"But Rachelle? I've never even been with a man. I don't know what the hell I'm doing."
Rachelle
put her palms flat on the table in front of her and lifted her head
until she was looking eye-to-eye with her best friend.
"Just go over there with a bottle of wine Mona, and then start asking him questions about his life."
Friday, November 16, 2012
The Daily Write: I'm all alone out here! (November 14, 2012)
Rose dropped Frank off at the gas station. "Dropped off" being the
polite term. She eighty-sixed his ass. Once they crossed the state line,
it became abundantly apparent that not only was he lousy company, he
also had a worse sense of direction than her ex husband. She figured
that meant he'd be useless on the playa too. A man who couldn't
conversate and couldn't find his way around on a flat-as-hell desert
road sure wasn't going to be able to erect a shade structure or lug
water.
She didn't spend all the last three months of her quickly shortening life to end up taking care of an old man who couldn't fend for himself.
"Damn, where's that Grizzly Adams when you need him?" she muttered to herself as she exited the last civilization she expected to see for quite some time, shifted into high gear and opened her up.
Two hours later she found herself tired. Not wanting to get hypnotized by the road, she pulled over, turned on the CB to listen the truckers and reached up to the sun vizor grab a joint. She needed to relax before the excitement of getting where she was going, where she had been going, she figured, almost all her adult life without realizing it.
She didn't spend all the last three months of her quickly shortening life to end up taking care of an old man who couldn't fend for himself.
"Damn, where's that Grizzly Adams when you need him?" she muttered to herself as she exited the last civilization she expected to see for quite some time, shifted into high gear and opened her up.
Two hours later she found herself tired. Not wanting to get hypnotized by the road, she pulled over, turned on the CB to listen the truckers and reached up to the sun vizor grab a joint. She needed to relax before the excitement of getting where she was going, where she had been going, she figured, almost all her adult life without realizing it.
Monday, November 12, 2012
The Daily Write: Photo #4 (November 12, 2012)
In the pre-dusk daylight, the ancient streets were warm and appealing.
Small hills covered in cobblestone, saffron buildings on either side. A
very different experience from my first time in Madrid when the rain
soaked through my water resistant zebra striped jacket, into my shirt
and even bra. I had been determined to visit Chueca to see the gay
nightlife, not realizing how lost I would become in the tiny dark
streets, nor how confusing the choices would be. Was every tapas bar
gay? Were there safe places to visit and those I should avoid? I
couldn't make sense of it with the dark dripping water making my hair
stick to the side of my face as I tired, in vain, to see over the tops
of my foggy glasses. Nor was I expecting it when a dark-haired man
peeled himself away from a wall where he had been hidden like a
chameleon.
He spoke to me in Spanish, and when I replied in English, switched languages. He wanted to know where I was going, if I was married, if I needed company. I said no a few times, walked away, brushed him off and kept looking for somewhere to eat. The best bars were probably the ones that I couldn't see inside with dark heavy doors and tiny brick lined windows. I wasn't feeling quite that adventurous, especially without command of Spanish, so I finally slipped into a black and red restaurant, dripping puddles onto the floor and the glass table top as I sat down, drying my head awkwardly on a paper napkin.
The menu was familiar but bizarre, Asian/Italian fusion. So against type being served among the tiny tight streets of the ancient Spanish city. I was glad. I had already eaten too much jamón , too many heavy egg tortillas and red, near raw meats, over salted and bloody. Noodles and a mixed drink in the yellow light of a small restaurant were warming, familiar, almost comforting.
Oddly, another woman was dining alone next to me, and speaking heavy Irish-accented English. I introduced myself, glad for the company in this strange netherworld. Her tale was as odd as she - a filmmaker and former lawyer who had recently finished a piece she was marketing to film festivals. She was in Madrid for a huge technology conference being held at some big sports pavilion where there were tents set up in rows for the attendees. She was one of very few woman, there on her last Euros, hoping for a check to arrive soon that would get her back to Ireland. We talked over our meals - about her film, about queer life in the US and Ireland, my family, her girlfriend. Not quite what I expected out of my first trip to Chueca, but an interesting travel experience nonetheless.
I left after dessert, having promised to watch her film clip and send it on to a friend who was a programmer for Frameline, SF's queer film festival. I was relieved to be going back to a hotel and not to a row of precision erected tents and techies.
The next day when I barely got out of Europe due to the Icelandic volcano, I thought about my new Irish acquaintance a lot. She had barely enough money to get from the restaurant back to the conference. I couldn't imagine she'd have found a way out of Spain and back home. She might have been stranded for weeks without money or a place to stay while I was safely tucked into a long coach class flight home next to a member of The Church of Latter Day Saints, who offered me a copy of his Book of Mormon mid-flight.
The Daily Write: I am determined (November 11, 2012)
She wasn't sure what went wrong or how it happened. Probably on account
of being white. Being white had so much to do with so many things. And
nothing felt more white than when her Black daycare provider admonished her for lax parenting.
"You have to be consistent, no matter what," she said, shaking her head as if the breech had already happened, as if it were a lost cause trying to get the white woman with overly good intentions to get it together and be a good parent.
Of course, such admonishment was deeply embarrassing, so she denied being inconsistent. Comical really. Like denying she was middle class. Or pretending not to be a do-gooder white lady social liberal with a parenting style that leaned toward "whatever is easiest in the moment."
For instance, those parents whose children always stayed in their own beds. Hard asses. They not only must've had endless energy to reinforce the ground rules at 3 am, they must've been the types who could handle delayed gratification. The same ones who, as children, succeeded in the experiment which would later help researchers hypothesize about who would make it far in the business world and who would not. It was all based on their ability to withstand the temptation of sweet treats as observed in a psychological experiment. Although she had not been one of the subjects, she was sure, without a doubt, that she would not have been able to resist.
Now her own child was a pre-teen, wily as he had ever been, easily set off, ungrateful when hungry, unhappy, bored and prone to insisting he get his own way. In moments when he was sweet, nothing could be better. The rest of the time she wondered what her lax white parenting had wrought. Too late to go back in time; she prayed he turned out well anyway.
"You have to be consistent, no matter what," she said, shaking her head as if the breech had already happened, as if it were a lost cause trying to get the white woman with overly good intentions to get it together and be a good parent.
Of course, such admonishment was deeply embarrassing, so she denied being inconsistent. Comical really. Like denying she was middle class. Or pretending not to be a do-gooder white lady social liberal with a parenting style that leaned toward "whatever is easiest in the moment."
For instance, those parents whose children always stayed in their own beds. Hard asses. They not only must've had endless energy to reinforce the ground rules at 3 am, they must've been the types who could handle delayed gratification. The same ones who, as children, succeeded in the experiment which would later help researchers hypothesize about who would make it far in the business world and who would not. It was all based on their ability to withstand the temptation of sweet treats as observed in a psychological experiment. Although she had not been one of the subjects, she was sure, without a doubt, that she would not have been able to resist.
Now her own child was a pre-teen, wily as he had ever been, easily set off, ungrateful when hungry, unhappy, bored and prone to insisting he get his own way. In moments when he was sweet, nothing could be better. The rest of the time she wondered what her lax white parenting had wrought. Too late to go back in time; she prayed he turned out well anyway.
Friday, November 9, 2012
The Daily Write: My Brother (November 9, 2012)
I've been wondering lately if they have good sex in communist countries.
Does giving yourself to the State equal the end of erotic desire? How
does it fit in with the rhetoric of The Party? And what of totalitarian
regimes? Is sex the only good thing left when everything else is
controlled, bloody, gray and you are half starved?
These are the kinds of things that go through my mind as I stand in the backyard of the 69-year-old across the street drinking white wine from a pink plastic cup while he smokes American Spirits and talks about what his house was like when he bought it, how it feels to be leaving after 22 years, and every now and then mentions Bob Avakian, Chairman of The Revolutionary Communist Party. It's not that I'm all that interested in his beliefs, but there is an erotic charge to talking to a man driven by passion for his politics and for righting the wrongs of the world.
Frank is short, gray haired and loose-eyed the way someone who drinks too much tends to be. He doesn't remember my name but he likes to talk. He's a grumbler and a mumbler so I can't always understand what he's saying. When he invited me over to tour his house I couldn't tell for sure if he wanted me to come in, and then he got annoyed that I hesitated before entering. Then standing in his bathroom admiring his tile work seemed so intimate, with the bedroom beyond.
I like that we are developing this friendship across generations, genders and the street. Only, he's about to move and I have no business, as a married woman with two kids, flirting with a man who can't see straight and is 22 years my senior.
But then thing is, I've never been with a man. I'm curious. And I like the ones that have experience, and who pay attention to me but don't, all in one breath. I find his cranky demeanor a turn on. And plus, there is that notion of conquest. Like, could I get under his skin enough to make him forget the politics? Or maybe he would grunt sweet Avakianisms into my ear in a moment of passion. On the the other hand, he may be spent at this point in his life. In which case, I'd still like to get drunk with him and hang out.
Perhaps I am a Commie after all.
These are the kinds of things that go through my mind as I stand in the backyard of the 69-year-old across the street drinking white wine from a pink plastic cup while he smokes American Spirits and talks about what his house was like when he bought it, how it feels to be leaving after 22 years, and every now and then mentions Bob Avakian, Chairman of The Revolutionary Communist Party. It's not that I'm all that interested in his beliefs, but there is an erotic charge to talking to a man driven by passion for his politics and for righting the wrongs of the world.
Frank is short, gray haired and loose-eyed the way someone who drinks too much tends to be. He doesn't remember my name but he likes to talk. He's a grumbler and a mumbler so I can't always understand what he's saying. When he invited me over to tour his house I couldn't tell for sure if he wanted me to come in, and then he got annoyed that I hesitated before entering. Then standing in his bathroom admiring his tile work seemed so intimate, with the bedroom beyond.
I like that we are developing this friendship across generations, genders and the street. Only, he's about to move and I have no business, as a married woman with two kids, flirting with a man who can't see straight and is 22 years my senior.
But then thing is, I've never been with a man. I'm curious. And I like the ones that have experience, and who pay attention to me but don't, all in one breath. I find his cranky demeanor a turn on. And plus, there is that notion of conquest. Like, could I get under his skin enough to make him forget the politics? Or maybe he would grunt sweet Avakianisms into my ear in a moment of passion. On the the other hand, he may be spent at this point in his life. In which case, I'd still like to get drunk with him and hang out.
Perhaps I am a Commie after all.
Thursday, November 8, 2012
The Daily Write: Larger (November 8, 2012)
"Do you remember that feeling of being carried up the stairs in your daddy's arms?" Lynette asked me with her lazy summer voice.
She was twirling the bottom of her braid and wagging her legs out over the edge of the porch of the big old family farm house. The light had left the sky an hour earlier and the stars and lightening bugs were just starting to twinkle.
Besides Lynette's voice, the next best sound in the world to me was the night bugs. Sometimes she and I tried to stalk them, but getting to the root of the sound is like trying to catch a butterfly. Rare.
"I remember it Joe Joe," she said to me, turning for just a whisp of a moment so that she was looking right into me. "It made me feel wiggly, like I was a whooshing tree in an autumn wind."
I smiled to myself at the thought of my big sister as a leaning tall tree. Suited her right. She was like that, with deep roots in the place so far down nothing could ever budge her, but so adventurous and pretty, she could reach up to the tip of the sky anytime she wanted to.
But then she got all still like she does sometimes. And I knew she was going to cry.
"Lynnie, don't cry. He's gonna come back someday." I scooted behind her and pushed my toes into her back, pretending to walk up it like a big spider. Our funny game.
She wasn't the kind to let sadness get her down for too long and I knew she was gonna start talking about something else soon. She was the strongest girl I ever met.
Way across the darkness of what we knew was the corn field were two tiny lights driving down the road to town.
Lynette laughed out loud like she just heard the preacher on Sunday say a curse word by accident. "Looks like old Sam forgot to bring home the sugar again!" She said, slapping her knee.
I was so relieved she was laughing I laid right down there on the rough grey wood of our porch and looked up at the rafters above me and laughed right along with her.
"Come on old young Joe Joe, let's go get us some ice cream," she said, standing up and stretching out like she was a wolf about to howl at the moon. She turned around fast, grabbed me by the waist and pulled me in through the screen door.
She was twirling the bottom of her braid and wagging her legs out over the edge of the porch of the big old family farm house. The light had left the sky an hour earlier and the stars and lightening bugs were just starting to twinkle.
Besides Lynette's voice, the next best sound in the world to me was the night bugs. Sometimes she and I tried to stalk them, but getting to the root of the sound is like trying to catch a butterfly. Rare.
"I remember it Joe Joe," she said to me, turning for just a whisp of a moment so that she was looking right into me. "It made me feel wiggly, like I was a whooshing tree in an autumn wind."
I smiled to myself at the thought of my big sister as a leaning tall tree. Suited her right. She was like that, with deep roots in the place so far down nothing could ever budge her, but so adventurous and pretty, she could reach up to the tip of the sky anytime she wanted to.
But then she got all still like she does sometimes. And I knew she was going to cry.
"Lynnie, don't cry. He's gonna come back someday." I scooted behind her and pushed my toes into her back, pretending to walk up it like a big spider. Our funny game.
She wasn't the kind to let sadness get her down for too long and I knew she was gonna start talking about something else soon. She was the strongest girl I ever met.
Way across the darkness of what we knew was the corn field were two tiny lights driving down the road to town.
Lynette laughed out loud like she just heard the preacher on Sunday say a curse word by accident. "Looks like old Sam forgot to bring home the sugar again!" She said, slapping her knee.
I was so relieved she was laughing I laid right down there on the rough grey wood of our porch and looked up at the rafters above me and laughed right along with her.
"Come on old young Joe Joe, let's go get us some ice cream," she said, standing up and stretching out like she was a wolf about to howl at the moon. She turned around fast, grabbed me by the waist and pulled me in through the screen door.
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
The Daily Write: Moving Forward (November 6, 2012)
We had the same last name, but he was one of those almost arrogant short Jewish men you see in movies. Not that good looking, but so confident it didn't matter. Not particularly interesting, but full of political fervor. Definitely not part of the swirling "in" crowd. He invited me to his apartment with other friends to watch the election returns come in. I had voted in my first presidential election,so naively hopeful that it would be better than '72, when I cried watching my father watch his black and white TV as McGovern conceded.
It was a short walk between his ground floor apartment and mine, which was good, because when Reagan started speaking, I was bereft, and in no mood to fake it around those I perceived to be my intellectual superiors.
Today I took my eleven-year-old son with me to vote. He filled in a couple arrows on the paper ballot for me and we discussed all the choices in depth and with careful and kind consideration. I don't take these teaching moments lightly. They matter. Will the look of the white sides of the small booth loom large in his memories some day? Honestly, I hope so. I hope he talks about understanding the importance of our liberal and humanity-oriented values with his children. I hope he carries the torch of pride with him that he was part of it. He's lucky. We won tonight. A rare and beautiful thing.
Now the real trick - to recognize that we are all far more like his favorite color, purple, than the binary reds and blues shown on two-dimensional maps. All of us have a stake in finding common ground and mutual respect.
It was a short walk between his ground floor apartment and mine, which was good, because when Reagan started speaking, I was bereft, and in no mood to fake it around those I perceived to be my intellectual superiors.
Today I took my eleven-year-old son with me to vote. He filled in a couple arrows on the paper ballot for me and we discussed all the choices in depth and with careful and kind consideration. I don't take these teaching moments lightly. They matter. Will the look of the white sides of the small booth loom large in his memories some day? Honestly, I hope so. I hope he talks about understanding the importance of our liberal and humanity-oriented values with his children. I hope he carries the torch of pride with him that he was part of it. He's lucky. We won tonight. A rare and beautiful thing.
Now the real trick - to recognize that we are all far more like his favorite color, purple, than the binary reds and blues shown on two-dimensional maps. All of us have a stake in finding common ground and mutual respect.
Monday, November 5, 2012
The Daily Write: Photo #3 (November 5, 2012)
"Impossible tiny doorways." Stephanie muttered under her breath, but loud enough for her travel companions to hear.
"It's really odd." Georgine replied, bending down like a giraffe to get a look into the bakery.
Cobblestones and white washed buildings built tight and low next to each other. It felt like the creepy Enchanted Hills play land Stephanie had gone to as a child, with demented cement figures meant to be cute and endearing but instead risque and tired.
"I think we should knock," Stephanie giggled as if she had just played a dare. She reached back behind her head and nervously twisted her wavy sun lightened brown hair into a ponytail, pulling a rubber band off her wrist to keep the hair in place.
Ginger had quietly backed away until she was across the tiny street. She pulled out a town map to try to orient herself while she prayed that no one made her go through with it. There were few things in life she could stand more than humiliating situations. But it was all the worse in a foreign country. All she could imagine was being chased away by some old man with a long pinky nail and a short hunched woman with a bale of straw on her back. Although now that she thought about it, probably a bag of flour was more likely.
Suddenly, the tiny door creaked open and Ginger stood there staring, the proverbial deer in the headlights. Stephanie smiled at the doorway, ready for whomever popped out. And Georgine, unbelievably was doing a headstand yoga pose against the house next door.
Lucky for all of them, it was little Hera, as they came to learn, that opened the door. A sweeter face none had seen since they started their overseas adventure. She had a long dark braid going down her back and she looked at all of them with a kind of happy curiosity.
Then she started speaking very fast Greek and gesturing for the big girls to come inside.
"It's really odd." Georgine replied, bending down like a giraffe to get a look into the bakery.
Cobblestones and white washed buildings built tight and low next to each other. It felt like the creepy Enchanted Hills play land Stephanie had gone to as a child, with demented cement figures meant to be cute and endearing but instead risque and tired.
"I think we should knock," Stephanie giggled as if she had just played a dare. She reached back behind her head and nervously twisted her wavy sun lightened brown hair into a ponytail, pulling a rubber band off her wrist to keep the hair in place.
Ginger had quietly backed away until she was across the tiny street. She pulled out a town map to try to orient herself while she prayed that no one made her go through with it. There were few things in life she could stand more than humiliating situations. But it was all the worse in a foreign country. All she could imagine was being chased away by some old man with a long pinky nail and a short hunched woman with a bale of straw on her back. Although now that she thought about it, probably a bag of flour was more likely.
Suddenly, the tiny door creaked open and Ginger stood there staring, the proverbial deer in the headlights. Stephanie smiled at the doorway, ready for whomever popped out. And Georgine, unbelievably was doing a headstand yoga pose against the house next door.
Lucky for all of them, it was little Hera, as they came to learn, that opened the door. A sweeter face none had seen since they started their overseas adventure. She had a long dark braid going down her back and she looked at all of them with a kind of happy curiosity.
Then she started speaking very fast Greek and gesturing for the big girls to come inside.
Sunday, November 4, 2012
The Daily Write: Write about giving (November 4, 2012)
I didn't even like pepperoni, so it was preposterous that this was the nickname I bequeathed on myself. Pepper for short. I tried Fir but my dad told me, in an embarrassed under-his-breath moment, that "Fir" was what some people called pubic hair. Maybe in 1953 in the army, but not in the mid-70s in a California suburb. Still, that disclosure was so uncomfortable, I quickly abandoned the notion.
For a while some of my friends actually did call me Pepper. But it always felt fake. Just like me. See, I never fit in with them. I never fit in anywhere. I was one half in California without a mom, and one half in Oregon without a dad. Back then, most kids had two parents. If they didn't it wasn't because of divorce. The fact that my folks split up when I was two-and-a-half was one of the many things that made me inferior. No self-imposed nickname was going to change that.
I did stupid things to exacerbate my differences - like sign up for German in 6th grade when all the cool kids were taking French and the not-cool but not completely ostracized were studying Spanish. As much as I wanted to conform, some part of me resisted. I thought German would get me closer to my roots as a Jew. But then when I pronounced things with a Yiddish intonation and the teacher mocked me, well, let's just say my status as a dorky outsider was reinforced.
There was no meeting of my identities. In Oregon I hung out with independent and strong minded hippie kids: Freddie who told me that someday there would be a war when the people rose up against the pigs, and that the people would be victorious, Karen who dropped acid and tried to hitchhike to Egypt while I was left behind trying to bum a ride home in a town I didn't know my way around. In California, I hung out with nerdy smart kids who came from stable homes, ate from buffets on the kitchen counter every night, and whose parents didn't yell.
I lived with a loud, bearded single father in a shitty house with no decor of which to speak. Our lawn was yellow and full of weeds and he was a counsellor. Not a mail man like my best friend's dad, or a business man like the popular kids' fathers.
For a while some of my friends actually did call me Pepper. But it always felt fake. Just like me. See, I never fit in with them. I never fit in anywhere. I was one half in California without a mom, and one half in Oregon without a dad. Back then, most kids had two parents. If they didn't it wasn't because of divorce. The fact that my folks split up when I was two-and-a-half was one of the many things that made me inferior. No self-imposed nickname was going to change that.
I did stupid things to exacerbate my differences - like sign up for German in 6th grade when all the cool kids were taking French and the not-cool but not completely ostracized were studying Spanish. As much as I wanted to conform, some part of me resisted. I thought German would get me closer to my roots as a Jew. But then when I pronounced things with a Yiddish intonation and the teacher mocked me, well, let's just say my status as a dorky outsider was reinforced.
There was no meeting of my identities. In Oregon I hung out with independent and strong minded hippie kids: Freddie who told me that someday there would be a war when the people rose up against the pigs, and that the people would be victorious, Karen who dropped acid and tried to hitchhike to Egypt while I was left behind trying to bum a ride home in a town I didn't know my way around. In California, I hung out with nerdy smart kids who came from stable homes, ate from buffets on the kitchen counter every night, and whose parents didn't yell.
I lived with a loud, bearded single father in a shitty house with no decor of which to speak. Our lawn was yellow and full of weeds and he was a counsellor. Not a mail man like my best friend's dad, or a business man like the popular kids' fathers.
Saturday, November 3, 2012
The Daily Write: Trying again (November 3, 2012)
What would it be like to be a "noted intellectual" she wondered as she drank coffee on the 14 year old couch, the sound of the bird pecking for seed at the bottom of her cage, a loud but distant plane in the sky, cars, kids, a neighbor's barking dog, and the electric hum of the house all creating the background music of the morning.
As a teenager inferiority and envy might have been her yin/yang. Or desire and disdain. Two sides of her coin. She had wanted to be very smart, the kind of smart that would get her into Harvard. And she wanted to be very beautiful, the kind of beautiful whose thighs don't touch, the kind of beautiful that gets invited to all the best parties, the kind of beautiful that has a popular boyfriend.
As a grown woman in her late 40s with a job at a Silicon Valley company, she had found at least some measure of success, which came about through smarts, creativity and tenacity. And finally, at this point in her life she felt beautiful, even with her non-conforming body. In fact, all those things that made her so self-conscious in high school helped created her strength as an adult.
Yet still, when she watched the MIT send up video of Gangnam Style, she felt like she was looking through teen eyes: look at all those brilliantly smart rich kids. Or if not rich, so smart they got paid to go to school. What would it be like to be that brilliant? And then, the cameo by Noam Chomsky. Him she would never be, gender and age differences aside. She was smart but not like the theorists, the cultural critics, and the philosophers. And sometimes that still pained her.
As a teenager inferiority and envy might have been her yin/yang. Or desire and disdain. Two sides of her coin. She had wanted to be very smart, the kind of smart that would get her into Harvard. And she wanted to be very beautiful, the kind of beautiful whose thighs don't touch, the kind of beautiful that gets invited to all the best parties, the kind of beautiful that has a popular boyfriend.
As a grown woman in her late 40s with a job at a Silicon Valley company, she had found at least some measure of success, which came about through smarts, creativity and tenacity. And finally, at this point in her life she felt beautiful, even with her non-conforming body. In fact, all those things that made her so self-conscious in high school helped created her strength as an adult.
Yet still, when she watched the MIT send up video of Gangnam Style, she felt like she was looking through teen eyes: look at all those brilliantly smart rich kids. Or if not rich, so smart they got paid to go to school. What would it be like to be that brilliant? And then, the cameo by Noam Chomsky. Him she would never be, gender and age differences aside. She was smart but not like the theorists, the cultural critics, and the philosophers. And sometimes that still pained her.
Thursday, November 1, 2012
The Daily Write: In the dark (November 1, 2012)
The psychedelic scene exploded in my 8-year-old eyes: the teenager getting ironed by the crazy woman. He was screaming or singing, or I don't even know. I was watching through my butter-greased fingers, trying not to cry. We ate popcorn out of a brown paper bag popped at home. Coke snuck it in under his coat and I was worried we were going to get caught. I was always worried about going to jail. It almost seemed inevitable.
I hated everything about that movie - there wasn't any real talking, there were mean freaky parents and awful wasted villains. The colors were all wrong and the lights were coming at me too bright. I don't know who thought it would be a good idea to take all the kids to the movie with them, maybe it was the only way the adults could go. It's not like anyone would babysit our rag tag neighborhood bunch with honey stuck on our lips from the sandwiches earlier in the day, and in my case, hair so tangled it could not be discerned from a spider's nest.
Although I was far less disturbed, I felt equally distant from Reds when I went to see it with my Grandfather. He was so into it that I could hardly stand to disappoint him, but all I felt was tired, bored and cold watching that never ending film.
Gandhi, on the other hand, which was also long, was riveting. I went to see that with my aunt, the one I smoked and drank with as she told me all about her guru from The Punjab. I felt that I was a lost soul, reincarnated from some better, more mystical existence. Gandhi spoke to me. Not that I'm the type to go on a hunger strike. It certainly lodged the hatred of Colonialism deep in my psyche.
I don't go to movies I don't want too see anymore. Even the "kid" ones I hoist onto my partner. She has a far higher tolerance for a non-riveting story. Me, I like romantic comedies most of all. I guess that makes me a little ditsy and cliche, but I'll take that over an ironing board any day.
I hated everything about that movie - there wasn't any real talking, there were mean freaky parents and awful wasted villains. The colors were all wrong and the lights were coming at me too bright. I don't know who thought it would be a good idea to take all the kids to the movie with them, maybe it was the only way the adults could go. It's not like anyone would babysit our rag tag neighborhood bunch with honey stuck on our lips from the sandwiches earlier in the day, and in my case, hair so tangled it could not be discerned from a spider's nest.
Although I was far less disturbed, I felt equally distant from Reds when I went to see it with my Grandfather. He was so into it that I could hardly stand to disappoint him, but all I felt was tired, bored and cold watching that never ending film.
Gandhi, on the other hand, which was also long, was riveting. I went to see that with my aunt, the one I smoked and drank with as she told me all about her guru from The Punjab. I felt that I was a lost soul, reincarnated from some better, more mystical existence. Gandhi spoke to me. Not that I'm the type to go on a hunger strike. It certainly lodged the hatred of Colonialism deep in my psyche.
I don't go to movies I don't want too see anymore. Even the "kid" ones I hoist onto my partner. She has a far higher tolerance for a non-riveting story. Me, I like romantic comedies most of all. I guess that makes me a little ditsy and cliche, but I'll take that over an ironing board any day.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)